New Libertarians: New Promoters of a Welfare State


Mark

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New Libertarians: New Promoters of a Welfare State

by John McCaskey

Brink Lindsey, then [2006] Vice President for Research at the Cato Institute, called on libertarians to abandon the doctrine that a good government is one that protects the rights of its citizens, abandon the non-aggression principle, and instead adopt the moral standard of social justice advanced by Rawls. By Lindsey’s reasoning, free markets are not moral because they protect individuals’ rights to keep the fruits of their own labors and to freely contract with other individuals doing the same but are moral because they benefit the poor. ...

The proposed new libertarianism would be a marriage of left and right, “liberaltarianism”; it would be a marriage of Rawls and Hayek ...

Brink Lindsey and his collaborator on this, Will Wilkinson, left -— or, many speculate, were made to leave -— the Cato Institute. But ... There was now a new libertarianism to be reckoned with ... Lindsey took the proposal to academic venues across America. ...

Then, in October 2012, after the organization appointed a new president, John A. Allison, Brink Lindsey returned to the Cato Institute as a Senior Fellow. He has since become, again, Vice President for Research.

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Throw-in-the-towel libertarianism.

Since common libertarianism has no philosophical roots being purely a self-contained political philosophy, the only libertarian ethics or morality is within individual rights--or, it is wrong to initiate physical force and violate rights. Hence it is vulnerable to chucking even that, ergo: Chuck-that Libertarianism (what's "that"?).

--Brant

as Wilke said: "Me too!"

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From the link: "Nozick is increasingly being replaced as libertarianism’s canonical theorist by F. A. Hayek . . . Hayek replaced Nozick as the standard theoretician of the libertarian right."

What? Not to disparage Nozick's contribution, but having followed the libertarian movement for nearly a half century, I am simply not aware of any significant number of libertarians who came to the philosophy by way of Nozick or who rely primarily on his work.

Furthermore, the author fails to note that Nozick retreated from laissez-faire purity in his later writings. How can you have as a "canonical theorist" a writer who rejected many of libertarianism's core principles?

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I guess you can teach an old libertarian new tricks.

So why did this happen? My guess is that the "New Libertarians" didn't like working for CATO for whatever reason, and in order to be able to find employment in their field elsewhere, they modified their ideology to conform more to mainstream politics, thereby making themselves more marketable to other propaganda mills think tanks.

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"

What? Not to disparage Nozick's contribution, but having followed the libertarian movement for nearly a half century, I am simply not aware of any significant number of libertarians who came to the philosophy by way of Nozick or who rely primarily on his work.

Nozick is very difficult to read and follow.

Ba'al Chatzaf

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I tried to read his "On the Randian Argument" when it was published in The Personalist over 40 years ago. I could neither understand it nor appreciate what was of obvious pseudo value except maybe to philosophical academics, themselves mostly worthless. I never bothered reading the rest of his stuff though I likely have his magnum opus--title?--lying around the house somewhere. Nathaniel Branden, an understandable author, thought Nozick was fresh bread for liberty--or something great (I don't recall why).

--Brant

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Mark quotes:

"The proposed new libertarianism would be a marriage of left and right, “liberaltarianism” "

Ron Paul also represented that "marriage" through his ability to draw political support from the dopesmokers on the extreme libertarian right as well as the radical anarchical left.

Greg

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That new word is much too difficult to work its way into this country's political culture even if it weren't supported by crappy reasoning. It's really the New Libertarianism from people who never learned from the New Coke.

--Brant

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Brant writes:

That new word is much too difficult to work its way into this country's political culture even if it weren't supported by crappy reasoning. It's really the New Libertarianism from people who never learned from the New Coke.

--Brant

I agree that word is cumbersome, but the principle is valid even if it's a description of wrong headed fools. For the political spectrum forms a circle where the radical left meets the extreme right in complete accord on the "dark side".

Greg

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