"Freedom" thread or something

Can you understand the difference, Tim, between"Communism is wrong because Karl Marx made money in the private sector" and "Communism is wrong, because it is immoral to take from those who work in order to give to those who don't." ?

One is an attack on a man, the other is an attack on an idea.

timothy leary wrote: The libertarians reminds me of G.K. Chesterton's description of people who are so eager to attack a hated ideology that they will destroy their own furniture to make sticks to beat it with. James Craig Green again: Typical excuses are "the common good", "public morality", "traditional family values", "human rights", "environmental protection", "national security", and "equality". Each appeals to the confused hysteria of a segment of the population. Each allows property to be denied its rightful owner. Each denies the concept of self-ownership.

I love G. K. Chesterton.

Now I'm confused because that quote sounds very libertarian in nature and I wholly agree with it. Self-ownership is one of the chief tenets of libertarianism.

thellama73 wrote: Can you understand the difference, Tim, between"Communism is wrong because Karl Marx made money in the private sector" and "Communism is wrong, because it is immoral to take from those who work in order to give to those who don't." ? One is an attack on a man, the other is an attack on an idea.

Patronizing the opposition as if you are intellectually superior does not make your position a sympathetic or inspiring one.  In fact, it inspires me in quite the opposite direction, to not want to allow people who do that to have too much personal power. 

There are left (socialist) and right (capitalist) libertarians.  It is not a third way, outside of the left-right spectrum.  Of course, this libertarian bunch leans sharply to the right. 

Whether you like it or not, Teo, you're a right-winger. 


Edited by The Doctor - December 15 2012 at 01:48

Don't give in to Doc, just a weak troll attempt. We all know the left right spectrum is garbage. And I can't even count how many times on the internet I've seen liberals use "right wing" "ultra right wing" and similar buzz words.

The 4 square spectrum is brilliant. Saw it years ago and it changed my whole political perspective.

Though I personally hate people who just use it for their greed, and I'm sure you will cry that is what will happen! But they already use government for their greed....guess I'm just cynical (realistic?) but the greedy wealthy powerful b*****ds have always been and always will be.

I'm no anarcho-capitalist but I will say "desire to ignore the greater needs of society" it can be said that socialism/collectivism is based upon a desire to suppress to individualism. Just throwing it out there


Edited by JJLehto - December 15 2012 at 09:46

The Doctor wrote: thellama73 wrote: Can you understand the difference, Tim, between"Communism is wrong because Karl Marx made money in the private sector" and "Communism is wrong, because it is immoral to take from those who work in order to give to those who don't." ? One is an attack on a man, the other is an attack on an idea. Patronizing the opposition as if you are intellectually superior does not make your position a sympathetic or inspiring one.  In fact, it inspires me in quite the opposite direction, to not want to allow people who do that to have too much personal power.

I'm not patronizing him. I legitimately think that he doesn't understand the difference, because he has made the same ad hominem attacks three times while seeming to think that he has made a clever argument. I was simply trying to see if he understood the nature of the fallacy he is committing, but refuses to respond so I guess he still doesn't.

timothy leary wrote: Consider a "libertarian" named Self Reliant. Mr. Reliant, fifty-five years old, suffers a sudden heart attack. He calls 911, and when the paramedics arrive he directs them to the best hospital in town, which happens to be the university hospital attached to a state university. Mr. Reliant is rushed to this hospital and receives treatment in the emergency room that essentially saves his life. Mr. Reliant's comical hypocrisy is that nearly every step along the way he's acting in contradiction to his loudly broadcast principles. 1) Dialing 911 and asking for paramedics is asking for help from local government. 2) Directing the ambulance to a local state university hospital emergency room is asking for help from the state in which he lives. 3) Once inside that hospital, accepting emergency treatment is accepting help from the federal government, since it's the federal government that funds nearly all the research and development in cardiac infarction emergency care. At every step along the way, Mr. Reliant has asked for help from the very local, state, and federal institutions that he claims are intrusions in his "self-reliant" life and that he would like to see disappear. It's a comedy of hypocrisy. Were Mr. Reliant a true libertarian, he would treat his heart attack himself (and most likely die), or at the least, when the paramedics arrive, he would direct the ambulance into the woods to die among the trees. (Actually, the woods may be off-limits also, since they may be maintained by a local, state, or federal forestry service.)

Why can't he engage private practice doctors to treat him and pay them for their services? Libertarianism is not against specialization and trade. Is that really what you think we believe? No wonder you react so violently against us.

I also disagree that it is hypocrisy to take advantage of the currently in place system, even if you think that system should be changed. I would like the paramedics and the hospital to be privately run for either charity or profit and not through the coercion of others. In the meantime, while I am working to convince people of that, what good does it do to refuse medical help when I can get it? It does not further my ends and it does not prevent money from being stolen from other people. Since the state is already stealing money from me, why shouldn't I accept services provided by them so that I get my money's worth?

You are getting what you paid for.
Boy llama that's an insane and unimaginable idea isn't it ?

timothy leary wrote: Require perfection as the only applicable standard to judge government: libertarianism, being imaginary, cannot be fairly judged to have flaws.

That's not true either. There are plenty of legitimate arguments against the ideas behind libertarianism. The Doctor, to his credit, has made a number of them. You could too if you were actually interested in thinking about the issue instead of regurgitating other people's thoughts.