Rules of Thumb

I wrote these for someone else a few weeks ago.

Any non-libertarian will support libertarian principles only so long as their political opponents are in power. Such support will cease once they or their political allies have power when the empowerment of the state (and hence themselves or their allies) will take priority over any previously libertarian positions they held.

The rhetoric of any political group not currently holding sway over the reigns of power will closely match libertarians regardless of their previous rhetoric or current ideological stance.

A person's opposition to state repression grows with the level of state repression they are experiencing. A person with authority over state repression will not repress themselves and hence have little or no opposition to the state repression of others.

No person is an absolute libertarian. Any person will support the repression of others in some circumstances. The ideology that determines which circumstances differentiate most political groups and are the primary guage of libertarianism.

I'm reposting them because of this. It's become fairly common lately to declare oneself a moderate. Being a moderate means nothing though. Anything other than sitting on the fence makes you an extremist. Being 'moderate' on one issue doesn't make you 'moderate' on any others. Being a moderate just means you're calling yourself a moderate (or someone else is).

You can think instapundit is bad for drinking puppy milkshakes, but it doesn't prevent you from thinking frank j is good or bad for drinking kitten milkshakes unless you're acting off of ideological principles. Principles that lead to a 'moderate' position will lead to extremist positions in other circumstances. Circumstances have a way of tripping people up, and why people who have a guiding principle of being seen as 'moderate' seem to flip-flop on everything.

Philosophical labels don't mean much either. Every socialist varient pretends to be the one true path, and claims to have nothing in common with the others. Anarchists supported the imposition of police states in Eastern Europe.

Have principles, explain them, but calling yourself a moderate doesn't tell anyone any more than posting internet quiz results that show which south park character you'd most likely lose a knife fight to.

Goe, not moderate.