Libertarians: "Useful allies for actual conservatives," at least "so long as they keep those views to themselves"

Immigration obsessive Mark Krikorian, writing about a Tea Party kerfuffle over FreedomWorks honcho Dick Armey's pro-immigration stances, issues a reminder of where libertarians stand in the eyes of some conservatives:

Libertarians like him might hold any number of outlandish, anti-conservative views — not just open borders but legalizing prostitution, for instance, or privatizing the Air Force — but so long as they keep those views to themselves, they can be useful allies for actual conservatives.

Here's Dick Armey at a Reason conference in 2007 speaking about immigrants: "They're trying to feed their babies…bless their hearts."

Reason on immigration here, and on Krikorian here.

Comments

[Pro Libertate]

Or a privatized air force of planes piloted by legalized prostitutes. Really, there's no end to our crazy ideas.

[Joe M]

Immigrant prostitutes.

[Drax the Destroyer]

Pot-Smoking Organ-Selling Immigrant Prostitutes

[Ska]

Pot-smoking Organ-selling Road-owning immigrant prostitutes

[NeonCat]

The toll really could be an arm and a leg!

[strat]

Now I have to go watch Goldfinger again.

[P Brooks]

I love the smell of bipartisanship in the morning.

[Suki]

Private Air Force with bi-sexual legalized prostitutes companions.

[Pro Libertate]

. . .that it drops on our enemies.

[Suki]

They drop bundles of paper money on our enemies. The paper money that will be retired when we switch to the gold/silver/platinum standard.

[Rice Bingham]

Dear Suki,

Please clean the fecal matter from under your finger nails. It's gross.

Thanks in advance.

[Suki]

A poo-flinging monkey giving hygiene tips! Only at H&R.

[Joel]

Smells like...futility.

[John]

Can we please stop Obama before we have a circular firing squad over immigration?

[Other Matt]

No. Next question?

[Jeffersonian]

We don't have an immigration system in America. We have a system for harrassing people stupid enough to try to stay legal when they enter the country.

[Tim]

Truer words were never typed. Having gone through the legal system (unsuccessfully), I encourage all prospective immigrants to go illegal all the way. At least you have amnesty to look forward to!

[If you don't like borders...]

...then feel free to move outside of ours.

Here's Dick Armey at a Reason conference in 2007 speaking about
immigrants: "They're trying to feed their babies...bless their hearts."

We're trying to feed ours, too. Fuck the libertarians.

[kinnath]

White man speak with forked tongue.

[Fluffy]

"Liberty. Sovereignty. Identity".

One of those things is not like the others, sir.

Guess which one.

[Steve Nash Equilibrium]

Let me be the first to say

Shut the fuck up, If you don't like borders....

[Episiarch]

THEY TOOK UR JERBS

[yonemoto]

YERP DERP DER DURR!

[yonemoto]

YERP DERP DER DURR!

[heller]

DEY TURK UR JERBS!

[Tristan Band]

Ooohhh boy, I'm going to have fun with you, Nazi boy.

First of all, the reason why white people are losing their jobs to "illegals" is that you Peckerwoods demand too much money for shoddy work. Maybe if you accepted lower wages...

[Drax the Destroyer]

But Tristan...we must pay $44 an hour for someone to make sure a welder doesn't cause a fire. Why? Because...because...the Unions told me so!

[DJF]

Damm peasants, thinking they run the country and have a say in who enters. A million legal immigrants a year is not enough, we need more since they still demand to be paid more then the workers of China

[Tristan Band]

Ooohh, another redneck!

Drop your pants and touch your toes, I'm going to show you where the wild good goes...

[DJF]

Another wantabe homosexual rapists

[DJF]

Another sick homosexual at Reason

[Tristan Band]

Oh, don't be such a prude!

In all seriousness, I'm not gay. But, I don't like homophobes like you too much.

[DJF]

Homophobe? No, I don't find you scary, just sick.

[food]

Of course you're a homophobe, and one that's not even original or clever enough to try a old semantic weave to avoid the term.

Totally fine if you think I'm sick. I could care less. Frankly, the idea of pig farming for a living with three teeth between my extended family makes me sick, but the difference is, I'll let you be.

Although, if you want to defend your borders, I suggest you look beyond the brown menace. The real scary immigrant hordes started zerg rushing a few hundred years before...

I'll be waiting for you to start circulating the petition to rename it to the Statue of Bigotry. "Liberty" is far too French for your type, isn't it?

[DJF]

If you weren't so ignorant you would know that the "Statue of Liberty" is actually named, "Liberty Enlightening the World". And you would also know that when it was built it had nothing to do with immigration. It was given to the US by the French to celibate the US independence which involved the right of Americans to run their own country and that would include who comes to the US.

It was twenty years after it was built before that stupid poem was attached to its base. A Poem which has been used to attack Americans right to run their own country.

And as to pig farming, that is a perfectly respectable occupation.

[food]

It was given to the US by the French to celibate the US independence

I think you're the one who wants to "celibate" independence.

It was twenty years after it was built before that stupid poem was attached to its base. A Poem which has been used to attack Americans right to run their own country.

So, I take it a bunch o' Mexicuns swam over and attached it to make Real Americans look bad?

What doesn't that plaque read? I live here, so I don't visit it except when tourists are visiting, but last I checked, it doesn't end ..."and I'll piss on them."

The reason why is that Americans - real Americans - were immigrants. Granted, it has long been a Real American Past time, right up there with foreign meddling, making money, Chinese food on Christmas, acting pious after sucking dick, and pining for the good ole' days, to try to roll up the ports after your family's off the boat, so I'll give you that you're carrying on a longstanding tradition.

Unfortunately for you, but fortunately for everyone else, it isn't one that has traditionally gone so well.

And as to pig farming, that is a perfectly respectable occupation.

I never said otherwise. I said something about letting you enjoy your perfectly respectable past time.

[heller]

DJF I agree, all immigrants and descendants of immigrants should leave this country to its rightful native owners. Oh wait...

[heller]

wild goose.

[Episiarch]

Why do you or anyone else get to have a say on someone else's freedom of movement? Who the fuck are you?

If I told you you weren't allowed in my state, you'd laugh at me, but you turn around and want to decide who can be in the country.

OH NOES THE IMMIGRANT HORDES WILL TAKE MY DAUGHTERS

[DJF]

So how are you going to move in the USA without moving on the roads which belong to Americans?

[Episiarch]

LOL WUT

Seriously, WTF are you talking about?

[DJF]

You do plan on moving around the USA right?

So how do you get from one part to another without using the roads which are owned by the American public? And since they are owned by the American public, you need their permission to use them. Or are you just a thief?

[Episiarch]

The mind boggles.

Let's explore your world a little: since I am part the American public, I give myself permission to use the roads, I give the immigrants permission, and I deny you permission.

Wow, your bizarre world is fun!

[DJF]

So are you a voting majority? No. In fact the voting majority is against you.

Just like you can't give permission for all sorts of things by yourself since being a citizen is being part of collective and that collective has rules on how decisions are made. And when it comes to people entering the country you don't have the right to make the decision on your own

[Soonerliberty]

How can a collective disagree with itself? It sounds like some sort of schizophrenia. Or is this one of those fascistic Volksk?rper arguments, where the bad cells must be eradicated from the body of the people for the good of the whole? Do you have any idea how dumb you sound or is Nazism in your blood? What's next, Blut und Boden policies of environmental radicalism?

[MikeP]

Somewhere between Jefferson's "to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men" and DFJ's effective "majorities are empowered to abrogate rights," something has been lost.

[DJF]

I seem to remember that Jefferson engaged in a war and the expelling of the losers of that war to secure the power to declare those rights. And those rights were not unlimited nor did they involve the unlimited movement of people from all over the world

[MikeP]

To the extent due process rather than revenge was involved, the expulsion was of provable enemies of the new country.

I certainly allow that provable enemies and other individually provable threats may be denied entry or residence.

You are correct that rights are not unlimited. However, it is true that rights are not limited by government. That's pretty much the whole point of the Declaration of Independence's statement on rights.

[food]

Go get your Junior Adventurer Pack, compass and .22 and go back to guarding the borders. I think I saw a brown squirrel trying take yer dada's job when you were trying to talk to sane people.

[DJF]

Don't need to, already got a government which has that job

[Paul]

And since they are owned by the American public, you need their permission to use them. Or are you just a thief?

Some sort of system where, before entering any public by-way, your papers should be presented to a sharply dressed man in a uniform with tall leather boots.

Maybe all the letters on his uniform should have lots of Umlauts in that heavy metal font to make it more bad-ass. Skulls on the cap, too.

This is the America of real conservatives.

[MikeP]

Egad.

[Drax the Destroyer]

Assuming these immigrants buy something at some point in this country, properly handled sales tax revenues should handle whatever wear and tear these illegals inflict on our roads. Of course, we are counting on governments (State) to properly handle tax dollars. That's about as impossible as people getting pay for what their work is worth. Ain't gonna happen.

[DJF]

Did these illegal's get the permission of the owners of the roads to use them? If they did not then they are trespassers and thieves

[Drax the Destroyer]

Go ahead and shoot them. Lets see how that plays in the funny pages. Moreover, your God might not be too happy with murder.

[DJF]

I don't have a god and I don't care about yours

[Drax the Destroyer]

We are agreed then. There is no god. I'm sure the rest of the anti-immigration crowd is in concurrence. Meeting adjourned!

[plutosdad]

lol. you realize roads used to almost all be private until "labor" lobbied the government to take over. Just like fire departments used to all be private before unions took over and wanted them "public" to squeeze more money out of taxpayers.

Sure, go ahead maybe you should change your protest signs to "we want to work less for more money" that's what you're fighting for. bunch of lazy asses.

10 years ago my own industry was very much indanger of outsourcing. Did i try to go rent-seeking and get the government to stop it? no, i saved and I worked harder and learned more skills. That's the American way, working hard, not asking the government to protect you from competition.

[DJF]

No, roads weren't private, especially the longer ones. There were some private roads on individuals property but the great expanse of roads were created by government charter and force. This included eminent domain in the USA. Prior to that in the USA the trail system was created by the tribes and those were not private ownership. In the rest of the world roads were also created by local governments and kings, not privately because people did not own enough land to create any medium and long distance roads.

The road network of the world is mostly created by government force.

[Steff]

Uhm... no, not really. I hate to break this to you, but do you really think that the Department of Transportation sent people into the wild west to build roads? Really?

[DJF]

No they sent the US Army to put a bullet into anyone who disagreed that that was a road.

[food]

So... let me get this straight. The Oregon Trail was really blazed by 9-5ers with orange vests, those 40 acres were neat parcels in suburbs with 7-11s on the corners? I suppose this was also back when the 7-11s were run by injuns, before the non-Euro immigrants took them over?

DJF is certainly demonstrating the case against public education, if nothing else. Alternately, perhaps DJF is making a case that a good use of tax money would be to test for lead in the water table wherever it lives...

[DJF]

Are you talking about the forty acres or the Oregon territory which were created by government force and the US Army?

You keep on wanting 100% anarchist on some items like open borders but then don't want to give up things like roads and unlimited travel rights which were created by government force.

[MikeP]

...unlimited travel rights which were created by government force...

This is so wrong in so many ways.

[DJF]

""This is so wrong in so many ways."'

I very much agree, so I wonder why so many so-called libertarians demand a right which is only available from the barrel of a government gun.

Show me any place on earth were there is a significant number of people where there is unlimited travel without government force being involved.

[MikeP]

Rights preexist and precede governments. Governments are legitimate to the extent that they secure those rights.

The fact that in the past governments secured people's freedom of movement by force does not imply that governments gave people the right of movement. They only secured an existing right, just as they do when they stop a mugging.

Or do you believe there is no right not to be mugged?

[DJF]

The only thing that stops a person from being mugged is force. Either the victim or someone else supplies that force. You telling the mugger that you have a right not to be mugged will be laughed at.

The whole thing about "rights" is that they have to be considered rights by everyone involved, but obviously those who engage in the mugging business don't think you have a right not to be mugged

[Drax the Destroyer]

Its easy to demand more money than Chinese workers since American employers don't customarily lock their employees in concentration camps at gunpoint. Maybe there is a reason people want to work here? I wonder if it has something to do with this place sucking less then the suckhole they sucked from.

[DJF]

But China is great according to Reason, its does not have any of those pesky worker rights, environmental laws or welfare that ruin the USA.

[Tristan Band]

They also have an autrocratic government that hasn't been kind to workers from the start. They also have a welfare system. Environmental laws, you are correct on that. But, environmental laws do not call for restricting immigrants.

[Soonerliberty]

They don't need environmental laws. The gov't is destroying the environment. It is par for the course for states. Socialist states always have the least amount of respect for the environment, because they have no respect for property rights.

[Drax the Destroyer]

Reason very well might say that (I'm not going to be bothered with looking anything up)but I sure as hell don't.

They don't have worker's rights because the STATE is their employer. They have lax environmental laws because the STATE is their #1 polluter. They don't have welfare because...well sometimes you have to be pratical to maintain your economic control on 2 billion people.

[DJF]

The State is not the only employer, there is Wal-Mart and lots of other globalists corporations who employ lots of Chinese. Those corporations do get the State to put its foot onto the neck of the workers when they get uppity but that is one of the great advantages bragged about by the globalists

[Tristan Band]

Perhaps, then, the problem is that China's State is getting too cozy with the corporations? Another reason that Reason shouldn't defend China: Government involvement on behalf of business isn't laissez-faire, it's something called...well, I don't know, I think it begins with the letter 'F'

[Soonerliberty]

That is not a free market. That's called corporatism, and it's not much different from what we have. It shouldn't surprise you that businesses are the first enemy of free markets. If there is a gov't that will kill their competition, then they will use it. Who wouldn't?

[Tristan Band]

For the record, I was trying to say "fascism", but that is essentially a synonym.

In a way, the economic crisis has been good for the growth and maturation of libertarianism. It ended our Rand-inspired love-affair with businesses. It forced us to see that being pro-business and pro-market are different things.

[Soonerliberty]

I wasn't referring to you, Tristan, but to the ignorant poster above.

[Tristan Band]

Great post.

Here's a simple fact: nobody "belongs" here in America. If every human being went back where they came from, we'd all end up in a tiny valley in Africa. We're all immigrants, and borders are just imaginary lines.

[DJF]

National borders are no more imaginary lines then property lines are imaginary

[MikeP]

Except that the latter accrues to individual rights and the former doesn't.

That's a pretty crucial distinction.

[Kool]

Evidently, somebody thinks that they're "all better" and hasn't taken their meds today.

Jesus, what fucking nonsense. I've seriously seen more logic from a schizophenic having a serious episode.

"That's some nice ranting there, Lou."
"Yeah, thanks Chief."

[American Indian]

Get the hell out of my country, whitey!

[Corduroy Rocks]

Actually, my Y chromosome hails from somewhere around the Indus Valley in good old Pakistan.

[Fluffy]

DJF must be a member of the group that has put that site up. His posts are a pretty good example of why the concept of "sovereignty" is alien to the concept of liberty.

The history of the concept of "sovereignty" is pretty unsavory. It basically has two roots: the Medieval concept that the king owned the entire country, and people held land as fiefs or leaseholds granted by him as the sovereign, and the ancient Roman concept of the hearth, where the state was seen as the property of the citizens arranged in tribes that were collections not of individuals but of "hearths". Both are pernicious anti-individual and anti-liberty concepts.

When we made "da people" sovereign, it was an improvement over the monarchical system[s], but that isn't really saying a whole hell of a lot. It still directly implies that there is some sort of meta-entity that we are all components of, and that this meta-entity is ultimately the unit of value, and that if you speak with the "voice" of this meta-entity you can violate the rights of individuals with impunity.

We should dispense with it in favor of the idea that we all individually own ourselves; that we all individually own our property; that government is not a "representation of sovereignty" in some meta-sense but merely a bit of business we're currently sharing for convenience; and that the national border is there just to define the territory outside of which you can't expect the writ of civilized law to run.

If I employ an illegal immigrant to do a job, or if I sell an illegal immigrant a piece of property, or if I rent a piece of property to an illegal immigrant, the "sovereign" public shouldn't get to say shit about it. To argue that the public deserves to control this, you have to not believe in my basic economic rights and associational rights.

[Libertymike]

Fluffy-

The position taken by DJF is consistent with run of the mill (not John Stuart) statism. Its akin to the notion that an entrepreneur who creates wealth and opportunity for others "must give something back" to the communitay for without it he would not have even have had the opportunity to create wealth.

More tired, flaccid logic.

[DJF]

But once again you ignore that fact that your immigrants are using public means to travel. Mostly roads but also other public waterways and airways. These were created by the public, both using public money And public force and therefore the public has a say in who uses them.

Also what do you plan to do with your immigrant workers when you don't need them anymore? Are you going to return them to where you got them when you don't need them anymore or are you going to dump them onto others in the USA? Don't dump them on my land or my road.

And please don't mention private roads since they have never existed to any great extent in any place on earth at any time in history so I doubt if you will create such a thing in the future. And they certainly have never been for absolute freedom of movement. Even the present system of limited freedom of movement was created by public money and force, you fantasy world of free movement is a fraud. Show me any place on earth where there is a significant number of people that it has occurred to any great extent.

If you want an absolute open border world then nations no longer exist and along with it those open roads you want since they were built and imposed by nations. The pubic road was imposed at the point of a government gun.

[MikeP]

If you want an absolute open border world then nations no longer exist...

You realize this is as stupid as saying "if you want an absolute open border country then states no longer exist."

[DJF]

You do realize that a state is just part of nation and the nation is made of citizens. Without a borders there are no citizens and so no nation. Why would there be citizen since there is no benefit of citizenship. Its like owning property and yet you have no control over that property, it's worthless

[MikeP]

And yet, somehow, states exist -- even though you can travel across their borders without any papers.

Why would nations cease to exist if you could travel across their borders without discrimination?

[MikeP]

DJF, you again completely fail to grasp the concept of a public right of way.

The right of way is a critical and inseparable part of the bundle of rights that accrue to private property. A government that is even pretending to protect property rights cannot deny access to a right of way to someone simply because a majority wishes it.

Certainly improvements that government makes upon the right of way can be properly charged for, but such taking and spending in no way gives any collective the right or power to deny individuals access to it.

[DJF]

So you get to use government force to take other peoples land and declare it a "right of way" and then you have unlimited use of that "right of way" but nobody else has any say in it because you say so. You might ask all the other people involved in your little plan before you declare it to be law of the land.

[MikeP]

When a property is first established, it has defined rights of way to it. When it is later subdivided, each parcel has defined rights of way to it. There is no taking of property involved anywhere here.

If you want to argue that government can legitimately keep people off property it takes through eminent domain and improves with a road, I will likely agree with you on a first principles argument. After all, this taking and new road is not necessarily a right of way, and the preexisting rights of way still exists. Therefore, denying people the use of the new road does not, in and of itself, deny their travel to whatever property they are invited to.

I would argue that it is pragmatically stupid to ask for the police state powers required to keep people off such roads, but that's your desire -- not mine.

[DJF]

What do you mean, "When a property is first established"? The only way property is held is by the barrel of a gun (earlier a sword, a spear or a sharp rock). There is no mystical right of property ownership, there is only the right of ownership of those who successfully fight for that property.

These days there has been set up a system called government which is very good at collectivizing those gun barrels and this now controls the property of most of the world. In some places like Dubai a small family controls the government and the property, in others like China, communist party members control it, while in places like the US it is at least nominally supposedly controlled by the citizens.

Now there are some who suffer the delusion that the property they "own" is under their total control, but as I said that is just a delusion. If you disagree then just stop paying taxes or start doing things with "your" property that the government does not allow you to do and you will soon find out that the government while often incompetent or inefficient is quit capable of putting enough gun barrels into operation to get what they want. That is why government is almost everywhere in the world, they are capable of enforcing their laws

In the US we have a republic with some limits on what government can do, however we have not limited its power over naturalization or immigration. And since the public has repeatedly shown that they think a million immigrants a year is enough your individual desire for more immigrants is overruled. As to the "public right of way" that too is enforced for the public by government guns and so you must either compromise your "unlimited right of way" or suffer the consequences

Now you can declare yourself to be a sovereign individual who does not need to follow US law but that will generally mean that you are either in jail or dead since as I explained above the government is good at collectivizing gun barrels. Your delusion that somehow you have the right to go against the public when it comes to immigration or the use of public rights of way is wrong because you don't have the firepower to enforce your desires. Power comes from the barrel of a gun and you don't have enough guns. And all the stupid talk about first establishing property ownership is just that, stupid talk. The graves of the world are full of people who first established property ownership who then had their head blown off and lost that ownership.

[MikeP]

blah blah might makes right blah blah.

Thanks for clarifying that there's no point in having a normative discussion with you.

[DJF]

Where do you think ownership came from if not from force? Someone came along and declared that they owned a piece of property and would defend it. If they won or intimidated rivals for that property they owned it, if not they lost it. We have now legalized ownership by using government but government power is also force

That is reality, something that overrules any theory

[MikeP]

I am quite familiar with positivist arguments for the origins of property rights, and I agree with them.

Where I apparently split from you is that I believe everyone has the same rights. Thus when an individual or collective claims dominion over a territory where they claim to have more "rights" than individuals actually can accrue in a voluntary association, it is illegitimate and not based on actual rights. I.e., it is a government that is abrogating inalienable individual rights rather than securing them.

[imhotep]

DJF's arguments regarding roads and movement are somewhat intersting.

If the public owns the roads then nobody owns the roads and as long as the people don't demand storm troopers to verify everybody's papers at the checkpoint, then nobody is bothered. If the crux of your argument against immigration is that they didn't pay their fair share you have to remember that federal highway funds mostly come from gasoline taxes and tolls - users pay. If you want to expnd that to a federal sales tax instead of a federal income tax then that should clear up any problems you have with immigration, unless you are just a xenophobe.

[Tristan Band]

imhotep, I'm inclined to the position that he is just a bigot trying to justify his caveman philosophy. A brute, trying to disguise himself in civilized language. I wonder who trained this simian?

In any case, his arguments about property and roads threw me off until you posted. The main feature with public property (which is just a fancy word for 'the commons'); if it is "owned" by everyone, then everyone may use it. We all derive benefits from organizations like the Red Cross, yet no-one pays for it. I consider the roads part of the commons; everyone may use them.

[DJF]

"""and as long as the people don't demand storm troopers to verify everybody's papers at the checkpoint, then nobody is bothered. "'

But the people have demanded that illegal aliens be deported, that is why there are laws against illegal aliens.

[Tristan Band]

When the will of the majority and the rights of a minority come into conflict, the rights of the minority takes precedence. The rights of immigrants outvotes the will of a bigoted public.

[DJF]

But there is no right to unlimited immigration. Please show me where such a right has been agreed to?

You want to impose a contract on others without their agreement nor do you have the power to impose this contract.

[People Power Hour]

*Some* people have demanded that illegal aliens be deported....

So you subscribe to the notion that America is a "democracy" where the majority rules, eh? Ethics, metaphysics and epistimology mean nothing in defining ethics and politics; just sheer numbers, huh? Crikey, mate, that's pathetic.

[People Power Hour]

Yeah, so I wrote ethics again instead of laws; get a majority of people together and horse-whip me.

[DJF]

No, the US is a republic based on a Constitution which clearly says that the people through the Federal Government has the right to regulate immigration.

You are the one who wants to impose your "ethics" on the whole country where a majority disagree. What gives you the right to impose you idea of ethics on others? Have you negotiated with them a contact concerning immigration? So what makes your ethics the law of the land or some universal truth?

[scineram]

Where exactly?

[Paul]

...then feel free to move outside of ours.

Here's Dick Armey at a Reason conference in 2007 speaking about
immigrants: "They're trying to feed their babies...bless their hearts."

We're trying to feed ours, too. Fuck the libertarians.

Wow, fucking zero-sum-game liberals... I mean conservatives... I mean.. who are we talking about here?

[Fluffy]

Hey Krikorian:

Enjoy Obamacare, fucker.

[If some asshole...]

...hadn't left the border open for the last 30 years or so, we wouldn't have Obama.

Enjoy Obamacare, yourself.

[Tristan Band]

Birther alert! GET HIM!

[Has nothing to do with where]

he was born. Obama only got 34% of the white vote. On that percentage, he couldn't have been elected 20 years ago. So where did all those Obama voters come from? 3 guesses, 2 don't count.

If libertarians are so smart, why are all their political goals mutually exclusive?

[Tristan Band]

Oh, now voter fraud. *rolls eyes*

[John Thacker]

I don't think he's claiming voter fraud, he's claiming changes in the demographics of the electorate. He has, in a way, a point, if you make various simplifying assumptions. Reagan would not have been elected, nor Bush I, if we had the demographics of today vote according to how those demographics did in those elections.

However, I don't think that those assumptions are valid.

[Fluffy]

The biggest problem with his argument is that an electorate made up of good white Christian non-multicultural Americans, and the small number of blacks they deigned to let vote [almost none of whom were immigrants] elected FDR four times and Truman once.

All five of those electoral outcomes are a lot pinker than Obama's election, honestly.

[James]

Those elections took place when the economy was much worse than it is today.

I shudder to think who would be elected if we had an economy like in the 1930s.

[DJF]

"""All five of those electoral outcomes are a lot pinker than Obama's election, honestly.""

Your wrong, Obama has built on the previous expansion of government, so he is "pinker". FDR never managed to get such a control over health care for example. Bush was pinker as well since he too expanded the government beyond what FDR did

[Paul]

He's claiming people with Dark Skin were immigrants and white folks have always been here, forever and ever, amen.

[food]

You pretty clearly don't understand the goals.

Hint: huge governments operated by white people aren't on the list.

(I know, two libertarians in the same room, three opinions, but I think *most* can agree on that one.)

[Ken Shultz]

I am so tired of fake conservatives telling actual conservatives like me what being a real conservative is all about.

It's been about opposition to the New Deal and the Great Society since FDR and especially since Goldwater.*

And what these fake conservatives don't seem to understand is that no one save racists and union leaders would care about illegal immigrants at all if it wasn't for social programs in the New Deal and the Great Society...

Sometimes I wonder if fake, anti-immigrant "conservatives" are loathe to get rid of Medicare and Medicaid, public schools and the rest for just that reason! Take away those things, and anti-immigrant "conservatives" have little reason to exist in the public imagination.

If it weren't for Great Society entitlements and public schools, who would still care about illegal immigration?

1) Racists
2) Unions

Notice that both of those groups were traditionally tied to the Democrats before Goldwater and Reagan--and both of those groups were thoroughly scorned by both.

Fake conservatives make me sick. Go back to your Dixiecrat Party where you belong and stop lying about what you want.

*George W. Bush expanded Medicare. George W. Bush was not a conservative.

[TrickyVic]

"""*George W. Bush expanded Medicare. George W. Bush was not a conservative."""

Under the do something not conservative and your not one metric, when have we ever had a conservative President?

By that metric, Obama signing an executive order to ban federal dollars for abortions disqualifies him from being a liberal. I don't think so.

[Hobo Chang Ba]

Calvin Coolidge?

[Ken Shultz]

They may not have been especially successful, but Ronald Reagan was a conservative.

Newt Gingrich was a conservative.

They did everything they could to cut taxes or keep them low, and they resisted the expansion of, and in some cases eliminated, Great Society programs.

George W. Bush expanded Great Society programs. His brand of forcing cultural change through the ballot box (which he tried to do both domestically and in his foreign policy) is Southern Democrat 101.

It was the Democratic Party of the Dixiecrats in 1948, it was their pro-slavery, popular sovereignty argument before the Civil War. The idea that culture (and recently economic opportunity) should be preserved or changed by way of the ballot box has been central to the Democratic Party since its inception.

That's why they called themselves Democrats!

Listen to the racists today, and they all have that message too--"Majority Rule! Minority's should Lose!" Racists heart Democracy!

"We live in Republic, not a Democracy". That's been the consistent message of Republicans since Lincoln. ...except for when the GOP was hijacked by George W. Bush--who by government philosophy, at any other time, would have been considered a Southern Democrat!

He was just like Lyndon Johnson--he expanded what he thought was a just war because it was fought in the name of Democracy--just like Johnson--and he expanded Johnson's Great Society!

George W. Bush was a Southern Democrat, part of that bunch who were pulled into Reagan's grand coalition for cultural reasons. ...and they took over the White House for eight years!

But he was a Southern Democrat in all but name, just like Lyndon Johnson...

Nevar Forget!

And there's nothing more that Southern Democrats in GOP clothing hate more than a real conservative...

They make up bad names for them and everything.

[John Thacker]

This is too nice to Republicans. The historic immigration restrictions in the 1920s, the first closing of the door, was definitely by Northern Republicans.

[JSinAZ]

Nope, not the first closing of the door. An earlier instance was the Chinese Immigration Act of 1882 and the sequels such as the Geary Act.

Interestingly, there is at least one quote from a Republican senator of the time, George Hoar, that the act was "nothing less than the legalization of racial discrimination."

What I have not bothered to do is understand from where and from whom the support for the act(s) could be found. I'm betting the 'where' is California.

[John Thacker]

Ah, good point. There was bipartisan support for those things. Labor was pretty solidly anti-immigrant, as expected.

[Ken Shultz]

Just for the record, I wasn't trying to say that any particular party is better than the other.

I was trying to say that George W. Bush wasn't a conservative, and that a lot of people have come to associate things with traditional conservatism through George W. Bush that probably won't stick.

If FDR and Johnson's Great Society were the crux of the matter in the past, as to whether someone was conservative a la Goldwater and Reagan, then it's probably not too far fetched to assume recent moves like Obama's made will be the crux of the matter in the future.

...and at any rate, how anybody feels, more or less, about illegal immigrants is completely beside the point.

We fiscal conservatives might be willing to let 'em ride our conservative coat-tails, if what they're really worried about is my future earnings being squandered on illegal aliens, but, quite frankly, I'm not sure that's what they're really worried about...

'cause, you see, for me? I don't care whether you squander my future earnings on hard working illegal aliens or native born lazy slobs, all I really care about is that you keep your dirty hands off my future earnings.

...and if that's not their primary concern? Then maybe they're the ones who aren't real conservatives.

And they have no business telling other people what is and what isn't conservative.

[Ken Shultz]

In fact, doesn't the standard anti-immigration case seem to engender a sense of entitlement?

Access to public schools, emergency rooms, etc., when you say that an illegal immigrant's access to those things should be restricted, how much different is that really from saying people have a right to those things since they're native born?

That's called a sense of entitlement.

[JSinAZ]

I think the theory is that it's taxes that fund these services, and thus the "unfair" part is access to services that supposedly the alien has not paid.

Of course, if highways are actually paid through gasoline taxes, then pretty much everybody pays that tax (unless you fillup on PEMEX gas before crossing the border, but that will only get you as far as perhaps Tucson when entering at Nogales).

So as far as the rabid nativists are concerned, I don't think "entitlement" is quite correct. It's probably better stated as whinging about equitability of tax burdens, or something. But that is a nasty road to travel if you actually pay attention to the byzantine tax code and details like that.

[Ken Shultz]

"I think the theory is that it's taxes that fund these services, and thus the "unfair" part is access to services that supposedly the alien has not paid."

I'm still not getting the distinction.

Why is it okay for native born Americans to use services they haven't paid for?

I worked my way through a boarding school. I don't have any kids yet, but when I do--they won't be going to public schools...

Why is it okay for native born Americans to go to school on my hard earned money?

I owe you nothing. I owe illegal aliens nothing. I owe native born Americans nothing. And if the anti-immigration folk are out there trying to tell people that it's okay for native born Americans to steal other people's future earnings that way?

Them they're not conservatives--they're a bunch of welfare queens.

Being born American doesn't entitle you to anything but life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. ...and if that isn't enough for the anti-immigrant lobby, then maybe they should get the hell out of this country and move to Sweden!

[DJF]

So being American does not even get you the US Constitution enforced which gives the power to enforce immigration laws?

Now if you want to get change the Constitution or change the laws then do so, Or do you only follow the laws you like? If so there are plenty of people like you in jail.

[MikeP]

So being American does not even get you the US Constitution enforced which gives the power to enforce immigration laws?

No it doesn't.

...not that that would matter to you since your apparent theory of government power is that there are no inalienable individual rights and the state can legitimately exercise any power it can get away with.

[Ken Shultz]

"...not that that would matter to you since your apparent theory of government power is that there are no inalienable individual rights and the state can legitimately exercise any power it can get away with."

And doesn't this speak to exactly what I was talking about above?

They believe in the magic power of democracy! ...the power of democracy to dictate who I can and can't hire to mow my own freakin' lawn!

They think my rights are up to them to vote on!

And then they turn around and call themselves conservative! ...oh, and I'm not!!! I'm not the real conservative here?!

They're so far out of conservative orbit, they react to conservative arguments like they've never heard them before. ...except for maybe regarding gun laws, that all makes sense to them.

"So being American does not even get you the US Constitution enforced which gives the power to enforce immigration laws?"

You and Barak Obama and the rest of the democratically elected clowns can have all the elections and take all the votes you want--I will still owe you nothing.

Your claim to the fruit of my labor is no better than anyone else's--here legally or otherwise. And isn't that what it comes down to with these guys?

One parasitic leech on my back, looking at another leech and saying, "Get out of here--you're an illegal alien leech!"

If you're sucking the blood out of my back, do you really think I care what county you were born in?

The correct answer is "no".

[DJF]

You rejection means nothing, you pay your taxes and you obey the laws or you get pounded by people with more power then you. You might be able to hide under a rock or in a crevice unobserved but the odds are against you. Your choice. And since libertarians have never learned to play together nicely they have the least amount of power. All that individualism comes up short when the opposition can bring in ten or a hundred or a thousand. That is why government are all over the world, they control more power then individuals

And don't think that overthrowing a government is going to stop government since as soon as one government is overthrown another is set up. Even in places like Somalia government has not disappeared, it multiplied with clan and gang governments

[Ken Shultz]

I thought we were talking about who's the conservative!

I want to undo the New Deal and the Great Society, I don't want an income tax or Social Security or Medicare! I want to privatize the school system.

That makes me a conservative.

The anti-immigration people pay lip service to those causes, but they don't really believe in any of it! They don't want to get rid of Medicaid--they just don't want any Mexican nationals getting benefits...

You see the difference between a real conservative and a fake conservative now?

That's what this thread is about. You've got an anti-immigrant type, with their typical phony conservative arguments, telling a real conservative that he's useful as long as he keeps his mouth shut...?

And I'm here to tell you that anybody that only wants to get rid of the Welfare State because of illegal aliens has no business calling anybody "anti-conservative".

[DJF]

""""No it doesn't.""'

So you reject the Constitution. How is that going for you, have you managed to create you anarchist utopia yet?

"""not that that would matter to you since your apparent theory of government power is that there are no inalienable individual rights """

And if I were to ask ten people what inalienable individual rights there were I bet I would get ten different answers. What is your list of inalienable rights and how do others respond to your list

""the state can legitimately exercise any power it can get away with."'

Depends on the state, some are more limited then others. In the great Chinese state so beloved by many at Reason since it supplies cheap goods the state can get away with almost anything. In the US they can't put troops in you house unless the country is at war, on the other hand they can regulate immigration. That is the rules under the Constitution which you reject

[MikeP]

So you reject the Constitution.

No. My "No it doesn't" referred to the fact that the Constitution does not give the federal government the power to enforce immigration laws.

[DJF]

Article 1 Section. 8. US Constitution, the Congress has the Power to "To establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization"

Article IV Section 4. "The United States shall guarantee to every state in this union a republican form of government, and shall protect each of them against invasion;"

[MikeP]

Naturalization is not immigration.

Immigration is not invasion.

[scineram]

Comprehending basic words is not their strenght.

[food]

George W. Bush expanded Great Society programs. His brand of forcing cultural change through the ballot box (which he tried to do both domestically and in his foreign policy) is Southern Democrat 101.

...And all the Dixiecrats migrated to the Republicans, largely (but by no means entirely) over civil rights.

Look at political maps from 1948-now. They don't call it the Southern Strategy for nothing.

And there's nothing more that Southern Democrats in GOP clothing hate more than a real conservative

Well, I call a Republican someone who consistently votes for Republican candidates. You may not call them "real conservatives", but they are certainly Republicans.

Just like the Rs have to sort out that, I suspect the Ds are going to have to sort out their new-found love for insurance and drug companies over the next half-century. And rednecks, as a rule, only had state-blocks of votes of offer. Money's a harder needle to shake.

[domoarrigato]

William Henry Harrison - our only true liberal and conservative president.

[John Thacker]

George W. Bush was not a conservative.

Oddly enough, Mark Krikorian agrees with you on this, because of George W. Bush's immigration stance.

[Ken Shultz]

I don't care what Mark Krikorian calls me, himself, President Bush or anybody else...

It is what it is.

[shrike]

Add Inhofe, Sessions, Shelby, Bunning, Cornyn, McConnell, Kyl, Santorum, Chambliss, Hatch, and others to that Bush "not conservative" list since they all voted for the new Medicare entitlement.

Apparently, Republicans are only "conservative" when there is a (D) in the White House.

[John Thacker]

Apparently, Republicans are only "conservative" when there is a (D) in the White House.

Except for McCain, of course.

[Edward Mckinney]

An Iraq war veteran and fellow Conservative, has started a great blog. (He also wrote the amazing book "House to House: An Epic Memoir of War") This is a must read:

http://davidbellavia.com/2010/.....yone-care/

[R C Dean]

Privatize the airforce? WTF? I've never heard that as a libertarian proposal, and I hang out with the whackjobs, well, here.

Right now there is a battle on to see who will be marginalized over the next generation - the command-and-control conservatives, or the small government folks. I smell fear from the command-and-control crowd.

[Seward]

Hmm, well privatizing the military has been proposed by some libertarians - I think it is certainly something worth considering.

[TrickyVic]

Who would the answer to, the government, or a CEO?

[Tulpa]

it is certainly something worth considering

...for 0.65 seconds perhaps.

[JD]

Privatizing the military has been bruited as a kind of "hypothetically, in Libertopia we might". Nobody's suggested it seriously, which makes Krikorian's comment just another version of "Libertarians think everyone should smoke crack and have sex with dogs!" In other words: drink!

[yonemoto]

What? I thought we were already doing that? I mean, seriously. Blackwater.

[kwais]

Blackwater is having sex with dogs and smoking crack?

Oh and they are called 'Xe' now.

[Corduroy Rocks]

Let them fear!

"To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of their women."

[scineram]

Anarcho-capitalism?

[Mo]

Krikorian doesn't sound like a very Anglo name to me. I wonder how many Armenians were on the Mayflower on in the Virginia Company. Though I guess he knows that if we let more immigrants in, we might get more guys like him.

[Episiarch]

Mo, Myles Standish's real name was Myles Standiskorian.

[Pro Libertate]

Help the bombardier!

[grrizzly]

Once I couldn't take Krikorian's nativist claims anymore and sent him an email telling him to go back to Armenia where he belongs. He actually replied.

[Tristan Band]

And what did the little goosestepper say?

[Mo]

What was the response?

[grrizzly]

Boring stuff. That he's an American and all his points don't apply to Americans.

[Tristan Band]

Hah, I'm sure Antony Flew would like to have a word with him. (No True Scotsman)

[BakedPenguin]

Flew's Dictionary of Philosophy is great reading.

[Sirk]

Cue Lone Wacko

[Episiarch]

If only; he's been banned, and we are deprived of his presence. I blame Jesse.

[Seward]

Lone Wacko was banned? When was this?

[Episiarch]

He's been banned for a while now. Don't remember exactly when.

[Seward]

Did he (she?) write something that was considered over the top? Or was it just the general history of his/her comments?

[SugarFree]

The thread was actually deleted. Warty pushed him over the edge, though. I have never been so proud of him.

[Seward]

Ahh, thanks, you anticipated my question. What did Warty do? Excuse my voyuerism.

[SugarFree]

He accused him of being a "Catholic priest," if you know what I mean... LW flipped out on the editors and he got banned or he hightailed it permanently.

We've never got a confirm or deny on the exact situation. But that whole thread was deleted.

[Seward]

Funny. Thanks.

[SugarFree]

He's still obsessed with us.

Although clicking that gives him what he wants, attention.

[Seward]

I considered clicking on the link, then I thought better of it.

[Kool]

You're smarter than me. Is there a stonger word than "obsessed?"

He claims he's libertarian, but is talking lawsuit about words. Repeat after me: Cognitive Dissonance.

[SugarFree]

Enwackonated?

[Kool]

Nice! A new favorite word to be used as a substitute for cognitive dissonance, with the bonus masterbatory overtones. I love it.

[Kool]

Or... was "enwackonated" or "obsessed?"

Eitherway, I may just use it as an insult in any way possible.

[John Thacker]

He claims he's libertarian

Actually, at times LoneWacko has admitted that he's not a libertarian at all, he just liked to claim he was one whilst trawling for anti-immigrant allies.

[Other Matt]

It's like a train wreck. I clicked. I couldn't look away.

[SugarFree]

KOCHTOPUS!

[Warty]

and I may take legal action against at least one commenter at that site

I LOOM LARGE MOTHERFUCKERS

[Warty]

I'm still waiting for my statue, by the way. Something along these lines will do. (probably nsfw)

[SugarFree]

Would you being giving birth to the child he molested?

[Warty]

In my vision, I'm birthing a new era for freedom and sanity at H&R. Out of my ass.

[John]

Can't we just get someone to play him? It is not like it is hard to figure out what he would post.

[Episiarch]

If I had the time, I'd just do quick installments of LoneWacko: The Novel and emulate what he'd be thinking, but I just can't.

[Johnny Longtorso]

We should run him for President, just for the "Join the Dick Armey" bumper stickers.

[P Brooks]

"Real" conservatives impress me as much as "real" liberals.

[John Thacker]

I really date the downfall of the Republican Congress to when Dick Armey left.

[Enjoy Every Sandwich]

Krikorian, you self-important asswipe, the question isn't whether we're useful to you; it's whether you're useful to us.

And by the way, the answer is "No".

[Tristan Band]

I think that is something conservatives need to get.

We don't need them. It's them who need us.

[John Thacker]

Krikorian is so important that GWB did exactly the opposite of what he wanted.

Of course, since GWB is so unpopular now, Krikorian is arguing that it was being pro-immigration that hurt GWB.

[John]

Of course the left has always been open about its plans to import in a ready made oppressed proletariat from overseas. In principle, I agree with open borders. But, sadly this country is too far gone to actually pull it off.

As Ken Shulz points out above, you really can't have big social programs and open borders. It is also hard to have open borders and multiculturalism. Open borders worked in America for so long because it was a melting pot. Yeah, people hated each other but ultimately they intermarried and bought into a single culture. That is hard to do when we have political and cultural leaders running around telling immigrants their culture is uniquely superior to American culture and the entire Southwest really belongs to Mexico and of course the whole society is racist against them and they have no shot of success without getting involving race grievance industry. Immigration is great. But there needs to be a equal commitment to a common culture and melting pot to go with it. Without that, we risk becoming the Balkans.

[Mo]

Except that interracial marriage and cultural exogamy is at historically high levels. Considering that miscegenation used to be illegal and a marriage between a Protestant and a Catholic used to be somewhat scandalous, it's funny to hear that there used to be a lot more multicultural marriages. Now a marriage between a Jew and a Catholic doesn't elicit more than a passing question of, "Where are you holding the wedding?"

[Lost_In_Translation]

Hotel Conference Room bookings are booming!!!

[Lost_In_Translation]

LIT's plan to bring immigration under control from this point forward

1. If you're here and want to be legal, you get together a nominal sum (let's say $2500 per adult, $1000 per child), go to your local tax office, fill out paperwork, submit to a background check (to check for criminal history) and walk away with green cards for you and your family, which after a period of 5 years or so can be redeemed for SS cards assuming you don't get convicted of a felony, pay your taxes, etc.

2. If you're a company using illegals, you can fess up and pay equivalent fines for each illegal employee (and essentially make them legal). If you don't, prepare to be raided.

3. If you want to come to the US, we figure out how much successful smugglers get per person (let's say $1000) and then match that and the person gets a green card good for 1 year and they must pay taxes equivalent to atleast $1500 to get a 4 year extension. After 5 years they can apply for a SS card.

Essentially, the US should charge everyone for admission (non-refundable) and leave quotas out of it.

[Colin]

Krikorian is the worst kind of moron imaginable. He even makes liberals look good.

Funny how all these anti-immigrant bigots have names like "Krikorian" and "Tancredo" -- names not likely not be found on the manifest of the Mayflower.

[T]

What, like the folks on the Mayflower weren't immigrants? Crazy Horse, Sitting Bull, Hiawatha and some of the rest might like a word.

[ChrisO]

And the funny thing is, Crazy Horse, Sitting Bull, and Hiawatha were also the descendants of immigrants. Perhaps the mastodons and saber-toothed tigers would like a word...

[T]

Meh. The beasties don't get a vote until they master fire. If they can figure that out, we'll have to either respect them or sic Smokey on them.

[Hazel Meade]

People like Mark Krikorian should be at our feet, thanking us for resurrecting the Republican Party from the ashes that people like him brought it to.

It was the Iraq war, Guantanamo, idiots like Sarah Palin and the social conservatives that turned it into a pariah party.

Small government libertarianism is the ONLY thing they have left going for them.

[John Thacker]

It was the Iraq war, Guantanamo, idiots like Sarah Palin and the social conservatives that turned it into a pariah party.

Although Sarah Palin actually raised McCain's poll numbers, and McCain was no fan of Guantanamo and the social conservatives (having, e.g., voted against the federal Marriage Amendment and been pro-immigration).

Looks to me like Medicare Part D, the highway bill, the farm bill, steel tariffs, Gitmo, waterboarding, Marriage Amendments, restricting stem cell research, making nice with Bob Jones University, and more spending is the way to be elected.

Voting against those things means losing. Unless none of those things have to do with small government libertarianism.

[John]

Hazel,

No one but the Get the US Out of North America liberals and Libertarians is upset about GUITMO.

[Hazel Meade]

Wrong. GITMO is not something that people like to talk about, because it makes them ashamed. But I can tell you that it, even more than the Iraq war, made reasonable people start to believe that the GOP was not just corrupt, but demonstrably evil. It poisoned a large swath of the political spectrum against the Republican Party. To the point that now they are willing to believe just about anything. It probably a strong contributor to the ease with which the Democrats have been able to paint the tea partiers as dereanged racists. (i.e. After all ... these are the same people who think it's okay to torture prisoners ...).

Trust me, nobody left of Red Team Hack Zombie wants to be associated with GITMO in the least.

[John Thacker]

But I can tell you that it, even more than the Iraq war, made reasonable people start to believe that the GOP was not just corrupt, but demonstrably evil. It poisoned a large swath of the political spectrum against the Republican Party.

And because those "reasonable people" can't think beyond Red Team/Blue Team, they voted against McCain despite him being against Gitmo.

Really absurd how many people just can't get beyond that Red Team/Blue Team thinking, and voted against McCain because of what Bush did, right?

[Hazel Meade]

No, it just made people go "Hmm. Maybe those Democrats were really right about the unqualified evil that they they say the Republicans are. Maybe they really are closet facists after all."

[marlok]

Sorry, but here's the poll contradicting what you said. Elegant analysis, though.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/113.....o-bay.aspx

[Mike]

Nobody except people that hated Republcians to begin with gave two craps about Gitmo. The average person knows its not a death camp.

[Hazel Meade]

Waterboarding?

Okay, maybe I should just say 'torture' cause, ya know, I was using GITMO to allude to it.

It's not the fact that it exists, it's what went on there that's the problem.

[Paul]

GTMO doesn't upset me. The policy that puts people there upsets me. The U.S. could put a prison like that in the middle of Disney World and that wouldn't change a thing in my mind.

[John Thacker]

Yes, well the Democrats thought it was sufficient to offer to put the inmates in even worse SuperMax conditions in the US to solve the problem, and Republicans also stupidly complained about.

But yes, not many actually care about it more than a partisan stick.

[STEVE SMITH]

STEVE SMITH ONLY REAL NATIVE AMERICAN! STEVE SMITH'S PEOPLE RAPING HERE WHEN EUROPEANS WERE STILL AFRICANS!

[Alan Vanneman]

kerfuffle: an irreconcilable conflict that, to avoid irreversible damage to both parties, must be dismissed as a light-hearted misunderstanding. It will be fun to watch Mark and Dick bitchslap each other over this one for the next two years.

On the substance of it all, I kind of like Episiarch, but Ken Shultz should write more posts, and longer ones.

[plutosdad]

Outlandish!

[Chris]

"Apparently, Republicans are only "conservative" when there is a (D) in the White House."

Ding Ding Ding!!! We have a winner.

I have found it odd and sometimes a bit amusing, that libertarians here on Reason have somewhat aligned themselves with so-called "conservatives" of late with the whole fuss over ObamaCare. Though we might agree on that one point, we must remember that Republinuts or "conservatives" (whichever you prefer) are the enemy just as much as Obama and the lefties. I would submit that Republinuts are opposed to ObamaCare not because they see it as wrong, but because it was a Demotard idea and they have to be opposed by special Republinut mandate or something. Demotards and Republinuts want the same thing: Big Government subsidized by big taxes.

The ONLY difference is that Republinuts have been able to convince their constituency that they aren't. In essence, they're better liars. They have their own pet programs which are diametrically opposed to libertarian ideas and values just as much as ObamaCare, and they want those ideas (crusades might be more fitting) paid for by you and me.

Ultimately I say screw them all. We need to be very weary of who we align ourselves with in our battles. Being opposed to ObamaCare and being a "conservative" are very different things. We need to remember that.

[marlok]

Libertarian-wise, Obamacare is the worst thing to come along in my lifetime. If conservatives can help beat this bill, I'll gestate a rejected fetus myself.

[Chris]

But they can't. Anyone who thinks they can is misguided. It is not going to happen. ObamaCare is here to stay unless the courts decide otherwise, and even then the courts may only decide that parts are unwarranted, not he whole deal.

All conservatives can do now is drum up support from those in the center, libertarians included, so they can be put in to office come November, and that's no better than the Demotards.

And I disagree with the idea that ObamaCare is the most anti-libertarian thing in my lifetime. I would argue that it's the drug war. It has cost us god only knows how much money. It has placed the government squarely against a vast portion of its citizenry, and has encouraged violence on behalf of the government.

I'm not saying ObamaCare is a good thing. Quite the contrary. But I do think we need to be wary of the "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" attitude that so many libertarians are affording the republinuts right now.

Simply put, they are NOT our friends. They are as much an enemy of liberty as the demotards, even if we can agree on this one point about ObamaCare.

To oppose ObamaCare should NOT mean to befriend Republicans and their values.

[capitol l]

But, Chris if "libertarians" around here hadn't slobbered all over Scott Brown's knob we'd have obamacare by now.

Oh, wait.

I was assured that pin-up boy would save us from this shit.

[John Thacker]

He voted against it. The Democrats just found a way to ram it through. They do still have a majority, and the election was after the Senate's crucial vote.

[capitol l]

It will be easier to move that goalpost next time if you affix wheels to it.

I said at the time, rightly, it mattered not a whit whether that faux free-market fanatic was voted in, and libertarians should support their guy not the Masscare enabling future junior senator. Also, my goddamn point wasn't how he voted for it, it's that it did not matter. I mean the democrats are not very bright but if you thought they were gonna fold that easy then you're bought off pretty easy. Scott Brown is just another opportunistic pol who saw his moment and took it, attaching high ideals to him is the height of naivety.

Consider the national police/security apparatus when decrying the tyranny of obamacare, without guns it's unenforceable.

[Libertymike]

Chris, we, including you, do not know enough about Obamacare to make a qualitative assessment on the comparison to the drug war.

We just do not know what the total cost to liberty will be. We know that the drug war has been horrible. Still, I do not know if we can even truly begin to measure what price freedom, dignity and dececncy we have paid to continue the war begun by the progressives and the women christian tempernace types over hundred years ago. For me, you can't say that Ed Meese started the drug war. That's just dopey.

And no one hates the drug war more than moi-I hate it more than J sub D or Fluffy or Kwais or James Anderson Merrit or John Thacker or JCR or bakedpenguin or Epi or Chicago Tom or even Bobby Barr.

[Chris]

That's true. We don't know enough about ObamaCare to quantify its intrusions. Which is exactly the reason why it shouldn't be qualified as the worst assault on individual liberty in our/your/my/whoever's lifetime. It's simply the latest assault, piled on top of countless other assaults perpetrated by both republinuts and demotards. That is exactly the reason why we can't befriend republinuts. They are just as responsible for the gradual breakdown of freedom as those they decry, make no mistake.

If they can help us, fine, but, for me, there will be no me helping them. Helping them only encourages them even more to continue their many assaults on liberty.

An assault on liberty is an assault on liberty, and the Republinuts have had just as much experience as the demotards. Neither are our friends and are the enemies of freedom from a massive government with loads of taxes. Republinuts have already made it known how they feel about those in favor of freedom. We can help (them get elected) "so long as they keep [their] views to themselves." They have no interest in anything but using us as political capital to advance their agenda (which is anti-freedom). Since that's the case, that they want me to help them but have shown no interest in helping me, they can go fuck themselves.

[The Rogue Economist]

What a coincidence... I happen to think Republicans are useful allies in the cause of advancing personal liberty, so long as they keep their socially reactionary views to themselves.

Who know he and I would have so much in common?

[Mike M.]

This thread made me suddenly realize that LoneWhacko never posts here any more.

[SugarFree]

That just came up today.

[Jonas]

Just yesterday I thought about posting "Shut the fuck up, Lonewacko" on a thread for the hell of it.

I'm glad that his memory is kept alive.

[Geo]

So I am new to this Libertarian, fake conservative debate. How do all of you feel about Pat Buchanan?

[Warty]

Usually crazy, but fun to listen to.

[marlok]

I heard he's a nice guy in person. My friend who knows him will try to say something that gets him stirred up so that he'll bring down the "double-chop" hand gesture.

[Paul]

Cultural conservative. Not our type.

[capitol l]

Not a big fan of his politics, but he used to get wasted with Hunter S. Thompson, so I have a soft spot for him.

Buchanan is also in the HST documentary 'Gonzo'.

[alan]

Some disagreeable politics, other not so disagreeable. Seems likable in an incorrigible uncle sort of way. The uncle who went a bit too far to justify things that are left well enough alone.

He shares a mutual literary interest I would love to pick his brain about.

[Mike]

Dick Armey is pretty stupid. Even more stupid than Newt.

[John Thacker]

Ah, you're one of those intellectual hating types, right Mike? Clearly you're just picking on PhD college professors that dare to go into politics, like Armey and Gingrich.