Reply #8: Around 1980...

[sendero]

..... my mother in law (of my first wife, she was a librarian) gave me a book "How I Found Freedom in an UnFree World". It was written by Harry Browne, and at the time I had no real interest in politics and little understanding of how the world worked.

It was pretty much a Libertarian manifesto, full of explanations as to why unions were unnecessary and bad, and how government stuck its nose way too deep into the business affairs of men.

One of its main prescriptions was to basically ignore the law and do whatever, the theory being that the chances of getting caught lying about your taxes or pulling various other little business/tax frauds was very low. Thankfully, I'm not that kind of person and I ignored his advice.

I have to admit that at the time some of his ideas were pretty seductive. I still retain a basic fondness for the "ideals" of Libertarianism, that government should do the minimum necessary. the problem is in defining what is "necessary". Because human nature is what it is, it will always be necessary for a Democratic government to level the playing field a bit economically, or the concentration of wealth and power will become toxic. Oh, it already has. Too bad.