The appropriate punishment for any political position

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Should be to give the person exactly what (s)he wants!

Libertarian? Get thrown to Somalia and see how it goes.

Actually think Communism could go? Get sent to Cuba or Venezuela.

Think government should endorse majority religion? Welcome to Pakistan.


Etc.

Sending someone to a pseudo-communist totalitarian dictatorship would not give them a very good picture of what true communism would look like. I don't see how that would prove communism cant work it would prove it hasn't actually been set up in those places.

Much like the U.S is not actually a 'democracy' it's a republic yet people still refer to it as a democracy. Other then that I agree with the points made kinda.

Last edited by Sweetleaf on 11 Oct 2012, 8:17 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Do you know what libertarianism actually is? It's about a democratic, limited government that protects the life, liberty and property of its citizens. It means a smaller state, not no state at all.

Somalia is a failed, lawless state that was previously governed by a brutal totalitarian dictatorship that eventually fell. The country is mainly controlled by well-armed, rich warlords and Islamist thugs and is heavily influenced by various foreign governments and organisations, and that has been invaded by Ethiopia numerous times. With no real organized government to use force to protect life, liberty, and property people and groups are free to use any aggression whatsoever. It's about the strong having power of life or death over the weak, which is not what libertarianism is about.

A better comparison of what a kind of libertarian society might look like - at least economically - would be colonial Hong Kong from the 1970s to the late 1990s, although it's true that BHK wasn't particularly democratic - there were no elections, for example and the HKers had no real choice over their future.

It's like suggesting that all socialists, regardless of their actual political opinions, should go and live in North Korea.

Then the pure capitalists can be sent to Somalia....since that place would be more like un-regulated capitalism based on that.

Somolia is more like anarchy than libertarianism. Libertarianism is limited government with personal freedom, but it does support a government to do such things as uphold laws, enforce contracts etc.

I do agree with the idea though. Everyone should be well aware of what happens in excess in any political system.

Can you name a country where communism has worked? I can't. I can think of a lot of communist states that s**t on human rights though.

Somalia isn't really libertarian in any sense, it's not even really anarchy but it is a very interesting country. While the internationally recognized central government has very little authority, outside of Mogadishu and south of the country the situation is relatively stable and in some cases doing quite well. Somaliland is for all intents of purposes an independent country and is a thriving democracy despite no international recognition or the foreign aid that the powerless central government receives. Puntland also operates as a relatively stable autonomous state.

The militias and warlords that have plagued the south of the country were actually defeated by the Islamic Courts Union back in 2006 and were essentially in control of that part country until our ally Ethiopia decided to invade less than a year after they took over. Not saying the ICU were good guys but they were governing. After the ICU was ousted, it gave rise to the more extreme al-Qaeda aligned al-Shabaab and insurgency.

The reason for Somalia's instability the last 20 years is not the because of it's lack of a powerful central government, it is the result of the communist dictatorship of Siad Barre who at one time possessed the largest military in all of Africa. Life after this dictatorship have improved in almost EVERY category (economically, politically, health, etc) and are doing relatively well compared of countries in that neighborhood of the world. I'd certainly live in Somalia over the police state Eritrea or Sudan.

I suppose if you want to call what Somalia is now libertarianism then you can(even tho it is not_since it's not the negative connotation that you think it is. You can't compare Somalia to the US or western countries, you can only assume what their country would look when compared to similar countries and I think Somalia is better off not having a powerful central government than having a corrupt autocratic one.

I've made a few posts about Somalia on this forum before in response to saying Somalia is somehow libertarian and usually people never respond to them.

My plan is to move to Somolia and open the first ice skating rink in Somolia.

The problem with communism is that it is an unworkable theory. It goes against human nature as people do not seek to work together for the common good but rather to prove themselves better than other people in order to have more sex. Thus, especially males, will always want to have the nicer car, the better job or the bigger home. Living in the same flat as everyone else and driving the same car as everyone else is not a reason to strive. Thus, communist states are always doomed to mediocrity at best and failure at worst.

I'd also add that no one has ever achieved what Marx's theories called for. The thing is, Marx called for a worldwide, simultaneous revolution and a one world state. This would eliminate the wasteful spending on militaries and let that money be reinvested in infrastructure and manufacturing. He also felt the same about religion. The closest the world ever came was the USSR, and the toll in human lives and environmental damage due to bad ideas and malinvestment was enormous. The problem was that the Bolsheviks were trying to bring the USSR up to an industrialized society when it was in actuality an agrarian one. To do that, the path was paid in human blood. It's part of why Stalin's reign was so bad. He was trying to achieve the start point for Marxism quickly. If you read the writings of Marx, particularly the Communist Manifesto, and know the history of the USSR, you begin to understand it from this paradigm.

That's the line that always gets repeated but it could also apply to libertarian utopia. Human nature isn't good enough for libertarian utopia either because human beings are not naturally charitable enough and large powerful corporations and companies will not conduct themselves ethically without some form of government coercion. Simply telling people to exercise power through their money (i.e. don't do business with unethical companies) is not always realistic. In a free market money buys power and power will always test the limits of ethics. Power is not limited to direct force either so government does not have a true monopoly when it comes to having power over others. Just think of what happens when a private company buys the entire water supply to a town and then decides to raise prices to increase profit while simultaneously allowing the pipes to degrade and toxins to seep into the water.

As for communism, I agree that there are problems but I also think you got the reasons all wrong. There's nothing unnatural about a group of 20-100 human beings working together for the common good. What's more problematic is getting millions to work together for the common good without forming into competing tribes and gangs. At the present day and age it's not exactly realistic since we are dependent on mass production and specialization of labor.


Marx's solutions may not have born out the way he expected (e.g. he didn't anticipate the development of collective bargaining and eventually modern welfare states existing coincident with capitalist markets). On the other hand the capitalism of today in western nations isn't the capitalism of Marx's time. Over the 20th century we managed to partially tame the beast and smooth out the rough edges so that there wouldn't be an inclination towards violent worker revolts and class warfare. Compromises were made in modern industrial societies and revolutions mainly happened in less industrialized areas.

Also, I don't put a lot of weight in all of Marx's economic theories (the labor theory of value for instance), but his criticisms of the long-term viability of laissez-faire capitalism are not that easily dismissed IMO. The thing is pure laissez-faire markets theorized by neoclassical economics generally have not existed without major economic shocks leading to repeated major government interventions in the name of "saving the system". Since the 1970s the major form of intervention has been the creation of fiat currency and virtually unlimited central bank lending to keep unemployment in check. This blunt instrument hasn't panned out well as a lot of the money got funneled into financial asset bubbles. My guess is we are probably headed for a collapse no matter what we do and the era of neo-liberal corporate multinational domination will have to end. A system predicated on perpetual growth is inherently unstable.

I have stated (in another thread) that I thought hard core Libertarianism had the same problems as hard core communism, so we agree on that. I will also say that Marx was not completely wrong in his assessment of history, but rather that he was too narrowly focused and lost track of what it means to be human. Then again, I would say something similar about Ayn Rand as well. It's the problem you get with idealogues. They get so wrapped up in their own theories that they fail to see the bigger picture.

As for economics, I admit that I have yet to study enough of the subject to be able to firmly defend any of the schools of though effectively. I tend towards the Austrian school because so far, it makes the most sense. However, I don't quite know if that is the stance I will wind up with in the end.

It seems to me at the very least people under a Libertarian style government would have the means to file a law suit against a company poisoning them.

As for safety nets, those are debatable among Libertarians. What most do not like is flat out entitlements.

Actually in the case of people made sick by a willfully negligent water company, a Libertarian government would probably be quite fine with suing their ass for compensation and damages for poisoning victims.

Otherwise though, I think even a Libertarian government would have emergency services like police and fire. It's possible that if somebody got hit by a drunk driver and was a special hard luck case that it could be seen as an emergency expenditure. I mean if you make a society where there is a car accident and your police and fire department show up it doesn't make sense to write up a report and leave. They'd be there to help take them to the emergency room.

One of the main things Libertarians are against is forced charity through income taxes. However, somebody like Gary Johnson would want to dump the IRS in favor of a consumption tax. At least when you buy a taxed good it is a personal free choice unlike the income tax which is a confiscation.

As a side not I do realize some would consider privatizing emergency services. I might contemplate a private fire department but I don't think Law Enforcement should ever be privatized.


Last thing, I like that Libertarianism tends to want to just leave people alone. If somebody is not infringing on somebody else's rights to life, liberty, and property then let them be.

Libertarianism is minimal government to enforce contracts and property rights. There would be no fire department. You could sue someone if you could afford a lawyer. The goverment would have officers to physically enforce the law where necessary, but private police forces would also abound. It's my land - are you going to tell me what I can and can't do to people who trespass? As can be seen by the prison labour thread, and by looking around, there is a race to the bottom. The point of bringing Somalia up in regards to libertarianism is to encourage them to go there and make their society. Rather than taking the prosperity and good will that has come from living in a strong state and trying top make that libertarian, they should go to failed states, and use them as a blank slate.

From what I've read, Marx didn't want to strive in that sense. He wanted to maximise leisure time. This was also Wilde's argument. And it's one I share - I have no inclination to strive on so I can spread my seed, to walk on what is for the majority a non-stop treadmill in a sinking building. Times are tough, sure, and I would cash any cheque you sent my way, but I'm not interested in Capitalism's shiny baubles or rat race. I want to read and think and learn and write more, to create and enjoy others' creativity. These things are good in themselves.

'Human nature' encompasses everything every human has ever done. To be selective with those behaviours is cheating.

That's an oxymoron.

The word "capitalism" implies the existence of regulations.

An unregulated economy in known as a Lazle-faire (No idea how to spell that, my mactionary isn't helping) economy.

I'm the complete opposite in some regard, I can't read fiction for the most part, so I only read textbooks and the likes. I love working and I love business, it's what makes life worth living in a sense, striving to watch my portfolio go up, to get a better job, better standard of living. The beauty of a libertarian society, is that we can both elect to do what we like, we can't in a communist society.

these ideologies have to interact with people and their values, and nowhere else on earth is the American value system found. You don't have any society that champions life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness, economic liberalism, democracy, a government built on checks and balances, a fair(er) court system, the melting pot, and a nation under God whose individuals and the collective are both liberated by it as well as morally accountable to it for their actions.

The above allows for a slight shift in any direction, but too far left or right and you've sacrificed too much that makes America America. It also makes comparisons to Somolia, Venezuela, and Pakistan useless, especially when those places do not share the most of the values that the libertarian, communist, or religious nut in America holds.

Values are what bind or separate us.

Please don't compare the utter crap known as the US court system to an *actual* system of justice. Some of us actually take the rule of law seriously...