Category Archives: Libertarianism

Since at least as early as the eighteen century, classical liberalism, and its modern variant libertarianism, have opposed warfare except in cases of obvious self-defense. We see this anti-war position clearly among the anti-federalists of eighteenth-century America (who opposed all standing armies) and more famously within George Washingtons Farewell Address. Thomas Jefferson frequently inveighed against war, although in moves typical for Jefferson, he acted against his own professed ideology on a number of occasions.

On the other side of the Atlantic, liberalism finally made significant gains in Britain with the rise of the Anti-Corn Law League in the late 1830s. The head of the league, a radical liberal named Richard Cobden, rose to prominence throughout the 1840s and is notable today for his active defense of laissez-faire capitalism as a member of the House of Commons, and also for his staunch anti-interventionism in foreign affairs.

For a time, his political star rose quickly, but by the time the Crimean War ended, Cobden, had been cast aside by both a ruling class and a public enthusiastic for both empire and war.

Prior to the war Cobden traveled Europe as an honored guest at international peace conferences while advocating for free markets, civil liberties, and libertarianism everywhere he traveled. But in the end, as has been so often the case, his political career was ended by his opposition to war, and his refusal to buy into nationalistic propaganda.

Like the Crimean crisis of today, the Crimean crises of the early 1850s were caused by little more than the efforts of various so-called great powers to tip the global balance of power in their favor. Foremost among those grasping for global power was the British Empire.

But even as early as the 1830s, the British were seized by a series of national hysterias whipped up by a variety of anti-Russian pundits who were obsessed with increasing British military spending and strength in the name of defense from the Russians.

As is so often the case in securing the case for war, the pro-militarist argument among the Brits rested on perpetuating and augmenting the publics nationalistic feelings that the Russians were uncommonly aggressive and sinister. Cobden, obviously far better informed on the matter than the typical Brit, published a pamphlet on Russia in 1836 actually considering the facts of Russian foreign policy, which he often compared favorably to the hyper-aggressive foreign policy employed by the British Empire.

Cobden began by comparing Russian expansion to British expansion, noting that during the last hundred years, England has, for every square league of territory annexed to Russia, by force, violence, or fraud, appropriated to herself three. And that among the self-professed opponents of conquest, the British failed to recognize that If the English writer calls down indignation upon the conquerors of the Ukraine, Finland, and the Crimea, may not Russian historians conjure up equally painful reminiscences upon the subjects of Gibraltar, the Cape, and Hindostan?

In an interesting parallel to the modern Crimean crisis, much of the opposition to the Russian among British militarists was based on the assertion that the Russians had annexed portions of Poland in aggressive moves that were deemed by the British as completely unwarranted. Cobden, however, understanding the history of the region to be much more murky than the neat little scenarios painted by militarists, recognized that neither side was angelic and blameless and that many of the annexed territories were in fact populated by Russians that had earlier been conquered and annexed by the Poles.

The Russians, while themselves no doubt hostile toward neighbors, were surrounded by hostile neighbors themselves, with the origins of conflicts going back decades or even centuries. The puerile and simplistic arguments of the British militarists, who advocated for what would become a global, despotic, and racist British Empire, added little of value to any actual public knowledge of the realities in Eastern Europe.

Read the original:
Ron Paul, Richard Cobden, and the Risks of Opposing War

Kevin Williamson, a libertarian-ish conservative writer for the National Review, wrote a bracingly honest assessment of the limited appeal of Rand Pauls ideology. (Short story: Most people really love the biggest government programs, like Social Security and Medicare.) This confession against ideological interest naturally antagonized Reasons Nick Gillespie, who is not only a libertarian-libertarian, but also deeply committed to his belief that libertarianism is always, just you wait and see, on the rise.

Gillespie counters Williamson with a sputtering piece arguing that Rand Paul is poised to seize the center of the American political debate with his innovative proposals, such as saving Ukraine by cutting aid to Ukraine. Gillespie bolsters his thesis with a random collage of factoids:

The one sort-of on-point factoid Gillespie offers is a poll conducted by the libertarian Reason foundation showing that, contrary to the overwhelming findings of pollsters everywhere, voters really do want to cut Medicare and Social Security. The unstated joke here, in case you didnt catch it, is that every interest group has its own handcrafted polls showing that, if you word the question in just the right way, overwhelming numbers of Americans agree with their position on any given issue. And sure enough, Reasons poll has its own wording that finds people are really keen to cut Social Security and Medicare. But this poll, just like every advocacy poll, is worthless, because in real politics, one side of the issue cant control the terms by which it will be debated.

The movie Divergent provides the frame for Gillespies paean to Paul. I have not seen the film. Apperently it describes a future in which people are slotted from birth into categories, and those who refuse to follow along are Marked for Death! This theme, explains Gillespie, sums up Rand Paul. Because obviously the clearest hallmark of an independent rebel is a candidate who has devoted his entire life to slavishly carrying out his fathers kooky dogma.

See the rest here:
Everybody Loves Libertarianism, Insists Libertarian

Libertarianism Screencast
Libertarianism Screencast.

By: Audrey Bell

Read the original post:
Libertarianism Screencast - Video

SFL Webinar Series: "Millennial Libertarianism" with Alexander McCobin
Students For Liberty joined students from all over the world on March 5th at 8pm ET for a webinar discussion led by Alexander McCobin, co-founder of Students...

By: StudentsForLiberty

More here:
SFL Webinar Series: "Millennial Libertarianism" with Alexander McCobin - Video

PRAXIS: Christianity and Libertarianism - Toward a Coherent Christian Political Economy
One pressing question in discussing conservatism and libertarianism is: how should one #39;s faith influence their politics? Through a critique of both the left ...

By: Hillsdale Praxis

Read the original:
PRAXIS: Christianity and Libertarianism - Toward a Coherent Christian Political Economy - Video

By Robert A. Levy

Naples

Chairman, The Cato Institute

Libertarianism is a political philosophy grounded on these propositions: Adult individuals have the right and responsibility to decide important matters about their own lives, but they may not infringe on the equal rights of others. Governments role is to secure those rights. The key word, from the Declaration of Independence, is secure, not grant. We do not get our rights from government. Individuals have natural rights, independent of government. Thats a bedrock libertarian principle and, its fair to say, the Founders were libertarians.

Within that framework, consider the polemic against libertarianism by Rev. Michael P. Orsi (Libertarian Candidate Not Good, Naples Daily News, March 16) as reduced to five assertions:

1. Extreme individualism is contrary to the common good.

Libertarians understand the necessity of cooperation to attain personals goals. My colleague, Tom Palmer, observes that individuals can never actually be self-sufficient, which is precisely why we must have rules to make peaceful cooperation possible. Government enforces those rules. The risk, however, is that rules too extensive will produce, not a common good for all, but rather a veneer for a system of special favors to secure largesse for the politically connected at the expense of others. By contrast, individualism promotes the common good, spontaneously, as long as no commanding power preempts freely chosen actions.

2. Belief in every man for himself is incompatible with concern for the poor.

From an ethical perspective, it may be morally right to help the poor; but in a completely free society we should have a political right not to do so. Put differently, a theory of justice is not always congruent with a theory of politics. One can condemn bad conduct without empowering government to take remedial action. Yes, charity is a virtue. But government-compelled charity is a contradiction in terms a political act that negates real charity, which must be voluntary, not coerced.

As it happens, the evidence proves conclusively that more wealth including a greater abundance for the poor is a by-product of individual liberty.

See the original post:
Guest column: Libertarianism 101, by leader of The Cato Institute

Sen. Rand Paul has won several recent straw polls and surveys, and his brand of libertarianism seems to be on the rise in his party. But anointing him the early GOP front-runner for 2016 may be going too far.

Is Rand Paul really the front-runner for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination? Theres some chatter to that effect at the moment among Washingtons pundit class. It was sparked by last weekends victory for the Kentucky senator in another straw poll, this one at the Northeast Republican Leadership Conference. Then CNN/ORC released a poll on Sunday with Senator Paul leading the list of potential nominees for GOP and GOP-leaning voters.

Washington Editor

Peter Grier is The Christian Science Monitor's Washington editor. In this capacity, he helps direct coverage for the paper on most news events in the nation's capital.

Subscribe Today to the Monitor

Click Here for your FREE 30 DAYS of The Christian Science Monitor Weekly Digital Edition

As CNN notes, thats a feat that Pauls father, Ron Paul, never accomplished in all his years running for president.

Plus, Paul is already making good use of his fathers base of committed donors, notes Washington Post political expert Chris Cillizza. Hes done well in the early-voting states of Iowa and New Hampshire. Pauls brand of libertarianism seems to be on the rise in his party, particularly among young Republicans.

Its past time people start taking him seriously as a potential Republican nominee, Mr. Cillizza writes.

Well, sure. Paul himself seems intent on making a serious run. Where his fathers presidential efforts seemed more purely ideological, based on promoting the libertarian brand, Paul is doing the sort of stuff you do if you actually plan on trying to win the thing. Thus hes established an alliance of sorts with the very establishment Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell, his fellow Kentuckian.

Excerpt from:
Rand Paul 2016: Front-runner or overrated? (+video)

Libertarian 101 - What is a Libertarian and Libertarianism?
Alex Merced explains what libertarianism is in it #39;s simplest sense. Learn more about libertarianism at libertarian101.com.

By: Alex Merced

Follow this link:
Libertarian 101 - What is a Libertarian and Libertarianism? - Video

For the second year in a row, U.S. Sen. Rand Paul has won the CPAC Washington Times Straw Poll. This year he won by 31 percent of the votes cast, 20 points higher than his closest rival for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination.

This is disturbing since 50 percent of those attending the conference were millennials between the ages of 18 and 25.

Libertarians have always been outliers in the American political scene. Their extreme individualism militates against the republican principles upon which this country was founded, first and foremost of which is a common concern for all those who share in the national franchise.

The Founders built safeguards into both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution to protect all Americans rights. They also recognized that a certain amount of personal liberty had to be ceded to the state to guarantee security and good functioning of the civil order. For example, a military draft and taxation have always been recognized as legitimate rights of the state necessary for the common good.

Libertarians favor a limited state, minimal taxation, and an unfettered free market. The question always remains: How much is limited? This is difficult to determine since libertarians run the gamut according to which issue is being discussed.

These issues apply to international and national affairs. For example, libertarians favor isolationism. Is this wise with American interests present in a globalized economy?

Even if there were no imminent threat to the U.S. or her interests, is it not true that as a part of the family of nations we have an obligation to help weaker nations overcome invasion and rapine by more powerful states? Or, can we tolerate genocide within national borders and make no effort to stop it? This would be ethically wrong.

Certainly, one can make the case that President Barack Obamas proposed cutbacks in military spending for the next fiscal year could be deemed a nod to libertarian principles, since this would limit Americas international presence.

Libertarians basically believe in the maxim, Every man for himself. This being so, the national fabric is in jeopardy.

For example, during the latter part of the 20th century, legislation was passed to prevent monopolies from gaining hegemony over American business and inhibiting free enterprise. An important part of our democratic life is the ability for each individual to achieve his or her full potential. To do this there are occasions when government must intervene to allow fairness of access to wealth for all.

See the article here:
No headline - orsi_essay

The next two years are crucial for the Republican Party. They been defeated in two straight presidential elections and some question the future of the GOP.

They have put up fairly weak candidates in John McCain and Mitt Romney, have successfully be painted as the party of "no" and have been blamed for the last government shutdown.

However, the 2014 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) sent an important message to the party. If the message isnt followed, the party will soon collapse.

That message? The party is moving in the libertarian direction.

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky), a freshman that has pushed many libertarian causes, won the yearly straw poll conducted at CPAC in a landslide. Paul garnered 31 percent of the vote, while second place Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) finished a distant second, only receiving 11 percent.

Politico says that while only 2,459 votes were cast, nearly 50 percent of those votes were made by those in the 18-25 age group.

This result is more than just more talk for political pundits. It shows what the Republican Party must do in order to achieve success in future elections.

The ever-growing libertarian movement is making a large impact in the GOP, and Paul is quickly becoming the face of this movement. These people, including myself, are less conservative on social issues and are becoming more attractive to the young voter.

They generally push for civil liberties, decriminalization of marijuana, restraint in foreign affairs, and allowing gay marriage. The agenda is one that speaks of freedom, both for your wallet and for your life.

Other results from the CPAC straw poll reveal more libertarian leanings.

Read more:
GOP must embrace libertarianism