Freedomain Radio

  It is hard for me to tell just how successful of a show Stefan has.  Has he hit the "big time" yet? Could he bring on a guest?   Personally, I think freedomainradio is the greatest show ever!  Sometimes I will be traveling with a friend or family member and we will get stuck listening to the CBC.  (For those of you who don't know what this is, it is the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation or something like that.  Anyways, it is terrible. It’s just a stupid mouthpiece for the state.)  I often wish Stefan could get onto one of those shows and debate the hosts or guests.  There has to be someone willing to debate Stefan on something.  I find them to be exciting and it would be nice to see how Stefan puts his ideas into practice.  I often think I know what I am doing, and then I just blow it.  It takes practice, but we rarely get to see it done in a less-than-confrontational manner.  I would like to hear some debates with people on the show.  Preferably this would be someone who is mildly intelligent and opinionated. Example. Any politician.

            If you go onto youtube.com you can watch some Noam Chomsky debates. Those are interesting.  There are so many benefits to listening to a serious debate. Stef, if you can, get someone on your show.  Just an idea. 

 

Thanks,

  David Kopp

Thanks, I think it would be great fun too! I have to take the time to deal with the technical issues of course, but I always enjoy debating. And it is hard, of course!

i am a little familiar with gaining popularity online by providing entertainment content (not to diminish at all what stef does by using the word entertainment but thats essenially what podcasts are). It takes time. I've never done advertisements so i don't have an intuition on how that increases hit counts, but my guess (from other marketing experience i have) is that there are blips or sharp increases at a certain time after the advertisement and then a return to slightly higher level than the original. it really takes time to establish a presence and a consistant base of viewers/listeners. i've had a particular site up for 2 years in november and currently i'm getting something like 2000 unique visitors a month (which is not great but with minimal attempt at spreading the url). if you have good content it will certainly happen but it is all about the patience imo.

Here is an absolutely hilarious debate between Robert Metz of the Freedom Party of Ontario and William Kashtan, leader of the Communist Party of Canada from the 1980s that cracks me up every time I listen to it, I would recommend this for an entertaining listening experience between a smart guy and a real idiot:

http://www.freedomparty.org/voice/v01.htm

Wow!  That is hard to listen to.  What an idiot.  It is too bad that the libertarian guy didn't approach the argument correctly. It would have been nice if he had used the argument for morality.  It is hard to convince someone of something in such a small amount of time.  The communist guy is really stubborn and doesn't even consider anything and keeps coming back to his stupid crutch of an argument. 

  Consider this: even a well moderated debate becomes tough.  Imagine if there wasnt a mediator.  It would be over in about 20 seconds.  Nobody would even listen to one another. 

How can you argue this guy?  It would take so long to even get this guy to realize the most elementry of economic principles. 

Yikes!  It is frustrating to listen to.  Everything he says seems to contradict itself.

I advice anyone to give this thing a listen.  Also, if you know where I could find more, please send me a link.

Dave Kopp

I find the listener call-ins very funny, when Mr. Kashtan accuses a caller of being a CIA or RCMP agent, because the caller criticizes the Soviet Union.

I agree that that this is great idea. It is pretty hard to argue against libertarianism from a logical standpoint.

One problem though, is that political debate I've encountered in the media is pure theatre. The O'Reilly Factor is just disgusting to watch.

If any of you know intelligent socialists, democrats, statists, minarchists etc, I would be more than happy to debate them. Just have them give me an email and we'll set it up...

Phil wrote:

Here is an absolutely hilarious debate between Robert Metz of the Freedom Party of Ontario and William Kashtan, leader of the Communist Party of Canada from the 1980s that cracks me up every time I listen to it, I would recommend this for an entertaining listening experience between a smart guy and a real idiot: http://www.freedomparty.org/voice/v01.htm

Oh my. When that woman from Estonia called and told Kashton how she was terrorized by the Soviets, he called her a liar. He also ignored the question of why people keep fleeing from Socialist systems. Well, I doubt there are many Socialists today in denial about the Soviet Union.

"The three major parties accept a lot of the premises put forth by Mr. Kashtan." -Fp founding member and president, Robert Metz

Hang on. Canada has THREE major parties? How do the polititians manufacture their false dichotomies?

xteve wrote:

"The three major parties accept a lot of the premises put forth by Mr. Kashtan." -Fp founding member and president, Robert Metz Hang on. Canada has THREE major parties? How do the polititians manufacture their false dichotomies?

In the U.S.A. there is one major party that has 2 names. Some members of that party call themselves Republicans and some members of that party call themselves Democrats.

                                                                       $

H. Rearden wrote:

In the U.S.A. there is one major party that has 2 names. Some members of that party call themselves Republicans and some members of that party call themselves Democrats.

Couldn't have said it better myself!

How does that old phrase go? "Not a dime's worth of difference..."?

Arguing with someone from a very different perspective is always a pretty frustrating experience for most libertarians. I've always found it so.

The right-wingers are utterly convinced they have a corner on morality and the Left hold so many dreamy, non-reality-based beliefs that they are consistently in denial of nearly everything that contradicts their fantasies.

So if it's one-on-one then you have to go at it in "persuasion" mode which is time-consuming and gentle. Like approaching a starving deer with a piece of fruit. Chances are it'll run away even though it badly needs what you're offering. Unless you're VERY patient and speak VERY gently....

But in a group setting (particularly with other Lefties around for support) one must go into "debate" mode. And yes, you'll always win the argument from a truth and logic standpoint. But NOBODY on the Left will realize or acknowledge the win. Because logic means precious little to them. Alleged motives, colorful phrases, attitudes and expressions of compassion for the hurt and weak is what counts.

So you argue and win it for the benefit of others who might be present. So they can see that the Lefties position is an unsupported collection of inconsistencies. And I've done it and my impression is very few ever come back for Round Two. But they NEVER acknowledge their loss. Hasn't that been your experience?

Sometimes I think that's the best we can do. But I'm open to suggestions.

I've actually given up "debating" people anymore. Now, I just like to have conversations and ask lots of questions...

Sometimes I learn something new, sometimes they do....

gmgauthi wrote:

I've actually given up "debating" people anymore. Now, I just like to have conversations and ask lots of questions... Sometimes I learn something new, sometimes they do....

I've taken to doing this a lot myself.  When someone says something I think is wrong I will ask them if and why they believe what they said.  Since they said it they are usually interested in continuing the discussion.  I've been lucky so far in that when I ask the "why" questions the other person isn't attacking me for being a smart ass know it all.  For me it seems that once I find a crack in their armor of falsehoods it is easy to take advantage of it, widen the crack, and purge the false beliefs or at least I get them to admit they don't know why they think what they do.  I do sometimes run into a problem where they can't find fault in my reasoning, but their "gut" tells them I'm wrong and their idea is correct, but at least they start questioning why they believe what they do.