South Pol

Progressivism and the battle of ideas

Jeffmiller defends Libertarianism and emphasizes its points of overlap with Progressivism (which we’re treating rather loosely here). He then insists that Libertarians are not bad people, and that while acknowledging the world is imperfect they oppose things like progressive health care reform out of a belief that it will result in worse outcomes. Specifically, more people will die.

We don’t oppose the government healthcare because we’re cold and heartless; we oppose it because we care about people.

I believe Jeff is sincere. And I believe such motives may indeed apply to a nontrivial number of libertarians. I just don’t think that this is the motivation of many of the people standing (from my perspective) in the way of reforming our health care system in a way that makes things better off for more people.  I don’t think that the defence of the free market I hear from Jeff comes from the same place as the (nominally identical) version coming from the insurance executives testifying on Capitol Hill.

I find the attempts to excuse the failings of the American health care system laughable. I have lived overseas. I have friends in other countries. The voices saying “America is too fundamentally different” and “all those places with ‘socialized’ medicine are worse off,’ etc… those voices sound to me like the pleadings of the status quo.

If I didn’t ascribe to Jeff good faith, the hypothetical provocation that “Your progressive health care proposal will kill a lot of people” would seem rather like fighting words, especially considering the demonstrable agony the lack of an acceptable system already creates in this country, and the fact that a substantial majority of the people who live here want the debacle of a system reformed.

My point wasn’t that libertarians are evil people. It’s that the nature of  progressives’ causes puts them in conflict with conservative tendencies to glorify the status quo, and that in America, The Church of the Free Market happens to be a sect of the Church of the Status Quo.

Me saying that “Free Market Forever!!!” is the hammer to a constellation of policy decisions that include many things which are not nails should not be construed as me not believing in the free market, or that Libertarians are evil, etc. And Obama saying he won the election is not the same as progressives being able to declare victory in the contest of ideals.

Progressivism seeks not to create utopia, but to ever strive for it. To quote Teddy Roosevelt, “A great democracy must be progressive or it will soon cease to be a great democracy.” We must fight to make things better in the face of the violent inertia of the status quo. That is why you will never, ever find a true progressive who says the battle is won.