More precisely what he says is that there is a reason he receives money from racists. That reason being that he is not a cosmopolitan, feminist, a pro-choicer and generally all around cultural leftie like Horwitz. Which makes Horwitz very uncomfortable because he has no use for libertarians who are not as culturaly left as he is. But naturally only because it goes against some kind of mystical, historic spirit of libertarianism which as Horwitz informs us is one of progressivism and cosmopolitanism. So it is not that Horwitz personally can not stomach people different from himself coming to play a bigger role in the movement. It is just that cultural traditionalism will corrput the soul of libertarianism and upset vengeful greater powers to smite it down! Ie, that it will damage it in the long term.
All of this leads to my general discomfort with Paul, which I think I would characterize as a lack of cosmopolitanism. For example, I don’t think he’s a racist but there are reasons why he’s getting donations from KKK leaders. Even though many of his positions are solidly libertarian, the way they are framed, along with the three above, lend themselves to appealing to the nativist/Buchanan types in a way that I think goes against the historical progressive spirit of classical liberalism.
If Ron Paul had not been pro-life, pro-border enforcement, and other attributes that normally would appeal to right-wing conservatives, I would never have become an enthusiastic supporter of his campaign and become permanently converted to libertarian thinking. I would still be a neocon.
Because he seemed to be more consistently “conservative” than the other Republicans and more personally morally upright, I was able to entertain the idea of listening closely to what he had to say about foreign policy. Although I was “conservative” on economics, the fact that he mentioned “the inflation tax” in the first Republican debate blew me away and made me scramble to YouTube searches to see what else he had to say about economics.
The first video I found was a short clip from “Money, Banking, and the Federal Reserve” by the Ludwig von Mises Institute. I had never heard of this place before! Then, I found the whole video and watched it. I became obsessed with this economics and the idea of a “gold standard,” and bought several books, including Rothbard’s What Has Government Done to Our Money: and The Case for the 100% Gold Dollar. I ate it up and could not get enough. I have read it through twice.
I then began to debate neocon Christians (and left-wing Christians) on Christian message boards about Austrian economics. Of course, I was bashed for daring to support Ron Paul because his foreign policy would ensure that the U.S. would surely become the next Muslim country if he were in charge. However, their flawed reasoning, misunderstanding, and alarmism did not deter me.
Needless to say, I am one of many who became a convert to Austrian Economics and much libertarian policies because of Ron Paul’s campaign. I am still ardently pro-life. I am pro-borders; however, I think that the necessity of enforcement would lessen if we get rid of the welfare incentives and embrace genuine free trade.
Should we also find some libertarian who might appeal to leftists? Maybe someone who is otherwise libertarian but happens to be pro-national health insurance? Then ex-leftists can say “if Mike hadn’t been pro-national health insurance, and pro-other things leftists like, I would never have paid attention and never have become a libertarian.” Actually, I like that idea.
Based on conversations with him, I’d say Mike Gravel would qualify. As for Dennis, I’ve never spoken to him, but he seems less likely to be a good candidate for that than Mike. Of course, it also helps that Gravel is a member of the LP and publicly identifies as a libertarian.
That is not the same. Abortion and borders are two issues that are not settled even among libertarians. You have good libertarians who are of either opinion and think that their stance is more libertarian. But somebody who wants more socialised health care would not be a good spokesman for libertarianism. He can not say that his stance is more libertarian than the alternative.
That statement is entirely based on definitions, not just of libertarians, but of good libertarians. What is a good libertarian? Is Kevin Carson a good libertarian? Based on your statement here, I’d have to guess your answer is no. What happens if I look into why he’s not a good libertarian? My guess is your answer might well include things like his support for socialized healthcare. So you’ve gone in a complete circle. Of course, no good libertarian supports socialized healthcare if opposition to it is presumed to be part of being a good libertarian. If I wanted, I could deny your earlier claims by making my own Scotsman situation and declaring that there might well be people who call themselves libertarians and disagree with me about borders, but they aren’t good libertarians, and hence, that issue is settled among libertarians.
For that matter, what about Mike Gravel? Either he’s a good libertarian who supports socialized healthcare, or he’s not a good libertarian (or he doesn’t support socialized healthcare, and he just lies about it when he speaks, but that seems unlikely.) If he’s not a good libertarian, why not? Presumably, because he disagrees with you about certain things. Why is your line drawing more valid than the one I proposed above?
Is Kevin Carson a sincere libertarian? He could certainly do a lot better than working for C4SS, yet chooses to devote his time to working for them to develop and spread libertarian ideas. He spends hours each day discussing libertarianism. Do you have some reason other than disagreement on healthcare to suspect that he is not sincere?
Regarding Gravel: He’s a former US senator who, during his time in the senate, was threatened with treason charges for helping Dan Ellsberg to release the Pentagon Papers, spent months filibustering the draft in opposition to his own party, and did several other libertarian things. He certainly has more accomplishments in actually fighting back the government to his credit than I do. He ran for president in 2008 on the Democratic line, called Hillary a bitch and Obama a liar in the debates, was subsequently ignored by the media outlets, and quit the party in protest when it became clear that Obama would be nominated. He then joined the LP, of which he remains a member, and sought that nomination unsuccessfully.
Gravel is a populist democrat and does not believe in private property, markets or individualism. If one cannot tell if he is libertarian or not, then we are in big trouble.
Proudon would likely insist that he’s not convinced most of us here are libertarians. Besides, leave Gravel aside (even though he was the only 2008 LP candidate who quoted Mises at the debate I went to - and he discussed AE with me afterwards) and tell me about Kevin Carson. Is Kevin not a libertarian?
Or, how about this - given that X believes in border enforcement, I can conclude that X supports the existence of the state, and does not believe in individualism, but rather national identity. Furthermore, X is clearly interfering with the labor market, and so doesn’t believe in free markets, at least for labor. If we cannot tell if X is a libertarian or not, then we are in big trouble.
On what basis do you say he doesn’t believe in private property, markets, or individualism, by the way?
There isn’t a libertarian argument for socialised healthcare. I don’t know what Kevin Carson’s views are regarding healthcare, but if he supports its socialisation then that takes away from his libertarianism and from his sincerity about freedom.
There is a libertarian argument against immigration however. In my view this argument is incorrect. However it is libertarian in spirit in that it arrives to its anti-immigration conclusion by thinking in terms of libertarian concerns like property rights, tresspassing and welfare.
Therefore I do not have to doubt the sincerity of anti-immigration libertarians’ passion for freedom and for core libertarian principles. (Only their understanding of libertarian theory regarding a single, rather advanced issue that even all brightest libertarian theoreticians are not jet of a single mind on.)
Just as an aside, within the broader libertarian tradition, the heavy reliance on private property is a bit of an enigma. It so happens that I support private property, and belong the historically quite small group of libertarians who believe in it strongly, but it seems a bit odd to have a standard by which the historical libertarians fail to be libertarians.
Now, there is also an argument about healthcare. In my view this argument is incorrect. However, it arrives at its conclusion by thinking of terms of libertarian concepts like equal standing before the law and opposition to special privilege.
The anti-immigrant argument relies in part on things like welfare. That is, it acknowledges the world as it is and asks if the uncritical application of the more obvious libertarian value (not waving guns at people after drawing lines on a map) runs into a conflict. Similarly, the question is not necessarily “do we prefer socialized healthcare over a free market?” The question could be asked as “do we prefer socialized healthcare over what we have today?” When a liberal points to high costs and poor outcomes in the current system, any libertarian worth his salt knows the answer “what we have today is nothing like a free market.” In that case, why defend it? Perhaps, as Kevin thinks, what we have is further from a free market than socialized healthcare is. Perhaps they’re equally distant, but this one has worse outcomes. If this is the only feasible reform, is it really so obvious not to do it, especially if you think a corporatist system is worse than a socialized one? Therefore, I don’t have to doubt the sincerity of pro-healthcare nationalization libertarians’ passion for freedom and for core libertarian principles - only their strategy for promoting change in a libertarian direction.
