Doc, Homless in LA

[_ajax18]

I tend to think what's being discussed by our board's, uh, whatever-he-is favors Left-Libertarianism because he's advocating more of what got SoCal into the mess it's in, and is in favor of securing your labor for the benefit of the people who are free to reproduce without end, take drugs in the street, and usher in more desperate people into an already desperate situation. I guess you Californians will just have to suck it up, throw more money at private organizations who are already solving the problem!

Can't you see all the wealth illegal immigration is bringing into the country in Markk's video?

[_EAllusion]

Let's see what the standard definition of 'libertariansim' is from Google:

an extreme laissez-faire political philosophy advocating only minimal state intervention in the lives of citizens.

Hrm. That's weird. That doesn't really square up with some people's, uh, unique view of Libertarianism. I wonder if Wikipedia would be a bit more helpful?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertari ... t_currents

Boy, it's sure hard for me to figure out which Libertarianism is the right one. I tend to think what's being discussed by our board's, uh, whatever-he-is favors Left-Libertarianism because he's advocating more of what got SoCal into the mess it's in, and is in favor of securing your labor for the benefit of the people who are free to reproduce without end, take drugs in the street, and usher in more desperate people into an already desperate situation. I guess you Californians will just have to suck it up, throw more money at private organizations who are already solving the problem!

But then again, I'm not really sure what our resident expert-on-everything thinks the solution is because he really doesn't offer solutions other than: More of your money to him so he can solve homelessness. Of course he doesn't believe private donors will step up to any relevant degree so I'm fairly certain it's up to the government to levy more taxes on you so he can fix what he advocates creating more of. It's the perfect job security position if you ask me...

- Doc

Minimal government intervention in people's lives is what you get when you are economically conservative and socially liberal. Minimal is not "none" and libertarianism does not collapse into its anarcho-capitalist subtype.

The view I expressed would not be out of place in Reason, the most important libertarian political publication or CATO, the most important libertarian think tank. Indeed, I specifically linked a podcast discussion among libertarians from libertarian organization CATO on libertarian support of universal basic income. It also would not be out of place among numerous important libertarian thinkers. I already mentioned one: Milton Friedman. The idea that the most influential and popular libertarian publications, think tanks, and scholars aren't really libertarian or don't know what libertarianism is because of some half-cocked reading of a wikipedia article certainly sounds like the hasty googling to confirm your biases that you are so fond of accusing others of.

The idea that libertarianism is a political label that describes relative economic conservativism and social liberalism is a popular stance among libertarians mostly famously expressed in the Nolan quadrant model of the political continuum. Libertarians stereotypically share this outlook through the "World's Smallest Political Quiz." which is designed to convince people that libertarianish thinking is more common than they might imagine. Studies that attempt to look at the prevalence of libertarian thinking in the US population typically measure it specifically by looking for the combination of economically conservative and socially liberal beliefs associated with libertarians (it's about 10-25% of the population depending on whose methods and definitions you favor). Maybe a little more hasty googling can lead to discovering that for yourself.

[_subgenius]

Can't you see all the wealth illegal immigration is bringing into the country in Markk's video?

well, tent stocks are certainly on the rise...

[_subgenius]

The homeless person, faced with a choice of involuntary patient care or community-supports, opts to take their medication.

Your post is a great example of fantasy. People suffering from psychosis don't share your A plus B must equal C rationale. In fact, most suffering from psychosis have an extreme inability to take medication. The reason "involuntary" care exists is because that "choice" does not exist for a psychosis sufferer. Once again you collage together some "makes sense to me" thoughts and prop it up as a sure-fire policy solution.
Your post over reached on this one, bub.

[_Analytics]

...But then again, I'm not really sure what our resident expert-on-everything thinks the solution is because he really doesn't offer solutions other than: More of your money to him so he can solve homelessness. Of course he doesn't believe private donors will step up to any relevant degree so I'm fairly certain it's up to the government to levy more taxes on you so he can fix what he advocates creating more of. It's the perfect job security position if you ask me.

Sarcasm aside, what is your solution?

Granted, the dynamics in the Midwest are a little different because housing is a bit cheaper and the winters are brutal. But even accounting for those things, you just don't see here what this video depicts as happening there. I know that if I go to the East Bottoms area of Kansas City I could probably find a few people living in tents. But other than that, the problem doesn't exist here--at least not in an out of control, visible way. I'm sure Maddison is similar.

So what are the solutions on the table?

Wait for private donors to step up and fix the problem?

Throw them all in jail?

Build a wall?

Something else?

It seems to me that what EA is suggesting ought to be categorized as practical Midwestern sensibilities that actually address the issue in a humane way for a relatively low price tag.

[_EAllusion]

Your post is a great example of fantasy. People suffering from psychosis don't share your A plus B must equal C rationale. In fact, most suffering from psychosis have an extreme inability to take medication. The reason "involuntary" care exists is because that "choice" does not exist for a psychosis sufferer. Once again you collage together some "makes sense to me" thoughts and prop it up as a sure-fire policy solution.
Your post over reached on this one, bub.

Most people who suffer from psychosis have an extreme inability to take medication? Oh yeah? Got a source on that?

I think you may have missed what was being said in that post though. Markk was asking how this works. I gave a single actual, real life example of how it actually is working. This isn't a proposal about some possible thing that might happen some day. It's what currently happens.

[_EAllusion]

Madison has a few thousand people who are homeless in any given year. At times the problem is more visible than others.

The causes are multivariate, but as I said before, the big issues are pervasive mental illness, AODA issues, and domestic violence especially as all three interface with poverty. Some people who are homeless are so on a persistent basis while others temporarily have a lapse in housing that is more quickly resolved.

I don't know how this per capita compares specifically to the area Markk is focusing on, but it would be wrong to say homelessness is unheard of in this cold Midwestern town.

For the past few years, there was a huge spike in homeless people panhandling with signs asking for help basically at every major intersection in city. What caused this is that a major day center shut down due to lack of funding and "Not in my back yardism." The homeless who had been taking advantage of it fanned out and developed a culture of hitting up intersections on busy streets. This made the problem way more visible. A brand new day center was brought back up just recently and the problem seems to have nearly vanished. We'll see what the warmer weather brings. What sucks is this resulted in more aggressive police response to homeless loitering, which ultimately is more costly than the day center and takes police resources away from other, more serious things.

[_EAllusion]

For what it is worth, the new day center I referred to is funded with a mixture of government grants and private donations and is operating on the cheap. I believe their front-line staff are all volunteers. Rumor has it that funding is already an on-going problem, but I don't know the specifics. Catholic charities runs the place.

I have zero doubt that a few dollars on the front end of a project like this saves money on more expensive interventions on the back end.

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

Sarcasm aside, what is your solution?

I've repeatedly posted solutions which are panned as racist, authoritarian, or anti-Libertarian. I believe my solutions are humane, compassionate, and fair. *shrugs*

Speaking of Libertarian, did the board know the United States Libertarian Party's first candidate for President of the United States, John Hospers, credited AYN RAND as a major force in shaping his own political beliefs.

So, I suppose if I'm a Libertarian, I can just view the homeless as savages and we should just rid ourselves of them in the most efficacious way, and create a new LA that rewards personal, objective, liberty.

- Doc

[_EAllusion]

Not all libertarians are Ayn Randian objectivists Doc. Most aren't. Ayn Rand herself didn't want to be called a libertarian, but she does fit within the political label's ordinary use. Some libertarians, especially decades ago, started out as Objectivists and moved on as they intellectually matured. Reason magazine, which I referenced earlier, gets its namesake from Ayn Rand inspiration, and the publication now is hardly Objectivist. It's mostly filled with a bunch of EA's. You'd love it.

Here's a thread from last year on Rand where I link an essay I'm fond of written by a libertarian philosopher about the problems with Rand's thinking, such as it is: viewtopic.php?p=1067902#p1067902.

Anyway, I want to hear more about why requiring sterilization for a homeless domestic abuse victim to receive food and shelter is humane, compassionate, and fair. We heard your reasoning that allowing them to reproduce just perpetuates the cycle of problems, but feel free to explain how those descriptors apply.