MICHAEL MEDVED: Losertarians Choose Porcupine for Mascot

Michael Medved Radio Show

[Man_of_Reason]

Try what? Locking up Libertarians? Aren't your jails full of enough of them already? Are you like, going to initiate force against me, oh fantasy warrior princess?

[ctlpdad]

Hey - I represent that statement!

[Man_of_Reason]

If we open the jails and let out all the perpetrators of victimless crimes - the johns, the dope smokers, those who view pornography, those who pay less than minimum wage, same sex lovers, sodomites, those who believe in atomistic social contracts, we'd be over run! We can't have people thinking, deciding and being responsible for themselves!! What would this country come to?

[gcruse]

Just Think

Just think of the War on Drugs and the victimless lifestyle crimes. By our making so much private behavior illegal, we are in fact making scofflaw criminals of great swaths of the population. This is corrosive to good citizenship, at the least, which leads to degradation of society. Degradation of society is the primary rationale of those folks who support and demand ever more victimless crime penalties and lifestyle regulation.
Think about it.

[dirtboy]

If we open the jails and let out all the perpetrators of victimless crimes

Hmm, let's see what this bunch looks like:

the johns,

without whom prostitution, with all its inherent social and health problems, would cease to exist.

the dope smokers,

although I think pot is on a par with alcohol, I don't pretend that pot smoking doesn't have serious consequences in many cases.

those who view pornography,

about the only folks who viewed porn who are in prison viewed child porn - and if you think child porn is a victimless crime, you ain't worth JimRob's bandwidth.

those who pay less than minimum wage,

Please give me counts of such people who are imprisioned

same sex lovers, sodomites,

Dittoes for such folks who were imprisioned specifically for those actions

those who believe in atomistic social contracts,

Say what?

we'd be over run!

Nah, but when we pretend that all these actions don't have consequences beyond the perpetrator and are somehow "victimless", then we have a real problem as well.

[rightwingreligiousfanatic]

Dead Losertarian in the middle of the road, and it's stinkin' to high heaven....

[Malcolm]

I hate the LP. Its existence means more Dems, not less gov't. Not only a waste of time, but a COUNTERPRODUCTIVE waste of time. LOL, as if LP types could accept that truth more easily than the others that they ignore.....

[dirtboy]

Just think of the War on Drugs and the victimless lifestyle crimes.

You know, I agree with the Libertarians on certain issuese, but to pretend that drug use, prostitution and other social matters are "victimless" is asinine. Just as alcohol is legal but carries a huge social cost beyond the health of problem drinkers, so do other so-called victimless crimes. You'd have better traction on this issue if you quit claiming otherwise, and instead presented the matter as pursuing the lesser of evils.

[LizardQueen]

Actually, most of the non-fringe Libertarians I know vote Republican, especially in cases where it's a close race and the Dems could win. It may be a "lesser of 2 evils" vote, but its a vote for your side, nonetheless.

LQ

[colorado tanker]

I agree. Senator Allard got quite a bit of Libertarian support in his close 2002 race.

[Xenalyte]

What you said should be done to us. C'mon down and try locking up me and the other Libertarians.

[gcruse]

The effect of criminalizing a great chunk of society for acts of and between consenting adults is overlooked by the drugwarrior/gungrabber/lifestylepolice as being one of the evils involved. There is a price to pay for using the powers of the state to enforce someone else's idea of morality.

[ActionNewsBill]

The Libertarian Party did no such thing.

If Medved said they did, he should fire his fact checker.

Why let the facts get in the way of a good Libertarian-bashing fest?

[dirtboy]

The effect of criminalizing a great chunk of society for acts of and between consenting adults is overlooked by the drugwarrior/gungrabber/lifestylepolice as being one of the evils involved.

So you have one group overlooking the police state implications and the other group overlooking the societial implications in their respective efforts to out-shout the other side. A lovely way to have a meaningful debate.

Why don't we instead realize that these crimes are not victimless, that they do have serious social consequences, that we cannot and should not wait for harm to happen to others before acting to stop it - while also realizing that efforts to crack down excessively on these matters raise additional problems, and therefore we try to balance the two conflicting problems and find the least of all evils in dealing with them?

[marshmallow]

He said the Libertarian party of Oregon picked the porcupine. And the TN and HI parties picked the penguin.

What about other states? I bet if you put all the mascots together you'd have a Noah's Ark. Or at least a circus.

Which is altogether appropriate.

[LizardQueen]

We've rarely had any viable Libertarian candidates up here, so I usually end up voting Republican myself.
But I'm registered as an independent (we have an open primary system), and I vote on the issues and the candidate, not by party.

I think a lot of the "swing" voters are Libertarianish-leaning (fiscally conservative but not socially conservative), and don't really fit in either party, particularly during the primaries where the more hard-core factions of both major parties are the ones to get the candidates elected.

LQ

[gcruse]

Why don't we instead realize that these crimes are not victimless

Because buying the services of another human and smoking a
vegetable that grows wild around the world and, for that matter,
whatever two adults wish to do in their bedroom, have no victims.

[Chuckster]

Hawaii picked the Penguin?!?!?

[colorado tanker]

I think liberatarians and social conservatives align on about 80% of political issues. We don't have to go to the same church (or any church) to be political allies.

[LizardQueen]

I agree.

But you wouldn't know it from this board. The constant bashing of Libertarian potential allies by the mosquito faction gets real old.

LQ