A letter to Libertarians.

[AllPurposeAtheist]

Dear Libertarians, stop calling 9-1-1. You're only going to get that part of the fire truck that you paid for. One half of a hub cap.

Oh, my libertarian friend Tom completely agrees with you. He says fire departments should be privatized and individuals should pay companies for emergency services. If you don't have a service contract or agree to pay, as your house is burning down, then too bad-- you should have been a responsible property owner and now you pay the price for your negligence. If the fire from your property damages a neighbor's property that neighbor can sue you.

If Tom's house is on fire and he screams to you from the window with flames licking at his back to call 911 you better demand payment upfront for your bother. Otherwise you probably won't get paid. Tell him cashiers check only.   :-k

[Mister Agenda]

Nope, libertarians favor nullification to be able to nullify any federal law they don't like. Basically they want to balkanize the US into some powerless confederation of independent states.

I'm a libertarian and I don't agree with that at all. Q.E.D.

And what's the deal with the Libertarian Party getting the blame for Republicans who say they're libertarian? Hint: if someone isn't a civil libertarian, they are not a libertarian at all. The DEFINITION of libertarian is the emphasis of both civil and economic liberties, there are already perfectly cromulent words for people who only pick one of them.

[Mister Agenda]

I for one have never seen a good definition of what Libertarian is. People like Rand Paul certainly do not echo my beliefs, and I frankly avoid discussing the issue because it is too murky for me.

"A Libertarian is a Republican that's too embarrassed to say so.'

A Republican is a Democrat who's been mugged.

[Mister Agenda]

You'll have to do better than that. You'll have to come up with a definition that fits exactly what Libertarian is so that we can define it. Libertarian is a catch all name. People who are both liberal and conservative call themselves Libertarian, Sorry, don't buy it.

Um, liberal and conservative are catch-all names, too. Why do you buy that, but have a problem with libertarians being on a spectrum?

Wikipedia says: "Libertarianism is a set of related political philosophies that uphold liberty as the highest political end. This includes emphasis on the primacy of individual liberty,political freedom, and voluntary association. It is an antonym of authoritarianism. Although libertarians share a skepticism of governmental authority, they diverge on the extent and character of their opposition."

Liberalism and conservatism are not more concise or less diverse. Much of libertarianism falls under classic liberalism, which could be described as moderate libertarianism in modern terms.

[stromboli]

Ask 10 people on the street what they are politically and half of them will tell you they are Libertarian. So same statement- define Libertarian so that I can understand it. And don't give me that "I'm a Libertarian except I agree with this, this and this" bullshit.

And I repeat- Social Security, Medicare, ACA (yes, we need it) and other stuff is big government. The ideal government is not one where people are allowed to do whatever they please; that is anarchy. Libertarian is a catch phrase. Capitalists love to call themselves Libertarian when they are trouncing worker's rights. Good ol' boys down yonder call themselves Libertarians when they's out shootin' the hawgs from helicopters. Tea Partiers call themselves Libertarians when they are drawing Social Security and using Medicare.

 The simple fact is that big government is necessary to a certain degree. The purpose of government in part is to provide for those who can't provide for themselves- the poor, the aged, the physically and mentally unfit. The Repubs call it socialism, but the fact is that their cronies like the NFL and Pharmaceutical companies benefit from tax breaks and subsidies far more than the poor do.

Libertarian is a word. Define it so i can understand it.

[josephpalazzo]

Libertarian is a word. Define it so i can understand it.

Libertarian is a pile of fucking shit.

Hope that helps.

[Mister Agenda]

Libertarian is a word. Define it so i can understand it.

You couldn't understand the Wikipedia description?

I can no more stop Republicans from calling themselves libertarians than I can stop them from calling themselves rational. We can't control what people call themselves. Politicians call themselves whatever they think will help them get elected. You're holding libertarianism to a different standard. What is your justification for this?

[SGOS]

Libertarian is a word. Define it so i can understand it.

Libertarian is a pile of fucking shit.

Hope that helps.

While I sort of agree with you, I think politics of any color or stripe are unfortunately filled with piles of shit.  That's because they are usually based on some over riding umbrella ideology, and while ideologies are seldom entirely good or entirely bad, they are certainly going to be problematic when they come into conflict with reality.

In Libertarianism, the umbrella ideology seems to be about autonomy of property rights, and to a lesser degree, lifestyles.  The idea being that if the government would just butt out of everyone's personal business, everything would work out.  However, where the rubber meets the road as it merges with the medium of reality, Libertarianism doesn't seem to hold much promise.  I believe this is true, because in general, people are just a bunch of pricks:  "Fuck your needs, Buddy.  I got needs of my own."  This of course is why the ideology of "Government" itself has become universal.  Government is seen as something necessary to provide fairness in a society of self serving individuals.

As others have pointed out, it's easy enough to find a definition of Libertarianism in Wikipedia, but in visiting a forum for Libertarians, I ran into the same thing others have noted.  It's hard to pin down individual Libertarians about what they want.  It's attractive to the disgruntled that have some real or imagined bone to pick with the government over some single issue, and that clouds the umbrella ideology, or what Libertarianism is supposed to be.  All Libertarians point out their love of autonomy and individual rights, but in the forum I visited, it was clear to me that the need for autonomy ends quickly when someone else's autonomy conflicts with another's.  As a result, we end up with government.

However, I don't want to single out Libertarians.  Do they generally pay mostly just lip service to the umbrella?  Yep.  Are they Ideologues? Yep.  Self serving?  Yep.  Idealists?  Yep.  But so are conservatives and liberals, and I'm a liberal.

[stromboli]

So let us apply Libertarian ideals. Privatize prisons. Oh wait, we did that. The reports tell us that they are poorly run, cost much more to operate and surprise- the money doled out for private prisons seems to wind up in the pockets of people running the prisons and not for the benefit of the prisoners. Why? Lack of oversight, primarily because state level politicians want to not see what is happening, and prisoners by and large don't have a voice in the media or government.

Privatize Defense department overhaul and maintenance of equipment. Nnope, once again, way more expensive and not as well done as under the defense department's government employed people- of which I was one.

We have these things that Libertarians want to have removed because they just don't want to bother with them, like the EPA. Ask the people of West Virginia how that worked. The "oversight" of the chemical storage that polluted the rivers in West Virginia was due to lack of funding and the attitude of Republican congressmen that the EPA was nothing but a pain in the ass. Surprise, now they are all over the need for greater oversight and control.

And ask the Texans about the chemical spills down there, once again with lax or no government oversight.

The post office? Last Christmas, both Fedex and UPS were late delivering their stuff. the post office wasn't. Dollar for dollar the post office is cheaper to operate and more efficient than any other delivery company.

The ideal government has to have oversight to ride herd on private industry run amok, period. There have to be safety nets that big government provides. There has to be as much transparency as possible so that misbehaving businesses are caught. There has to be regulation and prioritized guidelines to provide standards in areas like construction and manufacturing. Imagine what would happen if every baby crib was built with any method whatsoever and there were no standards of crib bar width, height, and so on. How many babies strangled in the crib bars do you want? We have all of the agencies and bureaus for a reason.

[SGOS]

I should clarify something.  I don't see Libertarianism part of the set that includes liberal and conservative.  To me, it belongs with the set that includes Democrat and Republican.

[Jason Harvestdancer]

I for one have never seen a good definition of what Libertarian is. People like Rand Paul certainly do not echo my beliefs, and I frankly avoid discussing the issue because it is too murky for me.

"A Libertarian is a Republican that's too embarrassed to say so.'

Also opposes the war, which Republicans support.
Also supports gay marriage, which Republicans oppose.
Also opposes the drug war, which Republicans support.
Also opposes bailouts, which Republicans support.
Also opposes the security police state, which Republicans support.

Other than all the things Libertarians and Republicans disagree on, they agree.

BTW, have you ever seen the firefighters in "Gangs of New York"?  :shock:

A work of fiction, by the way.

Back when fire fighter companies were private, they actually did put out fires of non-subscribers.

So let us apply Libertarian ideals. Privatize prisons. Oh wait, we did that. The reports tell us that they are poorly run, cost much more to operate and surprise- the money doled out for private prisons seems to wind up in the pockets of people running the prisons and not for the benefit of the prisoners. Why? Lack of oversight, primarily because state level politicians want to not see what is happening, and prisoners by and large don't have a voice in the media or government.

Um, no.  That's contracting, not privatization.  A private prison would have non-government clients.  Private parties would be paying that prison to hold inmates.  Except that would be kidnapping and slavery, which would have the private prisons and their clients sent to government prisons or contracted prisons.

It's a common mistake, and I'm beginning to think it is not accidental, when people refer to these examples of contracting as if it is privatization.  It is a monopsonitic relationship instead, where this for profit business has one and only one customer, the government.

I should clarify something.  I don't see Libertarianism part of the set that includes liberal and conservative.  To me, it belongs with the set that includes Democrat and Republican.

That's due to the unfortunate fact that the party name and the ideology name are the same.  That leads to a convention on the internet of using "libertarian" to refer to the ideology and "Libertarian" to refer to the party.  The capitalization makes the difference.

That means the phrase "libertarian Democrat" and "liberal Libertarian" are not self-contradctory because the first term refers to the ideology while the second term refers to the party.

[mykcob4]

You are obviously quite biased toward your own political agenda and seem to have a hard-on for anything resembling a conservative, in which you've included libertarians.  I think your sources, which seem dubious at best, appear cherry-picked to reflect your bias.

As a self-proclaimed libertarian, with a small "l", I'll tell you what it means to me.  The Stanford Encyclopedia says it pretty good for starters, "libertarianism, in the strict sense, is the moral view that agents initially fully own themselves and have certain moral powers to acquire property rights in external things."  The big part for me is self-ownership, and I think that's the big part for a lot of libertarians.  While I think government should small, only as big as absolutely necessary, and follow the principle of subsidiarity, I still think there is a necessary role for government in modern day society.  On social matters I lean liberal (in the classical sense), and don't have a desire to oppress anyone.  I watch CNN more than FOX and think Glen Beck is an opportunistic parasite.  I'm not a rich capitalist, don't hate anyone just because they're LGBT, I'm not a Christian, and have never turned in an illegal immigrant.  I even support a social safety net (Milton Friedman style) for practical reasons.  Oh, and I don't belong to the Libertarian party (hence the little "l").  I don't even know what their agenda is.

You might want to look at some other sources for your information.

Thank you Jack for your honest straight forward post. As you say I have a dislike of conservatism and yes I do include libertarianism in with that ideology. One I am a Liberal with a big "L" as you might be able to tell. I am a Progressive with a big "P".
Now what I don't like about libertarianism and it's agenda is the notion of NO government or a government paid for piecemeal. Privatizing everything makes no sense. Not having a standard makes no sense. The idea that the market will work everything out has been historically proven wrong. Leaving the market to it's own devises only allows the rich and powerful to exploit everyone and everything else with NO ethical compass. No public schools means no education for the masses. Letting each tax payer delineate what his taxes pays for leaves every service underfunded and set up to fail. The whole project by committed thing.
And BTW what libertarian means to you and what it means to each individual that calls themselves a libertarian isn't usually what it is at all.
Why I think that libertarian may be attractive to some people.
1) As someone said republican has become embarrassing so people seek a new title for the same thing.
2) There are those that want to ignore and actually hate the idea of social and civil responsibility. They think that libertarian allows them to be truly independent. Well that is a lie. Libertarianism is a sham that is nothing more than corrupt giant corporate monopoly protectionism. The lie about small government and lower taxes is just that. What is not said is that they want to defund things like regulations that protect workers, consumers, the environment, competition, small business. They want to privatize things like education because they want to 1st destroy unions and 2ndly end education altogether.
Those are just two reasons that I see why people call themselves libertarian.
And btw little "l" doesn't actually mean anything except that you lack conviction and or commitment.
As for the sites I posted they were the first ones that came up that were not by the libertarian party itself. There were literally 100s of 1000s. I just posted the top three. Basically the dozen plus I checked out all said the same thing, except of course the libertarian sponsored ones.

[Jason Harvestdancer]

That's due to the unfortunate fact that the party name and the ideology name are the same.  That leads to a convention on the internet of using "libertarian" to refer to the ideology and "Libertarian" to refer to the party.  The capitalization makes the difference.

That means the phrase "libertarian Democrat" and "liberal Libertarian" are not self-contradctory because the first term refers to the ideology while the second term refers to the party.

It isn't about conviction, it's about differentiating between the name of the ideology and the party.

It is easy to tell the meaning difference between liberal and Democrat or conservative and Republican.  But when someone says "libertarian" it leads to the question of whether one is referring to the party or the ideology.

That's why one can refer to a "liberal Libertarian" or a "libertarian Democrat" without contradiction, because the capitalization tradition serves to differentiate between the party and the ideology.

[mykcob4]

What's the difference in outsourcing, privatizing and contracting.
1) Contracting - Allowing private companies to bid on and win a contract to do a specific job for a specific price over a specified period of time.
2) Privatizing - Allowing several companies to do a job and compete for customers OR  Allowing private companies to bid on and win a contract to do a specific job for a specific price over a specified period of time.
3) Outsourcing -  Allowing private companies to bid on and win a contract to do a specific job for a specific price over a specified period of time.
Privatizing prisons is exactly contracting or outsourcing.
I could just see it:
There is a crime on the street. Privatized law enforcement goes into action. No less than 18 different companies compete to apprehend the perp.
They all corner the perp at the same time. They all start shooting killing the perp, 12 bystanders, nine of themselves, a squirrel in the new privatized city park, 200 glass windows, 84 parked cars, and luckily an empty baby stroller. One of the companies drags the now lifeless body of the perp off to the private prison and incarcerates him. There the perp will spend 85 years behind glass(even though he is dead) and his family will have to pay the $284.75 a day subject to increases what ever the market will bear over that time.
Yeah libertarianism will bring us great liberty and freedom.

[Jason Harvestdancer]

Oh my goodness, your myth about private police sounds exactly like the LAPD on a good day.