so republicans and democrats get a free pass while libertarians are criticized because if given the reigns of power, they might act the same as the rest? that doesnt seem fair. i think most americans would - the problem is that our collective actions dont match our rhetoric. neither party represents the interests of the american people, but as long as we keep voting them into office they will continue to behave in the manner that they have been.
I would argue that the libertarian philosophy of governance would only make this aspect of our current regime worse. Hard to blame the people when the system is rigged where no 3rd party has a chance.
i've heard him many a times. he is no different than any other politician; on many occasions he BSes and double-talks like the rest of them. Any capable con man, or one with good spin doctors, can make his messages seem common sense egs include Shrub jr's common sense approach to divert troops from Afghan to Iraq one man's truth is another man's lie
we will have to agree to disagree on that one. and i dont see how it could get much worse than it is under republicans and democrats. look where we are now. if anything, the libertarian philosophy is the only hope we have from saving ourselves from republican/democrat-led economic destruction. both parties are spending us into oblivion. bush was horrible and obama is even worse. it should be obvious to all that the current system is not sustainable. at the least, under libertarians the corporate welfare that big business enjoys under republicans and democrats would disappear. as long as enough americans maintain this defeatist mentality nothing will change. personally, i wont vote for republicans or democrats - i will only vote the 3rd party candidate and if there isnt one i leave it blank. id love to see more people do that. that being said, if someone put a gun to my head and made me pick 'sides' i would have to go w/ the democrats, but its more b/c i really, really hate republicans, their hypocrisy and they way they acted for the last decade or so.
And of course, the natural cure-all for this is the Libertarian program of tax cuts uber alles and kooky theorizing about the gold standard and the money supply.
This really depends on what vein of libertarianism is being enacted and how. While at it's core the principles are a good step, the problem is all in how the fundamentals are put into practice. Libertarianism (the American version) has no way of overcoming Rudolph Rocker's succinctly stated problem with the American society: If anything, libertarianism seeks to strengthen that capitalism - which will certainly not reduce it's impact on government - particularly when the strengthening coincides with a vast reduction in governmental power. Put this way, the idea sounds outrageous, frankly.
imo, it is the current republican/democrat system that strengthens and supports unbridled, unethical crony-capitalism. if anything, libertarianism would weaken this form of capitalism by eliminating the culture of 'corporate-welfare' that big business enjoys under both parties. yes, put that way it certainly does - but i disagree w/ your assessment on libertarianism. you might say i find it outrageous even.
Simply privatizing everything does not undo crony-capitalism. It just shifts the authority, and the benefits. Without a system of corporate regulation, libertarianism is really just neo-fuedalism. I don't consider that progress. How does libertarian philosophy or ideology propose to avoid this?
Shift that corporate regulation onto the state and local governments. There shouldn't be a huge federal system overseeing everything for every state. California can do what they like. Michigan can do as they like. If the power were shifted back to us on a local level, there would be a lot more transparency and thus discretion--of course, in theory. No child left behind and other programs in theory are great but those educational decisions need to be made by the local tax base. Heck if the local tax base decided more things then perhaps we could tax churches like DaDakota proposes
What a terrible idea - states don't have anywhere near the resources or expertise to do this, and the result would be basically the articles of confederation but a million times worse. There's a reason why the commerce clause exists.
I think this politic is generally referred to as "minarchism" and is usually associated with the movement for massively reduced (or non-existent) regulation. Regardless of that, the problem here is that any form of regulation in a capitalist society will inevitably lead to the subsidies that jo mama laments. Perhaps here it is just on a smaller scale, but the underlying issues remain nonetheless. Another issue is that this makes it cumbersome (or impossible) for companies to operate in more than one locale. Strict constitutionalism suffers from a similar problem, in that a constitution is only as limiting as it's current interpretation allows it to be.
Sorry, I should restate what i was referring to. I think there should be corporate oversight at a national level. I was thinking more along the lines of government spending decisions-the crony capitalism- should be done more on the local and state levels. I get federally taxed for federal spending and I have theoretical representation at the national level by 1 senator & 1 district congressman.
i disagree w/ your assertion that all libertarians want to 'privatize everything' and eliminate all corporate regulations. and as it is right now, corporations and their lobbyists write the laws and give them to our elected politicians to pass, often w/out them even bothering to read the bills. there is a revolving door b/t the corporate world and government where former executives can come into government and influence policy for the benefit of their former companies (which they often still hold stock options in) - when their time is up they go back into the private sector and its rinse-repeat. corporate regulation right now is a farce - the wolves not only have the run of the henhouse, they built and maintain it.
What you don't seem to realize is Libertarian philosophy turns these corporations loose without controls. You don't see the hypocrisy in your position?
You've said a lot about the current situation in this thread, but virtually nothing about how the libertarian politic would fix these problems.
turnabout is fair play. why don't you provide concrete evidence of his supposed truthfulness rather than just regurgitating his campaign rhetorics, ad nuseum.
i disagree w/ your premise and would again point out that right now under republicans and democrats corporations are operating in a very loose and uncontrolled manner. and they can do so b/c they know the government will be there to bail them out w/ taxpayer dollars when they screw up. to me it is hypocritical for republicans and democrats to accuse libertarians of being corporatists. would those be the problems that republicans and democrats have gotten us into? and ive pointed out several things that libertarians would do differently than reps and dems., who only seem to be digging us into a deeper hole.
thats not really how it works - when you accuse someone of being a dishonest liar you are supposed to prove evidence of such, not require others to prove their truthiness. can you be more specific - what do you feel he has lied about?
