I would try to curb alot of the chicken little/end of days type rhetoric. Things are much better now than in any other period in human history....pretending that things are getting worse and worse (when they clearly aren't) greatly limits the amount of people willing to take you seriously. An Apocalypse soon mentality is perfect for a successful fringe movement and can be finanacially beneficial for it's leaders, but basically makes it DOA in terms of making any impact on mainstream thinking.

Most libertarians don't seem to be making that distinction though. They seem to think voting for a republican is the answer.

Its not watering down its just applying reasonable limits. Its OK to be a libertarian if you feel government control of something isn't working or is somehow unfair, but it seems people are clinging to their ideologies so much that they automatically feel government shouldn't be involved in an issue because they identify themselves as libertarian.

Government control of X?

I'm a libertarian so it doesn't matter what X is, I'm against it.

You're so right that it's unfair to the dumber people. Let them have a chance like the ****** gets to win for fun sometimes. If you don't want to let the ****** win that's ok too.

I don't know where you live, or what demographic your acquaintances are, but I've seen more people closing their businesses, losing long-term jobs and having to settle for part-time garbage jobs, and otherwise taking it right up the dumper in the past few years than I'd ever seen before. I'm curious by what metric, other than raw technological progress, you would rank 2011 as a pinnacle year in human or American history, or the last 5 years as a pinnacle period.

I'm probably never gonna be a libertarian, there aren't many of them over here anyway.

Dismiss the notion of rigid non-interventionism.
A less aggressive foreign policy is fine. Saying it was correct not to intervene in Darfur or that the US shouldn't have intervened in WW2 before being attacked seems inhumane. Some situations are special and demand an appropriate response.

Stop bitching about foreign aid. Not all foreign aid is bad. I don't have a problem with not wanting to fund the Israeli war machine, but cutting foreign aid to victims of natural catastrophes or famines is nothing I'm ever going to support.

Support universal healthcare and a social safety net

LOL @ the bold.

Your suggestions are basically "become left-wing".

In the US supporting some form of UH or SS is probably enough to be considered left-wing, but not over here. I don't know what the first two have to do with becoming left-wing.

Well how about "support universal healthcare or regulations on what types of things insurance companies are allowed to discriminate price based on." The hardcore libertarians here are against any kind of regulation, which is unreasonable.

I don't care if the market will be "more efficient" or provide a better overall economy or whatever if it means people get completely ****ed on their ability to get affordable healthcare because they were born with certain conditions. People won't agree with you if your message is "eh, they should just earn more money" or you tell them that private charities will solve the problem.

Minimum wage is being extended further and further same for regulations. "Over here" is very lefty/statist.

The only really surprising thing on the positive side that I've seen from politics here in recent years was getting rid of the draft. I've lobbied pretty hard against this for a long time and didn't think it would ever happen.
Obviously I always use controversial lines of argument so I used to compare it to "Zwangsarbeit"

/derailing

Regulation leads to the crony in crony-capitalism to a very, very huge extend. The stuff that happens in the name of regulation is truely hillarious (in a sad way)

u derped hard, maybe it's because it's "socialized medicine". sounds left wing iyam.

What a fantastically enlightening post. I'm totally convinced to support libertarians now.

So then what is the libertarian solution?

not interfering with peoples bidness.

This is very much my mindset. I don't think it's unreasonable to assume a state-monopoly is non-optimal. I'd like to see the burden of proof switch to the pro-government folks. I mean "but look it works reasonably well" is fine but I always like my grass greener and strive for perfection (character flaw).
I'm pretty sure there has to be a better healthcare system than one where I (perfect health condition and history) have to pay 500+ Euro/month. And I'm not even the one that needs to complain, people that are way worse off than me get shafted pretty hard. I mean retirement funds and SS are pretty much busto and borderline fraud as far as I'm concerned.

Obviously "no government regulations". Market self-regulation, transparancy, customer awareness etc. pp.

I kinda like Alan Graysons plan he proposed on health care: Allow anyone to buy into Medicaid. Existing program, don't give it for free, just a reasonable price.

Seems libertarian enough, no?

If you don't tax people who opt out but fully fund it from the reasonably priced fees I think that's perfectly fine. Don't need government for that though, looks very much like a private business model.

Except without the profit motive.

How does that solve the problem?

Under a free market system, is there any reason to believe that people born with genetic defects which require exceptionally high healthcare costs wouldn't have to carry most of that burden themselves?

The heck! So every single form of government imaginable is non-optimal to you? Justice system, military protection, fire departments, everything? I find it pointless in arguing with you types of modern day libertarians because no matter how much evidence I show that government program X is beneficial to society you will automatically be rejecting it.

Clearly though Libertarianism as is has a lot of good it can do for healthcare in creating a free-er, less litigious market which will allow prices to come way down. Libertarians are the right party to deal with these in-bed-with-gov entities like Big Pharma too.

I don't know what he means by "at cost," but if he means that everyone pays roughly the same amount, then his plan basically just privitizes gains and socializes losses due to adverse selection (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adverse_selection). The majority of people opting into medicare are going to be people whose insurance would cost far more than the cost to opt in, while insurance companies will only underwrite insurance for people who they can profit off of the most.

healthcareis a tough subject. I don't want people to be getting rich from sick people, who will pay whatever it takes to cure themselves. but also paying for everyones healthcare is prob not going to work either.

people are crazy unhealthy.

A less litigious market requires laws in place capping how much people can sue for, therefore decreasing costs doctors have to pay for malpractice insurance and thus overall lowering health care costs. Its a great idea. Libertarians however are automatically against it because it requires more legislation.

bobman's and Max's posts are good (nothing to be gained talking about Lincoln, the CRA, inflation doomsday scenarios, etc.)

That post floating around the front-page today about some libertarian yokel warning everyone they need to "diversify themselves internationally" -- their cash, their assets, themselves -- is that really the political activity of people seeking out mainstream appeal?

That's upper middle class histrionics for paranoid white people that resonates with a very small percentage of the population. We just had a thread where all the libertarians decried statistics that showed the Walmart Kids have a combined net worth > 40% of America or whatever, because it turns out a huge number of Americans have a negative net worth. Is the Do-It-Yourself-Guide-to-Expatriating-Your-Prescious-Metal-Asset-Repository really a concern for most Americans? What does constant Millenarianism really offer anyone? I realize my example is one guy on the internet but then again, Alex Jones exists.

TomCowley writes in response to Max that "I've seen more people closing their businesses, losing long-term jobs and having to settle for part-time garbage jobs, and otherwise taking it right up the dumper in the past few years than I'd ever seen before" -- is the libertarian answer to them "and NEXT comes the FEMA train, make sure to ship your gold stash through the Caymans to avoid the tax hit!!!"... "Oh that's nice, my car needs an expensive repair so I can get to work next week for this job I hate because I got laid off last year and had to take a ****ty one, and my wife might need surgery because her back is in constant pain but I really can't afford it, got anything for me? Oh, a pamphlet on the coming NWO plot to enact the Garden Plot...thanks :-/ "

I'm not saying libertarians need constant allusions to Hope and Change and Shining Cities on a Hill, but if you really believe the government is having destabilizing effects on the economy, I think a focus on rhetoric about how libertarianism and free markets can make people's lives better is far more useful than just trying to frighten the **** out of them with far-fetched doomsday scenarios and supplying advice that has little practical use.