Posted at http://thirdpartywatch.com/2008/01/12/libertarian-radicals-and-reformers-deb ate/: Tom Blanton, regarding my "obsession" with Rothbard: sorry, but you'll have to run away from Rothbard far faster than that to disassociate him from Susan's LPradical cause. This is fundamentally a debate about the LP Platform, and the pre-Portland Platform was written by Murray Rothbard and his acolyte Bill Evers in the latter 1970s. Also, in answer to the LP radical's roster question "Just how radical are you?", Susan describes herself as "Murray Rothbard's intellectual love child" (or at least she did back before she expelled me from access to her Y Group). Rothbard was the undisputed intellectual leader of the original Radical Caucus, and the reincarnated Caucus was only a couple weeks ago discussing how much of Rothbard's original ten-point radical strategy document to endorse as their own. The 2004 Platform (the limits of your ignorance about which we've yet to discover) inherited much of its language and structure, and effectively all of its ideology, from the Rothbard/Evers versions of the latter 1970s.
TB) While he loves to call others absolutists, it would seem that on certain issues like the purpose of the LP, it is he that is the absolutist. (TB In this debate (and others like it) I only use "absolutist/m" in one specific context: the Rothbardian absolutist interpretation of the principle against force initiation. It's just ignorant to say I'm equally "absolutist" about the purpose of the LP, as I in fact am on record as disagreeing somewhat with the LP Purpose position that in the debate above I said "most LRC members probably support". Instead of the narrow purpose of electing Libertarians, the LP purpose I've long argued for is: "to implement and give voice to the Statement of Principles by uniting voters who want more liberty behind the electoral choices that will most move public policy in a libertarian direction". TB) The notion that there can be a platform that represents every person who claims to be a libertarian is a fantasy. (TB I agree, and within the LRC leadership I've argued against the "all libertarians" slogan. Whenever I use "all libertarians", it's always clearly in the context of, and shorthand for, "all schools of libertarianism". Gordon gave us strict word limits in the debate above, and I thought it was sufficient to use the phrase "schools of libertarianism" the six times that I did. Apparently not. I reject your unsubstantiated charge that I do not debate in a "positive and civil manner". If you dispute a single one of my descriptions of any libertarian's views, then I challenge you to muster actual arguments against those descriptions, rather than hand-waving about me being "accusatory". It's ludicrous to claim I'm the one who is putting radicals in the Rothbardian "box"; they hopped into it long before I arrived on the scene to point it out. You can (like Hogarth) pretend all you want that there aren't multiple identifiable principled schools of libertarianism, but wishing won't make it so. If you deny that Susan adheres to the "rigid dogma" of Rothbardianism, then quick -- tell us a single position where she disagrees with any principle of Rothbard's. Your charge that I "seem to hate anarchists" is apparently some form of psychological projection. Unlike some, I'm intellectually mature enough to be able to disagree with someone without hating him or questioning his motives. Your laughable charge that I "create anarchists" is belied by Hogarth and Montoni consistently censoring me and expelling me from the forums they control. Your closing profanity about "bullshit" renders ironic your opening charge that I "have an anger management problem and come off as abrasive and rude". Ditto for Benedict's empty charge that I "really came across as a jerk". When I make substantive arguments and my opponents can only sputter personal insults, that's as close to a concession as one ever sees in a discussion like this. Tom, the Pure Principles draft does not "advocate participation, voluntary or not, in the Social Security system". Rather, it advocates that the current mandatory participation in the program be made voluntary. Proponents of SS bitterly oppose such a measure, because they know it would end the program. The only thing left for SS would be to settle the claims of its victims. I agree that there should be a separate National Campaign Program (like we had from 1990 to 2002) of specific and immediate legislative steps that we propose.
