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Thanks for those excellent links. The descriptions of applied Randian Objectivism in Honduras are particularly... noteworthy: "The greatest examples of libert

Thanks for those excellent links. The descriptions of applied Randian Objectivism in Honduras are particularly... noteworthy: "The greatest examples of libertarianism in action are the hundreds of men, women and children standing alongside the roads all over Honduras. The government won’t fix the roads, so these desperate entrepreneurs fill in potholes with shovels of dirt or debris. They then stand next to the filled-in pothole soliciting tips from grateful motorists. That is the wet dream of libertarian private sector innovation."

DINKDINK 9y ago
>They then stand next to the filled-in pothole soliciting tips from grateful motorists. That is the wet dream of libertarian private sector innovation. Probably a more apt 'libertarian utopia' would be an entrepreneur buying land from consenting property owners (Converse to the government forcing people to move and not respecting their property rights via eminent domain), build a road (via a decentralized, competitive bidding process rather than a single point of economic co-option opportunity such as a state) and then charging access to the road (with guards in low-tech community, Toll-payment box in medium tech community, and a Bitcoin Lightning-Network payment channel in a high-tech society.) ;]
- sjg007 9y ago
  Roads are built by competitive bids.
turk184 9y ago
Nice way to take a swipe at libertarians, but it's incredibly obvious that it isn't true. How do you think civilization got started? Was it by some central authority that decreed to build roads and do everything or was it from the ground up by tens of thousands of individuals working together for their own interests? Outside of Rome, it was the latter. People in Honduras need government reform very badly--because someplace there's some oligarchs living large who have some serious explaining to do. Also, you're talking about a nation of people who are uneducated and living on like $2 a day. You can't be both ignorant and free (in the economic sense), now can you?

DINKDINK 9y ago

>They then stand next to the filled-in pothole soliciting tips from grateful motorists. That is the wet dream of libertarian private sector innovation. Probably a more apt 'libertarian utopia' would be an entrepreneur buying land from consenting property owners (Converse to the government forcing people to move and not respecting their property rights via eminent domain), build a road (via a decentralized, competitive bidding process rather than a single point of economic co-option opportunity such as a state) and then charging access to the road (with guards in low-tech community, Toll-payment box in medium tech community, and a Bitcoin Lightning-Network payment channel in a high-tech society.) ;]

sjg007 9y ago
Roads are built by competitive bids.

turk184 9y ago

Nice way to take a swipe at libertarians, but it's incredibly obvious that it isn't true. How do you think civilization got started? Was it by some central authority that decreed to build roads and do everything or was it from the ground up by tens of thousands of individuals working together for their own interests? Outside of Rome, it was the latter. People in Honduras need government reform very badly--because someplace there's some oligarchs living large who have some serious explaining to do. Also, you're talking about a nation of people who are uneducated and living on like $2 a day. You can't be both ignorant and free (in the economic sense), now can you?