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I received the Libertarian Party's Christmas email:
"Libertarians embrace the ideal of voluntary giving which is the very spirit of the holiday. May this season find your heart and table full. May you also find yourself in a position to help those less fortunate without government coercion. May we be the change we seek in the world."
This email certainly doesn't suggest that Libertarians believe in self-interest only, rather than helping others; it simply suggests a preference for the private sector.
(I don't see private charity as sufficient to provide for the less fortunate (although I wish that it could be), so I of course favor government help for those in need.)
Voluntary charity is fine except charity has never made any meaningful change for the people. Capitalism or free trade on the other hand has elevated billions of people out of poverty.
Voluntary charity is fine except charity has never made any meaningful change for the people.
I'm perhaps nit picking. Charity has made a meaningful change to many but there is simply no way it alone can reach the number of people needing help in this country.
There is a great homeless mission here. They work mostly off charity. They have helped house and feed many. They have been a positive change for many. They can not meet the health care needs of all these people.
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Capitalism or free trade on the other hand has elevated billions of people out of poverty.
I'm perhaps nit picking. Charity has made a meaningful change to many but there is simply no way it alone can reach the number of people needing help in this country.
There is a great homeless mission here. They work mostly off charity. They have helped house and feed many. They have been a positive change for many. They can not meet the health care needs of all these people.
Not without Socialist programs backing them up.
Voluntary social programs are fine but your socialist programs with the threat of guns is pure evil.
As a libertarian, I do not view Donald Trump as at all racist. I am a libertarian, but I do not support open borders unless we also eliminate all welfare schemes, which is a major pull factor for a lot of immigration.
I voted for and support him as a libertarian, even though of course he is not one, because through him, we are able to see more of our causes addressed than with others.
How else do you think we could have gotten two new libertarian minded SCOTUS Justices confirmed? How else could we have seen a roll back of the federal bureaucracy? How else could we have seen a tax cut?
who are these libertarian minded Judges? You mean gorsuch who sided with corporations 90% of the time? Or the entitled whiny frat boy kavanaugh?
Also as someone who said they are gay and married so you or your husband have any proboe with pence or other far right jesus freaks wanting you and others like you ether back in the closet with no rights or dead?
Last edited by DeadSpeak; 12-24-2018 at 12:00 PM..
Trump is aligned with Libertarians? Who knew? So the Libertarians now support protectionist trade policies, tariffs, heavy-handed government involvement in the economy, eminent domain over private property rights, massive increases in government debt, etc.? Libertarians now support brutal dictators like Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong-un, Recep Erdogan, Rodrigo Duterte, etc.? Libertarians are now aligned with bible thumping fundamentalists who want to turn the country into a theocracy? Damn. I guess I won't be voting Libertarian again.
Well, the poster DOES seem convinced that libertarians must embrace Trump who is anything but.
I think he may be just a confused Republican.
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Originally Posted by EastwardBound
Do you have something to say, you ignorant person.
Pretty sure they said it above and you had no response other than a personal attack.
1. You ignored my examples and continue to engage in argument by assertion. Argument by assertion is a logical fallacy, by the way. In Galt's Gulch, when you must pay Joe's Healthcare Co. to stay alive, do you reckon that will be a "consensual arrangement?" How about Roark's Energy Co. to heat your home and power your vehicle?
Yes and yes.
I hope the questions get more difficult. If you feel that I've ignored a question please ask it again.
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Originally Posted by chiociolliscalves
2. Yes, you were indeed oppressed by your elders telling you what to do. Children have a natural right to do as they wish, so long as...wait for it..."they don't hurt anyone else!" Freedom, baby! This principle will also work well in Galt's Gulch, provided the self-obsessed folks in that jurisdiction find time for children when they're not arguing over who transgressed whom.
Is there a question in here or just blowing off steam?
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Originally Posted by chiociolliscalves
3. Consent does not hinge on whether the state is involved in the transaction.
Yes it does. Any involvement by an involuntary 3rd party automatically creates doubt in the legitimacy of consent by the two voluntary parties. No private dispute resolution council could morally or logically hear a case or make a ruling in any issue from a contract within this paradigm.
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Originally Posted by chiociolliscalves
This is something you clearly misunderstand. When you need medical care in Galt's Gulch to survive and Companies X, Y, and Z are the only ones providing that care, you can perform whatever mental contortions you wish to arrive at the conclusion that you are freely choosing to use their services, but in reality, you are not entering into a "consensual arrangement" with them. You have no choice. Let me make it even clearer for you: there need not be a gun pointed at you by Da State for there to be a situation in which you are compelled to do something. You enter into these non-consensual "arrangements" every day of your life, whether you recognize it or not.
You have a few choices...
A. Consent to a contract with one of the companies.
B. Do it myself.
C. Die.
Just because you don't personally like these choices doesn't mean they aren't morally and logically sound. They are. Like all statists, your problem is with the fragility of life and natural scarcity. I have no interest in going down a rabbit hole of condoning preordained violence in the hopes of possibly staving off aggression by other individuals. i surely have no interest in going down a rabbit hole of condoning preordained violence in the hopes of possibly staving off certain death. I'm not above death. You aren't either. I would argue that you believe it can be cheated. I've stared down death for myself and loved ones knowing full well my principles weren't going to save me...only determine how I lived in that moment. When death finally wins it wins. Nothing I can do to change that. Make of that what you will.
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Originally Posted by chiociolliscalves
5. Ah, so morality is "individually-assigned." Okay, good.
You're praising me for something I believe in but you don't? Maybe you think you do but you're a collectivist so I don't see it.
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Originally Posted by chiociolliscalves
By what standard do you individually arrive at the conclusion that making a claim on someone else's life is immoral? You will recall that I asked that you not engage in circular logic in explaining this, so I will again await your answer.
Because I don't believe it is morally right for me to make a claim on your life. That answer is for me. If it isn't for you i have another moral right to defend myself so when you attack me with an axe it isn't up to me to decide why you are doing it only that I have the right to end it.
I know this is tough for statists to understand but us anarchists "just aren't that into you".
"Natural rights are simply self-ownership and private property rights."
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Originally Posted by chiociolliscalves
"Natural rights are simply self-ownership and private property rights."
6. I asked you who determines what natural rights are. How do you know which rights are "natural" and which are not?
The individual does. The individual owns himself. I can't make a claim on your life. I thought you said you read Rothbard? Here's a refresher...
7. Even in the deepest throes of libertarianism, I never would have made such a stupid statement. "Private entities are capitalist???" Do you have any understanding of what "capitalism" even means? Maybe we should have you start by defining "private entity." You clearly don't understand either of those terms, nor both of them put together. "Sub-states?" Do you understand that you don't get to make up definitions for words when they don't serve your purposes? Gee, that sounds an awful lot like what you would accuse "statists" of doing when they do something like call government spending "investments."
Regarding your assertion that "violence doesn't occur in capitalism," provide some evidence for this assertion.
Capitalism, by definition, is the voluntary consensual exchange of goods and services between two or more parties. Once violence is introduced into a situation it ceases to be capitalism. Not sure how this isn't clear.
The sub-states reference was merely my attempt to make you understand that no entity is privatized under an overall statist paradigm. Walmart is considered "private" but it's not capitalist. In order for capitalism to exist not only can there not be a State claiming legitimate authority over the "private entity" but there can't be any other States operating outside of the "private entity".
This is a bit more nuanced but makes sense. I've talked about this in several stories on the board, most recently one about an elderly man living on a deserted island near Japan who wanted to be away from States but was captured by Japan "for his own well-being".
Basically, "wherever you go there you are" is correct. But what is also correct is this: "wherever you go there the State is".
Sure it may bother you less or not at all for long periods of time or maybe never throughout your life but as long as it exists there is always the chance it will violate your rights and commit aggression against you. That's why one State means no individual is truly free since a State, by definition, does not believe in non-aggression and private property rights.
I'm a Libertarian, but I dare not tell a sole. EVERYONE knows that BIG Government can fix anything...as I think quietly and to myself "how the h#$%l's that working out for all of you clowns?
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