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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Road Walker who wrote (281205)	3/24/2006 5:34:24 PM
From: TimF	Respond to of 1572947

Economic growth and technological improvements. And going way back in the posts and to the heart of the question, I suppose you don't think that the governments coming out of WW2 had anything to do with that? It would be inaccurate to say that they had nothing to do with it, but to an extent it happened despite them. Some minimal part of their activity may have been a prerequisite for the achievements. Another part was beneficial. Some was neutral, or of minimal impact, and many other things where negative. re: But government spending is not the only issue that libertarians care about. There are many other issues and concerns for most libertarians. A better record on controlling spending doesn't necessarily mean a more libertarian record. I never claimed Clinton was a libertarian. Just that his policy fit your views better than Bush. Fitting my views better, in the context of this conversation, would appear to mean being more libertarian. I never claimed that you said that Clinton "was a libertarian". But you are apparently claiming that he was more of a libertarian than Bush, or that his views and or policy, and or achievements fit in with libertarianism more than Bush. If they do it would be a small step across the large gulf between both of them and libertarianism, and in any case I am far from sure that they do. The "disclaimers" that I mentioned about Clinton's spending record are IMO somewhat important. Also spending is not the only appropriate measurement. If Clinton was better on spending, Bush was better on taxes and regulation. Do libertarian support "Islamofacist terrorism" spending? I think not. Libertarians are isolationists by nature... they are not nation builders for sure. Isolationism is not an inherent part of libertarianism. Not all libertarians are isolationists, although there is probably a larger isolationist streak among libertarians then among conservatives or liberals. I would guess the majority of libertarians oppose the war in Iraq, possibly a larger majority than the overall current majority against the war. OTOH while it might be a strong majority its far from a universal view and support for Afghanistan or other operations against Al-Qaeda is probably much stronger. re: 4 - Clinton got action on a lot of things by regulation that required other people to spend rather then on increasing spending. The action is just as against real libertarianism as increasing spending, perhaps more so. You think Bush didn't? Bush just put it on the Fed credit card. Passed it on to the next generation. That abhorent. The "Fed credit card" issue is already covered by concerns about spending and the deficit. It is an important issue, and is relevant to those concerns but it isn't relevant to the issue of regulatory burden. You might consider the deficits a more important issue, but even if we assume that this is so the deficits aren't an answer to every other issue. It appears you will dump the libertarian part for the Republican part is a second. I'd say conservative rather then Republican. As I mentioned its more of an ideological issue than a partisan one. Which doesn't mean I have no amount of partisan favoritism of Republicans over Democrats, but its less of a concern then the conservative and libertarian ideological issues. It also only exists because IMO the Republicans have a record on these issues that is better then the Democrats. If the parties switched around and stayed that way for a long enough period of time I might come to have a preferences for the Democrats. Its rare that my conservative and libertarian ideological principles come in to conflict. So there isn't much chance to toss one out in favor of the other on a particular issue. As regards to Bush both ideas would support opposition to his large spending increases, but then both also supported opposition to Clinton's tax and regulatory policies. Turning to issues rather than politicians, I have over time come to favor legalizing such things as drug use and sales, and prostitution, and gambling. This might be considered to be my libertarian side winning out over my conservative side. More than one person has argued that I can't be pro-life and be a good libertarian, however if you believe that the fetus is a human life deserving of protection than there is nothing anti-libertarian about protecting it. (If however you assume the opposite position about the nature of the fetus and its rights, then I can see no good reason for a law restricting abortion) Gun control is something opposed both by the conservative and the libertarian traditions. One issue where some might see conflict is the "gay marriage" issue. This is another issues where I have become less conservative over time. I used to oppose anything that resembled gay marriage. Now I am mainly concerned that if such a change is enacted it is done so through the Democratic process rather then through courts, and I probably would support Democratically enacted laws that give gay couples (or other unmarried people) some of the same rights and responsibilities as married couples. (Domestic partnerships or whatever you want to call them). In theory I could support moving government out of marriage almost entirely, allowing people to call their relationship whatever they want, and other people to decide whether to accept and support it or not, but this is one case very specific issue where my conservative side wins out enough for me to oppose such a social experiment. I was an opponent of homosexual sex illegal and I'm glad such laws are not longer active in the US. I oppose the idea of a draft and the current registration requirement for a draft. Generally the conservative position has been in favor of having the draft as at least an option if we need it. I could examine some other issues if you want, but I hardly see how my record is one of accepting statism and dumping libertarian ideas "in a second".