Comment Re:Libertarian nirvana (Score 1) 534
I think we'd actually agree that a sparse regulatory regime accompanied by men of honor would do a fine job. I just don't think we have enough men of honor these days for that to work
I'm glad you find a sparse regulatory regime desirable. But we don't agree on the "men of honor" thing. The role of government should be limited enough that it doesn't matter whether it's run by crooks.
Yours is the age-old confusion of progressives and intellectuals, the erroneous assumption that "government is a way in which you put unselfish and ungreedy men in charge of selfish and greedy men. But government is an institution whereby the people who have the greatest drive get power over their fellow men get in positions of controlling them." (Friedman)
I read "classical liberalism" as being very much laissez-faire, which we never totally had either
I didn't say we had it; I said it was the principle we should be striving towards, as opposed to striving towards progressivism. Actually, simply getting back to making federal spending less than 10% of GDP and prohibiting all branches of the federal government from keeping records on law-abiding citizens in any form would be a good start, both conditions that existed throughout most of our history.