Smidgey

I second that.

I like the tripartite distinction of Milton Friedman as well though:

1) Political freedom
2) Economic freedom
3) Social freedom

The second and third are necessary, the first is not. It is often in conflict with the latter two. Lefties love to talk of the first one, like Woodrow Wilson: 'make the world safe for democracy.' Democracy has absolutely no bearing on whether a country is socially and economically free or not. Watch politicians or broadcasters and it is as plain as day that the word 'liberty' has been searched and replaced with the word 'democracy'.

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How vain is man, who boasts in fight the valour of gigantic might!

-Georg Friedrich Händel

For_England

that is ahistorical. Libertarianism was considered leftist when it first arrived - atomism and souless individualism are part of the modern world - just another pathway liberalism has taken. It's levelling, but in a non-obvious way - levelling traditional ties to family, religion, community, and ethnic nation, under the guise of rejecting the communal, but without a corresponding balance between the one and the many based upon the reality of human nature and its psychological needs. It's another way of empowing the hedonistic masses at the expense of the old institutions. It's a levelling in terms of denying the role of the ethnos and its territorial right to its own borders, and treating people as cogs in a capitalist machine who can uproot at the whim of economics with no impact to their cultural integrity, out of which only freedom is possible. Look, mkdavis, you talk about 911 being an inside job, and then you support the 'global free movement of goods and people' espoused by the very same economic establishment that pulled off 911. Corporatism is fascism, it is not the vision of American economics which Jefferson and Patrick Henry had. It is destroying this world, it has re-colonised Africa and third world countries, forcing them into debt and then making them grow cash crops at the expense of their traditional way of life. They are taking over the west and stopping at nothing to create an Americanised hedonist mass. This is what neo-conservatism is about - the global enslavement of people 'liberated' by self-indulgence only, ruled over by an economic elite. That is what 911 is about. Historically, 'right-wing' refers to the old conservatism of the middles ages - which the left wingers revolted against, with various forms of liberalism. I recommend a read of 'How the West was Lost' by Alexander Boot, to see how 'Modman' is seen in both libertarianism and in socialism. You are all 'conservative' libertarians only in so far as you reject the modern idea of the all-powerful state, which other streams of liberal thinking have placed so much emphasis upon. Actaully your views quite naturally lead to the creation of the all-powerful economic state, ruling over nation states, congregated together into colourless 'free trade areas'. As Boot argues, the old institutions - family, community, local government, the church, the law - actually acted as a check upon the upper echelons, and in this way the medieval system was actually superior to the modern, totalitarian one. Boot is right - both the USA and the USSR are simply the two paths that modernism has led to. I would call myself 'proto-westman', since I reject certain aspects of medievalism and all aspects of modernism; I want neither the all powerful state nor the old elites, but I would rather the latter. Still, don't let me stop you all from patting each other on the back and congratulating each other on how 'conservative' you all are .

John Carter

No worries ducks.

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There are three kinds of people in this world: Libertarians, fascists, and those who haven't been paying attention.