michael.bast@convergys.com wrote:
>
> But, if you get rid of the programs people want, you ARE making them do things
> your way. Not that's it's
> likely you'll be able to get rid of something people want, though. That's more
> what I was talking about than your specific
> comments. If we get our way, others won't get theirs, there are more of them
> than us, and so we have to take that into account.
> Taking the rest of your comment into it, I think you and I are largely saying
> the same thing, that we have to include subjects
> and people who don't have all our goals, in order to get even some of them.
>
HUH? Call me a simpleton but I thought Libertarianism was about people
doing it their way wherever that does not infringe on the rights of
others to do the same. The above seems to assume that a lot of people's
legitimate interests are in conflict much of the time.
> From: Chris Russo <extropy@russo.org>
>
> >>And THIS is exactly why libertarians won't ever be a real force in American
> >>politics. Almost universally every libertarian I know (including me, most of
> the
> >>time) comes off as a self-righteous know-it-all, acting as though everyone
> else
> >>is beneath them. We all seem to say "If only they could see what we see, but
> >>they're not bright enough, so we'll have to make them do it anyway."
>
Again, "make them do it anyway" is no part of what I thought
Libertarianism was about.
> >You might want to reread my argument. You're woefully misstating it.
> >I proposed nowhere "to make them do it anyway." To the contrary, I
> >talked about coincidental goals building a coalition of voters. The
> >more cerebral voters will probably appreciate the strong logic
> >underlying everything, and the less cerebral will probably only be
> >able to appreciate the shiny baubles that extend from that underlying
> >logic.
>
> >I'm basically saying to not turn away those voters just because they
> >don't understand the bigger picture. I'm also saying that if we're
> >waiting for a plurality to understand the bigger picture, we're
> >doomed.
>
The important thing is to actually have a bigger picture or have your
fundamental principles in order and be able to explain your positions in
terms of them. The main parties have not dared mention or name their
fundamental principles for some time now. There is a great emptiness in
American politics waiting to be filled.
It would be arrogant to say (not that anyone here has directly) that the
people are simply too dumb to be interested or to understand a platform
speaking of and build firmly on sound principles. You will lose if you
try to compete in terms of sound-bytes and particular issue appeals
only. You have at least of chance of making the issues clear if you
continuously bring it back to first principles. You will probably still
lose mostly for now. But you will have reached more people more deeply
and will have planted more seeds to be harvested later than otherwise.
- samantha
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Mon May 28 2001 - 09:50:34 MDT