I was pointed at an interesting critique of a section of libertarian thought (those at http://bleedingheartlibertarians.com/) by a group of bloggers at Crooked Timber: Let It Bleed: Libertarianism and the Workplace (there are some rude words when it gets to the parts on sexual harassment).

The main topic is the question of whether the cause of freedom that libertarians claim to argue for extends beyond 'freedom from the state', and into 'freedom from others' - primarily it the sphere of work.

While it may be a little remote from the question of quite how evil Obama/Romney is, and hopefully isn't a platform for personal emnity, and while it may be a critique from the left of some left-leaning libertarians, I thought it might be interesting to look at the argument as it's also applicable to more mainstream politics.

Is freedom really freedom if it means not letting the state deal with coercion - which is itself an attack on individual liberty?

I started to read this but after a while I came to realise that it's essentially a very long rebuttal of an argument that's almost certainly poorly explained, made by one group of people nobody has ever heard of in response to another group of people that nobody has ever heard of.

Well, it is largely that, but the subject itself is what I was interested in. Which when you get down to the main sections is pretty clearly made out.

The question is whether libertarians (and others who worry about the state) are consistently applying arguments based on liberty and choice etc to issues where it's not the 'State' that has the power, but another agency - eg employers.