ellauri100.html on line 321: What does that have to do with my final rejection of “liberalism” and turn toward libertarianism? When government intervenes in economic and social affairs, its interventions are based on crude “measures of effectiveness” (e.g., eliminating poverty and racial discrimination) without considering the intricacies of economic and social interactions. Governmental interventions are — and will always be — blunt instruments, the use of which will have unforeseen, unintended, and strongly negative consequences (e.g., the cycle of dependency on welfare, the inhibition of growth-producing capital investments). I then began to doubt the wisdom of having any more government than is necessary to protect me and my fellow Americans from foreign and domestic predators. My later experiences in the private sector and as a government contractor confirmed my view that professors, politicians, and bureaucrats who presume to interfere in the workings of the economy are naïve, power-hungry, or (usually) both. Oh I hated those M.I.T. professors. So smug, thought they knew everything.
ellauri100.html on line 323: But there is more to my journey into political philosophy. I began to think seriously about liberty and libertarianism in the 1990s. Eventually, I began to question doctrinaire libertarianism (pro-abortion, pro-same-sex “marriage”, etc.) which seems to have no room in it for the maintenance of social norms that bind civil society and make it possible for people to coexist willingly and peacefully, and to engage in beneficially cooperative behavior. And so, I have become what I call a Burkean libertarian. I had slipped all thw way to the right edge of the Virginia boys' scales, in the same way, and for the same reasons, as the Nazis after the shameful defeat in WWI.
ellauri119.html on line 700: Rand is a economic libertarian who thought selfishness is a virtue. Rational people simply reject Rand’s economic libertarianism because rational people understand that laissez-faire capitalism results in the concentration of wealth in the hands of those who are good at being selfish.
ellauri155.html on line 741: Humen tutkielman ydintyö – todellakin hänen yleinen (epäuskoinen tai "ateistinen") filosofinen näkemyksensä – on se, että moraalinen ja sosiaalinen elämä eivät perustu eikä vaadi kristillisen metafysiikan dogmeja. Humen naturalistinen kehys moraalisen ja sosiaalisen elämän ymmärtämiseksi sulkee pois paitsi libertarianismin metafysiikan (esim. aineettomien aineiden "moraalisen" syy-yhteyden muodot) lisäksi myös kaikki muut teologisesti inspiroidun metafysiikan, joka yleensä liittyy siihen (eli Jumala, kuolematon sielu, tuleva valtio ja niin edelleen). Uskonnon metafysiikka, Hume ehdottaa, vain hämmentää ja peittää ymmärryksemme näistä asioista ja piilottaa niiden todellisen perustan ihmisluonnossa. Humen näkemykset vapaasta tahdon ja moraalisen vastuun aiheesta, kuten on esitetty kohdissa "Vapauden ja välttämättömyyden" ja muualla hänen kirjoituksissaan, ovat juuri se käännekohta, johon tämä perusteesi kääntyy.
ellauri219.html on line 798: No it is not because of the clash in values between American individualism and libertarianism, and the rest of the West’s social democracy and collectivism. That’s a contributing factor among those with enough cultural affinity and exposure to get to know how the US ticks, which maybe explains some of the last decade or so, with the Internet. But again, the “Death to Amreeka” crowds, the sneering at the unsophisticated doughboys, the dismissal of American culture—all that predated that deep familiarity by decades. The discovery of the substantive cultural mismatches were again a late addition and confirmation bias. (How I like the scientific sound of it: confirmation bias.)
ellauri243.html on line 202: It is often used in the United States as a symbol for right-libertarianism, classical liberalism, and small government; for distrust or defiance against authorities and government; and occasionally co-opted for right-wing populism or far-right ideology. In the mid-1970s, the New Left People's Bicentennial Commission used the Gadsden Flag symbolism on buttons and literature.
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