I will never believe that you want to decide for yourself what concentrations of chemical byproducts from local metalplating shops is safe for your household AND the seismic standards for the bridges you cross AND the optimal level of pesticides on the lettuce you eat AND the proper response to the introduction of West Nile disease into your county AND I could go on forever. You cannot make me believe that you want to deal with all of those personally.
Yup, there’s a reason why we have regulatory agencies, something that some hardcore libertarians/free-marketeers will never understand. An objective review of things that concern the public’s welfare and safety is one of the benefits/attributes of civilization.
whether you like the outcome or not, bureaucrats have “best for our country” at heart the way that doctors have “best for my patients” and teachers have “best for my students” at heart.
No one goes into the civil service for the money. At the professional levels, they do it out of respect for a rigorous process, and out of love for their subject area and their country. Everyone loves to hate the government official who meddles in this and obstructs that, but the water we drink, the air we breathe, the roads and bridges we drive on, the medicines we take, and the food we eat are all as reliable as they are because of the efforts of these unloved folks.
I think the chief flaw of Libertarians is the belief that they are smarter than anyone else. But their smarts are focused on one thing, the visage they see in the mirror each morning and how everyone else is interfering with their pursuit of happiness.
I think some time in an environment with poor sanitation, unsafe drinking water, lots of industrial accidents, and serious economic inequities would be more educational that a lifetime subscription to Reason. In some ways, I see them as a similar threat as the theocrats, though they only want to set the clock back about 200 years, not 1000.