# Start Here > Guest Forum >  Libertarianism is just as extreme and misguided as socialism

## 56ktarget

One says only the government can make people's lives better. The other says only individuals can make people's lives better. Both are on the extreme wing of the political spectrum. Both have been tried throughout history, with disastrous results. What people need to realize is that like all things, society must find the right balance between government and the individual. That is what this country did for the past 250 years, and its generally worked pretty well.

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## acptulsa

Yeah?  So, when Wilsonian Socialism failed at the end of World War I and Harding and Coolidge undid it and sparked the Roaring Twenties, that was as 'disastrous' a 'result' as the depression we were in during 1919?  Really?

My grandparents find your 'reasoning' seriously faulty.

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## 56ktarget

Great Depression, hello????

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## acptulsa

> Great Depression, hello????


Herbert Hoover wasn't libertarian, hello?  FDR inhibited the recovery and also wasn't libertarian, hello?  The Dust Bowl could have been prevented by more proactive effort by the Democratic legislatures and governors of states like Texas and Oklahoma but wasn't, hello?  Serious problems in agriculture in the Heartland has caused depressions in this nation almost since the Louisiana Purchase, but never caused a ten year extension of those depressions the way FDR breaking the bank with his meddlesome Band-Aids did, hello?

The lights are on.  Are any synapses firing inside?  Hello?  HELLO?

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## 56ktarget

Hoover didn't cause the Depression, HELLO????

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## acptulsa

> Hoover didn't cause the Depression, HELLO????


I believe that's the first time you ever questioned the narrative that was spoon fed you in high school.

No, the depression, *as I noted*, was mainly caused by the Dust Bowl.

Pray tell us, then.  How did Coolidge or whichever libertarian boogeyman you want to blame it on cause it in your parallel universe?

Come on, out with it.  You want to preach to people who actually study this stuff in depth.  Dot your i's and cross your t's and let's see just how thoroughly you get ripped to shreds.

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## 56ktarget

The depression was not caused by the dust bowl... it may have been prolonged by it but the DB only started to have an impact in the 1930s. The republican presidents in the 1920s caused it by enabling the banks and corporations to run wild by removing all regulations, creating a huge bubble that popped in the stock market crash of 1929.

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## acptulsa

> The depression was not caused by the dust bowl...


So you're saying the correction caused the depression.  I disagree.




> ...removing all regulations...


Name 'em.  Give us the Gospel According to Target.  I dare you.

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## Aratus

HOOVER as Harding's Sec' of Commerce helped the ROARING TWENTIES 
BOOM but in the short months before the big fall crash, he had no time
to change things. he was in office only months, not years. Should we
blame FDR for our entry into WW2 because he had eight years to find
an alternative to the slowly gathering storm? i found it easier to blame
the "W" in 2oo8 for an economic malaise. Obama is and isn't where the
legendary "W" once was, he's either done better or worse. We know that
both Andy Johnson & Herbert Hoover faced very complex issues and got
overwhelmed by history. our two worst POTUSes were not total fools at all.

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## Aratus

lets be most logical, either mister hayek is very wrong or poor keynes is very wrong or both these dead guys were very astute men.
the counter-intuitive thought is that both may have been very correct at the same exact time. John Nash's game theory is a hint.
classic animal spirits as defined by keynes explain the herd impulses that created the crash. did smoot-hawley make things worse???

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## Root

*I withdraw consent.* 

Am I free now?

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## oyarde

> *I withdraw consent.* 
> 
> Am I free now?


Works for me  , Root , you are now free.

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## Ronin Truth

*WND.ARCHIVES, MARCH 19, 2008WorldNetDaily Exclusive*

*Bernanke: Federal Reserve caused Great Depression*

*Fed chief says, 'We did it. ... very sorry, won't do it again'*

Published: 03/19/2008 at 12:00 AM
http://www.wnd.com/2008/03/59405/


*Hello!*

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## NorthCarolinaLiberty

> Give us the Gospel According to Target.  I dare you.



He'll only take that dare if he gets a government subsidy.  _56K Income for ALL_ is always creating these threads, only to be run out on a rail when he can't answer the most basic questions.  Just look at his history.

He's then off to create another thread, just like a flighty teenage girl.

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## Brian4Liberty

> One says only the government can make people's lives better. The other says only individuals can make people's lives better. Both are on the extreme wing of the political spectrum. Both have been tried throughout history, with disastrous results. What people need to realize is that like all things, society must find the right balance between government and the individual. That is what this country did for the past 250 years, and its generally worked pretty well.


So if they are both unworkable extremes, which side is the pendulum on? Is true anarchy going to break out tomorrow? Is government even going to shrink? We are at one of those extremes right now. The totalitarian, big government Statists are in control.

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## 56ktarget

> *WND.ARCHIVES, MARCH 19, 2008WorldNetDaily Exclusive*
> 
> *Bernanke: Federal Reserve caused Great Depression*
> 
> *Fed chief says, 'We did it. ... very sorry, won't do it again'*
> 
> Published: 03/19/2008 at 12:00 AM
> http://www.wnd.com/2008/03/59405/
> 
> ...


Do you even understand the context? Bernanke said the Fed caused the GD because they listened to the critics at the time and didn't print enough money, which is what people like Milton Friedman said the Fed should have done.

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## mrsat_98



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## DamianTV

> Do you even understand the context? Bernanke said the Fed caused the GD because they listened to the critics at the time and didn't print enough money, which is what people like Milton Friedman said the Fed should have done.


Printing Money was not possible prior to the creation of the Federal Reserve Bank in 1913.  Then we allow a Private Bank to run a printing press and give that bank a monopolistic power over all the currency in existence, then charge interest on that money.  Fast forward a hundred years and take a look around, better or worse?

Letting a Private Bank print money gives Govt the ability to ignore the will of the people.  They get money without raising taxes.  Central Banks are how socialism starts.

And for the record, the Truth is Extreme.

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## erowe1

> One says only the government can make people's lives better. The other says only individuals can make people's lives better. Both are on the extreme wing of the political spectrum. Both have been tried throughout history, with disastrous results. What people need to realize is that like all things, society must find the right balance between government and the individual. That is what this country did for the past 250 years, and its generally worked pretty well.


You're probably right that I do think that freedom makes people lives better, or at least doesn't make their lives worse, like the state does. But that's not the important thing to me. Even if I thought the state did make people's lives better, I'd still be against it. I just believe that it would be morally wrong for me to use violence to force people to live better lives.

Why do you support violence?

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## Ronin Truth

> Do you even understand the context? Bernanke said the Fed caused the GD because they listened to the critics at the time and didn't print enough money, which is what people like Milton Friedman said the Fed should have done.


  Who gives a frick about the why?  The Federal Reserve caused the Great Depression. Case closed.  Period.

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## DamianTV

This article is kind of related.  Not fully dead on, but gets the point across that even amongst Libertarians or Socialists, the individual members of each of those groups do not fully agree with each other.

*The Future of Libertarianism*
http://mises.org/daily/6740/The-Futu...Libertarianism

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## cavalier973

> One says only the government can make people's lives better. The other says only individuals can make people's lives better.


Eh...both say that only individuals can make people's lives better.  The former group think that individuals with a monopoly on violence (Top. Men.) can make people's lives better.  The latter group think that individuals cooperating and competing in the marketplace without legal authority to use violence (except in self-defense) can make people's lives better.

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## Ronin Truth

Hey, a new entry for my Department of Redundancy Department list: extreme misguided socialism.

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## PierzStyx

> Printing Money was not possible prior to the creation of the Federal Reserve Bank in 1913.  Then we allow a Private Bank to run a printing press and give that bank a monopolistic power over all the currency in existence, then charge interest on that money.  Fast forward a hundred years and take a look around, better or worse?


You don't have to go that far. Its only 16 years between 1913 and 1929. '

The Roaring Twenties was one huge Keynesian boom, where the Federal Reserve used the actual wealth experienced after WWI ended as a basis to inflate, price fix, and manipulate the economy. The Stock Market Crash was one gigantic bust. The Great Depression is what happens when Keynesianism is used to try and fix a problem brought on by Keynesianism.  When the reality set in that the 20's inflated economic numbers were a lie, that in some sectors there was a flood of overproduction brought on my manipulated numbers sending false demands to producers, and on the other hand producers grasping for resources that weren't there but should have been based on the manipulated numbers, the result was the stock market crash and economic recession. Banks began to fail because they had been using inflated fiat money as the basis of their wealth and engaging in fractional reserve banking. That idiot Hoover only made it worse by signing the biggest tariff in history and freezing wages. Unemployment bloomed and businesses didn't want to hire people at inflated wages as their businesses suffered massively as a result of the almost cessation of international trade brought on by the tariff. The result? Breadlines and people being stuck in poverty, all thanks to government interference. Only an idiot would think the solution to this would be what caused it in the first place-Federal Reserve economic manipulations. Of course it only got worse under FDR, which extended the Depression for at least another SEVEN YEARS according to this study from UCLA: http://newsroom.ucla.edu/releases/FD...epression-5409

And to answer the original question: Libertarians want to leave you the hell alone, to live your life. Socialists want to dictate everything in your life, reducing you to a servant or slave to the state "for the greater good." Socialist want one plan that when fails destroys an entire national economy hurting hundreds of millions. Libertarians want plans by the many, not by the few, with a range that will effect only a small part of the population if they fail. There is nothing "extreme" about that.

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## buenijo

The Great Depression was caused primarily by government intervention. The fundamental cause was the inefficient allocation of capital caused by the distortion of the price structure, itself caused by nearly a decade of rapid and accelerating credit expansion during the 1920's. Understand that this credit expansion was authorized by the Federal Reserve Act adopted during the Wilson administration (just before WW1). This federal legislation allowed an unprecedented monetary expansion that has predictable consequences. Credit expansion financed the war. A financial panic (stock market crash and recession) in 1920 was the predictable consequence, yet this downturn saw rapid recovery mainly due to the limited response of the federal government at the time. Unfortunately, the fundamental problems with the monetary and banking systems were not corrected, and another round of aggressive credit expansion ensued shortly thereafter. This credit expansion fueled the "roaring 20's". However, while this set the stage for the Great Depression (its onset), it was the policies put in place by Hoover, and the continuation and expansion of these policies enforced by Roosevelt, that prevented the necessary corrections. Quite simply, capital was squandered during the 20's through malinvestment (savings effectively destroyed). A new stock of savings was necessary to restructure the economy toward genuine production (i.e. value creation). A recession could not have been avoided as liquidations were required, and investment and employment patterns had to shift. Hoover's policies fought this process, and FDR fought it even harder by adopting and expanding on Hoover's platform. The Great Depression was a prolonged period of reduced productive capacity caused primarily by the federal government locking the economy down by force into an nonproductive capital structure that formed during the 1920's - itself caused by previous federal government legislation.

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## pcosmar

> . That is what this country did for the past 250 years, and its generally worked pretty well.


Bull$#@!.

We have had Socialism for 100 years.. It ain't working well at all.

And Liberty did not last long at all before Authoritarians took over. Though Liberty has survived in small pockets of the country  from time to time.

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## enoch150

We've had fascism for the last 100 years, with chunks of socialism mixed in to keep the people who have been robbed docile, and lip service is paid to liberty to minimize the necessary amount of drug like socialism. Idiots then blame libertarians for limiting the amount of socialism when the socialist programs wouldn't even be needed if it weren't for the fascists in control of things who are robbing the country blind.

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## Vanguard101

> Do you even understand the context? Bernanke said the Fed caused the GD because they listened to the critics at the time and didn't print enough money, which is what people like Milton Friedman said the Fed should have done.


Friedman's argument functions on how the fed should have responded based on it's policies. He doesn't actually want the fed to print money LOL

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## ctiger2

> One says only the government can make people's lives better. The other says only individuals can make people's lives better. Both are on the extreme wing of the political spectrum. *Both have been tried throughout history*, with disastrous results.


When has a society based on the individual absent of a "ruler" ever existed? None to my knowledge.

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## Christian Liberty

What aspect of "don't use violence against your neighbor unless he uses violence against you or somebody else" is so extreme and misguided?

When people say libertarianism is "misguided" its really, really hard not to automatically assume that they are either unaware of what libertarianism is or evil.  I'm not even sure that assumption would be misplaced.

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