From: ARCHER@utkvm1.utk.edu (T. Archer)
Subject: Re: [misc.activism.progressive] Clinton Office Requests Comments
Organization: University of Tennessee 
Date: Fri, 8 Jan 1993 15:43:45 GMT

In article <BZS.93Jan8034450@world.std.com> bzs@world.std.com (Barry Shein) writes:
>From: hhuang@athena.mit.edu (Han-Young Huang)
>>>From: pjs269@tijc02.uucp (Paul Schmidt)
>>>Some guy who made a few million dumping toxic waste or raided people's
>>>savings etc may not have done his planet any good, but he's living it
>>>up somewhere on the money and probably thinks it all worked out pretty
>>>well! No doubt such evility would be a huge fan of libertarianism,
>>>these guys slip thru the currently regulated environment.
>>
>>I seem to have enormous difficulty seeing how someone can make a few
>>million dumping toxic waste (unless citizens do not sue that person
>>for ruining theirp property -- hardly likely).
>
>Well, for starters there's the Exxon Valdez...I hear Exxon makes quite
>a bit of money. 

Exxon makes a lot of money, most of it through legal loopholes created by 
congress at the behest of lobbyists.  But they didn't make any money when 
the Valdez ran aground, the lost money.  There was no profit in the accident 
that dumped all of that oil into the Sound.  This is irrelivant to your case.

>But one can quibble that I suppose, so how about the
>organized crime types who were picking up toxic waste and dumping it
>off on road sides when no one was looking? I hear they made millions
>posing as legitimate toxic waste removal services.

There is no bar in libertarianism for the activity to remain illegal.

>
>>Or how someone can
>>make a few million raiding people's savings, when a crucial point of
>>libertarianism is that one's property cannot be taken without one's
>>consent, whatever the circumstance.

As I recall, no one "raided people's savings."  Investments were poorly made 
and now the FDIC has to cough up at taxpayers expense.

>Or is the plan that under libertarianism there will be no one pushing
>the envelope of what they can get away with? A lot of the folks who
>made money off the S&L crisis technically didn't break a law, perhaps
>they used "poor judgement" or caused others to do that by loaning on
>property of questionable value, but hey, all the way to (or is it
>from?) the bank...

There are always going to be people who push the envelope of acceptable 
behavior.  No one denys this.

>
>You are talking about idealized behavior. Enormous amounts of what you
>see around you in terms of laws and regulations is because there seems
>to always be a certain ruthless type of human being who insists on
>living right at the edge of what is absolutely forbidden and what is
>questionably legal. So you have to firm up that edge lest they prey on
>people who run their lives based on reasonable common sense. 

Why?  Are people not capable of look out for themselves?  Do they need a 
paternal government to look out for them for their own good?

>
>>Perhaps you are assuming that
>>people are stupid and cannot be counted upon to protect what is
>>theirs.  It's a rather malevolent notion.
>
>Yes, so stupid as to hand their money over to banks for deposit who
>then go belly-up after loaning all the deposit money to their
>brothers-in-law. You must have an amazingly naive notion about
>punishment and accountability. 

There is no bar in libertarianism to penalizing this sort of behavior.  

>>The whole problem with a democratic society is that at any time, 50.1%
>>of the society can vote to wreck the livelihoods of the remaining
>>49.9%.  Do you consider this good government?  Does sound quite
>>dictatorial to me...
>
>You will never escape the will of the mob, about the best anyone has
>ever figured out to do is herd them into voting booths. That's hardly
>an opinion.

Sure you can, if you limit the power of the government to act against the 
individual on behalf of the mob.

>
>In the end that's the pathos, it's impossible to understand who
>libertarians are appealing (complaining) to? Is your point that people
>should democratically vote what you assert they will not? Or are you
>going to force them into libertarianism at gunpoint, or what? 

Of course not.  That violates the basic tenet of libertainism against 
coercion.

(And
>don't repeat the catechism about coercion to me, what are your plans?)

Plans?  To try to persuade people that limited government and self-reliance 
will produce a better society.  

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Xref: sparky alt.politics.libertarian:3407 comp.org.eff.talk:8625 soc.culture.usa:9728 alt.activism:20429