Where are the libertarians in the coronavirus pandemic?

[Jason Harvestdancer]

Of course, they have plenty of opportunities to show me that I am wrong. But 10 pages of deflection speak volumes on the fact that either the libertarians here know their position is unethical or they just don't have one.

You forgot to scroll up before you posted that.

It took ten pages and 12 days of evasion and deflection for you to come up with "suspend regulations". And as a policy, it is pretty lame on given the expected severity and extent of the pandemic.

I know it must be painful for you to watch your precious regulations get suspended, but it is already happening.

 

[laughing dog]

It took ten pages and 12 days of evasion and deflection for you to come up with "suspend regulations". And as a policy, it is pretty lame on given the expected severity and extent of the pandemic.

I know it must be painful for you to watch your precious regulations get suspended, but it is already happening.

As usual, you are mistaken. But as a policy for this situation, it is lacking. It does little to stop the spread of the virus or to develop vaccines/cures.

What is the libertarian view of the closures of bars, restaurants and cinemas to help slow the spread of the virus?

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

As usual you are mistaken. Suspending the regulations does a lot to develop cures and vaccines, as well as helping those already infected.

But muh roads...

 

[laughing dog]

As usual you are mistaken. Suspending the regulations does a lot to develop cures and vaccines, as well as helping those already infected.

Point to a suspended regulation (or regulations) that "does a lot to develop cures and vaccines"

But muh roads...

You are mistaken if you think babbling is an effective argument,

I repeat
What is the libertarian view of the closures of bars, restaurants and cinemas to help slow the spread of the virus?

 

[Arctish]

Anyone interested in understanding the likely impact of suspending regulations in the current situation should read this:

Gouged prices, middlemen and medical supply chaos: Why governors are so upset with Trump

Masks that used to cost pennies now cost several dollars. Companies outside the traditional supply chain offer wildly varying levels of price and quality. Health authorities say they have few other choices to meet their needs in a ‘dog-eat-dog’ battle.

Inside RWJBarnabas Health, New Jersey’s biggest health-care network, hospital leaders are so desperate for medical supplies to combat the coronavirus pandemic that they’re paying 50 times the usual price.

Confusion and want are so massive that they’ve been willing to work with sellers they don’t know, even paying upfront for the equipment they need. The threat of fraud is everywhere: A recent delivery of 500,000 surgical masks from a Chinese supplier turned out to be medically useless. They appeared designed for a nail salon.

“We’re burning through cash, but there’s no other option,” the network’s chief medical and quality officer, John Bonamo, told The Washington Post. “The rules as we know them don’t exist anymore.”

N95 respirator masks use a microscopic web of plastic threads to block 95 percent of airborne particles, making them a critical piece of protection for doctors and nurses. Federal agencies regulate the masks’ use and manufacture in the United States.

Some hospital executives said they worry the masks they’re being sold are coming from unregulated factories seeking to capitalize on the booming market: Though real masks and counterfeits look similar, they offer widely different levels of protection that could leave health providers at risk.

The price gouging has hollowed out public health budgets, officials say. Minnesota-based industrial giant 3M, which makes hundreds of millions of N95 masks a year, said in a statement Tuesday it had “received reports of an increase in fraudulent and counterfeit” masks and was working to find and stop “pandemic profiteers.”

 

[Rhea]

Do you ever just actually state a position instead of JAQing off?

I've stated plenty of positions in the long posting history. They're all in my history. You didn't like them, they didn't conform to your view of what a libertarian is supposed to say, so you "forgot" them so you could ask again. I'm tired of playing your stupid games.

Tell you what. You come up with the position you want me to give, then refute it, claim victory, and leave everyone else out of your mental masturbation.

It won't be libertarianism you're describing, but you'll probably call it that anyway. Have fun.

Not enough? Here. All the regulations that interfere with the professionals effectively dealing with this? Suspend them. Wait, that's already happening. It really is, and the suspension of those regulations are helping. I know it must be painful for you to watch your precious regulations get suspended, but it is already happening.

I’ve been reading back trying to find anything comprehensive and I cannot find it. Could you please post a link to the post, or just quote it? I’ve been trying hard to find it because I’m genuinely curious what your plan for the pandemic would be. But I cannot find these posts that you are saying you put.

If you’ve said it “plenty of times” in three pages, I should be able to find several instances. But I can’t.

Please post a link.

 

[Rhea]

Your reading comprehension problems are not my problem.

Still waiting on the libertarian policy on the covid-19 pandemic. Your inability to produce to one does lend credence to the conclusion that there is no policy whatsoever.

Step one: asses the severity of the situation
Step two: realize the biggest problem is the stupidity of the reaction of the people.

Not enough? Here. All the regulations that interfere with the professionals effectively dealing with this? Suspend them. Wait, that's already happening. It really is, and the suspension of those regulations are helping. I know it must be painful for you to watch your precious regulations get suspended, but it is already happening.

As usual you are mistaken. Suspending the regulations does a lot to develop cures and vaccines, as well as helping those already infected.

But muh roads...

So this is it. This is what your plan would be. When asked what your plan would be, you handwave - are you really asking people to go mine other threads to get your answer to a question? That not how this works. You come to this thread, you discuss this thread here. You don’t just arrogantly claim you posted something about it last year and aren’t others stupid for not remembering that. (We’re not that into you, honestly.)

So here in this thread your answer to ths question, for this global pandemic is:

1. Step one: asses the severity of the situation
2. Step two: realize the biggest problem is the stupidity of the reaction of the people.
3. All the regulations that interfere with the professionals effectively dealing with this? Suspend them.

And that’s it. That’s your whole Libertarian plan.


It seems kind of, how do I say it, shallow and vapid?

 

[bigfield]

Not enough? Here. All the regulations that interfere with the professionals effectively dealing with this? Suspend them. Wait, that's already happening. It really is, and the suspension of those regulations are helping. I know it must be painful for you to watch your precious regulations get suspended, but it is already happening.

So we're seeing the libertarian plan in action in the US?

 

[marc]

It took ten pages and 12 days of evasion and deflection for you to come up with "suspend regulations". And as a policy, it is pretty lame on given the expected severity and extent of the pandemic.

I know it must be painful for you to watch your precious regulations get suspended, but it is already happening.

As usual, you are mistaken. But as a policy for this situation, it is lacking. It does little to stop the spread of the virus or to develop vaccines/cures.

What is the libertarian view of the closures of bars, restaurants and cinemas to help slow the spread of the virus?

So it amounts to do nothing, you are on your own. With a side of removing regulations with no indication as to what regulations are a problem.

 

[James Brown]

"Let our factories dump untreated effluent into rivers to defeat COVID-19!"

"Let us employ grade-schoolers to work assembly lines to beat the virus!"

"Stop making us give employees protective gear so that we can make more hand sanitizer!"

 

[Elixir]

I repeat
What is the libertarian view of the closures of bars, restaurants and cinemas to help slow the spread of the virus?

You might as well stop repeating.
"The libertarian view" of EVERYTHING is the same thing: mouth a bunch of Rayndian platitudes, declare your superiority and walk away from any further discussion.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

I repeat
What is the libertarian view of the closures of bars, restaurants and cinemas to help slow the spread of the virus?

You might as well stop repeating.
"The libertarian view" of EVERYTHING is the same thing: mouth a bunch of Rayndian platitudes, declare your superiority and walk away from any further discussion.

Reminds me of Ted Kaczynski who stated that the FBI was incompetent, how he was always smarter.

Kaczynski had an IQ of 167 and obviously had some serious mental illness by today's societal standards. He lived free, filthy and alone in his shack in Libertopian rural Montana without electricity or running water, and by all accounts never helped a single person in his life. This must certainly illustrate libertarian perfection where no one is your equal and you help no one but yourself.

Sounds more like sociopathy to me.

 

[Elixir]

I repeat
What is the libertarian view of the closures of bars, restaurants and cinemas to help slow the spread of the virus?

You might as well stop repeating.
"The libertarian view" of EVERYTHING is the same thing: mouth a bunch of Rayndian platitudes, declare your superiority and walk away from any further discussion.

Reminds me of Ted Kaczynski who stated that the FBI was incompetent, how he was always smarter.

Kaczynski had an IQ of 167 and obviously had some serious mental illness by today's societal standards. He lived free, filthy and alone in his shack in Libertopian rural Montana without electricity or running water, and by all accounts never helped a single person in his life. This must certainly illustrate libertarian perfection where no one is your equal and you help no one but yourself.

Sounds more like sociopathy to me.

It sounds like that to you because you only skimmed the last third of The Fountainhead, instead of reading and internalizing the profound truths contained therein. The vast benefits to humankind that will accrue once everyone realizes the transcendent twin virtues of greed and emotional immaturity, can only be surmised in this time when people are shutting down profits in favor of a futile effort to preserve the worthless lives of the unenlightened.

 

[lpetrich]

Coronavirus Relief Bill Challenges All That Libertarians Believe In : NPR

Massie was the guy who caught hell from all sides Friday when he tried to force a roll call vote on the coronavirus relief bill in the House of Representatives. He said he wanted every individual member to record his or her vote on the gargantuan $2 trillion package, which he called the biggest relief bill in the history of mankind.

For Massie and many like him, the bill that aims to forestall economic disaster in the face of a pandemic is, in itself, a fiscal calamity and a radical turn in governing philosophy. Letting this go without a recorded vote was capitulation on a profound scale — a violation of all he held sacred.

Thomas Massie on Twitter: "Are they afraid of the truth? I’ve been told that they don’t even have 1 minute available for me to speak against this bill during the 4 hour debate. The fix is in. If this bill is so great for America, why not allow a vote on it? Why not have a real debate? #SWAMP" / Twitter

Explicitly, the CARES (Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security) Act spends money faster than any legislation in history, shoveling it out with an air of near-desperation. That strikes fear in those who routinely regard all government with suspicion and the government in Washington with the most suspicion of all.

 

[SimpleDon]

So that is it? Once again, a "No true Scotsman fallacy," railing against the lack of reading comprehension, a cry to return to constitutional governing without any hint of what that would mean in the case of the current pandemic, many posts claiming "I answered that so many times if you just would remember so that I shouldn't have to repeat it here," and endless discussions of a third rate book from a third rate thinker who actually despised libertarians, so there!

We have seen this all before, in fact, any time we have the temerity to ask for the reality behind the ideology.

There is nothing there.

Libertarians are a necessary creation of neoliberalism, the economic theory that we should direct all of the gains from the economic surplus produced by the economy to the already rich, to provide a socially acceptable gloss over anarchy to sully the very idea of government and to provide the very thinnest possible academic support for the fantasy of the self-regulating free market to movement conservatism, the political movement set up to direct all of the gains from the economic surplus produced by the economy to the already rich.

It is obvious that the Libertarians don't have anything to add to this discussion for this problem of pandemic. We have to learn to ignore them because of this failure, just one of many.

 

[SimpleDon]

I subscribe to Reason.com to keep up with all things libertarian. Not too surprisingly I have been told that reason.com is not a truly libertarian source by one of our libertarians here. They never responded when I asked for the True© Libertarian website, once again, not too surprisingly.

I read many articles in my current copy of the newsletter and on the web site and actually watched a video for almost 30 minutes without closed captioning.

Not too surprisingly, they recommend free markets without regulations, in this case for drugs and medical equipment from reputable companies (with no indication of how to determine that without the government regulations, by writing their own regulations that they solemnly promise to abide by?), free trade to allow medical equipment to cross national borders and open borders for immigration to allow people to travel to get the best medical care that they can pay for, presumably.

The problems with this prescription are too numerous to list, especially for the average poster here with their poor reading comprehension and I think that I posted these back in 2009 in a thread about something along these lines so I shouldn't have to list them again, especially since the web site isn't a truly libertarian one, they don't speak for every Libertarian.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

Not enough? Here. All the regulations that interfere with the professionals effectively dealing with this? Suspend them. Wait, that's already happening. It really is, and the suspension of those regulations are helping. I know it must be painful for you to watch your precious regulations get suspended, but it is already happening.

So we're seeing the libertarian plan in action in the US?

Just this one aspect.

Does that mean everything about the response is libertarian because one aspect is?

"Let our factories dump untreated effluent into rivers to defeat COVID-19!"

"Let us employ grade-schoolers to work assembly lines to beat the virus!"

"Stop making us give employees protective gear so that we can make more hand sanitizer!"

What a wild imagination you have.

 

[bigfield]

Just this one aspect.

Does that mean everything about the response is libertarian because one aspect is?

The libertarian response, as presented, only has one aspect. Unless we count the bit where you complain that human nature isn't compatible with libertarian ideology.

I suppose there might be a second, implicit aspect to the libertarian response: "don't respond in any other way".