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Pure libertarianism indeed is Marxism turned inside out, it could be as anarchic as Marxism is totalitarian.

As a note, if (or when) Obama wins the Democratic nomination my strongly Democratic wife will vote for McCain. She will always be more liberal than I and unlike me, remain a Democrat and would vote for Hillary if she were to win the nomination. I have a feeling that every vote McCain might lose to a potential Bob Barr will be doulbed by people like my wife. How can I say this? Because my Mother and Law has said the same and she is more of a liberal Democrat than my wife.

By the way I told them concerning Hillary’s campaign…

- less then 10% of the black vote…
- media in the tank for your opponent…
- assumed to be racist…
- a media turned against you…
- turning to Fox News for a fair shake…

now you an inkling of what it is like to be a Republican.

Lots of political ideologies are premised on another ism: idealism.

Which is why they appear to be living in another (unreal) world.

Ah, but that’s the good part about being a Heinlein-ian libertarian — they don’t believe in ism’s either. Just radical personal responsibility: you’re *always* free to choose, and you’re *always* responsible for what you do.

Joesph:

I have heard several Democrats say they will not vote for Obama, not when McCain is in the race.

Libertarians are divorced from reality, they really are.

As with all other “isms”, libertarianism and human nature don’t mix very well. The genius of our founding documents,with the provision for division of and countervailing power, was to give us the optimum framework to maximize our liberty,given our human nature.

We’re not divorced from reality, just separated from the current reality of the USSA socialist state that our country has become.

Most of us Libertarians really don’t believe every street should be a private road and all fire and police should be provided privately.

We *are* sick and tired of laws that diminish our freedom and enslave us with high taxes.

Freedom!

Joseph (formerly Samuel)

OT. It’s good to “see” you again. Great insight as usual.

Libertarianism is helpful as an ideal because it repeatedly asks us to examine our assumptions about human nature and figure out the level of responsibility we have. Ought implies can (as I.K. once said). Because of so many technological (and other) changes, the nature of what humans can do is ever changing, so we must regularly re-examine what responsibility means.

In practice some of the uber-libertarian crowd (sometimes, some of the folks at Reason and some of the Paulian crowd) go off the deep end IMHO and become almost prissy in the manner by which personal responsibility is discussed, as if they believe they only contribute to society but do not benefit from it. Nonetheless I think libertariansim is important because it provokes us to think about first principles.

I used to be a Big-L libertarian, then a little-l and now just a conservative. Libertarianism and libertarians are just too utopian to make policy.

However, there are good ideas in libertarianism. The best use of them is as a benchmark to view policies against. Not as a deciding factor, but a reminder of a useful perspective.

Libertarians have a terrible time with foreign policy, because they don’t trust government at all, but only government can carry out foreign policy – especially in as powerful a country as the US. So the most extreme tell you: “when they come across the border, take out your second amendment protected nuclear weapons and fight back,” or, it’s in your right to hire an army. Do so.

Sigh.

Even more sensible ones like Bob Barr are tainted by a reflexive isolationism.

As I’ve reached middle-agism, I am less enchanted with anything and anyone that are too highly charged with any isms. It’s a monumental borism…

Maybe the two of ‘em can run together. Ron-Barr has a nifty ring to it, like Ronco. And the popeil will love it.

Joseph, may I ditto Barry and say it’s good to “see” you again?

I’ve taken to defining myself as a conservative with libertarian tendencies.

CC, you sound like the “mythical moderate Muslim” complaining that the fanatics aren’t REALLY the main stream. You may be right but you aren’t in control of the libertarian message.

I don’t know that people that are anti-big government and pro-personal responsibility can rightly be called libertarians. But, those two attributes seem to get you “forced” into that ideological camp because of the, apparently, overwhelming need to categorize people by their views on certain issues.

To me, Rational Anarchism (as Heinlein discusses in “The Moon is A Harsh Mistress”) seems to be the only -ism that appears workable with humans.

You follow the law until it conflicts with what you want to do. At that point, you decide if what you want to do is worth breaking the law and dealing with the consequences.

So far its worked out pretty well for me.