The ideal libertarian society, as imagined by social democrats such as SesencoI am of good cheer today, due to the discovery of a hitherto unknown tribe of libertarians, dwelling within the liberal democrat party. I had heard legends to this effect, but had assumed the harsh climate would have killed them off long ago, with little to sustain them but the sparse and somewhat poisonous JS Mill. Happily I was mistaken in this regard.
Nevertheless, tenacious as they must no doubt be, I don't envy their position. If only some kind of Operation Magic Carpet could be organised...
4 comments:
Hah! Thanks for the link. Being a Libertarian Lib Dem can be a bit tough at times, as you've seen from the Lib Dem Voice comments thread you linked to.
It's as much about inertia as anything else. I started in politics in the Lib Dems, my colleagues in my local party have seen my journey and don't complain, so I figure that *any* network within which to try and spread common sense is probably worth hanging onto till exhaustion.
I was ready to give up around the time of the election, but personally figured that if there was a government that might be persuaded it might be a Conservative/Lib Dem coalition in which the two parties could barely agree but both had some real liberals who could be shored up by each other and make some headway.
Whilst that impression has not materialised yet, there are a couple of libertarian/Mutualist policies that I think are still worth pursuing. Monetary reform for one.
There has always been a small streak of Lib Dems who have agitated for fundamental reform and now that the likes of Cable are in important positions in that regard, some of us are going to go after him.
No worries. My original comment on that thread was primarily facetious, and I laughed at your response. I don't think I could tolerate being anywhere near people like Sesenco, although if I was in your position, I may derive some pleasure knowing that I was riling them as much if not more than they were riling me.
My hope was that the coalition would drag the lib dems towards liberalism and away from the socialistic stuff. At least the lib dems have been more right than the other two on a lot of the civil liberties stuff and the war in Iraq. What they're wrong about applies equally to all three major parties.
Still, my hope is that a strong, solely libertarian party will arise. It would certainly help if those that consider themselves such in the other parties could come together in this endeavour. At this point, though, this is not likely any time soon, and I guess the important thing is to try to spread the message of liberty, and, personally, educate myself in the economic side of libertarian liberalism.
I'm not familiar with mutualism. Perhaps it could form the rival wing. I'll be with the Misean/Rothbardian faction!
Oh - the "thin film of spittle" comment?
Thankfully I don't believe I have ever met the fine true libertarian that is the brave Sesenco! And long may it continue, at least until I have a herbal cheroot to blow in his face :-)
By the way, doen't it piss you off that the statists and meddlers have hijacked the Burford martyrs for their cause? I went to Levellers' Day once, but never again!
I didn't know they had, but sounds like the sort of thing they'd do. I bet they don't dwell too long on what Lilburne actually wrote. They'd find out he was no proto-socialist, but free market all the way.
Anyway, that Burford crowd (the originals I mean) were bloody quitters! Not like Trooper William Thompson - he went out both barrels blazing.
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