Re: Left, Right, Up, Down--Libertarian Ideas
Tim May writes:
Check out the "Nolan Chart," which is a fairly common classification in _two_ dimensions. Libertarians often use it to recruit members, by showing that the views of people they ask ("Do you favor legalizing drugs?" etc.) are often more similar to the libertarian position than to others.
In fairness to my left-leaning friends (Dave Mandl as a good example), the questions in the Nolan Chart test are designed to make almost anyone appear to be a libertarian.
Yeah, I agree. It always seemed like a tremendous kludge to me. But anyway...In case my point was misunderstood, I should clarify. I was not trying to enforce conservative/liberal distinctions, which (like most people on this list) I think are fairly meaningless. The world is much more complicated than that; though there are minor real differences, supposed distinctions between "conservatives" and "liberals" are for the most part an illusion--part of the "spectacle," to use Situationist jargon. I responded the way I did to John Kreznar's post precisely because it looked identical to standard Republican-style leftist-baiting, which I unfortunately see too much of every day on the net. John cleared this up in personal email. Apologies if I misunderstood or misconstrued what he was saying. --Dave. -- Dave Mandl dmandl@panix.com
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I responded the way I did to John Kreznar's post precisely because it looked identical to standard Republican-style leftist-baiting,
Actually, I _was_ deliberately baiting leftists, but I was doing so to challenge their conceit that a liberal State is more congenial to individual liberty than any other kind of State and therefore ought to be less hostile to cryptography. Remember Mike Schenk's original words:
I have always thought that the Netherlands was a very liberal country. But now the government is proposing a law that totally outlaws the use of encryption methods.
Last I heard, the Netherlands is a State. (So he's apparently talking about ``liberal'' as a kind of Statism, not as a synonym for anarchism as I would prefer. Mike Schenk, are you there to clarify?) A State is a State. The purpose of a State is to supplant personal choice with the State's choice. (To the extent that the State is a democracy, this means supplanting personal choice with collective dictate.) ``Liberal'' or not, a State is threatened by strong cryptography because it helps to enable a person to choose for himself in spite of the State. John E. Kreznar | Relations among people to be by jkreznar@ininx.com | mutual consent, or not at all. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.3a iQCVAgUBLZ09xMDhz44ugybJAQHriwQA1U8Yo4unADyxFmWuAEhukJPQj6980tzb UqgHxeXg8Qv9d5+V7uBFIrYw47SCzC0gpwHglofJpQLCxZHipUNNr8MFClM1fOaB ko8B9gNxjP1386m1n6USBZEy2pEtmR2Szg2Q3wRvks6EDDsdjQD9GRU7dXAjgnmI MFEF/DXt1YY= =7bLt -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
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