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To: JohnGalt
That's odd... I also consider myself a 'right-wing' libertarian, but my point of view on this is most influenced by Enlightenment/American Revolution-era natural-rights philosophy (as opposed to, say, Rousseau). I derive the pro-life position from the recognition of the inalienable rights of man, and the clear evidence that a child begun is as fully human (and thus a possessor of inalienable rights) as any other.

Why do you choose to call agnostically derived libertarianism 'right wing' and deistic (for lack of a better term) libertarianism 'left wing'? I always viewed it the other way - that systems that come from consideration of the individual's rights were right-wing and those that are based in a society's rights were left-wing.

Either way, it's interesting how we ended up with the same conclusion, reasoning from what appears to me to be two strongly contrasting points of origin.
64 posted on 09/30/2003 7:58:30 AM PDT by thoughtomator (Right Wing Crazy #5338526)
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To: thoughtomator
The Enlightenment Era philosophers drew as much as they could from the Christian and classical traditions but out of arrogance long to write a story that did not include God and namely Christ. They seemed comfortable with the Creator of All Things, but many of them (Jefferson) struggled with the issue of faith in Christ.

The divide comes on theories of self-government, the nature of government, and the pragmatic 'then how shall we live?' I continue to believe that liberty is best protected through the smallest political units possible through a system of checks and balance, and see little value in an exercise of Libertarian ideology that can only generate political support for one side or the other based on whose side has the better wordsmiths at that moment in time.

One of the useful tests on this subject is local control. Recently, the Supreme Court determined that Texas could not have a certain set of laws in their town-- left-libertarians cheered a great victory. The government should not be in the bedroom, they said.

A rightwing libertarian abhors the process, a supra-state over-ruling a local political entity, a microcosm for almost all that ails us.

As a rightwing libertarian, what is your view on Lincoln?

(These 'things' can get heated, but try to imagine us sitting on the bar stools in an honest attempt to try to better understand each others position.)

69 posted on 09/30/2003 8:21:12 AM PDT by JohnGalt (Attention Pseudocons: Wilsonianrepublic.com is still available)
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