On Fri, 9 Mar 2012, // ravi wrote:
> Since I am dipping my feet back in the water,
> I might as well do Michael some justice and take on his challenge.
Much obliged. I'll be swifter to reply from now on.
> For a refresher, here is the link he posted to Robin?s blog post:
>
> http://coreyrobin.com/2012/03/07/when-libertarians-go-to-work/
>
> Where he writes, among other things:
>
>> So if liberty is the absence of coercion, as many libertarians claim, and if
>> the capacity to act -- say, by enjoying material conditions that would free
>> one of the costs that quitting might entail -- limits the reach of that
>> coercion, is it not the case that freedom is augmented when people?s ability
>> to act is enhanced?
>>
>> More to the point: is one's individual freedom not increased by measures
>> such as unemployment compensation, guaranteed health insurance, public
>> pensions, higher wages, strong unions, state-funded or provided childcare --
>> the whole panoply of social democracy that most libertarians see as not only
>> irrelevant to but an infringement upon individual freedom?
>>
>> In one sense, of course, the libertarians are right: such measures require
>> taxation and redistribution, limitations on what people can do with their
>> property, all of which do infringe upon some limited group of people's
>> freedom. But by providing to others some version of the freedom from
>> material constraints that Sanchez already enjoys -- state-sponsored
>> childcare, for instance, being in one limited respect the financial inverse
>> of not having children at all -- such measures would also enhance the
>> freedom of a great many more.
>>
>> That, it seems to me, is the great divide between right and left: not that
>> the former stands for freedom, while the latter stands for equality (or
>> statism or whatever), but that the former stands for freedom for the few,
>> while the latter stands for freedom for the many. "We are all agreed as to
>> our own liberty," wrote Samuel Johnson. "But we are not agreed as to the
>> liberty of others: for in proportion as we take, others must lose. I believe
>> we hardly wish that the mob should have liberty to govern us." That's why
>> libertarians like Sanchez can sense so clearly the impending infringement of
>> his freedom while remaining indifferent to the constraints of others.
Very well selected. That's the pith of the argument.
> There are two things that are troublesome in the above:
>
> 1. What Robin gives with one hand - the acknowledgement that -- in one sense --
> libertarians are right? -- he takes away immediately with the other
I'm not sure I get your puzzlement. I read that as a rhetorical trope, like "It's true that cutting off your legs will reduce your weight, but..." He's saying their rightness is outweighed by their wrongness. They have half a point but have missed the whole.
The argument here is that that freedom from taxation frees fewer people than this basket of services funded thereby would. Do you take issue with that?
> 2. Second that when Robin does try to answer the "why" question, it does not
> seem to be an answer at all. Rather he seems to beg the question. He quotes
> Johnson asserting his own assertion and concludes "that's why libertarians,"
> but where's the "that?" What is it?
I don't quite get this objection either. Johnson's argument as quoted seems clear:
<parse Johnson>
We're always for our freedom. But other people's freedom often comes at our constraint (and vice versa). Then we're against it.
<end Johnson parse>
And Corey's analogy, drawing on the section you quote, is the freedom of most working people from the constraints of arbitrary rule at work (via social insurance programs that would improve their bargiaining position) come at the cost of the wallets of the smaller number of us who aren't as contrained precisely because we've got more resources.
So libertarians aren't for maximizing freedom. They are for maximizing theirs -- people who have resources -- at the expense of people who don't.
There seems to be implied a utilitarian view -- which seems to be very much engaging liberatarians on their own ground -- that the amount of freedom given up by paying taxes to support this basket of services would be less than the freedom gained.
Do you argue with any of that as a description or a proposition? Have I missed or skipped something key?
The key part of Sanchez argument for Corey is that he freely admits the constraints of arbitrary rule at work and freely admits they are mitigated by having greater resources -- that in fact they are essential to freedom per se, because they, and they alone, make him free to escape the coercion. Otherwise he'd have to buckle under.
Since the right to leave or not take a deal plays a central role in all libertarian argument, this is a huge concession. It's not just a personal confession. I think everybody from libertarian to busgirl would admit the justice of Sanchez's aside. Libertarians just don't see it as central precisely because they don't universalize it. Which Corey does. And I think he's right. It is universal condition -- resources always condition freedom.
Again, this seems like engaging their argument at its heart. It's not new, but it's sharp. IMHO.
If this part is settled we can talk about "no one wants the mob to rule over us."
Michael