What is the difference between Paulites and Libertarians?

[irisblue]

This is a serious question, not a flame starter. Is there a difference?

[Xyzse]

1. What kind of Paulites? Ron or Rand?

I fear that the Tea Party crazies have suborned the Libertarian Party that used to be more on Ron Paul.

The difference to me was the inclusion of the religious element. Where Ron was more towards religious freedoms while Rand would try to legislate morality.

That's about the only difference, but it is a significant one.

Of course I could be wrong, but from what I understood, that was it.

[Lasher]

2. Not in ideology.

Paulbots tend to be zealots, more so than your average garden variety of libertarian.

[beerandjesus]

3. "Paulites" represent a tiny sliver of the Libertarian spectrum.

There is a whole body of literature on libertarianism and "classical liberalism". I hate to be so pedantic as to refer you to Wikipedia, but this article is a very good introduction:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism

Note that Noam Chomsky and Mikhail Bakunin are noted as libertarian theorists as well as usual suspects Ayn Rand and Milton Friedman. The libertarians who have gotten the most press over the past few years are the ones who have aligned themselves closely with the Republicans, but they are far from representing Libertarianism in all its aspects; in fact, the so-called "Objectivists" (sorry, I hate that term) are only a subset of right-wing libertarians, who themselves are only a sub-set of all libertarians.

Hope that helps... but if you want a real answer, as opposed to a pithy comment, you'll need more than what you're going to find in a quick forum post!

[Arkana]

4. Well, all of them are whiny, immature manchildren

with a teenager's view of how the world works, but the Paulites generally tend to be more socially conservative. True big-L Libertarians tend to care less about gay marriage and abortion.

[Redfairen]

5. Libertarians are pro-choice *

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