why the left is dying

........“Declaration of Independents” is suitable reading for this summer of debt-ceiling debate, which has been a proxy for a bigger debate, which is about nothing less than this: What should be the nature of the American regime? America is moving in the libertarians’ direction not because they have won an argument but because government and the sectors it dominates have made themselves ludicrous. This has, however, opened minds to the libertarians’ argument.

The essence of which is the common-sensical principle that before government interferes with the freedom of the individual and of individuals making consensual transactions in markets, it ought to have a defensible reason for doing so. It usually does not.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/ ... story.html

I guess it never occurred to you that there are libertarians on the left?

AspenValley wrote: I guess it never occurred to you that there are libertarians on the left?

+1

I think the people in both parties are upset with the beltway boys and would like a little more freedom, party membership continues to fall. But will they flock back to the parties when the 2012 election comes around?

Socialist Libertarians are worse than regressive Democrats are with respect to personal property rights. That is who you meant by left libertarians, wasn't it AV?

PrintSmith wrote: Socialist Libertarians are worse than regressive Democrats are with respect to personal property rights. That is who you meant by left libertarians, wasn't it AV?

What the devil is a "socialist libertarian"? Another made-up category like your "regressive Democrat" BS?

It's an opportunity to use the words "socialist" and "regressive" in a sentence... Nothing more.

Socialist libertarians don't consider property rights as sacrosanct as Republicans.

They also like the idea of open borders.

SS109 wrote: Socialist libertarians don't consider property rights as sacrosanct as Republicans.

They also like the idea of open borders.

I don't... But then, I don't consider myself ANY kind of "libertarian"....

SS109 wrote: Socialist libertarians don't consider property rights as sacrosanct as Republicans.

They also like the idea of open borders.

I looked it up and you are right. Never heard of such a critter.

What I was thinking more of were people who had libertarian ideas about social issues, ie, opposed to "blue laws", prohibitions on drug use, "victimless crimes", etc. on the premise that the state should not have authority over other people's moral decisions.

In other words people whose libertarian ideas went more to the social side than the fiscal side. Although in some sense, the idea of open borders actually goes along with libertarian economic ideas because you can't have truly "free" markets when there are national borders, tariffs, etc.

But I can't say I "get" how a person could be fiscally libertarian and socialist at the same time. Seems like an oxymoron to me.

Yes, a fiscal libertarian socialist would have a hard time coming up with the money for his programs. Oh wait, even democratic statist socialist southern Europeans are having trouble coming up with the money for their social programs and they have already reduced military spending to 1% of GDP.