Posts on most blogs about Ron Paul rarely lead to any meaningful discussion as the Paul supporters quickly spam the comments. One benefit of using moderation to prevent Paul supporters from engaging in their usual tactic of shouting down anyone who doesn’t agree with them one hundred percent has been to allow for other ideas to come up. There are two items coming from the discussion under this post which I have decided to promote to the front page of the blog. The first has come up several times in discussions of whether the Paul movement is more one of social conservativism with some libertarian ideas or a true libertarian movement. This leads to a look at how the meaning of the word “libertarian” has changed over the years.
The word “libertarian” has become almost meaningless for a variety of reasons. The use of the word by many Republicans has been noted in the discussion but this isn’t the only problem.
The first factor which led to the change in meaning was the birth of the Libertarian Party. Back in the 1960’s and early 1970’s libertarianism was primarily used to refer to anarcho-capitalists like Murray Rothbard or supporters of government so limited that it didn’t even have the power to tax. Such positions based on principle were fine for political discussion groups and underground magazines but didn’t make a practical platform for a political party. Many libertarians such as Samuel Edward Konkin III argued against the formation of the Libertarian Party, correctly predicting how it would dilute the position. Subsequently we had Libertarian Party candidates such as Ed Clark campaigning on a platform of reducing government back to where it was under John Kennedy. Once libertarianism could mean a significant amount of government, it became easy for others who support freedom in some areas to support other government action (including the Iraq war by some or prohibiting abortion by others) while still using the libertarian name.
When I have called Paul’s campaign more a social conservative phenomenon than a libertarian phenomenon, some bloggers have argued that I am wrong on the grounds that Paul was once the Libertarian Party’s candidate. They miss the point that I was using libertarianism in its more strict meaning used before the birth of the party by which the Libertarian Party itself is not necessarily libertarian. If you want to define libertarianism as being synonymous with the Libertarian Party then by definition Paul would be a libertarian, but this is a definition which is independent of actual principles and not one I find particularly significant when looking at the positions of an individual candidate. Party affiliation is a poor way to describe an individual’s philosophy. Jesse Jackson and George Wallace might have both been Democrats at one time, but their views are certainly quite different.
Another factor is that libertarians have grown up and lived in the real world. The more consistent and extreme meanings of libertarianism look more realistic when living on a college campus than living in the real world. Many libertarians have moderated their views as they’ve lived in the real world but continue to use the label.
The word “libertarian” is also used to describe many people due to the lack of good terms to describe a variety of political positions. Many people don’t fit in entirely as conservatives or liberals. This includes people who are more liberal on social and civil liberties issues and conservative on economic issues. They support more freedom and less government than the status quo on both social and economic issues and therefore the libertarian label is often applied for lack of a better term but this is a distinctly different view from the more extreme libertarians who would support far less government (if any government at all).
As a consequence of these trends we have the split between Ron Paul and his former staffer Eric Dondero who both call themselves libertarians but have opposite views on the war and Patriot Act. Both might be libertarians under its current use but neither would be libertarians under the more pure definition of the past. Eric Dondero backs Rudy Guilani, considering him libertarian, but I’d consider Giuliani one of the least libertarian candidates due to his views on the war and in increasing executive power. Bill Maher also often calls himself a libertarian but leans towards John Edwards, the candidate who might be the least libertarian candidate of all when his views on economic issues, social issues, and civil liberties are all considered. Any label which includes Ron Paul, Bill Maher, anarcho-capitalists, and supporters of the Iraq War and Patriot Act is no longer of very much value.