[PrestonSturges]

My Mom is aware of who John Stossel is and figures if he's on Fox he's impartial and wicked smart. I explained that whatever credibility Libertarianism ever had is pretty much gone at this point, which is how it's ended up on Fox.

I know there are some Libertarians here, and I promise (maybe) to not heap ridicule and abuse on them just this once.

Anyone want to try to put explain this to Mom? And if someone else wants to mock Libertarians, feel free, but I'll try sitting this out......

[bratticus]

Just say, "Mom, Libertarians are incompatibilists who reject causal determinism." I'm sure she'll understand.

[PrestonSturges]

I've never thought to explain it in philosophical terms, but Wittgenstein's approach of making questions into intractable word problems seems like it's part of it. There's definitely a 19th century Continental influence there.

[careinke]

If you take the good parts of the Dimocrat platform, the good parts of the Repuglican platform, and throw the rest of the ignorant stuff out the window, you get a Libertarian.

Or how about:

If you are a Dim, you want personal freedom and financial slavery.

If you are a Repug, you want financial freedom and personal slavery.

If you are a Libertarian you get both personal and financial freedom.


Of course you are a Dim so you will never pass this on to your mom anyway.....

[PrestonSturges]

Stossel was on, and his arguement about everything is that everything has unintended consequences, so we shouldn;t do anything. All in his trademark sing-song almost whiney voice. He said credit card regulation was bad because people would use loan sharks, so I guess leaving the credit industry alone would fight organized crime (presumably with no unintended consequences). Then he was mocking health care reform (using GOP talking point "Oamacare") saying that health care costs have gone up, as if they weren't before.

Sure it was incoherent giberish, but if Stossel was just spouting incoherent gibberish, that wouldn't be too much a problem. But he's clearly a total sell-out peddling strict far right GOP talking points. It's not as if he'd ever go out on a limb advocating gay marriage, abortion, legalizing pot, or anything else a South Carolina politician in full race baiting campaign mode would disapprove of. Does Stossel get to advocate legalizing prostitution on Fox News? (insert joke here) Does he get to advocate legalizing prostitution off Fox News? And he calls himself a "Libertarian," so I wonder how people feel about that.

Or not to pick on Stossel, there's Rand Paul and his very cozy relationship with very authoritarian people.

Is there anybody out there that describes themselves as a "libertarian" not on the GOP payroll or sucking up to ultraconservative religious groups?

[BasilBoy]

Not all libertarians are of the Fox News types. There is also left-libertarianism...

[eastbay]

Tell her if she loves the idea of open borders she'll love the libertarian philosophy.

[Kristen]

A libretarian is simply the belief that "every x (person) has a right to do as they choose as long as they don't interfere with every other x's (peoples) same right.

[PrestonSturges]

Stossel is promoting a laissez-faire approach that says the individual is on some sort of level palying field with the rest of the world, which is a absurd fantasy. According to people like Rand Paul, government regulation makes coal mines less safe, because it prevents the suposedly all powerful market place from putting deadly mines ou of business. Despite a total lack of any supporting evidence, they ignore our current race to the bottom as well as previous economic bubbles, monopolies, and all sorts of avoidable disastors.

It probably pays very very well to claim that the health insurance industry is powerless to haggle over prices with someone needing heart surgery. I mean, that's got to pay truckloadfs of cash, and whoring yourself to the highest bidder sure is "libertarian" I guess.

Big business has done a terrific marketing job in rebranding laissez-faire economics as "libertarianism."

It's worth noting that the french were so taken with laissez-faire economics that it led to the French Revolution. Maybe it worked after all, if chopping peoples' heads off counts as "libertarian."

[Outcast_Searcher]

If you take the good parts of the Dimocrat platform, the good parts of the Repuglican platform, and throw the rest of the ignorant stuff out the window, you get a Libertarian.

Absolutely right.

IMO, most people who call themselves Libertarians really aren't -- so you get the stuff like the GOP-Fox connections to libertarians folks are posting about.

These are simply far right GOPers who CLAIM they are for small government while pushing their hard right agenda, including a giant military and their "family values". These clowns give Libertarianism a very bad name.

[Asterisk]

Libertarians are republicans who like to smoke pot and think prostitution should be legal. They also think that if businesses want to exclude blacks or Mexicans, that is their right and the "free market" will dictate whether they succeed.

It is the right of a business owner to exclude blacks, and it is the right of patrons to not patronize that business if they disagree with that philosophy.

That is libertarianism in a nutshell.

Keep in mind, a "free market" does not exist and has never existed. All employees drive to work on government funded roads with government funded stop lights. The business knows that if someone vandalizes their restaurant, they will be punished via the government funded police department and if there is a fire, the government funded fire department will extinguish it. Not to mention government mandated construction codes that insured the building that houses the business is safe, etc. etc. etc.

Libertarianism is just an absurdity.

[Novus]

Libertarians are some of the biggest sheep around. What is so great about be ruled by unelected plutocracy? Imagine if your Christmas dinner was served Libertarian style. First person in line takes all the food and everyone else has to pay or work for him as slaves if they want to eat. Think you got what it takes to be first in line? Well I got news for you. The person who got there first was there before you were even born. It is not a level playing field and new will be. Without some form of government to slap the hand of the fat cat pig from taking the whole turkey you will either starve or become his slave. Libertarianism makes exactly zero sense in a world of finite resources.

[Outcast_Searcher]

Not all libertarians are of the Fox News types. There is also left-libertarianism...

As a "moderate" libertarian, I have to ask -- how does this work? (I don't hear of it often).

Does this mean "I favor personal freedom and a small military"?
which makes sense to me for a left-libertarian platform.

If this means "I favor small government", that doesn't sound left at all to me, and if it means "I favor high taxes to promote social freedom", that doesn't sound libertarian (small government) to me.

If this is a stupid question -- sorry in advance.

[Outcast_Searcher]

Libertarians are some of the biggest sheep around. What is so great about be ruled by unelected plutocracy? Imagine if your Christmas dinner was served Libertarian style. First person in line takes all the food and everyone else has to pay or work for him as slaves if they want to eat. Think you got what it takes to be first in line? Well I got news for you. The person who got there first was there before you were even born. It is not a level playing field and new will be. Without some form of government to slap the hand of the fat cat pig from taking the whole turkey you will either starve or become his slave. Libertarianism makes exactly zero sense in a world of finite resources.

Bzzzzzzzt! Sorry. Wrong answer, you lose, but thanks for playing.

Libertarian style would imply someone would only take what s/he earned, or their fair share. What you describe is more Democrat style -- take everyone's share because you say you NEED it (which really means you WANT it without earning it). That's what big redistributive government gets you, which is the exact opposite of libertarianism.

Nice try. You must watch people like Ed Shultz and Rachael Maddow on MSNBC too much. They'll rot your brain just as surely as the idiocy spewed from their counterparts (Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity) on Fox News.

[Asterisk]

You must watch people like Ed Shultz and Rachael Maddow on MSNBC too much. They'll rot your brain just as surely as the idiocy spewed from their counterparts (Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity) on Fox News.

Sorry, I have to jump in here....

You cannot equate Beck/Hannity with Shultz/Maddow. Beck and Hannity lie and cherry-pick on a regular basis and Shultz/Maddow do not.

That is just a fact.

I find Ed Shultz SOOOO boring, but that doesn't change the fact that neither he, nor Olbermann, nor Maddow EVER knowingly lie and distort.

The left wing media and the right wing media are NOT the same. One is honest and the other is not. I'm sorry, I'm not being partisan, I'm just pointing out an objective fact.

The lies/distortions/cherry-picking of the right is what is bringing down our country and it upsets me when people say the left is no different from the right. The right-wing is clinically insane in this country and they are about as rational as climate deniars. There is a BIG difference between the left and the right...as in HUGE.

[Outcast_Searcher]

You must watch people like Ed Shultz and Rachael Maddow on MSNBC too much. They'll rot your brain just as surely as the idiocy spewed from their counterparts (Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity) on Fox News.

Sorry, I have to jump in here....

You cannot equate Beck/Hannity with Shultz/Maddow. Beck and Hannity lie and cherry-pick on a regular basis and Shultz/Maddow do not.

That is just a fact.

I find Ed Shultz SOOOO boring, but that doesn't change the fact that neither he, nor Olbermann, nor Maddow EVER knowingly lie and distort.

The left wing media and the right wing media are NOT the same. One is honest and the other is not. I'm sorry, I'm not being partisan, I'm just pointing out an objective fact.

The lies/distortions/cherry-picking of the right is what is bringing down our country and it upsets me when people say the left is no different from the right. The right-wing is clinically insane in this country and they are about as rational as climate deniars. There is a BIG difference between the left and the right...as in HUGE.

Be upset all you want. It just shows your bias. BOTH Fox and MSNBC cherry pick, lie, and distort. BOTH spend more time being sarcastic and rolling their eyes and making fun of the other side than saying anything substantive. BOTH are primarily entertainment sources, not news.

You are right that the far left and far right are hugely different. You are wrong to clai that the media hacks that infest these two channels are substantively different or behaviorally different -- they just come at things from their target audiences' differing viewpoints.

As a moderate libertarian, I find plenty of things about the extremes of BOTH parties to hate. Since you clearly are at the heart of the MSNBC target audience, claiming you are nonpartisan and objective and just stating facts is just as laughable as if some hard line GOPer said the same thing about Fox.

To claim that Shulz and Maddow don't cherry pick is like claiming that Glenn Beck is sane or that Sean Hannity isn't blatantly anti-Obama at every turn. To claim that MSNBC is honest is so delusional it's amazing.

By the way, the hard left stating that spending for (apparently) any and all social programs to any degree is GOOD, but the GOP is evil because tax cuts are bad for deficits (and this was stated in so many words by liberal media on many channels MANY times in recent weeks, with MSNBC in the lead) is JUST as insane as the hard right's total denail of climate change. But I'm sure that from where you sit, that you can't see that.

[Novus]

Libertarians are some of the biggest sheep around. What is so great about be ruled by unelected plutocracy? Imagine if your Christmas dinner was served Libertarian style. First person in line takes all the food and everyone else has to pay or work for him as slaves if they want to eat. Think you got what it takes to be first in line? Well I got news for you. The person who got there first was there before you were even born. It is not a level playing field and new will be. Without some form of government to slap the hand of the fat cat pig from taking the whole turkey you will either starve or become his slave. Libertarianism makes exactly zero sense in a world of finite resources.

Bzzzzzzzt! Sorry. Wrong answer, you lose, but thanks for playing.

Libertarian style would imply someone would only take what s/he earned, or their fair share. What you describe is more Democrat style -- take everyone's share because you say you NEED it (which really means you WANT it without earning it). That's what big redistributive government gets you, which is the exact opposite of libertarianism.

Nice try. You must watch people like Ed Shultz and Rachael Maddow on MSNBC too much. They'll rot your brain just as surely as the idiocy spewed from their counterparts (Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity) on Fox News.

You Mad bro? I exposed exposed your emperor as being completely naked. Junk swinging in the wind. Better put some clothes on because it is mighty cold out there tonight.

Show me people won't take more than their share in a capitalist society. The richest 1% own more then the poorest 3 billion. In 2009 one hedge fund manager took home $2.5 billion for pushing a few buttons on a keyboard and writing a few investor letters. Was the work of this one man really equal to the blood and sweat of 10 million day laborers. Did you ever read Atlas Shrugged? Well I did cover to cover. And Ayn Rand even admits if it ever became a Zero Sum game her theory wouldn't work. If everyone could write few a letters and type on keyboards for $2.5 billion a year they would do it. Only one person can have that job and he didn't earn the right to have that job either. It is all a con game to reward a few at the expense of billions.

BTW I don't watch any TV at all maybe that is why I can think straight and you can't. Unplug the TV and stop letting the talking heads on the idiot box brain wash you with non sense.

[BasilBoy]

As a "moderate" libertarian, I have to ask -- how does this work? (I don't hear of it often).

Does this mean "I favor personal freedom and a small military"?
which makes sense to me for a left-libertarian platform.

If this means "I favor small government", that doesn't sound left at all to me, and if it means "I favor high taxes to promote social freedom", that doesn't sound libertarian (small government) to me.

If this is a stupid question -- sorry in advance.

It's not a stupid question and I'm not surprised that you don't hear it often if you live in America. The left doesn't mean big government. Anarchy, or no state, is as far left as you can go. Many left-libertarians are in fact anarchists...or libertarian socialists. These ideologies support stateless societies and voluntary associations while rejecting hierarchy. I think the best example, or at least on the largest scale, of the implementaion of these principles can be found during the Spanish Revolution.

The Libertarian Party in America has been hijacked by anarcho-capitalists and there is no way the principles of libertarianism can be achieved with corporations running the show (unless the structure of corporations completely changed)...

So, it would mean that you would favor no state while supporting a form of governanance that was non-coercive and participatory (think of a cooperative that employs concensus building techniques where everyone has a say). You would favor a military that was formed voluntarily and did not act aggressively, rather defensively...its size would be dependent on its need and the desire of people to join.

[Oakley]

Libertarianism is the ultimate in democracy. They advocate people vote daily with their own money to acquire what they want instead of having a few people selected to make spending decisions for them.

Libertarianism advocates freedom instead of slavery. Libertarians advocate personal choice instead of government deciding how we live. Libertarians advocate government only engage in defense, not the present operation of a violent empire.

The only restrictions Libertarians advocate on our free choice is that we not be allowed to commit acts of aggression against others. It really is a "do unto others as you would have them do unto you" type of philosophy. This is why Libertarians object to government force that is not in self defense. You only have a right to use violence to defend yourself. You do not have a right to use violence to take away from someone else what you want. If we create government to act on our behalves, we can only authorize them to do what we, ourselves can do, hence Libertarians object to the use of government force for anything but defense against foreign or domestic aggressors.

Libertarians do not advocate fascism, the merging of the interest of corporations and the state. In fact there are many libertarians who advocate the end of government created corporations. Corporations, after all, are created by governments; to become a corporation the people who want to incorporate apply to a State government for a charter; without the State creating these corporations, they would not exist, and people who wanted to operate organizations in groups would be forced to operate as partnerships which the consequent unlimited liability for wrongdoing of the business that partners bear under the law. Read history and learn that the early corporations were created by Kings as grants of monopoly privilege to their friends. It is common for leftist/statist to claim that it is free markets that are responsible for the rigging of the markets in favor of those in power at the expense of the majority; this is false; it is government involvement in and rigging of free interaction among ourselves that creates the skewed distribution of wealth with poverty of the many and wealth for the politically powerful. If government by interfering with markets can effect the distribution of wealth so that the few wind up with most of the wealth, don't you think that the opposite would happen without them rigging markets and that we would have a statistically "natural distribution" of wealth if we could interact freely without force and privilege for the few?

Most Republicans are not libertarians and do not embrace the idea that freedom is a high value. Most Democrats are not libertarians and do not embrace the idea that freedom is a high value. Both Republicans and Democrats pick and choose for the rest of us what parts of our lives are to be free and what parts are to be government controlled. It matters not to them that people peacefully and responsibly live their own lives; what matters to these statists is that the population be forced to conform to what the collective decides. The problem is that the collective is always co-opted by the sociopathic few, and given the opportunity the collective will vote to take from others what they want. The way democracy works when government is involved is the old "two wolves and one sheep voting on what is for lunch". The democracy that Libertarians advocate is that you run your own life without constraints so long as you do not commit acts of aggression against your fellow man, and that when disputes arise they are settled without violence. Libertarianism is not license to do as one pleases, but rather is license to act as one pleases so long as there is not direct damage to others.

If you are interested in unleashing human potential and elevating the quality of life, you don't do it by enslaving the population.

[Oakley]

Show me people won't take more than their share in a capitalist society.

When you start talking about someone's share, you introduce your own value about what is fair, which can be highly influenced by envy of those who have more.

A free market system lets people decide what is fair by allowing people to freely interact in economic transactions. If someone makes more and someone makes less, then the market is telling them what is fair for what they bring to the market place. Bringing more value generally yields a higher reward.

What is not fair is government entering the market place and using its force to grant benefit to one at the expense of the others. The free market has been corrupted by government force so that those in power get an abnormally large portion of the pie; this is not the failure of free markets, but the failure of our government by its activities that exceed any authority it was granted in the Constitution. It is fascism, the merging of the interest of the state and of corporate financial interests, that has brought us to the degree of slavery that we are now experiencing. So if you are advocating government control of markets then you will never get a "fair share" because a "fair share" can only come from the operation of free markets. Anything other that free markets gives you a government controlled share, and being the sociopath controlled institution government always is, that share will always be low for those out of power and high for those inside government and their privileged friends.

Looks to me like you might be your own worst enemy.