From: ian@nasser.eecs.nwu.edu (Ian Sutherland)
Subject: Re: Limiting Govt (was Re: Employment (was Re: Why not concentrate...)
Organization: EECS Department, Northwestern University
Lines: 40

In article <1993Apr15.170731.8797@isc-br.isc-br.com> steveh@thor.isc-br.com (Steve Hendricks) writes:
>In article <1993Apr15.013651.11353@tijc02.uucp> pjs269@tijc02.uucp (Paul Schmidt) writes:
>>steveh@thor.isc-br.com (Steve Hendricks) writes:
>>: 
>>: As noted in another thread (Limiting govt), the problem libertarians face
>>: is insuring that the "limited government" they seek does not become the 
>>: tool of private interests to pursue their own agenda.
>>: 

[...]

>It is a failure of libertarianism if the ideology does not provide any
>reasonable way to restrain such actions other than utopian dreams.

You seem to be saying that a LIMITED government will provide MORE
opportunities for private interests to use it to pursue their own
agendas, and asking libertarians to prove that this will NOT happen.
While I can't offer such a proof, it seems pretty damn plausible that
if the government does not regulate a particular area, it cannot become
a tool of private interests to pursue their own agendas in that area.
I rather suspect that it's the sort of government we have NOW that is
more likely to become such a tool, and that it IS such a tool in many
instances.

>Just
>as Marxism "fails" to specify how pure communism is to be achieved and
>the state is to "wither away," libertarians frequently fail to show how
>weakening the power of the state will result in improvement in the human
>condition.

I suspect that this is because "improvement in the human condition" as
you define it is not the primary goal of libertarianism, and would not
be the primary goal of a libertarian government.  My impression of
libertarianism is that its primary goal is the elimination of
government coercion except in a very limited cases.
-- 
Ian Sutherland
ian@eecs.nwu.edu

Sans Peur
