Kohole's arguments below and is statements on what Gary Johnson would have done are why liberals and libertarians will never be able to work together probably.
I was referring to more than narcotics. I was referring to a whole litany of white collar crimes including but not limited to bribery, embezzlement, ponzi schemes, pyramid schemes, corruption, fraud, many laundering.
Why? Why is this so hard for libertarians to understand? That there are plenty of things that liberals believe that a strong federal government is good and necessary for and why we elected and reelected Obama.
This includes but is not limited to: protecting minorities from discrimination (Civil Rights Act of 1964 which will hopefully be extended to protect LGBT people one day), environmental regulations, Pell Grants, access to healthcare (Obamacare is not single-payer universal but a good step in the right direction), regulation of the financial markets (I'd like to bring back Glass-Steagall), etc.
These things are important to liberals. Obama delivered on as many of them as possible. Does this mean liberals are happy with everything Obama has done? No, not at all. But it should be a good indication that we would disagree with Gary Johnson on many issues that are important to us?
Sometimes it is necessary to gather evidence of certain crimes. I think it should be hard for the police to get a wiretapping warrant but I don't think they should never be granted.
We still have the problem then of the BHL crowd seeing government as being bad and/or unnatural. I as a liberal still see government as a potential for the greater good and necessary. Sometimes it works best at a local level, other issues need a large and national policy.
The idea that government is a natural bad is alien to me. I think it is perfectly natural for people to form societies and governments in order to protect themselves.
Also I notice very few libertarians are willing to make any concessions on economics issues to form a coalition with liberals. Even the bleeding-heart libertarian movement is largely aimed at convincing liberals to give up on the welfare state.
The most conservative Democrats are still further to the Left than the most liberal Republicans.
A Liberal and Libertarian alliance will not last too long because of fundamental disagreements over economic policy. As a liberal, I have no problem with ending at-will employment, a strong and robust welfare state, laws against discrimination, etc. Many libertarians would jeer that this makes me a supporter of anti-Freedom and an enemy to liberty.
This is the big issue that I think many liberals and libertarians do not have an answer for: how?
I think this is a very serious discussion and probably goes deep to the heart of philosophy and human nature. Do the majority of people care about civil liberties or do they prefer safety? There are lots of civil libertarians in the world but when someone like Conor F or Andrew Cohen at the Atlantic post about this, they are largely preaching to the choir.
Most people probably do not want to live in a totalitarian dictatorship but they are also probably not full on raging civil libertarians either. They are willing to have programs that are not free to keep them safe. Even from very distant and remote threats. The famous Ben Franklin quote on liberty and safety is fine and good but just appealing to the Founder's will not help promote civil liberties.
Welcome to humanity. You had a druken night of self-pity and wondering about the injustice of the world. Countless young people have had these thoughts, feelings, and conversations through the centuries. I'm sure people at Oxford in the 18th century felt conflicted thoughts about pretty snuff boxes while there was so much misery in the world. And they saw a lot more of it at hand.
I believe the Buddha was correct when he said Life is Suffering. He was also probably correct when he said the Suffering is caused by Desire. This is a universal and axiomatic truth. Though obviously there are scales and life is a lot more painful for some then others. This is completely random chaos. There are many things I have seen and heard happen to people and I am very grateful that they have not happened to me. At least not yet.
But we also need pleasure in life. Most humans were not meant or capable of living like acestic hermits and monks. We need to laugh and feel good and forget the pain of the world and our own lives. We need the company of friends and family. You probably have a point that if we spent even just a fraction of money from entertainment on fighting hunger and disease that we can do a lot of good but this does not mean we should all abstain from pleasure.
"A man must have aunts & cousins, must buy carrots & turnips, must have barn & woodshed, must go to market & to the blacksmith’s shop, must saunter & sleep & be inferior & silly."-Ralph Waldo Emerson
Yes and no. The whole situation was very complicated and very messy.
The "black" faction was largely African-American. However, they also had some New York Jews and some people of WASP-Scandanvian background, and some Asians.
The "white" faction was also pretty diverse but probably largely white and Jewish. There were Black-Americans aligned with the white faction.
Socio-Economics are harder to guess. I think most people in all factions were old 60s radicals who never became yuppies. Most of them probably lived very precarious economic existences. There were some exceptions though. The unofficial leader of the white faction was a well-to do business man who kept his youthful politics. There were also some old-school academics (tenure and everything) who had decent socio-economic lives. Others were of the "teach a class" here and there kind of academics.
In the black faction, there was one person who was an accountant and she and her husband owned a townhouse in the city and seemed to have an upper-middle class life. Others I am not so sure about.
The factions absolutely hated each other. The one concession I got was when a woman on the black faction admitted she really would like to talk to a guy on the white faction about his work in science. Then she added that this was verbotten.
Now watch the Internet deduct who I am and come in and denounce me for my performance as a poor elections supervisor. Both factions saw me as tool/pawn of the other faction. It was a learning experience but not in a good way.
You are right. It is not limited to right-wing groups. I have seen this first hand at left wing groups but those groups were far from the mainstream and did not have the ear or attention of the Democratic Party. FreedomWorks is a major player in the Republican Party and national politics overall. Freedomworks can get covered by the mainstream media.
There is a group of non-profit radio networks called the Pacifica Foundation*. They own 5 radio stations in the Bay Area, NYC, D.C., LA, and Houston. They are entirely listener supported and very-far to the left. I worked as a local election supervisor at the NYC station (WBAI) during one of their elections of board of supervisors. Control of WBAI is being constantly fought over by two factions. During my interview, my supervisor called these factions "the White faction" and the "Black faction". The fighting between them seems to have existed since the 1960s (when WBAI was hip and relevant instead of forgotten and largely broke.) You are right about the unpleasantness.
As for Ms. Rosenberg, she is a sweet and nerdy Jewish girl who self-described her taste for adventure as roughly calibrated to Liz Lemon levels. Dick Armey she is not but I suppose you can never tell.
*My politics are probably center-right to conservative by Pacifica standards but this still makes me pretty liberal. I just took the job because it paid a good a month for 25 hours of work a week and this seemed interesting and doubable during my last year of grad school.
1. Once again, I think that conservatives manage to find the most Orwellian use of words imaginable. They have been doing this since the New Deal with the Liberty League. How can this group call themselves Freedomworks? What do they mean by Freedom? I suppose the answer is that they are all Calivinists and Freedom is the right to choose God's will.
2. Where does a non-profit get the money for an 8 million dollar buyout? This is a rhetorical question?
3. Can anyone seriously imagine this happening at a liberal 501(c)(3)? Can anyone imagine Alyssa Rosenberg staging a coup at ThinkProgress?
4. Let's see if Kibbe actually promotes social liberty or will he be another libetarian that is all too willing to send social liberty down the river because he is already part of the established order. I somehow doubt it.
"Oh, you want to study 13th century weaving? Great. Please do. But I’ll be damned if I’m going to lend you the money to do that given that your job prospects will be nil and your likelihood of bankruptcy will be much higher than the engineering major."
Please stop putting arts and humanities under assault. We already subsidize the science and engineering majors by paying just as much in tuition even though their classes have costly lab components.
Also an arts and humanities education should be available for everyone, not just the very rich.
I did not receive any Fs. I received one D and two or three grades in the C plus range. I had many B minuses. The rest were B to A. Overall I think I ended up with a 3.0 GPA as an undergrad.
"1.) The strain of “emerging adulthood” that is probably better described as “extended adolescence”. I think there is a problem with a 25-year-old who doesn’t have a bank account in his own name or never paid her own bills or who has never been on a job interview."
I don't know anyone for whom this is true including my friends who have serious trust funds and can do whatever they want in life (anyone involved in art gets to know these people.) They all have their own bank accounts and have been on interviews even if the stakes are radically different.
When I hear people complain about "extended adolescence", it really feels like they are complaining about young adults with cool, urban lifestyles. These people might have good, professional jobs but there does seem to be a lot of conservative ID that gets unhinged around this. They want 23-year old Google engineers or 25-year old newly minted Lawyers to be married with a kid in the suburbs instead of living in San Francisco and going to bars on the weekend or even a weeknight.
The cultural politics of this are all rather interesting and it raises interesting questions for what it means to be a liberal, Democracy. A liberal Democracy should have no problem with young people choosing to live in the city and go to bars and concerts on weeknights but it seems to cause us a great deal of moral panic. We want them in suburbs and unable to go out because they have kids.
My issue is with the people who are pushing back about emerging adulthood.
I spent most of my 20s trying for a career in theatre before deciding it was not going to happen and going to law school at 28. Now at 32, I am graduated, passed two bars, and starting to build my career.
I get the implication from many people who bemoan "emerging adulthood" that there was something immoral or unethical about attempting for a passion, a career in art, and living in cool urban neighborhoods. The proper way would have been going straight to law school, finding a mater, and being a dad by 28 at latest.
I don't see why this is true. I have no problem morally or ethically with someone trying for a career in art or something unusual and therefore putting off the so-called adult things. Nor do I have a problem with people banging out their wild oats in their 20s and having a life that largely consists of work and going to bars on the weekend. I just don't see it as a sign that Civilization is in decline.
My grades were all over the map in high school. Many were very good but in some subjects like science and math, I was a perpetual C student. Biology was the only science I got a B in without serious effort. I just really liked it. Overall my average in high school was about 83-84.
I still managed to get into my first choice college in 1998 through a combination of a decent amount of good grades, excellent board scores, recommendations, and extracurricular activities.
I don't think this would happen today. The competition is way too select. My top-tier college can probably fill their class-size several times. IIRC someone from Harvard admissions said they can easily make 5-6 Harvards every year.
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.
On “2017”
Kim,
Kohole's arguments below and is statements on what Gary Johnson would have done are why liberals and libertarians will never be able to work together probably.
"
Kohole,
I was referring to more than narcotics. I was referring to a whole litany of white collar crimes including but not limited to bribery, embezzlement, ponzi schemes, pyramid schemes, corruption, fraud, many laundering.
Or should all those things be legal as well?
"
Why? Why is this so hard for libertarians to understand? That there are plenty of things that liberals believe that a strong federal government is good and necessary for and why we elected and reelected Obama.
This includes but is not limited to: protecting minorities from discrimination (Civil Rights Act of 1964 which will hopefully be extended to protect LGBT people one day), environmental regulations, Pell Grants, access to healthcare (Obamacare is not single-payer universal but a good step in the right direction), regulation of the financial markets (I'd like to bring back Glass-Steagall), etc.
These things are important to liberals. Obama delivered on as many of them as possible. Does this mean liberals are happy with everything Obama has done? No, not at all. But it should be a good indication that we would disagree with Gary Johnson on many issues that are important to us?
Is this really so alien to libertarian thought?
"
Jaybird,
Sometimes it is necessary to gather evidence of certain crimes. I think it should be hard for the police to get a wiretapping warrant but I don't think they should never be granted.
"
We still have the problem then of the BHL crowd seeing government as being bad and/or unnatural. I as a liberal still see government as a potential for the greater good and necessary. Sometimes it works best at a local level, other issues need a large and national policy.
The idea that government is a natural bad is alien to me. I think it is perfectly natural for people to form societies and governments in order to protect themselves.
"
Also I notice very few libertarians are willing to make any concessions on economics issues to form a coalition with liberals. Even the bleeding-heart libertarian movement is largely aimed at convincing liberals to give up on the welfare state.
"
Probably not. I care too much about economic justice and the need for universal healthcare, universal pre-K, etc
"
The most conservative Democrats are still further to the Left than the most liberal Republicans.
A Liberal and Libertarian alliance will not last too long because of fundamental disagreements over economic policy. As a liberal, I have no problem with ending at-will employment, a strong and robust welfare state, laws against discrimination, etc. Many libertarians would jeer that this makes me a supporter of anti-Freedom and an enemy to liberty.
"
This is the big issue that I think many liberals and libertarians do not have an answer for: how?
I think this is a very serious discussion and probably goes deep to the heart of philosophy and human nature. Do the majority of people care about civil liberties or do they prefer safety? There are lots of civil libertarians in the world but when someone like Conor F or Andrew Cohen at the Atlantic post about this, they are largely preaching to the choir.
Most people probably do not want to live in a totalitarian dictatorship but they are also probably not full on raging civil libertarians either. They are willing to have programs that are not free to keep them safe. Even from very distant and remote threats. The famous Ben Franklin quote on liberty and safety is fine and good but just appealing to the Founder's will not help promote civil liberties.
On “Inadequacy and the Problem of Misery”
Welcome to humanity. You had a druken night of self-pity and wondering about the injustice of the world. Countless young people have had these thoughts, feelings, and conversations through the centuries. I'm sure people at Oxford in the 18th century felt conflicted thoughts about pretty snuff boxes while there was so much misery in the world. And they saw a lot more of it at hand.
I believe the Buddha was correct when he said Life is Suffering. He was also probably correct when he said the Suffering is caused by Desire. This is a universal and axiomatic truth. Though obviously there are scales and life is a lot more painful for some then others. This is completely random chaos. There are many things I have seen and heard happen to people and I am very grateful that they have not happened to me. At least not yet.
But we also need pleasure in life. Most humans were not meant or capable of living like acestic hermits and monks. We need to laugh and feel good and forget the pain of the world and our own lives. We need the company of friends and family. You probably have a point that if we spent even just a fraction of money from entertainment on fighting hunger and disease that we can do a lot of good but this does not mean we should all abstain from pleasure.
"A man must have aunts & cousins, must buy carrots & turnips, must have barn & woodshed, must go to market & to the blacksmith’s shop, must saunter & sleep & be inferior & silly."-Ralph Waldo Emerson
On “What I Wish My Students Knew”
That is a really good point.
"
Stillwater in with the save
On “The FreedomWorks Coup that Almost Was”
I know ;)
But I want to clarify that I am a member of the sane/realist left :)
"
Yes and no. The whole situation was very complicated and very messy.
The "black" faction was largely African-American. However, they also had some New York Jews and some people of WASP-Scandanvian background, and some Asians.
The "white" faction was also pretty diverse but probably largely white and Jewish. There were Black-Americans aligned with the white faction.
Socio-Economics are harder to guess. I think most people in all factions were old 60s radicals who never became yuppies. Most of them probably lived very precarious economic existences. There were some exceptions though. The unofficial leader of the white faction was a well-to do business man who kept his youthful politics. There were also some old-school academics (tenure and everything) who had decent socio-economic lives. Others were of the "teach a class" here and there kind of academics.
In the black faction, there was one person who was an accountant and she and her husband owned a townhouse in the city and seemed to have an upper-middle class life. Others I am not so sure about.
The factions absolutely hated each other. The one concession I got was when a woman on the black faction admitted she really would like to talk to a guy on the white faction about his work in science. Then she added that this was verbotten.
Now watch the Internet deduct who I am and come in and denounce me for my performance as a poor elections supervisor. Both factions saw me as tool/pawn of the other faction. It was a learning experience but not in a good way.
"
You are right. It is not limited to right-wing groups. I have seen this first hand at left wing groups but those groups were far from the mainstream and did not have the ear or attention of the Democratic Party. FreedomWorks is a major player in the Republican Party and national politics overall. Freedomworks can get covered by the mainstream media.
There is a group of non-profit radio networks called the Pacifica Foundation*. They own 5 radio stations in the Bay Area, NYC, D.C., LA, and Houston. They are entirely listener supported and very-far to the left. I worked as a local election supervisor at the NYC station (WBAI) during one of their elections of board of supervisors. Control of WBAI is being constantly fought over by two factions. During my interview, my supervisor called these factions "the White faction" and the "Black faction". The fighting between them seems to have existed since the 1960s (when WBAI was hip and relevant instead of forgotten and largely broke.) You are right about the unpleasantness.
As for Ms. Rosenberg, she is a sweet and nerdy Jewish girl who self-described her taste for adventure as roughly calibrated to Liz Lemon levels. Dick Armey she is not but I suppose you can never tell.
*My politics are probably center-right to conservative by Pacifica standards but this still makes me pretty liberal. I just took the job because it paid a good a month for 25 hours of work a week and this seemed interesting and doubable during my last year of grad school.
"
Can you tell when Orwell renounced his democratic socialism?
"
Some thoughts:
1. Once again, I think that conservatives manage to find the most Orwellian use of words imaginable. They have been doing this since the New Deal with the Liberty League. How can this group call themselves Freedomworks? What do they mean by Freedom? I suppose the answer is that they are all Calivinists and Freedom is the right to choose God's will.
2. Where does a non-profit get the money for an 8 million dollar buyout? This is a rhetorical question?
3. Can anyone seriously imagine this happening at a liberal 501(c)(3)? Can anyone imagine Alyssa Rosenberg staging a coup at ThinkProgress?
4. Let's see if Kibbe actually promotes social liberty or will he be another libetarian that is all too willing to send social liberty down the river because he is already part of the established order. I somehow doubt it.
On “What I Wish My Students Knew”
Kazzy,
There were a lot of anti-Semitic comments directed at the Jewish teachers during that strike.
"
"Oh, you want to study 13th century weaving? Great. Please do. But I’ll be damned if I’m going to lend you the money to do that given that your job prospects will be nil and your likelihood of bankruptcy will be much higher than the engineering major."
Please stop putting arts and humanities under assault. We already subsidize the science and engineering majors by paying just as much in tuition even though their classes have costly lab components.
Also an arts and humanities education should be available for everyone, not just the very rich.
"
I did not receive any Fs. I received one D and two or three grades in the C plus range. I had many B minuses. The rest were B to A. Overall I think I ended up with a 3.0 GPA as an undergrad.
"
"1.) The strain of “emerging adulthood” that is probably better described as “extended adolescence”. I think there is a problem with a 25-year-old who doesn’t have a bank account in his own name or never paid her own bills or who has never been on a job interview."
I don't know anyone for whom this is true including my friends who have serious trust funds and can do whatever they want in life (anyone involved in art gets to know these people.) They all have their own bank accounts and have been on interviews even if the stakes are radically different.
When I hear people complain about "extended adolescence", it really feels like they are complaining about young adults with cool, urban lifestyles. These people might have good, professional jobs but there does seem to be a lot of conservative ID that gets unhinged around this. They want 23-year old Google engineers or 25-year old newly minted Lawyers to be married with a kid in the suburbs instead of living in San Francisco and going to bars on the weekend or even a weeknight.
The cultural politics of this are all rather interesting and it raises interesting questions for what it means to be a liberal, Democracy. A liberal Democracy should have no problem with young people choosing to live in the city and go to bars and concerts on weeknights but it seems to cause us a great deal of moral panic. We want them in suburbs and unable to go out because they have kids.
"
Okay that is a fair point.
My issue is with the people who are pushing back about emerging adulthood.
I spent most of my 20s trying for a career in theatre before deciding it was not going to happen and going to law school at 28. Now at 32, I am graduated, passed two bars, and starting to build my career.
I get the implication from many people who bemoan "emerging adulthood" that there was something immoral or unethical about attempting for a passion, a career in art, and living in cool urban neighborhoods. The proper way would have been going straight to law school, finding a mater, and being a dad by 28 at latest.
I don't see why this is true. I have no problem morally or ethically with someone trying for a career in art or something unusual and therefore putting off the so-called adult things. Nor do I have a problem with people banging out their wild oats in their 20s and having a life that largely consists of work and going to bars on the weekend. I just don't see it as a sign that Civilization is in decline.
"
The post to Damon was meant to apply to you.
"
Sorry. My response was meant to go to Kim. Not you.
"
I think this is changing.
My grades were all over the map in high school. Many were very good but in some subjects like science and math, I was a perpetual C student. Biology was the only science I got a B in without serious effort. I just really liked it. Overall my average in high school was about 83-84.
I still managed to get into my first choice college in 1998 through a combination of a decent amount of good grades, excellent board scores, recommendations, and extracurricular activities.
I don't think this would happen today. The competition is way too select. My top-tier college can probably fill their class-size several times. IIRC someone from Harvard admissions said they can easily make 5-6 Harvards every year.
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.