Posted on 09/06/2001 2:48:24 AM PDT by The Other Harry
Ha ha ha ha!
Ms. Ivins, I say this because I think you'd rather be called dishonest than ignorant. At least, all the other left-wing opinion-mongers seem to prefer it.
Freedom, Wealth, and Peace,
Francis W. Porretto
Visit the Palace of Reason: http://www.geocities.com/fporretto
Other than that, it is laughable to pin the libertarian label on Bush & co.
And is "Reaganism" a newly coined word, or have I just been missing it?
An exercise for the student: examine Cato and Ludwig von Mises Institute and reply, point for point, to this scribbler.
I have found the problem with leftist theory is their eternal tendency to apply complex problems to simple solutions.
Bull. Tax laws drove the S&L's out.
This is a fine example of Ivin's in-depth analysis.
Profound analysis, Kommrade Ivins.
- Nope. - We KNOW the gov quest is mindless & neverending.
In my experience, there are only two ways something gets regulated: a public disaster of such epic proportions that people demand regulation, or the industry itself asks for regulation.
That may strike you as unlikely, but it is to be seen every session in every legislature as the watch-repairers or the lawn-sprinkler installers or some other group arrives to demand that their high calling be regulated and practitioners certified.
- Again molly, it isn't 'unlikely' at all, it is human nature. That is why we have a constitution, which supposedly LIMITS the power of legislators to regulate industry & individuals.
People like you, who don't understand basic constitutional principles, are the fatal weakness of republics. Not libertarians.
To attribute the Savings & Loan bailout to libertarian policy is laughable. If it were up to libertarians, the government would have nothing to do with insuring private bank accounts.
About utilities deregulation, she simply comments "no good" without further explanation. My assumption is she expects her personal opinion to suffice for facts. The fact is, private utilities have only begun entering the market within the last two years and it's too early to make any assesment of their long term success. But in many areas where private utilities are available, like Enron energy, residents have opted to switch. They're evidently bringing something to the table.
I remember when a long distance phone call cost 40 cents a minute. Now you have a choice between many long distance services, some charging as little as 5 cents a minute.
Airline service is available by some carrier in nearly every city of any size at all. Maybe you can't catch an American Airlines 747 out of Eau Claire, WI, but a quick drive to Minneapolis will get you there. And prices have come down to a point where even a lower middle class family can afford air travel.
Cable television in the past offered about 20 channels and charged around $20 a month. Now you can get somewhere between 50 and 100 channels for about $40 a month. Adjusting for inflation or not, that's a net decrease in price per channel.
Truckers are still making a decent rate of pay at 25 cents a mile. The fact that so many people are lured to trucking schools is evidence that the industry is hardly a "sweatshop on wheels". And lower prices have benefitted millions of lower income families. Which is it, Ms. Ivins, do you want higher paid truckers or lower priced consumer goods. Pick one because to have both is impossible, unless you're a terminally myopic liberal.
Ms. Ivins, like a lot of liberals, expect libertarians to craft a perfect world in order to be taken seriously. If liberals can't do that, why are libertarians expected to?
This is a fine example of Ivin's in-depth analysis
Agreed. California's a mess because, as Rush and many others have pointed out, they weren't really deregulating. Here in PA, we really did deregulate. It was smooth and easy, we do not have a power crisis and never did, and most people probably don't even know it happened.
The author's logic on this point, as well as most of the others, is very flawed. And I'm not even that much of a libertarian!
The reasonable parts of Libertarianism were purloined, stolen, lifted, co-opted directly from Republican positions. The other parts are their owm ... and more closely resemble Dem / LIBERAL stances and now, the GREENIES .
180 degrees. Republican positions consistent with the libertarian principle of non-initiation of force are reasonable. The rest is socialistic crap.
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