• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

Is Libertarianism a Pragmatic Ideology?

Respecthelect said:
Jump down a well. Remember the hiker who fiddled with the boulder until it fell on his arm?

How about the pimp who gets the girl addicted to drugs, so he can control her? Oh wait... that involves two people. But, why is the enslavement any less, if the girl gets herself addicted and loses self-control?
Click to expand...

Whether it's slavery or not is irrelevant. Our attempts to prevent that slavery by criminalizing drugs has obviously and tragically failed. I don't know why we didn't learn from the obvious failures of prohibition.
 
Respecthelect said:
Jump down a well. Remember the hiker who fiddled with the boulder until it fell on his arm?
Click to expand...

Those aren't slavery.

How about the pimp who gets the girl addicted to drugs, so he can control her? Oh wait... that involves two people. But, why is the enslavement any less, if the girl gets herself addicted and loses self-control?
Click to expand...

Because it's not enslavement. Words have meanings, and slavery means a master owning a slave. Two people.

A person should have the right to run his own life, provided he acts peacefully and honestly.
 
JasperL said:
It's not that the concepts are meaningless, but that libertarians and lots of those on the right use them as cliches.

Again, liberals like me think the EPA works and worked better than courts to reduce pollution. If a libertarian says, I want to eliminate the EPA, because freedom and liberty, that's drivel, meaningless. There's a necessary second step, addressing the shortfalls of state regulations and the courts, which were recognized and whose failures are why we HAVE an EPA.

Point is, if you want to say, "I'm for liberty and freedom, and here's how an approach based on those concepts would look like in the real world, and would be able to handle this problem," that's fantastic. But we all know that "and here's how it would look" is the rare part of that statement.



There is an obvious tension between government versus 'free markets.' And OK, you don't want a government as strong as that of China, I don't either, but what is the optimal level of control? It's somewhere between anarchy and absolute Dictatorship, right? Now if I want a bit more control and you want less, you telling me 'freedom and liberty' doesn't help us find the right level. And it certainly doesn't help when looking at AN issue, such as pollution, or healthcare.
Click to expand...

The EPA is a perfect example of government protecting our freedom from those who would foul our water and air. It's not like t he individual can keep the environment clean, so the government keeping the polluters at bay is a legitimate function of government. Sometimes, the EPA does go too far, as in when it designates a sub species of some critter as an "endangered species" and stops necessary projects from being carried out, but by and large it is a legitimate function of government.

As for how it should look, the test is simple: Does the law/government action or regulation protect individual liberty, or does it curtail individual liberty? If it protects it, it's good and legitimate. If it curtails liberty, unless it's limiting one individual's liberty to protect that of another, then it's bad and not a legitimate function of government. If the purpose is to protect us from ourselves, then it's quite likely that the result will be to limit freedom.
 
Dittohead not! said:
The EPA is a perfect example of government protecting our freedom from those who would foul our water and air. It's not like t he individual can keep the environment clean, so the government keeping the polluters at bay is a legitimate function of government. Sometimes, the EPA does go too far, as in when it designates a sub species of some critter as an "endangered species" and stops necessary projects from being carried out, but by and large it is a legitimate function of government.

As for how it should look, the test is simple: Does the law/government action or regulation protect individual liberty, or does it curtail individual liberty? If it protects it, it's good and legitimate. If it curtails liberty, unless it's limiting one individual's liberty to protect that of another, then it's bad and not a legitimate function of government. If the purpose is to protect us from ourselves, then it's quite likely that the result will be to limit freedom.
Click to expand...

Yeah, but the problem debating with you is you're actually a reasonable libertarian. And that's not fair, really, to all the ideologues in the libertarian camp. ;)

I'd just add that IMO a legitimate function of government is taking care of the commons, which we pretty much all acknowledge includes public safety, infrastructure and education (even if we disagree about public versus private education, vouchers, teachers unions etc.). Healthcare is, in my view, part of the commons. As society we've come to mostly agree on that when it comes to seniors and I see no reason to single seniors out and deny that assumption of a baseline of medical care as part of the commons for ages 0-64. I'd even argue that higher education (college, or vocational training for the non-college inclined) should also be part of the commons in the modern era.
 
Amadeus said:
Interesting perspective. Maybe Libertarianism has been given a bad name in recent years, due to the rapid conservative switch from Neoconservatism. My dealing have mostly been with very anti-regulation, eat-or-be-eaten Libertarians.
Click to expand...

I personally see failure a good thing, it is the markets natural way of shifting. Regulations try to prevent failure, but failure in the end can be better for an economy and it can roar back stronger than ever. I'd go through a decade of crap for a lifetime of success, than to muddle in economic mediocrity forever.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom