I wrote this post in response to questions posed for Libertarians on an email list I am on. With the exception of foreign policy, it covers much of the political spectrum.
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WARNING: this is long, and I think it is valuable. It has been written in my normal stream of consciousness, non-editing style. For that, I will no longer apologize. Just forewarn. It also covers a lot of ground because Tom asked such powerful and wide ranging questions. The intent was to simply answer the questions with some degree of depth. It ended up being part rant, part in-depth answers, part an explanation of my libertarianism and why I stand there in my current evolutionary stage.
Oh yeah…it was a full moon, so it was part lunacy.
Heh.
I think these questions are not necessarily political questions as they are philosophical and economic questions–and they are good questions that go to the heart of the matter of the differences that make the difference between a libertarian and someone of a different philosophical persuasion/orientation.
DISCLAIMER: I do not consider myself a libertarian scholar. So the answers I offer are what I know, but also in some cases, what I intuit or generalize they would be, based on the basic knowledge I do have.
I also disagree with some prevailing Libertarian party principles–but I think it is only in the realm of foreign policy and national defense. I am definitely a hawk, especially in the war on terror. And to be fair, their is much current disagreement philosophically in these areas for libertarians ranging from pacifist/isolationist to preemptive hawk.
Fortunately, there is no foreign policy question posed.
Phew!
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I was not brought up a libertarian. Or registered Libertarian [I am registered Independent]. Nor did I become a libertarian in sensibility and orientation as a result of some great cause.
I have the same concerns you do, regardless of your party affiliation or philosophical persuasion. I care about hungry people and sick people and people dying in unnecessary conflicts. I care about the environment. I care about shelter and people being displaced as a result of not being able to adapt fast enough in a rapidly changing and global economy. I care about people having increased choice. I care about freedom and privacy and being free from the imposition of a value set based in religion–scared of the Christian Coalition and Ralph Reed, I am. Not as scared as I am of Islamo-fascism, but hey…no need to split hairs there.
I care about the same things, however, I am a libertarian because I have a different view of how to resolve these problems. I would love to have any number of things offered by our current mainstream political system actually work when you look at the results. Like subsidies [be it for the steel industry or for affordable housing or for farmers]. Like socialized ["single-payer" is the pc term] medicine and healthcare. It would solve a lot of problems quite easily if these alternatives worked better than the libertarian perspective. But regardless of the issue, I have yet to find one that is not better handled through something other that gov’t initiative. And I have examined/researched most of them anyone is talking about today in politics in great depth both economically and anecdotally–as well as philosophically.
There are many people on this list who are politically active and political activists out of a desire to increase choice for people. That is a noble cause. Unfortunately, the reality is, whenever the gov’t is involved, we are reducing the choices in real terms for a far greater number of people than we are increasing it for. There are wonderful feel good activism/populist/progressive causes. AND let’s examine the results and the facts rather than getting caught up in an emotionally “great cause” that “requires action”. “In the heat of passion” while a good excuse, is not longer a very good defense.
“Over the last 30 years, we have been replacing what works with what sounds like a good idea.”–Thomas Sowell, 1992.
I am a libertarian as a function of examining what works and the results of competing philosophies and approaches.
Just my observation and my _current_ understanding.
So while the libertarian perspective is not perfect and does not solve problems in a utopian happy ending, it is the best I have examined. Or to paraphrase Winston Churchill: “it is the worst philosophy regarding gov’t. Except for all the rest.”
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Ok. On to the questions:
Tom Asked:
> What is the role of government to address the following?
[snip] questions interspersed below
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The basic libertarian stance is that the only role of gov’t is to protect its citizens from force and fraud. Aside from that very limited scope, Laissez Faire [hands off; leave us alone].
There are three very good reasons for that.
REASON 1. Gov’t always [yes always] evolves towards tyranny and more control–it thirsts for more power. Sometimes with good intentions [but often unintended consequences] and sometimes for power for its own sake. Therefore, limit its scope as much as possible and use volunteer organizations and associations for everything else.
This is basically fact in the domain of the nature of gov’t. Hence, the right of revolution as laid out in the Declaration of Independence. If it gets to tyranny or despotism [as they felt it had in the mid 1700s, then dissolve it and form a new one that better serves the people "deriving its just powers from the consent of the governed". This alone is brilliant and was revolutionary--literally and philosophically.
Alexis de Tocqueville covered the tendency to more toward tyranny quite thoroughly in _Democracy in America_. A stunningly prophetic volume all Americans should read [authored by a Frenchman. Heh.] Our Founding Fathers were _very_ clear on it and that is why the general population at the time of the Constitutional Convention (which produced the “more perfect Union” — the less perfect being the Articles of Confederation which did not have a notable centralized gov’t like we have today) did not trust a centralized gov’t. This sentiment is what inspired the authoring of the Federalist Papers [another must read for any American] as a counter measure.
REASON 2. Virtually anything the gov’t does can be done better and more efficiently through the free market system. And while some people beat the drum of corporate malfeasance in order to justify gov’t bureaucracy to handle the same thing, there is a lot more accountability in the market because there are consequences–both legal and financial.
REASON 3. Gov’t is synonymous with force. Laws are passed and are backed with police–guns. Therefore, when I vote for an increase in gov’t, I am voting to authorize the use of force against my neighbor. Therefore, we must be cautious when enlarging the scope of the gov’t for _any_ reason. Justice [lack of force and protection of negative rights] before beauty [giving people stuff].
Sometimes this is obvious: the Patriot Act. Sometimes it is subtle: increased funding on any ballot initiative. Taxes are money taken by force. It is a violation of property rights in reality, but that conversation has not even been seriously discussed really since the run-up to massing the 16th amendment [Income Tax] nearly one hundred years ago. And BTW–anyone in economics will tell you taxes are brute force. Be they Keynesian or Misean/Austrian. This is fact. Even Chris Rock, the great American philosopher said: “They take dat shit outta yo’ check before you even see it! That’s not a tax–that’s a jack!”
Heh.
> Pollution
From a libertarian perspective this is handled through property rights.
If I am downstream from a factory that pollutes my water, then I have a legal cause of action based on one of the founding principles of the Country: property rights. They have committed an act against me (or my property, which in this Country is virtually the same) that is equal to force. The property has been damaged or in some cases, destroyed (by being robbed of its intended use or adding an element that makes in uninhabitable–destruction of it=force).
Where does this accountability break down? Sometimes through fraud–though that can often get exposed. More often through government favors or “bending of the rules” or “grandfathering” or some special legislative exception to to public necessity or some such thing (like a power plant that must stay in operation but has older equipment and the cost to the corporation is too great to upgrade)…the point is, we have more power and can demand more accountability if there is not some government actor/agent/official who has the power to skew things in the favor of the polluter. Be it a good old boy connection or a campaign contribution, or the discreet [but not very subtle] blackmailing of said official with knowledge of some indiscretion, or straightforward legislation.
Stick to good old property rights and you have them dead to rights. Add complex and inconsistent regulations and you have a recipe for subterfuge or favoritism or or or…
> Allocation of resources such as drinking water
A libertarian would say property rights again. However, additionally I think the market is handling this quite well, thank you. Crystal Geyser, Evian, Alhambra, etc. Ad Naseum]. There is a company in Israel that is about to start pumping drinkable water from the sea (it will be only pennies per unit more for the filtration costs than normal tap water).
Innovation. Free Market. See a need and fill it. Scarce resources draws innovation cuz there be money to be made. Basic supply and demand. Limited supply, then someone will innovate to either improve or break into the industry and make money.
Once you start centrally trying to control such things [which is what is presupposed in your question] efficacy plummets. Innovation dies. Incentive disappears. We can bemoan it all day long. It is still so.
> Distribution of electricity
Definitely free market. AND _cease_ gov’t imposed or sanctioned [therefore artificial] monopolies on utilities. Introduce competition and get the utilities out of the pockets of politicians who have no interest in efficiency or effectiveness.
I did a massive amount of research in the 1999-2000 approx time span on utility deregulation. You know–the period when we were having rolling black outs and we began to think we did not like Gray Davis.
The common wisdom is/was that deregulation caused the power problem. It is precisely the opposite. It was half-assed deregulation [literally the wholesale side of the energy business and not the retail side] that caused virtually all of the problems. That and gov’t sponsored monopolies. You give a utility company a virtual monopoly and you have back door deals, campaign contributions, and a lack of competition [less choice and no forces for greater efficiency]. That in addition to making power plants nearly impossible to build though increased environmental regulation and added costs and taxes in CA in the 90s.
While I am massively oversimplifying this issue here and now in this writing, I stand by the conclusion presented.
I remember the emotional drive to have the State take over the utilities. Libertarians [and frankly most people with an eye on results] know this would be precisely the opposite direction we needed to go to solve the problem.
> Threat of Extinction of animals and habit.
Again, _property rights_. Someone owns that land. However, I would need to know the _cause_ of said extinction. To quote George Carlin: “95% of all species that ever lived are instinct. Gone. We didn’t kill them all! That’s what nature does!”
On a more serious note, what this points to is the fact that humans are the first animals to adapt their environment to them. Before humans, animals simply adapted to the environment. Now, this represents a HUGE leap in evolution–and one that brings both tremendous blessings and challenges. It gives us great mobility, flexibility, choice. AND I think in general, it is a good thing and if we go too far out of balance, then we will adapt that too and bring it back into balance. I think that is already occurring through simply increased consciousness around the environment–and the free market is already providing environmentally friendly product across the spectrum because consumers want to buy stuff that is ecologically sound.
No gov’t action is ever as powerful as a major shift in consciousness to positively change things.
On the other hand…is this even a problem? I think this is another overly emotional issue for most people without many real practical problems associated with it. It is a feel good [or often fear based] cause. Do I think we could live in greater harmony with the environment? Yes. DO I think we should have some intentionality and consciousness around that? Absolutely. Do I feel we should go back to the middle ages where we are shoveling shit out of the streets by hand and having no choice but to grow our own food and weave our own clothes thereby consuming all of our time (except for that allocated towards chopping wood)? No.
And there is no “going back to a time when…” There is only evolution. There is distinguishing/differentiating, transcending, and including. While the unconscious patterning is to regress (the good ole days; before the fall; before the great evil of industrialization) we must transcend. We must create solutions that are integrative and forward looking and thinking.
> Global warming (assuming you believe the 95% scientific consensus that it is
> a problem that requires action)
From what I know, this is not the scientific consensus. That is the liberal political consensus. And you know how political consensus’ go regardless of which side of the aisle they are on, right?
The _scientific_ consensus is that there is something going on. It is not clear as a matter of science how much of what is going on the biosphere is man made or part of cyclical trends we have yet to understand. For an in-depth treatment on this by one of the primary leaders in the biosphere field (actually a book review that appeared in the New York Review of Books about one of his relatively recent books):
http://tinyurl.com/5g5ea
The book is half biography and half summary of biosphere concepts. The review linked is thusly divided as well. My advice is to read the first paragraph and the scroll down to “page 3″ and some change.
This is _the_ guy on the biosphere currently, really. And it is a good and well written review.
The most interesting part is how he maintains that we do not know from a scientific and cyclical standpoint (Ice-ages and warming trends) if we are doing more harm than good. Read the whole thing and you will begin to understand how complex and how little we really know in terms of being able to draw sound _conclusions_ on global warming. It is political popular to talk about it and it is an emotional issue, but the science simply does not support “action” of any kind for the very reason of stuff like the following:
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99996231
That’s right–sulfur from industry (which is responsible for acid rain) is apparently the only thing keeping methane in check–and therefore slowing down global warming. Increase in methane (from industry and fertilizers/farming, etc) is considered to be the number one gaseous cause of global warming.
Additionally, the big concern is the melting of the polar ice shelves, but global warming has increased snowfall at the polls effectively off-setting it and leading to confusion as to why the sea levels are rising.
The truth is, man is altering the environment fundamentally. However, divorcing man from nature is a fundamental error in thought. We are part of nature. We are part of, and in evolution. It is only in reunifying this idea while still maintaining our other additions to the planet that we will truly increase harmony with nature. Holding humans as an agent acting on nature in a negative way will not get us there because we are still separate and outside. And, that is just not accurate. We are not separate. We are IN our environment. A living part of it.
What the science supports is further study. Sorry. Not politically popular, not emotionally moving, and will not make a good moveon.org ad, but it appears to be the case.
This is the very reason I think political activists are not only irresponsible, but dangerous _most_ of the time. Think about it: someone _emotionally driven_ about some issue [which means--typically--that they are irrational, or at least not thinking clearly] inciting people who are largely uneducated and obviously excitable [or worse] to march, to pressure legislators to pass laws, creating television ads through this PAC or that 527 and asserting something “requires action” when it probably does not, and thereby increasing the scope of gov’t and unwittingly lobbying for the increased use of force. Less freedom for all and one step closer to the eventuality of tyranny.
All the while the political discourse is reduced silly things like:
Bush=Hitler
And
Flip-Flop
And
NO WMDs–Bush Lied, children died
And
“I have a plan”
And
Dick Cheney’s daughter [who is a lesbian, BTW]
Often the best course of action is no action at all if you do not have enough information and the situation is not an immediate life and limb situation. We pass treaties and legislation and regulation and get the emotional feel good and the pat on the back and the sense we have “done something good”. But have we? Or have we done just the opposite? Would doing any of those things
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> White collar crime
Again, this is fraud/force. A crime has been committed. There a criminal courts (and civil courts) for that. Libertarians like that. Any free marketer (all libertarians are, I think) supports the prosecution of crimes in business. Business is damaged as a whole when there is widespread corruption or actions involving fraud.
And, frankly, stuff like Enron, etc. demonstrates the system works. When these are private organizations, there is greater and swifter accountability than if we engaged the alternative. In this case fraud was engaged in, and it was investigated and prosecuted.
When was the last time you saw a gov’t employee held to that high of a standard that quickly unless it was the Oval Office?
When you put parts of the economy and business in the hands of the gov’t bureaucratic machine [like energy in this case] you have even less accountability. Who is watching the watchers?
> Child labor.
Heh.
You’re kidding right, Tom?
Here is another fundamental problem with gov’t in these realms: it is the imposition of a value set on others. Libertarians are against that.
LIBERTARIAN COMMANDMENT: So long as what I am doing is not on your property and is not utilizing force or fraud, then thou shalt not tell me how to live. You can tell me how to live on your property. Not sure that is official libertarian, but I like it.
Aside from the fact that children who labored over a hundred years ago instead of going to school [as a matter of record and fact] were _more literate_ than children today in America, and aside from the obvious fact that you take a child out of the real world (earning a living and seeing how the world works and gaining real-world skills and critical thinking abilities and useful problem-solving faculties) and put them in a bubble where the most important thing is what new gadget or friend or jeans–and they are going to grow up less capable, less stable, with self-esteem issues and fundamental misalignment with _reality_.
*****[this is where we make fun of that math problem template/pattern/genre? where there are two trains leaving two destinations traveling at different speeds....as if that will ever fucking matter in the real world]*******
Aside form all of that–this is a parental choice. Since when did it become unquestioned to dictate private family choices?
If someone wants to have their child work (or if the child wants to work themselves) I say let them. Next, the gov’t will be telling parents you can not spank children. Oops. Actually, it already does in some states.
But aside from all of that, lets make this real: sweat shops in third world countries. Horrible, right? They should be earning more, have better working conditions–and worst of all, those corporate fat cats are exploiting the workers again.
Maybe. Good for a political campaign ad. Yes. Accurate? No. Hell, even half the picture? No.
Those countries are in an evolutionary process. We are a mature economy. They are not. They have not established the rule sets we have decided to and they are like we were 50 or a hundred years ago or more. So they are in their own process. Even if they wanted to establish the rule sets now, it would not work–it would cripple growth. It would be the equivalent of trying to forcing a child to run before it has mastered crawling. Each level build on the former.
But what is never looked at in the mainstream conversations, or the sound bytes, is the relative value to those working “over there”. Those individuals who work in sweatshops (unless they have been rounded up by police in a communist nation and forced to work) are there by choice and _most_ of them are there because they experience a real increase in their standard of living making $3.00 a day. Let’s say they are not “sweat shops” per se, but they are third world factory environments being utilized for manufacturing by the likes of Nike, Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, Levi Strauss, and whoever. The point is there are children working over there for a pittance [to us] and they should not even be working at all–I mean, geez, they are just kids! But that “pittance” is a real and relative increase in their standard of living. THAT”S WHY they and their families do it. And the “just kids” and all the value sets that are implicit in that statement with the typical accompanying voice tones, is ours, not theirs.
It is only our arrogance, our American culture-centric orientation, and our lack of education [both culturally and economically] that has us want to lobby for similar wage structures and working conditions.
It is ignorance.
And no matter what the situation, if it is a free[er] market system, it is required that both the employer and the prospective employee feel it would be mutually beneficial to work together. This is elementary. If they feel it is mutually beneficial and they are freely associating, why should we impose some value/moral set to stop that?
If people want to work, let them work. Regardless of the age. The data demonstrates that by taking them and putting them in school instead has produced negative (and opposite of intended) consequences. Public and compulsory schooling made sense in Austria/Prussia and Nazi Germany, however…oh, the next question is on education…
> Education of the general public
I am a high-school drop out. Case closed.
Anyone with an internal desire to learn and/or inherent curiosity [which is every human before we stick them in rows and boxes when they go to kindergarten] can get a more useful and more thorough education in America by getting a library card and a job. That beats anything the public school system offers up.
Seriously, the gov’t has no business “educating” the general public–if you want to call what the gov’t does in the classrooms “education”. Other names for it could be “propaganda”, “revisionism”, “brain-washing”, “churning out another productive citizen”, “babysitting”, “indoctrination”…I could go on, but that would be silly. The gov’t trains minds. It does not educate them.
Apparently, you did not read the book posted by another libertarian on this list:
http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/chapters/index.htm
And highly touted by me. It is free and available at that link. It is in HTML, so you gotta go though the pages/click. You can also buy the book on that site…anyway…
It is a comprehensive look at American education as instituted by the gov’t. It is a program that was explicitly set out to make the populace productive [in factories] and compliant. If you read this book, you will be horrified about the HISTORY, the WHO, the WHY, and the RESULTS of the public school system. Not only the major players, but the philosophical base, and the history of the ideas of state run schooling that the American’s modeled explicitly.
Our literacy rates began dropping precisely when the gov’t injected itself into the education business, and have continued to drop in direct proportion to the increases in scope and funding.
Hmmmmm. Isn’t that interesting?
That says it all and it is an example of what all libertarians believe: the gov’t does not know how to do anything effectively outside of two things. They are good at protecting us from force and fraud (national defense, court systems [civil and criminal], law enforcement). That is all it is good at. The evidence, long held to be true by those crazy radicals who founded this Country, is even more overwhelming today.
The gov’t also blow things up well.
Heh.
Education? Nah.
Name one thing–just one–outside of those I have stated it is good at that the gov’t has set out to “improve” where it has actually succeeded in the last 30 years. Gov’t is intentionally inefficient. That saves us from it. But is is also ineffective at anything outside of fraud and force. Frankly, the market handles it better, faster, more efficiently, more effectively–and I do not need to violate your property rights [by force] through added taxes to get it done. Gov’t has no accountability in terms of efficacy–and they like it that way. If a private business is ineffective for too long–it dies. As it should be.
Gov’t has experienced immeasurable “scope creep” in the last 50 years. So much so that people are not even asking the fundamental questions of role of gov’t. We have been trained to think it is meant to help, to provide a safety net, to assist, to lend, to spend. Rather than further increasing the very thing the created the problem in the first place, let’s stop. And think. And reevaluate our very premises about what we think gov’t is about and actually look at what made this Country great–what made it revolutionary.
Michael Moore said “Not My America”. [I am about to get libertarian pissy] It never was his America. After watching and reading him for two years, it is clear to me that Michael Moore has no clue what the founding principles of the Country are–and if he does he ignores them. And he is an idol and an icon of the most passionate political movement underfoot today.
Wow.
We all have a responsibility as citizens in this great Republic. That responsibility is to understand the rules of the game set up by those that invented this particular sport called America. Examine them for yourself.
For starters, I recommend:
The Declaration of Independence
The Constitution
The Federalist Papers, by Madison, Hamilton, and Jay [I think]
Democracy in America, by Alexis de Tocqueville
Basic Economics: A Citizen’s Guide to the Economy, by Thomas Sowell
It is stunning how uneducated people are about one of the primary reasons this Country was founded–economics. “The Pursuit of Happiness” in the vernacular of the day meant essentially being in business acquiring wealth/property. Also, without an understanding of basic economics, your thinking may not be clear on a whole host of political issues and politicized issues that should never be so presented.
Additionally, we have to be vigilant about staying dispassionate and rational–measuring results.
The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. Why is it that when it has been proven that gov’t programs and intervention almost invariably makes matters worse, or slows the natural resolution of the problem, or simply can not address it–not its function, that we go back for more hoping that will fix it?
Part of the problem is political advertising and slogans and bromides. One has to truly self-educate beyond the slogans and the banners and the possibilities and the visions etc.. But I think mostly it goes back to something I said earlier in this post…we want to sign a treaty or pass a law or create a program and increase a “benefit” [the new word for entitlement]. Why do we want to do this? To make the world a better place. Duh. And to feel like we have. And to have a sense of accomplishment or of doing good in the world.
The question is, when we do those things, are we? Have we?
I think it is wonderful to want to contribute. Be it out of compassion or a sense of possibility or a desire to give your gifts. Or simply wanting to “give something back”. And for those of you who want to be active: I urge you to vision and found a non-profit organization to address the community or state-wide or National problem you are concerned or passionate about.
Organizations where the membership is voluntary and the funding is voluntary and effectiveness is a primary value and intention are wonderful things. They produce more choice, more freedom, and real solutions.
“Making a difference” with the same passions for the same reasons where your neighbors are forced to contribute financially, the membership is implicit, and efficiency has been proven antithetical not only decreases choice, but it slowly but surely decreases our freedoms and slowly but surely advances tyranny.
Even if it is the tyranny of good intentions.
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