Paranoid, Me?

Via Julie over at Kittie Kounters. This.

Wilentz claims that far from being “truth-telling comrades intent on protecting the state and the Constitution from authoritarian malefactors,” they “despise the modern liberal state, and they want to wound it.”

Whoa! Hold your horses there! What precisely is a modern liberal state? Because, you see, I’d like to see one of those. What we have is far from liberal. What we have is a state – and the USA ain’t that far behind – that likes to spy on us, to regulate what we eat, drink, smoke, say and do and tax us to penury into the bargain. That is not – very much not – liberal. It is something else entirely. To describe the vermin that sit on the green benches in Westminster (or on Capitol Hill) for example as liberal is to demean the word, it is to twist it beyond all recognition – it is, in fact, Orwellian – freedom is slavery and all that. It is not – not even close, to being liberal in any sane examination of the English language.

Wilentz gives credit to Richard Hofstadter for the term “paranoid libertarianism,” but he is being generous.

Yeah, ’coz pointing out that the state is spying on us; is deeply malevolent, taxes us till the pips squeak and shits out liberty-reducing legislation like a lager lout after a night on the curry is a sign of mental illness. Of course, it is so easy to claim that those who disagree are mentally ill – we can be written off more easily rather than actually, er, you know, look a little more closely at the points we are making.

Sunstein goes on to list the five points that make up paranoid libertarianism:

A sense of exaggeration – the risk are over stated.

In practice, of course, the risk might be real. But paranoid libertarians are convinced of its reality whether or not they have good reason for their conviction.

The risks are real, though. We see it with every liberty-reducing new law, we see it every time the health fascists manage to get the government to listen to their latest bit of control freakery (for flying fuck’s sake, these scumbags are seriously trying to ban smoking in privately owned vehicles – in what way is this over stated?) and the language changes subtly – we now have for example, obesity epidemics or a laziness pandemic as if these things are communicable diseases and those who dare to question the orthodoxy of the day are labelled deniers. This is not imagined, it is real, it is happening now and the evidence is all around us. This is not paranoia, it is observable reality.

The second characteristic is a presumption of bad faith on the part of government officials — a belief that their motivations must be distrusted.

Trust is a two-way street. So far throughout my adult life I have witnessed untrustworthy behaviours on the part of legislators from all parties. They lie and cheat – and when caught out doing it, lie even more. They will say one thing to get elected and do the opposite when in power – remember, folks, a manifesto promise is not binding, we have a legal precedent to say so. It keeps happening. To trust them would be insanity. They are lying, thieving charlatans and in pointing this out, I am not the one with mental health problems.

The third characteristic is a sense of past, present or future victimization. Paranoid libertarians tend to believe that as individuals or as members of specified groups, they are being targeted by the government, or will be targeted imminently, or will be targeted as soon as officials have the opportunity to target them.

Bollocks. Rampant cockwaffle. Piffle on stilts with jangly bits. This is a blatant logical fallacy – poisoning the well. We are a bunch of crazies so our concerns can be written off as the deluded rantings of a mentally ill minority.

The fourth characteristic is an indifference to trade-offs — a belief that liberty, as paranoid libertarians understand it, is the overriding if not the only value, and that it is unreasonable and weak to see relevant considerations on both sides.

More bollocks. Benjamin Franklin said all that needs to be said on this one. Liberty is not a trade-able commodity. While there might on occasion be a balance to be struck, we are way past that point. I for one, do not want to trade my liberty for the protection of the state – not least because our biggest risks do not arise from some mythical terrorists who might blow us all up, rather those risks are in the form of the state as it seeks to grab ever more power over us. I’ll take the risk of terrorism if it’s all the same, thanks.

The fifth and final characteristic is passionate enthusiasm for slippery-slope arguments.

Yeah, ’cos the slippery slope is just a logical fallacy isn’t it? And what about tobacco control? After being told that tobacco is a unique product, we see the health fascists wheeling out the same template for other products – only lately we are seeing it being proposed for sugar. We refer to the slippery slope precisely because it is Teflon coated with olive oil drizzled over it just for good measure.

There’s an old saying about paranoia and Sunstein mentions it in his risible article – just becuse I’m paranoid, it doesn’t mean they aren’t out to get me. Sunstein may think we are paranoid – and in doing so says more about himself than he does about us – but the problems we rail against are real enough. In fact, he even ends up admitting it, which leaves me wondering what the whole ad hominen is designed to achieve.

But, then, this is the arsehole who wants to nudge us and he can nudge right off. I am not easily nudged.