Good point, Carol. ;-) There are a great variety of ideas out there about what "freedom" means and about what "moderation" means and what "extremism" means. I would regard that libertarian's view as an unrealistic one that is based on rigid dogma, not on an accurate understanding of the situation.

The way roads began was like this...

1. First you had trails through the wilderness. Trails were naturally created by animals and people just following the least difficult and clearest route to reach water, food, and whatever else they were after. Trails were free. The more they were used, the better they got, but they were still free.

2. With the advent of horseback riding trails became even better than before, but they were still free. No one owned them. Everyone used them.

3. With the advent of horsedrawn vehicles trails had to be improved upon considerably, specially when nation-states began needing to move large armies around on them. This resulted in funds being raised by various kings and emperors to hire workers (or buy slaves) and build genuine roads. All of a sudden trails weren't free anymore! Taxes needed to be raised to improve them into roads. It was the Romans who really put roads "on the map" and they raised a lot of tax money to do it. Their superbly paved roads made it possible for them to rapidly move huge armies long distances and to conquer many other nations and build an empire.

4. You've basically had a situation ever since where organized societies must raise funds to build and maintain their many roads. Those funds can either come from taxes...the usual method...or they can come from tolls if the road is built and run by a privately owned consortium.

Most of us would prefer, I think, not to drive on toll roads. ;-)

The libertarian longs for a world that simply isn't possible anymore...as long as we have money.