Civil Liberties especially civil liberties for criminal defendants and suspects are things that I suspect people support in an abstract nature but get a bit more wishy-washy when confronted with reality. By people, I mean your average non-ideological citizen. I do not mean law and order types or civil libertarians.
The current remedy for violations of the 4th Amendment is that the improper evidence is exlcuded from the prosecution's case in chief. This is a gross simplification of the complicated in and outs of the 4th Amendment. I think most people will support this in theory but begin to hem and haw if you gave them a really bad case and I read some dozies in law school. Most 4th Amendment cases deal with narcotics. There are plenty that deal with more serious crimes like serious white-collar crime and in one case that made it to the Supreme Court twice, the murder of a 10 year old girl. The evidence in question was her body.
Nob was probably right above when he said that many people support or have no opinions on this legislation and will not until it gives very totalitarian or abused. Simply most people do not see themselves as ever being the defendant in a criminal case or having a program like this used against them. This includes when they engage in criminal behavior no matter how low level like shoplifting or minor naroctics use.
So the challenge for civil libertarians is on how to convince the maority that this kind of stuff is very bad.
I believe that some licensing requirements are silly especially in haircutting, pedicures, and manicures. There was a story on Planet Money this year about an African-immigrant woman in Utah who wanted to set up a business specializing in African-braids. There were a lot of children in her community who were adopted from Africa. She was shut down by whatever board goes after barbers and haircutters. She took her case to court and won. I support this decision.
I also think that the overregulation of taxis is bad. Taxi medallions should be unlimited and issued on a more liberal basis at affordable rates. Perhaps there could be a slightly heightened road test but that is all. I also support companies like uber trying to get in and break up the cartel/system.
However, I still think licensing is important for fields where there is a risk of injury to clients. This involves esthetcians who work with chemicals and wax, massage therapists (the real kind, not the innuendo kind found at the back of alt-weeklies everywhere), lawyers, doctors, nurses, accountants/CPAs, etc.
Now please tell me an area where you think libertarians can compromise with liberals on regulation and/or the need for welfare state politics at a strong, federal level.
Title VII is one part of the civil rights act of 1964.
There are also the sections that forbid public accommodations like restaurants, hotels, transport, etc from discriminating based on race, religion, gender/sex, etc.
These were upheld by the Supreme Court in landmark cases like Ollie's BBQ and Heart of Atlanta.
Please give me a cite and case name for the Indiana Supreme Court case you a referring to. From what I remember in law school, tortious interference with a business relationship deals with cases when C interferes with a contract between A and B. It is not useful for when an employee is denied hiring or promotion for discriminator animus. Why do you think it is better than Title VII in dealing with racist or otherwise discriminatory employers?
The act is still useful even if most cases settle. Most cases of all types settle because the stakes of litigation are often too high for all parties involved. Not because of any malice on the part of plaintiff's lawyers towards their clients.
This is where libertarians and liberals often seem to split. We seem to be talking about two different freedoms. Right-wingers and libertarians will say that segregation and discrimination are morally and ethically wrong but not as wrong as interfering with property rights or how someone wishes to run their business. I disagree with this. I think it is more important to allow all citizens equal access into full civic life even if it means telling a bigoted restaurant owner that they are not allowed to refuse service to people because of their race, religion, gender/sex, sexuality, nationality, etc.
Perhaps suffering deals with your ability to get on and do things in life. A person might be in a great deal of pain (physical or psychological) but if he or she can get up, take care of themselves, and do what needs to be done; perhaps they are suffering less than the person who is bed-ridden and unable to take care of themselves for what ever reason.
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.
On “2017”
This is what I meant by how.
Civil Liberties especially civil liberties for criminal defendants and suspects are things that I suspect people support in an abstract nature but get a bit more wishy-washy when confronted with reality. By people, I mean your average non-ideological citizen. I do not mean law and order types or civil libertarians.
The current remedy for violations of the 4th Amendment is that the improper evidence is exlcuded from the prosecution's case in chief. This is a gross simplification of the complicated in and outs of the 4th Amendment. I think most people will support this in theory but begin to hem and haw if you gave them a really bad case and I read some dozies in law school. Most 4th Amendment cases deal with narcotics. There are plenty that deal with more serious crimes like serious white-collar crime and in one case that made it to the Supreme Court twice, the murder of a 10 year old girl. The evidence in question was her body.
Nob was probably right above when he said that many people support or have no opinions on this legislation and will not until it gives very totalitarian or abused. Simply most people do not see themselves as ever being the defendant in a criminal case or having a program like this used against them. This includes when they engage in criminal behavior no matter how low level like shoplifting or minor naroctics use.
So the challenge for civil libertarians is on how to convince the maority that this kind of stuff is very bad.
"
I meant to reply to this post. I replied to this above.
"
Brandon Berg,
I believe that some licensing requirements are silly especially in haircutting, pedicures, and manicures. There was a story on Planet Money this year about an African-immigrant woman in Utah who wanted to set up a business specializing in African-braids. There were a lot of children in her community who were adopted from Africa. She was shut down by whatever board goes after barbers and haircutters. She took her case to court and won. I support this decision.
I also think that the overregulation of taxis is bad. Taxi medallions should be unlimited and issued on a more liberal basis at affordable rates. Perhaps there could be a slightly heightened road test but that is all. I also support companies like uber trying to get in and break up the cartel/system.
However, I still think licensing is important for fields where there is a risk of injury to clients. This involves esthetcians who work with chemicals and wax, massage therapists (the real kind, not the innuendo kind found at the back of alt-weeklies everywhere), lawyers, doctors, nurses, accountants/CPAs, etc.
Now please tell me an area where you think libertarians can compromise with liberals on regulation and/or the need for welfare state politics at a strong, federal level.
"
Title VII is one part of the civil rights act of 1964.
There are also the sections that forbid public accommodations like restaurants, hotels, transport, etc from discriminating based on race, religion, gender/sex, etc.
These were upheld by the Supreme Court in landmark cases like Ollie's BBQ and Heart of Atlanta.
Please give me a cite and case name for the Indiana Supreme Court case you a referring to. From what I remember in law school, tortious interference with a business relationship deals with cases when C interferes with a contract between A and B. It is not useful for when an employee is denied hiring or promotion for discriminator animus. Why do you think it is better than Title VII in dealing with racist or otherwise discriminatory employers?
The act is still useful even if most cases settle. Most cases of all types settle because the stakes of litigation are often too high for all parties involved. Not because of any malice on the part of plaintiff's lawyers towards their clients.
This is where libertarians and liberals often seem to split. We seem to be talking about two different freedoms. Right-wingers and libertarians will say that segregation and discrimination are morally and ethically wrong but not as wrong as interfering with property rights or how someone wishes to run their business. I disagree with this. I think it is more important to allow all citizens equal access into full civic life even if it means telling a bigoted restaurant owner that they are not allowed to refuse service to people because of their race, religion, gender/sex, sexuality, nationality, etc.
On “Inadequacy and the Problem of Misery”
I can see how it is true.
Perhaps suffering deals with your ability to get on and do things in life. A person might be in a great deal of pain (physical or psychological) but if he or she can get up, take care of themselves, and do what needs to be done; perhaps they are suffering less than the person who is bed-ridden and unable to take care of themselves for what ever reason.
Though I have a hard time defending this as well.
On “2017”
Plus all the stuff I wrote below.
The divide on libertarians and liberals on this is staggering.
"
Kohole,
Some transactions should be illegal like organ donation. That is a transaction that can only come from duress and the government needs to ban.
"
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.
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.