That’s nice. I’ll bet we could sell that one. Yup!

You simply echo Paulie’s silly lefty propagandists who attributed 100% of the national debt to defense, for no other reason than it’s the kind of spending they personally like the least. Typing in the word “discretionary” doesn’t make this move any less silly.

I apologize for the sarcasm on unfunded liabilities. I should try harder to assume agreement with fellow Libs rather than disagreement.

Out of curiosity, how do you as an ex-Marine view veterans’ benefits? Would you immediately repudiate such obligations, just like (if I understand correctly) you would repudiate the national debt?

My position is: 1) we should honor the terms of employment that led people to choose to become government employees; and 2) we should continue “entitlement” benefits for individuals up until they have recouped their past payroll “contributions” plus interest plus inflation.

If you wouldn’t cancel veterans’ benefits tomorrow, it sounds lame to complain about them. If people should be punished financially for lending to The Omnimalevolent State, then surely they should be punished financially (at least!) for fighting for The Omnimalevolent State.

Bzzt x2.

First, those figures make a VARIABLE assumption, ranging from 23% to 91% for the “defense”-related interest figure.

Secondly, it’s reasonable to place more blame for debt on discretionary spending than on non-discretionary spending (if I pay my rent with my salary and then take out a title loan and go out for dinner and a movie, it makes more sense to blame my debt on dinner and movie rather than on rent), and on supplementary rather than regular spending (if I spend what I have, and then borrow and spend more, it makes more sense to blame my debt on the extra spending than on the initial spending).

I ignored the unfunded liabilities because I was making a very NARROW point (that “defense” spending is more than you said it is), not disputing the larger issue.

This almost as comical as when Paulie cited some figures that tried to exclude Social Security and Medicare because they are allegedly self-financed through payroll “contributions”.

For more recent numbers than either Higgs or I were using:

Oh, and thanks for completely ignoring the $50 TRILLION in unfunded nanny-state liabilities: http://libertarianmajority.net/debt

Bzzzzt. Try $651 billion for DoD proper alone, and somewhere between $925 billion and $1.144 trillion in total “defense” and “defense-related” spending for FY2009:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_budget_of_the_United_States

Like the platform– which used to, in essence, say that Ls support the individual right to any and all weapons, including WMD — if it contains goals that I find hurts the cause of liberty, I’d be inclined to not support the goal list.

If you can cobble together goals that resonate with the required super-majorities, good luck!

I’d note that we already HAVE a goal:

“As Libertarians, we seek a world of liberty; a world in which all individuals are sovereign over their own lives and no one is forced to sacrifice his or her values for the benefit of others.”

During the Reagan budget cycles, there was pretty explicit logrolling going on. Ds acceded to R defense buildups in exchange for increases in Nanny spending. Reagan/Stockman had proposed some actual domestic spending cuts, as I recall, but gave in.

Even if we forget all we know as libertarians about how comparative advantage makes trade positive-sum, it would be ludicrous to suggest that the U.S. troops in Germany and Korea are what created the American Nanny State, or that returning them to U.S. soil would dent the demand for continuation and expansion of the Nanny State.

The “Chickenhawk” argument is the weakest on my list of fourteen arguments against liberventionism. That argument says I only get to advocate the existence of crime-fighting and fire-fighting and drowning-prevention and jails if I personally am a combination cop / fireman / lifeguard / warden.

I don’t order anyone to be a soldier; the U.S. military is (and should be) all-volunteer. American soldiers voluntarily enter a contract to “obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice.” I don’t believe in any gods, but people in my family have indeed been in war. My grandfather lost a leg in one. Nevertheless, as a Libertarian I don’t believe that the lives of my family are inherently worth more than those of the many innocents abroad that the U.S. military has variously saved, avenged — or killed. In general, you can count me as in favor of minimizing the killings of innocents — by anybody.

If the American worker was not subsidizing her economic competition then maybe we would not have all that nanny state spending.

Try again!

It is a bit difficult to hand the platform out at a booth if someone ask about the LP’s position on this issue. Nor does it explain the costs associated with the present deployment which might help to sell the idea. I’ll bet dollars to doughnuts that most Libertarians not to mention most Americans have little or no idea as to how many bases we have abroad or what the costs are.

You talk about the costs your daughters have to deal with, well this one is one of the biggest. We need to deal with it and it may be at the root of the inflation we have been experiencing since the 1950s.

And just a few weeks ago, we reiterated: “The Libertarian National Committee calls on the government of the United States to withdraw the armed forces of the United States from Afghanistan, without undue delay”.

I doubt you could get the requisite supermajority to get an LP convention to demand that every last member of the U.S. armed forces be brought back to U.S. soil.

I am also for bringing the troops home from abroad. Some Libs I have spoken to say getting them home isn’t our problem. That is their problem and they should not have gone overseas in the first place. Let’em pay their own way home. Some Libs think we need to keep some forces overseas. Those are two extremes. So are we to do nothing and say nothing because of the two extremes? Me, I want to specify the goal of bring them home, spell out the numbers overseas and as some questions such as how long are the U.S. taxpayers going to support their overseas competition. We need to ask the question so that we drive the debate.

We’ve got this wonderful idea but now we are like the guy who invented a better mouse trap but didn’t tell anyone.

I’ve spent a number of years in sales and realize that one size does not fit all. I’ve also spent some time at sea and recognize that getting to your goal (port) depends on the winds, currents and weather and as one shifts you may need to change course. Same idea work in politics.

What one community decides to do may not work in another.

We do however, need to be clear as to what our goals are and we need to offer some suggestions as to how to go about achieving those goals. No one is going to be satisfied with everything all the time but right now we have people leave because we are vague on too many issues.

Robert you want people to support your St Loius Accord. Fine. I have said I will support that accord. But not any longer. Based on what I read as your unwillingness to be specific on goals that support is withdrawn. Until you are willing to provide some examples as to what you believe in other than some vague ideas I do not feel it is beneficial to myself or the LP to support the accord.

Leadership requires taking a stand out in front of the crowd. Time to do so.