Nate,
I appreciate your challenge. You're very reasoned and thought-provoking; both of which qualities are seriously lacking in any other refutation I've seen of Ron Paul's ideas.
That said, I'll briefly (yeah, right) state the areas where I oppose your points.
Foreign aid, when provided by tax dollars is something I'm against in any form. Dennis Praeger's colleague, Michael Medved, agrees that we shouldn't send foreign aid to Israel or any other country and he, too, is a Jew. His brother lives in Israel.
My opposition is easily stated and is the entire basis for my "libertarianism," which I'd rather call classical liberalism; it's this: I'm absolutely against the initiation of force. Force is for defense, only. While I hold all manner of moral standards and feelings of my own, it is wrong for me to force anyone to live to those standards. If anyone violates my individual unalienable rights, that's when I'll employ force. Barring that, I'll live and let live. When the govt points a gun at me and takes money I've earned, I don't care what wonderful things they're going to spend it on, it's legalized mugging. Now, if individuals, churches or charities want to give money to people overseas, great. Certainly we should all do this. But it should be voluntary. And that includes the freedom to not volunteer one's own money or help or what have you.
You said, the "police provide security and a safe environment." I disagree. I like the saying, employed by pro gun rights people, "When seconds count, the police are only minutes away." I believe in self-defense. The police have their place and I'm grateful for their work. But the illusion that anyone can provide safety or security is what has fed and abetted the progressive movement for 150 years. The police are great, but they're really there to arrest the criminal after the crime's been committed and safety and security have flown the coup. I can see how getting that guy off the street keeps him from doing it again and that could keep potential victims safe, but the damage to current victims is done. Where there's freedom, there's risk. And besides, we're paying for our local police. Do foreign nations pay for our world policing services? Nope. We're forced to pay for them, too. Our military is to protect and defend our constitution; to defend US. Other countries must work out their own defense. Again, any individual can volunteer to go over and help or teach or even fight for people in foreign countries. I just think our interests or more especially, our security, the threat to us, must be specifically defined when we commit troops, and sometimes it's not. Ron Paul wants congress to approve military action and maybe even declare war before action is taken. That doesn't seem too radical to me.
I shudder a little when you refer to "using our influence for good." Certainly, like many things, the decision to use violence / force must be considered on a case by case basis and there are many things to consider. It's hard for me to argue against WWII and fighting Hitler, etc. Again, I just want to begin with the idea that we must have a specific threat to the U.S., which we're combating, which is the reason we're putting blood and treasure on the line. And then, we should declare war and get the people's approval through congress. As far as the good done in Korea and Vietnam. Good for them. But where was the good for us? Where was the threat to us? Communism seemed to be spreading, but I think free trade did more to defeat it than our wars by proxy or the rest of the cold war.
Individuals must be responsible for themselves. People aren't children. We must treat them as adults. Even when it comes to our kids, I think we parents intervene too much. I think we initiate force too much. Although intervention and initiative force are sometimes called for. I sometimes neglect my kids. I've even spanked them. I'd sure be upset if you or the state intervened. And my kids wouldn't be well served if I were taken out of the home. A stronger argument than that would be, if I got into an argument with one of my brothers. Do you think you should intervene and come to my defense, even if I'm having my rear end handed to me? It's none of your business. Win or lose, I've got to face it myself. Only then am I allowed the maximum growth opportunity. Even if I get beat up by my brother, I can't see an argument for you showing up at his house and exacting revenge. Now, if our argument and/or fisticuffs somehow spill over onto your property, it then becomes your business as far as your right to forcibly remove us from your property because we've then initiated force against you by violating your individual unalienable right to own and control property. And I'd make all of these same arguments to counter your Alphatown vs. Betaville scenario.
As far as our justice system being racist, I don't agree with Ron Paul there. The only flaw I see in the numbers argument is that it still appears that blacks, as a percentage of the whole population, are over-represented in our prisons and executions. That is, if 20% of our population are black, yet 30% of the total number of prison inmates are black, then they're over-represented. But I'd say that it's because they commit more crimes, as a percentage, than whites. That said, there are a variety of what I would call racisim-inducing statistics on blacks. Couple that with the fact that 90% of them voted for Obama and that they appear to be happy to be represented by Sharpton, Jackson and Rev. Wright and it becomes difficult indeed to not make a few generalizations. If you look at a couple of them individually, like Walter E. Williams and Thomas Sowell, not to mention Clarence Thomas and Condi Rice and the list goes on.., Larry Elder; anyway, there are many exceptions to the evident rule. That is, the rule as evidenced by the statistics and voting records. I've read at least some of the "racist" text in Ron Paul's newsletters and didn't find much to disagree with based on the arguments I just made. It does seem like there are some generalizations that can be made. However, I view people as individuals and it would be ignorant of me to assume anything if I met a black man. I would have to get to know him as an individual; like any other individual.
Anyway, maybe in closing I can just restate my libertarian ideology.
As long as no one's individual, unalienable rights are being violated, let people do what they may. That includes drugs and prostitution. Both are abhorrent and completely immoral. But I have no right to force anyone to do or not do anything, even if I think what he's doing is wrong and bad for him. Gay marriage comes to mind. I've stated in my blog why I oppose it and how I think it hurt kids' best chances for the best rearing. But I can't hold a gun to anyone's head and keep him from having sex with whomever. Persuasion, yes. Force, no. Abortion, of course, can be argued on the same basis albeit from the other side. Sure, a woman's body is her private property and she has an individual unalienable right to it. But an unborn baby, too, has that right to his own body and life. If someone leaves a helpless newborn baby on my doorstep, that baby is on my private property but I can't kill it. I really don't see the difference; what, a thin layer of skin, muscle, fat and other tissue separates the two scenarios from each other? I don't buy it. In both cases, you have a baby being deprived of its right to life. I may not want the baby I find on my porch but I can't kill it.
I know government is necessary and that money from taxes is needed. I just start from the basis of national defense being the only legitimate use of govt and that there's no need for the defenders to do anything at all unless we're attacked and that happens only rarely. If we could start the national debate there, it would be great. But when the other candidates talk of "repairing" the social safety net instead of tearing it down, I know we're not even applying the brakes of our careering car as it heads toward the cliff. Let's give to the poor, I love education and healthcare for those who can't afford it. Just let freedom reign by making all of the funding for those programs, whether foreign or domestic, be voluntary, through individuals, churches and charities. It's satanic for the govt to seek to destroy our agency.
