And You Think You Have It Tough

That’s probably the truth.



The delicate sensibilities of today allow you could kill a baby — even out of the womb — but god forbid someone 200 years ago say something that sounded racist.

I was listening to a little of Michael Medved’s show today. Some guy was on there (I don’t know who) who was going on about the harm of political rancor. We must tone it down. Etc.


When it came to the subject of Trump, this guy was full of the same old hysterical “the sky is falling.” Look, dick-wad. If you’re worried about an oppressive government, just trying building anything in most places. There will be regulations and restrictions up the ying-yang. Word police are everywhere and you can be fired for a slip of the tongue. These are all Leftist ventures. But God forbid Trump enforce immigration laws or things such as that. Then it's "the Constitution is under dire threat."

And this is what I call the Weenie Partisans. They find themselves so fastidious about the supposed wrongs of others but — to get back to that bible quote — strain the water so they won’t swallow a gnat but instead easily swallow down a whole camel of nonsense.

Brad,
There are very few Libertarians who would disagree, at least not here in Galt's Gulch Arkansas, hidden in a secret bunker waiting for the end life, the universe and everything. Could it be that scratch a real conservative and there is a secret libertarian seeking to get out?

The only thing I would add is checks on government must exceed in quality the checks on business. The market provides checks on business but nothing checks government except law and sunlight. The last three decades should provide sufficient example that more sunlight is needed and send the criminals to jail. I long for the time when election to office is viewed with the same aversion as a jail term. 

Issue by issue, I may well agree with libertarians as often as any other group.  But libertarianism operates on the basis that the solution to problems never involves the Behemoth, which is the opposite of the leftist belief that solutions to problems always involves maximizing the power of the Behemoth.  I can't agree with either.

I think these labels now say more about an ambition for identity rather than a coherent framework for policy — in practice.

How can one be conservative when the government’s reach is so far? You’d have to move to a ranch in Idaho to live the conservative life. What we call “conservative” is only conservative because it’s not quite as liberal as the Left. And the other main practical difference is that conservatives love America instead of hate it. But when speaking plain dollars-and-sense, the elephant is every bit as massive as the donkey

Libertarianism I think is more of a conceit than a coherent framework for policy. It’s so fungible, it’s almost impossible to nail down the system other than on a few commonly-held elements. And when you look at these common elements, it’s every bit as corrosive to the integrity of America as liberalism. They are basically cousins.

Here’s a good critique which is based on accepting Libertarianism as a coherent set of principles — an idea I reject:



And, really, if your average Libertarian believed in The United State of Markets, and that was his only excess, I wouldn’t bat an eyelash at Libertarianism. Even in this excess it would not be harmful given how un-market-oriented so much of our economy is.

But the Libertarianism I’ve gotten to know is nothing like that. It’s libertinism, at best, with generous spoonfuls of outright Leftism as with their stance on open borders. No real conservative objects to a pure (as possibly) market economy with sensible checks and balances. He just doesn’t believe that is all that is needed.

And that’s presupposes that free markets are at the top of the Libertarian list. I don’t believe that for a moment. But speaking of markets and choice, I think perhaps that’s why it is so hard to pin down a Libertarian philosophy because it acts, in principle, as a self-selected set of beliefs from a whole smorgasbord of quasi-liberal ideas whose purpose is to anoint whatever behavior the yute is engaging in at the moment.

My understanding about Norway and the rest of the Nordic countries is not that they are socialist, they still operate free markets and the government does not own factories. But, the tax rates for the services delivered are horrendous 80-90%. So you can stillown a business but almost all your profit goes to feed the social net. How do you become a millionaire in Noeway--start with a billion dollars.