49 lines
3.1 KiB
Plaintext
49 lines
3.1 KiB
Plaintext
Libertarian realism
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<p>I hate war. Even when the results of defeat would be worse than<br />
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the results of war, I hate war. It kills people and makes government<br />
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stronger. But when the results of defeat would be worse, I face<br />
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reality and support war.</p>
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<p>Our Islamist enemies want to kill us all — starting with Jews and<br />
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gays, but continuing to anyone who doesn’t convert to Islam and accept<br />
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shari’a and the whole nine yards. That’s not melodrama, it’s<br />
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reporting of the plain and simple statements Al-Qaeda uses in their<br />
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recruiting videos. <em>They want to kill us all.</em> They demonstrated<br />
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the deadly seriousness of this aim on 9/11.</p>
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<p>The choice between “support the war” and “allow the pressure off of<br />
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enemies who want to kill us all” is not a difficult one. As a libertarian,<br />
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I’m deeply sorry we live in a world where governments are doing the fighting<br />
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for us, and I fear the consequences of the power they will amass while<br />
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doing so. But I don’t see an alternative.</p>
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<p>If I had a magic wand that could instantly materialize a world of<br />
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private security agencies, insurance pools, and mercenaries capable of<br />
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fighting the war on terror, I would have waved it long before 9/11.<br />
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But I am not capable of changing the objective conditions of the war<br />
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any more than I am of changing the murderous intentions of our<br />
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enemies.</p>
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<p>Though I’ve been accused of abandoning my libertarianism for a<br />
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conservative position, I still believe in the non-initiation of force<br />
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as strongly as I ever have. I saw one damn huge freaking initiation<br />
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of force on 9/11 — not just an attack on one city or one country<br />
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but an assault on Western civilization. Everything al-Qaeda’s<br />
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propaganda organs have said since confirms that is what they intend.</p>
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<p>George Orwell, writing during World War II, wrote:</p>
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<blockquote><p>
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Pacifism is objectively pro-fascist. This is elementary common<br />
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sense. If you hamper the war effort of one side, you automatically<br />
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help out that of the other. Nor is there any real way of remaining<br />
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outside such a war as the present one. In practice, ‘he that is not<br />
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with me is against me.'”
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</p></blockquote>
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<p>If Orwell were alive today, I have no doubt he would view this war<br />
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as equally pressing, nor which side of it he would choose. And all<br />
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libertarians should heed his words. We’ve shown far too much of a<br />
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tendency to slide into denial about the war on terror and the<br />
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consequences of refusing to fight it.</p>
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<p>Sliding off into denial and fantasyland is not noble, it’s an<br />
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abdication of our responsibility as human beings and members of a<br />
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civilization. If that denial becomes “the” libertarian position, our<br />
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statist opponents will damn us as for deserting our neighbors and our<br />
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civilization in its hour of need — and they will be <em>right</em> to<br />
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damn us.</p>
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<p>Other libertarians may fail this test. I will not.</p>
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