Happy New Years!

Welp, I'm leaving for a boy's night out in a few hours. Happy New Years, everyone! We're one year closer to the collapse of the state and creation of teh anarkeh!

For some reason, every New Year's Eve I think of this video (probably because it's from a New Year's Eve special I was watching live at the time)

The Few Things Bush Did Right

Bush's presidency has been a disaster from beginning to end, and the US will be suffering from the consequences of his insane policies for years to come.

Nonetheless, as difficult as it was, I wanted to come up with a list of the few things he did right:

1) He pardoned a number of pot-heads, tax evaders, and gun owners.

2) He (thankfully) "failed" at securing the borders, and had a somewhat lax immigration policy, which really pissed off conservatives.

3) The Dubai port deal, which also angered conservatives.

Aside from these three things (and a handful of vetoes), what did he do right? His fiscal irresponsibility, foreign-policy blunders, and alienation of the entire world have made it far more likely that the US empire will come crashing down in our lifetimes. If someone with more restraint, responsibility, or intelligence had been in office, the end of the empire would probably be further away. Better that it be headed for collapse.

Zimbabwe As Bad As Ever

Or, it's going through what most countries go through after left-wing shock treatment is applied to their economies.

And just think: Americans are demanding similar policies right now. Sometimes I think that only mass starvation (if even that) will cure people of their idiocy.

My New Blog Is Now Up!

Don't worry, I'm not abandoning this blog. Not by a long shot. I will be paying as much (if not more) attention to this blog as I have in the past. I love this individualist-anarchist stuff to death.

Nonetheless, I invite you to check out my new (non-political) blog: UnMainstream Cinema! I don't know how much of it will appeal to the regulars here, but who knows? Libertarians watch movies, right?

The Machinery of Freedom: Worth Reading?

Question: is David Friedman's book worth ordering and reading, or is it just a watered down rehash of Rothbard's For a New Liberty (which I already have)? I doubt that I'll convert to his version of ancap, but I'm still curious enough to consider ordering it. Plus, I have quite a few gift cards to get it with--good ol' xmas.

Maybe My Intuition Just Sucks?

When I left my job interview this morning, I was fully convinced that it went terribly. The whole thing just felt really awkward and I wanted to get the fuck out of dodge, pronto. As my cell phone rang later on, I thought they were going to tell me to get lost. Incredibly, they said they were impressed and want me to go to a second interview. WTF? I mean, not that it's a bad thing, but I'm seriously shocked. I thought the interview was friggin' awful. Maybe I'm just a pessimist.

Yippee...I guess?

Donate To A Bunch Of Lunatics And Bums?

No thanks, Brad.

Infoshop routinely promotes state propaganda, gratuitous vandalism, coercive unions, and all kinds of idiocy.

And Brad wants us to donate to these scumbags? I think all this left-lib stuff has screwed him up in the head.

Objectivist Pipe Dreams, Part 1

One place where market/individualist anarchism is often debated is on Objectivist forums. Every time I read their objections, I get the feeling that none of them have ever read any actual anarchist writing. They parrot the "social contract" gibberish like gospel, apparently unaware that Spooner totally (and extensively) demolished all of that hokum over 100 years ago in No Treason. Here are some particularly big howlers from various Objectivist forums.

Starting at square one, a number of people live in the same geographic area - jurisdiction - and decide to secure their rights. They start a government and draw up a border. Anyone who enters that border must contractually agree to respect the laws and government of that nation. This violates nobody's rights. The government-creation-contract would also stipulate that nobody may enter into other contracts with other protection agencies (governments) without renouncing this contract and moving out of that geographic area (i.e. renounce citizenship and emigrate). Again, no rights are violated.

Of course, if Objectivists would read anything by Spooner or Rothbard, they would quickly learn there's no such thing as a government that was actually created this way. As Rothbard put it, "the historical evidence cuts precisely the other way: for every State where the facts are available originated by a process of violence, conquest, and exploitation."

But suppose a “government” was magically created in this way? The only way in which it could be maintained would be if every property owner agreed and refused to deal with anyone who wanted a different protection agency. It would only take a single dissenting property owner or newcomer for this “government” to collapse. Since this “government” would not be able to outlaw competing protection agencies, it would not even be a government.

If a pro-capitalist enforcement agency prevented an anti-capitalist agency from operating, it would be acting as a legal monopolist or, in other words, a government.

Umm…no. The point is that the victims would be free to choose from any agency to punish the anti-capitalist agency, instead of a single monopoly (government).

What in so-called 'market anarchy' would stop there being agencies that monopolize aggressive violence, or practice such violence systematically?

ROFL! Does the author really not see the hysterical irony in this question!?

These guys crack me up.

More howlers to come in future posts..

Fred Thompson On The Economic Crisis

Yes, Fred is a statist who shamefully attempted to become dictator ("president"), but I have to admit, I found this video kind of entertaining.

McElroy On Cheating The State

Plan and act right now to protect the quality of life for yourself and your family. The quality of your life is not the amount of money you make. It is the level of comfort (the food, the shelter, etc.) you can sustain and that level can come largely from "alternative financing" rather than from an official pay stub. Indeed, as long as you sustain a reasonable comfort level - what used to be called 'middle/working class'-- the lower your official wage the better because, then, your taxes will also be lower.

Read the rest here.

What Counts As "Left-wing"?

On another blog, I commented on what I consider as being "left-wing." I wanted to re-post it here:

There are two kinds of self-identified left-libertarians: those who support economic (not political) capitalism, and those who oppose it...IMO, if someone is not opposed to economic capitalism, that person is not a left-winger. At least not in my book. That doesn't mean they can't consider themselves left-wingers, or identify with the left, just that I don't really see someone as 'left-wing' unless they oppose economic capitalism. It's just a matter of basic political accuracy. I don't know of a single well-known left-winger who had no problem with capitalist structures.

When asked to define "economic capitalism," I responded:

Economic capitalism = making a profit off of other people's labor via ownership of capital.

This is an issue I've discussed before (see here for a perhaps overly harsh early post on this blog), and my opinion hasn't changed much.

Tropic Thunder: Not Very Funny

So I rented Tropic Thunder, thinking I would like it. After all, it got pretty good reviews for a comedy, and I usually enjoy Ben Stiller's style of humor (Zoolander and Dodge Ball had me in stitches).

But this one just didn't do it for me...I don't know. While I have nothing against profanity or crude humor (I own the entire John Waters collection, for Chrissakes), it just felt excessive and forced here. Nearly every line in the movie was yelled, and the whole thing was just really over the top. Didn't work for me, but who knows? Humor is pretty subjective.

Bush: "The Biggest Regulator Since Nixon"

If only the Democrat myths about Bush being a heartless, regulation-shredding idealogue were true...

Alas, they aren't.

But then again, these are the same people who think the Soviet Union collapsed as a result of "deregulation."

Holy Crap!

The lead singer of Arch Enemy is a chick!? I seriously never had any idea this was the case.

She does a freaking good job, then. Damn.

Brutus Buries The State

A great column at Nolan chart.

Leftists Cheer On Bail-Outs

Abolish all capitalist businesses! But bail them out and prop them up first!

This is oddly reminiscent of the "abolish the state, but empower and kowtow to it first" mantra we get from the (anarcho) left.

"Universal Pre-K": Another Statist Scam

Right-Thinking From the Left Coast dissects the "universal pre-k" scam.

Right-Thinking is one of my favorite blogs, and I've been reading it on a daily basis for several years. While not anarchist in any sense of the world, it frequently has a libertarian bent, and has been one of the few conservative blogs to speak out against torture, the religious right, the war on drugs, and so on.

Mike Gogulski Foolishly Rejects The "Freedom" Of The US Dictatorship

Mike did the right thing. If things get bad enough, I may end up doing the same thing some day. (Have to finish up my degree first, though ;)

PRESS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Bratislava resident renounces American citizenship, becomes stateless person

BRATISLAVA, SLOVAKIA, 10 December 2008 – Citing US war, human rights abuses, rapacious state capitalism and hypocrisy, Bratislava resident Michael Gogulski announced today that he has renounced his United States citizenship and become a stateless person as a means of “political divorce”.

Gogulski, 36, renounced his citizenship on 8 December 2008 at the American embassy in Bratislava, surrendering his US passport and culminating a two-week process and months of personal preparations. He currently awaits a Certificate of Loss of Nationality of the United States confirming his loss of American citizenship. As Gogulski has no other citizenship, he is now a stateless person.

“I was disgusted to be associated through citizenship with the most dangerous gang of criminals in the world, the United States government. Renouncing my citizenship is a means of achieving a political divorce with that vile institution,” Gogulski said. “American politicians extol their state in terms of liberty, human rights, free markets and the rule of law. Examination of the country’s history and present actions reveals nothing but lies and hypocrisy. The genocide of Native Americans, slavery, nuclear slaughter at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, support for brutal dictators, the torture of innocents at places like Guantánamo and Abu Ghraib, the massive robberies for the benefit of big business in the name of ‘rescuing’ the economy, the world’s biggest prison population, the growth of a domestic police state and the brutal wars of oppression underway in Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia paint a rather different picture. America, via its government agents, is truly exceptional – exceptionally evil,” he stated.

Gogulski says that when he receives the Certificate of Loss of Nationality he will apply to the Slovak Interior Ministry for a Travel Document – similar to a passport – under the 1954 Convention on the Status of Stateless Persons, which Slovakia signed in 2000. He says that he has no plans to leave Bratislava until then, and that he recognizes that his life without citizenship will be more difficult, especially with respect to travel. But, “if the Schengen Zone is to be my cage,” Gogulski states, “I think it’s large enough for me. There’s enough to explore within Europe to last a lifetime.”

On his personal blog, Gogulski indicates that he works as a freelance translator and editor. He also writes about anarchism and supports the revolutionary theory called agorism, which posits that free-market service providers will compete with and eventually supplant states, giving rise to a voluntary society. “Governments pride themselves on notions of ‘equality’ and ‘rule of law’, but fail to apply the same standards to themselves that their subjects must endure,” he says, explaining his political philosophy. “The foundation of state power, taxation, is robbery. That the robbers have fancy uniforms, impressive titles and the sanction of law does not in the slightest way change the basic formula for extortion: pay us, or we will kill you.”

Michael Gogulski’s blog can be found at http://www.nostate.com/.

Mike has been a friend of this blog since the beginning, and is responsible for a good chunk of my readers. Congratulations and god speed, Mike. Sever all ties with this neo-fascist shit-hole and never look back.

It's Official: Franc Is A Communist

Or at least that's what his most recent post sounds like.

Slowly but surely, Franc continues to slide into the wackier backwaters of ultra-leftism. He's starting to sound indistinguishable from the 16 year-old Tater Trots at RevLeft.

Some excerpts:

The consumerist view of progress is that corporations exist to “serve the customer” by providing ever-expanding alternatives, advancements, by lowering the prices of the resulting products, and by providing more of them. This is possible due to the profit motive: the more they sell, the more they profit, and there are always more expensive novelties to introduce to compensate for lower prices elsewhere. In the labour view, economic organizations serve the needs of their workers and the community, not primarily profit.

"Serve the community, not profit!"

Sounds like loser talk to me.

In the labour view, poverty can be eliminated if the poor self-organize and reclaim their own labour from the ruling elites, working solely for their own benefit and the benefit of their community.

*coughdirtycommiecough*

Psychologically, the consumeurist view leads to mental passivity. As consumers, we watch ads (now, even down the aisles of the stores and at the checkstands) which appeals to his most primitive emotions, wanders around aisles of brightly packaged products which are geared towards the lowest common denominator, and just generally gets in the same mindset that leads to the acceptance of propaganda in general.

And the Frankfurt School begins to rear its ugly head. Blech.

Will he keep going or will he one day realize how crazy all this blather is?

Where I Stand Or Something

The left-libertarian vs right-libertarian war continues!!!

Where do I stand in all of this? I'm beginning to think I'm more of a 'plumb-line' radical libertarian, like Walter Block.

I agree with left-libertarians on some things and right-libertarians on others.

On the corporate form / limited liability arguments, I tend to agree with right-libertarians.

While I think the size of firms in the free market is irrelevant, I ultimately fall somewhere between right-libs and left-libs on the issue.

On immigration, religious idiocy, and cultural conservatism (blind hated of all minorities), I agree with left-libertarians. To be honest though, I really don’t care as much about these issues as most left-libertarians seem to. I also sometimes get annoyed by the overbearing PC police on their side. (If you think criticizing Lincoln is “racist,” then you’re simply an idiot.)

I identify more with individualist anarchism than the "Old Right" (and am also more influenced by it) so I guess I'm a left-libertarian in that regard.

On corporatism, I'm with the left-libertarians. I think it’s a far bigger problem than most right-libertarians do (though I think the left-libs can sometimes get pretty nit-picky on the issue).

IMHO, the vast majority of anarcho-communists are statist social democrats in disguise, and the left in general is pretty hopeless--except for some of the mutualists! So I'm probably with the right-libertarians on that.

And that's where I sit...er, stand. Just thought I might as well kick these random thoughts out there, because I had to comment on the whole thing sooner or later.

Peter Schiff Continues Pwning Idiots

This may be the first time I've heard Rothbard's name said on national television!

Slayer - Consfearacy

Welp, I'm busy as hell for the next two weeks, so I'll mostly be video-blogging. Here's another great anti-state metal song, and it's by one of my favorite bands of all time. Sing along, boys and girls! (Eh..let's not kid ourselves, there are no females reading this blog.)



I need to redefine
All the things I hate today
Politics that fail
From a president derailed
I hate the shit economy
It might as well be sodomy
I know that in the end
I'm expected to pretend

But I can't relate
To your verbal idiocy
No one's in control
When the government's the enemy

So light the fuse
Impose your views
Consfearacy Is anarchy

Actions of hostility
Breeds conformity
Annihilation will begin
Extermination from within

So light the fuse
Impose your views
Consfearacy
Insanity

I need to redefine
How I see the world today
Seems that all the war
Didn't even up the score
It's only mind pollution
There is no resolution
Still I know that in the end
I'm expected to pretend
That I can't think for myself
Blame it all on someone else
Half hearted smile
While you look the other way

I can't relate
To your verbal idiocy
No one's in control
When the government's the enemy

So light the fuse
Impose your views
Consfearacy
Complacency
Is your demise

Otep: Warhead

Since I'm a metalhead, and metal has a tendency to be extremely anti-state. I don't know why I don't post videos more often. Sadly, while this music video was released years ago, it's still nearly every bit as relevant today. :(

Anarcho-Soviets

Everyone at Mises.org is taking a thwack at the anarcho-communist pinata, and ignoring the tired "They're our allies! Our disagreements are just semantics!" bullshit that some ancaps have been claiming. Good for them.

Make no mistake: I am sure there are some decent anarcho-commies out there who want are picturing something like the kibbutz. But it seems like the vast majority want something more like Venezuela..

The LP's Unbearable Lameness Continues

Could the Libertarian Party possibly get any more lame (or irrelevant)? It's become so embarrassing that I literally wince whenever I have the misfortune of stumbling upon its web page.

In an obvious attempt to pander to conservatives, they are now doing different "volumes" (as if anyone is actually keeping track of this bullshit) of "Free Market Heroes."

Excerpt:

This is why John A. Allison, the chairman and CEO of BB&T, is the Libertarian Party's Free Market Hero for the week.

In addition to running one of the nation's largest banks, Allison and BB&T fund programs at more than 40 universities that teach the moral defense of capitalism. "Although each of these programs differs in its composition and mission," says Clemson University's business profile of BB&T's charitable programs, "all are united by a commitment to teaching and research on the moral foundations of capitalism."

ROFL. Sweet Jesus, that is fucking retarded.

This blog post alone makes me wish I had never told anyone else that I'm a 'libertarian.' Ever. **Shudder**

What is it about the LP that just rubs me the wrong way?

A Left-Rothbardian Business Model?

Eh?

This is the kind of work environment I was endorsing in a previous post.

Hat tip to Neverfox, on the GOTG board.

(For some stupid reason the embedding has been disabled, so I can't just post it on my blog.)

Still Debating (Well, More Like Discussing) Mutualism

Here, here, and here, for whoever's interested.

UPDATE: It turns out that I am officially on Franc's "ignore" list:

"I'm putting you on ignore. I am tired of your attacks and your constant straw men. Even though we keep indulging you, you obviously have ZERO intention of engaging in dialogue beyond your preconceived notions and things you quote on the Internet. I am really fed up with you."

It's the same line I hear at the end of every dinner party.

Block and Huebert's Horrid Article On Long

I don't agree with everything Roderick Long wrote in his Cato Unbound article, but Block and Huebert's response to it is just plain awful.

They begin the article by claiming "There is no such thing as corporate power." Ain't that a relief?

Long writes that "Corporate power depends crucially on government intervention in the marketplace."

But what does he mean by "corporate power"? A corporation is merely a group of individuals who have entered into a particular type of business relationship. The corporate form allows them to be known collectively by their business's name instead of their own names. And it allows them to enter into contracts under which they limit their own liability – something which is perfectly legitimate under libertarianism. (Objectivist historian Robert Hessen has made this point well in his book, In Defense of the Corporation, and see our article, "Defending Corporations," forthcoming in the Cumberland Law Review.)

The corporation, therefore, has no power to speak of.

Instead, only the state has power.

Any idiot can tell you "corporate power" means. In a nutshell, it's the ability of corporations to make people accept shitty jobs and products.

Yes, only the state has (coercive) power. But it is that power that leads to corporations having power. That's all that Long was pointing out, so they seem to be admitting he's right.

There is nothing special or different about government privileges for corporations – so why does Long single them out?

Yes, there's nothing at all especially significant about the about Blackwater, Halliburton, the corporatist Fed, etc. Move along, folks! Nothing to see here. Oh, and try not to wince while taking it up the ass.

They deny that there's anything at all suspicious about Wal-Mart getting huge tax breaks that other companies don't get.

It might be otherwise if corporations avoided taxes while actively urging the government to tax its competitors – but Long doesn't mention that.

Of course not! For they would never, ever lobby for that kind of thing.

Right?

At the outset, we will concede that Wal-Mart has been guilty of some serious wrongdoing over the course of its existence. For example, it sometimes has used eminent domain to take land for its stores, which is inexcusable. Also, it for a time favored the minimum wage law. See here Lew Rockwell’s incisive critique of Wal-Mart’s fall from grace in this regard.

Yes, Wal-Mart has indeed been responsible for "some" serious wrongdoing. They receive an obscene amount of subsidies, steal other people's land, and have a thing for slave labor. An April 2005 Strike-the-Root article chronicled some of Wal-Mart's lust for statism, concluding:

...it seems Wal-Mart, with its blatant government coercion, pork, and bribes, has little or nothing to do with the free market, but could be the poster child for state capitalism.

What is so funny is that Block and Huebert link to Rockwell's article on how Wal-Mart supported a minimum wage increase to wipe out smaller competitors through state violence. But not long before this, they implied Wal-Mart would be unlikely to "[urge] the government to tax its competitors."

Now, it's undeniable that most of the people who hate Wal-Mart are a bunch of whiners who hate success, and that it definitely took a large degree of skill for it to get the point it's at now. And when I need a bunch of cheap crap, it's the first place I'll stop. But to cherish it as some heroic exemplar of the "free market" is worse than a joke.

Look, when (some) left-libertarians make asinine predictions or embrace Luddism (consciously or not), there's nothing wrong with pointing it out. I do it all the time, often just to see if any of them will respond in an entertaining fashion. But this article goes overboard and confirms a lot of the worst stereotypes about "right-libertarians."

Debating Mutualism

I've been discussing mutualism all weekend, in this thread and this thread. In the first one, Franc gets pretty pissed at me! Fun stuff all around.

Collectivist/Statist Mentality Explained

The Motivations of Political Leftists, by John J. Ray, is a great read. I do strongly disagree with him on a number of things--Ray is most definitely a conservative, and so there is a lot of right-wing rubbish in it. But in the areas where he's criticizing statism and collectivism, it's really good.

Bringing Spooner's Vision To Life...Realistically

Both Spooner and Tucker thought (largely correctly, in my view) that the prevailing wage system and workers' lack of control of their means and conditions of labour were objectionable features that were in large part sustained by various sorts of government intervention in the economy on behalf of the wealthy.
-Roderick Long

Some time ago, I linked to an excellent article laying down the basics of Lysander Spooner's political philosophy. Spooner was rightfully concerned about the authortarianism of the modern employer-employee relationship, and sought to fix it. Although he considered it an absolute natural right for people to sell and purchase labor, he basically wanted to aim for a system of self-employed people, worker cooperatives, and independent contractors.

In today's industrialized world, aiming for an economy made up of pure worker cooperatives and nothing else is hopelessly doctrinaire. Nonetheless, I feel that there are still ways in which Spooner's views can be brought to life...at least to the greatest extent realistically possible (we can't return to the 19th century, no matter how badly some anarchists would like to).

Notice that in the segment above, I said "pure" worker cooperatives, not de facto worker cooperatives. A business can take on many features and aspects of a worker cooperative without every employee being a 100% equal owner or manager. Employees can be treated as partners on equal footing without a business being a "pure" cooperative. So a business can be "cooperative" in many ways without being a "pure" cooperative. David Ellerman, Mr. Economic Democracy himself, makes exactly the same point in his book The Democratic Worker-Owned Firm:

The worker-owned cooperative has historically been an all-or-nothing creature. It tends to assume a workforce that already understands and appreciates the rights and responsibilities of democratic worker ownership. A more practical compromise is a hybrid structure that can initially accommodate less than 100 per cent or even minority worker ownership—but where that portion of worker ownership is organized on a democratic cooperative basis.

Businesses can come up with other ways of experimenting with workplace democracy as well, such as "broader sharing of information and authority," involving them in management and decision-making, etc.

This would allow for businesses to maintain economies of scale and specialization, while at the same time incorporating many of the benefits of pure cooperatives. Thus, we should strive for businesses that are as cooperative as possible, and encourage worker input and participation, so that everyone is able to experience maximum autonomy and dignity and nobody is ever put into a "wage slavery" position.

Businesses can also contract certain--perhaps many--tasks out to cooperatives or hybrid models.

There are huge benefits of making the employer-employee relationship "egalitarian," instead of one party being treated like the property of the other. First, it discourages statism by making work less like a Communist dictatorship. Second, it is good for the self-esteem and psychological wellbeing of the workers in those firms. Third, it is good for society as a whole because of the two previous things.

In individualist-anarchist land we should strive for all relationships to be as anti-authoritarian as possible. Reforming the modern workplace is a good start.

Note: an excellent article about workplace democracy in Argentina can be found here.

ROFL! Market Anarchist Website Destroys Families!

I'm not really a hard-core fan of Stefan Molyneux's Freedomain Radio. I think there's some excellent stuff on it (my favorite podcast is the one where he gives a fictitious speech to "the troops"), and I agree with many of his views, but I don't listen to him religiously or anything. I was always a bit put off by all the anti-family stuff on his site.

Now I know why....DAMN!

(Hat tip to the Mises forum.)

The Libertarian Party's Lame-Ass Website

I know that most of us could give a crap about the LP, but I do. Not because I think they'll ever get elected for anything, or that they deserve to, but because it was the "gateway" through which I eventually became a market anarchist, and through which many others to come will (hopefully) become market anarchists. As we're all aware, it has gone in an increasingly crappy direction. A good start would be having a website that isn't so freakin' lame.

A few complaints:

1) The logo. Wtf? It's awful. It looks like a moon made out of cheese is swinging behind the statue of liberty or something. The older logo is way better.

2) The text: "Smaller government, lower taxes, more freedom." Fucking YAWN. That is so boring, cliched, and vague that literally anyone could claim to believe in it. Ask Barack Obama if he believes in those things, and he'll say "yes." Hell, if someone asked Hitler if he believes in "more freedom," he would have said yes. Everybody claims to believe in "freedom," even (especially?) when they advocate the exact opposite.

3) The "blog" is lame as hell. The LP used to allow people to leave comments on it, but that's changed ever since most of the party got pissed at the LP's direction and nominees. Now the posts are completely uninspired and nobody can even leave comments or feedback.

4) The platform. It is perhaps the most sad part of all. When I was a young conservative back in the day, exploring the LP site for the first time, the radical plank demanding the total abolition of taxation energized me on the spot and got me all excited. Now it doesn't even take a firm stance against the war on drugs. There is now only one measly sentence on victimless crimes, just barely condemning them. Don't even get me started on the rest of the platform. It is Republican-lite at its lightest. If the Ron Paul and Bob Barr campaigns taught us anything, it's that principled radicalism excites, while "mainstreamism" bores the snot out of everyone.

5) The press releases are terrible, focusing on petty issues (mostly ones Republicans agree on) while mostly ignoring the frightening war-torture-bombing-police state built up by conservatives. When the press releases go after the Iraq war at all, it's not because it's a murderous imperialist crime, but because it's a "waste of taxpayer dollars." (If Obama started building concentration camps, would our first criticism be that it's a "waste of taxpayer dollars?") The LP has utterly failed to address the impeachment of war criminals Bush and Cheney.

The site sucks, guys. Clean it up.

OT But Hysterical

I nearly fell off my chair laughing the first time I watched this:

Obama Already Working On Building A Fascist State

So now he is working on an "Auto Czar" to direct the auto industry (I really wish I was making this stuff up), along with a program to mandate servitude to the state.

Just wait until this Nazi gets in office..you ain't seen nothin' yet.

How Big Or Small Would Firms Be In Ancapistan?

Since this issue is being argued back and forth by libertarians (see here, here, and here), I figured I'd throw my own opinion out there.

As any regular reader of my blog knows, I think most "left-libertarian" predictions are pretty asinine. In left-libertarian la-la land, laissez faire will result in all of us working in small, luddite, sorry-ass co-ops with a bunch of peasants. Nobody is to become too big or successful (or happy) because those things are "scary." So we work in these dinky, shitty little co-ops that have no electricity or plumbing, and we feel guilty about whatever success we have.

In "right-libertarian" land, things are the reverse. Corporations will all be huge snarling monsters (beasts, even) that will stomp the living crap out of the working class and the environment without undue delay. They will all be huge and powerful and manly and hierarchical and unforgiving, because huge corporations kick mighty ass. (Cue right-libertarians high-fiving each other next to the beer keg.)

Which viewpoint is more right? My answer: Who knows and who cares?

Who cares how big or small businesses will be? There are no "businesses," anyway. In the end, there are only *individuals* buying and selling goods and services as they see fit. There are no "corporations," just people trading things. "Businesses" are an illusion, so worrying about their "size," or demanding that they be big or small, is nonsensical.

The entire world could be considered one really "big" business. Or, it could be considered billions of really, really small businesses--with every individual being his own "business" with his own skills for hire.

So the whole debate is pretty silly once you deconstruct it.

Why See The Movie When You Can Live It?

As we all know by now, they're making Atlas Shrugged into a film. But considering that the United States' current political and economic situation is already following her novel to a tee (bail-outs, corporatism, totalitarian government taking away people's rights, goofball intellectuals praising collectivism, etc), do we really need it to be a movie? Seems to me that we're already actors in it!

The only difference is that in Rand's book, the government actually showed some restraint.

Lysander Spooner's Philosophy

A great essay on it, here.

On another note..

One thing that is interesting is how many social anarchists label Spooner as "anti-capitalist" for some of his criticisms of wage labor (most of these criticisms were discussing wage labor in the context of *state* capitalism, but some were not).

Ancaps Sam Konkin and David Friedman (among others) both made similar criticisms of wage labor, yet neither of them are hailed as "anti-capitalists," like Spooner is. And Spooner's conception of natural rights is basically the same as Rothbard's, which is why I think it's politically accurate to call him an anarcho-capitalist--albeit a "left-leaning" one.

Why do the collectivists want to claim Spooner so badly? My guess that they can't stand the thought of not being able to "have" a famous abolitionist.

Just Ordered A New Book!

America Gone Wild, by Ted Rall. This ought to be a freaking hilarious read.

Anyone who is vehemently denounced by Malkin, Hannity, O'Reilly, the crowd at Little Green Footballs, et all is obviously doing something right.

Like A Rock (In Terms of Dumbness)

This woman was just a hair away from the presidency. Let that sink in for a minute.

(I suppose it runs in the family.)

Capitalist Authoritarianism and How To End It

"Capitalism" is, rightly or wrongly, associated with the current economic system. While many individualist anarchists use the term in a strictly economic sense, based on very well-defined notions of legitimate property rights, no such system and no such property rights exist or have ever existed in the real world (all individualist anarchists, past and present, support “capitalism” by the standard contemporary dictionary definition).

Under our present system, a great many capitalists have become the equivalent of feudal lords and tyrannical oligarchs. This is because of the control they have over the state, the mechanism through which they are able to exploit the rest of the population. These capitalists use every trick in the book (state-aided land grabs, subsidies, patents, intellectual “property”, protectionism, the federal reserve system, the military industrial complex, eminent domain theft, anti-strike laws, regulatory cartelization, and so on) to maintain and perpetuate their power. Thus, although it is not “free market” in any sense of the phrase, it is fair to call the current system a capitalist plutocracy, as it is a plutocracy run by number of capitalists.

"American conservatives... exhort the backward countries on the virtues and the importance of private foreign investment from the advanced countries, and of allowing a favorable climate for this investment, free from governmental harassment. This is all very true, but is again often unreal to the undeveloped peoples, because the conservatives persistently fail to distinguish between legitimate, free-market foreign investment, as against investment based upon monopoly concessions and vast land grants by the undeveloped states. To the extent that foreign investments are based on land monopoly and aggression against the peasantry, to that extent do foreign capitalists take on the aspects of feudal landlords, and must be dealt with in the same way...."
-Murray Rothbard

As Benjamin Tucker pointed out, this plutocracy is responsible for much of the existing crime:

We make war upon the State as chief invader of person and property, as the cause of substantially all the crime and misery that exist, as itself the most gigantic criminal extant. It manufactures criminals much faster than it punishes them. It exists to create and sustain the privileges which produce economic and social chaos. It is the sole support of the monopolies which concentrate wealth and learning in the hands of a few and disperse poverty and ignorance among the masses, to the increase of which inequality the increase of crime is directly proportional. It protects a minority in plundering the majority by methods too subtle to be understood by the victims, and then punishes such unruly members of the majority as attempt to plunder others by methods too simple and straightforward to be recognized by the State as legitimate, crowning its outrages by deluding scholars and philosophers of Mr. Ball's stamp into pleading, as an excuse for its infamous existence, the necessity of repressing the crime which it steadily creates.
-Benjamin Tucker

Notice how Tucker mentions “methods too subtle to be understood by the victims.” This is exactly the case. Most people simply have absolutely no idea just how extensive, secretive, and ruthless this process is. Most people have no idea just how long it has been going on for, or just how many current land titles and riches are stolen. So when they see injustices taking place, they assume it is the result of not enough statism.

These privileges often lead to authoritarian employment relations ("the subjugation of labor to capital"). In the unlikely event of them being abolished, modern “wage slavery” would come to an end and employment would simply become a mutually beneficial transaction. In our current plutocracy, employment is about as “consensual” as a salad-tossing session in prison with Bubba.


However, if authoritarian employment relations did somehow manage to take place under a total free market with perfectly just property titles, we should still actively oppose it and call for non-statist solutions and alternatives. Again, I don’t think all employment is inherently authoritarian, but a great deal of it currently existing is. This is especially true under our current system where corporations can team up with dictatorships to put workers in sweatshops and assassinate labor organizers. While it is difficult to imagine a modern market economy devoid of any employment, we should support and encourage worker autonomy to the highest degree possible.

The labor theory of value and corresponding goofy “revolt” against “interest, rent, and profit” that all too many anarchists engage in is a pointless distraction from the real problem: statist corporations and the obscene levels of power they possess, along with the authoritarian social relationships created through such power.

How to end this system of plunder? Take a guess.

*This post has been edited a bit, so that it flows better.

An Election That Will Go Down In History...

...for the tyranny it leads to.

Barack Obama will destroy the already-fucked US economy, expand the US empire, and continue to strip away our freedoms. The most disgusting part of his victory is the wretched nationalism it has whipped up in liberals and conservatives alike. They're "so proud that we live in a country where something like this could happen!" Having a dictator who is a member of a minority group is apparently an improvement. I'm tearin' up already!

The People(TM) have spoken, and they want a Mugabe America.

Goddamn It

Every fucking time I think I'm feeling better, I manage to get sick again, gain some other illness, or have some other health problem. This is really pissing me off. If I smoked or did coke or was overweight or something it would make sense, but none of those things apply. I'm sick as hell, and it's really a drag.

I just want to lay in a dark room for the rest of the day and watch my Family Guy DVD's...screw the rest of the world.

Mike Huben's Totalitarian, Horrifying Vision

If I had a nickel for every time a statist, right-winger, or milquetoast liberal linked me to Mike Huben's torturously boring Critiques of Libertarianism, I would be even more wealthy than the plutocrats Huben shills for.

Libertarians, according to Huben, are wrong. On literally everything. In his warped mind, there isn't a single issue on which libertarians are right, or even partially right. A quick perusal through his site makes that pretty clear. Huben is a hysterical and uncritical cheerleader for every police-state measure in the book: the war on drugs, gun control, corporate welfare, legislation of morality, socialized medicine, the abolition of free trade, and so on.

Eventually, one has to stop looking at his site and ask, "Ok, so you believe libertarians are 100% completely wrong on absolutely everything. What would your ideal society look like, then?"

Criticizing stuff is easy; solutions tend to be the tricky part (especially for third-rate thinkers like Huben). Unsurprisingly, he does not put forth many positive views of his own for other people to criticize. That doesn't mean we can't look at his views and ask: what would a Mike Huben society look like?

A Mike Huben society would be a brutal dictatorship, pure and simple. It would be run strictly from the top down (by Huben himself, of course). Civil liberties would not exist. Free speech would not exist. Liberty would not exist. You would wake up in the morning, get in a bread line, and try not to make eye contact with the trigger-happy guards spying from the watch towers. Every tiny moment of your life would be watched, regulated, and micromanaged at gun point. You would be asked for "your papers" at the appropriate check points. "Back talk" would get you a one-way ticket to the nearest Huben-approved gulag or concentration camp. Hitler and Stalin? Pikers. Amateurs. Too libertarian for Huben.

Does that really sound like an appealing society to live in? It sure doesn't to me. But then again, I'm not a big fan of totalitarianism.

Semantic (Ideological?) Clash

It was a huge, damn near Earth shattering decision, but after giving it some thought I decided to change the label in the blog description from "market anarchist" to "individualist anarchist." Why?

The single biggest reason has to be my affinity for historical individualist anarchism, and its analysis of contemporary "capitalism" as a statist system of plunder and exploitation. Essays such as this and this and this (among others) gradually pushed my perspective back "leftward" after thinking about them for some time.

Now I realize that the reason it took me so long to return to a more "leftist" perspective of market anarchism wasn't so much the arguments (many of which I've always agree with), but the behavior of self-identified left-libertarians. Seriously, I'd go to forums like Mises and every thread would like this:

Guy #1: I like the free market.

Left-libertarian: That sounds like a bunch of VULGAR LIBERTARIAN twaddle to me! I suppose you support CAPITALISM, don’t you, you fascist paleoconservative?

Guy #1: Huh? All I said was I like the free market.

Left-libertarian: Spoken like a true VULGAR LIBERTARIAN. When I smashed a CAPITALIST window yesterday, I thought of how badly it would hurt the RICH and their state-built HIERARCHIES which you coddle!

Guy #1: Uh..ok. I’m guessing you define capitalism differently?

Left-libertarian: I define capitalism as YOUR FACE, you homophobic little BITCH! Huzzah!

Ok, so that’s a huge exaggeration (not sure how that “huzzah” got in there), but you get my point. At some point it just got repetitive and fucking tiresome, so I put a lot of effort into trying to piss these people off. Just ask Freeman—that dude still hates me ;)

The steam has now finally been let out, so I’m back to my old bag of tricks…both in the “clumsily chasing tail” department and the “left-libertarian” department.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I still don’t believe in the normative labor theory of value, and so I’m still (politically) Rothbardian. I still think anarcho-communism is asinine. I still oppose the statist left, and I'm still viciously anti-collectivist. I still think smashing random windows is stupid.

Nonetheless, it's about time that label was simply changed to "individualist anarchist."

The Individualist Anarchists All Opposed Employment, Right? Wrong.

Benjamin Tucker:
"If a man has labor to sell, he has a right to a free market in which to sell it.”

" [if the ‘four monopolies’ are ended] it will make no difference whether men work for themselves, or are employed, or employ others. In any case they can get nothing but that wages for their labor which free competition determines."

“Wages is not slavery. Wages is a form of voluntary exchange, and voluntary exchange is a form of Liberty.”

Voltairine de Cleyre:
"the system of employer and employed, buying and selling, banking, and all the other essential institutions of Commercialism, centered upon private property, are in themselves good, and are rendered vicious merely by the interference of the State."

Stephen Pearl Andrews:
“The 'Wages System' is essentially proper and right. It is a right to that one man employ another, it is right that he pay him wages, and it is right that he direct him absolutely, arbitrarily, if you will, in the performance of his labor, while, on the other hand, it is the business of him who is employed implicitly to obey, that is, to surrender any will of his own in relation to a design not his own, and to conceive and execute the will of the other...It is right that the great manufacturer should plan, and either alone, or through the aid of assistants under his direction, organize his mammoth establishment. It is right that he should employ and direct his hundreds, or his five hundred men...It is not in any, nor in all of these features combined, that the wrong of our present system is to be sought and found. It is in the simply failure to do Equity. It is not that men are employed and paid, but that they are not paid justly..”.

Lysander Spooner:
"And if the laborer own the stone, wood, iron, wool, and cotton, on which he bestows his labor, lie is the rightful owner of the additional value which his labor gives to those articles. But if he be not the owner of the articles, on which he bestows his labor, he is not the owner of the additional value he has given to them; but gives or sells his labor to the owner of the articles on which he labors."

"I therefore submit, for your [Grover Cleveland's] consideration, the following self-evident propositions:
…
That so long as no force or fraud is practised by either party, the parties themselves, to each separate contract, have the sole, absolute, and unqualified right to decide for themselves, what money, and how much of it, shall be considered a bona fide equivalent of the labor or property that is to be exchanged for it. All this is necessarily implied in the natural right of men to make their own contracts, for buying and selling their respective commodities.
…
That any one man, who has an honest dollar, of any kind whatsoever, has as perfect a right, as any other man can have, to offer it in the market, in competition with any and all other dollars, in exchange for such labor or property as may be in the market for sale.
…
That any prohibition, by a government, of any such kind or amount of money --- provided it be honest in itself --- as the parties to contracts may voluntarily agree to give and receive in exchange for labor or property, is a palpable violation of their natural right to make their own contracts, and to buy and sell their labor and property on such terms as they may find to be necessary for the supply of their wants, or may think most beneficial to their interests."

Pierre Proudhon:

Thus I do not consider as falling within the logical class division of labor nor of collective force the innumerable small shops which are found in all trades, and which seem to me the effect of the preference of the individuals who conduct them, rather than the organic result of a combination of forces. Anybody who is capable of cutting out and sewing up a pair of shoes can get a license, open a shop, and hang out a sign, “So-and-So, Manufacturing Shoe Merchant,” although there may be only himself behind his counter. If a companion, who prefers journeyman's wages to running the risk of starting in business, joins with the first, one will call himself the employer, the other, the hired man; in fact, they are completely equal and completely free. If a youth of fourteen or fifteen wants to learn the trade, there may be a certain division of labor with him; but this division of labor is the condition of apprenticeship, there is nothing remarkable about it. If orders come in freely, there may be several journeymen and apprentices, besides helpers, perhaps a clerk: then it will be what is called a shop, that is, six, ten, fifteen persons, all doing about the same thing, and working together merely to increase the product, not at all to contribute to its perfection by their different abilities. If suddenly the employer's affairs fall into confusion, and he goes into bankruptcy, they whom he employed will have only the trouble of finding another shop; as for his customers, they run no risk, each of the journeymen, or all of them together, may resume the business.

Mutualist William Greene’s extensive comments on the subject can be found here.

Happy to put an end to this myth.

Emile Armand: A Hidden Treasure

For anyone who loves classic individualist anarchist literature as much as I do: check out Emile Armand. This guy is da bomb--I can't believe I didn't find him earlier!

A great quote: "But, whether property be in the hands of the State, of the collectivity, or of the communist milieu, or of a few capitalists, as at the present time, it makes the individual dependent upon the community, it breeds the master and the slave, the leaders and the led."

I'm Back!

Big thanks to Mike and Rorshak for the well wishes. You guys rock!

This last week was really freaking crazy for me. In fact, I just got back from a hospital operation. I won't go into too much detail, but I'll say this: all is well (phew!).

Now I can go back to blogging again :D

Ugh

Won't be blogging any this week (maybe not even the next). I was in the emergency room all last night and feel like total shit. Things aren't looking too good...

Is A Comprehensive Market Anarchist FAQ Long Overdue?

Sure, I'm aware of this one and this one. But neither one can hold a candle to the Anarcho-commie FAQ. Seriously: their FAQ is a million times better, guys. And it has been an extraordinarily effective recruiting tool for them. Why not give our own side for people to read?

I would like to see a comprehensive Market Anarchist FAQ that discusses the history of market anarchism, the ideas and disagreements of different strands of market anarchism (mutualists, ancaps, agorists, philosophical anarchists and so on), criticisms of minarchism and collectivism, and perhaps some rebuttals to the other FAQ. It should also be somewhat entertaining and tongue-and-cheek. Basically, it would be our own version of their endlessly-quoted-and-linked-to FAQ.

Just a thought. And maybe not even a good one. But who else agrees that we need an FAQ more like theirs?

Study Finds That Market Anarchists Are Geniuses

Ok, so these studies are usually bullshit and every political category is loaded with smart people and idiots. But still, since this article fits with my own narrow point of view, I'm going to put up its dubious conclusions as if they're gospel, so that I can proclaim myself an intellectual giant.

Sociologist Markus Kemmelmeier compared college students' self-professed political views to their SAT and ACT scores (which are imperfect but useful measures of cognitive ability.) First, he did find a general trend that social conservatives (those who wanted to ban abortion and gay marriage) weren't as gifted as students with a more progressive take on gender roles.

And who is less socially conservative than us market anarchists? Nobody! Hooray!

But he found the exact opposite pattern with anti-regulation attitudes: The conservatives/libertarians (yay guns boo taxes) appeared to be smarter than their commie compatriots. Kemmelmeier found this crossover "particularly surprising" and says, "It highlights (yet again) that ‘conservatism' is not necessarily a coherent construct, but that you have to distinguish at minimum social conservatism and economic conservatism (libertarianism). If you think about it: Jerry Falwell and Milton Freedman are worlds apart."

And who is more anti-regulation than us market anarchists? Literally nobody! Hooray!

Kemmelmeier found another pattern in his data, one supporting the previously-suggested idea that holding unpopular political views demands more cognitive resources ("context theory"). Those with the strongest beliefs, either way red or way blue, are smarter than the wishy washy centrists too confused to stake their own ground.

And who the hell is less wishy washy or 'centrist' than us market anarchists? Nobody! Hooray!

We're a bunch of friggin' geniuses. Just as I thought.

Hierarchy vs. the Alternatives: A Response to Francois Tremblay

So Francois Tremblay has a new post up called Why hierarchies are immoral. To his credit, he at least attempts to define and explain "hierarchy," which virtually no left-anarchist ever attempts to do.

He still doesn't make much of a compelling case. Like most leftists, he is big on criticism but not so big on solutions. However, the act of criticizing something is pointless without offering actual alternatives. Francois never really discusses what the alternatives would be to the hierarchies he loathes, so we will discuss them here.

He starts off on the right track:

Government is the most acknowledged and the most demonstrative hierarchy. With pomp and circumstance, we elect presidents, prime minister, or crown kings, but we know that most of the power is vested in gigantic bureaucracies and agencies fighting a tug-of-war for resources and laws. The ordinary citizen-subject, who is subject to whoever wins, is the inferior. The aim of governments is the monopolization of a greater and greater amount of political power.

So far, so good. But as Walter Block has pointed out, the hierarchy of the state is different from the hierarchy of other institutions.

Libertarians oppose the initiation of coercion or the threat thereof, not hierarchy. Yes, all groups that violate the non-aggression axiom of libertarians are hierarchical. Governments, gangs, rapists, impose their will, by force, on their victims. They give orders. And yes, in all hierarchies, people at the top of the food chain give orders to those below them. But the difference, and this is crucial, is that the recipients of orders in the latter case have agreed to accept them, but this does not at all apply in the former case.

When the rapist orders the victim to carry out his commands, this is illegitimate hierarchy. When the conductor orders the cellist to do so, this is an aspect of legitimate hierarchy.

Bah! Time to overthrow the conductor and seize the means of production (that baton belongs us all, dammit)!

Ok, time to get serious again. What happens when you condemn all hierarchy, instead of just coercive hierarchy? Answer: batshit insanity. We can see this when we take a good look at what the alternatives would be to the hierarchical institutions Francois wants done away with.

We'll start with Francois' dismissal of capitalism.

Capitalism is the less acknowledged but just as important (if not more important) hierarchy. Here there is a clear distinction between the exploitative class of corporate managers and investors on the one hand, and their employee-subjects on the other hand, and also with the group of consumers (who are victims of the by-products of the activities of production). The aim of the capitalist hierarchies, generally big corporations, is profit.

So what is the alternative to capitalism? In the comment section, Kent McMaginal asks the question:

How could a large company (not a “corporation”) function if there is no one “in charge”?

I would never start a company and hire anyone if I couldn’t insist upon them doing the work they were hired to do. Or if they could decide they owned the company just because they worked there. That would pretty much limit companies to one person each.

So the first alternative is a luddite, primitivist economy--presumably with some form of state apparatus to ensure that it remains an impoverished hell-hole.

The only other alternative is communism, where a dictator (or "anarcho"-communist council, which is the same thing) would plan the economy at gun point. This is about as hierarchical as things get.

These are the alternatives to the "hierarchy" of capitalism. Any takers? I didn't think so.

Of course, I dispute the whole "capitalism is hierarchical control" argument in the first place. A poster at ASC explained this better than I can:

EVERYONE is self employed. Everyone who does something for which they receive monetary compensation is self-employed. Self-employed means offering your services to clients willing to pay, and getting a fee based on mutual agreement. When a "self-employed" plumber fixes your toilet for a fee, that act is fundamentally the same as when a "wage slave" offers his skills to a "boss" for a fee, aka a wage. He "bills" the boss an amount referred to as the wage. Put most succinctly: the rich have clients, the poor have bosses. It's the same damn thing.

Barry Loberfield also discusses this in his article, The Coercive Anarchism of Noam Chomsky.

Let's move on to the other hierarchies Francois opposes.

Religions and cults are another major category of hierarchies. Although they are of course different, I classify them in the same group because their aims (primarily, thought control) and structures (authorities which are deemed “closer to God” or otherwise more holy) are generally similar.

As big of an atheist as I am, the solution to this is pretty simple: don't go to church!

Now, if Francois truly believes that hierarchy is immoral, he must believe it is morally justified to coercively prohibit these hierarchical institutions from forming. So I challenge him to:

1) Demand the compulsory abolition of churches (along with all the other hierarchies he opposes), and

2) Explain how this will be done without some form of hierarchical authority.

Parenting

Ok, so Francois is apparently against parenting. What is the alternative, then?

Are children going to be raised by wolves? I assume that would also be "hierarchy," so Francois would oppose that too.

Should parents drop their newborns off in a random place to let them fend for themselves, instead of raising them? Most would consider that to be child abuse. Child abuse is a big reason why some people oppose families, so that doesn't make much sense either.

schools

Schools would also not exist in the Tremblayan order (not much would, after all).

What would this mean? We would have a society of uneducated idiots and morons. We would not have doctors, engineers, scientists, or anyone else necessary for civlization.

We would starve to death. Pointlessly.

Let's be clear...

None of this is meant to imply that hierarchy is always a good thing. Many hierarchical institutions violate liberty.

But once you start on a crusade against all hierarchy (instead of coercive hierarchy), you are naturally going to have to oppose everyone and everything. I touched on this in a previous post:

...without the use of threat or coercion, nobody really is being "ruled" or "dominated." If your "submission" to an authority figure is voluntary, then it ceases to be domination.

Should libertarians battle S&M sex games, along with the state? How about asshole football coaches (some of the most authoritarian people on the planet)? Should libertarians fight against teachers, parents, and sports referees? Should we lead the fight against online message board moderators?

Consider the alternatives, and the whole thing reduces to absurdity.

Is Chuck Baldwin "More Libertarian" Than Bob Barr?

I keep hearing from libertarian websites (sometimes even from big-name libertarians) that Chuck Baldwin is more libertarian than Bob Barr. Now, I agree with most libertarian criticisms of Barr, who has undoubtedly said some very stupid things and made some very stupid moves during his campaign. He also has a terrible record and past.

But is it really true that the far-right paleocon Baldwin is "more libertarian" than Barr? Sorry, but the answer is no.

Which candidate brags about taking the least libertarian stance on immigration out of all the candidates of the race? Baldwin.

Which candidate openly endorses protectionist measures? Baldwin.

Which candidate wants the government to ban gambling? Baldwin.

Which candidate advocates a national ban on abortion? Baldwin.

Which candidate opposes gays in the military? Baldwin.

Which candidate praises Jerry Falwell? Baldwin.

Which candidate is running on a platform of theocracy? Baldwin.

Even on the war on drugs, Barr is better than Baldwin. (Neither will flat-out legalize all drugs, but at least Barr wants to divert non-violent offendors from prisons and encourage private alternatives.)

Barr, of course, is a statist with a horrible record and this post is not meant to praise him. But is it really true that Chuck Baldwin is "more libertarian" than Barr, as the rightwing paleolibertarians insist? Nope, not really.

Just because someone is a supporter of Ron Paul does NOT make him a libertarian.

The Economic Lessons of Paul Kurgman

Ok, so this is from a right-wing website.

It's still a hysterical parody of left-wing economics. The primers on "profits" and "trade" are especially entertaining.

John P. on the Idiocy of American Voters

Excerpt:

Voters are stupider than politicians because, one, they inexplicably ascribe a high level of intelligence to their vaunted leaders and, two, they delude themselves that this separates their leaders from those across the aisle. The professional criminal class must at least be somewhat smarter (and less ignorant) than the voters because they treat the voters like complete idiots, which is appropriate.

I couldn't agree more. The American people are just plain stupid. What is so amazing to me is the lengths to which Democratic and Republican voters will go to make themselves believe there's a difference between the two parties-- no matter how much evidence there is to the contrary.

Since most of my friends are Republicans (yuck), I get an up-close look at this sort of idiocy on a regular basis. At a recent party, I annoyed several of them for suggesting McCain may lack some degree of sanity, and George W. Bush may, just may, be a bit of an idiot. Needless to say, they would shit a canary if they read anything on this blog.

One of them actually praised the "stimulus"--no joke. Insert laugh track here. Yes, that's right: even watered-down Bob Barr style libertarianism would be completely unhinged, reckless insanity to them (and to most of the American public).

Say what you want about Tucker Carlson, but the man did an excellent job (starting at 7:15) of explaining why libertarianism isn't and will never be popular. It requires people to think instead of forcing others to do what they want. I would say the same about market anarchism.

Rothbard Gives His Take On the Barr-Root Campaign

...from beyond the grave.

In any ideological movement, the temptation to take quick shortcuts, the lure of betraying principle for supposed short-run gain, can become almost irresistible. But usually sellouts have occurred after the movement has taken power, or else when it is teetering on the brink of power. But it is surely rare for an ideological movement to sell out when it merely sniffs the faintest whiff of possible power some day in the future. Surely this is gutlessness and venality of an unusually high order. Yet this began to happen to the growing libertarian movement in early 1979, and is happening right now before our eyes.

This new opportunist strategy we might call, with considerable and much-merited sarcasm, the "quick-victory" model. The reasoning goes something like this: All this principle stuff is just a drag on the machinery. We can gain a rapid and enormous leap forward in votes, money, membership, and media influence. But to gain these great goals we must quietly but effectively bury these annoying principles, which only put off voters, money, influence, etc.

The problem, of course, is that even if money, votes, and influence are achieved by this route, what are they being achieved for? A major purpose, for example, of the Libertarian Party is to educate the public, but to educate them to what? Presumably, to libertarian principles. But if we present to the public watered-down pap hardly distinguishable from liberals, conservatives, or centrists on various issues, there will be no true education. The public will receive education, not in liberty, but in pap, and whatever votes are achieved will not be for liberty but for watered-down treacle. In the process, our glorious principles are betrayed and forgotten, and so the cause of liberty is worse off, even with several million votes, than it was before the sellout strategy took hold. So everyone loses, and no one benefits – except perhaps the opportunists themselves, who may personally gain in power and income from the whole shabby process.

How, then, were the opportunist connivers going to handle all the stiff-necked and principled purists in the Libertarian Party? The answer was simple, and typical of the process of betrayal occurring in ideological parties: Let the purists have their platform, which indeed has gotten harder core and more radical with each national convention. And then, simply control the Presidential candidate, and he ignores the platform. And then the party can quietly go to hell, except of course when needed as foot soldiers for ballot drives. Besides, they believed they could get away with this strategy with only a minimum of hassle from us purist malcontents. So far, in fact, the tactic has worked, and will continue to work unless and until genuine libertarians throughout the country rouse themselves and begin to do something effective about it. And the first step is to raise all of our voices loud and clear against this repellent takeover of our party.

Read the rest here.

Prophetic? You decide.

Wall Street Gets Dick Slapped!

Woohoo!

Unfortunately, it doesn't make any difference. We're still screwed, and the plutocrats will just come up with some other scam.

Silber: "Stupider Than Shit"

Arthur, as we all know, is brilliant.

(On a side note: one thing that amazes me is how similar his writing style is to mine. When I read his posts, I feel like I'm reading my own damn blog. Trippy, man.)

My Debate (Well, Sort Of) With SilentRadical

This is an older debate I had over left-anarchism and market anarchism, and I felt I'd post it just for the hell of it. Much of it takes place in the comment sections to these posts. (Obviously, I've dropped the left-Rothbardian label since, because I think it has been perverted.)

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4

Enron: Small Beer Compared To The Latest Batch of Corporate Crooks

The upcoming bail-outs are corporate fascism at its very worst. At this point, I would stand up and cheer if the left-anarchists were to throw bricks and rocks at the "private property" of these tyrants. These robber barons fucking deserve it!

The corporate extortion this time is around a trillion dollars. You know what that means: we all get to take it in the ass. Without lube. The pitchers are the corporate oligarchs who have successfully enslaved this idiot country.

At least historians are probably happy. They finally get to see what the Weimar Republic was like!

In Defense of...Bob Barr!?

Anyone who follows third-party politics (I confess: it’s a guilty pleasure of mine) has already heard the news: Ron Paul has endorsed the theocratic whacko Chuck Baldwin to punish Barr for ditching his press conference.

First, regardless of what you think of Paul and his conference, it was a HUGE mistake (from a strategic standpoint) for Barr to skip the conference. He pissed off everyone for no good reason and the whole thing could have easily been avoided.

Nonetheless, I can understand why Barr decided to skip it after hearing the initial details. When I first heard of Paul’s press conference, I also thought it sounded extremely asinine. Like Barr, I got the impression that Paul was mindlessly endorsing four candidates (including Ralph Nader!?), stupidly diluting his following. It wasn’t until I actually watched Paul’s conference that I really understood what he was trying to do. “Aaahh, so that’s what the man is getting at.”

While I am a fan of Ron Paul (boo, hiss, not an anarchist, I know), his “endorsement” was clearly just an act of childish, petty revenge to get even with Barr. He came off as butthurt and unprincipled. “Oh yeah? Well now you can’t come over to my house after school!”

Baldwin is a grade A (or is that grade F?) nutter. The guy is all of the very worst elements of the Paul campaign rolled into one gigantic shit burrito: unhinged social conservatism, crackpot rightist populism, and fringe conspiracy theories out the ass. The Constitution Party’s platform of “family values” (ie, gays back in the closet, women back in the kitchen, Timmy back under daddy’s spiked belt) is quite open in its advocacy of theocracy. If you insist on voting and are torn between Chuck and Bob, you are better off with Bob.

Only one word can describe Paul’s endorsement of these creationist idiots:

YYEEEEEEEEEEEEEECCCCHHHHH!!!!

Is Walking Next On The State's List Of Things To Ban?

So I have this habit of going on long walks in the middle of the night--to clear my head and relax.

BIIIIIG mistake.

Not too long ago I was walking on a big-ass dirt trail late at night. My car was parked in a park near the beginning of a trail.

When I got back from my walk, I climbed in my car, and knew that I smelled bacon. Unsurprisingly, the cop car coming down the road turned on its lights while I rolled my eyes.

It took nearly ten minutes for the moron to get out of his car. First, he told me about my "crime": being parked in a "public park" that's closed. Whoop-de-friggin doo. Who follows those silly rules anyway?

Then he got all "tricky," thinking he's clever, asking me what I'm doing outside by myself out in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night.

I told him the exact truth--that I was out walking/jogging--and the pig didn't believe me. Every word out of my mouth he tried to 'turn back' on me ("Do you always jog in jeans? Blah blah"). It was rather laughable. He asked to see my license and registration, so I gave them to him. He asked why I had bedspread and a pillow in my backseat, thinking I was a drifter or something (I was actually going to wash them).

I waited forever while his incompetent ass sat in his car. Then he finally came back and started taking down my name, number, and so on. I didn't get in any trouble, but this fool wasted about 30 minutes of my time while god-knows how many people were being raped, murdered, molested, and mugged.

What a great reward for being a law-abiding citizen! It's now illegal to go on a walk!

I keep hearing that we need to "respect cops" and "pay them more," but I don't see the point. I've never met a cop who wasn't a complete asshole. They do nothing but harass those of us who follow the rules while the crooks go free.

Screw the cops.

Ack! I Want To Write, But Can't!

This week is so busy for me, it's ridiculous. Not even enough time to finish this po

Kinsella On Left-wing Idiocy

Echoing some of my own recent comments, Stephan Kinsella takes out the trash over at Austro-Athenian Empire.

For some reason these disaffected “anti-corporate” types, who appear to largely be stuck in dismoded Marxian economics and social analysis, have no comprehension of the way real enterprise works. It’s as if a bunch of Che-teeshirt wearing grad students whose Republican daddies paid for their scholarships to Princeton and never worked a day in their lives were railing against “Wal-Mart.” They have some inexplicable, useless, and self-destructive (in the Darwinian sense; would that we had not short-circuited Darwinism with our modern capitalist largesse) animus against commerce and market life.

Hey, to each his own–but it’s not libertarian (IMHO), and it certainly doesn’t justify breaking the windows of merchants. They may feel “alienated” (though how pampered grad students and trust-fund babies can be alienated from labor you don’t actually perform with your own hands is a mystery), but to assume, Marx-like, that this is a natural condition of actors on the market is antiquated, to say the least.

So I would of course as a libertarian favor a rule whereby non-state actors having some color of title to property have a presumptive right to use it as owners until someone else can establish a better claim thereto. Pocahantas’s great—–grandniece can establish a better claim to the property than you? Fine. Hand it over. Such cases would be rare; and covered by title insurance. In the meantime: the world is for the living. Rand was not wrong about everything.

We as libertarians must–we must–support productive achievement, commerce, the market, freedom, free enterprise, the division of labor, economies of scale, individualism, and, above all, as Nozick said, capitalist acts between consenting adults–which these ignorant savages rail against.

Enough. Yes, we can appreciate the caution against vulgar libertarianism. But it is too much. Give me George Reisman’s “vulgar” libertarianism any day over the rock-throwing–and condoning–NON-libertarian misfits.

Bravo!

Anyone thirsty for even more trashing of these worthless degenerates should click the Anti-Left tag at the bottom of this post.

It is best to think of the Left as one gigantic drain on society.

OT: Fuck Vista

God, I hate this fucking thing sooooo much.

Not only do I have to update the POS a thousand times every day, but the stupid thing just completely killed my sound! My reward for updating, I suppose.

When I put my mouse over the volume, I get some ri-goddamn-diculous "no audio output device is installed" message. I swear to Christ, I'm going to strangle someone over this.

The entire goal of Vista is to make it humanly IMPOSSIBLE to sit down for five minutes and just relax and surf the web. The nonstop updates are annoying as fuck, and these screwups do nothing but drain away my life.

I'm not alone in hating this worthless OS, either.

Market anarchism mentioned; Social anarchist wimps not happy

A brief article on market anarchists attending the RNC was recently posted at Infoshop. If you want a good laugh, scroll down and read the responses.

One commentor writes:

The sooner so-called "market anarchists" totally distance themselves from "anarcho"-capitalism and people like Molinari, Rothbard and other supporters of "pure" capitalism the better. It would also help if they called themselves, say, mutualists -- assuming, of course, that they are genuine anarchists...

Hahaha yeah, if only we would see the light and embrace mutualism. *Raspberry* That'll happen soon!

And what is the argument? That defenders of capitalism and hierarchy like Molinari and Rothbard are actually "market anarchists"? If they are, then "market anarchism" is simply "anarcho"-capitalism with a more clued up PR campaign. If they are not, then why link to a site which includes "anarcho"-capitalism in "market anarchism"?

Hey, they caught on surprisingly quick on that one! Usually they're easier to fool (not exactly the sharpest tools in the shed, after all).

Another dullard leaves a series of questions. My insightful, respectful answers are after them.

1. Do market anarchists believe in inherited wealth?

Yessiree Bob.

2. Do market anarchists believe that individuals who accumulate more wealth have the right to purchase for private use large areas of property and enjoy them and the products of this land?

Damn straight!

Or do they subscribe by Tucker's late idea that whoever has the most force to possess the land has the right to take it?

Nah, that's a bunch of tree-hugging hippie crap.

3. Do market anarchists believe that they can use wage labour and that using employees is a consensual act?

Hells yeah, we dig that stuff.

Or to [sic] they only believe in individual labour or cooperative labour?

A hahahahaha!!! *Catching breath* No seriously..."cooperative labor"...a hahahahah!

Where do they come up with this stuff?

4. What is this "market" if not the instrument which determines, among other things, the value of exchange for goods and labour? (At least Warren wanted to make time equal to time.)

BWA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Oh my god, I feel like I'm going to pass out. What's next, worship of the pagan gods?

6. Why are the market anarchist pages full of anarchocapitalist texts?

Because we are anarcho-capitalists, you dummy.

Thanks for the chuckles, geniuses.

(Note: this post was written with a lot of Smirnoff in me. Don't take it too seriously.)

Palin "Proud" Of Her Idiot Son Who Will Die For Nothing

From her Dayton speech (hat tip to LRC):

Our oldest son, Track, though, he'll be following the presidential campaign from afar. On Sept. 11 of last year, our son enlisted in the United States Army.

Wow, what a dumbfuck. Anyone who signed up on September 11, 2001 was enough of a gullible sheeple moron. But Sept. 11 of last year?!

Frankly, I would admire this leech more if he was the jizz-mopper at a nudie booth. At least then he would perform some kind of service to society.

And on Sept. 11, Track will deploy to Iraq in the service of his country.

He'll slaughter women and children so the US plutokkkracy can end freedom in Iraq just like it is succeeding in doing over here.

So in a way, Palin is right. Track is fighting for his country.

And Todd and I are so proud of him and of all the fine men and women serving the country in uniform.

Just like those brave Nazi soldiers who fought in Poland!

U-S-A! U-S-A!

Proudhon At His Best

Thanks to Libertarian Labyrinth, here is a quote of Proudhon at his best. The man would definitely be banned at RevLeft.com today!

I am, as you are well aware, citizens, the man who wrote these words: Property is theft!

I do not come to retract them, heaven forbid! I persist in regarding this provocative definition as the greatest truth of the century. I have no desire to insult your convictions either: all that I ask, is to say to you how, partisan of the family and of the household, adversary of communism, I understand that the negation of property is necessary for the abolition of misery, for the emancipation of the proletariat. It is by its fruits that one must judge a doctrine: judge then my theory by my practice.

When I say, Property is theft! I do not propose a principle; I do nothing but express one conclusion. You will understand the enormous difference presently.

However, if the definition of property which I state is only the conclusion, or rather the general formula of the economic system, what is the principle of that system, what is its practice, and what are its forms?

My principle, which will appear astonishing to you, citizens, my principle is yours; it is property itself.

I have no other symbol, no other principle than those of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen: Liberty, equality, security, property.

Like the Declaration of Rights, I define liberty as the right to do anything that does not harm others.

Again, like the Declaration of Rights, I define property, provisionally, as the right to dispose freely of one's income, the fruits of one's labor and industry.

Here is the entirety of my system: liberty of conscience, liberty of the press, liberty of labor, free trade, liberty in education, free competition, free disposition of the fruits of labor and industry, liberty ad infinitum, absolute liberty, liberty for all and always?

It is the system of '89 and '93; the system of Quesnay, of Turgot, of J.-B. Say; the system that is always professed, with more or less intelligence and good faith, by the various organs of the political parties, the system of the Débats, of the Presse, of the Constitutionnel, of the Siècle, of the Nationale, of the Rèforme, of the Gazette; in the end it is your system, voters.

Simple as unity, vast as infinity, this system serves for itself and for others as a criterion. In a word it is understood and compels adhesion; nobody wants a system in which liberty is the least bit undermined. One word identifies and wards off all errors: what could be easier than to say what is or is not liberty? Liberty then, nothing more, nothing less. Laissez faire, laissez passer, in the broadest and most literal sense; consequently property, as it rises legitimately from this freedom, is my principle. No other solidarity between the citizens than that accidents resulting from chance.