Posted on 05/19/2002 3:02:10 PM PDT by aconservaguy
Yes, I'm sure there are a few libertarians so extreme as to be indistinguishable from anarchist. But they are a tiny minority.
In fact, his description of what a conservative is sounds much like typical libertarian positions:
Both libertarians and conservatives believe that only a free market can produce widespread prosperity: neither believe in vast coercive redistributive schemes which are self-defeating— the intended beneficiaries hardly benefit— and (libertarians believe) immoral. Both believe that people are entitled to whatever they can earn in a free market: that individuals should have the right, singly or incorporate groups to own, produce, buy, and sell whatever they wish, at whatever prices they can get and to hire whomever they wish, at whatever wages are acceptable, with a minimum (none for libertarians) of government regulation or monopoly. Both groups believe that economic freedom is essential not just to prosperity and efficience but also to individual freedom. "Liberals" make the government the star player.
I'm sorry, but I see many officeholders that call themselves "conservative" that do not believe in the principles outlined above. They support the current high levels of taxation. They support continued intrusiveness of the federal government, in the name of such monstrosties as the drug war.
Conservatives see the government as umpire, or rule-maker, -interpreter, and -enforcer. Libertarians feel that the game goes better without an umpire.
This is flat out not true. Libertarians completely understand the need for a system of courts and law enforcement. Some idealistic libertarians do believe that private alternatives would work better, but they also know that's an academic point until we get the government back to constitutional minimums. Many so-called "conservatives" seem mostly to have given up on getting that far, or even going in the right direction.
I read the first 4 or 5 paragraphs of this article and decided not to waste my time. This was obviously written by someone who has no clue as to what libertarian philosophy is about.
This was the first warning sign that the author has a poor conception of libertarianism.
Libertarians oppose public courts, laws, police, armies, roads, parks, education, health. They want no government whatsoever.
And this clinches it. Why not just call libertarians "anarchists" and save the bandwidth, you know?
Where libertarians and conservatives disagree primarily is that libertarians believe that virtually nothing can be done by the state without harming someone directly or indirectly. Libertarians tend to oppose almost all zoning regulations for example. Libertarians want a 100% secular state, but one that places no restriction on freedom of religion. I am mostly a libertarian so on that I can say that we do not support any taxation period on churches and any business they run should be treated like any other business. We have no problems with non-coercive public prayers including students praying privately in classrooms so long as the teacher does not initiate it because that scares the other students into thinking that if they don't join in their grades will be affected. After school, let the teacher direct prayers with willing students as long as they and the parents want to.
The personal freedom area we differ the most is that we place virtually no value on "morality" that exists only because of a coercive state. For example banning Cradle of Filth's music is pointless, it is an intrusion into their right to freely express himself and it won't make their followers moral. They have chosen to be immoral and their choice of music reflects that. In case you are wondering, CoF is a blatantly satanic rock band. It doesn't sing about depravity like Manson does (IIRC he is an atheist, not satanist) they glorify satanism in their music. Essentially where we differ is that we realize that coercion alone is incapable of changing them. You can put a gun to their heads and they will only "give it up" in order to not be killed, but their minds won't have changed for the better. In fact you will probably have made them more determined in their belief that they are right and you are wrong.
And this clinches it. Why not just call libertarians "anarchists" and save the bandwidth, you know?Because the author isn't interested in writing about libertarianism, he's interested in discrediting it by claiming that it's "really" anarchism. Which is much, much simpler than honest debate or analysis.
Perhaps so. But a lot of them were not, at least by the time I got involved in the early 1980s.
And your observation is about the LP, which has always been a long way from being all libertarians. In 1977, Edward Crane split with the LP to found the Cato Institute, which has represented the "moderate" libertarian viewpoint for 25 years now. I'd defy anyone to describe the Cato Institute as "anarchist".
The point is that libertarians were never solely (or, I believe even predominantly) anarchists. The article equates libertarianism and anarchism, which makes it a silly piece of opinion, even in 1979.
In reality, American conservatism is very much a liberal movement. And American liberalism has nothing to do with it, having been perverted to mean essentially "spending liberally".
Beautifully said.
Libertarianism would spell the death of our nation and must be rejected.
Or perhaps he knows more than you think you do.
No, it is you who does not know what libertarianism is about. You have a comic book-level understanding of libertarianisn which is why you are so easily used and manipulated by brighter, better-formed proponents of your vain and silly ideology.
Whenever it is pointed out that Marx was a libertarian in the truest and fullest sense of the word (he hated the idea of central goverment just as much if not more than Harry Browne does) libertarians blink dully, laugh nervously, take a toke, and say, "No way, man!" Yes, way.
Socialist billionaire pro-doper gadfly George Soros is one of your core allies. You owe it to yourself to find out why. But he is more cunning and better informed than you are; you may not find out before it is too late.
All the superficial thinkers who boast of being libertarian will ignore this essay. They could not stand the cognitive dissonance that would resound in their craniums if they were to actually try to study it critically and learn from it.
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