printOn EPJ, “Presstitute-Cultivated Ignorance On Ukraine” has elicited one particularly typical libertarian response that demanded a reply. Here is the letter. My response follows below.
TonyFebruary 21, 2014 at 11:09 AM
I like the article overall, but there is too much government-concept worship.
Examples:
“Revered in the US, Pussy Riot is a punk rock Russian band of feminists, whose forté is breast-baring, defiling places of worship, punching the air while shrieking, “F-ck you Putin,” and participating in public-orgy protests and other criminal acts.”
Most of these would not be CLOSE to being “criminal acts” in a libertarian society. And they should not be considered such (by libertarians) in a statist one, with the exception of defiling places of worship.
“The “occupation of government buildings in Kiev and in Western Ukraine”
Oh so what…
“Having flouted America’s national interests and squandered Russian good will—the ignoramuses of the Beltway will have no place in this grand geopolitical realignment.”
There are no such things as “America’s national interests” within libertarian thought. It is a nationalist and collectivist concept.
Nonsense. The article deals in reality, not in pie-in-the-sky libertarian theory. The sin of abstraction is just that: a grave sin. The article, moreover, is for adults, not for the childish libertarian who wishes to remain suspended forever in never-never land. The Pussy Riot retarded sisterhood defiled private property. They copulated in a public setting, paid for by taxpayers. Only a bad writer does a discursive detour into the various contingencies that would apply if we lived in a private-property anarcho-capitalistic society. We don’t! Grow up. Has nobody taught you kids how to stay on topic, or write without flights of fancy? I guess I’m old enough to remember being taught such discipline and learning it from my betters. Does one effect a realistic analysis, which entails the concept of the national interest (peace with Russia, non-interventionism, in this case), or does one twist into ideological pretzels in order to come down on the side of politically proper libertarianism? This column deals in reality. So should you. Deal with real life!