Difference between revisions of "What Is Libertarianism?"

From Critiques Of Libertarianism
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(Wishful Thinking)
(Technological Utopianism)
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What they all miss is that creation of a new frontier doesn't change those left behind into a libertarian society.  And as the frontier matures, density and competition will bring about the same problems that led to the governance that libertarians object to, the same as happened in other frontiers in the past.  Libertarianism might "work" on the edges of expansion, but creates problems that grow until a government solution is needed.
 
What they all miss is that creation of a new frontier doesn't change those left behind into a libertarian society.  And as the frontier matures, density and competition will bring about the same problems that led to the governance that libertarians object to, the same as happened in other frontiers in the past.  Libertarianism might "work" on the edges of expansion, but creates problems that grow until a government solution is needed.
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== A Herd of Cats ==
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Libertarianism, with its excessive emphasis on individualism, tends to lack coordinating mechanisms besides markets.  Liberalism has markets, politics and government, which between the three of them can coordinate group efforts up to and including eradication of smallpox and total wars.  Organizing libertarians is like herding cats: oxymoronic.  In 10 years, the Free State Project has only been able to line up half of the 20,000 people it thinks are necessary to be effective, despite funding from the Koch Brothers.<ref>Pam Martens, [[The Far Right's Plot to Capture New Hampshire]]</ref>
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== The Libertarian Party ==
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US third parties are often a joke, but the LPUSA is a particularly funny one.  It is by far the most public face of libertarianism, and to many libertarians it is libertarian orthodoxy.  Indeed, many LP members don't seem to know that there are other libertarians with other beliefs.  Like some other third parties, it was founded with funding from billionaires, the Koch brothers.  The LPUSA has been crippled by internal conflict, corruption, declining membership, purges, featherbedding, grotesquely radical platforms, repulsive candidates and a preference for preaching to rather than serving the public.  Consequently, few LPUSA candidates get elected to positions higher than dogcatcher, and then often as stealth candidates in nonpartisan elections.
  
 
== Conclusion ==
 
== Conclusion ==

Revision as of 23:05, 12 October 2010