From: Razer <rayzer@riseup.net>
On 11/20/2016 12:34 PM, jim bell wrote:


>>Highly, highly misleading.  In a nation of 310 million people, it will be always possible to find somebody to focus on, a person who has just the right combination of negatives, as well as things you want to misleadingly attack.  That's precisely what's done, here.  Cherry-picking.  

>>You (the person writing the NYT article) want to attack libertarians, right?  Okay, there are millions of them, and perhaps a million more claiming that but who don't actually understand libertarianism.  A few will have negative characteristics you will be able to exploit, just as we see above.  Focus on just those specific people, and you think you've made a valid point.  But you haven't.
What superficial logic this seems to have should remind us that anti-Obama people didn't spend most of the last 8 years looking at what would probably have been hundreds of extremist groups that just happen to support him, rather than the various alternatives available.

A good contrary example, which in the end actually proves my point, is Rev. Jeremiah Wright ("God Damn America!").  Obama had spent 20 years going to this guy's Sunday sermons, presumably to boost Obama's Christian credentials.  But by early 2008, Obama had a problem:  He needed to help shed the extremist image Wright had.  Obama couldn't just "discover" Wright's extremism:  I think it was necessary to coordinary (collude; conspire) to shed this.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeremiah_Wright_controversy    Perhaps cooperatively, Wright put out a conveniently extremist statement, which Obama took and ran with it.  Even then, it took months for Obama to finally  "resign[] his membership in [Wright's] church".   

>>At least that incident has an actual connection to Obama:  His voluntary 20 year membership (and presumably, attendance) in Wright's church.  It's not improper to point to this connection.  But if there is no connection, such focussing on these people confuses and distorts the fact.

>>To merely identify some person, like this 'Robert Taylor', as having previously called himself "libertarian", is misleading.   The above article says "Mr. Taylor was a committed libertarian, he said..."
The key words are "he said".  Notice that the article doesn't even bother to address the question, how accurate was his assertion?  No doubt that there are people with far less questionable positions who CALL themselves "libertarian", yet misunderstand what libertarian philosophy.  Is there any indication that Robert Taylor was a mainstream Libertarian, rather than just calling himself that?
I did a Google search for '"Robert Taylor" libertarian', but even that was futile:  The name 'Robert Taylor' is so ubiquitous as to make it clear who this specific 'Robert Taylor' really is.

            Jim Bell




>The definition of "Libertarian, and how it plays out in real life are two VERY different things. Just like the definition of Marxism varies dramatically from what, lets say, Doug Henwood, Marxist investment advior to American Lefties and a cruise missile marxist who never met a US invasion he didn't (initially) support, believes.

If you are simply saying that there is variation among people who declare themselves libertarians, I have to agree with you.  If you are saying, instead, that few people who call themselves "libertarian" would meet that standard, I must disagree.  There's a difference between these two positions.

>I'll stick with empirically observed generalizations when discussing politics, thanks.

As long as you don't misrepresent reality, fine.

>In MY experience, EVERY SINGLE LIBERTARIAN I've ever met (a few decades ago I got to interview the Libertarian presidential candidate for a local college paper too) turns out to be an ostensibly socially permissive republican with the full set of American exceptionalist traits I despise regarding everyone else om the planet.

Look at the Nolan Chart, and the World's smallest political quiz.  Look at "social freedoms" and "economic freedoms".  Stereotypically, "liberals" are people who believe in social freedoms, but not at all in economic freedoms; conservatives believe in economic freedoms, but not social freedoms.  A libertarian believes in both.
When you say, a "socially-permissive republican", that approximates a libertarian.  But you could have also said, "an economically-permissive democrat".   Why didn't you say that?  Perhaps your biases are showing.
In my one experience doing the WSPQ survey at Clark County fair in about 1990, the results on the chart strongly clustered around 70/70 on the Nolan Chart.  ("Libertarian" was 100/100).   In other words, at least 50% of the public were 'closer' to libertarians than conservatives, or liberals.  Naturally, I can imagine that conservatives and liberals don't like this.  

>Further, Fascists lead you to believe people have rights until your rights interfere with their sociopolitical needs. That's a US Libertarian, defined.

You will have to be more specific.  Which "sociopolitical needs"?  Which "rights"?


" Libertarian techies are also well known for being gentrifiers of communities belonging to others..."

Your reference to "communities belong to others" suggests a collectivist point of view.  Not surprising, I suppose.  
"Gentrifiers" are people who are willing to buy into areas; the cumulative effect of thousands of such raises the standard of living in such areas.  Is that a genuine problem?
Hint:  In the 1960's, when whites fled neighborhoods, this was called "white flight", and it was considered "bad".  Now, it happens in reverse, and somehow it's still "bad".
I don't get it.


                            Jim Bell