Let Them Eat Cake: The Poverty of Libertarianism

[TexasTowelie]

The GOP's ill-fated strategy to defund Obamacare via a government shutdown ended in a political defeat for the Republicans. But the Libertarian Party was happy:

"Elected Republicans in the House can stimulate the productive private sector by slowing down Big Government," said Geoffrey J. Neale, chair of the Libertarian National Committee.

"Why?" Neale asked. "Because a government-sector slowdown equals a private-sector growth speedup of small businesses and jobs. Americans should welcome a government slowdown -- and fear the opposite: allowing politicians to continue irresponsible, reckless government overspending."

-snip-

In the final analysis, libertarianism is a sophistic political philosophy -- at first blush, seductive, but upon further inspection, it would result in a society where the income inequality would be analogous to a banana republic, a non-existent to paper-thin social safety net, where people allegedly get what they deserve (meritocracy!), pollution goes unregulated and the "free market" (i.e., greed) reigns. Libertarians dream of a utopia, in practice libertarianism would bring about a dystopia.

The complete article is at http://blogs.houstonpress.com/hairballs/2013/10/let_them_eat_cake_the_poverty.php .

[Warpy]

1. Always mistrust Utopians of any stripe

We can achieve Utopia only when the human race has been perfected, and I don't see any evidence of that being attempted, much less happening.

All we can do is rein in the thieves and redistribute the spoils to make exploitation unprofitable.