The biggest problem, I believe, and I have posted this on other threads- is our straying from the realities of the world and ignore the reality of business and economics, and replace it with untested , and perhaps untestable thoughts on how to run a super-size super power economy, and maintain the very security of the nation.

For instance- social programs. The constitution, I believe, is being stretched with the "general welfare clause"- to me, in philosophy, is correct, but in reality, is recipe for revolution.

Hungry poeple at the bottom make revolutions, not full poeple in the middle! At least that is true when you have a large, modern population. If you have millions of starving poeple living in the streets during an economic downturn, such as the great depression, that is when revolutionary ideas and thoughts of violent overthrow of the goverment become pretty commonplace.

Socialism, Marx style, almost came to this country because of the great depression, and was only averted IMO because of a public works programs FDR put in place that put able bodied men to work. Had Coolidge or Hoover continued thier old policies, we probably wouldn't have this nation today!

Okay, I hoped I explain this somewhat- someone will try to debate my statements on the depression- but my point is not causes of the great depression, but that sometimes goverment has to step in and help capitalism.

Regulations are not created in a vacuum. I feel we have too many for small business, not enough for corporate business, specificaly publically traded companies.

Goverment subsidizes business, when it is done right, to put domestic business on equal footing with another goverment's subsidies - or to maintain a strategic industry- for instance, there needs to some sort of steel industry in any super power because without one, you are vunerable to not having any steel if a nieghbor invades you, the one with all the steel.

Libertarians, some, are for total free markets, and using trespassing type criminal and civil code to regulate business wrongdoing.

According to many libertarians, there would be no SEC regulating wall street execs, the market would do it- there would be no anti-trust laws and monopolies would be allowed to stand.


Well, I think anyone can see the potential for abuse and instability in an TOTALLY unrestricted capitialist society, short of slavery (suppose we say slavery is illegal in this totally open market).


As a libertarian, what goverment programs, or regulations, can you live with, whether it be some kind of small welfare system, basic medical, subsidized steel industry or farm industry, Social security, medicaid, medicare etc

If you can't live with any of them that are not specifically mentioned in the constitution- do you think we would have a stable goverment?

As a libertarian, what goverment programs, or regulations, can you live with, whether it be some kind of small welfare system, basic medical, subsidized steel industry or farm industry, Social security, medicaid, medicare etc

I think I could live with Social Security, if the law was revised to allow each citizen the option to place his contributions into a private account under his own control. I can appreciate the liberal argument about the need for a safety net, but I think Social Security, as it exists now, is not much of a net and it is decaying rapidly.

Subsiziding the steel industry, I can live with, if it is solely for the purposes of national security. Steel is important to our military dominance. I don't approve of subsidies if they are for economic purposes. The free market can do the job much better than the government.

Government de-regulation of harmful drugs is not an issue I jump up and down about. I do believe that violent crime does increase with regulation of drugs, and that things would likely be better without the regulation. But I can live with the regulations.

But for the most part, especially economic matters, there is virtually no program that I approve of.

If you can't live with any of them that are not specifically mentioned in the constitution- do you think we would have a stable goverment?

I think our government is pretty unstable right now. It is bloated and top-heavy, and if it continues to grow, it will reach a point where the People can no longer carry it.

I think we could shut down 95% of what the federal government does right now and still have it be stable. If there are programs that need to exist, I am confident the States could pick them up, and do a better job.

I think we could shut down 95% of what the federal government does right now and still have it be stable. If there are programs that need to exist, I am confident the States could pick them up, and do a better job.

So do you know what 95% of the fed does right now? Medicaid, Medicare and Soc Sec are fed programs that are already (mostly) state administered- for instance- you go to the welfare/medicaid state office to apply for medicaid- and the check itself is usually disbursed by your state (I am not sure if that is true for all states, but most I have looked into so far)

1) The reality of the world today- all G-8 developed nations- have at least this much goverment spending as we, or more. They compete with us. It goes back and forth for market share and such, but we don't always win! How do you suppose to compete against a country that subsidizes thier goods and services- without resulting to protectionism?

2) The reality of our economy today- the US goverment is the largest corporation in the world- what do you think would happen to the nations economy lost 95% of the largest corporation in the world out of it's economy? No goverment growth, much less cuts, can trigger a recession, or if big enough, trigger a depresion GW Bush added over 150K goverment jobs just in Homeland security alone- How will the nations economy, already pretty fragile, take to 10 times that amount of job loss?

Where to you suppose to cut this 95%? Please clarify!

For the medicare and medicaid programs, let the States administer them completely. If they are already mostly there, great. They can do a better job of seeing the money spent where it's needed and prevent abuse of the system.

Close down the Department of Education. Education is vital, yes, but the federal government is wasteful, inefficient, and ineffective at seeing American's educated. Give that power completely back to the States, who will then give it back to the communities to whatever degree seems appropriate to the citizens of that State.

We don't need the Department of Agriculture. Again, the free market can make sure that we produce the food we need. Farm subsidies especially do harm, since 1) they keep farms in business that cannot make it on their own, making them a burden, and 2) keep those farms that could otherwise compete from being competitive, because their subsidized neighbor can undercut their price.

We should stop all the foreign aid we've been giving, especially since a great deal of it goes to governments who use that money to oppress their own people, or at the very least, suppress the free market. Our contribution may help in the short-term, but they will always need more money.

and so forth...

1) For every dollar a socialized nation spends on subsidizing their goods and services, it had to first confiscate (tax) a dollar from its citizens. Competing is simple. With a 95% reduced government, the taxes these businesses would have to pay would be reduced considerably. Our corporations are currently paying upwards of 30% of their net income to finance the government. With that money in their pockets, they would be able to cut prices, keeping them competitive globally. In fact, since only a small portion of their taxes comes back to them in the form of subsidies, the reduction in overhead costs would easily outstrip the loss of subsidies.

2) Words on paper may define the U.S. as a corporation (I don't know about that), but that does not mean that it contributes to our economy. Government does not create. It does not produce. Government jobs do not contribute to the economy. They provide a needed service, and can be considered an expense to the economy. If we were to follow your logic to an extreme conclusion, we could have the goverment create and control every job in the U.S. Would we prosper then?

Now of course, I don't suggest cutting everything all at once. Yeah, that would traumatize our economy. But we should start with one program, slowly reduce and eliminate it, and then start on the next one.

As a libertarian, what goverment programs, or regulations, can you live with, whether it be some kind of small welfare system, basic medical, subsidized steel industry or farm industry, Social security, medicaid, medicare etc

I could live with a welfare system that was based on helping a person get on their feet and not supporting them, but I think this should be handled at the state level as opposed to the federal level. This way the oversight is closer to the recipients. I think the only thing the fed should do is regulate state to state and international commerce, protection from foriegn sources, and maybe education but that would have to be a limited amount of interaction.


If you can't live with any of them that are not specifically mentioned in the constitution- do you think we would have a stable goverment?

I think at one point alot of these 'protections' were necessary, but if they don't evolve with society then they are doing nothing but holding us back as a people. We need to let the people make their own decisions and force them to face the reality of their decisions knowing that there may be help available for them but not at the level of today. Maybe re-education or something along those lines.

As a libertarian, what goverment programs, or regulations, can you live with, whether it be some kind of small welfare system, basic medical, subsidized steel industry or farm industry, Social security, medicaid, medicare etc

If you can't live with any of them that are not specifically mentioned in the constitution- do you think we would have a stable goverment?

I'll handle these together, as I think they're very closely related.

What I can live with is one thing; what I'd like to see as a long term goal is something else altogether.

What I can live with is anything that moves us in the direction of smaller government, lower taxes, less onerous regulations, more personal responsibility and individual liberty. I'll take even the smallest incremental steps toward that, but I do insist that we progress in that direction and use the "ratchet effect" that socialists have put to such good use. When you make progress, lock it in. Make a little more, then lock that in. Keep going that way and eventually you've accomplished quite a lot. I guess that makes me a Fabian libertarian.

Ideally, I would like to see all government activities stopped that aren't at least implied by a strict original intent reading of the Constitution, but that's a long way off and I don't expect to accomplish it until we already have a solid Libertarian majority. At that point it won't seem so radical and will have wide public acceptance.

Instead of commenting on specific programs, which is not my specialty, please allow me to take a step back and look at the larger economic picture.

Hopefully, we can agree that there can come a point in time where a government that is too small, too out of control, would negatively impact society. We can also agree that a government that is too large, too controlling, would negatively impact society. We see this truth in all aspects of life, and we call it the Bell Curve. There is a range of optimum government whereby we create a "more perfect" society.

Where is this optimum range? Completely debatable, and always will be. Personally, I think society functions best when spending on social welfare and entitlements by the American government ranges from 10-15% of the GDP. I think if Congress could stay within those restraints, it would force them to cut out the unnecessary spending that has little impact and trim the domestic spending to that which has the largest effect. In the same token, it also forces libertarian-type Congressmen to keep government spending up, which would force the libertarians to approve of the most effective programs.

Today, we kinda laugh at the thought of forcing a Congressperson to keep spending high. But that's truly the platform that Badnarik and many Libertarians run upon. I believe they would damage society by cutting spending so drastically.

On the same token, is the current scenario any less damaging?

That is always the way I have felt - a "rachet" method that made wiggling out of it very hard- BUT, and it is a big BUT, the more I find out about how the global economy works- and how power, the ability to maintain the integrity of your borders, is determined by spending power-

Izdaari- what if we can't compete based on Libertarian economic models? What is your safety valve? This one has given me fits! I believe we are in some kind of global flux from one global reality to another, and the change will be painful- can libertarian ideals survive this reality of freedom? This is a more specific question of my thread "is being libertarian too utopian, in the dreaming of another reality type utopia" LOL

Like with predatory pricing by major corporations, if we force ourselves into a box, and since the history of about any society is that we need near overwhelming crisis to change, would any "locked in" ideals be TOO constraining for survival?

Well, if we can't, we can't, and we'll have to make adjustments. I'm ever the empiricist and pragmatist, even if I sound otherwise. My ideals are always focused on maximizing individual liberty but I can be as flexible as necessary about means. Ayn Rand, Robert Heinlein, Milton Friedman and F.A. Hayek are heroes of mine, but so are Julius Caesar, Machiavelli and Dick Morris. Some would say that makes me dangerous.

And it may indeed be the case that we have to be flexible on some particular issues. It may be, for example, that we have to use a little bit of across the board tariffs, as was Republican policy in the time of Calvin Coolidge. I don't think so but it could be. It may be we have to smack some big companies around with the anti-trust laws. Again, I don't think so, but it's possible.

Whatever we have to do, we have to do, but by and large I'm totally confident that the free market works. For those who aren't so sure it does, I usually find that study of free market economics cures that. Dr. Izzy prescribes the works of Milton Friedman and Ludwig von Mises. And for those who are just getting into free market economics, Eat the Rich by P.J. O'Roarke and Economics in One Lesson by Henry Hazlitt are good places to start, probably in that order.

See, why I start these topics is that I see to much dreaming about what we would do if we won some seats- but the doing seems to really hang up the libertarian party-


With these fairly straightforward questions- though not simple questions LOL_


As a libertarian, what goverment programs, or regulations, can you live with, whether it be some kind of small welfare system, basic medical, subsidized steel industry or farm industry, Social security, medicaid, medicare etc

If you can't live with any of them that are not specifically mentioned in the constitution- do you think we would have a stable goverment?

Libertarians, as a group, can not seem to come up with a starting place, a workable platform as an alternative to the other two animals we have now- and I think these are the basic issues we need to get started to win office- we have to realistically, without putting thousands out of jobs, or depress our local economys, or whatever, and stay independent.

Oh! You actually want a workable libertarian platform that we could run on and try to win elections? Well, that should be very doable, but that isn't what you asked. You do realize the LP would have none of it? They're completely uninterested in compromising. We're talking yet another third party here, maybe something like a more principled version of what Ventura started in Minnesota. If you really want to try to win with today's electorate, that's going to take a libertarian-oriented centrist rather than a real libertarian, but I think somebody like that could actually win if the conditions were right.

Ventura showed us the way to win such an election, if not how to govern afterwards. You nominate a charismatic celebrity with some government or executive experience on his resume (Ventura had been a mayor) who can debate. Not necessarily an actor or wrestler - a well-known and respected CEO would be excellent, someone like, say, Ross Perot except for being pro-free trade and not paranoid. You get enough poll numbers to muscle your way into the debates and you make more sense than the other guys do. You appeal to the habitual non-voters by running against the establishment, but without being too threatening. That's important because you also have to peel off enough Dems and Reps to win, and that'll also take the right combination of issues.

Basically we're talking about building a centrist coalition here. At a minimum, such a candidate would need to be seriously for controlling government spending and for lower taxes, pro-gun, pro-choice and for at least decriminalizing marijuana possession. If we're talking about running for President, he'd also have to be credible on foreign policy and national security issues. That wouldn't even approach the libertarian ideal, but it'd certainly be more comfortable for libertarians and many other Americans than either of the current major parties.

So what you are saying, if I am to paraphrase, that the libertarian party platform, as it stands, has no chance of winning any elections?

Now, does running as a libertarian force you sign a pledge or something to the party platform? Can there be a centrist libertarian? Perhaps time to start another thread?

Merely advocating the legalisation of mariuana consumption does not a Libertarian make!

I couldn't agree more Argonaut- there are elements in both the dem and repub party that advocate that- however- are we such a group of extremists that no libertarian can be elected? We can't answer the hard questions with a workable answer? Isn't that why we are disgusted by the other two- they can't answer the questions, only assign blame?

That's right, zero chance. What the LP believes and what the voting public believes are too different. That, and they've never heard of us. Now, if you poll the voters on issues without using labels, 17% answer as libertarians would*, even though they don't know the term, and if everybody knew about us, and if we could overcome the reluctance to vote for someone who can't win, I think we could get that 17%, but that's all we could get. That's actually a pretty respectable number for an ideology, similar to conservatives and greater than liberals. In a parliamentary system or with proportional representation it'd be enough to make a difference. In a two party system, it isn't enough without a coalition. The only plausible coalition would be independent centrist, as I outlined above, or else to take back the Republican Party from the neocons and social conservatives, as the Republican Liberty Caucus hopes to do.

Oh, members of the LP can be elected and have been, but in non-partisan races, or in the cases of Congressmen Ron Paul and Dana Rohrabacher, as Republicans. You only have to take the non-aggression pledge to join the LP, but if you run, you certainly don't have to run on the platform. The Catch-22 is if you're not an "extremist" Libertarian, you can't be nominated: the convention delegates (which consists of the members who bother to show up) will have none of that. The purpose of the LP is not to win elections, but to "show the flag" for libertarian principles and to educate. Hey, it worked for Norman Thomas and his Socialist Party, who couldn't win elections either, but changed the national debate and eventually got most of their platform enacted into law.

* Can't find the poll anymore, but Scott Rasmussen, who is a major respected pollster, did exactly that poll a few years ago, apparently trying to establish how much hidden libertarian sentiment there was out there, which is where I'm getting the 17%.

I guess it is time for a revolutions within the libertarian party- time to bring it back to reality?

Could be, CR, but if we were going to run with my centrist coalition idea, I think that should be done either independent or with a new third party. I like the LP the quixotic way it is. It's good to have at least one party that's all about principle and not about getting elected.

I think more could be done with the LP without changing its basic character, because you don't necessarily have to win elections to advance libertarian ideas. But to do it effectively, we need to get a lot more major media coverage than we've been getting. I think the LP should compromise just enough to be able to nominate a libertarian celebrity.

There are several admitted libertarians in Hollyweird: Clint Eastwood, Kurt Russell, Drew Carey. That would get us some coverage and some serious fundraising power. There are also some fairly well known libertarians outside of Hollyweird: TV newsguy John Stossel, T.J. Rodgers, CEO of Cypress Semiconductor, talk radio hosts Neil Boortz and Larry Elder -- but I'm not sure any of those has enough name recognition with the general public to get the full celeb effect, though all of them are very articulate and would make fine candidates if we could convince them to run. Whoever it is, the goal is to get enough poll numbers to be a serious threat of "spoiling" the election: that's what would make the LP a big news story and get us into the debates.