Originally posted by: Capitalizt
Craig, the truth is there is no Libertarian society on earth I can point to as a shining example of my ideas. I can't point to one because it doesn't exist and has indeed NEVER existed. Human history has shown that power corrupts...ALWAYS.
We don't differ too much yet - which is why it's better to have power diffused to the public in general than in the hands of a few.
And the power of the state is supreme...because it is power BACKED BY GUNS.
When hasn't there been the use or threat of force in some for by the powers in a society? Whether it was sticks or Samurai swords or Roman swords or muskets or revolvers?
Unfortunately, the threat of force is needed to keep people from committing their own violence - not most individuals, but many who would otherwise do so.
So, it's better to have that force restrained by 'the rule of law' under an elected government than to be the sorts of forces that serve dictators - what's your alternative?
We have never been able to achieve a truly capitalist society under any government...not even during the "gilded age" you keep referring too. Government in those times was still intervening like mad in the lives of its citizens...using political power to create artificial winners and losers rather than letting the market decide things.
What you fail to understand is that that WAS the market deciding things - it was the market taking control of the political system to reflect the power wielded by the wealthy.
What exactly do you think prevents robber barons from exploiting their power and creating tyranny?
Just because this is the way it has always been, doesn't mean it's the way it SHOULD BE. (I can already hear your "Oh how convenient" response.) But the bottom line is I believe fighting to maximize personal freedom is a moral necessity, so I will continue to fight utopian dreamers on your side when they try to increase government power over people's lives.
I don't mean to discourage you from your idealistic fight for personal freedom - a fight I'm on too, in fact. I'm trying to discourage you from a fight for things which will actually have the different result than you want ot reducing personal freedom, to discourage you from an unworkable system the same way one might discourage someone from starting up yet another communist society for the purpose of an ideal equality.
Originally posted by: Craig234
"I absolutely 'recognize the danger' and would be happy to cut a lot of what's there now. Our difference lies in your radical opposition to frame many of the benefits a people can choose for a government to provide not as a good thing and the sort of thing the majority wants the government doing, as some sort of bad thing.
Craig...herein lies the difference between you "liberal" folks and those of us who believe in the Constitution. You worship majority rule above all else. Democracy is your God...It is the last word. What the people say, goes. This is completely contrary to the Bill of Rights. The founders created that document to protect INDIVIDUAL rights...including the minority. It was intended to guard the life, liberty, and property of every citizen against any overenthusiastic government that might come to be one day. Modern liberals however are perfectly willing to disregard the Constitution and Bill of Rights if THE MAJORITY of citizens decide it best. The "common good" argument takes precedence over individual rights. If 70% of the country demand (and vote) that the government provide health insurance a 'free' college education to everyone...to be paid for by confiscating all property of the richest 30%, so be it! Majority rules! Democracy has spoken! [/quote]
You almost entirely misrepresent my position, I assume because you misunderstand it.
It's not the case at all that I have 'majority rule' as the ideal you describe. In fact, I can probably write a book about the weaknesses and problems of majority rule (but Walter Lippmann has already written it, "Public Opinion"). We have an ill-informed public where simple practicality dooms it to being ignorant on pretty much every complicated issue, and it's going to be manipulatable by monied interests - bread and circuses was the rule in Rome and today. And I treasure the Bill of Rights' protections from the mob mentality.
The small bit you get right is that I do put majority rule ahead of minority preferences, to an extent. Not the extent you describe - but if the majority wants to spend money to cure cancer, and you don't want to contribute, tough luck. To get big important things done requires some level of enforced cooperation. How could the lesson be any clearer than we we attempted the United States without such coercion, with the Articles of Confederation, the government did not work. That's the entire purpose of on of our nation's most famous writings, the Federalist Papers - many papers written to convince people that a stronger federal government was the right plan.
I'm not saying it's perfect, that there aren't some injustices that still happen, but I am saying that to throw the baby out with the bathwater and limit democracy is more harm than good - that the problems are better addressed by efforts to inform the public and such. I'm a lot more worried about the return of tyranny, in these modern days where the public would not stand a chance of winning any battle (we nearly lost the first time, despite the assistance of France), than I am about the small injustices we see in the current system.
There's a lot of paranoia about the tragic rich being abused by the public, but even for the decades the top tax rate was 90%, the wealthy did just fine in this nation. Was the nation an economic disaster in the 1950's? Were the wealthy people in the 1950's so disincented to produce that our nation was unproductive? No - and that's when the top tax rate was 90%.
Our nation benefited hugely - both economically and in the human benefit of a more educated populace - by the progressive creation of free or nearly free public colleges. Yes, they were paid for by the taxpayers that you so melodramatically point out did so at the point of a gun - and I mock your concern about how that was a bad thing. I want to say, 'grow up', and realize how good you have it, what is practical in society. What spoiled brats do we have for citizens who whine about that when others are in terrible oppression?
Your objection to public colleges is just the sort of nonsensical complaint I call radical because it reflects a basic opposition to the government serving its people.
What Libertarians believe is representative democracy BALANCED BY RESPECT FOR INDIVIDUAL RIGHTS. We will not disregard the rights and liberties granted to us by the Constitution just because a public opinion demands it. Those rights are ABSOLUTE...and should be defended at all costs. Libertarians believe the federal government should be limited to the bare minimum functions such as roads, courts, defense, etc. It should protect people from theft and violence, but otherwise leave them free to pursue their own interests. Of course I recognize that "some" taxation is necessary to provide these basic services...but the number I have in mind is a far cry from the insane 30-40% tax rates that most Americans end up paying to Uncle Sam today. Working through April/May just to pay your tax bill is a bit ridiculous in my opinion, and I have a feeling if you had your way, it would be much worse for all of us.
If I had my way, the tax bill would not increase, unless necessary for the short term to get our debt under control. The taxes remaining would be shifted - you can't rationally explain to me why the top 5% have gone from owning 50% to over 75% of all the wealth in the US since Reagan took office, and how any shift of taxation their direction is somehow an undair threat to them in light of that. I am fully in favor of incentives existing for people to do things good for society - i.e., to get more money who earn it - and I'm against the *extreme* concentration of wealth we see when the concentration leads not to increased productivity because of incentives for productivity, but to decreased productivity because opportunity is reduced (the oligarchy will only share crumbs and owns everything).
Libertarians are like the blind guys who touch part of the elephant; it's not that they lack any point, it's that they lack important other points. They remind me of little more than the people who embrace a new tyrant to replace the old. The thing is, how are they going to fix things when they find that they were wrong? Their mea culpas will be small consolation.
Our society is working a lot better than they realize, as much as they complain. Some of them don't even get the basics right - e.g., thinking dollars will be worth the same if the taxes were lower, as if they could buy that better house, not realizing that they would be likely no better off relative to others, and the house prices would shift accordingly.
We all need to be fighting the corruption you acknowledge - but we need to fight the source, not the government that is mainly a problem when it's too weak to stand up to the private interests who take over, as they largely have now. The government, when the public has a real republic, is good for the people, it keeps any oligarchy from being excessive. We need to try to fix that - not throw away the government and with it democracy and shift towards a banana republic status.
What I'm looking for is a balanced distribution of wealth, with still people who are relatively poor, most in the 'middle', and wealthy - but not the extremes we see, where instead 'all boats are lifted' by the nation's prosperity, rather than the wealthy becoming an instrument of oppression wielded by a very few. Our ends don't sound that different - it's the means of libertarianism I think will unwittingly lead to tyranny.
