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I just know the first of the many anti-libertarian straw men is of the form "well I guess you don't like roads and schools" which is a straw man containing a couple false dilemmas. The first of them is that only government can build a road or school, because prior to government, nobody ever thought of clearing a path, widening that path, smoothing that path and then eventually paving it, nor did anyone ever learn anything until they were forced by government to herded into school buildings 180 days of the year for 12 years. The next false dilemma is that road building and schools must necessarily be public endeavours, which gated communities/parking garages/industrial-commerce parks/etc and private schools/home schooling all prove is not the case. And finally, the implied all or nothing false dilemma, where to have public roads and schools, you must accept every other thing the government does without question, else you lose the roads and schools, since government must be all or it must be nothing.
If you want public school, you simply must accept the federal register containing over 1 million punitive articles, the majority of which are byzantine crimes against the bureaucracy. If you want a road, you simply must accept the IRS existing almost completely outside the 4th, 5th and 6th Amendments. If you want someone else to filter your drinking water, you simply must accept institutional racism that destroys entire cultures. And yeah, if you want a military defending you, well then you simply must accept drone strikes killing people that pose no threat to you whatsoever, but the President finds annoying. If you don't like all the bad stuff, then you get none of the good stuff, because there simply is no middle ground. Totalitarianism or anarchy...you pick.
Most of the time I am simply too tired anymore to explain it, so I become part of the problem by simply ignoring the "oh, so you want anarchy, no schools, dead children, people dying in the streets, blah blah" argumentums ad absurdum. I should try to educate more often than I do, but people have it in their heads that government is the only reason they are not lying in a ditch starving/dead. In the argumentum ad absurdum math, there is 0% and 100%, and no other amount or government can exist.
FYI, one doesn't have to proclaim Libertarianism to want reforms in spending. That by itself is not the definition of a libertarian. The Libertarian party's own website states they do not want public schools - that education should be the responsibility of the family.
Someone like me, who researches the background of a political party cannot accept your skewed view of a system that you supposedly agree with. There are plenty of Dems and GOPers (not Libertarian leaning) who would like to see money cut from various departments in our country. But a true Libertarian wants to remove public schools, doesn't want to fund roads or police or the military.
That is why you are continually feeling you need to "educate" people. It is because you are not really a Libertarian. You just are a reformer or someone who values fiscal responsibility. You should stick with that mantra instead of clinging to Libertarianism if you want people to take you seriously and understand where you are coming from. Libertarians equal the opposite of Communists.
There are no Democrats who don't want public schools funded. There are no GOPers who don't want public schools either unless they are "Libertarian" leaning. Because to not want public schools is a Libertarian ideology, not one associated with traditional Democrats or Republicans in our country (in the modern era).
Both basically say more markets and corporations, less government and sovereignty. The only real difference is that neoliberals unlike libertarians tend to support military interventionism and libertarians unlike neolibs oppose any sort of safety net.
Overall the ideas they promote they promote are the same, like trickle down economics, the unemployed/poor just needing to pick themselves up and get to work, the naive belief that trade makes war impossible, and glorification of big business especially the tech industry. Libertarianism is just an extreme form of neoliberalism basically.
As much as I dislike neoliberals they're far better and their ideology is much saner than libertarians. They still accept the necessity of government, and many if not most believe there should be social security programs and support for people who can't work. Libertarians on the other hand believe the government's only duty is to guard the border and punish criminals, and some would even say those duties should be privatized. In fact they partially have been already!
Like social democrats and moderate socialists, neoliberals are strong believers in democracy. Libertarians on the other hand advocate consumerism over the vote, and would rather we live in a world where dollars ran things not ballots.
Another double digit IQ. We have become the people of Walmart.
I consider libertarians to be economic terrorists and sociopaths. Neoliberals are Republicans who drive Priuses.
And you expect anyone to believe you know anything about us? You're a political terrorist who votes based entirely on a letter... and that is the scariest thing I can think of.
Another double digit IQ. We have become the people of Walmart.?
I agree with you, but using Walmart as the example is like saying it's dumb to shop for good prices.
"Another double digit IQ. We have become a people who allow others to think for us"
This imbecilic topic proves this.
For those who truly believe we wouldn't want to fund education and infrastructure (roads, police, FD..etc.) you are completely wrong.
-Our local LEOs are becoming militarized by the federal government and now we have an epidemic of cop on citizen violence.
-Our school system has become nationalized and we have fallen from 1st to 17th in the world.
-There are more than 20,000 bridges which need rebuilding or repair and our highways are crumbling. 5 years later and we still don't have a shovel ready jobs program. See how well the federal government works?
We don't want the Federal Government funding and controlling things that should be handled by states, counties, and cities. The Federal government proves time and time again that if they get involved you can count on everything becoming (SNAFU) screwed up. That is the one constant, and they are extremely good at it.
FYI, one doesn't have to proclaim Libertarianism to want reforms in spending. That by itself is not the definition of a libertarian. The Libertarian party's own website states they do not want public schools - that education should be the responsibility of the family.
Someone like me, who researches the background of a political party cannot accept your skewed view of a system that you supposedly agree with. There are plenty of Dems and GOPers (not Libertarian leaning) who would like to see money cut from various departments in our country. But a true Libertarian wants to remove public schools, doesn't want to fund roads or police or the military.
That is why you are continually feeling you need to "educate" people. It is because you are not really a Libertarian. You just are a reformer or someone who values fiscal responsibility. You should stick with that mantra instead of clinging to Libertarianism if you want people to take you seriously and understand where you are coming from. Libertarians equal the opposite of Communists.
There are no Democrats who don't want public schools funded. There are no GOPers who don't want public schools either unless they are "Libertarian" leaning. Because to not want public schools is a Libertarian ideology, not one associated with traditional Democrats or Republicans in our country (in the modern era).
You really need to stop the "ism" game. The bottom line is this...someone who calls themselves "moderate" or "reasonable" take elements from different "isms" and guess what? You get stuff like PROGRESSIVISM. Or....just make up any name you wish and slap ISM on the end.
You can say "Libertarianism ls the opposite of Communism" and you can say "Conservatism leads to Libertarianism" or "Progressivism leads to Communism".
You can also say "Libertarianism and Communism BOTH lead to Anarchism"..in the paradigm shift, this holds true. so...BOTH Progressivism and Libertarianism lead to Anarchism!!
OMG....OH NOEZZZ
You are also trying to pigeonhole ideologues into party affiliation, which is a false dilemma. All people involved has personal convictions that overlap ideologies and at the end of the day all you are really saying is "Stop having a preference".
Which you do, and they fall into any of the "isms".
And you expect anyone to believe you know anything about us? You're a political terrorist who votes based entirely on a letter... and that is the scariest thing I can think of.
There is no greater threat than the progressive cancer that currently infests our political system!
You really need to stop the "ism" game. The bottom line is this...someone who calls themselves "moderate" or "reasonable" take elements from different "isms" and guess what? You get stuff like PROGRESSIVISM. Or....just make up any name you wish and slap ISM on the end.
You can say "Libertarianism ls the opposite of Communism" and you can say "Conservatism leads to Libertarianism" or "Progressivism leads to Communism".
You can also say "Libertarianism and Communism BOTH lead to Anarchism"..in the paradigm shift, this holds true. so...BOTH Progressivism and Libertarianism lead to Anarchism!!
OMG....OH NOEZZZ
You are also trying to pigeonhole ideologues into party affiliation, which is a false dilemma. All people involved has personal convictions that overlap ideologies and at the end of the day all you are really saying is "Stop having a preference".
Which you do, and they fall into any of the "isms".
Our nation was founded upon Anarchism!
The Constitution is a document that promotes constant Anarchism!
FYI, one doesn't have to proclaim Libertarianism to want reforms in spending. That by itself is not the definition of a libertarian. The Libertarian party's own website states they do not want public schools - that education should be the responsibility of the family.
Someone like me, who researches the background of a political party cannot accept your skewed view of a system that you supposedly agree with. There are plenty of Dems and GOPers (not Libertarian leaning) who would like to see money cut from various departments in our country. But a true Libertarian wants to remove public schools, doesn't want to fund roads or police or the military.
That is why you are continually feeling you need to "educate" people. It is because you are not really a Libertarian. You just are a reformer or someone who values fiscal responsibility. You should stick with that mantra instead of clinging to Libertarianism if you want people to take you seriously and understand where you are coming from. Libertarians equal the opposite of Communists.
There are no Democrats who don't want public schools funded. There are no GOPers who don't want public schools either unless they are "Libertarian" leaning. Because to not want public schools is a Libertarian ideology, not one associated with traditional Democrats or Republicans in our country (in the modern era).
The big "L" Libertarian Party is not what I am referring to when I describe libertarianism. Two different things, and I know how I think better than you do. I am not opposed to the public school, I am opposed to the various dimensions of force involved with public school. I am opposed to making people pay for them against their will, opposed to forcing children to attend them, and opposed to removing individual control over a classroom to an exterior bureaucracy instead of the teacher in the room. Let's take those point by point.
In the case of forcing people to pay for them, that is simply one facet of my general opposition to government bloat. If schools were still run at the community level, and communities were saying "part of life in this community is a great public school, so your participation in the community comes with that fee" then I'd have no issue with public school. But schools have a federal and state overlord layer I simply despise, and would see that removed. Further, a general maintenance fee for public grounds within a community is fine to charge all residents (as long as they knew of these charges ahead of time and chose to participate, like an HOA), but people who do not make use of the school should pay only basic maintenance fee, and people who send their kids to that school should pay a use fee above and beyond the basic maintenance. Simple, easy, more freedom.
In the case of compulsory attendance - oppose completely by definition. If the parents want to force behavior, that is their business. The state should not be forcing behaviors, especially when the alternative does nobody any harm at all. A child not attending school harms me in no way whatsoever (assuming we have libertarianized the welfare state to stop carrying people who choose to be lazy), so if they don't want to learn things and create opportunities for themselves...so be it.
And finally, the teacher in the classroom being slaved to the bureaucracy, the state, and notions of political correctness and social engineering. Rubbish, all of it. A teacher is a conduit for transferring knowledge. That is their prime objective. Take a group of people who do not know that which the teacher does, and transfer some/all of that knowledge. As such, they should have free reign to manage their knowledge transfer environment as they see fit, including the removal of miscreants and hoodlums, letting an objective grading system flunk poor students, etc. But if we apply my second point and remove compulsory attendance, most of the hoodlums would be gone anyway.
The public school system was broken when the states began meddling, got more broken when the DoEd was created, and just gets more and more costly and broken as the days pass. Tear it all down to the studs and let the communities take their schools back and run them like private/charter schools run.
And yeah, relax all the state/federal barriers that serve to impede home schooling and funnel kids into your state indoctrination centers masquerading as schools. You want a standard? OK, have one standard test for each grade. If a kid passes it, they are done with that grade. Have the 12th grade GED test as the final. If you can pass it (monitored controlled testing environment), you're done. Pass it when you're 9...okie doke, here's your high school diploma. Can't pass it at 18 and need to keep trying until you turn 25...okie doke. Sucks to be you, but the test is the test.
Some kids will be done with everything K-12 has to offer by the time they hit 10-11, and some people will struggle to get a diploma before they can legally drink. OK, so what? Let different ability sets produce different outcomes. K-12 is the first area of life we artificially engineer a set of outcomes from wildly randomized inputs, so right at the age of 4-5, we start collectivizing individuals, making the strong weak, the fast slow, and the smart dumb...so there's an average with a larger population and a relativistic utilitarian collective happiness.
Lack of competition, government enforced monopoly, and bureaucratic meddling have created a public school system that quite simply is worse than were there nothing at all and parents just read books to their kids. Call it government sponsored day care for the new "both parents work" paradigm of the nation.
As for roads and military, the true libertarian, as I already explained, is fine with a government that limits itself to those things individual citizens have as natural rights that can be delegated, are funded as often as possible by the individual's actions, and benefit all citizens that are encompassed by that level of government equally. In the case of national defense, that is quite easy. I have the natural individual right of self-defense. Thus, I can hire a body guard, get ADT security for my home, by a gun and learn how to use it, and oh yes, delegate the the defense of the sovereign nation to an outside agent we typically call "the military." They protect all Americans equally (theoretically), are limited by things like Posse Comitatus to keep them narrowly focused on actual defense, and were taxes based on consumption rather than income and everyone paid the same rate, the military would be funded by people choosing their taxation levels based on their own behavior.
Where libertarians gripe about the military is the bloat in military budgeting (corporate welfare on the grandest scale), the bloat in non-essential personnel (individual welfare on the grandest scale), and using the military for purposes other than the defense of the United States, its sovereign borders, and/or its citizens. But no small "L" libertarian I know opposes national defense generally, nor do any of the more hardcore libertarian philosophers, because we are only 5% of the global population, and someone out there might decide someday to violate the natural rights of Americans en masse, and that person should get a slapdown for their willful violation.
Roads are already done privately, since almost all roads, even federal highways, are built and maintained by private companies who are contracted with taxpayer money to do a thing. And once again, if the individual possesses the right to connect his property with his neighbor to make transit between the two easier (which we do), then they can and do delegate that right (hire contractor) to an outside agent. Again, no small "L" libertarian says there should be no public roads, just that the public should have choice and voluntary participation in their construction and use. That's what tolls are for. Make every federal and state highway a toll road and the toll pays for the road, and you're done hearing me argue anything related to roads, minus making sure the citizens can hold a bad contractor more accountable for the quality of the work.
I do not champion the absence of government nor of things a small and limited government is absolutely necessary for. What I oppose, as a true libertarian must, is a) the government initiating force against the citizen in order to b) do things they rightfully should have no power or authority to do anyway. And where almost all "you're crazy and that's why I could never be libertarian" arguments from liberal and conservative alike boil down to one or two places/areas of life where they feel government force against its own citizens simply must exist for the Earth to continue spinning.
Our nation was founded upon Anarchism!
The Constitution is a document that promotes constant Anarchism!
But when you suggest that you break up the "order" you are called "unpatriotic".
Go Figure.
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