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It hasn't wounded my ego, rather I find the article insulting. It caricatures people of my political beliefs as having nasty motivations and abundant personal f

It hasn't wounded my ego, rather I find the article insulting. It caricatures people of my political beliefs as having nasty motivations and abundant personal failings. It reads like an op-ed in a high school Marxist newsletter and is about as balanced. I am fine with reading political articles on Hacker News but I would hope they have a little more respect for their audience. Any Capitalist would make the rejoinder that society sucked so much in the Victorian era because society was so much poorer in aggregate. You could tax the rich at 90% and it wouldn't have stretched very far. In the long run, the wages of labor are determined by labor productivity. Laws, unions, regulations, and other beloved institutions of the left can tinker with that ever so slightly at the margin but not by much. It is only through the accumulation of capital goods and the advancement of technology that a middle class arose. You can legislate all you want before that happens and you aren't going to do a ton of good. You can declare free unicorns for everyone but if you ain't got no unicorns then you'll leave people disappointed. And after a capital stock is accumulated, labor becomes more productive, wages increase and life gets better of course ideologues of all stripes will claim credit for it.

jbooth 16y ago
Well, in the current political climate? Libertarians are a self-caricature. Not you personally, and sorry, but Carl Paladino's got signs up all over New York state that say "I'm mad too, Carl!". That's literally the guy's slogan, major party candidate for Governor of a large and important state, and his platform is a bunch of incoherent nonsense. And 99% of self-described libertarians are lining up behind these wackos all over the country. Sorry that the crazies are ruining your rep.. but if you don't want it to happen, don't enable the crazies.
- jacoblyles 16y ago
  Why should I take credit for people I don't agree with? Do you think it fair if I lump you together with people you don't like because they are in roughly the same part of the political spectrum as yourself? Politics makes people rude and irrational.
  - jbooth 16y ago
    If you don't agree with them (and I'm using the royal "you" here), then why are libertarians lining up across the country to support these loonies? Maybe you're ok, but libertarians in general? Part and parcel of the tea party this year.
    - jacoblyles 16y ago
      To the extent that the libertarian voting bloc goes Republican this year, it will probably have something to do with the $1.4 trillion deficit. During the Bush years, people that have roughly libertarian values went Democrat (you can look up old Cato articles for details) so it is not as if they are beholden to any one party. Unfortunately our system forces people to choose between the lesser of two evils and right now many people are blanching at the deficit.

jbooth 16y ago

Well, in the current political climate? Libertarians are a self-caricature. Not you personally, and sorry, but Carl Paladino's got signs up all over New York state that say "I'm mad too, Carl!". That's literally the guy's slogan, major party candidate for Governor of a large and important state, and his platform is a bunch of incoherent nonsense. And 99% of self-described libertarians are lining up behind these wackos all over the country. Sorry that the crazies are ruining your rep.. but if you don't want it to happen, don't enable the crazies.

jacoblyles 16y ago
Why should I take credit for people I don't agree with? Do you think it fair if I lump you together with people you don't like because they are in roughly the same part of the political spectrum as yourself? Politics makes people rude and irrational.
- jbooth 16y ago
  If you don't agree with them (and I'm using the royal "you" here), then why are libertarians lining up across the country to support these loonies? Maybe you're ok, but libertarians in general? Part and parcel of the tea party this year.
  - jacoblyles 16y ago
    To the extent that the libertarian voting bloc goes Republican this year, it will probably have something to do with the $1.4 trillion deficit. During the Bush years, people that have roughly libertarian values went Democrat (you can look up old Cato articles for details) so it is not as if they are beholden to any one party. Unfortunately our system forces people to choose between the lesser of two evils and right now many people are blanching at the deficit.