73 replies to this topic

[Ami]

You believe Alan Greenspan is a free marketer?!

Alan Greenspan, devotee of Ayn Rand? They used to hang out together. She even had a pet name for him; she called him "The Undertaker". Sorry, but he's one of your guys, and he is one of the top-tier perps in the near-destruction of the world economy.

http://mises.org/fre...spx?control=267

"Alan only believes in laissez-faire "on the high philosophical level." In practice, in the policies he advocates, he is a centrist like everyone else because he is a "pragmatist."

As an alleged "laissez-faire pragmatist," at no time in his prominent twenty-year career in politics has he ever advocated anything that even remotely smacks of laissez-faire, or even any approach toward it. For Greenspan, laissez-faire is not a lodestar, a standard, and a guide by which to set one's course; instead, it is simply a curiosity kept in the closet, totally divorced from his concrete policy conclusions. "

This was well known even way back in '87.

[Ami]

Libertarians don't seem to understand the need of skill specialization in the context of society. One person has only so much time, and can only learn so much. This person contributes to himself and to society through what he has learned and his expertise, focusing on that (say, medicine), while another person focuses on something else (i.e. stocks). By combining these sets of expertise we build a society, where one's person's expertise can support another person in some way. In a libertarian society, everyone would have to be completely responsible unto themselves, and would have to learn more than one person realistically can. Libertarianism ignores the fact that we are where we are as a society from both individual and combined efforts, not just one (libertarianism), or the other (communism). There is a reason why people have evolved to go completely crazy (literally) by being isolated from social contact for a significant amount of time.

That being said, the FDA combines people's expertise so that it can do the work for other people whose expertise may differ. It may not be all sunshine and roses, but it's a necesssary body.

Actually, most libertarians simply realize that the private sector does a much better job and that most govt. run agencies are failures.

[OneScrewLoose]

Way to ignore my points.

[Ami]

Way to ignore my points.

Your point that you believe we live in a world where one can simply specialize in one area while having faith that his monetary and health interests will be looked after by big govt. agencies?
Or is it that you believe this utopia will be possible if only govt. would be even bigger and more intrusive?

[EmbraceUnity]

Way to ignore my points.

Your point that you believe we live in a world where one can simply specialize in one area while having faith that his monetary and health interests will be looked after by big govt. agencies?
Or is it that you believe this utopia will be possible if only govt. would be even bigger and more intrusive?

The nation-state is just one of many places in which governance occurs and the market is simply a different form of disciplinary structure, and often a very cruel one.

If you truly want to create a libertarian society, your top priority should be revoking corporate personhood. Investors should bear full legal responsibility for any actions of the part of the corporation, just like consumers and depositors should according to your logic. Of course there would be much less investing, depositing, and consumption in general considering all the risks involved in each, but I'm sure that would be acceptable to you.

We could just all live as farmers in a Jeffersonian fashion. It would be awesome waking up every morning to milk Bessie. Lets just hope she doesn't kick you while doing it, because you will go broke trying to pay the medical bills. Oh right, and lets forget about bankruptcy.... it is your contractual duty to live up to your obligations.... and if you don't.... well I guess that is what prisons and workhouses are for.

Sorry for questioning your logic, Mr Scrooge.

Edited by progressive, 01 January 2010 - 10:23 PM.

[OneScrewLoose]

Way to ignore my points.

Your point that you believe we live in a world where one can simply specialize in one area while having faith that his monetary and health interests will be looked after by big govt. agencies?
Or is it that you believe this utopia will be possible if only govt. would be even bigger and more intrusive?

So then tell me how each person is kinda find the time to know everything?

How old are u btw?

[frederickson]

Yeah, just that the FDA did not know beforehand that the drug was harming people. In contrast to cancer scammers. They are regularly told that their pseudo-treatments, deterring people from or replacing real treatments, kill. They know the consequences beforehand, but they choose to willingly poison and/or exploit dying people. Murderers. Worse than that.

It is the responsibility of the FDA to take drugs off the market which are dangerous. They save lives, that's not the same as killing and exploiting people.

PLEASE watch the following video from a PBS special describing the intimidation that Dr. David Graham experienced at the FDA when trying to expose the fact that Vioxx had killed hundreds of thousands of people. Click on "Bad Medicine", the video is less than 20 minutes long and will help rectify this kind of naivete. Make no mistake about it, the FDA protects the financial interests of the pharmaceutical industry not the health of the American people.

http://www.pbs.org/n...ex_010705.html#

[niner]

You believe Alan Greenspan is a free marketer?!

Alan Greenspan, devotee of Ayn Rand? They used to hang out together. She even had a pet name for him; she called him "The Undertaker". Sorry, but he's one of your guys, and he is one of the top-tier perps in the near-destruction of the world economy.

http://mises.org/fre...spx?control=267

"Alan only believes in laissez-faire "on the high philosophical level." In practice, in the policies he advocates, he is a centrist like everyone else because he is a "pragmatist."

As an alleged "laissez-faire pragmatist," at no time in his prominent twenty-year career in politics has he ever advocated anything that even remotely smacks of laissez-faire, or even any approach toward it. For Greenspan, laissez-faire is not a lodestar, a standard, and a guide by which to set one's course; instead, it is simply a curiosity kept in the closet, totally divorced from his concrete policy conclusions. "

In other words, libertarianism can never fail, it can only be failed. Greenspan wasn't a "real" libertarian, just like George W. Bush wasn't a "real" conservative. Are you seriously trying to tell us that Greenspan's "let the companies police themselves" proclivities were not "laissez-faire enough"? I get the impression that to be a Real Libertarian, you would need to ride a Unicorn, because no policy that could be implemented in the real world would be pure enough to qualify as Real Libertarianism. It's basically a fantasy political philosophy for people who like to bitch about the government.

[rwac]

...just like George W. Bush wasn't a "real" conservative.

Let's look at Bush. He let Ted Kennedy write the "No Child Left Behind" act, for one thing (which is a failure). He signed into law the Medicare drug benefit program. Hardly the work of a doctrinaire conservative.

[KimberCT]

You believe Alan Greenspan is a free marketer?!

Alan Greenspan, devotee of Ayn Rand? They used to hang out together. She even had a pet name for him; she called him "The Undertaker". Sorry, but he's one of your guys, and he is one of the top-tier perps in the near-destruction of the world economy.

Actions and words are two different things.  Alan Greenspan may say he's devoted to the free market, but his actions tell a drastically different story.

[KimberCT]

Libertarians don't seem to understand the need of skill specialization in the context of society. One person has only so much time, and can only learn so much. This person contributes to himself and to society through what he has learned and his expertise, focusing on that (say, medicine), while another person focuses on something else (i.e. stocks). By combining these sets of expertise we build a society, where one's person's expertise can support another person in some way. In a libertarian society, everyone would have to be completely responsible unto themselves, and would have to learn more than one person realistically can. Libertarianism ignores the fact that we are where we are as a society from both individual and combined efforts, not just one (libertarianism), or the other (communism). There is a reason why people have evolved to go completely crazy (literally) by being isolated from social contact for a significant amount of time.

That being said, the FDA combines people's expertise so that it can do the work for other people whose expertise may differ. It may not be all sunshine and roses, but it's a necesssary body.

You just described "division of labor" which libertarian and economists both agree with... and the FDA has a handful of experts but thousands of bureaucrats.  Who do think makes the final decisions?

[OneScrewLoose]

Libertarians don't seem to understand the need of skill specialization in the context of society. One person has only so much time, and can only learn so much. This person contributes to himself and to society through what he has learned and his expertise, focusing on that (say, medicine), while another person focuses on something else (i.e. stocks). By combining these sets of expertise we build a society, where one's person's expertise can support another person in some way. In a libertarian society, everyone would have to be completely responsible unto themselves, and would have to learn more than one person realistically can. Libertarianism ignores the fact that we are where we are as a society from both individual and combined efforts, not just one (libertarianism), or the other (communism). There is a reason why people have evolved to go completely crazy (literally) by being isolated from social contact for a significant amount of time.

That being said, the FDA combines people's expertise so that it can do the work for other people whose expertise may differ. It may not be all sunshine and roses, but it's a necesssary body.

You just described "division of labor" which libertarian and economists both agree with... and the FDA has a handful of experts but thousands of bureaucrats. Who do think makes the final decisions?

I am not specifying division of labor, but rather the inability for people to knno all of these things at once. At some point, someone that is not you has to make the finals decisions for some things. But libertarians somehow see this as some great evil, even though society couldn't function without a system of people making decisions like these.

[VespeneGas]

I've never been able to understand how libertarians propose to deal with monopolies. Before the modern age of regulation, both vertical and horizontal monopolies were pretty common, the easy ones to remember from U.S. History 101 being Standard Oil and US Steel. You can argue till you're blue in the face about whether a monopoly grabbed such a huge share of the market through better fitness, more ample initial access to capital, or simply getting there first, it doesn't really matter. Once the company becomes a juggernaut, it can basically bend over the consumer because they're the sole provider of the good/service in question. If a brilliant start-up company emerges selling a better product, the monopoly can undercut it, selling their product so cheaply that the newcomer can't afford to compete. Or just saturating the market with advertisements for their product, or maybe buy out the new company. The point is, economic power gets incredibly concentrated, and that can never favor the average consumer. Companies start to look like corrupt bureaucracies real fast in the absence of competition.

Not to mention the fact that the free market will always favor the company that pollutes the most or screws their workers most thoroughly, not only due to the lack of penalties for these outrages, but also due to the lack of oversight. How am I supposed to know that 'company x' is dumping mercury and cadmium into groundwater if there's no (inefficient, suboptimal, bureaucratic) government agency to monitor their behavior?

Can't we all just agree that American government needs to invest in some insulation from special interests (e.g. campaign finance reform, kicking out lobbyists)? Doesn't anyone believe in checks and balances anymore?

[OneScrewLoose]

Doesn't anyone believe in checks and balances anymore?

Sometimes I wonder this myself...this board needs more emoticons.

[rwac]

Can't we all just agree that American government needs to invest in some insulation from special interests (e.g. campaign finance reform, kicking out lobbyists)? Doesn't anyone believe in checks and balances anymore?

Campaign Finance Reform: The problem with this is that money is a fundamental way to get speech out.
Restricting money results in restricted speech.

As for the "lobbyist problem", it is more of a "corrupt legislator problem". For instance, both the ACLU and the NRA have lobbyists.
As do the environmentalists and "Big Oil".
It is right and proper that some companies/industries should be able to communicate to legislators that xyz will affect them negatively.

We desperately need more checks on the government, which seems to be going crazy right now ...

Edited by rwac, 02 January 2010 - 10:00 PM.

[OneScrewLoose]

Can't we all just agree that American government needs to invest in some insulation from special interests (e.g. campaign finance reform, kicking out lobbyists)? Doesn't anyone believe in checks and balances anymore?

Campaign Finance Reform: The problem with this is that money is a fundamental way to get speech out.
Restricting money results in restricted speech.

As for the "lobbyist problem", it is more of a "corrupt legislator problem". For instance, both the ACLU and the NRA have lobbyists.
As do the environmentalists and "Big Oil".
It is right and proper that some companies/industries should be able to communicate to legislators that xyz will affect them negatively.

We desperately need more checks on the government, which seems to be going crazy right now ...

Dat der big gubment dun gone stopped big oil frum given money to politicans!

[rwac]

Dat der big gubment dun gone stopped big oil frum given money to politicans!

Are you calling me a redneck ?

I almost forgot, the unions raise lots of money for the dems.

[kismet]

You just described "division of labor" which libertarian and economists both agree with... and the FDA has a handful of experts but thousands of bureaucrats.  Who do think makes the final decisions?

I would assume, perhaps naively, that expert panels indeed have the last word over at the FDA (at least when it comes to their drug department). That's what we have been told by the FDA and it should be up to you to prove your assertions to the contrary.

Antineoplastons

The FDA persecuted the doctor behind them to no end. He was, and still is (though changing), viewed by his peers for the past 30-40 years as a "quack" and a "scammer." Yet, it turns out, antineoplastons do work.

Based on the evidence you provided (so far) and a quick pubmed, that seems somewhat inaccurate. When phase III studies just start, we don't know whether the compound works. That's the reason we do those studies in the first place. Many promising treatments fail in phase III.

You can find articles, many of them very recent, all over the Internet to show the extent to which this "unconventional" and controversial doctor was outcast from the medical community.

Although, the story may be completely true, I don't see how it is related to the FDA? As we have establised: they play by their own rule book -- if there are no studies proving efficacy and safety, they cannot allow any claims. If anything you should be criticising conserative oncologists and research institutes that did not fund any research and/or downplayed the treatment.

The FDA is filled with bureaucrats from large pharmaceutical corporations and other controversial food corporations such as Monsanto. Its history is riddled with scandal. The concept of the FDA would be great if it weren't so corrupted.

Do you have better citations to prove that the FDA is corrupt? Especially, in regard to their drug department.

The following links do point a different picture re. efficacy and explain in more detail why the treatments are dubious, but I can't comment on their accuracy..
http://en.wikipedia..../Antineoplaston
http://quackfiles.bl...sh-post-re.html
http://www.cancer.or...sp?sitearea=ETO
http://www.quackwatc...burzynski1.html

Edited by kismet, 03 January 2010 - 01:42 AM.

[maxwatt]

...just like George W. Bush wasn't a "real" conservative.

Let's look at Bush. He let Ted Kennedy write the "No Child Left Behind" act, for one thing (which is a failure). He signed into law the Medicare drug benefit program. Hardly the work of a doctrinaire conservative.

No Child Left Behind, Kennedy's signature education reform bill, was intentionally underfunded by the Bush administration. Kennedy came out aains his own bill when Bush broke his promises and morphed it into an industry-friendly "Medicare reform" package. The senator spent months cajoling Democrats to back his version of the legislation, went to the Senate floor to pleading with his colleagues to stop the measure he charged had been "hijacked" by Republicans.

Whatever Bush was, and there are plenty of four letter words that might apply, he was no libertarian, and his "conservativec" veneer was a cloak of opportunism to gain and maintain power. "Opportunist" is not a four letter word, but it should be. He served the interests of the corporations whose lobbyists control our government, O'bama is proving to be another such corporate shill, under a "progressive" guise. The left-right, Repulican-Democrat. Conservative-liberal, libertarian-socialist dichotomy is being driven as a wedge to divide the people the corporations want to control. No libertarian agenda can succeed until both sides recognize their common interest in an anti-corporate program, and Ron Paul and Alan Grayson unite and run on the same ticket....

The FDA serves a useful function, sometimes. But it has been hijacked.

[EmbraceUnity]

...just like George W. Bush wasn't a "real" conservative.

Let's look at Bush. He let Ted Kennedy write the "No Child Left Behind" act, for one thing (which is a failure). He signed into law the Medicare drug benefit program. Hardly the work of a doctrinaire conservative.

No Child Left Behind, Kennedy's signature education reform bill, was intentionally underfunded by the Bush administration. Kennedy came out aains his own bill when Bush broke his promises and morphed it into an industry-friendly "Medicare reform" package. The senator spent months cajoling Democrats to back his version of the legislation, went to the Senate floor to pleading with his colleagues to stop the measure he charged had been "hijacked" by Republicans.

Whatever Bush was, and there are plenty of four letter words that might apply, he was no libertarian, and his "conservativec" veneer was a cloak of opportunism to gain and maintain power. "Opportunist" is not a four letter word, but it should be. He served the interests of the corporations whose lobbyists control our government, O'bama is proving to be another such corporate shill, under a "progressive" guise. The left-right, Repulican-Democrat. Conservative-liberal, libertarian-socialist dichotomy is being driven as a wedge to divide the people the corporations want to control. No libertarian agenda can succeed until both sides recognize their common interest in an anti-corporate program, and Ron Paul and Alan Grayson unite and run on the same ticket....

The FDA serves a useful function, sometimes. But it has been hijacked.

I definitely agree it isn't left vs right, but the corporations vs you (unless you happen to own a large corporation).

Nevertheless, Ron Paul is a false messiah of hilarious proportions. I don't remember Ron Paul sponsoring legislation to repeal corporate personhood, and to my knowledge he supports these imaginary persons, and even if this weren't the case his libertarian ideology is inherently contradictory.

Capitalism by its nature creates inequalities which lay the seeds for all sorts of governmental interventions, because it is in the interests of moneyed elites to lobby for favorable laws. Free Market Fundamentalism is a feel-good mythology that elites use to knock down unfavorable regulations or enhance the efficacy of their corporatist policies (as was the case for farm subsidies and the signing of NAFTA). A mixed economy is inevitable.... the only choice we have is whether it is a social democratic one or a corporatist one. That is, until we can progress beyond it.

http://www.adciv.org

Edited by progressive, 03 January 2010 - 04:40 AM.

[niner]

...just like George W. Bush wasn't a "real" conservative.

Let's look at Bush. He let Ted Kennedy write the "No Child Left Behind" act, for one thing (which is a failure). He signed into law the Medicare drug benefit program. Hardly the work of a doctrinaire conservative.

Leaving NCLB aside, per comments above, Bush did a few things that were not conservative, and a few things that were not neocon, and a few things that were not libertarian. ("few", ha.) But among his greatest errors were applications of all of these ideologies. We can't use the fact that he was not "pure" in any one of them to distract from the failures of the application of the ideology. One can always claim that it was not the fault of the ideology, but that "he didn't do it right", which gets us back to my earlier point that if an ideology can't be applied in the real world, it isn't really very useful. I think the most useful exercise here would be to point to examples of these ideologies being successfully employed in a modern industrial society anywhere on Earth. What country would a Libertarian hold up as an example of the right way to do it, and how is that country faring? If none exists, why not?

[EmbraceUnity]

...just like George W. Bush wasn't a "real" conservative.

Let's look at Bush. He let Ted Kennedy write the "No Child Left Behind" act, for one thing (which is a failure). He signed into law the Medicare drug benefit program. Hardly the work of a doctrinaire conservative.

Leaving NCLB aside, per comments above, Bush did a few things that were not conservative, and a few things that were not neocon, and a few things that were not libertarian. ("few", ha.) But among his greatest errors were applications of all of these ideologies. We can't use the fact that he was not "pure" in any one of them to distract from the failures of the application of the ideology. One can always claim that it was not the fault of the ideology, but that "he didn't do it right", which gets us back to my earlier point that if an ideology can't be applied in the real world, it isn't really very useful. I think the most useful exercise here would be to point to examples of these ideologies being successfully employed in a modern industrial society anywhere on Earth. What country would a Libertarian hold up as an example of the right way to do it, and how is that country faring? If none exists, why not?

Hong Kong, at least before being incorporated into the PRC, is usually held up as an example of libertarianism, but it is actually more georgist. They use land taxes as the main source of income and have long had some sensible regulations, public works, public healthcare, a huge public housing program, welfare policies, and so forth. Oh and their currency has long been pegged to the USD, not gold or any such thing. Considering that is the most libertarian place on Earth, I think that supports the theory that the most resilient systems on earth are indeed mixed economies. Every other "Asian Tiger" had a strongly state-oriented development model, as did post-war Japan and Germany, and basically every other country with an ounce of wealth.

That's ok though, Patri Friedman is building libertopian colonies in the ocean. Maybe it will work. In any case, Bon Voyage!

By the way, the attacks on immortalism in that article should actually be an impetus for trying to disassociate ourselves with insane anti-democratic misogynist free market fundamentalists. Yet, this thread is probably a perfect example of why nobody funds anti-aging research.

Edited by progressive, 03 January 2010 - 07:50 AM.

[rwac]

I think the most useful exercise here would be to point to examples of these ideologies being successfully employed in a modern industrial society anywhere on Earth. What country would a Libertarian hold up as an example of the right way to do it, and how is that country faring? If none exists, why not?

Not today. But yes, America a 100 years ago was much closer to a libertarian society.
Flawed ? Yes, Very. But in a lot of ways, much freer than today's America.

Oh, yes, Bush also punted on a lot of necessary reforms leading upto today.
Conservative champion or not, he wasn't all that great.

Edited by rwac, 03 January 2010 - 08:03 AM.

[Cappa]

In other words, libertarianism can never fail, it can only be failed. Greenspan wasn't a "real" libertarian, just like George W. Bush wasn't a "real" conservative. Are you seriously trying to tell us that Greenspan's "let the companies police themselves" proclivities were not "laissez-faire enough"? I get the impression that to be a Real Libertarian, you would need to ride a Unicorn, because no policy that could be implemented in the real world would be pure enough to qualify as Real Libertarianism. It's basically a fantasy political philosophy for people who like to bitch about the government.

Greenspan is a Keynsian economist. Despite what he may have claimed in the past (re: gold standard, etc.), he believes in central economic planning (goes without saying, as an ex-chairman of the Fed). The business cycle starts at the Federal Reserve and cheap credit (artificially low interests rates) and easy money policy are what caused this meltdown. Easy money is like a drug. You don't give alcohol to an alcoholic and expect him to only drink under certain conditions (let alone allow those conditions to be set by his friends). The cure is part of the disease, and the recent "stimulus" will produce more of the same.

I'll reply to the rest later.

Edited by Cappa, 03 January 2010 - 08:26 AM.

[rwac]

Hong Kong, at least before being incorporated into the PRC, is usually held up as an example of libertarianism, but it is actually more georgist. They use land taxes as the main source of income and have long had some sensible regulations, public works, public healthcare, a huge public housing program, welfare policies, and so forth. Oh and their currency has long been pegged to the USD, not gold or any such thing. Considering that is the most libertarian place on Earth, I think that supports the theory that the most resilient systems on earth are indeed mixed economies. Every other "Asian Tiger" had a strongly state-oriented development model, as did post-war Japan and Germany, and basically every other country with an ounce of wealth.

HK was kept free because of significant British influence.
The judges and people in power were British educated, and that showed.
You're praising the British Empire. Not sure if you intended to do that.

Anyway, that policy only works in a small and ethnically uniform country (HK is ~95% Chinese).

HK did not have strong welfare policies. I believe Chris Patten, the last British Governor (1992-1997) of HK introduced some welfare policies, but we don't get to see the results thereof.

Edited by rwac, 03 January 2010 - 08:31 AM.

[Cappa]

...just like George W. Bush wasn't a "real" conservative.

Let's look at Bush. He let Ted Kennedy write the "No Child Left Behind" act, for one thing (which is a failure). He signed into law the Medicare drug benefit program. Hardly the work of a doctrinaire conservative.

And he was an interventionist in foreign and economic affairs and had no fiscal discipline. He isn't a conservative by any standard.

[EmbraceUnity]

In other words, libertarianism can never fail, it can only be failed. Greenspan wasn't a "real" libertarian, just like George W. Bush wasn't a "real" conservative. Are you seriously trying to tell us that Greenspan's "let the companies police themselves" proclivities were not "laissez-faire enough"? I get the impression that to be a Real Libertarian, you would need to ride a Unicorn, because no policy that could be implemented in the real world would be pure enough to qualify as Real Libertarianism. It's basically a fantasy political philosophy for people who like to bitch about the government.

Greenspan is a Keynsian economist. Despite what he may have claimed in the past (re: gold standard, etc.), he believes in central economic planning (goes without saying, as an ex-chairman of the Fed). The business cycle starts at the Federal Reserve and cheap credit (artificially low interests rates) and easy money policy are what caused this meltdown. Easy money is like a drug. You don't give alcohol to an alcoholic and expect him to only drink under certain conditions (let alone allow those conditions to be set by his friends). The cure is part of the disease, and the recent "stimulus" will produce more of the same.

I'll reply to the rest later.

Greenspan did a lot of work behind the scenes to promote all sorts of deregulation, especially under Clinton. Not to mention all his numerous public statements in favor of free market fundamentalism both before and during his tenure at the Fed. To say he is a Keynesian is beyond absurd. He would be appropriately titled a "vulgar libertarian" who has seemed to favor corporate interests at the expense of everyone else.

[maxwatt]

...just like George W. Bush wasn't a "real" conservative.

Let's look at Bush. He let Ted Kennedy write the "No Child Left Behind" act, for one thing (which is a failure). He signed into law the Medicare drug benefit program. Hardly the work of a doctrinaire conservative.

No Child Left Behind, Kennedy's signature education reform bill, was intentionally underfunded by the Bush administration. Kennedy came out aains his own bill when Bush broke his promises and morphed it into an industry-friendly "Medicare reform" package. The senator spent months cajoling Democrats to back his version of the legislation, went to the Senate floor to pleading with his colleagues to stop the measure he charged had been "hijacked" by Republicans.

Whatever Bush was, and there are plenty of four letter words that might apply, he was no libertarian, and his "conservativec" veneer was a cloak of opportunism to gain and maintain power. "Opportunist" is not a four letter word, but it should be. He served the interests of the corporations whose lobbyists control our government, O'bama is proving to be another such corporate shill, under a "progressive" guise. The left-right, Repulican-Democrat. Conservative-liberal, libertarian-socialist dichotomy is being driven as a wedge to divide the people the corporations want to control. No libertarian agenda can succeed until both sides recognize their common interest in an anti-corporate program, and Ron Paul and Alan Grayson unite and run on the same ticket....

The FDA serves a useful function, sometimes. But it has been hijacked.

I definitely agree it isn't left vs right, but the corporations vs you (unless you happen to own a large corporation).

Nevertheless, Ron Paul is a false messiah of hilarious proportions. I don't remember Ron Paul sponsoring legislation to repeal corporate personhood, and to my knowledge he supports these imaginary persons, and even if this weren't the case his libertarian ideology is inherently contradictory.

Capitalism by its nature creates inequalities which lay the seeds for all sorts of governmental interventions, because it is in the interests of moneyed elites to lobby for favorable laws. Free Market Fundamentalism is a feel-good mythology that elites use to knock down unfavorable regulations or enhance the efficacy of their corporatist policies (as was the case for farm subsidies and the signing of NAFTA). A mixed economy is inevitable.... the only choice we have is whether it is a social democratic one or a corporatist one. That is, until we can progress beyond it.

http://www.adciv.org

Ron Paul? On Thursday, November 19, 2009, after several hours of heated debate, the Paul-Grayson “Audit the Fed” amendment passed 43-26 in the House Financial Services Committee. The amendment calls for a comprehensive audit of the Federal Reserve.

But then any ideology is inherently contradictory, will not work in real world, blinds its adherents to "facts on the ground". Acting from idealogy instead of responding to the actual effects of one's actions leads to disastrous policies.

Edited by maxwatt, 03 January 2010 - 01:26 PM.

[Cappa]

In other words, libertarianism can never fail, it can only be failed. Greenspan wasn't a "real" libertarian, just like George W. Bush wasn't a "real" conservative. Are you seriously trying to tell us that Greenspan's "let the companies police themselves" proclivities were not "laissez-faire enough"? I get the impression that to be a Real Libertarian, you would need to ride a Unicorn, because no policy that could be implemented in the real world would be pure enough to qualify as Real Libertarianism. It's basically a fantasy political philosophy for people who like to bitch about the government.

Greenspan is a Keynsian economist. Despite what he may have claimed in the past (re: gold standard, etc.), he believes in central economic planning (goes without saying, as an ex-chairman of the Fed). The business cycle starts at the Federal Reserve and cheap credit (artificially low interests rates) and easy money policy are what caused this meltdown. Easy money is like a drug. You don't give alcohol to an alcoholic and expect him to only drink under certain conditions (let alone allow those conditions to be set by his friends). The cure is part of the disease, and the recent "stimulus" will produce more of the same.

I'll reply to the rest later.

Greenspan did a lot of work behind the scenes to promote all sorts of deregulation, especially under Clinton. Not to mention all his numerous public statements in favor of free market fundamentalism both before and during his tenure at the Fed. To say he is a Keynesian is beyond absurd. He would be appropriately titled a "vulgar libertarian" who has seemed to favor corporate interests at the expense of everyone else.

His beliefs (at least in the past) might be classified as moderate libertarian, but he came out largely in favor of central economic planning. You can't artificially manipulate interest rates and print money out of thin air the way he did for years and years and still try to divorce yourself from Keynsian economics. Any deregulation on the fiscal side may have been unwise (from a Keynesian perspective) with the monetary conditions as they were (the floodgates of easy money being wide open) but on the monetary end he was an all out Keynsian. You can say he did a poor job by Keynsian standards, but don't push his shit on libertarians or try to lay the blame on Austrian economics.

Anyways, I'm at a crossroads myself with what to do fiscally even under ideal conditions on the monetary end. I suppose it depends on what your goals are (if you believe in some amount of personal welfare and other state programs). I find myself being less libertarian on the fiscal end (although certainly more libertarian than socialist). But it's obvious to me that the economy is decrepit due to years and years of central economic planning at the Federal Reserve, especially the relentless pounding of more recent history. Bernanke is making the same dumb mistakes today, except now he has very little room left, given that interest rates are literally on the floor and people worldwide are losing more and more confidence in the USD. Maybe that's the point. It would make it much easier to push for a continental or even international currency with a collapse.

Edited by Cappa, 03 January 2010 - 01:36 PM.

[EmbraceUnity]

In other words, libertarianism can never fail, it can only be failed. Greenspan wasn't a "real" libertarian, just like George W. Bush wasn't a "real" conservative. Are you seriously trying to tell us that Greenspan's "let the companies police themselves" proclivities were not "laissez-faire enough"? I get the impression that to be a Real Libertarian, you would need to ride a Unicorn, because no policy that could be implemented in the real world would be pure enough to qualify as Real Libertarianism. It's basically a fantasy political philosophy for people who like to bitch about the government.

Greenspan is a Keynsian economist. Despite what he may have claimed in the past (re: gold standard, etc.), he believes in central economic planning (goes without saying, as an ex-chairman of the Fed). The business cycle starts at the Federal Reserve and cheap credit (artificially low interests rates) and easy money policy are what caused this meltdown. Easy money is like a drug. You don't give alcohol to an alcoholic and expect him to only drink under certain conditions (let alone allow those conditions to be set by his friends). The cure is part of the disease, and the recent "stimulus" will produce more of the same.

I'll reply to the rest later.

Greenspan did a lot of work behind the scenes to promote all sorts of deregulation, especially under Clinton. Not to mention all his numerous public statements in favor of free market fundamentalism both before and during his tenure at the Fed. To say he is a Keynesian is beyond absurd. He would be appropriately titled a "vulgar libertarian" who has seemed to favor corporate interests at the expense of everyone else.

His beliefs (at least in the past) might be classified as moderate libertarian, but he came out largely in favor of central economic planning. You can't artificially manipulate interest rates and print money out of thin air the way he did for years and years and still try to divorce yourself from Keynsian economics. Any deregulation on the fiscal side may have been unwise (from a Keynesian perspective) with the monetary conditions as they were (the floodgates of easy money being wide open) but on the monetary end he was an all out Keynsian. You can say he did a poor job by Keynsian standards, but don't push his shit on libertarians or try to lay the blame on Austrian economics.

Anyways, I'm at a crossroads myself with what to do fiscally even under ideal conditions on the monetary end. I suppose it depends on what your goals are (if you believe in some amount of personal welfare and other state programs). I find myself being less libertarian on the fiscal end (although certainly more libertarian than socialist). But it's obvious to me that the economy is decrepit due to years and years of central economic planning at the Federal Reserve, especially the relentless pounding of more recent history. Bernanke is making the same dumb mistakes today, except now he has very little room left, given that interest rates are literally on the floor and people worldwide are losing more and more confidence in the USD. Maybe that's the point. It would make it much easier to push for a continental or even international currency with a collapse.

Monetarism is like the one thing that is usually associated with libertarian thinkers that isn't a complete failure, but you are correct that it is very Keynesian. It attempts to smooth out the business cycle, and since according to the logic of libertarians there shouldn't ever be a need to, this is quite confusing. If we aren't always at an equilibrium, perhaps it is because even under "ideal" conditions, people are not actually as rationally self-interested as we might like.

Ok, I am exaggerating. Libertarians do have solid critiques of price controls the the perverse incentives of many sorts of welfare programs and bailouts. Serious progressives would have nothing to do with those policies.... but perhaps as a result of dialectical discourse with libertarians and other capitalists, so gotta give credit where credit is due.

Edited by progressive, 03 January 2010 - 02:16 PM.