Posted on 11/06/2008 7:40:03 PM PST by Delacon
It's no secret that the Bush years have severely strained and perhaps broken the conservative-libertarian political coalition. Most libertarians were deeply disappointed by the Bush Administration's vast expansion of government spending and regulation, claims of virtually unlimited wartime executive power, and other departures from limited government principles. As a result, many libertarian intellectuals (and to a lesser extent, libertarian voters), actually supported Barack Obama this year, despite his being a very statist liberal. Republican nominee John McCain had opposed some of Bush's excesses, including rejecting Bush's stance on torture and being one of the very few GOP senators to vote against Bush's massive 2003 Medicare prescription drug program. But McCain had numerous statist impulses of his own, including the most famous piece of legislation that bears his name. Even those libertarians who voted for him (myself included) did so with grave reservations.
With Barack Obama in the White House and the Democrats enjoying large majorities in Congress at a time of economic crisis, it is highly likely that they will push for a large expansion of government even beyond that which recently occurred under Bush. That prospect may bring libertarians and conservatives back together. Many of the items on the likely Democratic legislative agenda are anathema to both groups: a vast expansion of government control of health care, new legal privileges for labor unions, expanded regulation of a variety of industries, protectionism, increased government spending on infrastructure and a variety of other purposes, and bailouts for additional industries, such as automakers.
Even if conservatives and libertarians can find a way to work together, it would be naive to expect that they can block all the items on the Obama's agenda. Many are going to pass regardless of what we do. However, a renewed libertarian-conservative coalition could help limit the damage and begin to build the foundation for a new pro-limited government political movement.
Obviously, a lot depends on what conservatives decide to do. If they choose the pro-limited government position advocated by Representative Jeff Flake and some other younger House Republicans, there will be lots of room for cooperation with libertarians. I am happy to see that Flake has denounced "the ill-fitting and unworkable big-government conservatism that defined the Bush administration." Conservatives could, however, adopt the combination of economic populism and social conservatism advocated by Mike Huckabee and others. It is even possible that the latter path will be more politically advantageous, at least in the short term.
Much also depends on what the Democrats do. If Obama opts for moderation and keeps his promise to produce a net decrease in federal spending, a renewed conservative-libertarian coalition will be less attractive to libertarians. However, I highly doubt that Obama and the Democrats will actually take the relatively moderate, budget-cutting path. It would go against both their own instincts and historical precedent from previous periods of united government and economic crisis. If I am right about that, we will need a revamped conservative-libertarian alliance to oppose the vast expansion of government that looms around the corner.
Reforging the conservative-libertarian coalition will be very hard. Relations between the two groups have always been tense, and the last eight years have undeniably drawn down the stock of goodwill. But if we can't find a new way to hang together, we are all too likely to hang separately.
I'm sorry but you haven't a clue what you're talking about. Libertarianism is AFAIC by far the most pricipled and consistent of political philosophies.
Exactly. By analogy, I won't take any position on the prohibition of slavery. Then I'll call myself a libertarianism. Liberty for me, but not for thee.
It only seems that way to (1) the selfish, and (2) the uninformed. I used to fall into both categories back when I was an atheist, and stayed in #2 for a while after becoming a Christian.
Here are two counter-examples to libertarianism. The first is dueling. It is a voluntary consensual behavior, but legalizing dueling amounts to creating a social dynamic in which bullies can legally dominate weaker men with literally the threat of killing them. It causes hyper-masculine codes of honor and is a threat to prosperity.
Polygamy is the second counter-example. It is the natural state for human beings. References upon request, 80% of human societies are polygamous prior to contact with the West. But they are also extremely inegalitarian. Not in the fuzzy-headed liberal way, but in the "we're playing a zero-sum game" way. Every man with 10 wives means that 9 men must go without a wife. The standard solution is to find ways to kill off the surpluss young men, generally through war.
The only reason why people can believe that libertarianism is a coherent and viable moral philosophy is because we live in a world that has - still - internalized Judeo-Christian values.
And that's as it should be, AFAIC. I'm a Christian and wouldn't want to live in a world devoid of those values, but I think that a lot of them don't translate well to legislation or are simply none of the government's businesss. Dueling, huh? That's an interesting case. In fact, I'd wondered briefly in the past why the government thought they had any business outlawing that but you make good points. I'll have to ponder on that one some.
Incidentally, You'd call your self a Libertarian, not libertarianism.
As i told you before, you don't have a clue concerning what you speak.
You should read ‘Black Rednecks and White Liberals’ by Thomas Sowell. He gives a brief cultural history of the redneck culture in the south (which actually comes from England). His basic point is that white southerners are rejecting that redneck culture, but blacks have actually adopted it.
You missed the point of the analogy. I was not arguing that libertarians want to see slavery return (although some libertarians favor voluntary slavery). The point is that failing to take the pro-life position is not an excuse. That is as despicable as sitting on the fence during the debates over abolition.
If I can find a copy, I’ll check it out. Anything by Sowell is worth reading.
Yeah, Sowell is great. ‘The Marriage Problem’ by James Q. Wilson is also good. I always recommend ‘The Myth of Monogamy’ and ‘The Triumph of Sociobiology’ to secular conservatives. They are basically a defense of the fact that (1) children need fathers, and (2) adults have self-intrested reasons to neglect their parental duties, but from an evolutionary perspective. People who aren’t receptive to traditional family from a conservative sociologist are usualy receptive when it comes from an evolutionary biologist.
There's room for a spirited debate over where life begins provided that at the end of the day the final answer will be that a living being is endowed with the same rights as anyone else.
I personally believe that as soon as the child has unique DNA that it's a living being. I have heard the argument that once a child is viable outside the womb that it's a person. I disagree, but I recognize the validity of the position. Neither position, however, can justify the taking of the life of the child one it's been established that it's alive.
Fundamentally, those are both pro-life positions with a minor disagreement on how "life" is defined.
In short, yeah, I agree with you but I maintain that all "small-l" libertarians are pro-life, they just may differ on what they are willing to accept as "life."
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