Even so, the minimal government of the libertarians, and this includes perhaps most of the Republican members of Congress and state legislatures, exacts unjust "liberty costs" on the general public.
Their libertarian "liberty" is the liberty of the burglar in the town without locks on the doors and with no police department.
To be fair, libertarians advise door locks and approve of police protection -- of those basic rights to life, liberty and property. They are not pro-burglary. That's the theory. But to our sorrow, we are discovering today that in practice, the so-called "night watchman" minimal government promoted by today's Republicans does not protect the freedoms of the poor, the workers, children, among others -- arguably, most ordinary citizens.
In theory, the libertarians tell us, if a business is unscrupulous, the customers will shun it and the business will fail. It is all nicely automatic -- "by the invisible hand" -- no need for government regulation and enforcement. This may be true of barber shops and restaurants in a small town. But it is not true when the negative effects of the business activities are delayed or the causes are less than certain. Examples: the effects of tainted food, harmful drugs, and tobacco use. Neither does the unregulated free market prevent so-called "negative externalities" -- harms to innocent and unconsenting "third parties."
How do we know all this? Again, not merely "in theory." We are instructed by history.
In addition, the libertarians assure us, harmful business practices will be deterred by law suits. Not so, when purchased legislators enact so-called "tort reform" that reduces maximum allowable damages to "the cost of doing business." And this is just one of many reasons why "torts and courts" deterrence fails, as I explain at some length in my "With Liberty for Some" (Section IV).
Why do we have regulations? Because we have tried minimal government and have found out that it doesn't work. Without rule of law and effective enforcement thereof, we got drugs that were harmful or ineffective, tainted meat, financial fraud, dangerous consumer products, polluted air and water, and now climate change.
And yet, notwithstanding the historically proven necessity of government regulation, the incessant anti-government message of "the one-percent" and their clients in Congress, state legislatures and the media, has enjoyed spectacular success. Pew Research reports that public trust in government [is] at historic lows." The Gallup organization confirms this finding, adding that confidence the Supreme Court and the Presidency ranks behind the military, small business, the police, and organized religion. Congress, at seven percent approval, is at the bottom of the list of seventeen institutions.
The libertarians and their GOP disciples, it seems, are striving to fire "the night watchmen" and leave the public at the unregulated mercies of the corporate and financial oligarchy.
If they succeed, that would be good news for the one-percent and bad news for the rest of us.
All this despite the plain fact that the foundational ideology of the one-percent -- libertarian theory and neo-classical economics, "trickle down," anti-regulation, market fundamentalism and all that -- fails the reality test.
And so, when the right-wing politicians and corporate media talk of "liberty" and "freedom," remember this: Your "liberty" and "freedom" are not what they are talking about.
And that's not just "theory," that's history.
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