United Liberty
Eric Dondero
Comment Check: Purifying the Libertarians
Mon, 04/23/2012 - 12:50pm | posted by Jeremy Kolassa
Recently, I authored a series of posts (a series I may continue) on the problems I see with libertarianism. One of the big ones that got a lot of attention was my third post on anarcho-capitalism, the more radical end of the libertarian movement. Yesterday,I wrote a piece responding to a critique of Gary Johnson, which said he wasn’t a libertarian; naturally, I was not supportive of said critique.
One of the comments to my Gary Johnson post was thus:
I like Gary Johnson but the author of the other piece simply did what Kolassa has done on 3 or 4 different blog posts now: calling out a libertarian because he disagrees with some of their views. I actually find this post funny but quite hypocritical.
- maninblack
That’s fair.
I’ll admit it. That’s a fair assessment to make. In my anarcho-capitalism post, I laid in a bit too heavily with what I saw were the philosophical problems of anarcho-capitalism, rather than what I felt was the real, major problem.
Basically, I would love it if there was no government, no taxes, and no silly laws, and we all just respected each other and each other’s property. The thing is that I just don’t see this happening—though I am more than willing to be proven wrong on that one—and I see having anarcho-capitalism as the foot we lead with to be counterproductive.
I’m not going to kick anarcho-capitalists out of the movement or call them un-libertarian. (Some may be, but the vast majority are not.) I’m not going to start a purity test. I’ll leave that to the likes of Eric Dondero and people like him, who make fools of themselves every day.
