The lament in this essay is that we're not open to persuasion in our politics. How about considering that politics itself is the problem. A person of a more li

The lament in this essay is that we're not open to persuasion in our politics. How about considering that politics itself is the problem. A person of a more libertarian bent, like myself, would assert that it's the conflation of government and society, the political and the social, that's the problem. They are separate spheres of human activity. That same sort of person would tell you that politics is a method for conflict resolution, given the inescapable fact of force in human relations. Politics is about force. The social, by contrast precludes the use of force. Society is about cooperation. If you accept the above view, you try to reign in what politics applies to. But that is not at all what our politics is like today. Today, we try to do all sorts of things through the power of government. We inject force into aspects of society that should instead be left to cooperation. In fact, we go beyond that. We consider that use of force moral, since it's in the service of the pursuit of "utopia." I don't expect non-libertarians to agree. I just want to point out that no one should be shocked at all the fighting in the political sphere. Moreover, I would further assert that no one should kid himself or herself that "openness" or "persuasion" is the solution. Lastly, I would point out that when the question "how should government accomplish such-and-such" is posed to someone of libertarian bent, no amount of persuasion is possible, one way or the other. All arguments are superficial. At the bottom, they ignore the point that government shouldn't.