Individualism seems to be at the center of American Libertarianism. Ron and Rand Paul's political vision is linked to that of Ayn Rand and she and Friedrich Hayek are instrumental thinkers in the Libertarian moverment (http://myslu.stlawu.edu/~shorwitz/Papers/JARS-Hayek.pdf). Rand was a champion of the pure opportunist, free of any restraints while Hayek clung to the idea of morality. Central to Friedrich Hayek’s thesis is that freedom created great wealth. This cannot be defended. Hayek laments the old Liberalism which means today the theory of free market capitalism. On page 19 of Road to Serfdom he makes this claim while depreciating the efforts of liberals (those in his day pushing for social justice) to establish a just society. If wealth creation were the main factor as Hayek argues, then Persia under Xerxes would have been the freest nation in history. Compared to the Greeks who were mean in appearance and home with their slaves as prevalent as the Persians, the Persians were the richest nation at the time. We have to seek in Hayek’s mind what this freedom is he lauds.
Hayek justifies sweat shops, monopoly, corruption and condemns unions and social legislation as socialist. To him justice is the road to serfdom for the aristocracy, chaos and brutality the road to wealth and prosperity for the masses. On pages 33-34 he argues that socialism is a species of collectivism and his definition of collectivism means any institutional means of guaranteeing general privileges against such imposed limits. Given this definition democracy would then be the collectivism of authority once feudalism collapsed since this form of government guarantees the vote to all citizens given classes (i.e., in the early USA slaves could not vote as in Athens, and nor could women). Capitalism would also be seen as the collectivism of wealth vs feudal or aristocratic control by inheritance, caste or force.
As a main theorem Hayek argues that individualism built Western society. There are two ways of looking at the origins of the Renaissance, one in the collapse of Feudalism where one man is the manor chief, the master, the lord and everyone else is a slave, a serf. Here is true individualism, the manor lord answers to no one but a more powerful lord and therefore the constant warfare of the Middle Ages.
This feudal paradise is undermined by the trader, the ideal of individualism to Hayek, but this is not so, the traders were often family groups or guilds of traders. They in turn used the growing crowds of vagabonds and runaways to provide the labor for beginning production for sale as opposed to use. These vagabonds created associations and became guilds. Thus the power of these two groups of free men were seen as both creators of wealth and enemies of the manor and the power of the lord. Therefore,collectivism was the point of creation of the break from feudalism and not individualism.
Basic to Hayek’s criticism of modern liberals is that they accept the idea of socialism as good. He equates "left" socialism and communism with "right" socialism, therefore Stalin’s Soviet Union with Hitler’s Third Reich. This is a profound mistake for they are opposites in every aspect of philosophy and policy. Hayek equates them by isolation, by taking them out of history he is able to show that they seem to result in similar outcomes, for example the mass murder of minorities in Germany and Russia which do not result from philosophy but from culture since both nations have a long history of pogroms of this kind long before socialism. Imperial Germany’s brutal adventures in Africa certainly equate with the Holocaust against the Jewish people. Also, he argues right and left socialisms repress individual liberties, though it would be hard to separate the repression against individual liberties and free speech in Czarist Russia from Stalin’s Soviet Union, except perhaps by a more efficient program.
The real differences are clear, however, each of these represents the victory of a social order, in the Third Reich it is the aristocracy, in the Soviet Union it is the popularies. The same struggle took place in classical Greece and Rome with similar consequences. Before the Punic Wars the Ultimas, a sect of the aristocracy, waged a latent struggle against the popular party. After the victory over Carthage the struggle intensified as the popular leaders fought for land for the soldiers and poor and more liberty and freedom for the plebs. At each stage in the struggle where the Ultimas felt their power relaxing they resorted to violence and murder. The popular party responded in kind and the two forces eventually tore the Republic into shreds as the Patrician class broke apart to support one or the other faction. The result was the rise of dictatorship in the form of Augustus, a relative of a popular party leader. However, the system of government which he placed into power rested on the army, now a professional force with no allegiance to either party or principle.
Today the Libertarians in American who look to people like Ron Raul or Hayek as their spiritual leaders make the same mistake as the Ultimas. Rand Paul's positions on issues are clearly aligned to support an increase in wealth inequality, a major element in the Roman struggle that drove the Ultimas and his other policies are consonant with the creation of an aristocracy (http://www.randpaul2010.com/issues/). The victim of the conflict they wage will be the Republic. Their actions, from joining the focus groups set up by the health care industry’s lobbyists and front organizations, to attacking any proposals to increase taxes or reform the financial industry, only strengthen the power of the corporations (see http://www.dailykos.com/... The corporations, who have no allegiance to America or American values are motivated by gaining power whether economic or political. This is why Murdock (Fox News) and John Malone (Liberty Media) have come to be the central organizers of the Tea Party Movement (see http://www.dailykos.com/...
Rand and Ron Paul attack government, but it is only government, our American government that we can change by voting. From town councils to Senate races individual citizens must have the power of the vote. Now, corporations have more power since the Roberts' Supreme Court has given them citizenship. We cannot change the policies of corporations, private citizens cannot vote in the board rooms. The Pauls and their followers are fifth columnists in the battle to destroy America (see http://www.dailykos.com/...