
I'm not sure why you don't consider it an option.  No one suggests that
such analysis should be left to "regulators."  In fact, the "re-inventing
government" movement provides just such a cost/benefit approach to the
analysis of public spending.  Libertarians would do well to learn more
about it. 


Sorry, but it strikes me that it is the only "feasible" approach.  What is
not feasible is a wholesale attack on all government regulation and 
licensing that treats cutting hair and practicing medicine as equivalent
tasks.


Actually, the only areas of public spending above that strike me as 
generating substantial support among libertarians are police and defense.
(It is an interesting aside that as committed as libertarians claim to
be to a principle of non-coercion, the only areas of public spending
that they frequently support involve hiring people with guns....hmmm...)


Perhaps you have.  May I suggest that you consider that revolutionaries
frequently generate support by acting as protectors of "geezers," 
mothers and children.  Governments that ignore such people on the grounds
that "we don't have much to fear" from them do so at their own peril.

jsh