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Title: The Passing of the Libertarian Moment
Source: theatlantic.com/
URL Source: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/04/defused/556934/
Published: Apr 2, 2018
Author: KEVIN D. WILLIAMSON
Post Date: 2018-07-05 21:45:54 by Gatlin
Keywords: None
Views: 18067
Comments: 110

The end of the Cold War and the rise of Donald Trump have left classical liberals without a political home.

Senator Rand Paul is a man out of time. It was only a few years ago that the editors of Reason magazine held him up as the personification of what they imagined to be a “libertarian moment,” a term that enjoyed some momentary cachet in the pages of The New York Times, The Atlantic, Politico (where I offered a skeptical assessment), and elsewhere. But rather than embodying the future of the Republican Party, Paul embodies its past, the postwar conservative era when Ronald Reagan could proclaim that “the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism,” when National Review founder William F. Buckley Jr. could publish a conspectus of his later work under the subtitle “Reflections of a Libertarian Journalist,” and young blue- blazered Republicans of the Alex P. Keaton variety wore out their copies of Milton Friedman’s Free to Choose.

The view from 2018 is rather different. The GOP finds itself in the throes of a populist convulsion, an ironic product of the fact that the party that long banqueted on resentment of the media now is utterly dominated by the alternative media constructed by its own most dedicated partisans. It is Sean Hannity’s party now.

The GOP’s political situation is absurd: Having rallied to the banner of an erratic and authoritarian game-show host, evangelical leaders such as Jerry Falwell Jr. are reduced to comparing Donald Trump to King David as they try to explain away his entanglement with pornographic performer Stormy Daniels. Those who celebrated Trump the businessman clutch their heads as his preposterous economic policies produce terror in the stock markets and chaos for the blue-collar workers in construction firms and manufacturers scrambling to stay ahead of the coming tariffs on steel and aluminum. The Chinese retaliation is sure to fall hardest on the heartland farmers who were among Trump’s most dedicated supporters.

On the libertarian side of the Republican coalition, the situation is even more depressing: Republicans such as former Texas Governor Rick Perry, who once offered important support for criminal- justice reform, are lined up behind the atavistic drug-war policies of the president and Attorney General Jeff Sessions, whose big idea on opiate abuse is more death sentences for drug traffickers. Deficits are moving in the wrong direction. And, in spite of the best hopes of the “America First” gang, Trump’s foreign policy has not moved in the direction of Rand Paul’s mild non-interventionism or the more uncompromising non-interventionism of his father, Ron Paul. Instead, the current GOP foreign-policy position combines the self-assured assertiveness of the George W. Bush administration (and many familiar faces and mustaches from that administration) with the indiscipline and amateurism characteristic of Trump.

Some libertarian moment.

Postwar conservatism, under the intellectual leadership of Buckley, Frank Meyer, and their allies, was, famously, a “fusion”—an alliance between social and religious traditionalists, anti-Communists and national-security hawks, and libertarians ranging from ideologues and idealists such as Henry Hazlitt and Ludwig von Mises to Chamber of Commerce types with their more prosaic concerns about taxes and regulation. The libertarians have always been a junior partner in that alliance, but for many years they punched above their weight. Partly that is because libertarianism is an intellectual tendency rather than a cultural instinct, one that benefited from the rigor and prestige of the economists who have long been its most effective advocates. And libertarianism has benefited from the fact that American elites are notably more libertarian in their views than is the median American voter. That dynamic was explored by the economist Bryan Caplan under a typically bold title (“Why Is Democracy Tolerable?”) with a typically needling conclusion: “Democracies listen to the relatively libertarian rich far more than they listen to the absolutely statist non-rich … Democracy as we know it is bad enough. Democracy that really listened to all the people would be an authoritarian nightmare.”

But if libertarianism benefited from its rich friends, it surely benefited even more from its impoverished rivals: the Soviet Union, Castro’s Cuba, North Korea, Mao’s China, and other practitioners of robust étatism. Despite the best hopes of the postwar conservative fusionists, libertarianism has always been more effective in opposition than in government. President Reagan may have called himself a libertarian from time to time, but he also enacted protectionist tariffs, radically expanded the military and the federal police powers, and failed to exhibit a great deal of energy in resisting the deficit-swelling spending bills sent to his desk by Tip O’Neill. The libertarian tendency mainly provided a useful ideological foil, not only to the totalitarian socialist projects of the time but also to more liberal efforts to expand the welfare states in the Western democracies. If you are not moving in the direction of Milton Friedman, the argument went, then you are moving in the direction of Leonid Brezhnev—it’s Chairman Greenspan or Chairman Mao.

That was an effective rhetorical strategy while the Soviet Union was a going concern and while the Cold War remained fresh in the national memory. And it was enough to keep the right-wing coalition together. But as the memory of the USSR came to be replaced by the reality of NAFTA, WTO, ASEAN, etc., the fruits of globalism—everyday low prices at Walmart—turned out to be uninspiring to great masses of voters to whom those benefits are invisible for the same reason that water is invisible to fish. Ancient prejudices, including the prejudices against social relations with foreigners, began to reassert themselves, as did the expectation that government should take a paternal interest in the people rather than a merely administrative one. Libertarianism, with its emphasis on free trade, its deference to the market, and its hostility toward social-welfare programs, went quickly out of fashion. How quickly? Last week, my former National Review colleague Victor Davis Hanson published an essay calling for a stronger regulatory hand over high-tech companies, fondly recalling the “cultural revolution of muckraking and trust-busting” of the 19th century, and ending with a plea for “some sort of bipartisan national commission that might dispassionately and in disinterested fashion offer guidelines to legislators” about more tightly regulating these companies, perhaps on the public- utility model.

That from a magazine whose founders once dreamed of overturning the New Deal.

Libertarian attitudes enjoy some political support: Nick Gillespie, a true-believing libertarian, insists even in the teeth of the current authoritarian ascendancy that we still are experiencing a national— yes!—“libertarian moment,” based on Gallup polling data finding more support for broadly libertarian political sensibilities (27 percent) than for any other single group: conservative, liberal, or populist. But “libertarian” often means little more than “a person with right-leaning sensibilities who is embarrassed to be associated with the Republican Party.” (Hardly, these days, an indefensible position.) Libertarian sensibilities are popular because they enable the posture of above-it-all nonpartisanship, but libertarian policies, as Caplan and others have noted at length, are not very popular at all. Americans broadly and strongly support a rising minimum wage and oppose entitlement reform with at least equal commitment, and they are far from reliable supporters of free speech and free association or enforcing limits on police powers. Hence the peculiar fact that 2016 polling of Republican primary voters found self-identified libertarians backing the authoritarian Trump in remarkable numbers—59 percent in South Carolina—over more libertarian-leaning candidates such as Ted Cruz (17 percent in the same poll) or Marco Rubio (0 percent—ouch). By way of comparison, only 39 percent of self- identified independents backed Trump in that same South Carolina poll, 37 percent of self-identified Tea Party adherents, and 40 percent of voters in the oldest bracket (56-61). Self-described libertarians were not less likely to line up behind the authoritarian demagogue, but half-again as likely to do so. Self-professed libertarian voices such as Larry Elder have become abject Trumpists.

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#1. To: Gatlin (#0)

And so the obsession continues.

It's cool that you're bringing so much attention libertarianism, even if in attempts to cast it in an unfavorable light. It's not going to go away, in spite of whatever direction the current political winds are blowing.

Pinguinite  posted on  2018-07-05   21:58:58 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#2. To: Gatlin, Chairman Mao, Jerry Falwell Jr, USSR, Castro, ACLU. Tip ONeil (#0)

Hondo68  posted on  2018-07-05   22:12:50 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#3. To: Pinguinite, tater (#1)

... political winds are blowing.

We certainly know which way tater's hot aire is blowing.

buckeroo  posted on  2018-07-05   22:32:06 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#4. To: Gatlin (#0)

If the Libertarians could not obtain any traction against a GOP ticket of McCain/Palin, it seems their moment passed some time ago.

nolu chan  posted on  2018-07-05   22:54:08 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#5. To: nolu chan, tater (#4)

If the Libertarians ... [blah, blah, blah.]

The Libertarian Party is completely removed from the libertarian movement in the USA; moreover the Libertarian Party does not have the BILLIONS of dollars to run publick advertisements and commercials as both the GOP and the DEM perform.

Your argument is weak in other words. I guess you don't have a SCOTUS opinion to back your post, correct?

buckeroo  posted on  2018-07-05   23:23:48 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#6. To: nolu chan (#4)

If the Libertarians could not obtain any traction against a GOP ticket of McCain/Palin, it seems their moment passed some time ago.

The problem is that the election system we have in place is given to having only 2 dominating parties, regardless of what their political spins happen to be. Come election time, voters have a choice of voting for one of the 2 dominating parties, or throwing their votes away. Pluralist voting systems -- about the worst there is and what the US system is, of course, based on have that fatal flaw. It's as simple as that.

It's only with parliamentary election systems where people vote for a party instead of a person, does the 2-party monopoly (duopoly) not exist, as voting for a minor party does NOT constitute throwing a vote away, as voters are allied with similar vote sentiments across the whole country to take some seats in the legislative body.

IMO, "Approval voting", rather than a pluralist voting system, has the best chance of giving so called 3rd parties a chance to take root in the current US political system.

Pinguinite  posted on  2018-07-05   23:27:56 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#7. To: buckeroo, nolu chan (#5)

The Libertarian Party is completely removed from the libertarian movement in the USA ...
Why?

Gatlin  posted on  2018-07-06   0:13:37 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#8. To: buckeroo, nolu chan (#5)

The Libertarian Party is completely removed from the libertarian movement in the USA ...

Gatlin  posted on  2018-07-06   0:23:52 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#9. To: Gatlin (#7)

Because the LP has a "party" ticket, similar to your two party system operating in America, today.

But you knew that. Why are you asking, "why?"

buckeroo  posted on  2018-07-06   0:30:16 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#10. To: Gatlin (#8)

Sorry, but I can't watch videos as I use TOR. Oh sure, I can search, sort and run links on another machine ... but why? I don't need or care about the data you want to "present" from a third-party source.

buckeroo  posted on  2018-07-06   0:33:01 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#11. To: buckeroo (#10)

I use TOR.
Why?

Gatlin  posted on  2018-07-06   0:52:03 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#12. To: buckeroo (#5)

The Libertarian Party is completely removed from the libertarian movement in the USA;

The libertarians, big or small L, could get no traction against a GOP ticket as bad as McCain/Palin opposed by a Dem ticket as bad as Obama/Biden. In other words, they have failed to be competitive against warm bodies.

They have never been able to approach the success of Perot/Stockdale.

The libertarian moment was so fleeting, the American people missed it.

nolu chan  posted on  2018-07-06   1:59:42 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#13. To: buckeroo (#5)

the Libertarian Party does not have the BILLIONS of dollars to run publick advertisements and commercials as both the GOP and the DEM perform

That is because the amoral libertarians don't have much support. That is and was always my problem with libertarians. They equate moral things with immoral things. Do what thou wilt just like the satanic so called Bible.

A K A Stone  posted on  2018-07-06   6:24:00 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#14. To: Pinguinite (#6)

IMO, "Approval voting", rather than a pluralist voting system, has the best chance of giving so called 3rd parties a chance to take root in the current US political system

Approval voting is a sham where losers win.

A K A Stone  posted on  2018-07-06   6:26:28 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#15. To: Pinguinite (#1)

It's not going to go away

And it’s not picking up any speed either. Same Ol’ 6% following... because you assholes eat your own. The best and most viable libertarian minded candidate, EVER, is Rand Paul... and the bulk of the rabid 6%, aka, RON PAULTARDS, turned your backs on Rand... because Rand doesn’t run on anarchy.

Since you all like to shit in your own bed... you get to sleep in the mess you make.

I'm the infidel... Allah warned you about. كافر المسلح

GrandIsland  posted on  2018-07-06   7:09:50 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#16. To: GrandIsland (#15)

AMEN !!!

Gatlin  posted on  2018-07-06   8:38:49 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#17. To: GrandIsland (#15)

You can always be counted on to post the most juvenile, immature and vulgar references. So glad you aren't on my side. Gatlin gave you a big AMEN on that. He's welcome to you.

Pinguinite  posted on  2018-07-06   9:00:04 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#18. To: A K A Stone (#14)

Approval voting is a sham where losers win.

Tell me Stone, why you think it's a great idea to have a vote system where someone winning 30% of the popular vote gets to represent 100% of the people in a given region.

That's pluralist voting for you.

Pinguinite  posted on  2018-07-06   9:03:40 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#19. To: Pinguinite, GrandIsland (#17)

One cannot help but notice that you did not dispute anything GI posted or in any prove what he said was wrong. Why not? Is it because you can’t? Of course it is. All you did was launch into a personal attack. You could show one country that has a successful libertarian “style” government or any paramount successes the libertarian movement has undertaken with smashing accomplishments. Again, why not? Again, because you cannot. All you libertarians ever do is talk, talk and talk. The libertarian movement is a dying cause. FACE IT. You are a pathetic group ...

Gatlin  posted on  2018-07-06   10:02:49 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#20. To: Gatlin (#19)

Why not? Is it because you can’t? Of course it is.

The "good book" says not to throw pearls before swine.

It's good advice. My time is too valuable to waste on some people.

Pinguinite  posted on  2018-07-06   10:14:24 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#21. To: Pinguinite, GrandIsland (#20)

The "good book" says not to throw pearls before swine.

It's good advice. My time is too valuable to waste on some people.

You should learn to be VERY careful how TRY to use Scripture and when you do use Scripture, then you need to QUOTE the whole verse. Since you are unable to so and try to shade its meaning like you libertarians do with everything, then I will quote the Verse in its entirety:
Do not give what is holy to the dogs; nor cast your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you in pieces. ~ Matthew 7:6 New King James Version.
I like the part where it was said that “lest they trun and tear you in pieces.”

You have made it quite evident that you don’t really KNOW what Jesus meant when He said to not cast your pearls before swine in Matthew 7:6. It’s from the Sermon on the Mount and for you to understand its meaning, you first need to understand its context and placement within His sermon. The command not to cast your pearls before swine does not mean what you are IMPLYING it to mean.

There is GREAT advice for you to be found in Matthew and I would like to share some with you, but my time is also very valuable and I need not waste too much time on ignorant libertarians. You have used up my allocation of time for you today.

Gatlin  posted on  2018-07-06   11:25:04 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#22. To: buckeroo, Gatlin (#10)

Sorry, but I can't watch videos as I use TOR.

You need a better excuse. Youtube videos, including that specific Youtube video, are watchable on TOR.

nolu chan  posted on  2018-07-06   11:37:37 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#23. To: Pinguinite, A K A Stone (#18)

Tell me Stone, why you think it's a great idea to have a vote system where someone winning 30% of the popular vote gets to represent 100% of the people in a given region.

That's pluralist voting for you.

We do not have pluralist voting, even for President. The President is not elected by vote of the people; the Chief Executive of the Union is elected by the members of the union. The members of the Union are the States who have ratified the Constitution, and the election is by a majority vote.

There need not be any popular vote taken in a presidential election, and the early presidential elections featured no popular vote whatever.

nolu chan  posted on  2018-07-06   11:48:26 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#24. To: Gatlin (#21)

You have used up my allocation of time for you today.

That's the best news I've heard all day! Though it isn't even 11 AM yet.

I infer from your response that you purport to be an enlightened Christian saint. That's wonderful. I'm sure GI would be much appreciative if you brought him to the table of Christian charity through your generous and loving examples of how to treat others. Certainly that would do him much good, even though it seems you've yet to learn not to be so condescending toward others, but all things in time.

Pinguinite  posted on  2018-07-06   11:54:32 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#25. To: nolu chan (#23)

We do not have pluralist voting, even for President. The President is not elected by vote of the people; the Chief Executive of the Union is elected by the members of the union. The members of the Union are the States who have ratified the Constitution, and the election is by a majority vote.

There need not be any popular vote taken in a presidential election, and the early presidential elections featured no popular vote whatever.

You are partially, but not totally correct. We do have pluralist voting. You cite only the matter of the election of president, and only in regards to the electoral college.

However, #1) Every seat of both houses of Congress is elected by pluralist vote, and the vast majority of state legislatures and gov, if not all unanimously, all utilize pluralist voting systems to fill them. I think there may be a handful of seats nationwide at lower municipal levels that utilize a different method.

#2) Even in the case of president, within each state, most every state employs pluralist voting to decide which presidential candidate receives all electoral votes from that state. I haven't done the count, but in many of the states Trump won he only won a plurality, not a majority vote.

We DO have a pluralist voting system in the US, Nolu. You know this. I did not limit my statement to only the office of president.

Pinguinite  posted on  2018-07-06   12:07:29 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#26. To: Pinguinite (#6)

It's only with parliamentary election systems where people vote for a party instead of a person, does the 2-party monopoly (duopoly) not exist, as voting for a minor party does NOT constitute throwing a vote away, as voters are allied with similar vote sentiments across the whole country to take some seats in the legislative body.

We do not have a parliamentary government and so we do not have parliamentary elections.

In the UK, they have the Labor Party and the Tories. When is the last time anyone else was in charge of the goverment?

Voting for an Independent is not throwing a vote away. If elected, he or she will caucus with one of the major parties. He or she can still only vote aye, nay, or present. If you know who he/she will caucus with, it's almost like voting Dem or GOP except the major party you least favor may win due to your vote.

Just having a few seats in the legislative body confers no power. Believe whatever they will, a party with a few seats lacks the power to enact anything.

Nations where five or six competitive parties are in an eternal struggle for power don't seem to work out so well. It is more like Game of Thrones than a well-functioning government.

There is nothing stopping the Libertarian party from rising to power except for the lack of popular support, and candidates who do not inspire support.

nolu chan  posted on  2018-07-06   12:08:11 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#27. To: GrandIsland, Pinguinite (#15)

And it’s not picking up any speed either. Same Ol’ 6% following... because you assholes eat your own.

You are too generous.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_2016#Libertarian_Party

In the 2016 presidential election

  • the Libertarian Party (Johnson/Weld) won 3.27% of the popular vote.

  • the Green Party (Stein/Baraka) won 1.06% of the popular vote.

  • the Independent Party (McMullin/Finn) won 0.53% of the popular vote.

  • the Constitution Party (Castle/Bradley) won 0.15% of the popular vote.

Combined, those parties won 5.01% of the vote.

Faith Spotted Eagle won one electoral vote which was one more than Gary Johnson the official Libertarian Party ticket.

nolu chan  posted on  2018-07-06   12:09:40 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#28. To: nolu chan (#26)

We do not have a parliamentary government and so we do not have parliamentary elections.

Of course not. Others do, but not the USA.

Voting for an Independent is not throwing a vote away. If elected,

I can stop you right there. As long as the independent/3rd party candidate has no realistic chances of getting elected, then voting for him is, in practical terms, throwing a vote away.

Just having a few seats in the legislative body confers no power. Believe whatever they will, a party with a few seats lacks the power to enact anything.

Yes, of course a minor party in parliament or even in US congress can't "enact anything". But in a body where a majority IS required to get things passed, a minority presence does confer influencing power.

Nations where five or six competitive parties are in an eternal struggle for power don't seem to work out so well. It is more like Game of Thrones than a well-functioning government.

That's not to say a "well functioning government" is the virtuous best result for all people. Better to have a non functioning government than one that efficiently and carelessly enacts laws and pursues goals that trample rights and destroy its society.

I would not argue a parliamentary system is the beth system in that regard. To the contrary I'm sure it has plenty of flaws. But it does have the advantage of giving it's citizens more than 2 practical choices of political parties.

There is nothing stopping the Libertarian party from rising to power except for the lack of popular support, and candidates who do not inspire support.

I disagree, as I articulated previously. Our vote system largely prevents any 3rd parties, whether libertarians or others, from gaining a foothold. If the L's & D's were in power, the R's would have the same problem. The end result: libertarians like Ron Paul utilize the R party as a vehicle to get elected.

Pinguinite  posted on  2018-07-06   12:22:04 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#29. To: nolu chan (#27)

Combined, those parties won 5.01% of the vote.

Of course. Why? Because voting for 3rd parties is "throwing your vote away". It's a pragmatic fact.

Pinguinite  posted on  2018-07-06   12:23:34 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#30. To: Pinguinite, Y'ALL (#1)

And so the obsession continues -----

This antilibertarian obsession is akin to the antiTrump one. --- Both types should be pitied for their fanaticism.

tpaine  posted on  2018-07-06   12:45:40 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#31. To: Pinguinite (#29)

voting for 3rd parties is "throwing your vote away". It's a pragmatic fact.

Then don't do it.

nolu chan  posted on  2018-07-06   12:47:33 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#32. To: tpaine, Pinguinite (#30)

This antilibertarian obsession is akin to the antiTrump one.

With the minor exception that the Libertarian target can barely be found.

nolu chan  posted on  2018-07-06   12:49:50 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#33. To: nolu chan (#31)

Then don't do it.

You're smoking something today.

Pinguinite  posted on  2018-07-06   13:12:21 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#34. To: Pinguinite (#28)

As long as the independent/3rd party candidate has no realistic chances of getting elected, then voting for him is, in practical terms, throwing a vote away.

They can get elected to the House or Senate. There they caucus with the Dems or GOP. They have no power to get anything done by themselves.

That's not to say a "well functioning government" is the virtuous best result for all people. Better to have a non functioning government than one that efficiently and carelessly enacts laws and pursues goals that trample rights and destroy its society.

Identify an historical example of a non-functioning government which has served a country well.

The U.S. government under the Articles of Confederation was not very functional. That union of 13 states was dissolved and an 11 state union replaced it. Eventually, the two missing states joined the new union.

But it does have the advantage of giving it's citizens more than 2 practical choices of political parties.

How is the advantage of that a given fact? What is the advantage?

If the L's & D's were in power, the R's would have the same problem.

The R's only date back to 1854. Others had a long head start on them. 1860 saw the Republican Party get their candidate elected president. Of course, 1864 saw the National Union Party get their candidate elected president.

Ross Perot and the Reform Party garnered almost 20% of the popular vote.

The problem with the Libertarians and other third parties is that they have been unable to attract viable candidates to run for President/Vice President. People who watch their conventions or observe their candidates conclude the party is a joke.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=olYx5LILl34

Libertarian chair candidate strips at party's convention

Three cheers for freedom of expression.

nolu chan  posted on  2018-07-06   13:18:06 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#35. To: nolu chan (#32)

tpaine, ---- This antilibertarian obsession is akin to the antiTrump one.

With the minor exception that the Libertarian target can barely be found. --- nolu

You fanatics here have had no problem finding it, have you?

tpaine  posted on  2018-07-06   13:26:47 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#36. To: nolu chan (#34)

So you argue there is no duopoly today and that 3rd parties can attract a significant base to dethrone the R's and D's because it happened before, 160+ plus years ago.

Cute.

If you want to start a campaign to repeal the Bill of Rights because some guy stripped at a convention, go for it.

Pinguinite  posted on  2018-07-06   14:30:29 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#37. To: tpaine, nolu chan (#35)

tpaine, ---- This antilibertarian obsession is akin to the antiTrump one.

With the minor exception that the Libertarian target can barely be found. --- nolu

You fanatics here have had no problem finding it, have you?

That’s right. It’s no problem at all finding why libertarians are failing at politics.

Jerry Taylor of the Niskanen Center dropped a truth bomb on the beltway in his recent piece for Fox News about the decline of Rand Paul. Taylor notes that the alleged growth of the libertarian movement in the wake of the Ron Paul campaign was largely illusory. The alienated populists and conspiracy theorists that filled out Paul’s numbers in 2012 easily made the transition to the very un-libertarian Donald Trump in 2015, leaving Rand out in the cold.

The lack of a broad-based movement, despite a number of high profile campaigns and events, is a bitter pill for libertarians who believe in electoral politics. Having libertarians in office may help raise the profile of issues like overcriminalization, tech freedom, and the insanity of the drug war. But those who await a libertarian takeover of the GOP misunderstand the fundamentally radical nature of libertarian ideas and how deeply that radicalism conflicts with the perceptions most Americans have about the role of government.

Trump supporters are a grim reminder that millions of voters view the government as a hammer that can be wielded to smash opposing values or groups and force their beliefs on others. Educating the electorate about libertarian ideas misses the fact that they have no real incentive to learn; most don’t care about the relationship between man and state and likely never will, as long as the state continues to provide the stability they have come to expect. Ron Paul’s success in 2008 and 2012 can largely be credited to the mortgage crisis; once the sting faded, so did support for his radical ideas.

There’s a good reason libertarians remain at the ideological fringe: “Libertarian politics” is a contradiction in terms. Libertarianism is not a third party, like the Know- Nothings or the Whigs or a prescription of policy tweaks to make the government more efficient. It is a distinct value system that abhors political power itself, even if some of its adherents consider power a necessary evil.

Libertarians may disagree whether the state should be abolished or minimized, but the difference matters little to the average American: Both seem frighteningly outside his own experience. Even the most moderate libertarians will wax poetic about ending intellectual property or privatizing the welfare system. Moreover, virtually all voters are deeply invested in government services they have come to depend on, and libertarians have been unable to present hypothesized private- sector alternatives while the state forces dependence upon itself. Conceptually, libertarians are on a page that most people find bizarre.

Libertarianism is best understood as the latest in a long line of radical liberation ideologies, rooted in the principles of natural law and individualism, that have provided the intellectual basis for rebellion since the American Revolution. It is a reaction to the perpetual expansion of government power in the U.S. and its frequent abuses. But radicalism, by definition, is immoderate and cannot compromise its way to reforms. Rather than moving toward the “Overton window” of public opinion by moderating controversial views (as Rand Paul attempted), radicals must pull public opinion towards their own viewpoints. Rand’s straying from libertarian principles means that he likely has little unique appeal even for the tiny libertarian electorate his father created. David Boaz’s research shows that 70 percent of libertarian-leaning voters went with Mitt Romney over Gary Johnson in 2012, so we know even libertarians who believe in politics are willing to blunt their own sword.

If libertarianism is denied its radical characteristics, it degrades into a flimsy millennial conservatism: Fiscally conservative, socially liberal and completely powerless, a mashup of existing ideas better espoused by other parties and ideologies. Without unyielding commitment to truly radical ideas, libertarians are drowned out by louder voices catering to the will of angry, pitchfork-bearing constituents. They add little of value, and are likely to end up little more than a footnote in the history of conservatism.

To fail to understand this is to remain resigned to swim against the tide of American politics. As Friedrich Hayek pointed out: “Those who have concerned themselves exclusively with what seemed practicable in the existing state of opinion have constantly found that even this has rapidly become politically impossible as the result of changes in a public opinion which they have done nothing to guide.”

Instead, libertarians might be more useful as single-issue activists and innovators. While U.S. politicians fail to shrink government, individualists like Erik Voorhees, Cody Wilson, Peter Thiel and the pseudonymous Satoshi Nakamoto are using technology to forge a new path. Time will tell exactly where that leads. But Rand’s decline underlines the fact that libertarian ethics predicate disruption and revolution, not moderation and compromise. As such, it is unlikely to ever get big votes in American politics.

Gatlin  posted on  2018-07-06   15:18:48 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#38. To: Pinguinite, nolu chan (#36)

... some guy stripped at a convention ...
I’m Shocked.

Well, not really. You libertarians are fucking crazy.

Libertarian Party chair candidate strips on stage at national convention.

Gatlin  posted on  2018-07-06   15:32:01 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#39. To: Pinguinite (#36)

So you argue there is no duopoly today and that 3rd parties can attract a significant base to dethrone the R's and D's because it happened before, 160+ plus years ago.

If they had a leader to run. They don't. They will need to manufacture a Lincoln to repeat the GOP success. Until then, they will remain irrelevant.

nolu chan  posted on  2018-07-06   19:14:08 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#40. To: tpaine (#35)

You fanatics here have had no problem finding it, have you?

Yep, court opinions ain't the only thing I can find with the google.

nolu chan  posted on  2018-07-06   19:15:29 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  



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