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Is Being a Doctrinaire Libertarian Bad For Your Ass?

Jun 21, 2010
By .
WTF?

I'm asking because I figure that, whatever its faults, the FDA has done a halfway-decent job keeping radium suppositories marketed as potency aids off the market recently.

I'm pretty sure I'm supposed to think the market should have taken care of that. But I'm not losing sleep over it.

Last 5 posts by Ken

10 Comments
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10 Comments

  1. matt  •  Jun 21, 2010 @9:54 am

    for the record the article states that this was before the effects of radium were understood (for those that dont feel like reading the article)

  2. Patrick  •  Jun 21, 2010 @10:05 am

    Yeah Ken, I think your attempt to add a spin to this was pretty lame. It was civil litigation, the libertarian's friend, that took radium out of most markets, in the 1920s, yet oddly enough the government has not passed a specific radium law or regulation pertaining to anally ingested medications.

    To this day.

    Concerning regulation, ask an African suffering from malaria about DDT. But hurry! They die pretty quickly.

  3. Kevin  •  Jun 21, 2010 @10:19 am

    Whatever the faults of the post may be, this is the second excellent title in a row. Not that past titles have been deficient in any way.

  4. Patrick  •  Jun 21, 2010 @10:34 am

    Boom Shaka Laka! Shai Gaba Um Dala Shoombala Oom!

  5. KipEsquire  •  Jun 21, 2010 @11:00 am

    The doctrinaire libertarian response is, I believe, to highlight the unseen negative effects of government pre-emption / crowding out of safety regulation. There IS a private market for it. See, e.g., Consumer Reports, Underwriters Laboratories, Good Housekeeping, Better Business Bureau, etc.

    "FDA (CPSC/SEC/local health commission/etc.) or nothing" is simply a false choice invented by those who still think "The Jungle" (and "Unsafe at Any Speed") were not complete works of fiction.

  6. Ken  •  Jun 21, 2010 @11:07 am

    This is exactly why I shouldn't use any issue that is even remotely controversial as a satirical or humorous frame for a link.

  7. Patrick  •  Jun 21, 2010 @11:25 am

    There's an actual controversy about the benefits of inserting radioactive metals into one's rectum?

  8. Steve Chaos  •  Jun 21, 2010 @12:45 pm

    …but will it cure/prevent diseases without turning you blue, like colloidal silver? Inquiring minds want to know!

  9. SG  •  Jun 22, 2010 @6:41 am

    Just learned about the "Peltzman effect" by looking up "Unsafe at Any Speed" on Wikipedia. Apparently increased car safety regulations make people drive more recklessly?

    Soooooo, by the same standard, forbidding radium in suppositories has probably caused people to insert in their rectums other things that were not specifically forbidden to use as suppositories by the FDA, like knives, spiked dildos, and maybe ICBMs.

    Isn't this the "doctrinaire libertarian" response?

  10. Patrick  •  Jun 22, 2010 @6:47 am

    What about gerbils?