Neither Left Nor Right

by Doug Carkuff

I have always taken it as a good thing that libertarians are detested by both the left and the right. To me it is proof positive that we libertarians are in the right. After all, both the left and the right are fundamentally the same – authoritarian statists who wish to use the force of government to make society in their own images and to compel others to live in ways that they approve of. And let’s be honest, both the left and the right do truly hate us and whatever we may ostensibly have in common with either – say free markets with the right and human rights with the left (of course neither really supports either except in qualified and conditional ways) – what they find detestable about us involves fundamental differences which can never be overcome as long as they remain "left" and "right," as long as they remain wedded to that dialectic.

I’ll be honest, at this point in my life I find political philosophy to be tiresome or maybe I have just become tired and lazy. Beyond considering the merits of minarchism versus anarchism I don’t like to go much into any of it anymore. Debates about the implications of the privatization of this particular thing versus government control of that seem to me pointless. From my perspective, if you believe you own your own life, if you believe in liberty, there is nothing to debate. You are never going to convince anyone who doesn’t believe in or understand liberty in a meaningful way to come over to your side. At best, the arguments will all be utilitarian in nature and both sides are going to make counter arguments which are often essentially meaningless – what if this scenario occurred or what would happen in that particular circumstance.

Don’t get me wrong, I very much enjoy watching YouTubes of my libertarian heroes – most associated with Lew’s site and Mises and way too many to mention. And, of course, the great Dr. Paul – but when I see a libertarian debate a statist of whatever stripe the futility of it is tiring. It is as though they are talking different languages. It is particularly trying when I see what we often refer to as a "beltway libertarian" (think Cato, Reason) debating a main stream "progressive" or a main stream "conservative." The feeling I get is that they are pretending at disagreeing, both of them really committed to never changing anything fundamentally.

The bottom line is that I have been troubled by the inability of libertarians in general to make any substantial inroads into the minds and hearts and thinking of most Americans, which is fairly ironic when you consider that the values on which this country was founded and the values continually espoused when speaking reverently about this country are distinctly libertarian values. Funny how they sound so foreign and unfathomable (and dangerous), except in the abstract, to so many devoted Americans. It’s fine to talk about dedication to liberty, but it’s something else altogether to actually consider living by the principles of liberty. It strikes me that whenever libertarians and those who are suspicious of libertarians talk they invariably talk past each other. It strikes me that our approach as libertarians has been off the mark. We are never going to win by talking principles and philosophy. The only way we are going to reach those who can not hear us now is to show them what they are missing and what they are losing by being afraid to seriously consider liberty and the kind of world they could inhabit by embracing the principles of liberty. READ MORE AT LEW ROCKWELL

Great Historical Quotes

"So long as the people do not care to exercise their freedom, those who wish to tyrannize will do so; for tyrants are active and ardent, and will devote themselves in the name of any number of gods, religious and otherwise, to put shackles upon sleeping men."

Voltaire

The Truth

"Washington is not America. It has become an alien city-state that rules America, and much of the rest of the world, in the way that Rome ruled the Roman Empire. "

Richard Maybury

Laboratories of Repression

We don’t let the states “experiment” on the First Amendment. Should the Second Amendment receive any less respect?

Damon W. Root

In 1932, progressive Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis penned one of the most famous passages in American jurisprudence. “It is one of the happy incidents of the federal system,” Brandeis wrote in his dissent in New State Ice Co. v. Liebmann, “that a single courageous State may, if its citizens choose, serve as a laboratory, and try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country.”

Since then, Brandeis’ famous words have been quoted or referenced countless times, appearing everywhere from legal documents to campaign speeches. Most recently, they surfaced in the arguments leading up to the landmark Second Amendment case McDonald v. Chicago, which the Supreme Court is set to hear in early March 2010.

At issue in the case is Chicago’s draconian handgun ban, a restriction that largely mirrors the gun control law struck down last year by the Supreme Court in District of Columbia v. Heller. The key difference is that Heller only decided whether the Second Amendment secures an individual right against infringement by the federal government (which oversees Washington, D.C.). McDonald will settle whether the amendment’s right to keep and bear arms applies against state and local governments as well.

That’s where Brandeis comes in. In Chicago’s view, the Second Amendment should have no impact on its vast gun control regime. As the city has argued to the Court, “Firearms regulation is a quintessential issue on which state and local governments can ‘serve as a laboratory; and try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country.’” Thus, Chicago claims it should enjoy “the greatest flexibility to create and enforce firearms policy”

READ MORE REASON

Great American Quotes

"They have gun control in Cuba. They have universal health care in Cuba. So why do they want to come here? "

Paul Harvey 8/31/94

'Withdrawal Tax': How to Stick It to the Big Banks That Got Bailed Out, and Make Money While You're at It. Pass It On!

by Gary North

The Huffington Post has come up with a nice little protest movement. Let's pull our money out of the bailed-out banks and put it in local banks that lend to locals. Who are the locals? People just like us.

This makes sense economically. If you ever want a loan, get it from your own banker. If it's a local bank, you will be treated well.

The FDIC insures all accounts up to $250,000. Your money is as safe in a local bank as a bailed-out mega-bank.

The folks at Huffington are on the Left. But we can all agree when we see insider bailouts like the ones in September and October 2008.

They have produced a video. This video is biased, mean-spirited, and simplistic; I love it! The more of these low-budget YouTube videos on the Big Bank bailout, the better.

The bankers are on the defensive. Let's keep them there.

On the causes of America's Great Depression, we should blame the Federal Reserve System in the late 1920s – not the early 1930s, contrary to Milton Friedman. On this point, read Prof. Roger Garrison's review of Murray Rothbard's book, The authors – Mrs. Huffington and former Chief Economist of the Senate Banking Committee, Rob Johnson – have had enough.

The Huffington Post article is here. The authors – Mrs. Huffington and former Chief Economist of the Senate Banking Committee, Rob Johnson – have had enough.

They do not call this a bank run. They call it a withdrawal tax. I like that.

Michael D. Tanner & Michael F. Cannon dissect Obama's health care plans.

Baucus: No Senator Understands This Health Care Bill

NICE! WHAT DO WE PAY THEM FOR?

Sam Adams on a Sunday Afternoon

"It does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people's minds."

Samuel Adams

Reason.tv's Nanny of the Year 2009!

Worst. Decade. Ever.

Not Quite the 'Decade from Hell'

by Gene Healy

Friday brings an end to a decade most Americans will be glad to see the back of. What's to like about a 10-year span that started with an embarrassingly botched election, moved on to the worst terrorist attack in U.S. history and ended with a harrowing financial crisis?

The "Aughties" were awful. But all the media-driven doom and gloom is getting a little out of hand. Yes, it was a rotten 10 years for America. But cheer up: Things aren't as bad as they seem, and there's a good chance they'll get better.

This was the "decade from hell," Andy Serwer proclaims in a recent Time cover story: a period of economic apocalypse and unrelenting terror, "the most dispiriting and disillusioning decade Americans have lived through in the post-World War II era."

Holy hyperbole, hackman. Has Serwer never heard of the "misery index," the measure of unemployment plus inflation that Ronald Reagan used to pummel Jimmy Carter in the 1980 race? At 11.84, it's at its decade-long peak right now, but it hit 22 in Carter's last months and busted Obama's record in four of the last six decades.

Surely the 1930s -- the decade that saw Hitler's rise to power and a U.S. unemployment that routinely passed 20 percent -- has to count as more "dispiriting" than the 2000s. And how about the '60s -- a decade of assassinations, vicious race riots, rising crime and a pointless war that killed more than 50,000 Americans? READ THE REST

Cash For Clunkers: Home Edition

by Doug Bandow

This article appeared in Forbes on December 28, 2009.

Cash for Clunkers (cars) is over. Cash for Clunkers (houses) continues. Legislators just extended the scandal-marred $8,000 home- buyer tax credit--which means another $11 billion will be wasted.

Ground zero of last year's financial crash was the politically driven collapse in the housing market. Six years ago, Rep. Barney Frank, now chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, declared: "I want to roll the dice a little bit more in this situation towards subsidized housing."

Uncle Sam rolled the dice a lot, and we all are paying the bill.

So far the home-buyer tax credit has cost $10 billion. As few as one-fifth of those taking the credit really were new buyers, which Steven Pearlstein of the Washington Post figured meant a $75,000 subsidy per new house sold. When Congress nevertheless renewed the credit, it also expanded the benefit to owners for up to five years, and raised income eligibility.

However, the credit is barely a rounding error compared with continuing losses by Fannie Mae ( FNM - news - people ) and Freddie Mac ( FRE - news - people ). These two "government-sponsored enterprises" (GSEs) promoted both subprime lending and mortgage securitization, which turned bad mortgages into bad securities.

Today Fannie and Freddie underwrite $5.4 trillion worth of private home mortgages. Yet Washington is keeping the GSEs busier than ever. In October, Secretary Timothy Geithner advocated "a one-year extension of the current loan limits" to help "support the continued availability of affordable mortgages for many working families and aiding the recovery in the housing markets." READ MORE @ CATO

How Liberty Makes Health Care Virtually Universal

by Mary J. Ruwart, Ph.D.

Everyone knows that health care costs are soaring every year, making medical bills and insurance unaffordable for many. No relief is in sight with the health care bills being considered in Congress, which are estimated to cost us at least $1 trillion over the next 10 years. Given government’s abysmal record in estimating costs, we should expect to pay much more.

Judging from what has happened in other nations with “universal health care,” many of us, seniors especially, will die waiting for treatment. Health care is so expensive that there is only so much to go around; it has to be rationed.

But why is health care so expensive? Why does it cost so much more every year?

The health care industry is one of the most highly regulated in the country. These regulations drive up costs enormously. About 80% of the costs of new drugs, for example, are due to regulations that are intended to make them safer. In practice, however, these regulations cause millions of premature deaths by adding 10 years to the drug development time of life-saving drugs and favoring new, expensive drugs over nutrients and older pharmaceuticals with good safety records.

Very few nutritional supplements are put through the FDA testing process. Consequently, manufacturers are banned from advertising their products to doctors. Lovaza, a prescription fish oil supplement, is one of the few exceptions. Even with their insurance company paying most of the cost, patients pay almost as much for Lovaza through their co-pay as they would for virtually identical over-the-counter pharmaceutical grade fish oil at the same drug store!

In addition to driving up the costs of drugs, regulations have created a shortage of health care professionals by limiting the number trained each year. When the number of practitioners go down, prices go up. Physicians are more likely to overlook potential treatment options and make major medical mistakes when they put in the long hours generally required of them because of regulation-driven doctor shortages.

Even when doctors do all that is medically possible for their patients, juries often find them liable in order to give patients with poor medical outcomes access to the “deep pockets” of their physicians’ malpractice insurance. Premiums have gone up so much that doctors are leaving some specialties, notably obstetrics and neurosurgery. Those who remain estimate that 10% of health care spending goes to order tests that are done solely as “defensive” measures.

These distortions of the market drive up health care costs. Insurance goes up too. However, some states double these already high insurance costs by “mandating” that every policy cover treatments that many people consider “optional” such as massage therapists, in-vitro fertilization, and hair transplants.

Most insured individuals never realize what their true medical costs are. They have little incentive to shop for the physician or pharmacist providing the best value. What they pay is fixed, especially if they have low-deductible insurance policies through their employer. When workers lose their job, they often lose medical coverage because they cannot afford the high COBRA payments their former employer offers. They discover that their “free” health care is actually quite costly and that if they pay for it themselves, they can’t deduct the cost to the extent that their employer can.

Workers with Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) fare better than their coworkers when they leave a job. Workers or their employers make tax-deductible contributions to employee HSAs, which grow tax-free. Individuals pay their insurance deductibles from their HSAs and take the account with them when they leave their employer.

HSAs are available to those who have high deductible insurance. Since individuals can eventually use this money for other expenses, they have an incentive to shop for cost-efficient high quality service. Since high deductible policies are less expensive, employers pay less for insurance and employees benefit from the tax benefits and portability.

Clearly, lowering health care spending by doing away with wasteful practices should be at the top of our health care reform list. Such reforms include:

1. Allowing individuals, as well as businesses, full tax credits/deductions for medical insurance and/or medical expenditures. In the interim, encourage the use of HSAs by increasing the amount of tax-deductible contributions (currently $3000) that a person can make each year.

2. Ending insurance mandates that states impose. As an interim measure, allow insurance sales across state lines so that consumers can choose the insurance plan that best fits their needs, rather than be limited to what state legislatures allow.

3. Making doctors and their insurers liable only for actual negligence and malpractice. In the interim, caps on non-economic damages, such as those in California and Texas, lower insurance costs, but may prevent victims of actual malpractice from being appropriately compensated.

4. Ending the regulation of medical professionals and employing a system of voluntary certification instead. Studies show that certification increases the amount of quality care delivered, especially to the poor. Since practitioners are usually certified on the basis of competence, rather than on politically-correct regulations, their number and quality increases, while prices decrease.

5. Ending FDA regulation of pharmaceuticals and employing a system of third-party certification instead. The FDA doesn’t test any drugs, but simply looks over the data provided by manufacturers. Underwriters’ Laboratory (UL), which certifies electrical appliances, actually tests the products that bear its “Seal of Approval.” Such third-party testing is an excellent model for drug certification.

In the interim, passing bills such as Congressman Ron Paul’s HR 3395 and HR 3394 removes the FDA’s jurisdiction over all nutrient-disease relationship claims and prevents the Federal Trade Commission from taking action against any advertiser that communicates a health benefit unless it can establish that the claim is false and harmful.

Each of these measures by itself can decrease health care costs by at least 10%. Taken together, they can slash health care costs by 50% or more. This is true health care reform.

Your representatives in both branches of Congress now are trying to create a compromise bill. That's why it's more important than ever to call each of them personally. Tell them to vote against this compromise, which will create health care rationing, especially for seniors. Tell them to vote for real health care reform, as outlined above. The life you save may be your own!

---

Mary J. Ruwart, Ph.D. is an At-Large Representative on the Libertarian National Committee, Inc.

LP Monday Message

You have probably heard lots of politicians in recent months complaining about "the skyrocketing cost of health care." They wring their hands about how "the United States spends more on health care..." etc. etc.

Their solution? More government, of course.

But why does the cost of health care keep going up so fast? Most other products and services don't have this problem. Food prices don't skyrocket every year. Electronics don't either. What is so special about health care?

I think the problem boils down to this: the government subsidizes health care very heavily. When you subsidize the purchase of something, the price goes up--that's Economics 101. Then, since politicians use the higher price as an excuse to give even higher subsidies, you get into a vicious cycle, and prices keep rising endlessly.

Michael Munger, 2008 Libertarian candidate for North Carolina Governor, commented on this in a recent op-ed.

If the government would just get out of the health care subsidy business, I think we would see health care--drugs, doctor visits, tests, surgeries, everything--become much more affordable.

Of course, there are other problems too: too much regulation, malpractice lawsuit abuse, and so on. Libertarian Mary Ruwart has written about some of these problems in a recent article.

You won't hear Republicans or Democrats call for ending government subsidies of health care. That would mean getting rid of Medicare and Medicaid, programs which politicians of both parties support strongly. I think they love this situation: increasing government now guarantees they'll have an excuse to increase government even more in the future!

Republicans are railing against the Democrats' current plans, but that's only because the Democrats are in charge. When the Republicans had the majority, they couldn't wait to pass their giant Medicare expansion, costing over $1 trillion (entirely debt-financed, by the way). LP Chairman William Redpath pointed this out in his response to President Obama's health care speech.

Many congressmen are home for the recess. If you have time and are looking for ways to promote liberty and the Libertarian Party, please call your congressman again and tell them you oppose this plan, as we suggested before. Every call helps, even if just a little bit.

If you want to magnify the power of your voice 10,000 times, and have newspapers and television stations quoting you, then run for U.S. Congress.

For example, Libertarian Joseph Kennedy is participating in debates and getting plenty of press coverage as he runs for U.S. Senator in a Massachusetts special election.

Only the Libertarian Party wants the government to get out of the health care business. Only the Libertarian Party recognizes that government intrusion into health care is what causes most of the problems. I hope you'll support us today.

Wes Benedict
Executive Director
Libertarian National Committee