Saturday, October 26, 2013

The case for progressive-libertarian cooperation

The Case for Progressive-Libertarian Cooperation | Mediaite - Clarke Ruper, Vice President, Students for Liberty:

October 24, 2013 - "This Saturday, October 26, privacy advocates from across the country will gather in Washington, DC for a Rally Against Mass Surveillance.... Students For Liberty, an international network of libertarian student groups, is proud to be a part of this coalition on such a critical issue.

"However, a recent Salon article by Tom Watson argues that libertarians ought not be allowed into this coalition because we are not progressives. While it is true that libertarians aren’t progressives, Watson does not provide a convincing argument for why that should prevent our working together. Libertarians and progressives share many core values, including tolerance, fairness, respect for human rights, and privacy, to name a few. We both envision a world of opportunity and justice, free from the abuses of power which have become far too common in the modern age.

"What Watson fails to realize is that libertarianism is not a philosophy of the right or left. We are actually a radically centrist coalition ourselves. Not beholden to any political party, from the center we can hold both sides accountable for their abuse of power. The past thirteen years of the Bush and Obama administrations have offered plenty of that to go around. Libertarians have been out in front on privacy issues, criticizing the Patriot Act from the beginning and pushing for reform ever since."

Read more: http://www.mediaite.com/online/the-case-for-progressive-libertarian-cooperation/
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