I heard on a radio show last night Obama making the argument that the government should provide health insurance to force private sector companies to be more competitive.
Well, Mr. Odumba, why don’t we have the government own grocery stores, hardware stores, phone companies, and every other company out there to force the private sector to be more competitive? Oh wait, I don’t really want to ask him that, because he will say “why not?”
If we nationalize it, all other prospects will be so affordable by comparison, just think of the money you will save if you let me steal it all!!!
That’s gotta be the stupidest argument I’ve heard since that one guy on here argued that federalism was not a centralization of political power.
I’ll repeat this once more: this chap isn’t stupid, in fact he’s very smart and is advised by very smart people. Only remember they do not believe in personal freedom, free market etc.
They may believe in such a “mixed system” but Karl Marx himself pointed out that any “interventionist” system is nothing but the a step toward full blown Socialism.
lol
no doubt…[:P]
My dog isn’t stupid either it can roll over while my neighbors dog can’t, but my dog still has this urge to eat anything from deer shit, to raccoon shit to other dog shit. My dog gets advice from other dogs too, they bark with each other and sniff around.
Agreed, it’s becoming self-parody for libertarians to assume Obama is stupid, & shows an incredible lack of foresight on their parts.
It also does little to distinguish them from “Conservatives” on the Red Team of the Statist parties. who have reverted to ad-hom, infiltration of other movements (Tea Parties) & other Machiavellian nonsense that we would do well to avoid.
It only hurts libertarian argument to assume that those who are in power are either or (stupid or smart, conscious or unconscious of the free-market), when the reality is that it varies. Obama & Co. know exactly what their doing, & the main point should opposing that, not belittling them.
This will only encourage more people to give Obama & Co. the benefit of the doubt when a supposed libertarian argument amounts to the anti-intellectual cop-out of:
“LoL, Obama is stupid!”
Does anyone remember how many arguments against Marx, that amounted to more or less ad-hominem, survived over the ages long enough to convince the world that Marx was probably wrong?
Yeah, me either.
I have to agree with you. People made the same argument about Bush II. My reply would be: If Bush II is so stupid, why isn’t he jail?
Well, “stupid” is completely subjective.
I consider anyone “stupid” that is unable to see the fallacies in their arguments and are unwilling to seek out opposing points of view. Which boils down to libertarianism/Austrian economics are the only consistent political philosophies, as such, anyone who has heard of libertarianism, and has not embraced it, is, IMO, stupid. All other political philosophies are arbitrary.
Obviously, according to my definition, he is stupid. So was Bush. So was Clinton. So was Reagan. Etc., etc.
I am not really interested in converting the simple minded or uninterested to libertarianism. Before I was a libertarian, if someone would have said “Obama is stupid”, my reaction would have been, “really, why do you say that?” People like that are who I am interested in. Not the run of the mill sheeple that says, “really, well then you are un-American” or some such nonsense.
Yeah. I depends on the context in which stupid is used.
Spidey has good points, but I prefer to use the term “ignorant” than stupid, as the later implies the incapacity to learn (which may or may not be true; obviously not everyone is going to have an I.Q.), while the earlier implies anything between a different knowledge base, emotional attachment to views and/or knowledge despite contrary evidence, etc.
Stupid just seems too reactionary ad-hominem, whereas ignorant merely implies a lack of exposure to different information. Many smart people who have high I.Q’s, for instance, cannot be called stupid merely because they vote a certain way (or vote at all), but ignorant in certain things.
Many libertarians can be great at libertarian rhetoric but completely ignorant of some of the things their rhetoric targets, such as being ignorant of a middle-class job experience yet arguing that the free-market would better the middle-class.
By no means am I’m saying that’s wrong, in many ways that can be demonstrated, but what I am saying that it is almost impossible for an indivdual to not be ignorant on something, & I think that makes any anti-establishment argument, let alone the libertarian argument, much harder to propagate. It makes argumentation in general a hard sport to engage in.
I also think Rothbard’s Law gives good support in because many people specialize in things they are “worst” at, it would seem to help explain the vast amount of ignorance found in any given state-society, which isn’t a coincidence since over specialization is typically encouraged, imo.
lol wut?
Exactly why my dog is smart for rolling over but eat’s shit still.
Do not avoid Machiavelli! Even if the tactics are not compatible with libertarianism, Machiavelli is an excellent study into mob mentality, nationalism, monarchy, aristocracy and the church. Know thine enemy.
Not to mention the fact that The Prince may have been satirical.
I’d like to be able to read that source but I don’t feel inclined to buy the book. If you come across the arguments online, I would be much obliged if you could share the link.
Machiavelli is an excellent source to read. I just meant we should avoid similar tactics by the state that evoke him, such as ad-hominem, mob mentality, enemy of my enemy is my friend, etc, not to not study him 
LOL
Well, libertarianism is the only consistent political philosophy.
For example, many non-libertarians will claim that we need immigration laws. But for some reason they claim that we should only have immigration laws for national borders. When asked what about state, county, and city borders they just get a dumb look on their face and revert back to we need national immigration laws. It is a completely inconsistent position to hold, and as such, you have to be completely stupid to hold it, IMO. If you are smart, you go, well yeah, it is inconsistent. A smart person would either say there should be immigration laws for all borders or none. If a smart person says that all borders should have immigration laws, then you could just ask a smart person, “so, what is so great about immigration laws?” If he or she responds “it makes us safer”, and you ask “well prove it then”. When he or she fails to prove it, a smart person would go, well, I guess we should get rid of immigration laws.
Or in this case, Odumba says that a government take over will force the private sector to be more competitive. This is a completely inconsistent position to hold. Government owned companies kill competition, they do not encourage it.
On all political subjects, libertarianism is the most consistent philosophy, as such, anyone who is smart, will embrace it. I had not heard of it until just five years ago. Once I found out about it, I looked into it, and have embraced it. And I am not saying smart people embrace it just because I did. Again, I say a smart person embraces it, because it is a consistent philosophy.
Keynesianism says on the one hand that saving is good (for individuals), and on the other that saving is bad (for the government). Stupid.
I though Keynesianism hated saving in any case?