Conservatives have sacrificed their right to grandstand on... well... rights

I fear we're always one President and two Supreme Court Justices away from forced Christianity. It seems like some of the people we're talking about would love to see that happen, sadly. Luckily for the rest of us, however, there is always revolution ;)

I think grandstanding can serve a purpose when it's done with virtuous intentions at heart. When someone is doing it with the hopes of raising awareness on an issue that a lobbyist isn't paying them for... which sadly doesn't happen very often. I feel like most politicians go to law school, but they minor in theater, and that's the bigger problem. It's not that they grandstand on the important stuff, but that they do it on all of the stuff.

gay marriage...check...abortion, check, polygamy....check...prostitution...check...legalize all drugs....check....keep the fruits of your labor...check.

And there's where you lose me. Most drugs aren't as simple as pot. They're deadly and excrutiating and addictive to the point where not just one life is ruined, but all of the lives around it are as well. The freedom to use a drug is a moot point when the drug itself is the most totalitarian substance around. And when a drug addict murders and steals to get them more drugs, then you start infringing on the freedoms of others.

Polygamy is a fancy word for forced religious sex slavery. Women are forced, mentally and emotionally and even physically, into involuntary bondage, where their only purpose is cranking out babies and cleaning after the man. Religion is used to terrify these women into whatever the guy wants. That's not liberty. It's slavery. The polar opposite of freedom.

And in keeping the fruits of your labor, you're saying the government has no need for money whatsoever. So you'd privatize the military? The police? You'd strip away every government regulation under the sun, right down to traffic signs and safety standards for the food we eat? At what point does the ideal Libertarian government become an anarchist state with no government at all? No one seems to be able to point at that line and tell me where it is.

who cares which one is worse....alcohol, pot, cocaine, heroin, shrooms....it doesnt matter if one is more dangerous....its about freedom and INDIVIDUAL RIGHTS.

But the substance itself infringes on your right to life. Heroin is the worst of the ones you mentioned, as far as I'm aware anyway. Have you ever seen someone use heroin without their entire life falling victim to it? They become a slave to the drug itself. That's not freedom.

I would never advocate involuntary contracts.....voluntary ones...yes.

Head out to Utah where those Mormon polygamist sects still exist, and ask one of their "sister wives" if they're married voluntarily. They'll look around sheepishly and nod their head slowly, of fear of the wrath of God, or their husband... whichever is worse. If you ask the polygamist wife, or the heroin addict, or a labor slave, or a prostitute if they like their boss, whether it be a husband, or a narcotic, or a master, or a pimp, they're going to say "yes, and please sir, may I have another?" That's not freedom. It's slavery in each and every case.

we dont need a federal income tax...all that does is fuel war....along with the fiat money system.

we went most of our existence without it....its not needed.....

We also went most of our existence as a nation without a population exceeding 100 million, let alone 300 million. We went without highways. Without food and drug safety regulations that have saved more lives than anyone could hope to count. Without Federal grants that gave us the computers we're talking on, the Internet we're talking through, and the medicine that keeps us talking whatsoever, and the air traffic control that lets us do that without the fear of a plane crashing through our windows. The Federal government spends that money doing stuff for us that we couldn't ever dream of doing ourselves. Not all of it of course, and that's a problem that I think liberals, conservatives, and libertarians can all agree on. But most of our tax dollars go to worthwile causes, when the government is doing well anyway.

We will never experience a libertarian government. The reason is pretty simple: the vast majority of Americans would never go for it. The truth is that most Americans like regulations. They like having the ability to walk into a store and buy something off the shelf, knowing the government has taken steps to ensure its safety. They like knowing that dangerous drugs are harder to get, because most of us would never want to even try something like heroin, and it's a comfort to know that heroin addicts can't walk into a drug store and walk out with a weapon of mass destruction, which is the only way one can really describe something like heroin. People like order, they like regulations, they like what the Federal government does for them. They stop liking it when it stops working the way they expect it to work.

Libertarians believe they have a moral high ground as well. Whenever a person starts to believe that their system is the best, that their horse is the only one that can win the race, and/ or that everyone else is delusional or evil or authoritarian, they start infringing on others. If you were King for a day, I would be afraid to leave my house each morning, because a society without regulation, or law and order, isn't a society at all. You can call that freedom if you want, but the rest of us? We'll call it something else.