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Conservatism, Libertarianism and Other Distinctions
I recently got back from attending the 10th annual meeting of the Property and Freedom Society. It’s a libertarian organization of the anarcho-capitalist variety, started by Hans Hermann Hoppe (anonymous recently reviewed one of Hoppe’s books). I found the visit rejuvenating: rarely do I spend four or five days in the company of so many libertarians.
Even on Ricochet, there seems to be a constant conflict between conservative and libertarian ideology. What most people — including many of my fellow Ricochetti — would find most surprising about the conference is how conservative these anarcho-capitalists are. I present to you a speech from last year’s meeting by Dr. Gerard Casey, a Catholic, conservative anarchist, and a lovely and brilliant man. To me, it encapsulates why so many anarchists exist in the libertarian movement, and why they aspire to the same morals as most conservatives.
Published in Culture, Religion & Philosophy
There are people who can’t get jobs because their credit rating implies the lack of self control and judgment. Not saying this applies to your friend or everyone with the same credit, but it does happen.
Yeah. This happened to me. Medical debts at an early age before I had built up any other credit history. Having clawed my way out of that once (with help!), I hope never to be there again.
But you advocating for a system where people are given the impression that their say matters. Maybe that has a certain tendency to quell people that don’t have any influence whatsoever, but the link I provided shows two things. One is that Americans tend to agree on most everything. So in that respect, the poor will get what they want anyway. And two, in the places they disagree, the rich get what they want right now.
Here’s the strange thing though. People don’t act like homo economus. They value things other than money. The rich don’t ask for things that only help the rich. They tend to support things like the minimum wage (unfortunately.) Less so than the poor, but there’s no selfish economic reason to support the minimum wage. People are far more complicated than most assume when they fear the free market.
Here’s an article by Victor Davis Hansen that I think speaks to some of what we have been discussing on this thread.
http://www.hoover.org/research/mob-coming-you
It does a good job outlining the negative consequences of our current system.
An excellent article against Government.
Of what you propose as well.
You say it will be a mob, Ed says the poor will have no say. It can’t be both.
Sure it can. When the poor have no say, you get mobs.
The poor, as a whole, have a lot of money. They would likely have more say under anarcho-capitalism than they do in democracy. A vote is a very weak signal that only shows up every couple years. A dollar is a much stronger and constant signal that can move industries. Most industries create solutions for the rich and poor. It’s fairly easy to picture both a Bloomingdale’s and a Walmart of security and law.
Way to misread the article. The Founders rejected no government because they were afraid of mob rule. This article is an argument against direct democracy. It is not an argument against a republic.
But what all of y’all are asking for is closer to mob rule than what we have now. After all, in your magic government-less utopia, I can make my own rules as long as I am willing to pay for them.