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</o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--></head><body lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><div><div style='border:none;border-top:solid #E1E1E1 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in'><p class=MsoNormal><b>From:</b> extropy-chat <extropy-chat-bounces@lists.extropy.org> <b>On Behalf Of </b>Dan TheBookMan<br><br><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Comic Sans MS";color:black'><o:p></o:p></span></p></div></div><p class=MsoNormal style='margin-bottom:12.0pt'>>… only in the last decade or so that “libertarian” became so widely used that people who started identifying as libertarians suddenly started to be so loose that folks can pretend it’s Republican Lite or just Constitutionalist. Regards, Dan<o:p></o:p></p><div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Dan it doesn’t look to me like either of the US mainstream parties so much as tossed a bone to libertarianism, or rather my view of what libertarianism is today.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>The US must at some point talk about the elephant in the room: the fed is bankrupt. It isn’t so much it will be in the future; it is now. It has no idea how to balance its own budget. The US has grown dependent on its own adversary to loan it money just to make regular expenses in peacetime, we are left to wonder happens when the Chinese government says one day: no more lending to the US. Too risky.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>My (admittedly idealized) view of libertarianism would demand balancing the federal budget forthwith.<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>spike<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div></div></div></div></body></html>