I know this sounds like a very radical concept but I encourage you to read about Rand’s philosophy of Objectivism.

Here are a few good places to start:

http://www.aynrand.org/site/PageServer?pagename=index

http://www.objectivistcenter.org/

http://capmag.com/
http://fpffressminds.blogspot.com/2008/02/john-galts-words-more-relevant-than.html
http://fpffressminds.blogspot.com/2008/02/john-galt-part-v-viii.html
http://fpffressminds.blogspot.com/2008/02/john-galt-part-ix-xii.html

We as a society need to not only fund social programs, education, and health care at the government level

Here’s an idea…why don’t you make that taxation voluntary? You and everyone else who want social programs can pay your tax dollars for it while everyone who doesn’t want the government running wealth redistribution programs can spend their money how they see fit.

Every person has much to offer in the way of taking care of his neighbor, but as long as we’re being played against one another and spoon-fed the myth of the rugged darwinian individualist all our attempts at creating a cohesive system are bound to fail.

You’re correct in that everyone has something to offer his neighbor, but then you veer off into a common fallacy that capitalism is a zero-sum game and undermine your own point. The free market does encourage neighbors to work together for mutual gain out of self-interest…it’s not exclusively predatory. Government programs, on the other hand, are entirely predatory since they are based on force. Check out Milton Friedman’s “Free to Choose” sometime, I think you’ll find it interesting.

Or, you might say our wisdom has become: “A stitch in time saves nine… but just imagine how much we can charge for those 9 stitches, Bob!”

We as a society need to not only fund social programs, education, and health care at the government level, but we need to be encouraged to get involved at the grass roots and become active citizens, taking responsibility for our communities and taking the time to understand the dynamics of our problems.

Every person has much to offer in the way of taking care of his neighbor, but as long as we’re being played against one another and spoon-fed the myth of the rugged darwinian individualist all our attempts at creating a cohesive system are bound to fail.

Oh the horrors of “socialized” medicine. Yep, we should link it right up there with socialized fire protection and crime protection.

I can’t speak for other people, but exactly how well does the police service work? What is the average crime solving rate? Instead, people who are really worried get a service like ADT or Lo-Jack to protect valuables, services akin to Aflac and other supplemental insurance coverage. Sure, a lot of people can’t afford to buy ADT or Aflac, but if we stopped forcing police to patrol the roads and instead focus on crimes (not to mention all the useless drug stings) and we had insurance companies focus on lowering costs instead of trying to cover everybody and their brother for procedures they will never need (I can safely say I don’t need ovarian cancer coverage on me), maybe the police would solve more crimes, protect more people, and more people might be able to afford to protect themselves from health disasters. But, that last thought gets into the definition of “insurance,” which must be the topic of another comment.

When did selfishness become a virtue?

And following in tarran’s line of thought, what, exactly have the people who want socialized medicine done for me or any other taxpayer that entitles them to get free health care at our expense? Especially considering that we also pay taxes for welfare, Social Security, Medicare, food subsidies, and any number of other programs that most people with jobs will never use.

I think we’ve been quite charitable to a group people who like to whine a lot about “selfish” taxpayers who are working jobs to support complete strangers at little or no benefit to themselves. It’s not our fault that the solutions poor people are always demanding are flawed and incompetently executed because they depend on the government to run them.

If you like Europe’s socialized medicine so much, I suggest you go live there.

http://www.thelibertypapers.org/2007/08/01/you-like-europes-health-care-so-much-then-go-live-there/

We libertarians feel it is immoral to seize other people’s property to satisfy our desires and wants. You, on the other hand, are advocating the opposite: demanding that people be forced to pay for your medical care.

We’re not the selfish ones.

Only if you think politicians are better able to make your medical decisions than you are.

It amazes me how in such a short period, your mind jumped to that analogy.

It was a pretty easy link to make, since when the government gets control over your medical decisions, it’s just a matter of time before they start choosing who “deserves” to get medical care (and therefore who gets to live or die)…just like the Nazis did to their “undesirables”.

HA!!! Godwin’s Law again…take that, Medical Nazis :)

Libertarians don’t want to “run” anything but their own lives.

Yup…”leave me the hell alone” does indeed work as a governing principle when it’s directed from the individual towards the government. The world would be far better off if people focused more on their own lives instead of trying to run everyone else’s.

Libertians need to run their own state; get a little practical experience. See how well their “if an only if” premises work.

Yeah because you collectivists, socialists, and authoritarians have done such a wonderful job running things! Libertarians couldn’t do any worse. Liberty works whenever it’s tried.

BTW, the entire purpose of this blog is not so much that “Libertarians should run their own state” but to create a state where individuals “run” their own lives with minimal interference from the state. Libertarians don’t want to “run” anything but their own lives.

Libertians need to run their own state; get a little practical experience. See how well their “if an only if” premises work.