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Libertarian Cant
The difference between Libertarians and Fascists
Most people have at least a passing familiarity with Libertarian philosophy.
Libertarians believe that the smaller the government, the better, and that the
sovereign rights of the individual citizen are paramount. On most social issues,
they are liberals, with the main divergence from liberal thought coming in the
notion that they believe social services should be in the domain of the private
sector (and thus run on a for-profit basis) as opposed to public sector.
Based on this, you would think that Libertarians would absolutely despise the
Putsch regime, with its massive increases in federal spending and debt, the
PATRIOT ACT, and the invitation to intrusive and suffocating Christian
fundamentalists to manage the affairs of the citizenry for them.
You would be right. Libertarians absolutely hate that. But they only make up
about 5% of the people who are claiming to be Libertarians. It really isn’t a
very popular philosophy.
The rest are just neofascists using populist jargon to promote their agendas.
Neofascists–who like to refer to themselves as conservatives or
libertarians–figured out some time ago that if they talked about decreasing the
power of government and the people so the power of corporations and the wealthy
could be augmented wasn’t a very good selling point, and so what they would have
to do was talk about getting government off our backs, without specifying who
the “our” actually was, and promote freedom from taxation and regulation,
without mentioning just who was to be freed of these burdens.
This, by itself, wasn’t enough. Republicans used this tactic from the 50s
through the 80s, and they seemed destined to remain the permanent minority party
in America.
It took two more additions to their coalition; religious fundamentalists, who
wear their belief like a ring through their noses and thus are easily
manipulated by anyone willing to sweet talk them and invoke Jesus a lot; and to
replace America’s free media with a noisy propaganda machine that easily
overwhelms the largely bought-out mainstream media. But fascists never dropped
the Libertarian jargon. Moving the tax burden from corporations and the wealthy
elite was called “tax relief”; blunting the ability of the public to seek
redress in court was called “tort reform”. These dishonest gimmicks were
promoted to obscure the fact that far from making government smaller and less
imposing, they had turned it into a repressive monster.
Telling an honest libertarian from his ersatz doppelgänger in the GOP is easy.
You only need to ask them one question, and one question only.
Ask them how they feel about unions.
One of the bits of populist jargon the fascists have picked up is “free
markets.” The idea in a nutshell is that a completely unregulated market will
seek the most efficient and effective answers as a consequence of its drive to
maximize production and profits. The more unregulated business is, the better
off society is.
Going by this logic, the Mafia is the most socially beneficial entity in
America. Followed closely by the drug cartels.
The best thing government and society can do is stand back and let the market
work its magic, both libertarians and pseudo-libertarians say. They’ll tell you
that when it comes to business matters, if you didn’t have laws, then you don’t
have crime. They believe that the only time business breaks the law is in the
noble cause of circumventing unjust laws.
A real libertarian will acknowledge that part of free market forces is labor.
They will concede that labor is an integral part, not only of demand, but of
supply, and that the value of labor on both sides in a vital factor to the
invisible hand of Adam Smith.
A pseudolibertarian – the fascists of the GOP – will reject the notion that
labor is anything more than a drag on productivity. “Productivity” has become
their socially acceptable catchphrase for “maximizing profits” A company that
pays its employees $5 an hour is more productive than one that pays its
employees $10 an hour for the same work. By that logic, a company that doesn’t
pay its employees at all is even more productive.
Coupled with the love of individualism is a pseudolibertarian abhorrence of all
cooperative efforts. Such endeavors smack of socialism, if not communism, and
are to be assailed at all times. Unions, which consists of like-minded
individuals with common interests grouping together to deal as a collective
toward a common goal is obviously a Bad Thing in the eyes of these rugged
individualists.
If you want to get them really upset, you could point out that a corporation is
nothing more than like-minded individuals with common interests grouping
together to deal as a collective toward a common goal. “That” they’ll huff at
you, “is different!”
And there is the big difference between real Libertarians, and the fascists who
have appropriated their cant. Regular people are MEANT to be a part of the
overall equation for Libertarians; in fact, on paper, their philosophy is
designed to serve the common man.
With fascists, power and wealth devolve to the elite. Corporations cater to that
elite. Unions do not. That is the difference. Corporations good, unions bad.
Libertarians understand that the free market consists of counterbalances. Demand
and supply balance against one another. Productivity includes a large consumer
based. Put in blunt terms, they understand that if you want to sell a lot of
widgets out of your factory, it isn’t enough to be able to make lots of widgets
at the lowest possible price. You have to have a large enough base of consumers
who can afford those widgets, which means that labor, the biggest segment of
nearly any consumer target group, has to be well-paid.
If corporations are a collective of those interested in turning a profit, labor
unions are a collective of those interested in safeguarding the interests of
both labor and consumers. It is vital to a balanced market, and that, rather
than ceding all power to the manufacturers, is the true goal of a free market.
Next time someone talks about how liberals are socialists, ask them about
unions. Their answer will tell you if you are talking to a Libertarian, or a
fascist fraud. Real Libertarians think capitalism should apply to all.
The fascists of the GOP believe fiercely in capitalism for the working people,
and socialism for the wealthy.
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