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Notes -
I look at this as dialectic. For instance, by itself as an ideology libertarianism hasn't really appealed. While a lot of the ideas are quite beautiful I find it all a bit simplistic, a bit look over here, not over there and at it's worst just a rote-learned thought system, or catechism.
But as part of a dialectic to work against other prevailing ideas I think it has great merit.
I call it "directional libertarianism", the belief that there is no ideological nirvana to achieve, but that our society could use a more libertarian approach in a bunch of specific areas.
Political sophistication begins with the realization, in the words of Sowell, that there are no solutions, only trade-offs. The socratic ideal of political sophistication requires one to be able to articulate the opposing side in terms they can accept, and to state what bits of reality would need to change before one supported different policies.
So, for instance, I oppose the drug war in general, but believe there are drugs out there that are dangerous enough that they should stay illegal. At a certain probability of bad health outcomes, we kind of need to hit the ripcord.
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