

Designing For Jedi - angusgr
http://theferrett.livejournal.com/1534590.html

======
jacoblyles
Let's make a deal, you guys refrain from pop-psychoanalyzing those of us with
libertarian leanings and I won't submit right-wing essays that diagnose
socialists with megalomania and delusions of grandeur.

Impugning your opponent's motivations is the lowest form of rhetoric.

~~~
angusgr
It seems the post has wounded your ego, and I guess that's fair enough given
it makes such sweeping generalisations (and "pop-psychoanalysis", as it were.)

However, I'd be really interested to hear your comments on some of the other
points he makes, or the other threads of his argument (particularly,
comparisons to history.)

(FWIW, I didn't submit the article because I whole-heartedly agree with it, I
just thought it was quite well-written and interesting, and I thought it might
generate some enlightening responses.)

~~~
jacoblyles
It hasn't wounded my ego, rather I find the article insulting. It caricatures
people of my political beliefs as having nasty motivations and abundant
personal failings. It reads like an op-ed in a high school Marxist newsletter
and is about as balanced. I am fine with reading political articles on Hacker
News but I would hope they have a little more respect for their audience.

Any Capitalist would make the rejoinder that society sucked so much in the
Victorian era because society was so much poorer in aggregate. You could tax
the rich at 90% and it wouldn't have stretched very far.

In the long run, the wages of labor are determined by labor productivity.
Laws, unions, regulations, and other beloved institutions of the left can
tinker with that ever so slightly at the margin but not by much. It is only
through the accumulation of capital goods and the advancement of technology
that a middle class arose. You can legislate all you want before that happens
and you aren't going to do a ton of good. You can declare free unicorns for
everyone but if you ain't got no unicorns then you'll leave people
disappointed.

And after a capital stock is accumulated, labor becomes more productive, wages
increase and life gets better of course ideologues of all stripes will claim
credit for it.

~~~
jbooth
Well, in the current political climate? Libertarians are a self-caricature.
Not you personally, and sorry, but Carl Paladino's got signs up all over New
York state that say "I'm mad too, Carl!". That's literally the guy's slogan,
major party candidate for Governor of a large and important state, and his
platform is a bunch of incoherent nonsense. And 99% of self-described
libertarians are lining up behind these wackos all over the country.

Sorry that the crazies are ruining your rep.. but if you don't want it to
happen, don't enable the crazies.

~~~
jacoblyles
Why should I take credit for people I don't agree with? Do you think it fair
if I lump you together with people you don't like because they are in roughly
the same part of the political spectrum as yourself?

Politics makes people rude and irrational.

~~~
jbooth
If you don't agree with them (and I'm using the royal "you" here), then why
are libertarians lining up across the country to support these loonies?

Maybe you're ok, but libertarians in general? Part and parcel of the tea party
this year.

~~~
jacoblyles
To the extent that the libertarian voting bloc goes Republican this year, it
will probably have something to do with the $1.4 trillion deficit. During the
Bush years, people that have roughly libertarian values went Democrat (you can
look up old Cato articles for details) so it is not as if they are beholden to
any one party.

Unfortunately our system forces people to choose between the lesser of two
evils and right now many people are blanching at the deficit.

------
8ren
The "Jedi" idea is related to John Rawls "original position":
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Theory_of_Justice#The_.22orig...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Theory_of_Justice#The_.22original_position.22)

As for laissez faire, I think every government has already concluded that it
doesn't work very well.

One might think that with modern labour-saving technology (and the
consequential age of leisure) that this might change. One theoretical counter-
argument is that people seem to love to have "inferiors" - it makes them feel
better about themselves - which probably comes from our innate sense of
pecking order/dominance hierarchy etc. Being a part of human nature, changing
that is a hard one. Evidence in support of this is how some US citizens treat
illegal immigrant workers who don't enjoy the protection of labour laws etc -
it is laissez faire in action, right now. Another example is how US
corporations treat labour in developing countries (such as China), and
detainees from other countries. Whoa, that's getting political.

OTOH, we must remember that trade - like language, law and religion - are
created spontaneously by human communities. Our current society didn't just
create it; it appears to be innate. However, the specific ideas of trade and
civic structures that we have today are informed by centuries of experience
and thought, and constitute a tremendous cultural refinement of the innate
concept of trade. Unlike the foregoing, it seems that civilization is not
quite innate in humans - we have to work at it.

------
trickjarrett
It's odd to know Ferrett from the Magic community and then see his link on the
tech related site.

While very well written and an enjoyable read, my problem with his opinion and
the people who think Libertarians = Anarcho-capitalists is that they take it
to the complete extreme. Democrats aren't Socialists, etc. My #1 desire with
Libertarianism is for a smaller government, not a destroyed government.

~~~
moultano
I'm tired of the crazy libertarians spoiling it for the rest of us. I would
like to have something to call myself that includes removing corn subsidies
and capping medicare, but also retaining fiat currency and instituting a
carbon tax.

~~~
jbooth
I'd suggest "Democrat" :)

We might not agree with libertarians 100% of the time, but we're not lunatics,
we're with you on social issues, not actually that far economically, and we
approach problems with the intention of solving/ameliorating them, rather than
using them as social dog whistles.

It beats hearing rhetoric about small gov't and then getting Medicare Part D
(absolute budget disaster - and obamacare reduces the projected medicare
deficit, for those keeping score at home)

~~~
moultano
I generally vote democrat in national elections, and whoever seems most
competent in local elections. The democrats at the moment seem to have a
monopoly on "believing in science." So I don't really have much of a choice.

------
philwelch
Reading the Hacker News guidelines, it seems terribly odd that "please avoid
introducing classic flamewar topics unless you have something genuinely new to
say about them" is only suggested for _comments_ , because many submissions
have this problem as well. (And no, "life was miserable in the era of the
robber barons, therefore libertarianism is wrong" isn't anything genuinely new
to say, nor is "libertarians secretly imagine themselves to be the robber
barons instead of the tenement-dwelling wage slaves".)

~~~
jbooth
It's election season, and as far as propagandizing, the republicans* have
probably had an edge in it on HN. Not that I'm suggesting anything organized
on anyone's part, it's just topical right now. It'll drift off the front page
soon enough, and all will settle down after Tuesday.

*during the fall of even numbered years, you're either a D or an R unless you actually vote third party

~~~
russellallen
Even during the fall of even numbered years, I'm neither a D nor an R. That is
because I am an Australian.

Edit: and its Spring now, anyway.

~~~
jbooth
Well, if we had a parliamentary system in the US, maybe we could have
libertarians here too :)

------
pandafood
Is wanting a social net because you think it will benefit you somehow more
moral than not wanting one because you think it won't?

