Are libertarians our enemies?

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Well, then we all should take a page out of the Nordic mixed economy of Sweden.

I agree...we could learn a lot from them. It seems their social welfare system is more efficient than ours.

I perfectly understand that, that's market economy 101, but the statement we're talking about isn't economy it's personal rights. If we're moving from economy to rights and applying the same laissez faire concepts there are bound to be problems, most likely violent problems. At some point there has to be a third party authority or all over the country there would be hatfield/mccoy scenarios if it were up to two disagreeing parties alone to determine their disputes.

I apologize if I wrote something annoyingly obvious that's probably been written a million times in this thread...I can see that causing irritation in others.
I would worry about the same problem you stated if we were living in a completely unregulated market. I think there should be a third party authority in the strict sense that they prevent scenarios such as that from playing out; however, I don't think innocent arbitrary personal choices like setting prices should be controlled by an authority, and I don't like how huge corporations are funded by the government thus increasing the risk of failure in small businesses, but I think that's a given for everyone and probably unnecessary for me to point out.

The definition that involves the classless society....North Korea is not an example of that nor is Cuba. I think a classless society would be beneficial, but not sure how practical it is...obviously various attempts have failed and systems a lot of common Americans would refer to as 'communism' are totalitarianism which communism should in theory eradicate.

...Hm .

Care to elaborate

...As far as " In practice " goes...I tend to disagree with your last paragraph ! !! !! !! !! !!
Likewise , " the marketplace " tends to do rather little/be extremely tardy , at the least , in dealith with nonsafe/un-pure food .










ote="Magneto"]One, how much does Walmart rely on the state, both in stopping competition through regulations, and through indirect subsidies that support their large size (making transportation artificially cheap, for example)? In a free market, would a company be able to grow to such a size, or would diseconomies of scale result in most firms having a much smaller size? For a supermarket, I don't think Walmart size is the natural size...

Two, it's mainly been technology that has driven up living standards over the past century, not government intervention. When you look back through history, the state has typically been the one *reducing* living standards - it originated, after all, in warlords farming people for resources. The common saying in libertarianism is, "The state breaks your leg and gives you a crutch".

Third, a free market does not mean you get to impose externalities on everyone else. Property rights don't mean you can pollute the aquifier that your neighbour relies on...[/quote]

Therein lies the problem though, power will consolidate more power. The system you describe is what we started out with, all these controls rose out of the failure of the market to account for citizens. The first national bank conceived by Alexander Hamilton was a direct result of the open market that created rampant inflation and unemployment during the Article of Confederation years, the Federal Reserve was created due to the series of market crashes of the early 1900's. These institutions weren't always there, they were created directly because the free market couldn't control itself, at least not without tons of collateral damage.

thats not an example of what communism does, but rather what human greed and power hunger does. that's the flaw in communism and rather any perfect system. humans. We are just too greedy and power hungry. a system where the government have all kinds of expensive things is not communism. which is that everyone is equal including the government. but rather it is corrupted by power hungry people to get them power and all the things they want at the expense of others. capitalism suffers from the same problem. star trek is communism. but its scifi based on a future where we some how removed greed and power craving, something I think is impossible.

in the end communism like the bible or the koran or insert just about anything else is corrupted and abused by people to gain power. stalin didn't give a s**t about communism or the well being of the people, he wanted power, he killed and lied for it, then corrupted the idea people fought for. this is the reality, look no farther then the US gov. it is a far different gov then originally dreamed of and started as, corrupted by power hungry people slowly over the years to give the gov more and more power that they shouldn't have. I think the us as it is will one day collapse like others have, its unavoidable. as the quest for more power continues til it reaches a breaking point.

so all this fighting over communism vs capitalism, when both lead to the same destination, is funny.

Aye Lassie but a TRUE Scotsman dunno ever put sugar in 'is porridge!

To see how a free market works, look at India.

Good example...their economy vastly improved since 1991 when they internationalized trade and employed free-market strategies. They do however have inadequate public healthcare among other problems...they seem to have a healthy economy but the rest of the system is corrupt (federal constitutional republic).

I don't think we're fighting over communism vs capitalism. I thought we were discussing the pros and cons of various economic systems, since as far as I know none of them are perfect. But good point.

I don't associate with human traffickers.

It's not like India was getting worse pre-1991 and suddenly the tide shifted after, it's been very slow progress for many decades. I would imagine India's government is fairly weak and ineffective considering the size and population of the place versus the taxation their government is capable of receiving from the population.