I still feel somewhat Schitzoid – wanting the most personal liberty as an individual, but terribly distrusting of ” the private sector” as being a solution to our nation’s needs.

Your discourse has kept me looking deeper into these issues. I fear though that the “hold that line” menatlity will keep us in deadlock and prevent any real results in changing our government from happening.

LINCOLN! LINCOLN! LINCOLN! GO LINCOLN!

Regarding corporations, it is inane to believe that multinational corporations will lose their power if government loses its power. Just the opposite is more likely. The cartels that Teddy Roosevelt battled in earned his “trust buster” sobriquet, were created during an era of laissez-faire small government. While I believe that business should be given every opportunity to self-regulate, the incentive to do so is larger when the there is a threat that government will step in and screw things up if they don’t.

Democrats may want to link up with us libertarians, but we libertarians have little if any interest whatsoever of linking up with Democrats.

Put aside for a moment our huge disagreements on economic issues.

Democrats are even bad these days on civil liberties. Who is pushing all the smoking bans all over the US? Democrats. Who is it that’s calling for a return to the Military Draft? Democrats. Who was it that got our libertarian petitions kicked off the ballots all over the US like MT, MO, and NV in 2006? Democrats. Who is it that protests and disrupts speeches by libertarians on college campuses all over the US? Democrats. Who is it that wants to take our guns away? Democrats.

Who is it that supports anti-libertarian affirmative action laws? Who is it that supports seat belt laws? Who is it that wants to force little kids riding bicycles to weat helmets? Answer to all the above: Democrats

When was the last time you even heard a Democrat supporting legalization of marijuana?

There are virtually no areas of agreement between Democrats and libertarians. Maybe Pro-Choice on abortion and Gay Rights. But even there Dems want government funding and “special rights for Gays”(which we libertarians oppose).

Further, how many libertarians ever win election as Democrats? Virtually none. How many libertarians win as Republicans? Hundreds like former Libertarian Party Presidential candidate Ron Paul now a Republican Congressman from Texas.

“libertarian Democrat”? A stupid idea if there ever was one.

Eric Dondero at http://www.mainstreamlibertarian.com

As far as corporations, liberals seem not to get the point that CORPORATIONS ARE CREATED BY AND SUPPORTED BY THE STATE. If you want to disempower corporations, join with libertarians in rolling back the state. It is through government that corporations are chartered. It is government tax policies that subsidize the inherent costs of centralized production and distribution. It is government that writes regulations that favor corporations (yes, indeed, regulations are cartelizing forces that increase big business hegemony via political means).

If it were not for government, there would be no corporations as we know it. Period. The point is so fundamental that it boggles my mind liberals and progressives fight it. If you want a regulated society you are BY DEFINITION introducing the kind of central planning and special interest politics that promotes centralized business and centralized government.

Liberals seem to love corporations, as long as they do things liberals like.

“No, hktelemacher, you and other libertarians don’t understand REALITY. I’m talking reality, you’re talking theory – theory that is fundamentally flawed & with very evidence to support it…. Like most libertarians, I suspect that you have no real experience in government in America or anywhere else in the world. If you did have experience with any regulatory agency as an employee, lobbyist, or observer, you would see how rampant corruption is in the private sector! And, how that private sector corruption dominates small gov’ts in the Third World even more effectively than large gov’ts… Monopolization of power whether in the private sector or the public sector is the problem. Liberals see this, libertarians don’t! ”

You hit the nail on the head. Privatization is sometimes a good idea, sometimes not. But, libertarians all believe that the pivate sector can do no wrong and government can do no right.

Some liberals are skeptical of any attempts to privatize. Others, like Clinton & the DLC, are not. Clinton privatized or deregulated many government functions and industries. Some plans worked, some didn’t. Libertarians refuse to learn from history. They just spin wild utopian theories.

Hktelemacher’s response is typical of most libertarians I’ve argued with. Don’t expect anything more. They have no defense against any of your arguments above.

They can’t explain why low-tax small government developing countries don’t develop.
They can’t explain how cutting the SEC will create fewer Enrons.
They can never respond to yout “tragedy of the commons” argument either, etc.

They think they have all the answers, because they just preach to the choir. But, someone comes along with real substantive detailed argument challenging the fundamentals of their ideology they always claim that YOU simply don’t understand their theories. Well, you said it, THEY don’t understand reality and can’t support their theories with hard facts.

I’ve argued with many libertarians. Libertarians often remind me of Trotskyists trying to explain why “real socialism has never been tried” & “if only the Soviet Union had organized differently, according to Trotsky’s theories, than all would have been utopia.” yadda yadda yadda. The Objectivist libertarians are just as devoted to their religion as diehard Trotskyists are too. LOL

There’s THEORY and then there’s REALITY. Libertarians are short on reality.

Liberalism, on the other hand, has a looooong history of sucesses to point to:

Federal Reserve, interstate highway system, the 5-day work week, employer-sponsored health care, public education (vs. illiteracy in the 19th century), Medicare, ending senior citizen poverty with Social Security, Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, women’s rights, worker safety, Civil Rights Act, etc.

What has libertarianism done for anyone, but offer promises that don’t deliver. Reagan’s voodoo economics cut taxes, but then left us with a huge deficit and a recession the early 90s. No quick fixes. Libertarianism creates wealth for the wealthy. Liberalism leads to higher standards of living everywhere. The evidence is clear.

I said nothing about the “libertarian view of slavery”. The point on slavery at the end of my post was it was the PRIVATE SECTOR that invented the slave trade. And, it was government that ended it! The private sector NEVER would have addressed the issue by themselves. The private sector view in both the North & the South was laissez faire with regard to slavery and slave owners.

Sorry, my point went over your head!

Government does do some good in the world. And, by extension there are many, many, many other examples (e.g. taking lead out of gasoline) that the private sector never in a million years would have ended on their own.

Strict government regulation and even outright bans are often necessary. Sorry, the free market will never address public interests, only private interests & monopoly interests, if left to it’s own devices.

Libertarian theories are mostly just feel-good bumper sticker solutions to complex issues.

Sorry, all evidence shows the opposite of what libertarians preach, Cutting government oversight of the financial sector or the environment, etc. leads to MORE Enrons & Love Canal & Bhopals, NOT LESS.

All “evidence” for often-repeated libertarian successes for things like school vouchers are spurious at best. There is NO EVIDENCE anywhere of any for-profit schools providing basic education more efficiently than public schools (i.e. same or better education with LOWER COST PER STUDENT). Yet you and others still repeat such garbage.

Somethings the government can simply do better. Medicare administrative costs are just 3%. No private health care company can match that. Their profit margin is larger than that.

Liberals are ALL FOR reforming and streamlining of government programs to make them function better. Liberals are 110% supportive upholding civil liberties too! But, the libertarian mantra that GOVERNMENT IS THE PROBLEM or CAN DO NO RIGHT is just absurd.

WASTE AND CORRUPTION IS THE PROBLEM. Cutting government across the board might reduce waste and corruption in an absolute sense – just as I said above there is less total corruption in a city government than a federal government. But is the percentage of waste & corruption versus benefits for tax dollars spent LESS in a smaller government? No. Not necessarily.

And that is where your ideology FAILS. Simply cutting, doesn’t improve efficiency. Intelligent reform is what is needed – reform that upholds basic constitutional rights and community standards and applies those standards efficiently (less waste) & impartially (less corruption).

There are no magic bullets. “Government” in general is not the problem. Nor, is it, by itself, the solution. Bad government is the problem. Working to create “good government” – by first removing the unbalancing influence of for-profit corporations on our politics – is the solution.

When libertarians realize that reform & upholding rights takes hard work, that there are no magic bullets, then they can join with liberals to create a better America. Until then, forget it, we don’t want you in our party. As progressives we want people who understand the problem and are willing to work to make our country better, NOT clueless people who don’t care about anything but their own tax cuts or their god-given right to smoke pot.

I addressed it directly. No evidence that voluntary programs and self-policing work. Nor, is the problem ever solved when the prosecuter representing the public interest is under-funded and can’t effectively compete with private interest polluters. And, it REALLY doesn’t work if the prosecuter is being paid (even indirectly) by those that he is regulating.

“if you don’t understand the libertarian response to corruption in the private sector,”

I addressed that directly too. Your response to my criticism? … NONE! Small underfunded government regulators + powerful private special interests = more corruption. Please, visit any capitalist Third World country with a small government & low tax base and you will be instantly dispelled of your “cutting gov’t spending means less corruption” myth.

“if you do not understand the difference between libertarianism and federalism”

I addressed that too. I showed how libertarian theories of governance fail even at the small scale. Nothing built up from such a flawed foundation can possibly suceed at the large scale!

It is YOU, hktelemacher, who has no interest in learning!

You just want to preach your theories to the choir and ignore all evidence from the real world to the contrary.

The problem with you & most libertarians is they don’t want to learn from the mistakes of others. There is plenty of empirical evidence from all over the world that proves libertarian ideology and policies are fundamentally flawed and when I point these things out to you, YOU CLAIM that I don’t understand your theory.

No, hktelemacher, you and other libertarians don’t understand REALITY. I’m talking reality, you’re talking theory – theory that is fundamentally flawed & with very evidence to support it.

Like most libertarians, I susupect that you have no real experience in government in America or anywhere else in the world. If you did have experience with any regulatory agency as an employee, lobbyist, or observer, you would see how rampant corruption is in the private sector! And, how that private sector corruption dominates small gov’ts in the Third World even more effectively than large gov’ts.

Monopolization of power whether in the private sector or the public sector is the problem. Liberals see this, libertarians don’t!

You guys want “free lunches” – i.e. all the benefits from a big gov’t (like good roads & not dropping dead from tainted foods or rampant epidemics as in the Third World), but without having to pay for it!