Another aspect of why he's wrong on this point is that we've narrowed the debate to just talking through the frame of party politics...

Which means we have narrowed the discussion to only talking about right-libertarianism... which the Libertarian Party would fall under (though some Libertarian Party voters I know out in california are Left-Libertarians...)

The Standford Encylopedia of Philosophy has a good discussion of this in its Libertarianism entry...

"Libertarianism is often thought of as “right-wing” doctrine. This, however, is mistaken for at least two reasons. First, on social—rather than economic—issues, libertarianism tends to be “left-wing”. It opposes laws that restrict consensual and private sexual relationships between adults (e.g., gay sex, non-marital sex, and deviant sex), laws that restrict drug use, laws that impose religious views or practices on individuals, and compulsory military service. Second, in addition to the better-known version of libertarianism—right-libertarianism—there is also a version known as “left-libertarianism”. Both endorse full self-ownership, but they differ with respect to the powers agents have to appropriate unappropriated natural resources (land, air, water, etc.). Right-libertarianism holds that typically such resources may be appropriated by the first person who discovers them, mixes her labor with them, or merely claims them—without the consent of others, and with little or no payment to them. Left-libertarianism, by contrast, holds that unappropriated natural resources belong to everyone in some egalitarian manner. It can, for example, require those who claim rights over natural resources to make a payment to others for the value of those rights. This can provide the basis for a kind of egalitarian redistribution."

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/libertarianism/

Political philosophy and personal ideology is more dynamic and complex than the often messy coalitions, compromises, and lesser of two evil voting patterns that happen in american politics... so there isn't a good litmus test for what "Libertarians" look like in a two party system.

Plus people (especially americans) have a shoddy understanding of intellectual history... [insert an Edmund Burke quote here...]

I just found a good example... you wouldn't see this: Corporations versus the Market; or, Whip Conflation Now from Boortz "libertarians"

Where Roderick Long notes..."[c]orporations tend to fear competition, because competition exerts downward pressure on prices and upward pressure on salaries; moreover, success on the market comes with no guarantee of permanency, depending as it does on outdoing other firms at correctly figuring out how best to satisfy forever-changing consumer preferences, and that kind of vulnerability to loss is no picnic. It is no surprise, then, that throughout U.S. history corporations have been overwhelmingly hostile to the free market. Indeed, most of the existing regulatory apparatus—including those regulations widely misperceived as restraints on corporate power—were vigorously supported, lobbied for, and in some cases even drafted by the corporate elite.[1]

Corporate power depends crucially on government intervention in the marketplace.[2] This is obvious enough in the case of the more overt forms of government favoritism such as subsidies, bailouts,[3] and other forms of corporate welfare; protectionist tariffs; explicit grants of monopoly privilege; and the seizing of private property for corporate use via eminent domain (as in Kelo v. New London). But these direct forms of pro-business intervention are supplemented by a swarm of indirect forms whose impact is arguably greater still."

2010 looms largely.

Look at Texas and the idiotic things journalists like Chris Matthews says about their only motivation is being racist.

Listen to Prez Barry talk about "beaing false witness."

Watch and listen as the Dems In Power (DIPs) continue a fruitless march to categorize people into definable clumps of clay.

Today's themes are not new. Party loyalists will go on being such. Libertarians, in my experience, are true to a belief system - like conservatives and liberals and whatever real thinkers are out there.

The need to lump groups together is about identifying, isolating and attacking... The old Alinksy model. WE are all the enemy largely because we think rather than follow a poorly presented mantra.

I have found myself ignoring more public speakers & writers of all stripes simply because of the Us vs. Them mentality they preach.

The Us and the Them are WE. Individuals with God given intellect and ability to discern... just not the strategists and all too many pundits. All you can expect is they may get the facts straight before they begin to distort them.

Larry you sound so nihilistic!

when have humans ever not done these things? History repeats itself over and over again but there is nothing shocking or hopeless in this fact.

Improvements have come over time, through economic development, free flow of ideas, and democratic participation in the governing process (which is the most important check on the atuhoritarian power of the state that we have).

For instance at both UC Davis and GA State... the discussion on politics, political ideology, and party preference are a whole lot more dynamic than what is coming from talking heads and the blogosphere--where we see these kinds of litmus tests on how individuals vote.

One of the great things about the ivory tower is you get to go face to face with so many different views and opinions...

Also with meetups through Democracy for America and other groups some of the discussion groups have brought together a lot of people who one might cookie cutter into a right/left red/blue divide... who make more complex calculated decisions on whom to support, why they support them, and have they resolve such votes with their ideology...

thats why politics--the good kind--is always about building personal relationships debating the ideas, and walking through the what such policies and positions mean in the real world to real people.

Another thing I was thinking about last night larry is something Lindsey over at Cato talked a little about in his Liberaltarians piece:

"Libertarian disaffection should come as no surprise. Despite the GOP's rhetorical commitment to limited government, the actual record of unified Republican rule in Washington has been an unmitigated disaster from a libertarian perspective: runaway federal spending at a clip unmatched since Lyndon Johnson; the creation of a massive new prescription-drug entitlement with hardly any thought as to how to pay for it; expansion of federal control over education through the No Child Left Behind Act; a big run-up in farm subsidies; extremist assertions of executive power under cover of fighting terrorism; and, to top it all off, an atrociously bungled war in Iraq." http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=6800

Example would be the perscription drug benifit bill... I think first and foremost a libertarian position is going to be a removal of patent protections... but corporations wouldn't stand for it (rent seeking). The population wanted it--and hence you see the keep your government hands off my medicare (because its politically popular). The Republicans kept the federal government from using its purchasing power to lower the costs of those medications. So not only do you expand the federal government but you do so in the most expensive way possible--subsidizing corporations via tax payer dollers.

Economist Uwe E. Reinhardt reflected on the 2003 health care reform debates and notes that Democrats are much more fiscally responsible than Republicans in approaching reforms that american citizens are calling for, "American citizens — especially older ones — might keep this backdrop in mind as they behold and comment on the current administration’s and Congress’s travails to place the proposed health reforms of ’09 on a fiscally more responsible footing than was the M.M.A. ’03." http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/28/financing-health-care-reform-2009-vs-2003/

On the flipside look at Farm subsidies which has been devastating to poor people across the world who are starving to death because their crops are worthless due to a flood of subsidies coming out of the U.S. and Europe. The federal governments involvement in agriculture has been a huge perk for farmers proping up prices where it isn't necessisarily a good thing.

Democrats have been a huge backer of the farm industry which is big business and in many people eyes a needless intervention that weighs on the federal pocketbook only to help big, politically influential business.

So split government for most libertarians is seen as a good thing... policy is bought and sold. But you won't see a boortz libertarian calling for a free flow of labor... or a removal of protectionisms.