PF: That would not be the left. That would be those who seek to pursue leftist goals through rightist tactics.

PF2: Correcting myself slightly – some of those, especially at the top of the food chain, are rightists, professing a false dedication to leftist goals in order to trick leftists into supporting rightist tactics. This has by and large been successful in recent decades.

Although I am not ruling out the possibility of converting some of those through crisis of conscience – e.g., Saul of Tarsus – they are not our primary target market. Their misled followers – especially tenuous ones just starting on their path – are.

Possibly better analogy:

We are Jews in Poland in 1942, at the train station headed for Birkenau. Our conversation is mostly revolving around what we will do after we get off the plane at LaGuardia Airport, NYC, following the war.

I’m going to take a wild guess that you did not read the linked essay or think about it before replying. Of course, I have many more links if you are interested in learning more. But replying without understanding the ideological, philosophical or historical basis for my statements will not lead to productive conversation.

The BIGGEST potential constituency for Libertarians are independents and non-voters. The people who’ve said “Fuck the government and fuck the system.” The people who’ve given up on voting. The people who think that both major parties are corrupt. These are the people who the Libertarian Party needs to reach out to the most.

If you study the origins of the terms “left” and “right,” you would understand that those are leftists. The right represents the established order, top-down authority, those it serves and those who serve and support it. The left means the underdog, those left out of the system and screwed over by it.

I do agree that more outreach should be done to the left, but to act like the left is in the same ballpark as Libertarian is nonsense. Welfare statists, union thugs, politically correct Affirmative Action supporters, environmental communists, and gun grabbers don’t have a damn thing to do with libertarianism.

That would not be the left. That would be those who seek to pursue leftist goals through rightist tactics. However, to say that they have nothing in common with libertarianism is dooming yourself to failure. Most people have some things in common with libertarianism, and other things which are not. Very few are either completely on board or completely opposed.

By all means, try to convert the people on the left who believe in some freedoms (such as anti-war and anti-drug war) and try to get them to shake off their socialist nanny state beliefs, but to act like the left has something to do with libertarianism is just as delusional as Eric Dondero and his right wing fetish.

To have this discussion in earnest it would really help if you understood what I mean by left and right. The terms mean different things to different people, and their meaning has changed over the years. If you read the essay I linked – once again that is

http://mises.org/story/2099

That would cut out much unnecessary misdirection in pursuing any conversation here.

It would be even better if you could follow up on the references provided and linked in that essay, but that would almost certainly be asking too much.

Just read it and think about it for a few minutes before replying again.

Also, you may be failing to realize or consider that many people who are motivated by opposition to militarism, the drug war, coercive religious conservatism, etc., may either have no economic position whatsoever – having never really considered economic issues in much detail yet – or, may accept coercive socialist or quasi-socialist beliefs only because they are sold as part of a faux-left “package deal.”

Since the current (right-oriented) public face of libertarianism never challenges that package deal, it has no hope of breaking it. Yet it can, should and must be broken for libertarianism to get anywhere.

Don’t forget to read

http://mises.org/story/2099

before attempting to reply.

Once again that is

http://mises.org/story/2099

Operators are standing by!

The idea that the Libertarians belong in the same general grouping with the Constitutionalists and Republicans is what belongs in the sewer of history. The space between the Libertarians, Democrats and
Greens is the new frontier of politics where the future exists. See http://voteliberalist.org/ for an interesting UK experiment.”

This is just as much a bunch of bunk as what Eric Dondero is saying. Libertarians have NOTHING to do with the right or the left. Libertarians are something totally different (or at least they are supposed to be).

The BIGGEST potential constituency for Libertarians are independents and non-voters. The people who’ve said “Fuck the government and fuck the system.” The people who’ve given up on voting. The people who think that both major parties are corrupt. These are the people who the Libertarian Party needs to reach out to the most.

I do agree that more outreach should be done to the left, but to act like the left is in the same ballpark as Libertarian is nonsense. Welfare statists, union thugs, politically correct Affirmative Action supporters, environmental communists, and gun grabbers don’t have a damn thing to do with libertarianism.

By all means, try to convert the people on the left who believe in some freedoms (such as anti-war and anti-drug war) and try to get them to shake off their socialist nanny state beliefs, but to act like the left has something to do with libertarianism is just as delusional as Eric Dondero and his right wing fetish.

The “name calling” as you characterize it – I’d called it a kind of summing up – just seemed to emerge inexorably from the underlying material in this instance.

That’s probably a mirage.

Some conclusions just scream their way through to recognition, eh?

Absolutely. But not those.

For me, the key word in that sentence is if, and the answer to whether it was is no.

Brian it may well take some time to get to the point where we do not live in a society where force is a tool.

It certainly may. On the other hand, it can also happen quickly, as historical changes often do.

* repeal of the Sixth Amendment right of the accused to “have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor”?

Good questions. I’m not sure I have all the answers.

General principle to apply:

Hard cases make bad law.

I’m in favor of moving in that direction, e.g., World’s Smallest Political Platform; (“supports reducing the size, scope or power of coercive monopoly government at all levels and on all issues, and opposes increasing the size, scope or power of coercive monopolygovernment at any level, for any purpose.”) and general adherence to the non-initiation of force principle:

http://isil.org/resources/philosophy-of-liberty-index.html

However, it is not as clear to me exactly how every detail would be implemented in an ideal world that we are very far from – nor is it clear to me that trying to hash out every possible detail of such a blueprint is in any way, shape or form the best use of our time (I’m inclined to think it isn’t).

It seems clear to me that a force-based governance model is akin to a disease of some sort – metastasized brain cancer, infectious plague or late stage hard drug addiction, for example.

In such cases, a cure is imperative, but not always possible. Removing the pathogen completely is necessary, or it will grow again – but removing it can be a very tricky operation, and can kill the patient just as certainly as the disease itself. For instance, chemotherapy can be deadly, as cold turkey withdrawal from some substance addictions can be as well (alcohol is one).

I don’t want to be too bleak however – recovery is certainly possible, and I think even likely.

But why spend so much time worrying about whether to disembark in San Ysidro or Tijuana when you are in Boston and headed for Canada?

Also posted immediately; same message awaiting moderation at BAN.

PS=Phil Sawyer
ED=E*** D****** R*******
P=Paulie (moi)
RW=Richard Winger

PS) At any rate, both parties [LP and NSGOP] (along with the Constitution Party) are bourgeois conservative parties that are going
to end up on the trash heap of history.

P) The libertarians shouldn’t be. See
http://mises.org/story/2099

Conclusion is:

“Genuine libertarianism is very much left wing. It’s revolutionary. The long and tragic alliance of libertarians with the right against the spectre of state socialism is coming to a close, as it served no purpose after the fall of the Soviet Union and so-called “conservatives” have subsequently taken to letting their true
big-government-on-steroids colors fly…. [I]n the period since the demise of the Soviet Union, both the radicals and moderates among the
left have been subconsciously seeking a new radical creed to orient themselves upon to replace Marxism…. I believe that radical
libertarians … will be most effective when they overcome any lingering right wing cultural contamination of their libertarian views and
embrace their inherent radicalism �” which is most at home on the left. For as the radicals go, so do the moderates grudgingly follow in small
steps…. It’s time for libertarians to stop fighting the left and take up the challenge of leading the left.”

Overwhelming supporting evidence in the article.

Please don’t bother to argue against the thesis without reading the supporting evidence.

PS) The Proletarian Revolution is now happening in this country and it is probably irreversible at this point.

P) Entirely doomed, just like it was in the USSR and everywhere else.

ED) 1. Libertarian Party founded in 1971 by the Colorado State Chairman of the Young Republicans.

2. 8 of 9 of all past Libertarian Party Presidential candidates came from the Republican Party, or have since returned to the GOP.

3. The 2008 Libertarian Party Presidential ticket was made up of two Republicans: Bob Barr and Wayne Root.

4. 10 out of 11 of all Libertarian State Legislators ever elected to office, were either elected as dual-party Republicans, or caucused
with the Republican Party immediately upon being sworn into office.

p) Precisely the problem with the Libertarian Party as it currently is. It needs to cut the umbilical cord to the Republicans and
conservatives completely and irrevocably, to rediscover why liberal and libertarian sound so similar, and why Frederic Bastiat sat on the
left in the French Parliament (from where we draw the categories of left and right). Then, and only then, can the Libertarian Party become
effective.

The idea that the Libertarians belong in the same general grouping with the Constitutionalists and Republicans is what belongs in the sewer of history. The space between the Libertarians, Democrats and
Greens is the new frontier of politics where the future exists. See http://voteliberalist.org/ for an interesting UK experiment.

Incidentally, left/libertarian/centrist is the plurality cluster on the Nolan quiz at US colleges (I have tens of thousands of data points
I personally gathered for this), and studies show that the vast majority of people never change their party after the age of 30.

If anyone reading is interested in donating $300 or portion thereof so that a new College Libertarian Organizing Committee can file 501c3
paperwork, please write travellingcircus at gmail dot.com and CC mdh underscore lists at yahoo dot com. We have the chair of the WV LP,
Matt Harris, who has experience in filing 501c3 paperwork and is willing to do so if we can raise the requisite fee.

Mission statement:
———————————————-
Steering committee for a proposed new effort to create professional libertarian college field outreach. Once the group is created, we will
raise funds and hire field organizers to travel, create and expand campus networks.

Could also work for things like Vans Warped Tour – we could have a libertarian booth crew travel with the tour so we are set up on every
stop, not just the ones where the local LP is organized enough to take advantage of the opportunity.
—————————————————
PS) Imperialist bourgeois capitalism, in this country, has reached and passed its zenith.

P) Anti-imperialist, anti-corporate free market/free will syndicalist voluntaryist mutualism is the future of third millenium politics. Bureaucratic imperialist socialism, imperialist bourgeois capitalism, and their synthesis of faux-democratic imperialist corporate fascism are all late second-millenium metastasized cancers, or actually strains of the same cancer of anti-free will, force-based politics.

PS) Conservative bourgeois political parties (such as GOP, LP, and ConP – not ComP) have outlived any purpose that they once had.

P) ConP, ComP – SSDD. The LP can have a bright future after it is reorganized as a non-conservative party. Otherwise, the movement will succeed outside of outmoded regime politics.

PS) Down with the bourgeois ruling class! Up with the Proletarian Revolution!

P) Down with the bureaucrat/corporate ruling class! Up with the agorist countereconomy!

RW) If Eric regularly makes $300 to $400 per day when he is working, he has a far higher annual income than I do.

P) That sounds better than what it is. I often make that much or more when I am working. However, I spend more time not working than I do working many years, and living full time on the road costs $500-1000 per week just in food and housing alone, not including luxuries such
as medical care, clothing, transportation, etc.

My nomad lifestyle makes any attempt to get an apartment turn into, essentially, overpriced storage. When I am not working, I have to
either find people willing to let me sleep on their floor, or continue to pay those same costs without knowing how long it will be until the
next job.

Donating money to political causes becomes a rather tenuous notion at this point, although I do donate more time and effort than most people.

Quite a large bundle of unsupported statements.

Appears to be nonsense at first glance, although I am open to being convinced if you can become them up and connect them.

The Hammurabi Code was written in 1700 B.C. and the Magna Carta about 1215 A.D. A great deal of time went between those two documents and it may take us a bit longer, but for some of us the effort will continue. If you wish to you may join us, if not that is fine as well.

The concern here is less with liberty per se than with its being sliced and packaged as a kind of ideological credit default swap. To posit morality as consisting in an absolutization of the idea of individual liberty cast in the context of an unspecifiable utilitarianism is like trying to dress up a package of sub-prime mortgage loans as an investment grade security.

“The only legitimate role of government can be to protect the rights of individuals.”

If a government has been duly/legally created, is it not a legitimate function of that government to defend itself from an outside decapitation attack? (meaning from beyond its borders)

The argument was here, Jim:

“And here lies the utter poverty of libertarianism, the poisonous notion that morality consists in an absolutisation of individual liberty and that, in turn, as a weakly intuited utilitarianism. ”

You had something more substantial than simple assertions to offer us?

The “name calling” as you characterize it – I’d called it a kind of summing up – just seemed to emerge inexorably from the underlying material in this instance. Some conclusions just scream their way through to recognition, eh?

As for Brian’s question(s), that’s a lot to chew on. I am more and more favoring the Dallas Accord, as I understand it, these days. For one thing, I would like to see this sentence “Government exists to protect the rights of every individual including life, liberty and property,” changed to something like “The only legitimate role of government can be to protect the rights of individuals.” This change would allow for the comfort of both anarchist and minarchist libertarians within the Party.

The Radical Caucus says “Libertarians must always make clear that the outright removal of the injustice and interference of the State is our ultimate goal.”

Let’s test that clarity standard. Is it the position of the Radical Caucus that the LP should officially advocate abolition of all State authority/power to protect the rights of every individual including life, liberty and property? I.e. should anarcholibertarianism be the official position of the LP?

Specifically, should the LP platform advocate

* that individuals have a right to renounce their affiliation with any government, and to be exempt from the obligations imposed by those governments?
* elimination of all restrictions on immigration?
* that all criminal and civil sanctions against tax evasion should be terminated immediately?
* repeal of all laws that restrict anyone, including children, from engaging in voluntary exchanges of goods, services or information regarding human sexuality?
* privatizing national defense?
* repeal of the Sixth Amendment right of the accused to “have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor”?

Went through immediately with no moderation queue

Obviously, this group is not “entirely unmoderated.” Perhaps it is only “lightly moderated.” I’ll see if it is any better than Hogarth’s mess.