Well worth the watch.

Haidt does a great job of explaining the Libertarian mindset.

Good video. I've been telling people a long time that I was more of a libertarian than a conservative. The professor's summation pretty much reinforces that.

I would say that Trump's base is more libertarian than conservative. He's brought a lot of people out of the woodwork that are just tired of special interest groups using the power of government to mess with them and take their property.

I've never understood what conservatives had against libertarian ideals. I hear the open borders crap brought up all the time, but apparently no one seems to understand that those things aren't going to happen until the social programs end and coming to the US is strictly a sink-or-swim proposition.

I really want only 2 things of government.

1) Follow the Constitution as written.

2) Leave me the hell alone!

The proble with the Libertarians is they can't get anyone elected dogcatcher. All they accomplish is to draw votes away from Conservatives. In other words, they increase the electoral percentage of Democrats, though that is not their intention.

I can't see any reason to consider them.

What I have seen is that most of the Libertarians that run for office are batshit crazy. miles

Libertarian platform is Open Boarders.

That’s enough right there to put them in the anti-American column.

My list is very similar.

1) Leave me alone

2) Don't waste my money

3) Leave me alone

No protect my country and secure my boarders?

The Libertarian Party is the Brain Child of the Democrat Party, developed for the sole purpose of dividing the Right to insure Democrat victories.

In just about every election where a Democrat funded (L) appears on the ballot, the Republican candidate loses.

And the Democrat Funder (L) gets less than 10% of the vote.

I heard it this way:
Government has 3 functions: 1. deliver my mail 2. protect my borders 3. stay out of my life.

They do a better job with the mail than with either of the other 2 but even the mail isn't ideal.

Our system of elections is set up for 2 parties. Any 3d party or independent candidate will screw up the works and very often gives the election to the candidate least favored by the majority.

I have a severe Libertarian bent.......but I agree with you 100%!

Like it or not, this is the legacy of the Libertarian movement.

I’m more of a libertarian but I see that it can never work. Oh, it is superior in every way, but as this video shows, personality and genetics determine attitudes and there are just too few people who are built that way for it to work. The best we can do is probably a sort of Burkian Classical Liberalism where private property and culture is sacrosanct and ordered liberty built on those concepts is the model. That is most likely a lost cause as well. Liberty cannot survive long where females have the vote. They are not built that way for th most part. They do not value it.

Most of the people who fueled Ron Paul's relative success in recent years weren't actually Libertarians. They were just people who wanted to hear someone speak truth to power.

Most of them are now part of the New-Right.

Most people, conservatives included do not want liberty. Think about it. Are you willing to give up government redistribution of wealth (social security), are you willing to give up foreign intervention? The Spanish American war, World War I & II, and all others including Korea, Vietnam, Middle East, etc. etc. did not have to involve this country. And the bad thing about these wars is that in addition to the men we lost is that they ended up in a net loss for the people and nations we set out to save. The East Europeans were saved from Nazis and turned over to Russia. East Asia was saved from Japan and turned over in a large part to Red China. We have never paid for these adventures or the interest on the money. The list of things to give up could go on and on. How about farm subsidies. All of us that are rural people know families that have drawn millions in farm subsidies. Without all this government interference there would be a lot of freedom and a lot less suffering except that each family and community would have to take care of their own elderly and afflicted.

Any good salesman can tell you why libertarianism will not work. Every good salesman soon learns that one must tailor the sales pitch to the individual. What works on one will not work on the other. Some people respond to one thing and some to others. Of course, the salesman cannot really tailor the product to these people in most cases, the product is what it is. But he tailors his sales pitch to get different people to react to it. But when the product is the sales pitch itself? Some will respond and some won’t.

The more we learn about people the more we realize that in many ways, free will is an illusion. We are captive to our genetics. And we cannot control how we respond to arguments or ideals. An argument based on perfectly sound reasoning for one type of person is madness to another.

Article IV, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution

"The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence."

Most people in the world aren't IMO.

The major problem with several of the political systems is that they ignore or mostly fail to take into account human nature.

You know one way to ameliorate the negative effects of human nature and insure the survival of beneficial political systems? Common ethnicity and common culture. There are no universal rights of man ordained by God or nature. Natural rights are a sham. There are beliefs and cultural touchstones that create rights of long standing by common understanding and convention. These rights do not develop equally or even similarly in every culture and they are not universal.

American style civic nationalism based on the idea of the so-called melting pot is doomed to fail. Even moreso and more quickly when not only is there no dominant culture but the vestiges of that once dominant culture are ridiculed and despised.

Sub-Saharan Africa here we come.

Edited

LOL!

No doubt.

I would amend that to, "Those who run on the Libertarian Ticket".

The video described me politically to a T. I'm very libertarian minded, but not a member of the Libertarian party.

I've often described myself as a Classic Liberal, unfortunately, most people today don't understand what that means:

Classical liberalism is a political ideology and a branch of liberalism which advocates civil liberties under the rule of law with an emphasis on economic freedom. Closely related to economic liberalism, it developed in the early 19th century, building on ideas from the previous century as a response to urbanization and to the Industrial Revolution in Europe and the United States.[1][2][3] Notable individuals whose ideas contributed to classical liberalism include John Locke,[4] Jean-Baptiste Say, Thomas Robert Malthus and David Ricardo. It drew on the classical economic ideas espoused by Adam Smith in Book One of The Wealth of Nations and on a belief in natural law,[5] utilitarianism[6] and progress.[7] The term "classical liberalism" was applied in retrospect to distinguish earlier 19th-century liberalism from the newer social liberalism.

I'd be ok with a return to Classic Liberalism vs. the current Post-Modern Marxist "liberalism" of today.

We will only enjoy those rights they can defend.

What the open borders leftist fail to understand, is you can have either a highly developed social welfare system, or open borders, but never both, for the reasons you mentioned above.

In principle I'm generally in favor of open border in places and ways that make sense. In practice I understand why the unregulated border proposes by the left might not end our nation, but at a minimum would lead to a civil war that may, or may not, save our Constitutional Republic.

Once again, lets here from Johnathon on this subject:

always did believe, and continue to do so, that the libertarian ethics are the way to go. but with current numbers of libertarians and greens, it makes more sense for each to support their respective main parties, that is the demo's and republicans.

ralph nader cost al gore the election, no doubt about it, and he got a mere 2 percent of the votes cast?

as far as the borderlines are concerned, i'd have to say i belong to a subset that might be described as nationalist libertarians. that is, our borderlines are sacrosanct. l learned that from my scotti history. we humans just aren't prepared to live in a world with many fewer than some 200 independent sovereignties.

when we see putin and trump on stage in a few days, we'll get to see what the real world ldrs look like in each other's company. the only thing lacking is the dude representing the red chi-coms. that is, the people that the tv announcers will tell us lead the people on earth.

Gus,

That's what I call a practical libertarian. I'm all for stealing the brightest minds and hardest working strong backs, and pretties girls from other countries. The rest they can keep.

Libertarians are an annoying and naive lot.

This is what we all should want.

In the video Haidt points out that libertarians can be liberal or conservative. Libertarian is not a separate party. Though many would marginalize it as such.

For you conservatives out there, it'll also be helpful to learn what libertarians mean when they say "big L" and "little l".

Little l means libertarians (go look up the Non-Aggression Principle).

Big L means the "Libertarian" party, which is very, very often anything but.

Generally "little l" and "big L" folks won't have anything to do with each other. In my opinion, libertarians just aren't party-kinda folks, since by nature they mostly want to be left alone and are happy to leave others alone.

Taking libertarians to their end game (freedom to do whatever suits them with minimal or no oversight by society or consideration for others), results in near anarchy.

So while there are libertarian principles I get and want, reasonably, those principles are not absolutes. For society to function, there must be rules. Otherwise it is Lord of the flies.

You both have good points the way I see it. Socialism, communism, Marxism and every iteration thereof fail because they fail to understand human nature — both it’s greed in the elites, and the effects of lack of motivation in the masses. So, failed ideologies, so adhered to by the Left.

At the risk of being labeled a misogynist (I’m not) by the left, and this is a vast generalization (which also means there is truth in it), women (note, for example, the most vociferous, vacuous leaders in the Democratic Party) seem to go off the rails sharply, their nature being more easily deceived by waves of emotion.

Contrary to leftists’ political falsehoods, all cultures are not only not equal, they are vastly unequal. Without a clear, “desirable profile” for admitted immigrants, we get, as we are now, mostly the chaff of the world as regards potential individual industry.

All of these make up leftist groups, policies, ideologies, and characteristics that slip in everywhere.

Libertarians are not Anarchist. Small government is not the same as no government. As an example, libertarians typically believe government expenditures should be around 15% of GDP. It's enough to provide for essential government services such as a legal system for the enforcement of contracts that is necessary to protect private property. 15% is also small enough to prevent government overreach.

Like many here, I have a strong libertarian bent. Which, to me means three things:

1) I mind my own business

2) you mind your own business

3) the government minds it's own business.

There is a natural, necessary function of government, primarily to pave the highways, deliver the mail, aim the ICBM's so other countries mind their own business, and make sure that the people mind their own business -- that is, provide security for the people in their persons and their property.

Maybe support widows, orphans and cripples.

Yes, I wished we could give up re distribution for sure. I'll take my own damn chances.

Antelope sniper: Personally I could NOT care less about "libertarians mind sets"!
The harm these cretins have done to the American political landscape over the last few decades has been dramatic.
They siphon off the votes of somewhat conservative citizens and have given us the likes of bill "bent dick" clinton and john tester!
To name just a few.
libertarians are simply NOT smart enough to realize with a Republican voted into office they would get maybe 80% of their issues instilled, sought for - by voting libertarian and getting demonrats into office they get exactly 100% of NOTHING they would prefer.
Sad these libertarians and yet laughable at the same time.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

Horsepuckey. Without libertarians, the GOP would have given us another friggin Bush this election.... Which is really not any different than electing Billary......

How many times have we heard "There needs to be a new law...." ??

Hell, I'd like to have a nickle for every time I've read that here at the Fire... Written by "conservatives"...


Every time a new law is passed, and every time a lawsuit is filed, Americans lose that much more freedom.

www.reason.com

Lots of neocons are figuring out that the neocon co-opted Republican Party militates against their interests. Neocons (Romney, Bush 43, etc) will destroy our Second Amendment as quickly as any liberal, which neocons are. The neocon co-opted Republican Party desperately tried to defeat President Donald J Trump. Neocons preferred the uncharged felon to President Trump because she's one of them. President Trump is not among the ruling elite of neocons, which scares the hell outta them. President Trump is fixin' to expose neocon treachery (globalism, auctioning America's sovereignty, false flag BS wars, etc.) and return our country that neocons have stolen from us to We, the People.

I'm a qualified libertarian. I part ways with libertarians on their advocacy for open borders, abortion, legalizing drug abuse (opiates, cocaine, meth), and its anti-nationalism stance.

Don't confuse conservatives with neocons. The 'fire has a substantial population of neocons who try to palm themselves off as conservatives.

Good lord, it's akin to reading 'binary, fluid, trans, lesbian ' etc ways to define every freak. When in fact there are only boys and girls.

Give it a name.

People are either American (for the Constitution) or anti-American.

I no longer give a 💩 how they think nor do I care. Fug the anti American a**holes. They are all welcome to leave this country anytime they wish. Good riddance.

Lets see, we have democrats, republicans, independents, big L libertarians, small l libertarians, neocons, rino etc etc.

We need to get back to American.

Just like the 38 special interest hunting groups

I'll even help them.

I considered myself a Libertarian for several years. But it's become evident that it's never going to be a possibility in an America that's 50% Communist.

I've adopted a Nationalist mindset these days simply because Nationalism is the only chance there is to save this country,....and it needs to happen yesterday.

Folks still keep confusing a libertarian mindset with the Libertarian political party. We live in a democratic republic, I don't think many people would want to get rid of the democratic or the republic part of that. Yet lots and lots of people despise the Democratic and Republican parties, and rightfully so.


















































I'm thinking visual aids might be in order here.

Little "l' libertarian:





Big "L" Libertarian:

Yep.

All the sub-groups can be filed away as either a Globalist or a Nationalist.


The media has been making the word "nationalist" a dirty word for awhile now... Which tells me that's where I am.

The libertarian movement that started gaining steam under Ron Paul had a steak driven through its heart by the deep state.

It was an eye opening event for those young people who were new to politics. It was an eye opening event even for some of us old folks.

I knew the deep state existed and that it was corrupt. But it was surprising to see the lengths it would go to to insure that a candidate didn't advance.

Of course, after watching how the deep state attacked (and continues to attack) Trump, nobody is surprised any longer.

The Ron Paul libertarians are now Trump Republicans,....and many of them are far to the right of even Trump.

Said it before and I'll say it again. The Trump Presidency if just the first iteration the New Right Nationalism,......the 101 version.

This should NOT be a function of government, to be in the charity business.

Tea Party is dead too. Much the same thing.

Correct.

That is what charities and the churches are for.


Tax money should not go towards that. It should be funded voluntarily and not whisked away among the rest of your tax dollars that go to the IRS.

I wouldn't say that it's dead. The Tea Party bunch were ripe for Nationalism. All it took was for a candidate to offer it to them.

The young Ron Paul libertarians had to be slapped around a bit before they went the Nationalist route. But they're there now!

This. To me, it really is that simple. Way too many U.S. citizens aren't Americans, even though they think they are.

Libertarians are Snowflakes that are too old and fat to go out and protest. Fugg’em one and all. There’s more varieties and ilks of Libertarians than there are what we now call democrats.
QED

You have to realize that the greatest leftist ideology is contained in the Declaration of Independence. All men are not created equal. They are not all Americans waiting to be set free. Given that chance, they’ll take everything from you and your progeny.

[/quote]
You have to realize that the greatest leftist ideology is contained in the Declaration of Independence. All men are not created equal. They are not all Americans waiting to be set free. Given that chance, they’ll take everything from you and your progeny.[/quote]

yeah we had a past governor who was fond of handing out axe handles. he told a federal judge that Georgia could run it's prisons just fine as soon as a higher caliber and better quality inmates can be attracted.

That is some serious satire there,

You either don’t understand what libertarianism is or you’re biased by a commitment to the conservative social agenda. If the latter, you’d be a bigger person to admit it.

I believe in giving other folks enough freedom (rope) to "hang themselves", if you will. "Progressives" think there should be a "safety net" (big government), so that doesn't happen.

Libertarians believe in giving other folks enough freedom (rope) to hang ME.

Do any of y'all see the difference?? Legalized heroin, open borders, and a general "free for all", doesn't make for a functional society. Freedom and democracy is only as useful as the people to whom it is given. It doesn't work well for greedy uneducated folks with no work ethic, looking for a chance to elect Santa Claus/Easter Bunny/Lenin/Castro all rolled into one....

As usual, you are wrong on most accounts. Libertarians typically align with Liberals on social issues, so your assertion the "get nothing" when a democrat is elected is just factually wrong. Most libertarians (notice the small "l" and explained above) vote Republican because of our alignment on economic liberty.

That’s your version of it.

Sniper, thanks for posting the video it's worth the watch for sure.

As expected, not everybody is wired to think like a Libertarian or able to understand them, or to paraphrase Orin Hatch, he's "doggone offended by them and despises them"

Interesting video none the less.

Libertarians are sometimes referred to as Utopians.

I've never been accused of being a Utopian but I have been accused of being a little "l" libertarian as "Jim in Idaho" pointed out earlier.

I really like a lot of things about Libertarianism. It is fatally flawed, just as is socialism. Both ideals begin with the premise that everyone else is on board with you. If everyone is, life is great and you have just created a Utopia where unicorns dance about and fart cotton candy. All is good until some mean [bleep]'er comes along with a thirst for power and an amoral indifference to your rights, your ideals, and your desire to be left alone. The ambitious crook will conquer and own you. You have no will to fight him until you are subjected to his will and power. You want to fight AFTER you've lost. Before hand, you want to be left alone.

That is the the problem with "live and let live. Do your own thing as long as it doesn't impinge on mine". It does not factor for the power hungry.

The Clintons would own all of you Libertarians. So would Chavez, Castro, Mugabe and Stalin. Hitler would own you. Every dictator and power hungry despot in history would trample right over your Libertarian society and crush it.

Sorry, I wish it would work. I wish it was practical. I'd love to live in such a society. However, I realize that such a society is easily toppled and the result is a toleration State in it's place.

Anyone who is for pre-emptive action is labeled by Libertarians as a "Neo-con" I haven't figured out was a "Neo-con" really is, but I will say this: Although we spent a ass load of money in the past 70 years fighting communism and other socialist idealists directly and by proxy, we have succeeded in preventing Communism from engulfing the World. Communists do not control Europe, Africa or Latin America. Outside of China and the Norks, Communism is dead in Asia. It is dying in Vietnam as we speak. NORKS know that they are at a dead end, and are frantically looking for a way out. XI and China have embraced capitalism much like the Yellow Mafia they are.

Yeah, I'd love to live in a country, or a World where rights are rights and nobody f'ed with you otherwise. That is the stuff fairy tales are made off I'm afraid.

[bleep] Gus, that was 55 years ago. Please join the 21 Century. Lester Maddox autographed pick handles as a publicity stunt. Jeezus!

Solid stuff, Doc, again. ;-{>8

Then they are doing it wrong.

The Ron Paul types, and big L Libertarians tend to have some unrealistic blind spots that would only work in a perfect world where everyone shared the libertarian ethic. I'm much more practical.

As an example I see a critical element of protecting my economic freedom is fighting war on the other guys territory. It's better his factory's are burned than ours. It's pretty difficult to have any economic freedom when your economic base is a smoking pile of rubble. Although I consider myself a libertarian, I would not vote for Ron nor Rand Paul. Libertarianism is not a suicide pact.

Agree (I think) with Hatari. "Unfettered" libertarianism is "utopia", much like "unfettered" socialism. Too much "freedom" (or perhaps a society's "tolerance" of hurtful/harmful behaviors) and the power hungry take advantage of you. Too much socialism ("free stuff"), and the lazy take advantage of you. A case would be made, by some, that too much capitalism leads to greed. For most, it's a way of instilling a good work ethic, and respect for others' property that they have earned.

Boarders:

Border:

Really good analysis!