From: sulkom@ubvmsb.cc.buffalo.edu (Mark Sulkowski)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.marrou,alt.politics.libertarian
Subject: Re: Libertarian Platform
Date: 9 Nov 92 02:39:00 GMT
Organization: University at Buffalo
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41

In article <1992Nov06.045948.4964@gibdo.engr.washington.edu>, bobk@gibdo.engr.washington.edu (Bob) writes...
> 
>  That's the first time in a while that I've seen the Liberatarian
>  platform spelled out.  It contains a lot of government activities
>  you want to get rid of, but I'm not sure what you want to keep.

	Well, the way Andre Marrou explained it to the media, there are
three government services that are basic to the protection of individual
rights, they are: national defense, a system of courts, and police.
If government does any more than protect individual rights, it is
probably violating them in some way, and so rights-respecting Libertarians
want government to do very little else.  Those three services would
comprise the bulk of the government, and the total cost would be much,
much less than the cost of the government we have now.

The Federal level would handle national defense and federal courts.  This
would include diplomats to other countries, the Congress, and other
things necessary to the operation of the Federal government as per the
Constitution.  There would be far, far fewer bureaucracies.  Funding for
this level of government need only be a tenth or less of what we currently
fund our Federal government, which is way too much.

On the State level there would be police and state courts.

On the Local level there would be police.

> 
>  If the Liberatarians had control, what types of government spending,
>  taxes and regulations would there be?  This should be a pretty short
>  list, right?
>  ==

	Sure.  There obviously would be a need for funding to protect
people's rights.  That's a given.  Libertarians seek to minimize taxation,
and would replace taxation altogether with non-coercive methods of funding,
if such a thing were possible.  Libertarians expect taxation to end up at
0%-10% of current levels.  This will take many years of a Libertarian
administration to achieve, as you could well believe.

	If taxes are necessary, there are four types of taxes mentioned in
the Constitution that could be used.  I don't have the list on hand.
I wouldn't mind paying taxes if I thought they truly approached the
minimum level possible.

	The Libertarian vision of the healthiest economy comes from
such economic theorists as Ludwig Von Mises, Friedrich Von Hayek, and
Milton Friedman.  The latest economic theory called "Bionomics" also
has some appeal.  Libertarians want a dynamic, adaptive, growing,
self-correcting free market, and efficient, independent charitable
organizations, to provide the vast majority of services in society.

	A good popular book to read to understand how Libertarians
think about economics is _Economics in One Lesson_ by Henry Hazelitt.
Not a boring textbook, it is an informative and entertaining debunking 
of popular misconceptions of how the economy works.  It is written for
the layman.  It is available in book form, and I have seen it available
in audio cassette tape form at a local Barnes & Noble bookstore.

	It's great!  Check it out.

> 
>  Bob

Mark Sulkowski