Comments Elsewhere

Indy: “Well, that, and there are a bunch of corporate whore economic libertarians who are trying to kill america.”

Please don’t use the word “whore” as a slur when what you mean is “unscrupulous apologist.” Women in prostitution are doing a job, some of them in quite desperate circumstances, and don’t deserve being used as part of your derisive vocabulary.

Mike T.: “My problem with Libertarians (whichever style of grammar they use for the “l”) is I’ve never met one who doesn’t think that the Government and the Buisness World are two diametricly opposed forces, instead of two barely disseperate groups working in collusion to keep the status quo right where it wants to be.”

Well, expand your horizons.

Historically, libertarianism was a movement of the economic and social left, associated with wildcat unionism, opposition to mercantilism, and anti-imperialism, as well as abolitionism and radical feminism. Some (Benjamin Tucker’s circle) went so far as to describe themselves as “anti-capitalist” or “voluntary socialists.” For various reasons, a few of them good and most of them quite bad, libertarians drifted from their roots in the left into intellectual and political alliances with the Right during the 1930s-1950s onward. There are many of us making deliberate efforts to reverse this trend, for both theoretical and strategic reasons. (I happen to think that trying to pitch radical change to the existing cultural elite is a damned fool project. I also happen to think that anti-racism, feminism, wildcat unionism, populism, anti-authoritarianism, etc. are the right positions to hold, and essential parts of any sane politics.)

Hope this helps.