I had the unequalled pleasure of being on “A Jeremy West Show” for the late-January 2006 edition. For those of you that are unfamiliar (probably meaning all of you, unless you are me and you are reading your own post or are Jeremy himself) with Jeremy West, he is a libertarian that isn’t tied down by the idealogues (ie. marijuana-and-firearms-for-all activists) of the party, but simply would like to open a discussion on how we can solve problems without bringing the federal government into it. The show is a podcast, and I was the first caller I think. I called last year in the summer, but Jeremy got married and moved to Australia in the interim, so I guess I’ll let the delay slide.
Here’s the podcast episode: Park Place.
To Jeremy:
I had an idea while listening to some of your solutions.
(Reviewing)
The Problem: Under a libertarian model, how can we preserve and continue to enjoy public parks/beaches without constantly paying fees or a membership, and without a government to tax us to groom and maintain the grounds?*
I’ve heard your ideas on this and other problems and had an idea of my own that is a more general idea about the different fiscal ideologies on the opposite sides of the political spectrum. I know that you aren’t a parrot simply repeating official opinions of the libertarian party, so your views don’t always necessarily coincide with the party’s. With that in mind, I must say that I am hearing a significant amount of solutions that rely somewhat on citizen volunteerism. One idea to the problem at hand that you put out for discussion was to allow private citizens the opportunity to donate land and resources so that there could be free public parks. Your example of the gentleman in Washington who attempted to do so but got snared in gobs of (was it state or federal?) red tape and taxes was alarming. Our current system makes volunteerism for private citizens difficult at times. A more privatized society would definately facilitate good will. Another solution you mentioned in a previous episode had to do with firefighters. Where would we be without government funded firefighters? Volunteer firefighters would have to be employed to put out the fires of those who are too poor to hire firefighters.
Of course, the idea is that we would all keep the money that we currently lose in federal and state taxes; money which currently makes its way through many beaurocratic hands and falls into many administrative nooks and crannies (those of which even an english muffin would covet), a self-consuming system designed to pay as many unecessary people as possible to give us back mediocre goods and services; a non-competative system with little to no incentive to innovate or increase effeciency unless there is self-initiation, or volunteerism. This system that the United States has slowly adopted over the decades of course is a form of socialism, the opposite end of the fiscal spectrum from privatization.
The point is that although the two extreme sides are truly polarized, privatization (libertarianism) and socialism (liberalism) rely on a similar element to work: volunteerism, also known as love, an ironic conclusion considering that privatization has always been thought to go hand-in-hand with the idea that selfishness is society’s greatest virtue.
I now apologize for the gross generalizing that occured for me to make my general point.
Let us also admit for the records that if we had to choose one extreme or the other, privatization would work better if there is no love on Earth, God forbid.
Thank You Jeremy
*the latter solution being less efficient and ultimately more costly than private fees/memberships.
