My libertarian vacation nightmare: How Ayn Rand, Ron Paul & their groupies were all debunked

[DonViejo]

My family and I traveled last month to a Honduras city known for its libertarian ideals. Here's what happened next

EDWIN LYNGAR

Last month, I spent my final vacation night in Honduras in San Pedro Sula, considered the most dangerous city outside of the war-torn Middle East. I would not have been scared, except that I traveled with my wife and our four children, aged 5, 7, 14 and 18. On our last taxi ride, we could not find a van to fit us all, so we rode in two taxis. Mine carried me and my two daughters, aged 5 and 14, while the driver blasted Willie Nelson singing “City of New Orleans” (a city that is also considered very dangerous).

It was a surreal moment, traveling in one of the most dangerous cities in the world with my babies in tow. I gave a nod to the radio. “Willie,” I said, and he gave me a grin and vigorous “sí.” There’s a lot of American cowboy culture in Honduras, but along with silly hats, Honduras has also taken one of our other worst ideas—libertarian politics. By the time I’d made it to San Pedro Sula, I’d seen much of the countryside and culture. It’s a wonderful place, filled with music, great coffee, fabulous cigars and generous people, but it’s also a libertarian experiment coming apart.

People better than I have analyzed the specific political moves that have created this modern day libertarian dystopia. Mike LaSusa recently wrote a detailed analysis of such, laying out how the bad ideas of libertarian politics have been pursued as government policy.

In America, libertarian ideas are attractive to mostly young, white men with high ideals and no life experience that live off of the previous generation’s investments and sacrifice. I know this because as a young, white idiot, I subscribed to this system of discredited ideas: Selfishness is good, government is bad. Take what you want, when you want and however you can. Poor people deserve what they get, and the smartest, hardworking people always win. So get yours before someone else does. I read the books by Charles Murray and have an autographed copy of Ron Paul’s “The Revolution.” The thread that links all the disparate books and ideas is that they fail in practice. Eliminate all taxes, privatize everything, load a country up with guns and oppose all public expenditures, you end up with Honduras.

more
http://www.salon.com/2015/03/02/my_libertarian_vacation_nightmare_how_ayn_rand_ron_paul_their_groupies_were_all_debunked/

[Romeo.lima333]

1. he took his children to the most dangerous place in the world? what's next world cruise in a sailboa

Last edited Mon Mar 2, 2015, 03:58 PM - Edit history (1)

sailboat? more parents of the year.. The trip from Copan to the coast took a full six hours, and we had two flat tires. The word “treacherous” is inadequate—a better description is “post-apocalyptic.” [/]
Sounds like a great place to take the kids

[hunter]

2. I think you missed the point of the article.

Maybe they have friends or relatives there, or maybe they just wanted to travel.

[Blue_Tires]

3. kick

[tosh]

4. K&R...

and thanks for bringing this! Great read and darn good arguments in the comment section.

[octoberlib]

5. K&R! Good article.

[liberalhistorian]

6. Social scientists have long since known that

human civilization only truly advanced when we began working and cooperating TOGETHER, as a GROUP, instead of the every-person-for-themselves individualism. Actually, such group cooperation and work was far more common among the majority of human civilizations throughout most of our history than many people today would think. It's only because western individualism has taken such a firm iron grip on everything that we tend to think that that is the norm, when it's really an anomaly. A very unfortunate anomaly that has spread its cancer to too many other places globally.