GOP: Libertarians not wanted

[AthenaAwakened]

Well, the GOP must like some of the ideas of libertarians and vice versa since these two groups have been pissing through the same quill now for decades.

 

[Nice Squirrel]

Well, the GOP must like some of the ideas of libertarians and vice versa since these two groups have been pissing through the same quill now for decades.

Most libertarians I know have no friend in the GOP. I know a lot of GOPers who like to think they are libertarians except when it comes to abortion, women, sex, homosexuality, drugs, the military, geopolitics, personal rights, crime and punishment, corporatism, cronyism, smaller government...etc. The only big issues they tend to agree upon are taxes and guns.

How these doughheads think Ronald Reagan was a great libertarian just blows my mind. Nearly everything he did was statist.

 

[SimpleDon]

Well, the GOP must like some of the ideas of libertarians and vice versa since these two groups have been pissing through the same quill now for decades.

Most libertarians I know have no friend in the GOP. I know a lot of GOPers who like to think they are libertarians except when it comes to abortion, women, sex, homosexuality, drugs, the military, geopolitics, personal rights, crime and punishment, corporatism, cronyism, smaller government...etc. The only big issues they tend to agree upon are taxes and guns.

How these doughheads think Ronald Reagan was a great libertarian just blows my mind. Nearly everything he did was statist.

You are assuming that libertarians would be fazed by a conflict between their faith in their beliefs and reality. If they were it would be impossible for them to be libertarians. Their philosophy is a bundle of contradictions.

For example,

When people organize governments they do so with evil intent to enslave the population and to interfere incompetently in the economy. When people organize to compete in a free market they have no evil intent beyond greed which never causes a problem and they are forced to be supremely competent in the market.

Looking at a march of history showing humans accomplishing more and progressing by cooperating with one another and organizing into ever more complex social structures based on individuals specializing in what they can do the best, the libertarians have decided that the best way forward is as individuals working on their own each having to understand a broad range of knowledge to allow the one in ten thousand who are capable of it to excel.

The one in ten thousand with whom they place the burden of future human progress in their perfect libertarian world would is a supremely capable person who is currently incapable of achieving anything because of the oppression of government regulation, which, despite their enormous capabilities, they are unable to understand, leaving them paralyzed and unable to accomplish anything.

Libertarians have no understanding of statistics and probability. How else can you explain that every one of them believes that he is one of the one in ten thousand who would excel if not for government regulation and oppression, in spite of the fact that the majority of them are unemployed and living in their parents' basement cruising the internet 18 hours a day leeching on a neighbor's wifi.

That their free market is not only self-regulating it is also self-organizing, but it has never organized itself into existence in the, say, 8,000 years of history of civilization, anywhere.

That government has been a reality in all of human civilizations, to the point that they are the defining characteristic of civilizations, but we really don't need them, except to enforce contacts of course.

That their simple solutions are the answers to our complex problems because we have learned that there are always simple solutions to complex problems, haven't we?​

 

[Emily Lake]

Sure. But I don't think he's likely to draw enough votes to make a difference. That's a draw back to our voting system, unfortunately.

It would depend on who he ran against and how he ran.

But he would have the ability to be on the left of people like Hilliary Clinton on things like foreign policy and the drug war.

Perhaps, yes. Do you think that he could run as a third party, and realistically garner enough votes to create a three-party election? To either bring in enough votes for the third party platform he's running on to make it a valid candidate, or alternatively to reduce the votes given to the democrats by enough to make a difference in the outcome for that party?

I mention democrats specifically, because historically libertarians have fallen in with the republicans. We're now discussing a schism in that partnership. And since we have effectively a two-party system, a real shift in the system would need to have an effect on the alternate party - the democrats.

I think it's more realistic to envision a shift of popularity away from the republicans to the libertarians as the opposing party, much like popularity shifted from the whigs to the republicans in the past. History is not my strongest subject though, so I might have some of the bits wrong

 

[Emily Lake]

If libertarians aren't happy with the GOP, why don't they just get their lazy asses up off the couch and start a popular and respected political party that can win the presidency for them? The Republicans aren't responsible for dealing with these guys' lack of effort.

For years I've been advocating that the last few libertarians still in the GOP move on and out of a party that doesn't want them.

Because it's a first-past-the-post voting system, and it's nearly impossible for three parties to have a foothold at the same time. The libertarian party needs to be able to supplant the republicans in popularity. FPTP is a two-party system; that's its natural state. It can really only maintain multiple parties in its infancy, and then only for a few cycles.

- - - Updated - - -

The libertarians stayed with the republican party because they got tired of losing by themselves. Now with the republicans losing everywhere they haven't gerrymandered, that incentive is going away.

And there are other reasons not to want to be associated with Rand Paul. He constantly shifts his positions and then lies about it. That sort of thing is political poison when done too much.

If I understand correctly, that sort of thing is political poison to libertarian principals anyway, so...
Of course, it's also supposed to be political poison to republican principles. And democratic principles.

I guess it's just par for politics...

 

[ZiprHead]

If libertarians aren't happy with the GOP, why don't they just get their lazy asses up off the couch and start a popular and respected political party that can win the presidency for them? The Republicans aren't responsible for dealing with these guys' lack of effort.

Haven't you read Ayn Rand lately? The appeal of libertarianism is that you don't participate at all. You just join all your other genius industrialists in a secret enclave where you keep your society-saving technologies to yourself and wait for the "takers" to tank the rest of the country.

And once the sick, twisted society built by these crypto-socialists has failed miserably, you stay in your secret enclave...where everyone is a "maker" and not a taker.

I'm wondering, who cleans the toilets, mows the lawns, etc. in the Wonderful World of Ayn^TM.

 

[untermensche]

I'm wondering, who cleans the toilets, mows the lawns, etc. in the Wonderful World of Ayn^TM.

There are no menial jobs in the land filled with Atlas's.

No committees, no soldiers, no heirarchies because everybody is the boss.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

I'm wondering, who cleans the toilets, mows the lawns, etc. in the Wonderful World of Ayn^TM.

There are no menial jobs in the land filled with Atlas's.

The books disagree, but don't let that interfere with your three minutes of hate.

 

[untermensche]

There are no menial jobs in the land filled with Atlas's.

The books disagree, but don't let that interfere with your three minutes of hate.

I don't recall reading about who cleaned the toilets.

And it's ridicule, not hate.

If only all the "bosses" would just go away. That's exactly what we need.

I think I can live without the Donald Trumps and Koch brothers of this world.

 

[thebeave]

Honestly, are you libertarians all that cheesed about this? Do you want to be associated with the republican party?

Actually, I'm not cheesed about this. I find it refreshing to note that the likes of Dick Cheney, Rick Santorum, and Underseer do not want libertarian influence in their neocon theocon conservative Republican party.

I really find refreshing is that they are saying it out loud.

But..but, if the conservatives and libertarians each go there own way, does that mean we won't be seeing any of the [/conservolibertarian] comments on this forum anymore? Say it isn't so...those clever comments are pure comedy genius!

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

The books disagree, but don't let that interfere with your three minutes of hate.

I don't recall reading about who cleaned the toilets.

And it's ridicule, not hate.

If only all the "bosses" would just go away. That's exactly what we need.

I think I can live without the Donald Trumps and Koch brothers of this world.

There were bosses in the books too, as well as menial laborers, but don't let that interfere with your Three Minutes Hate.

 

[untermensche]

I don't recall reading about who cleaned the toilets.

And it's ridicule, not hate.

If only all the "bosses" would just go away. That's exactly what we need.

I think I can live without the Donald Trumps and Koch brothers of this world.

There were bosses in the books too, as well as menial laborers, but don't let that interfere with your Three Minutes Hate.

These are books of complete fiction you realize?

 

[Ford]

The books disagree, but don't let that interfere with your three minutes of hate.

I don't recall reading about who cleaned the toilets.

Well, see, the books disagree. Yep, you read that right. Books. Apparently there was an "Atlas Shrugged Part 2" that the true believers got to read once they arrived in Atlas-land. Like the first one, it starts with a question, but instead of "who is John Galt?" the question is "who is gonna clean up all this shit?"

But don't let that interfere with your three minutes of ridicule!

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

What I find amazing is how many people haven't read the books yet know their contents. Paul Ryan and untermensche, experts on books they haven't read.

 

[Ford]

Just to make sure, I checked my book shelf.

An incomplete collection, to be sure, but I've got "Atlas Shrugged," "The Fountainhead," "Philosophy, Who Needs It?" and "The Virtue of Selfishness."

Read them all several times, but apparently in order to be an "expert" you have to actually espouse the nutty philosophy of a hack writer or you don't pass muster with dedicated Objectivists.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

I never understood why libertarians would be considered the political right in the first place. They are more their own thing, no? They are for legalization of drugs, hookers, marriage equality, etc. They are against the military industrial complex. They just also happen to be against gun control, socialized anything (medicine, schools, whatever), and want minimal goverment. Do I have that about right?

 

[SimpleDon]

I never understood why libertarians would be considered the political right in the first place. They are more their own thing, no? They are for legalization of drugs, hookers, marriage equality, etc. They are against the military industrial complex. They just also happen to be against gun control, socialized anything (medicine, schools, whatever), and want minimal goverment. Do I have that about right?

Don't forget support for the return to the gold standard and 100% reserve banking or free banking. All of which conflict with each other, but whose counting, it is a fantasy.

 

[Nice Squirrel]

These are books of complete fiction you realize?

Shh, don't break the delusion. Not only were they fiction, but they were simply Czarist Russian fiction with beureacrats replaced by business leaders.

 

[Sarpedon]

Libertarians and Anarchists are essentially the same thing at different ends of the spectrum, like Nazis and Communists.

Both believe the world would be better off without government. The difference is that Libertarians believe that with no government, people will act rationally according to their interests, and the economy will reward everyone according to their talents, while Anarchists maintain that with no government, everyone will rationally cooperate, sharing resources and taking only what they need.

Both beliefs are based on the false notion that people are fundamentally good and rational, and that government is unnecessary.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

I never understood why libertarians would be considered the political right in the first place. They are more their own thing, no? They are for legalization of drugs, hookers, marriage equality, etc. They are against the military industrial complex. They just also happen to be against gun control, socialized anything (medicine, schools, whatever), and want minimal goverment. Do I have that about right?

And that's why Republicans like Cheney, Santorum, and Underseer don't want libertarian ideas infecting their pristine Republican Party.