On Wed, 20 Sep 2000, Doug Henwood wrote:
> Actually I know quite a bit about libertarianism and libertarians. I
> used to be one, in fact
> <http://english-www.hss.cmu.edu/bs/36/henwood.html>.
An enjoyable article. I would be about as uncomfortable amongst the POR as you were, I'd imagine.
> (you knew that was coming), the kind of technolibertarianism that
> Paulina Borsook writes about in Cyberselfish just seems like childish
> entitlement and stubborness elevated into a political philosophy. The
> computer industry wouldn't exist in its present form without what you
> folks charmingly call the .gov - nor would the Internet. Private
> industry had no interest in funding it in its first decades - too
> much risk for uncertain reward. Silicon Valley wouldn't exist in its
> present form without the Pentagon and Stanford University, and
> Stanford, like all big universities, would be hard-pressed to keep
> the doors open without all kinds of public subsidy. And most
> libertarians are completely indifferent to private concentrations of
> wealth and power: marketers do as much to spy on people as do
> governments these days, not that that's the worst thing about
> concentrations of w&p. Wealth and power run the state most of the
> time, but unlike corporations, states are somewhat contested terrain,
> and politicians have to face elections, as flawed as they are.
Oh, sure, as I've said, I'll concede that the net would not exist without the gov't. It is not the case that EVERY action of the gov't is evil. <rhetoric>But how many lives lost at the Wacos and as victims of the Drug War are worth one internet?</rhetoric>
> I'm not sure if you're implying that "the Klintons and the Algores,"
> which is almost as charming a spelling style as MIM's "Amerika," are
> some kind of socialists, but if you are, please schedule a return to
> planet earth sometime soon.
No, just the opposite. I mean that a Socialist agenda, for all its noble goals, has to do battle with Clinton and Algore. The Clintons of the world love those concentrations of power, and if they have to paint themselves as populist to get the power they'll do it. My cynicism tells me that most of the sheeple will happily follow, since this is is just a two party race. I find it interesting how polls, media coverage, etc. always mention "should this be a three party race?" and then mention Nader or Buchanan as the "alternative", even though Browne is leading Buch. and matching, if not leading, Nader. Simply put, the sheeple would be easily duped and you end up with a new ruling class. I consider this the fundamental "flaw" with socialism; that while there exists limited resources, a ruling class will emerge because they will control those resources. Capitalism offers the most fluid type of ruling class, and a republic combined with capitalism the best way to ensure the freedoms associated with a good life. This fits nicely with my personal ethic, which says that the entrepeneur, the innovator, and the hard worker are a "better" type of person and "deserve" to live a better life; it is a Good Thing that they procreate and spread these genes while the lazy and dumb do not. For socialism to succeed (IMNSHO), you need infinite resources, and an end to the power and wealth concentrations in places like OPEC. Socialism can exist for an agrarian or an extremely technically advanced culture, but unfortunately anywhere in between the commodities become owned by tyrants who usurp the power given to the population.
On Wed, 20 Sep 2000 JKSCHW at aol.com wrote:
> Matt, I have a paper critiquing one popular argument for libertarianism:
> Justin Schwartz, From Libertarianism to Egalitarianism, Social Theory &
> Practice 1992. Someone out it on line at one point and you might be able
> to
> find it with a search engine. I would like to get your thoughts on my
> arguments. The main target of the paper is the idea that the labor
> theory of
> property, accepted by Locke and Nozick, among others, leads to
> libertarianism: I argue that on the contrary, if you accept the LTP, you
> end
> up with a version of radical egalitariansim that embpdies the principle
> Marx
> thought govcerned the highest phase of communism, To Each According to
> His
> Needs. I hope in the paper I treated Libertariansim respectfully. I
> certainly
> tried tpo give its arguments the best run for their money, as it were,
> that I
> could.
Ah, now this gives me some interesting reading. However I couldn't find that article, although I did find this:
http://lists.village.virginia.edu/spoons/marxism/DefenseE.htm
I'll keep looking, and I need to read a bit about the LTP.
On Thu, 21 Sep 2000, [iso-8859-1] Daniel Davies wrote:
> I promise you, I'm not. I learned my political
> philosophy from Hayek's biographer, and have written
> God knows how many essays on Barry, Wolff and Nozick
> (I've been to seminars given by Nozick). On the other
> hand, because I'm neither an American nor a loony, I
> know next to b-all about the Libertarian Party.
Then this may be a cultural issue. In the US there are plenty of libertarians who disagree about many issues.
> > There are degress of
> > libertarianism, but all
> > you want to recognize is the extreme version.
>
> All there is, is the extreme version. Libertarianism
> in the Nozick/Hayek sense (ie, the philosophy, not the
> party) is intrinsically an extreme theory. It's based
> on natural rights, which are absolute by definition,
> and it's individualistic, which means that
> interpersonal tradeoffs are ruled out. There isn't
> any room for a "soft" libertarianism; what you have is
> a capital-biased version of liberalism.
Agree to disagree. This is simply a matter of semantics.
> > Freedom, of both action and thought, has to end at
> > some point. When our
> > actions cause direct harm to others, for example.
>
> No, bad example. That doesn't set libertarianism
> apart from any other kind of liberalism, or indeed
> from any theory which recognises that harms are bad.
> What libertarianism believes is the complement of your
> example; that neither freedom of action or thought
> have *any* limits *unless* they cause direct harm to
> others (with "harm", IMO, defined in a very weird and
> question-begging way).
Agree - the way you phrase it is what I meant to say.
> There isn't a libertarian theory of the nation state,
> by the way, and some of the more honest libertarians
> admit it.
Does that matter? Can there be a nation state in a libertarian world? If you say no many registered Libertarians would disagree....
> > Where that line lies
> > reflects the many degrees within....
> >
> > How can I be a libertarian and support anti-trust
> > legislation against M$?
>
> Frankly, only by self-deception or by otrtuing
> libertarianism.
The ad hominems are not impressive. Please give it a rest.
> > Well, first of all, M$ is not a person, so it has no
> > rights.
>
> A complete dodge. Microsoft is a corporate fiction,
> created by Bill Gates and a syndicate of his
> supporters. To put restrictions on how they can go
> created by Bill Gates and a syndicate of his
> supporters. To put restrictions on how they can go
> about free and uncoerced exchanges is a restriction on
> their freedom, not an action against a fictitious
> entity called "Microsoft" which has no other effects.
Bollocks. Is M$ free to put out contracts on the CEOs of rivals? No. A libertarian world still has laws. M$ is NOT going about uncoerced exchanges. They are a criminal empire.
> > Second, this
> > non-corporeal entity is directly causing harm.
>
> No it isn't, and I'd be damnably surprised if you
> could prove otherwise (in a libertarian sense).
See above. It isn't about monopolising per se, but rather about the illegal business practices.
> Microsoft has not used force against anyone,
Does M$ have troops executing rivals? Well, not yet. But there are other kinds of force, particularly the economic one.
I disagree with the official position of the LP wrt to the M$ case, but then I think they, like most people, do not understand the nuances involved. Certainly the judges and lawyers do not have the skills necessary to understand what M$ has been doing.
> and it
> has not made fraudulent claims of anything like the
> magnitude which would justify the current action
> against it.
Heh. The fact that M$ sells software that it claims will work seems like fraud to me. They're basically running a protection racket.
> It has, through the popularity of
> Windows, found itself in a position in which people
> have been enticed to make a number of contracts with
> Microsoft which are highly unfavourable to them, but
> these contracts were freely entered into.
I believe there are many peculiarities about this issue which you may be overlooking. It is not an issue of those contracts, it is more about intentionally crippling competition and selling faulty goods with claims that they function.
> > > > I object
> > > > to the concentration
> > > > of power in a centralised .gov, not the notion
> > of
> > > > .gov as a social
> > > > contract.
> > >
> > > Then you're not a libertarian. You're a
> > federalist of
> > > some sort.
> >
> > I find merit in a Constitution. That you think this
> > is not orthogonal to
> > being a libertarian proves my point.
>
> No, that's not what you said. You said that you don't
> object to the notion of government of a social
> contract. That's not a libertarian position.
I believe I was addressing the question "then why aren't you an anarchist?" I don't understand what you are trying to say. One can certainly be a libertarian and support a form of gov't, as long as the gov't has a very limited scope. In the States we have many Libertarians holding office - are you going to tell them they aren't "real" libertarians as well?
On Thu, 21 Sep 2000, Doug Henwood wrote:
> Matt Cramer wrote:
>
> > > And that != thing is a bit pretentious too.
> >
> >It means "does not equal". Fairly common shorthand in informal logic.
>
> When you're writing English prose for non-geek readers, it helps to
> use words they understand rather than symbols they don't. Part of the
> process of socialization, of trying to understand your audience.
It is a struggle to know just how much of "our" slang the "non-geeks" are using. You use more than you know, probably. Smilies, for one. Email and Usenet posts float in a kind of grey area between formal letter and casual speech. We've created our own "dialect" of english, in a way. Using "!=" to denote is as natural to me as contracting "can not" into "can't". Kelley fancies herself ee cummings with her writing style, and it is interesting that no one has mentioned that yet seems to react to what I consider normal 'net slang.
> >I find merit in a Constitution. That you think this is not orthogonal
to
> >being a libertarian proves my point.
>
> Ditto "not orthogonal to."
Bah. I am not writing for USA Today, fer chrissakes.
> >Did I say this? No. I was refuting the "libertarians are all
investment
> >bankers who only want to pay less taxes because they are such greedy
evil
> >bastards" position I got so sick of hearing.
>
> Actually, the caricature that's been floating around here is not of
> greedy investment bankers, but of poorly socialized computer geeks
> who confuse juvenile narcissism with a political philosophy.
I find it interesting how such anti-class people are quick to classify people! "Poorly socialized" fnord fnord is crap, and I can't believe I'm hearing it here. That we socialise in different ways than you automatically means we are "poorly socialized". Har har, that's a good one. Come to a hacker gathering like Defcon, and see our poor social skills at work.
The stereotype of hacker as socially inept, fat, and smelling of BO is about as boring as the investment banker one.
> Far from being mutually exclusive, that's exactly the libertarian
> line: helping the poor isn't the government's business, since that
> involves coercion; it should instead be the business of private
> individuals and charitable organizations. It's also the theory behind
> George W's compassionate conservativism.
GW is no more a libertarian than Algore is a socialist. :-)
Matt
-- Matt Cramer <cramer at voicenet.com> http://www.voicenet.com/~cramer/ He who makes his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself.
-Thomas Paine