But I take issue with the popular belief that anything to the left of the hard-right libertarian laissez-faire ideal should be decried as communist.
That is something that those of us who believe in little intervention and regulations tend to do, exaggerating. I acknowledge that. At the slightest regulation or tax increase we accuse of communism.
Dealing in absolutes is easy. Harder to rigorously define those terms before use.
Ideally, I believe that there should be some intervention (some free market theorists argue that everything should be private, justice, security forces, etc. everything). I believe that sectors such as health, justice and security forces should be if not offered and controlled exclusively by the government, at least in cohabitation with the private sector, in health for example. Just as the government has to help people who cannot fend for themselves. From there, I understand that the best thing is the minimum of regulations and the minimum of taxes possible, which is a system that has its flaws, but at least it is not as disastrous as extreme interventionism.
I always thought governments akin to companies that have gone beyond notions of 'efficiency'. Groupings of individuals lead to interesting things with mixed results, whether you think statelessness
* is good or not. Creating an amalgamation of individuals to progress toward some ideal can always have unintended consequences - it's all a matter of how one structures power in different ways at the end of the day.
*whatever that means