JimS:Drinking age law hasn't exactly been a success. We have far higher rate of teenager and college binge drinking than any country where alcohol is legal and not age-limited.
I have yet to see a country that had no age limit on alcohol purchases. And the causes of binge drinking are social, not the result of the law. And in any event it is beside the point. There is a clear difference between two positions you want to equate as essentially identical, and totally tyranical, because they both involve to some extent government regulation. The effectiveness of the law is directly related to the over reach of prohibition. Limited resources require decisions on allocation of funds. Which is why adults should be left alone, what resources are available on the issue should be geared towards preventing underage sales, and you have less money spent overall so families aren't getting taxed out of existence and parents can teach their kids about alcohol consumption themselves rather than relying on government drone teachers and DARE officers.
Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty, not of utopia. It is the price of liberty because it is up to us, the people, to keep an eye on the government and reign it in when the laws do become to broad in scope and power. But that's not exactly possible if the core of people who want to limit the government are amazing each other with their own rhetoric and brilliance in small cliques, online or in the real world, and not involving themselves in the process of limiting the government. Because they're agorists. Or because the person running who is closest to their ideal, and who at least has more than a snow ball's chance in hell of winning, isn't perfectly in line with their ideals.
JimS:Perhaps you never bothered to read my earlier posts? Not only do I support RP's candidacy, I have donated money and time for his candidacy; I have even actively converted other people, people who never heard of RP, to consider and even endorse RP. The point I have been making all along is that advocacy of strong anti-immigration enforcement gets in the way of his campaign and his chance of winning what votes he can get.
Then admittedly I have mistaken your overall viewpoint and/or have mistaken you with someone else I was debating with on these boards earlier, for which I apologize. However the point stands regarding immigration. The portion of Muslim men willing to martyr themselves is likely very miniscule in comparisson to the total population. As is the number of husbands/wives who kill their spouses. However when the spouse is killed, common sense and experience points investigators to the other partner and close relatives, as depending on the circumstances it's usually not a 'stranger' who committed the crime. Ergo it makes a hell of a lot of sense to exercise caution when you decide who you invite into your life on an intimate level. People who don't exercise such caution pay a price. Same goes for young Muslim men and terrorism. No one is suggesting an outright ban on all immigration. But the group of people who seem to make up the majority of terrorists? Yes, I want some extra attention paid to them.
Even were we to end all foreign policy tomorrow which infuriates the Muslim world against the US, the hatred will not die over-night. And it is possible to have a two prong approach: to engage the Muslim world and acknowledge their grievences and work to correct them as we can; and while doing so to state clearly that while we understand their point of view and are working to change our behavior to be more noninterventionist, they do have their own problems that they need to deal with. Part of that is the small subpopulation of suicidal lunatics who want to kill US citizens. Put simply, we'll both each get a large bowl and a potato masher and get our collective crap together, and get rid of such measures as have been previously deemed necessary when both groups of people mutually agree it's time to do so.
JimS:Focus on the issues that people can agree with
Most people agree on this issue to some extent or another, if not on a total ban on immigration then on some more stringent watch on Muslim immigrants. No one but a xenophobe wants to end immigration. However, no one but a fool chances inviting a violent stranger into his house, or his country. The message is not anti immigration. It is anti terrorist, and anti let's get another few metric assloads of people into the country and sucking off the government teet, making our wallets lactate more as opposed to hemorrhaging.
Kent C:Was immigration a red flag?
Absolutely. Government control over the mobility of populance is incredibly costly, both in terms of resources and civil liberty. That's the stuff the dark ages of feudalism was made of.
xahrx:I have yet to see a country that had no age limit on alcohol purchases.
Then you haven't travelled wide enough. Quite a few countries have no legal drinking age law at all, off the top of my head I can think of Poland, Portugal, Thailand, China and Viet Nam. These countries alone (the ones that I remember off the top of my head) account for 1/4 the world's population. Almost all other countries have lower legal drinking age than the US.
xahrx:And the causes of binge drinking are social, not the result of the law.
Notice, I didn't say binge drinking in general, but teenager and college binge drinking. It's the rite of passge in the US, as proof of maturity.
xahrx:There is a clear difference between two positions you want to equate as essentially identical, and totally tyranical,
I never equated the two positions. However, would you support someone who advocates strict enforcement of existing drinking age laws instead of the current state of benign neglect? that any relative serving alcohol to minor, even in private setting, should be hauled off to jail; that parents should lose custody of the minor? and that in order to enforce such a law, every who is about to pour a drink, even in private homes, have to call into a national database to enter the recipient's social security number and biometrics? All in the name of enforcing existing drinking age laws. In the name of controlling immigration, we have come a long way from the days of checking for lice on Ellis Island to today's state of every American citizen seeking a job has to give their social security number (and soon perhaps biometric data) to be verified in a national centralized employment eligibility database. And of course get tracked; yes dear, you need government approval to take any job now . . .better make sure the last girlfriend you ditched didn't work for that database.
xahrx:Or because the person running who is closest to their ideal,
If someone is for the strict enforcement of existing laws against victimless crimes, laws that are currently being left in a state of benign neglect, that person is not anywhere near "closest to ideal." There are plenty laws that would fit this category: blue laws (no drinking on Sunday; no open business on Sundays), sales tax laws (on mail orders or purchases made across state borders), drinking age laws, laws regarding sex in certain positions, etc. etc. Immigration laws just happen to be one of those. I'm not saying RP necessarily is. However, sometimes it does make one wonder who are these people putting together his campaign ads.
xahrx:As is the number of husbands/wives who kill their spouses. However when the spouse is killed, common sense and experience points investigators to the other partner and close relatives, as depending on the circumstances it's usually not a 'stranger' who committed the crime.
Your analogy is deeply flawed. When the suspect list is narrowed down from a town of 20,000 people to half a dozen close acquaintances of the victim, that's real progress in investigation. On the other hand, even if the last murder case in town was a woman killed by a man, it makes no sense to advocate locking up all men of the town. Okay, it may make some sense to some man-hating flaming gender-baiter somewhere, but it makes no sense whatsoever to any thinking person. Narrowing the suspect list from 20,000 to 10,000 is not much progress as far as the investigation is concerned, and chances are that you are upsetting 9,999 innocent people in the process. There are plenty ways to draw up a rationally small suspect list that may indeed include more men than women in it using reasonable criteria derived from evidences; explicit policies that upset large swath of people is quite unnecessary.
xahrx:Part of that is the small subpopulation of suicidal lunatics who want to kill US citizens.
That small subpopulation of suicidal lunatics exist in any culture, not just muslims. Like I said before, I don't have high opinion of Islam, considering it an institution of collectivism. However, the other evening when Giuliani was bashing Ron Paul with the claim that muslim religious fanatics had been attacking us for decades before 9-11, especially citing the Munich Olympic bombing in 1972, I couldn't help wonder what world was Giuliani living in: the "Black September" terrorists were atheistic socialists, part of the secular PLO, and they were mad at the west for the latter's support of King Hussein's suppression of PLO that killed thousands of PLO members and their families. Those despicable Munich murderers were not religious at all, much less any aspieration for a muslim caliphate. "God" only came into play in that episode when the forceful Israeli retaliatory attack was called "Operation Wrath of God." In case anyone is wondering if that kind of suicidal lunaticism is unique to the middleast, the answer is probably no. The Japanese bushido worriors fighting to the last man, the Hitler Youth wasting his last breath biting on some Canadian soldier's combat boots, and the soviet infantry fed into the relentless meat grinders of the east front, well they were all suicidal fanatics. If we appoint ourselves to the grand task of fighting every suicidal lunatic anywhere in the world, it will be a long and bloody road ahead for ourselves; makes one wonder, if we are suicidal lunnatics ourselves for taking up that task :-)
xahrx: It is anti terrorist, and anti let's get another few metric assloads of people into the country and sucking off the government teet, making our wallets lactate more as opposed to hemorrhaging.
It's just the same xenophbic pig with some lipsticks applied. None of the terrorists crossed the southwest desert. There are 47 million uninsured Americans and 50 million under-insured Americans, many of whom are sick with existing medical conditions (hence can't afford to buy insurance). There are only 12 million illegal immigrants, many of whom passed the desert endurance test :-) The math should be quite obvious: people notice and get alarmed at the emergency rooms because the immigrants look different. Frankly, I'm not even sure how they come to the statistic conclusion that it's the illegals not the legals doing the mooching; realisticly, the system is simply broke from all the 8 times as large number of Americans not buying enough insurance and not paying their medical bills, thanks to the collectivist medical system that our political establishment has set up.
So, I'm "wondering" who wrote those pieces for the Ron Paul newsletter. I have a strong guess, though I'm hoping I'm wrong. I do see a bit of that attitude among some here (no you, of course).
I'm rather disappointed that Ron Paul has done so badly. On the subject of his alleged racism and the like, here are some recent articles:
http://reason.com/blog/show/124298.html
http://www.reason.com/blog/show/124284.html
And an example of an outright (not to mention ignorant) smear:
I did finally look through the newsletters they posted on TNR site. They had a handful to back up their case, which is suprising that for a man who they clam is an angry old white racist, that over a two decade period they could only come up with few cases. And taken in context, I didn't find them that bad (though most were poorly written). When I started on the internet back in 1992, at that time, you'd see much worse on Usenet written by libertarians. Many at the time were rebelling against political correctness and such terms as "femanazi" came into being. People took things to extremes (not me, of course). Actually, I've seen better displays of intolerance on this board, and I won't name names. But given the hoopla this newletters have cause, its pretty clear that political correctness has won.
Because the government can tax, it is inherently a Socialist institution. If Paul is a Constitutionalist, then he is a Statist, but I would argue that he is a minarchist.And while he probably won't win, I am voting for him in the primary. I would rather a minarchist be in charge then these Fascists and Socialists. Paul is so much better, for people who are willing to break the anarchist creed, there is no other choice.
As far as immigration is concerned, illegal immigrants do not have my sympathy. I would be against government actively pursuing them, but I have no qualms about denying them the benefits of our welfare state.
If you care about your freedom, there are a lot worse things about which to worry than Paul's immigration stance.
I read those too. Honestly, I don't know if I really, really believe him about not being the author. I don't think he wrote it all, but some of that stuff was classic Paul. I loved where he said that the LA riot looters were attempting to privatize the welfare state. Don't get me wrong, Paul has earned a significant amount of my trust, but who else but an Austrian economist would call riotous looting the privatization of the welfare state?
I thought it was classic!