The Trouble with Libertarians

a reply to: LDragonFire

Corporations can force you to undergo financial checks, back ground checks, drug tests, they can and have fired people because of opinions posted on social networking sites, yet the supreme court ruled that corporations are people, yet why do they have more rights than you?

So does the US government.

Just ask any gun owners, and anyone who just signed up for the ACA.

and the difference is WHAT ?

You're just another person lobbying against self sufficiency and advocating for the gov to take care of us.

Self sufficiency is largely a myth. Humans are social creatures that live in groups (societies). We need to work together and help each other, just like other social animals do.

As for coercion, you can't have a government without any power, which means that some people will have to do things or not do things they don't like. You can call it coercion, but it's just reality.

Ron Paul showed the foolishness of libertarianism when he proclaimed that we should get rid of the FAA because government shouldn't be able to tell anyone what to do. Never mind that they are required in order to prevent the thousands of planes in the air together from crashing into each other.

a reply to: neo96

Well one we vote for and have given them to power to govern.

The other is a corporate business. Republicans have giving the corporation the power to do what they do.

Drug testing was ruled unconstitutional up until the 1980's but reagan changed all of that.

Here's an example of what Libertarians mean and what they want - the veteran's experience with the Lowe's employees.

Here are three private citizens operating on their own initiative without government control or any outside directive who fixed a problem that the almighty government program of the VA had failed to address in any way for two years.

Anytime government gets involved things get less efficient.

Not only did the employees fix the wheelchair in a few hours tops, but they also merely fixed the already existing wheelchair. Their solution was cost effective. When the VA got wind of what happened, miraculously the wheels suddenly turned and they bought the vet a whole new wheelchair. So, the old wheelchair which was fixed to be perfectly serviceable was replaced by an expensive new one which may not even be necessary thanks to the initiative and charity of three private citizens.

This is the difference between liberty and government in a nutshell.

Doug Stanhope 2016

the only libertarian worth your vote.

Anytime government gets involved things get less efficient

Government does a lot of things private industry won't or can't do, and business receives a huge amount of money, research, and other benefits they wouldn't have without the government.

For example, where I work at Job Corps we train young people, many from less than desirable backgrounds, to become acceptable and employable citizens. Many of these young people are almost completely unemployable and after we spend up to two years working with them some go on to have successful careers in fields like construction, truck driving, etc.

Private business would never do what we do putting up with young people who are often basically uneducated, unskilled juvenile delinquents and training them to be able to get and hold a job.

originally posted by: TycoonBarnaby

originally posted by: CB328
...

A prime example of this is Social Security, which many libertarians believe should be eliminated because supposedly everyone could save and profit more without it, and they feel that somehow they are being cheated by helping others in society. Other people, like moderates and Democrats, see the great utility and importance of the program because of all the needy people that rely on it, and realize that most people would not have the discipline, knowledge or ability to save that much money on their own. They see correctly, that removing this huge societal support would not only impact the retired people, many of whom rely on it, but would also impact their grown children who might have to start supporting them if their benefits are taken away.

Emphasis mine, and yeah, that's not my problem. I don't like paying for foolish people and the mistakes that they make.

"They see correctly..." Funny.

SureI dont like paying for the welfare of 30 year old drug addicts ect


But what about children born into poverty should they pay for there parents mistakes?

What about a 20 something struck down via disability before they have a chance to save up a retirement fund or emergancy fund?

I dont like the easy and bloated welfare system usa and uk have BUT i accept there needs to be some sort of minimal saftey net.

originally posted by: beezzer
a reply to: LDragonFire

But government control has increased. Government intrusion has increased.

Just look at the IRS, EPA, NSA.

Government authority has increased.

NSA thought that started under clinton?

Its only under obama we found out about but it started years ago.

But your IRS ect seems more militant.

originally posted by: CB328

Anytime government gets involved things get less efficient

Government does a lot of things private industry won't or can't do, and business receives a huge amount of money, research, and other benefits they wouldn't have without the government.

For example, where I work at Job Corps we train young people, many from less than desirable backgrounds, to become acceptable and employable citizens. Many of these young people are almost completely unemployable and after we spend up to two years working with them some go on to have successful careers in fields like construction, truck driving, etc.

Private business would never do what we do putting up with young people who are often basically uneducated, unskilled juvenile delinquents and training them to be able to get and hold a job.

Yes, and if government had done what it was supposed to the first time around, then there would be no need for Job Corps.

All of these kids should have had access to public education which is also a government program. Obviously that failed, so government pays money to do it all over again.

How inefficient is that?

Also, construction and truck driving have their own job training programs.

a reply to: ketsuko

Which means you need to look at overhauling the state education system.

Not patch it up with other social programs but gut it and reform it.

What you cant do is cancell state education and leave it to the private sector.

Do that a education wo t be free and the poor will end up with no education. And education gets you out of poverty so you create a underclass in a cycle of perpertual poverty.

And dont say home schoolfor poor kids. Sure SOME parents and kids are suited for it but alot are not! If a parent has little education and low IQ how can they be expected to provide a education? America really would be dumb dumb land!

State education works in most of europe,japen, canada, australia ect its just in the USA and UK ( who adopted theUS dumb system) that seem to be failing.

a reply to: crazyewok

What I'd like is for the state to take the money it spends on kids already and tell parents that the money will follow the child. Essentially a voucher system. We already spend enough money per child per year that most parents could take that money and spend their kids to most any private school in most places. DC public school kids would only be about a couple thousand dollars/year shy of being able to attend the same schools that Obama sends his daughters to.

I'm told there are countries in Europe that use this system and it works very well for them.

But it would privatize the system to some degree while still allowing even the poorest parents to find good schools if they wanted to, and schools would need to compete to keep students attending to keep the money coming.

But this system we have now where a kid is doomed to a school simply because they live where they live with no recourse is about as bad some of the things I've heard about the NHS.

if government had done what it was supposed to the first time around, then there would be no need for Job Corps.

The fact that most young people don't have to go to Job Corps kind of shoots down your theory.

It's a social safety net of another kind and business benefits from it as much as the young people do, plus we all benefit by having less people on welfare and more people being responsible, staying out of drugs and other kind of trouble as well.

a reply to: CB328

No, it doesn't really.

I taught inner city school, and I've seen what happens to those kids. The ones who wind up at Job Corps are lucky in a sense; the rest just live off the government cheese for the rest of their lives or go into crime or a mix of the two.

There are far fewer who can actually take advantage of what's offered in those schools in any meaningful way the first time around.

What they call school in the inner city is terribly dysfunctional. I was asked to teach without any books at all in my classroom for at least two months, and I was an English teacher.

originally posted by: ketsuko
a reply to: crazyewok

What I'd like is for the state to take the money it spends on kids already and tell parents that the money will follow the child. Essentially a voucher system. We already spend enough money per child per year that most parents could take that money and spend their kids to most any private school in most places. DC public school kids would only be about a couple thousand dollars/year shy of being able to attend the same schools that Obama sends his daughters to.

I'm told there are countries in Europe that use this system and it works very well for them.

But it would privatize the system to some degree while still allowing even the poorest parents to find good schools if they wanted to, and schools would need to compete to keep students attending to keep the money coming.

But this system we have now where a kid is doomed to a school simply because they live where they live with no recourse is about as bad some of the things I've heard about the NHS.

That would seem a good option.

Dont let the horror storys on the NHS scare you. For ever 1 horror story we get here we hear a dozen from the USA, fact is private hosptals or not you are going to get bad ones. It will always happen. Fact is UK ranks 13th in the world for healthcare which lets be fair? Not bad, its above the USA but could still do better. But fact is in the UK we have private hospitals too so no one has to use the NHS if they dont want too, it something I think alot of american miss that we have private hospitals too. But end of he day you ask any brit if they want the US system or NHS and we will all say NHS!.Despite its flaws it could be alot worse!

Now of course a NHS would never work in the USA i get that the USA is too bloody big! So I know its not a viable optio n foryour guys.

originally posted by: ketsuko
a reply to: CB328

No, it doesn't really.

I taught inner city school, and I've seen what happens to those kids. The ones who wind up at Job Corps are lucky in a sense; the rest just live off the government cheese for the rest of their lives or go into crime or a mix of the two.

There are far fewer who can actually take advantage of what's offered in those schools in any meaningful way the first time around.

What they call school in the inner city is terribly dysfunctional. I was asked to teach without any books at all in my classroom for at least two months, and I was an English teacher.

Same problem in inner city british schools. It something that needs tackling but no one seems to want too.
Think the problem is the parents if they are waste of space welfare monkeys or criminals it spreads to the kids.

Exactly, it's probably largely the parents' fault, but why be real when you can just blame it on the government as an excuse to not pay taxes?

And then call yourself moral.

THIS is all you are and serve here.
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originally posted by: CB328
Exactly, it's probably largely the parents' fault, but why be real when you can just blame it on the government as an excuse to not pay taxes?

And then call yourself moral.

The problem is the govement (least in the US or UK) dont try to do anything to help.just patch it up with half arsed social progams that bleed money and not even bother to tackle the core issue.

No the private sector eont help either.

Its just trust, the incompetent ways our respective governents have gone about things has lost the publics trust.

Someone needs to get down and dirty with education and the core problems.

But politiciansare too busy sqabbling, lobbying, back patting , living the high life and ekking out ever cent they can get there grubby hands on to bother tackling anything difficult!

originally posted by: CB328
Exactly, it's probably largely the parents' fault, but why be real when you can just blame it on the government as an excuse to not pay taxes?

And then call yourself moral.

Ah, but the government enables it. If you can make more money by having more kids and not being married ... how eager are you to do the hard work of cleaning your self up? That's hard work when it's much easier to have that extra kid and continue to neglect them.

And so long as politicians can continue to buy votes by promising more and making people "need" government there is no will to change that system anytime soon.

And how is it moral to pay taxes to a system that is proven to be shoddy at what it's supposed to do?

It's interesting to see some of the same people in here promoting libertarianism who are in other threads having meltdowns over the "Illegal Immigration Crisis." That would imply an immediate issue with the (big L) Libertarians. The LP's platform is one of open borders:

Libertarian Party Platform

We support the removal of governmental impediments to free trade. Political freedom and escape from tyranny demand that individuals not be unreasonably constrained by government in the crossing of political boundaries. Economic freedom demands the unrestricted movement of human as well as financial capital across national borders. However, we support control over the entry into our country of foreign nationals who pose a credible threat to security, health or property.

Granted, not all libertarians want to be Libertarians but I thought I'd point that out.

My biggest problem with modern American libertarianism (Mises/Rothbard/Rockwell/etc inspired) is that similar to communism, pretty much every aspect relies upon the validity of heterodox economic theory (in this case, Austrian economics) that is, at its very heart premised on an invalid model of human behavior.

Basically, every libertarian solution starts and ends with this mythical unregulated free market, a real life example of which has never existed, and for things to work as intended, the action axiom would have to NOT be BS — and it is.

But hey, "socially liberal, fiscally conservative" sounds good as do many of the typically stated positions so I'm sure otherwise bright folks will continue to fall into this trap.