What is a libertarian and what aspects of the Democratic platform do they support vs the GOP platform
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Libertarianism is a large tent. They tend to be idealogical rather than practical – IE that they have a theory of how the world should work and then they stick to it. In general it is a conservative world view that ignores negative externalities of policy (Basically – even if the personal freedoms libertarians would afford people would harm others indirectly, it isn’t a focus).
Generally speaking, the goal of libertarians is to minimize the impact of government on individuals.
Some libertarian positions would be, from more mainstream ideas to more extreme ones:
Pro choice (This would be pro abortion, anti government vaccine mandate as two examples)
Generally very strong “second amendment” support. As long as you don’t harm someone they don’t care how many guns you have.
Decrease the amount of power police have
Shrink or eliminate the military industrial complex
Reduce outside influences of government by eliminating lobbying
Freedom of speech/religion should be upheld at basically all costs
Decrease the power of the executive branch of government.
They prefer an isolationist foreign policy and also support free trade.
Generally prefer more open immigration policy
Reduce regulations (This goes for both assinine regulations like requiring interior designers to having a license all the way to reducing environmental/safety regulations)
Privatize as much as possible
Allow businesses to operate unimpeded
Decrease the social safety net (Less welfare / food stamps / social assistance)
Minimize what the federal government does at all – for example, some more extreme libertarians may think that as much of the road system should be privatized as possible.
There are people that call themselves libertarians that are closer to republicans. There are people that call themselves libertarians that are *closer* to anarchists.
They understand that the rule of law needs to be upheld, so they don’t think things like regulations and police shouldn’t exist, but they should be minimized.
I’m an ideal “democratic party” society, you’d pay your taxes and if you were sick you too the doctor and get fixed up. In an ideal libertarian society, you’d pay a lot less taxes, nothing would force you to pay for health insurance, and you could use all of that money that you saved to pay your doctor’s bill, which would hopefully be a lot cheaper. But if you don’t get sick, you could spend it elsewhere. And if you don’t have the money…. ?!? Good luck! Maybe some private individual will help out or the doctor will let you pay less or something.
If you want to read a fictional book that espouses a libertarian ideology, Atlas Shrugged is probably a starting point.
If I were to characterize the libertarian party, it would be that of a business tycoon that doesn’t care what you do in your spare time as long as he can do his business tycoon things and people aren’t killing, raping, and stealing from each other.
Sometimes this idealogical style creates preferences that do not say first seem logical. Libertarians will generally be fine with a social media platform banning people for any reason. They have no authority to affect the platform. It isn’t banning free speech. But they are also OK with stuff like storm front existing.
Personal opinion here:
I do not think there is no merit in libertarianism, but I do not think it is a practical enough ideology to apply in reality. The party is most useful as a foil to keep others in check.
I apologize for the formatting here, reddit on phones is annoying.
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