Libertarians Are Taking Over The Republican Party: James Antle Believes

[GunnyFreedom]

Uh no, not remotely. An individual may behave how he likes, but traditional bulwarks of society allow freedom to be robust and sustainable. The freest and most prosperous societies in history also had a strong current of traditionalism; it's only since moving away from traditionalism that a cancerous state has emerged to leach off these civilizations. Atomistic, permissive cultures that seek to tear tradition down will not produce freedom in the way we think of it.

Are you aware that it was largely the 'traditionalist' movement supporting chattel slavery, opposing interracial marriage, opposing women's suffrage, supporting the War on Drugs, and so on? In what way did these things help to make America more free?

I would agree that you can't have a free society if the population is immoral. I agree with John Adams that the Constitution is only fit for a moral and religious society. However, 'traditionalists' enforcing morality through statute is as immoral as any atheist...and maybe more so if we take Jesus Christ's reaction to the Pharisees to heart.

 

[ThePaleoLibertarian]

Are you aware that it was largely the 'traditionalist' movement supporting chattel slavery, opposing interracial marriage, opposing women's suffrage, supporting the War on Drugs, and so on? In what way did these things help to make America more free?

I would agree that you can't have a free society if the population is immoral. I agree with John Adams that the Constitution is only fit for a moral and religious society. However, 'traditionalists' enforcing morality through statute is as immoral as any atheist...and maybe more so if we take Jesus Christ's reaction to the Pharisees to heart.

The War on Drugs was a massive federal expansion of the power of the state to regulate the behavior of individuals. Traditionalists may have supported that, but there's nothing traditional about the program. America was a far more traditional society when laudanum was available over the counter. I don't view tradition as a monolith the way some do; if there is a truly oppressive part of tradition, lets get rid of it. Any tradition that survives evolves.

As for the other issues: slavery is far too vast an issue to get into here, and I too oppose women's suffrage and indeed universal male suffrage (after all, I am a reactionary), but again, that is a discussion for another time.

 

[BV2]

Uh no, not remotely. An individual may behave how he likes, but traditional bulwarks of society allow freedom to be robust and sustainable. The freest and most prosperous societies in history also had a strong current of traditionalism; it's only since moving away from traditionalism that a cancerous state has emerged to leach off these civilizations. Atomistic, permissive cultures that seek to tear tradition down will not produce freedom in the way we think of it.

Being shackled to 'a way it has always been' doesn't appeal to me. I don't see how a rigid, traditional, society could possibly be considered a liberated or free one. Traditionally people just walked around, and I have no intention of giving up my bicycle.

 

[XNavyNuke]

As for the other issues: slavery is far too vast an issue to get into here, and I too oppose women's suffrage and indeed universal male suffrage (after all, I am a reactionary), but again, that is a discussion for another time.

I must be a "traditionalist" too, though going back more to the Spirit of 1776-type.

http://www.ushistoryscene.com/uncategorized/njsuffrage/

.In 1776, the New Jersey Constitution ruled, “all inhabitants of this colony, of full age, who are worth fifty pounds…and have resided in the county, in which they claim a vote for twelve months…shall be entitled to vote.”

Thanks to the Quaker influence in western New Jersey, free blacks and single women with a modicum of wealth could, and did, vote. Fifty pounds sterling is about $3k in today's value. That precluded only vagrants and transients from the polling booth. It's a shame that the Neo-traditionalist flipped the efforts and it would take decades (in the case of women, a century) to move back in the direction of the Spirit of '76.

XNN

 

[DamianTV]

Libertarians Are Taking Over The Republican Party: James Antle Believes

Good

 

[A Son of Liberty]

I'm a libertarian, a big fan of Kirk, and some might say a "social conservative" (I self identify as a "traditionalist" though). Kirk's problems with libertarians had to do with what he thought to be an atomistic, empty culture within the movement that reduced the whole of philosophyical political prescription to pure economics. I can't disagree, really. That's one of my main bones to pick with the broader movement; the insuperable nature of a free society and a traditional society that libertarians have sadly forgotten.


Hate to say this (genuinely, I do) but he's right. Not to say that Kirk's critiques of libertarians don't deserve criticism as they do of course. Many of them are spot on.

Libertarians don't "reduce the whole philosophical political prescription to pure economics" (whatever that is supposed to mean). Libertarians, in the correct usage of the term, recognize the immorality of the unprovoked initiation of force. That can at times appear to be a reduction to economics in the eyes of folks who wish to cling to the use of unprovoked force for a few pet issues. Thus, what separates libertarians from the rest is a stubborn adherence to logical consistency.

 

[ThePaleoLibertarian]

Being shackled to 'a way it has always been' doesn't appeal to me. I don't see how a rigid, traditional, society could possibly be considered a liberated or free one. Traditionally people just walked around, and I have no intention of giving up my bicycle.

Like I said, I don't view tradition as a monolith, so my traditionalism isn't "rigid". I also don't think that something should be respected simply because it's traditional, but that many traditions have survived for a reason and exist because they allow civilization to function. The bicycle thing is silly, because traditionalism has nothing to do with technology; you could have a traditional society with vastly more advanced technology than what we have today, or a non-traditional society that's backward when it comes to tech. The almost pathological conflation of technological advancement with social improvement is a progressive lie that has infected libertarianism.

 

[ThePaleoLibertarian]

Libertarians don't "reduce the whole philosophical political prescription to pure economics" (whatever that is supposed to mean). Libertarians, in the correct usage of the term, recognize the immorality of the unprovoked initiation of force. That can at times appear to be a reduction to economics in the eyes of folks who wish to cling to the use of unprovoked force for a few pet issues. Thus, what separates libertarians from the rest is a stubborn adherence to logical consistency.

Walter Block specifically says that libertarians should "remain neutral" on cultural issues. "Culture doesn't matter as long as there's a free market!" Problem is, there's more to civilization than markets; indeed, if you neglect cultural and sociological issues you aren't going to have free markets because culture determines politics, not the other way around. I want the privatization of the law and I see this as such an obvious fact.

 

[THX 1138]

More often than not a "libertarian" is simply a Republican who's trying to get street cred.

 

[acptulsa]

Thanks, surf!..methinks maybe the okie from muskogee is still sore at me for exposing him as a monetary theorist/alchemist...certainly not a monetary realist...

LOL

More often than not a "libertarian" is simply a Republican who's trying to get street cred.

Does seem that way, these days.

Which is huge. We've come a very long way from, 'A what? You mean that Lyndon LaRouche character?'

 

[cajuncocoa]

All it means is, the definition of labels is flexible. Someone says they want to lower your taxes, they think that's all it takes to proclaim him/herself for smaller government and therefore "libertarian". Glenn Beck tried calling himself a libertarian a few years back and his audience probably bought into it. Rush Limbaugh has been bastardizing the label "conservative" for decades.

If Mr. & Mrs. Republican sheep voters want to take credit for electing Rand Paul, let them. I care about Liberty. I don't care to dick measure and complain I found it first before them.

Yeah, OK. But that wasn't my point at all.