As promised, I want to talk briefly about libertarianism, the philosophy of the Libertarian Party. Most people call themselves conservative, liberal, or moderate. Only a few of us dare call ourselves libertarian. But I believe that is due in large part to simply a lack of information about the philosophy. To put it simply, it's the only political philosophy that doesn't contradict itself.
In modern American terminology, conservatives advocate freedom in economic matters (but not always) while advocating the initiation of force in many "social" matters (such as reproductive issues, marriage issues, drug use, gambling, prostitution, etc) and in foreign policy (usually). Liberals advocate freedom in social issues (but not always) while advocating initiation of force in economic matters and foreign policy (unless the other party has the White House, as we've seen over the last 8 years). And no one really knows what a "moderate" believes, but one might be fairly disturbed by the implication (perhaps they prefer initiation of force in ALL matters??).
Now libertarianism, on the other hand, is based on the non-initiation of force principle--the idea that it is wrong, no matter what, to initiate force or fraud against other people (including invasion of property), whether done by an individual or a group, even if that group calls itself a 'government' and says it has the 'right' to initiate such force. And it is all based on the axiom of self-ownership, the idea that we each own our life. If you own yourself, then any unowned resources you find and put into productive use are necessarily your just property and cannot be taken or invaded by anyone else (otherwise, humanity would degenerate into violence and poverty). Obviously, you can enter into any voluntary exchange with anyone else, exchanging your just property for their just property. Anyone who came along and forbid such an exchange would be guilty of aggressing against both parties (this is what happens, for instance, when government sets minimum wages--it aggresses against both the employer and the employee by using force to prevent their voluntary exchange). There's obviously much more to libertarianism, but my purpose is not to re-derive the philosophy on my blog.
I promise you'll find that the logic and morality and beautiful consistency of libertarianism is, at the very least, a new way for you to look at the world.
