Marxism of the Right

[Starfury]

This may be the best criticism I've seen yet of libertarianism, particularly the sort of ideology that has infected so many Republicans the last couple decades. One note, for those who might care, is that this article is written by a conservative for other conservatives, but there's still a great deal here that liberals can digest. Anyway, I found this article very interesting - I used to work in the same office with a hard-core libertarian, and this article hits the bullseye of what's wrong with libertarianism. (And it helps explain why so many of today's Republicans are so screwed up! :))

(...)

Furthermore, the reduction of all goods to individual choices presupposes that all goods are individual. But some, like national security, clean air, or a healthy culture, are inherently collective. It may be possible to privatize some, but only some, and the efforts can be comically inefficient. Do you really want to trace every pollutant in the air back to the factory that emitted it and sue?

Libertarians rightly concede that one’s freedom must end at the point at which it starts to impinge upon another person’s, but they radically underestimate how easily this happens. So even if the libertarian principle of “an it harm none, do as thou wilt,” is true, it does not license the behavior libertarians claim. Consider pornography: libertarians say it should be permitted because if someone doesn’t like it, he can choose not to view it. But what he can’t do is choose not to live in a culture that has been vulgarized by it.

Libertarians in real life rarely live up to their own theory but tend to indulge in the pleasant parts while declining to live up to the difficult portions. They flout the drug laws but continue to collect government benefits they consider illegitimate. This is not just an accidental failing of libertarianism’s believers but an intrinsic temptation of the doctrine that sets it up to fail whenever tried, just like Marxism.

Libertarians need to be asked some hard questions. What if a free society needed to draft its citizens in order to remain free? What if it needed to limit oil imports to protect the economic freedom of its citizens from unfriendly foreigners? What if it needed to force its citizens to become sufficiently educated to sustain a free society? What if it needed to deprive landowners of the freedom to refuse to sell their property as a precondition for giving everyone freedom of movement on highways? What if it needed to deprive citizens of the freedom to import cheap foreign labor in order to keep out poor foreigners who would vote for socialistic wealth redistribution?

(...)

Much more at
http://www.amconmag.com/2005_03_14/article1.html

[NMMNG]

1. Libertarianism, for most,

is just an excuse to be selfish and greedy and feel virtuous while doing so.

[Chulanowa]

2. I used to think I was Libertarian...

And then I talked to other Libertarians. I still indulge in that pastime, out of a degenerate sense of humor and a compellingly morbid curiosity.

They can get pretty disgusting once you get 'em going. It's sad, because they almost get it. They come so close... and then they reveal themselves to have no grip on reality whatsoever. They fail to consider the ramifications oftheir theories, becuse as proponents of an inherently selfish system, they only think of the immediate ebnefits, and then only if those benefits apply to themselves. They would gladly ruin the nation, just to be able to say "WE were the ones who did this, ain't we great?!"

You want to see a Libertarian sputter and become totally apoplectic? Ask them the following: "Your philosophy says it is based off of logic and reason. Logic and reason state that every system of operations has benefits and drawbacks. I've heard the benefits of Libertarianism from you, now I'd like to hear the drawbacks of it." They can't do it. Libertarians are physically incapable of discussing the inherent flaws of Libertarianism. They truly believe that their philosophy is immaculate and without flaw. Either that or they're like those guys on infomercials who are down to pawning items for ramen and just want you to buy their crap so they can go eat.

Given how Libertarian economic philosophy works ("Lowest bidder gets hired!") I wouldn't be at all surprised if it were hte latter.

[readmoreoften]

3. Yes, many RIGHT libertarians are greedy. But not any less than

RIGHT AUTHORITARIANS. And what about left libertarians? Of course laissez faire capitalists have some damn silly arguments. Unfortunately arguments like this are pretty damn silly, too.

"Consider pornography: libertarians say it should be permitted because if someone doesn’t like it, he can choose not to view it. But what he can’t do is choose not to live in a culture that has been vulgarized by it."

NO. That's the whole thing about living in a collective society. There will be some "vulgar" people. What next? Banning miniskirts because they "vulgarize" American culture? Who says we have the right to live in a vulgarity-free zone? It's pretty preposterous. I don't see any hustler centerfolds on billboards. What about GLBT people? I'm sure this author thinks that we pollute his visual moral environment as well.

[izzie]

4. I am pretty opened minded but I think society needs to set standards.

It always has, all one needs to do is read one history book to see that. These people seem to want no govt. and I see no way society can handle that. Once you get two people together some types of rule pop up. It is like this silly stuff about gays. I am over 70 and let me tell you they have been around my whole life. As a young women one hardly saw much on a sex crime in a 'good' newspaper but you could read it in the 'bad' papers. I think a lot of the fuss is the 'intheface' of what has always gone on. People just want to keep the fallacy of it is not going on. I think we have to learn to live within that standard that our society sets up even if it is a fallacy. Just think of the Victorians. And they were the very ones that put fig leafs on all the open sex of the Romans. But both those societies has standards and govt. You just need rules and all that stuff in society even if they are not the same from age to age. Libertarians seem to miss that.

[unpossibles]

5. yes. the irony of economic Libertarianism is that it ultimately

becomes "the rich get to do what they want because they can afford protection/power/etc."

which is close to where we are now, except that less fortunate people still have some rights.

The other thing that bothers me is that the very few people I know who really did pull themselves up by their own merit with little or no help are hard core lefties not Libertarians. They understand that they could not have done so without society's help, where most self-proclaimed Libertarians I know have received a lot of help, from parents, from connections, and from government handouts, etc. but refuse to admit or see that. They also seldom start at the bottom, so they can't understand why the people at the bottom don't just "try harder."

I guess my feeling is that every system is theoretically great, but seldom works in practice. Greedy & selfish people will always try to take advantage of everyone else regardless of it's in the name of Capitalism, Socialism, or whatever.