
Peter Thiel on the future of Libertarianism, politics, and technology - sama
http://www.cato-unbound.org/2009/04/13/peter-thiel/the-education-of-a-libertarian/#
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jfarmer
I'm sorry, but this paragraph:

"Indeed, even more pessimistically, the trend has been going the wrong way for
a long time. To return to finance, the last economic depression in the United
States that did not result in massive government intervention was the collapse
of 1920–21. It was sharp but short, and entailed the sort of Schumpeterian
“creative destruction” that could lead to a real boom. The decade that
followed — the roaring 1920s — was so strong that historians have forgotten
the depression that started it. The 1920s were the last decade in American
history during which one could be genuinely optimistic about politics. Since
1920, the vast increase in welfare beneficiaries and the extension of the
franchise to women — two constituencies that are notoriously tough for
libertarians — have rendered the notion of “capitalist democracy” into an
oxymoron."

is just terrible. "[T]he extension of the franchise to women ... [has]
rendered the notion of “capitalist democracy” into an oxymoron."

Even the most generous interpretation of that sentence is very illiberal.
Well, if they don't agree with us and we're right, maybe they just shouldn't
be allowed vote. They obviously don't know what's best for themselves, those
women and welfare beneficiaries. Really?

And also is the 1920s really the decade we want to hold up as the last great
decade in America?

The whole article swings violently between utopianism and nihilism. I find it
very depressing.

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jdminhbg
Women's suffrage is generally acknowledged to have resulted in the passage of
Prohibition, and Prohibition is generally acknowledged to be a mistake. Why
couldn't other mistakes have their roots in suffrage?

That doesn't mean that suffrage was itself a mistake or should be repealed,
just that there could be bad effects as well as good. I'm generally
libertarian, and regard the extension of the welfare state as bad, but I'd
regard the political inequality of half the populace as far worse.

~~~
jfarmer
The contrapositive of his statement is: IF you believe in capitalist democracy
THEN you cannot have universal suffrage.

Since he believes in capitalist democracy, presumably he also believes you
cannot have universal suffrage.

Actually, he's more explicit than that. He doesn't believe you can have
democracy at all if you're a capitalist: "I no longer believe that freedom
[read: capitalism] and democracy are compatible."

So, sounds like that's exactly what he's saying.

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biohacker42
A sad yet realistic summary of _representative_ democracy.

Also his cyberspace and seasteading ideas are far too optimistic. High tax
governments are currently going after tax heavens, even as old and diplomatic
strong ones as Switzerland. What changes does your sea outpost have against
the world?

But he's missed out on two important things. First democracies tend to follow
a long term cycle of government boom and bust. See Sweden and Great Britain.
The general patter is the government grows until it's too big to be effective
and then it collapses.

The other example is _direct_ democracy like Switzerland, that's also worth
examining.

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trickjarrett
The direct democracy is something I've toying around with. The Republic arose
because it was not feasible to have thousands of people vote on every decision
a government needed to make, obviously. However as technology advances there
is a very real possibility that we'll see more direct democracies arise as
technology simplifies those voting procedures (assuming we ever reach a
satisfactory security level on digital voting.)

~~~
jacoblyles
I don't see what's so beneficial about direct democracy. Sure, it whets our
21st century egalitarian appetite. However, while populist sentiment is
sometimes correct and sometimes disastrous, it is never created by any sort of
rational decision-making process.

I have a hard time thinking of reasons why direct democracy is an optimal
government structure.

~~~
biohacker42
I have an easy time thinking of examples of why direct democracy is an optimal
government structure. Switzerland. It has a long history of direct democracy,
compare how it has been governed with how the other democracies have been
governed.

There's no need to get all abstract when there are real world examples.

~~~
jacoblyles
It's also a federalist system with unique geography and a smaller population
than New York City. Their example might not be portable.

It's worth thinking of different alternatives, rather than generalizing from a
sample size of one.

Hong Kong and Singapore are also good examples of well-run states that are
completely different. Hong Kong has the same population as Switzerland.

~~~
biohacker42
That's a good point, all of those places are tiny places. Still, I'd like to
think that Switzerland can be scaled up. As well functioning as Singapore is,
I don't want to see that scaled up.

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xenophanes
I agree with a lot of what he says, but not with his extremely pessimistic
conclusion. It's not time to just give up on all existing countries!

Separate issue: Karl Popper (a friend of freedom) argued that democracy is
good because it allows for non-violent changes in Government. I think Thiel
should be careful in attacking democracy itself: what non-violent alternatives
are there? Suppose we form a libertarian sea steading or outer space colony.
What system of Government does Thiel imagine libertarians would use if not
democracy?

~~~
byrneseyeview
They could use overlapping corporate jurisdictions. If you don't like how
things are being run, you pay someone else to enforce your contracts. You
might have different service providers for, say, IP versus personal safety
versus family law. And since they'd compete, it would allow people to coexist
with wildly different legal regimes. You could have a drug-prohibiting regime
(or even one that fines you for alcohol consumption) -- but your neighbors
might not.

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frig
Walk me through the mechanics of a hypothetical market for IP law service
providers.

Who sells what to whom?

~~~
mindslight
The imaginary property industry would look pretty much like it does now, but
the content cartels would be hiring goons with bats instead of goons with law
degrees.

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smanek
H.L. Mencken: Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they
want and deserve to get it good and hard.

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daniel-cussen
What about Chile? We have a real democracy, when we bailed out the banks in
1982 the bank boards got thrown out on the street and the taxpayers got all
the shares and made a profit, and there is still rule of law. Entrepreneurs
effectively pay no taxes. We have a democracy and have our shit together.

~~~
jfarmer
He's not arguing for "real democracy" -- he's arguing against democracy
altogether. He believes that capitalism and democracy are mutually
incompatible.

Maybe Chile is a counterexample, I don't know, but I don't think he's looking
to salvage democracy. He's looking to jettison it.

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asciilifeform
A must-read for would-be seasteaders:

<http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/3328/floating_utopias/>

 _"Big capital will support tax-lowering measures, of course, but it does not
need to piss and moan about taxes with the tedious relentlessness of the
libertarian. Big capital, with its ranks of accountant-Houdinis, just gets on
with not paying it."_

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MaysonL
See: [http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2009/05/cato-institute-
crashed...](http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2009/05/cato-institute-crashed-
burned-and-smoking-watch.html)

