Re: Why John Ringo Threatens Science Fiction's Future

willreich_77@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
> That's an interesting thought and I am sure it has some validity. I
> know that there were those who really thought Marxists were cool and,
> in some sense, more idealistic (although the term would be insulting to
> a Marxist if it were meant literally) than they were. However, I am
> sure that I was being humored at times also.
>
> People on the left do seem more willing to be rude to libertarians
> today than they were to Marxists back when I was one. What passes for
> the right these days doesn't seem to have civility as a major virtue.

Libertarians get fire from three sides: the left for being too fiscally
conservative ("capitalist pigs!"), the right for being too socially
liberal ("Godless liberals!"), and their own party.

I'm a small-l libertarian and the people I dislike most aren't the
far-right crowd or the far-left crowd, they're the embarrassing
extremist scumbags at the top of the national Libertarian Party, and
the incompetent scamming scumbags at the top of the local
(Massachusetts) Party. They make the movement look bad; they make the
concept look bad; they cause anyone who believes in less government,
any social conservatives/fiscal liberals, to be tarred as people who
believe their ludicrous bullshit about how local streets should be
privatized, corporations abolished (no shit - this is what Michael
Badnarik, the LP's 2004 candidate, said in his platform), and criminals
should be tortured (Badnarik, a self-proclaimed Constitutional
professor, seemed to have missed that little bit about 'cruel and
unusual punishment'.)

Whereas the people who follow the extremists at the top (Badnarik might
be a nut, but Harry Browne, the `00 and `96 candidate, was a crook - as
are the people running the MA LP; I don't believe that these people
believe jack-shit, except that trading off other peoples' idealism is a
good way to get themselves wealthy and famous... BUT, I'll buy the
notion that there's an idealistic core of party faithful who fall for
the bullshit these people put out), call people like me unprincipled
compromise-happy opportunists who would put cheap expedience ahead of
honor and principle.

I don't think there's any love lost between the (few remaining)
moderate small-l libertarians, and the extremist skunks at the top.

That said- I think I can also call myself a moderate Democrat with some
validity. I know friends who definitely are. I worked on a New
Democrat's 2002 campaign for lt-gov in MA, and of course most of the
others in the office were New Democrats themselves. The prevailing
consensus was that Michael Moore, Ted Rall, Ralph Nader, etc, were far
worse than George Bush.

At least in active politics - the important activists, the campaign
people and the political aides - the extreme wings of both parties are
looked upon with disfavor. Most Democratic staff types, for instance,
care about winning elections and getting policy through. This boils
down to winning the center. Far-left Dems are mostly seen as an
embarrassment, because they drive independent voters in the middle away
from the party. They might not call Moore a boogerhead to his face, or
Charlie Rangel/Jesse Jackson Jr. (JJJ?) an embarrassment, but I've
spoken with Dems (the ones I'm thinking of are Kerry Senate aides,
before their man declared his formal candidacy) who reserve more
private distaste for their own party's extreme wing, than for the other
party's moderate wing.

Leo

.

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