Falkor said:
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libertarians are so unrealistic. small govt worked moderately well way back in the day, it cant make a come back. what would you do without federal agencies such as the marshals, fbi, cia, the military, public education, medicare, social security, etc, etc, etc. true libertarianism is such a crock. so is capitalism. they're both fucking jokes of a theory which never ever ever works properly in actuality - human nature is just too much of a bitch!
I don't think modern Libertarians in the traditional sense (at least the magazines and ideas I subscribe to) want to eliminate every single government agency that we have. There are some, however, that do need to be removed or, at the very least, given far greater transparency. Obvious the FED is a big sore spot for me personally not necessary for what the organization does, but because it is the tool that allows us to overspend past our ability to pay it back to begin with. It is also, in spirit, against the very constitution, which gives Congress the power to do what the FED does. When Congress can't even accurately perform oversight of the FED then we have a problem.
As for public education? I don't think any sane person thinks what the national government has done to education is a good thing. In fact, what they are doing in blatantly unconstitutional. Education is for the states, not the national government. This isn't a libertarian issue--it's a legal one where the Fed gov't has overstepped its boundaries. I don't really care if you think national education is a wonderful idea. It's a moot point because the constitution does not allow for it.
And where I'm coming from isn't from a libertarian stand point. William Ayers, who I am sure you know of, came to my college campus last year and gave a similar speech on how Obama's national education plan, Race to the Top, is a complete disaster and the absolute wrong direction to go in revitalizing education in America.
Problem with giant bureaucracy is that you start to think that we cannot operate without them today. When in reality we actually did quite well without them and such departments only add red tape and inefficiency to the cost.
As for other areas, the military could obviously do with some cutting back on. There is no reason to have as many bases as we do or to be intervening in any where near the capacity that we are now. The ironic thing is, the very reason we are in Afghanistan and Iraq now is as a result of our previous military incursions into the same exactly countries two decades prior. Our military campaigns are only further aggravating the charge brought against us by foreign nations. It is an endless loop of play where the ultimate loser will be us when we go broke and our economy can no longer sustain the spending.
also, it's 2011 wake the fuck up, you cant have non-interventionalist/isolationist policies in our globalized world, especially not when youre the remaining super power.
Your argument rests on a false premise. You assume that we have a duty to the rest of the world to maintain order and act as a police force. Problem is, this isn't true at all and is not representative of what our country's foreign policy was up until the Cold War.
Asking the US to stop intervening in internal affairs in other countries is not akin to becoming isolationist. This is a misnomer. Put yourself in the shoes of a Middle-Eastern. I don't think you would appreciate it very much if some foreign country had multiple military bases on your country's own soil and actively promoted its causes through backdoor diplomatic dealings (often corrupt bargainings) and / or the funneling of weapons to artificially aid one side over another in civil war.
And a "globalized world' refers to economics and communication, not military conquest. This fails to explain why an expansive military with hundreds of bases across the world is necessary for a global economy. China seems to be doing just fine and they are a regional power at best.
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