Ask a Libertarian: The Compleat Questions & Answers

During an eight-hour stretch on June 15, Matt Welch and Nick Gillespie answered questions via Reason.com, Facebook, and Twitter about any and all topics related to libertarianism and our new book, The Declaration of Independents: How Libertarian Politics Can Fix What's Wrong America.  In the end, we cranked out 29 videos on everything from the drug war to foreign policy to abortion in that eight-hour period. Take a look by clicking on the playlist above.

Conceived and orchestrated by Meredith Bragg, who produced the series with Jim Epstein, and Josh Swain; special help from Katie Hooks, Kyle Blaine, and Jack Gillespie.

Music by The Zoggs.

Comments

[hmm]

Interesting bracket on the H&R page.

HTML > You!!

[fyngyrz]

From the video, by Nick: "There's no reason other people should be paying for the education of my children."

Actually, there are many reasons. Basically, the most important one is, the better educated your children are, the more capacity they have to move society forward. Generalized to the population of kids, an educated population is vastly better than an uneducated population. Now, I don't have any problem with the idea of a more distributed system with more choices, or with improving it to do a better job, if indeed that can be done, but I *do* have a problem with kids not getting educated because you're too shortsighted to see the value to society of educating other people's children.

The same thing goes for healthcare. A healthy society is of broad benefit to all. This is why it is worth paying for. It is also why it is worth trying something that is less than optimal... currently, we have NO care for many, and that situation is ethically and morally reprehensible. Implement the admittedly lousy mechanism the loons in congress came up with, then begin to fix it, step by step. The alternative, to trash this and start over, leaves more people with no safety net and is reprehensible -- at best.

WRT your book: I went to the Kindle store and saw the price was $13. End of any urge to buy it. Just some free market feedback for you. Someone is getting far too large a cut. And I'm pretty sure it isn't you guys. You made a bad deal. I'll buy it when it hits $2.99 or less, if I remember to keep an eye out for it.

[CE]

...I *do* have a problem with kids not getting educated because you're too shortsighted to see the value to society of educating other people's children.

But so many people agree with you about the value of educating other people's children that they ought to be able to pool their money and do it, without requiring EVERYONE to contribute.

The same thing goes for healthcare. A healthy society is of broad benefit to all. This is why it is worth paying for.

Again, I'm not stopping you. I'm also not trying to use the force of government to get you to pay for things you don't think are worth paying for.

[jerbigge]

To reduce the cost of health care:
1. Repeal prescription laws for all non narcotic medicine (would prefer to repeal all prescription laws period)
2. Allow people with lesser levels of medical education to provide services for which they are competent to provide.
3. Allow lower technology (cheaper) hospitals to be built for those who don't need 21st Century technology.

All of these ideas will reduce the cost of health care by taking government as far as possible out of the picture.

As for education, we already have computer technology that allows people to teach themselves. There are also public libraries for those who don't have computers. Not everyone needs to be educated in a conventional educational environment.
Or taught by unionized licensed teachers.

[Colin]

I can't wait for this dumb book to be published, so they can stop spamming this blog.

[Richard Head]

and they missed some ??'s
- why does money not affect an election unless it's from a public employee union?
- why are predictions about our complex climate system worthless yet we can put great faith in predictions about our equally complex economic system?

[Fist of Etiquette]

More like combleat questions and answers. (Total burn!)

[Mammy Sent Dis Ovah]

Weiner to resign

http://www.twincities.com/ci_1.....ck_check=1

[Tim]

Wiener's pulling out? How will Pelosi fill the void in the caucus?

[hmm]

Definitely not with a Frank.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Save your A material until they create an actual post about that and can get it up. Letting your Weiner comments dangle where they don't belong is unappropriate.

[Ralph Wiggim]

That's unpossible!

[Fist of Etiquette]

Let's pretend that was on purpose and not because I started to type unacceptable and changed it mid-word.

[Joe M]

Yeah, let's not have too much premature deprecation.

[Lord Humungus]

or premature jocularity.

[Tim]

A wiener thread? I heard it's coming quickly.

[hmm]

Hell, it ain't even breathing hard yet.

[WuxBobo]

OK, that makes a lot of sense dude. WOw.

http://www.complete-privacy.no.tc

[????? ???]

tnky friemih

[?????]

wlkome mirs abrel tnks

[????? ????? ????]

wlkome mirs abrel tnks

[David]

Great videos,but after watchin' 'em all back to back, that surf guitar intro got really goddamn anoying lol.

[David]

annoying*

[Robert]

Yay! Can't wait to pirate the book!

[Robert]

We heard from the leather jacket, but what about the mustache, which is presumably also on vacation?

[????]

thank you

[MattTrey]

What is with the libertarian obsession with ending the drug war? Are they so clamoring for the ability to take physiologically debilitating and destructive narcotics legally?

[scarpe Nike Store]

is good

[scarpe Nike Store]

is good

[air max]

is good

[???? ??????]

thank u