re: #19 Obdicut

{snip}The actual ideology of ‘libertarianism’— which is a category so broad it includes anarcho-capitalism and socialist libertarianism— is that the maximization of individual freedom is the greatest good.{snip}

Viewing freedom as a goal to be maximized seems to be contrary to the typical libertarian’s view that the possession of private property is an absolute right on a par with what we might consider to be the right not to have one’s life taken away. The right to private property creates absolute restrictions on the government’s behavior. (Robert Nozick called such rights “side-constraints”—meaning that whatever one’s goals might be, one is also constrained not to violate such rights.) If freedom were just a goal to be maximized, then you could take away one person’s freedom if that would lead to more overall freedom.

This an important distinction that is often not noticed (even if you yourself didn’t mean “goal” in that sense).