I see the issues of pragmatarianism as centered around a discussion of direct democracy as opposed to the US version of a representative democracy and beyond my current thoughts and this discussion (though not less important). At some level I think we are all libertarians, but it becomes rather complex in practice. (see this mornings Times article.) I also think there are many people who consider themselves libertarians but only think in terms of a few issues. They are not philosophical libertarians at all and support many contradictory or authoritarian assertions.

My thoughts have been focused on economics. I think free markets may be a good thing and we should try them some time, but free markets are not unfettered markets. There are so many places where consumers would be better off if there was real competition, but business hates competition and will do anything to squash it. Why didn’t bankers go to jail in 2009, because there are many ways to legally rip people off. (There was a reason why everyone cheered when the T-rex ate the lawyer in Jurassic Park.) There was little difference between people living under communism or under facism like Hittler and Stalin. I believe the same result can be seen between a totally planned economy and totally unfettered markets. In fact that is what I see trending. The unfetterring of our markets is yoking our liberties, that’s what I mean when I say that we’re headed toward a new feudalism. Everyone likes liberty and nobody likes it when government impinges on their liberty, but many also feel they’re not getting a fair shake and most of that unfairness is not coming directly from government. Furthermore, there are many who claim the libertarian mantel but only want to substitute their own yoke on the populous. When that happens, when the power behind inequality becomes ominious, homework doesn’t matter anymore.