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A comment on The U.S. government's long and shameful history of intercepting people's letters. Parent comment

Re:The U.S. government's long and shameful history of interc... by tptacek on Sunday August 08, 2021 @12:44AM (#28104277)
Wait wait wait wait wait wait, Rayiner. Liberty is a good thing. It does not follow axiomatically that libertarianism is a good thing. Libertarianism has a quirky and unpopular orthodoxy, one that equates drivers licenses to "a license to make toast in your own damn toaster", and creates utopian New Hampshire townships that are ultimately overrun by bears.

Give me liberty, as the saying goes, but also drivers licenses, and hold the bears.

Libertarianism isn't bad on spec. But it is not reasonable to suggest that people shouldn't be made aware when their sources are all libertarian, as these ones are, for the same reason that it's good to know if your sources are Jacobin, Current Affairs, and In These Times.

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Re:The U.S. government's long and shameful history of interc... by rayiner on Sunday August 08, 2021 @10:05AM (#28106784)
Sure, insofar as we’re also willing to go around saying “liberal newspaper the New York Times says, …”
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Re:The U.S. government's long and shameful history of interc... by tptacek on Sunday August 08, 2021 @11:19AM (#28107341)
We do that incessantly!
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Re:The U.S. government's long and shameful history of interc... by cloudfifty on Sunday August 08, 2021 @10:14AM (#28106850)
> Libertarianism isn't bad on spec

How is it not? It's deeply anti-democratic, basically handing over power to corporations and wealthy people. It's not like its biggest proponents are advocating "a great reset" where all people will start at zero property again or something, it's just a power grab for the already propertied.

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Re:The U.S. government's long and shameful history of interc... by tptacek on Sunday August 08, 2021 @06:54PM (#28110949)
Since I'm not a Libertarian, I'm the wrong person to ask to mount a defense of it.
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Re:The U.S. government's long and shameful history of interc... by cloudfifty on Monday August 09, 2021 @03:59AM (#28113741)
Alright. I'm just annoyed that such obviously reactionary stuff get the benefit of the doubt constantly, and to add insult do injury, call it freedom.
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Re:The U.S. government's long and shameful history of interc... by R0b0t1 on Sunday August 08, 2021 @01:10AM (#28104347)
The same reason the ACLU challenges the no-fly list also serves to challenge driver's licenses, and actually exposes that we are accepting very strong prior restraint on the right to travel. You can keep people from driving, but not proactively.

Some other arguments though, yes, they go too far.

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Re:The U.S. government's long and shameful history of interc... by tptacek on Sunday August 08, 2021 @01:20AM (#28104385)
I'm not even saying Libertarians are wrong about drivers licenses, just that they're idiosyncratic and unpopular on that issue, and it's worth knowing what you're getting yourself into if you take their word for everything. I think Reason is generally pretty sane! (But they were idiosyncratic and unpopular on the opiate crisis, by way of example.)
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Re:The U.S. government's long and shameful history of interc... by tptacek on Sunday August 08, 2021 @01:40AM (#28104456)
I didn't say anything about "who will pave the roads", you did. But I mean, there's a reason that keeps coming up! Regarding seizing the means of production: see my previous comment, where I said that is indeed an ideology you'd want to be aware of.
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