Libertarian ping.To be added or removed from my ping list freepmail me or post a message here
Posted on 02/20/2006 6:24:40 AM PST by Shalom Israel
Let it be noted that you're arguing against what is probably the most widely acknowledged "legitimate function of government." In order for your idea to work at all, you must make a number of significant assumptions about what people are like and what sort of world your system must operate in; and you must ignore the lessons of history at the same time.
Not only would no one group have the incentive or the resources to buy a nuclear submarine, but no one group has the incentive to spend its time and effort enlisting others in buying a nuclear submarine.
Not to mention having nuclear weapons being shared among a possibly unstable coalition of private companies...
I'm reminded of the story from last week, about the volunteer FD in Missouri(?) that refused to put out a fire because the property owner hadn't paid his fire dues.
"This article sings to me."
The notes sound sour to me.
Sounds a lot like Murray’s in a Home Owners Association (the nation) and he doesn’t want to contribute to the cost of the Security Patrol and so forth (National Defense) in accordance with Association rules and the other Home Owners want to use the governing body of the Home Owners Association (the state) to force him to pay up.
It’s one thing if Murray was pressed into the Home Owner’s Association (the nation). It’s another thing entirely if Murray’s participation is voluntary.
If Murray voluntarily accepted a contractual arrangement (kind of like a Social Contract) with the other Home Owner’s and tries to benefit from the contract without living up to his end of it, the other Home Owners should not be faulted for trying to enforce the contract on Murray through the governing body of the Home Owner’s Association (the State).
If Murray doesn’t like it he can try to change the rules of the Association or he can leave.
As to: “But when consistently failing to realize the costs of coercion it makes their reasoning fundamentally flawed.”
True as it stands but unproven to be the case. The cost of enforcement should be figured into the overall cost. If the governing body of the Home Owners Association (the state) doesn’t do that, the Home Owners (the people of the nation) need to replace it. If the Home Owners refuse to accept the cost of enforcement, they have no complaint about the outcome of their refusal.
And, of course, one must not forget the temptation of said companies to suddenly realize the extortionary potential of their holdings. It's human nature to think of such things.
It never hurts to remember that human nature is why there are nation-states in the first place. Why one would care to ignore human nature, and simply assume everybody's intentions are always good, is beyond me.
And "regulated", as it meant in the day, was to "make regular".
The term was use by clock and watchsmiths. In fact, the particularly accurate pendulum wallclocks were termed "regulators", by which men would time their watches and lesser clocks from.
Thus a regulated militia meant that they were expected to have laid out emergency plans for their communities and have regular shooting excersizes to hone and keep their skills up, turkey shoots and schutzenfests.
If only our modern politicians and "scholars" were just half as intellectually honest as the founders - how much better off we'd be today!!!
You are clueess - read the founding documents for a change.
Statism is not ill defined - it is the accumulation and concentration of Govt power outside founding and limiting constitutional boundaries, which the last 119 years are chocked full of. Most of which are purely a parroting by our Govt and elites to emulate the more powerful Govt's of the Marxist inspired Euro-dictators they so envied starting with Bismark.
The pooh-poohers of libertarianism are intellectual clods who will never see that our Founders were small govt liberals in the classical sense, whose primary purpose was limiting the power of the state to only that which protects our rights that preceeded the state.
That's a rational argument, which I mostly agree with. Humans are such pathetic animals that, if you could make the state vanish tomorrow, they would immediately start resurrecting it to their own detriment. Those of us who love freedom are in such a tiny minority that we wouldn't stand a chance of survival; Galt's Gulch would be annihilated quickly.
What's distressing is the circularity of the argument: in effect, we (probably) need to be defended by a state, precisely because we need to be defended from states. We need them because we can't get rid of them. If we could get rid of them, we also wouldn't need them. My head hurts.
And, quite frankly, we got our butts kicked there as we did at almost all the early battles in the Revolutionary war.
True! I'm surprised you're the first person to point out that we lost that battle, after I cited it so many times! If the US fit my earlier description--namely, everyone armed to the teeth and willing to fight to the death--then the Brits would probably have lost eventually, but casualties would have been far higher than they actually were. But, if the population were small enough, and the Brits determined enough, then they would have simply exterminated the colonists and started over. That's the flaw in the libertarian position: it only works if there's a critical mass of humanity behind it.
But, just for the sake of argument, what constitutes a well trained and well armed individual?
For this discussion, it suffices if a person is willing to fight to the death with his teeth. Weapons are a bonus, since they increase the kill ratio, but 300 million people squatting, ghandi-like, and refusing to obey, would also be OK with me. The flaw in my theory is that humans don't work that way. Kill a few, and the rest will obey like the sheep they are. Privatized defense requires a critical mass willing to take responsibility for, and command of, their own lives.
So each area would have it's own separate air defense system? Coordinated how?
How did so many railroads manage to coordinate their use of the rails? Should trains have been colliding all over the place? That's actually not a very hard problem for a market to solve. People coordinate all the time, because it's in their best interests.
No, you haven't demonstrated any thing remotely like that.
I said "illustrated," not "demonstrated." As a mathematician, I'm accutely aware of the difference. But let me clarify. When you speak of many companies all providing linebackers, you're suggesting that the defense is nothing but a giant linebacker. It isn't. There are infinitely many threats out there. Luckily, most of them are unlikely, and many have only minor consequences. Defense is about addressing the totality of those threats in the most efficient manner possible.
The government does this very inefficiently, on the whole. After 9/11, their idea of protecting airports was to fill them with men carrying M16s. We know that those men were essentially useless; he threat was in the air, not in the terminal, and people flew with pocket knives, etc., right under their noses. I know I did (by accident, I assure you). But smart terrorists wouldn't be interested in planes right then; they'd be interested in bridges, power-plants, etc. The military solution is to scramble those same men, with their rifles, to the power plants... right after an attack on a power plant calls their attention to it.
The army, in general, can only throw bodies, bullets or bombs at a problem. That's incredibly inefficient, except perhaps in a conventional pitched battle for territory. It's a horrible way to find a needle in a haystack.
Which brings us back to my point: the market is not a monoculture; the military is. The market can chip away at various pieces of the problem separately. For example, if the government promised to do nothing to rebuild damaged infrastructure, power companies would suddenly find their insurance increasing. To get those insurance rates down, they would deploy measures to convince the insurer that the risk is lower. What measures? The army can only come up with one or two options, mostly involving lots of boots all around the plant. The insurers and insureds can come up with lots of measures. Maybe armed guards, yes. Or maybe anti-navigation devices to fool missiles. Or a moat full of crocodiles to deter illicit entry. Maybe electric fences. Maybe they'd buy up adjacent land and create a security zone, fill it with landmines, and shoot at anyone crossing the land. Maybe they'd move parts of the installation underground, or reinforce other parts. Best of all, their efforts would be (more or less) commensurate with actual risk, unlike the ridiculous shows of force around our airports in September of 2001.
Contractors?
No, I should have been more clear: terrorism itself is not a law-enforcement problem, but the terrorist himself is similar to other trespassers. If I have Pinkertons guarding my place with orders to shoot if necessary, they can shoot a hairy arab as easily as a hopped-up junkie or an industrial spy. Parts of the problem can be offloaded to security providers that aren't military in character at all. I'm not talking about private armies here.
The market has decided. Those things are best done at the national level.
This is the second time you've pretended that "the free market has decided" something, when in fact no free market has ever been tried. When airport security was privatized, I don't remember any market process producing that result. Do you?
And many other companies would select a different company and there's that nasty issue of coordination again. BTW, who authorizes one of these companies to open fire?
You'd find it very interesting to learn more about the railroad industry. It's not the only one, but it's got one of the more highly-developed systems for inter-provider cooperation. Railroads even use each-other's cars all the time! You'd be amazed.
As for "when to open fire", that's in general quite easy. If you aren't on my land, I have no jurisdiction. If you are, I do. Someone who passes my no trespassing sign will be shot. If adjacent property owners choose to band together, there are some economies of scale to be had. For example, if everyone in town, including the owner of the roads, agrees, then we can put gates on the roads into town, and staff them with Pinkertons. Anyone who enters the town without permission would be shot on sight.
In any case, severe problems arise long before you get to that stage. As soon as I find out that my neighbors have purchased invasion insurance or militia coverage or what-the-hell-have-you, the obvious rational choice for me is to stop paying for my own military defense. After all, the people protecting my neighborhood from attack can hardly leave my house selectively undefended, in which case, I get the best of both worlds - I get protection, but I don't have to pay for it. It's the classic free-rider problem, of course, and as soon as my neighbors figure out how my impeccable logic works, the whole thing falls apart tout suite.
So you are rightly against free-riders - good!
But the article's thrust was that coercion is the antithesis of the founding principles of our Govt, and was limited to no more power than needed to insure the protection of our rights.
A highly recommended essay on America's rise to statism can be found here:
Big Business and the Rise of American Statism
http://praxeology.net/RC-BRS.htm
George Washington, a founder with some military experience at the top of the food chain, knew this was balderdash which is why he had to conscript an army.
Excellent! You're one of the few people on this thread making cogent arguments for the state.
I would point out, by way of disagreement, that the State is not a club. A homeowner's association is a legit enterprise precisely because it's voluntary. You might not like it after you join, but you have the power to join or not. The State, in contrast, is not joined voluntarily. If a homeowner's association worked like the State, it would go something like this:
"Hi, Mr! We're starting a homeowner's association in this neighborhood!"
"Well, neighbor, that's mighty interesting. I wish you the best of luck with your assocation."
"Actually, sir, we're interested in you belonging to it."
"No, sonny, I'm not much of a joiner. I'll be a good neighbor; I'll mind my own business, but I'm not joining your association. Best of luck to ya, though!"
"We collect money from our members to plow the snow. If you don't contribute, you're a freeloader!"
"Don't go getting personal, sonny. I lived here for decades, and I never paid nobody to plow no snow, and I've been just fine. What's your business telling me I'm no good unless I join you and pay you some money?"
"We're sorry, sir, but that's the way it is. If you don't like it, you can always move somewhere else."
"Move somewhere else? This is my private property you're standing on, sonny..."
Big difference. Membership in the State is mandatory. If you don't like it, leave. Clubs don't have mandatory membership.
If Murray voluntarily accepted a contractual arrangement (kind of like a Social Contract)
"Social Contract" is a contradiction in terms. A contract is a consensual agreement between two parties. When you stick "social" in front of it, you mean that someone else made an agreement, on my behalf, whether I like it or not, and now I'm bound by its terms.
The cost of enforcement should be figured into the overall cost.
True, but the ultimate cost can't possibly be known. Is my tremendous misery at being robbed worth more or less than your moderate contentment in enjoying services I paid for? Is your satisfaction greater or less than the satisfaction from whatever you would have bought with the money taken from you in taxes? A priori it must be less, since if you wanted it that badly, you'd have gone and bought it--but instead, someone had to come take it from you.
See my post #71.
The problem being that the Founders were not advocates of the idiocies being propounded by our good friend on this thread who, if you'll take the time to notice, says that there are no powers that private contracts cannot do better than the government -- including national defense.
While I am definitely a proponent of limited government, I confess that I am, indeed, a pooh-pooher of libertarianism. The basic tenets of libertarianism are inconsistent with human nature, as demonstrated through all of history.
"They seem to present arguments that specific functions may be handled better privately. Proving that there is nothing they don't think would be better handled privately seems to be an invitation to a quagmire."
I wasn't trying to draw you into a quagmire. It's just that I cannot remember any specific instance where they have found any virtue in government. I would suggest you might wish to visit their website, not to try to find something to prove me wrong, but just to scan a few of their articles (their economic articles are fairly good with much to recommend) as an opportunity to verify my impressions. As I said, I've been receiving their daily email for a few years now.
The free-rider problem is very real. It isn't as insurmountable as public-choicers like to claim, however. Yes, the free-rider is behind the front, if his paying neighbors are. However, when the neighbors travel, they are entitled to intelligence updates on safe routes, and an escort for "important" trips (as defind by contract), which the free-rider is not. The free-rider isn't allowed into bomb shelters when there's shelling, and he isn't allowed in evacuation vehicles if the battle is going badly. His homeowners' insurance will be sky-high, because he doesn't get the "defense-agency discount". Etc., etc...
The article goes well with Michael Crichton's speech a couple of months ago:
Fear, Complexity, & Environmental Management in the 21st Century
http://www.michaelcrichton.com/speeches/complexity/complexity.html
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