Ron Paul & DOOMSDAY...

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That's just a silly example of a continuum. This particular scenario is applicable even to governments that don't follow the "non-aggression principle".


That is a strawman, libertarians don't believe that a factory should be able to dump its waste anywhere and say "to hell with anyone affected". That is easily resolved by private property laws, unless the people that own the factory own the entire river then your argument doesn't hold. As soon as their waste flows into a part of the river that is owned by someone else, it would be an act of property aggression and the factory owners would be accountable.

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/arc ... sm/250387/

Don't make me copy and past the whole article Orwell, it's full of links and subquotes and trying to format that kind of thing makes me angry...

That is not a strawman at all.

I live in an area with lots of factory farms (mostly poultry) and lots of issues with water contamination. The industrial farmers absolutely hate the EPA and many of them flock to Ron Paul and his ilk because they believe they'll be free of responsibility to control their waste products under a libertarian system.

I've talked to these men. I did not cut them open, but I'm pretty sure they were made of meat--especially their heads.

PS

Correct me please, but even under your more sensible libertarian system, the water issue would be a matter of civil law and conflicts would be settled by law suit, right?

The point is how to determine when you are infringing on someone else's liberties, and who is going to enforce that. That is the role of government, like it or not. That is where the EPA, the DHHS, and NLRB, and innumerable other meddling federal agencies step in to protect people like you and me.


Jefferson's foreign policy is obsolete. It no longer fits our needs in the modern world. Jefferson himself warned against fetishizing the Founders and trying to stick dogmatically to everything they did. If you think you are following in the mold of Jefferson by advocating withdrawal from the world, you are grossly misinformed.

And what is this nonsense about people going of their own accord to help another country militarily? I know your devotion to Paul makes you say simple-minded things, but you cannot possibly be that stupid. I don't have a tank, helicopter, machine gun, or any of the other advanced military equipment that is the real driver of America's strength on the battlefield. A warm body alone is nothing in war.


There are always unintended consequences, to our inaction as surely as to our actions. Should we have allowed North Korea to annex the South and condemned the entire peninsula to all these decades of brutal oppression? Would the unified communist Korea then have turned their sights on Japan? Should we have let Europe fight Europe's war and sat back to watch Hitler take the continent? After bringing down the Third Reich, should we have simply withdrawn without our meddling Marshall Plan? Then Stalin would have conquered all of Europe. A larger and stronger Soviet Union could well have had the resources to defeat us in such a scenario.

Advocating inaction because you cannot fully predict and guarantee every consequence of an action is madness. You cannot guarantee the results of inaction either, and sitting on your hands to avoid taking any responsibility for the messes that might ensue is moral cowardice.


I think I've been pretty clear in the past that I disagree with our policy towards Cuba. Economic sanctions can still have their place in some circumstances, though.


OK, I was mistaken. I had read that somewhere, I thought. Paul does admire Rand, though.

Not silly. The point is that there is not an absolute right to freedom from interference, but there is a reasonable right to such freedom that extends to restrictions on your neighbor's freedoms. Can I shine floodlights in your bedroom window at 2 in the morning? Can I have a booming sound system running at all hours? None of these questions are settled under the idea of individuals having absolute rights. Your rights are limited by the rights and interests of others, and the machinery of government is there in large part to arbitrate disputes when they bump up against each other.


Not a strawman at all, this is a completely real scenario that happens every day. Self-proclaimed libertarians and conservatives always advocate for less regulation- this means companies would be "free" to pollute the environment. They can dump waste in rivers, in the air, in the oceans and lakes. This affects all of us, and we all have an interest in the commons. Who owns the rivers and oceans? For that matter, who owns the skies? It would be ridiculous if you were to try to assign ownership of the atmosphere to any given individual. Do we all own equal shares of the atmosphere? If so, how are you going to keep your share separate from mine, and prevent any pollution you make from contaminating my air without my permission? All it would take is one treehugger unwilling to grant permission to dirty "their" air, and no one could ever drive a car or burn coal again. The libertarian notion of "property aggression" as a solution to the question of pollution is beyond unworkable. It's batshit insane.

If nothing else, conspiracy nuts and racists share a hatred of the federal government; the one group because of their paranoid delusions of black helicopters and the other because it protects minorities from their Jim Crow ambitions. That is a reasonable first guess at the motives of those demographics backing Paul.

You are quite dishonest in attempting to frame your question as you did. "Peace and freedom" my ass.

I still can't wrap my head around this whole concept of property aggression when it comes to the environment. The environment is a more much dynamic thing than a piece of land so they must constantly be under attack

The argument I have heard before is that we can solve the "tragedy of the commons" by simply privatizing the commons. Hopefully it is evident why this is an absurd proposal.

So that means that communism will be privatized?

The commons permit the perverse incentive of degrading the common resource in exchange for a short term gain. Sounds good until everyone starts doing it. If the commons is subdivided each person can derive a benefit from his own plot only. He cannot misuse his neighbors plot and enhance his own.

That is the rational behind privatizing. There is only one trouble. We cannot privatize or subdivide the atmosphere or the seas or the rivers. Which means that use of these resources must be regulated by a central authority. At this point you should read Hobbes Leviathan.

ruveyn

Really can't forsee Ron Paul ever becoming president.

but then again in 2007 there was this little known jr senator with the funny name and well I said he could never be president.

Oh well just goes to show you never know.

To those slamming Paul for a lot of "truthers" and "conspiracy nuts" clinging to him - think about this:

These types of people spent a good portion of their adult life scrutinizing the current administration, and several before it even before the presidents were elected. If these paranoid people can vote in strong confidence in one candidate in particular, does that not say something about how trustworthy that person is or do you have a conspiracy theory of your own about the conspiracy theorists' motives?

It's folly to speculate on the motives of lunatics.