Opinion: Neither side correct on court leak

The recent Supreme Court leak is all over the media. People on both sides feel compelled to speak out loudly and passionately for whichever side they support. There is no debate; just a fight. For days it was as though hyperbole had become America’s official language.

I even allowed myself to be drawn in. Getting involved didn’t improve my life in any way. Engaging with this subject makes me miserable, like sticking a nine-volt battery to my tongue (please don’t do that!).

This is the one topic, which everyone is talking about, where I don’t like either side -- even the side I might be inclined to agree with otherwise.

Every person who commented on the issue made me dislike their side more than I disliked it before they weighed in. There aren’t many topics that have this effect on me. Yet, this specific issue has affected me in this way throughout my entire life. I dislike both sides of the fight more than I can express.

Neither side seems honest; both are emotionally manipulative and ignore the scientific method in picking sides. Or, I should say, they cherry-pick through science to find things to bolster the side they’ve already decided to support, based on their other beliefs.

Very few people avoided becoming the enemy of the side they were trying to promote.

Even many individual libertarians were passionate about opposite sides. So much so that it felt as though they, too, were trying hard to push me away from agreeing with them.

Wanting government to step in and force your opinion -- through legislation and enforcement -- on others who do not share your opinion is an authoritarian approach. It is anti-social and thus anti-libertarian. No matter what your justifications are.

Libertarians aren’t always able to be put into one of the tidy boxes made to hold public opinion. Most of those boxes are labeled “Republican” or “Democrat,” “Left” or “Right,” “Conservative” or “Liberal.” Often one box is more correct than the other paired box, but too often both completely miss the point. That’s when you need the ability to rise above the boxes to see inside both, find the few gems in each box and discard the rest of the garbage. This is the advantage libertarians usually enjoy. For this to work, though, there needs to be something worthwhile in the boxes. Sometimes, there is nothing there.

Farwell’s Kent McManigal champions liberty. Contact him at: 

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