Are we allowed to express a libertarian view point here

[Bernardo de La Paz]

56. My screenname is a fictional "rational libertarian"

Basically, he believes in a libertarian ideal, but is first and foremost a realist and pragmatist and thus happily co-exists with many other political stripes.

Libertarianism is a fantastic ideal, just as communism is a fantastic ideal. By "fantastic" I mean the "fantasy" sense of the word.

Libertarians imagine a world where everyone is focused on working hard to get ahead and everyone is cooperating to get stuff done because it is in their best interests; cooperating by being careful and responsible. Communists imagine a world where everyone works at their best ability and everyone gets what they need and the rest is spread around.

Both ideologies are imagining idealized human beings who are cooperative, work hard, never exploit anyone and jointly make life fair in somewhat different senses. Both will never be achieved because they are both unrealistic.

I value highly freedoms and rights, but I believe no right is in isolation. Rights are shared and not owned. Rights are frequently in conflict and have to be balanced. That means no pure form of social governance, no crystalline distillation into simplest principles will ever be sufficient or workable or desirable.

I believe that in the future, government will be reduced but never eliminated. The only way it will be reduced is when people learn to get along without shooting each other, bombing each other, exploiting each other, or being nasty to each other. To the extent that people the world over cooperate with each other responsibly and respectfully, ... to that extent government can be reduced. Though that is an idealistic dream, it is a dream worth having. "Imagine." But don't depend on it arriving next week.

For example, libertarians believe government should get out of things like welfare and providing health care. The libertarian fantasy is that everyone will be motivated to donate to charity and it will all work out. The reality is that the poor donate a much larger percentage of their income than rich people do, despite rich people having a much much greater percentage of disposable income to give out.

So I hold libertarianism as an unobtainable ideal that is worth moving towards by enlightening and educating the public, especially the rich fuckers who should know better but are very unenlightened. It seems that money and privilege are counterproductive for enlightenment. I also hold that it is a better ideal than marxism or communism.

My liberal progressive libertarianism is a far cry from Republican faux libertarianism and much closer to liberalism, progressivism, Democratic policies, and Canadian Liberal Party / New Democratic Party policies.

Thus I am comfortable here, and very glad to be accepted for what I post from time to time.