Morality Central Planners: Rick Santorum is one of them. Ron Paul is not.

The greatest example of the difference between Libertinism and Libertarianism is Ron Paul. He lives his life according to “conservative” principles but the big difference between him and others running for president, especially Rick Santorum, is that Ron Paul doesn’t believe that the force of government should be used to dictate how a person lives.

Libertinism is the practice of living a lifestyle of behaviors that characterized by self-indulgence or lack of restraint.

Libertarianism is as Leonard Read put it “anything peaceful”. Stated differently everyone has a God-given (Rick Santorum would like that) or Natural Right to their life, liberty, and their justly acquired property. And you can act in any manner you choose as long as it doesn’t violate the Natural Rights of others.

The difference between the two philosophies has to do with self-responsibility. Libertinism was a philosophy of the wealthy, usually the Nobility which stole the wealth of the citizens to fund their debacherous life. It was built upon force. A lot like the Politicians in this country live.

Libertarianism is a philosophy based upon voluntarism. You can live the life you want but you reap the consequences. No bailouts are to be expected with Libertarianism because each individual is responsible for their actions. So even if someone models themselves as Libertine and they spend money earned on the Free Market, they are free to live as they please as long as their actions are consensual with other individuals.

Rick Santorum is a Morality Central Planner. He believes that individualism is the greatest sin on Earth. He doesn’t believe that individuals have a right to live they way they choose. If you believe you can tell someone who they can’t marry then the logical conclusion of that train of thought is that you can determine who you can marry. That should scare the crap out of any American.

If you believe you can tell someone how to behave in the bedroom, then you believe you have the right to tell them how to live in their living room, kitchen, bathroom and at their job. If you belive that the force of government should be used to implement your idea of Utopia there is no end to the “good” that you will seek to do. Isabel Patterson called them “Humanitarians with Guillotines”. And that is where this kind of thinking in the course of human history has ended up producing, millions and millions of corpses of individuals who stood in the way of the Morality Central Planners.

If you resist you die. That is the fundamental relationship between those who disagree with the edicts coming out of Washington. Think about that for a second. If you are a dude and want to marry another dude, Rick Santorum would use the Power of the Federal Government to prevent you from doing that. And the force of government means forcing individuals to act in a certain way at the barrel of a gun.

Ron Paul in his personal life believes in traditional marriage, but that’s for him. He doesn’t believe that abortion is a good idea but doesn’t believe that the Federal Government has any authority to regulate individual behavior. That is the key difference between Ron Paul and all the other major candidates.

Ron Paul and the founding father’s knew you can not and should not regulate morality. Within a Free Market economy without the back stop of Government and the absence of Bailouts the behaviors and virtues needed to succeed will be determined by the Free Market. Stated differently certain behaviors will produce success and others will not. Those who demonstrate the successful behaviors will prosper and those who do not will not.

The traditional values of hard work, saving, being honest, having integrity are not in my opinion necessarily religious concepts but rather Market driven behaviors that gives individuals the best possible chance at success when voluntarily exchanging with other individuals for mutual benefit.

These same virtues that are necessary for “trade” also produce an environment of “peace”. Rick Santorum doesn’t believe in Free Trade, Individualism, or Peace. He believes that he is on a Mission from God to institute his “Vision of America and to Promote Family, Faith, and Freedom”.

Ron Paul believes that we are all individuals who are self-responsible. Rick Santorum and the other candidates do not. Ron Paul views the Government is the Problem not the solution.

Not only is it antithetical to individualism to use the power of force to regulate individual’s peaceful behavior, the mechanism, The Federal Government, which the Morality Central Planners want to use to enforce their version is the opposite of every “Moral Code” ever set down by man.

The basic tenets of just about every Moral Code has three things in common; Don’t kill, Don’t steal and don’t Life. Most Americans would agree with that. Then why in the world would they put their faith in Politicians to use the Force of the Federal Government to Legislate Morality?

All Governments that have ever existed have lived upon three  anti-life “virtues”: Lying, Stealing and Killing. Those are not necessarily the virtues I would ascribe to an “Omnipotent” entity who knows what’s best for me and my family. So when people talk about “traditional” values or using the Federal Government to “Promote Faith and Family” remember that the Federal Government of the United States of America is the largest thief in the world, spends hundreds of millions of dollars on lies and propaganda each year and is going around the world killing and maiming people at will.

That is not my idea of “Moral”.

Ron Paul  wants to limit the Federal Government back down to the Constitution. He wants to limit the interference that the Federal Government can perpetrate  in the lives of individuals in this country and around the world.

Rick Santorum and the others want to expand the power of the Federal Government to limit your choices of how you live your life. He wants to use the Lying, Stealing, Killing Leviathan to do that. Libertarianism or Radical Individualism relies on peaceful persuasion to sell the ideas of Liberty. But Rick Santorum and the others candidates want to use force to get others to accept their ideas. This is what caused the deaths of 170 million people in the last century when these individuals resisted the ideas of the collectivist countries they lived in.

Moral Regulation is very insidious. If a man thinks he can tell me how to live he can tell me when I should die. It doesn’t matter if he claims to “value life”. Because he doesn’t. A man is alive because he can think for himself and be able to choose how to live best according to his values. Rick Santorum will not be our next president. But the push he is getting is dangerous because the front-runners, not including Ron Paul will trend his way in order to get Santorum voters.

When Rick Santorum talks about using the Federal Government to promote Faith and Family, he is also talking about increasing your taxes. He’ll do that by having the Federal Reserve Print money out of thin air causing inflation, (a stealth tax that destroys the dollars in your pocket), or by borrowing from foreign countries, which will necessitate raising taxes in the future, or by raising them now.

It boils down to do you believe that you own yourself. Do you believe that others should tell you how to live. Do you believe that the Federal Government which is a lying, stealing, killing machine should tell you who to love and how to love.

I am an individual. I don’t need anyone telling me how to live. When people hear LIbertarian, they think Libertinism, or anything goes mentality. I think it speaks more to the person who thinks that than to the reality of living in a Libertarian Society. I heard a quote that the “nicer the guy, the darker the sexual secrets”.
Maybe that is why a lot of these “Christian Conservatives” are scared to live in a free society because they are scared that they won’t be able to control themselves. I don’t know, all I know is I want to be free and the only way to do that is help other people see that Liberty is the only way that individuals can express their uniqueness and uncover develop their potential.

What worries me too is that people like Rick Santorum feel like they have a lock on the truth. That is scary. He believes he is on a holy crusade to return America back to Faith and Family. The first thing anyone who claimed that as their mission should eliminate 90% of the Federal Government over night. That would be the best way to accomplish what he claims to want to do. If you reduce taxes by 90%, if you get rid of all regulations and get government out of people’s lives then people can get back to the business of living instead of serving the Federal Government. This gives each of us the best chance at glimpsing our small piece of the “truth” in our own lives.

Ron Paul doesn’t believe in any type of Central Planning. He believes the Central Planning of the Federal Reserve should end, he believes the Central Planning of Education should end,  and He definitely believes that the Federal Government has no Authority to be the Morality Central Planning force in America.

Brad Miller

AdvocateofLiberty