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18 June 2006

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Debbie_S

It's fear of being shunned or ridiculed that keeps people from using the word, "Republican." Also fear of being associated with the Republican stereotype so prevalent on the Left -- you know, stupid, bigoted hillbilly with an American flag on the radio antenna.

I called myself a Libertarian for many years, but when the movement didn't go anywhere, I decided to admit I'm a Republican. I really do agree with most of the party platform. I have some disagreements regarding social issues but they're not that important. Sometimes I say I'm a classical liberal, but I also think this is a cop-out.

Ali Massoud

>>(Psst: Kos is moving to the center, by the way. His audience notwithstanding, he’s a political animal before all else, and therefore cares more about winning than ideology.)>>

Yes, and that is what identifies him as a power hungry statist poseur, and (therefore) not a libertarian.

>>..libertarians should apply their mistrust not only to governments, but also to corporations. Thus, traditional lefties can persist in their usual instincts — capitalism is bad —">>

State capitalism is bad. A truly "free market" cannot exist in a state environment where monied interests can buy privileges, monopolies, and constrict market conditions to their advantage. Adam Smith spoke of that 250 years ago.

Debbie: The GOP isn't going anywhere (good that is) either, unless you advocate huge deficits, inflated currency, endless war and ever dimishing civil liberties either.

tricky47

There is plenty of logic in a thinking person resisting a party label; after all, is the world really so simple that we can divide all ideas into two parties, and then can decide that only one has all the right answers? And what do we do when parties shift?

So it's understandable that the libertarian label is appealing, since the Libertarian party plays no significant role in politics and thus a "libertarian" isn't bound by that party's beliefs.

But what is clear is that many libertarians today wish to apply litmus tests for others who would call themselves libertarian. One of your commenters declares that Kos isn't a libertarian. Don't know that he is or isn't, but he has the right to call himself one.

I find it interesting that, since the core of libertarianism in the literature is generally the defense of individual liberty, any one individual can grant or deny the label "libertarian" to another individual. When did libertarianism gain gatekeepers, and who appointed them?

mark

"As I’ve said before, however powerful you believe a particular corporation to be, they are much more accountable than government. After all, the government only needs to please 51% of its customers every 4 years or so. A business that performs at that level ceases to exists."

No, many large corporations are completely unaccountable. They are accountable (in public corporations at least), to their shareholders, not the public. In large companies individual middle-class people often don't even have a say, a majority of the shares (or at least enough) are held only by a relatively small number of people sometimes not even in America. Even then, the only technical goal of a corporation is to make as much money as possible for their shareholders. Most investors and many businessmen are in it for the money only, they don't care about what effect their company has on the public, the environment, with lobbying the political process, etc.

"If Kos’ goal is to reduce the power of corporations, how do we do so? The only organization that has the power to do it is the state. If corporations are to be penned in, the only way to do this is to increase the power of the state, and that is hardly a libertarian position."
It's possible for a government to respect the rights of its citizens, while limiting corporate power to exploit them. There's no reason that having laws against, say, pollution, violating privacy, or for living wages will result in a police-state. The last six years have seen the opposite.

Furthermore, if corporations can do whatever they want, they will become much more powerful and take on some of the roles government previously did. Libertarians do of course talk about contracting government functions like even the police to private companies. Ideally citizens should have guaranteed rights, and limits on the abuse of power, by both the state and private entities. At least an elected, transparent government is accountable to the voters.

Also, the problem many have with self-described libertarians and Republicans who supposedly care about freedom, is that freedom seems to only mean "free enterprise." That is, they don't seem to care too much about things like the NSA scandal and the fact the government has essentially repealed the Bill of Rights, but then they get agitated whenever someone brings up issues like, say, forcing car companies to improve efficiency. Some of course mention is, but they spend far more time on the evils of minimum wages, and trying to rationalize that things like global warming don't really matter.I think that's a big reason why denying global warming is almost like a religion for some. It's like an insult to them in that it goes against free-market absolutism (the idea that completely unregulated markets and the most natural and desirable, and that they improve society and always yield the best outcome). Here is a problem that the beloved so-called "free market" is causing, and not only that, but it will take government action to fix it (as even a group of CEOs recently agreed).

Moncler

with three Muslim sects disciples repair tactics increasingly deep

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