10 responses so far ↓

• 1 John Famularo // Jul 9, 2009 at 9:04 am

  “world of investment advisory services”

  They are all con-men. If they really had an insight into the stock market, they would have made so much money in the last 10 years that they would not need YOUR MONEY to fund their newsletter, or to put on their seminars.

  They like to hang around Libertarians because they are such suckers.

• 2 Donald Raymond Lake // Jul 9, 2009 at 9:27 am

  And their patron saint? Ole Joe Kennedy, the first director of the Securities Exchange Commission!

• 3 mdh // Jul 9, 2009 at 9:29 am

  Errr. Some investment advisors just do the basic work of filling people in on the information they need to be competitive in the market. They are not all con-men. They can also act as information hubs – to provide clients with information on market trends and analysis that they wouldn’t otherwise have readily accessible.

  The point isn’t to make clients unrealistically huge sums of money, but to keep them from losing their shirt and doing stupid things.

• 4 JT // Jul 9, 2009 at 10:44 am

  What MDH said.

  Unless you’re talking about people who seriously claim to commune with spirits or predict your future, it’s not right to say that everyone in any particular profession is a “con man.” In any field, some people make false promises, and some don’t. It’s up to each individual to discern which is which based on the available evidence. Writing off everyone or blindly trusting everyone is just an attempt to absolve oneself of that responsibility.

• 5 Third Party Revolution // Jul 9, 2009 at 3:00 pm

  The possibility that the Libertarian Party may grow in coming years may indeed become a reality.

• 6 Catholic Trotskyist // Jul 9, 2009 at 3:35 pm

  But probably not.

  But how dare you say that all people communing with spirits are con men? I communicate directly with God and I am not a con man.

• 7 JT // Jul 9, 2009 at 4:01 pm

  Do you charge people money to communicate messages to them from a realm of ghosts? If so, you are one.

• 8 Catholic Trotskyist // Jul 10, 2009 at 12:42 am

  No, I do that for free.

• 9 Scotty Boman // Jul 12, 2009 at 7:41 pm

  While I liked most of the article, I don’t see how supporting the IRS and socialized medicine helps us. I think Lutts is off on that count.

  It notable that one of the most successful Libertarians, Ron Paul (yes he is an LP member) supported eliminating the income tax and replacing it with nothing, and a comparatively mainstream conservative, Mike Huckabee advocated abolishing the IRS and replacing it with a national sales tax.

  One can call for quality private medical care and alternatives to the IRS, without insisting that it happens at once. Gradualism is simply the honest acknowledgment that we are part of a process in which one doesn’t get perfection overnight.

  In other-words, maximizing a voluntary non-coercive society is a destination. In looking at compromises I always look to see if it points us in the direction of that destination. As Tom Knapp once noted, “I recognize that the bulk of the passengers will be disembarking at stations somewhere east of the one for which my ticket is stamped.”

  If I believed government run health care was the solution, and that the income tax were good for the economy, I would stop being a Libertarian. To accept these views, would be to reject many of the most fundamental premises and arguments that support most libertarian positions. That doesn’t mean I would oppose intermediate measures in which some (but less) of the socialism and taxation still existed.

  The Republicans are already using our rhetoric everywhere I turn. When I corner them on the issues they show they don’t mean it. If we are to contrast ourselves from them, we must be clear that we really mean it. Otherwise, we are just neo-con Republicans with no campaign funds.

• 10 Zhu Bajie // Sep 7, 2009 at 9:49 pm

  Both Libs and Greens attract natural extremists, so are not at all likely to make the compromises necessary to govern.

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