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Wednesday, May 22

Guest Editor

Eric Field is the guest editor today.
 

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photo courtesoy of ixtussy
Adam Kokesh Arrested in Philadelphia while Engaging in Free Speech
Original article
Bullhorning Philly Fed Detention Center
Original article Video footage of protest. 
On Target Pressure Points: Government Paranoia
Original article
Verizon Wireless Secretly Passed AP Reporters' Phone Records to Feds
Original article Thanks, Verizon.  Way to go with your customer service. 
IRS Denied Nonprofit Status to Free State Project
Original article
The Collapse of Journalism, and the Journalism of Collapse
Original article
Dan Carlin: Probing the President
Original article
Pentagon Spec Ops Chief Sees ’10 to 20′ More Years of War Against al-Qaida
Original article
Robert Anton Wilson and Karl Hess: Subversion for Fun and Profit
Original article Video of a 1986 conversation between R. A. Wilson and Karl Hess. 
Scott Horton Interview with Jed Morey
Original article Jed Morey, a journalist with Long Island Press, discusses the Pentagon’s “power grab” of unilaterally granting itself authority over civil disturbances; giving local military commanders the same authority as the president during some ill-defined emergency; preparing domestic military operations with the NDAA and Northern Command; and the pushback coming from Congress and the National Governors Association. Podcast by Scott Horton. 
Washington Gets Explicit: Its 'War on Terror' Is Permanent
Original article
Theres a Question Mark Hanging Over the Apostrophes Future
Original article An everyday example of conflict between the state and society. 
Little Boy Has New Hand 3D Printed
Original article
Ten Reasons Why Statism Is (Nearly) Universally Accepted and a Brief Note on Why It Matters to Know Them
8.5
Jakub Bozydar W... 2010-12-09 04:00
Column by Jakub Bozydar Wisniewski. Exclusive to STR It seems scarcely an exaggeration to say that today’s inhabited world is almost universally statist. Thus, the task facing libertarians remains comprehensive and formidable. Since the shape of social reality is ultimately determined by the ideas people hold, undermining the influence of any given doctrine requires prior understanding of...
Acid Test
5.33333
Jim Davies 2010-12-09 04:00
Column by Jim Davies. Exclusive to STR The aftermath of the release of the first 1% of the recent second wave of leaks of sensitive government documents is in some ways more fun than reading of the newly uncovered secrets themselves. It has drawn a clear distinction between those who are horrified and those who are delighted; like the acid test for fake gold, this reveals what people really think...
Private Universities? Ha!
9.8
tzo 2010-12-08 04:00
Column by tzo. Exclusive to STR The State has always needed an opinion-molding class to convince the masses that the institution of government is necessary, proper, and vital in its organization and delivery of essential public services that could not otherwise be provided.   In exchange for the creation and dissemination of such ideological propaganda, the apologist class receives certain...
The WikiLeaks Critics’ Pathological Obedience to the State
7.5
Scott Lazarowitz 2010-12-06 04:00
Column by Scott Lazarowitz. Exclusive to STR The most recent example of the sheeple’s State-obedience has been the response among many politicians and news media blabbermouths and scribblers to the latest WikiLeaks release. The documents show the utter ineptness of our government officials who have no idea what they’re doing, and the documents also show the bureaucrats’...
Power & Force in 'Crash'
5.5
Michael Kleen 2010-12-03 04:00
Column by Michael Kleen. Exclusive to STR On the surface, the Academy Award-winning film Crash (2004) purports to be an emotional portrayal of race and prejudice in America. Through a series of interwoven vignettes, the filmmakers portray characters of several different races and ethnic backgrounds as they interact over the course of two or three days on the streets of Los Angeles. At every point...
TSA Should Offer Travelers Search Options
10
Emiliano Antunez 2010-12-03 04:00
Column by Emiliano Antunez.  Exclusive to STR If you boarded a plane over the holiday weekend, I am sure you weren’t very comfortable exposing your “privates” on a screen or having a “highly trained” TSA employee feel your “junk.” The TSA should explore giving flyers options in order to make these invasive procedures more bearable or constructive....
All-Purpose Platitudes
9.75
Paul Hein 2010-12-02 04:00
Column by Paul Hein.   Exclusive to STR   During the pre-election propagandizing, I heard enough platitudes to last me a lifetime, but it hasn’t ceased with the cessation of voting. Now the president, seeking to make the best of a bad (for him) situation, is giving us still more, but they’re the old familiar, tried-and-true blatherskite we’ve come to know and despise...
Martial Law vs. 'Let Us Separate'
8
Scott Lazarowitz 2010-11-23 04:00
Column by Scott Lazarowitz. Exclusive to STR It seems that President Obama, Congress and especially Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke are determined to cause economic collapse in America. Some people, such as economist and investment analyst Peter Schiff and trend forecaster Gerald Celente, have been predicting that, because of Washington’s spending sprees, debts, perpetual wars and...
North Korea Is Not a Problem – The U.S. Is
4
Per Bylund 2010-11-23 04:00
Column by Per Bylund. Exclusive to STR News agencies report on another potential nuclear threat from North Korea, which has developed an advanced program for enriching uranium. Granted, nuclear weapons are extremely dangerous – and they are especially dangerous in the hands of nutcases such as Kim Jong-il. However, the media misses the point as they urgently run in the direction pointed out...
The G-Word
9.5
tzo 2010-11-23 04:00
Column by tzo. Exclusive to STR Is it inaccurate and overly-dramatic to proclaim that government is synonymous with aggression? Sure, government can certainly be aggressive (in the sense of violating the non-aggression principle [NAP]), but that doesn’t necessarily mean that everything it does is aggressive, does it? Government may be an imperfect work still in progress, but perhaps we will...
Ten Reasons Why Statism Is (Nearly) Universally Accepted and a Brief Note on Why It Matters to Know Them
8.5
Jakub Bozydar W... 2010-12-09 04:00
Column by Jakub Bozydar Wisniewski. Exclusive to STR It seems scarcely an exaggeration to say that today’s inhabited world is almost universally statist. Thus, the task facing libertarians remains comprehensive and formidable. Since the shape of social reality is ultimately determined by the ideas people hold, undermining the influence of any given doctrine requires prior understanding of...
Metamouse
8.5
tzo 2011-04-07 03:00
Column by tzo.   Exclusive to STR   Hello, and welcome. I would like to introduce you today to my metamouse, Stanley. Let me tell you a bit about Stanley: Stanley depends upon cheese in order to survive, and he has been, as a rule, very well fed. This is Stanley's home over here, which as you can see, is a maze. If you look closely, you will notice that scattered about on the floor of...
How Dare You Rob Me of My Time on Earth
8.5
Jim Moore 2011-05-24 00:00
Column by Jim Moore.   Exclusive to STR   Dedicated to the Unknown Soldiers   Most people think of life as precious, a miracle, a fabulous gift. Life is all of these and more. Above all, life is sacred.  Sacred, because each human life is God-given, unique, one-of-a-kind, never duplicated. And once that life is over, THAT life—yours and mine—is gone...
About Strike The Root: A Terror and a Wonder
8.5
Lawrence M. Ludlow 2011-08-10 00:00
Column by Lawrence M. Ludlow.   Exclusive to STR   I have encountered a range of responses to material that appears on the website Strike-The-Root.com. Some people dislike the vitriol that rises to the surface of some of the columns. Some say the topics are too specialized. Others complain that an article was of poor quality. All of these criticisms can be partially true at times, but...
A Rose By Any Other Name Is Still Vegetation
8.5
Paul Hein 2011-09-01 00:00
Column by Paul Hein   Exclusive to STR   Suppose you hired a landscape architect, and asked him to submit a plan to beautify your yard. He would ask you what you had in mind. “Well, how about some vegetation?” He might smile at that, or frown; but he would want you to be more specific. “What vegetation would you like?” “You know, green plants, maybe...
The Most Important Jobs in the World--Education and Parenthood
8.5
livefreeretiree 2011-09-29 00:00
Column by Vahram G. Diehl.   Exclusive to STR   The essence of culture is formed by ideas that are passed down through the generations. Politics, religion, customs, language, etiquette, fashion, music, sports, cuisine, and every other ideology that distinguishes one place from the next constitutes culture. Everything about culture has developed respective to each group of...
The Great Fiction of Fiat Money Cornucopia
8.5
Jakub Bozydar W... 2012-02-22 01:00
Column by Jakub Bozydar Wisniewski. Exclusive to STR In this day and age of easy and equal access to a practically infinite supply of independent information, a serious economic crisis can potentially have intellectually beneficial consequences. It can make people start questioning the "mainstream consensus" on, say, the nature of central banks, ex nihilio credit expansions and fiat...
The Great Stagecoach Robbery Recommended
8.5
David Calderwood 2012-03-02 01:00
Column by new Root Striker David Calderwood.  Exclusive to STR  It’s Political Season and the airwaves are stuffed with Great Plans from Great Men, full of promises to Fix This and Fix That. I guess the goal is, “He who makes the Most Believable Promises Wins.”   Bah.   Does anyone else share my sense that I’m a passenger on a stagecoach that is being...
Discrimination
8.5
Paul Bonneau 2012-04-24 00:00
Column by Paul Bonneau. Exclusive to STR  The sign in the window said, “No Firearms Allowed Inside”. First thing that came to my mind was, “Great, now what am I supposed to do? Leave my gun out here lying on the sidewalk?” My next thought was, “I am trying to do business with morons.”   I was in front of the local office of my ISP provider, a company...
Beware the Swarm
8.5
tzo 2012-12-19 09:09
Column by tzo. Exclusive to STR It has been said that government is merely an intangible set of ideas that influence how people interact with one another. It has also been called a belief system analogous to a religion in that it generally has its own creation mythos, a pantheon of idealized superheroes, and a set of superstitions grounded in faith instead of logic. While I don’t disagree...
An Armed March on Washington? MUST READ
10
Alex R. Knight III 2013-05-07 06:52
Column by Alex R. Knight III. Exclusive to STR Perhaps never before have I encountered a proposal within Liberty Movement circles that has generated more controversy faster and further than Adam Kokesh’s planned July 4th march on Washington, District of Criminals, in which he states that himself and the other participants “will march with rifles loaded & slung across our backs to...
The Orwellian Paradigm--Killing You, For Your Own Safety MUST READ
9.625
fmoghul 2013-04-10 08:12
Column by Faisal Moghul. Exclusive to STR Almost 30 years ago, cultural critic Neil Postman argued in Amusing Ourselves to Death that television’s gradual replacement of the printing press has created a dumbed-down culture driven by mindless entertainment. In this context, Postman claimed that Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World correctly foresaw our dystopian future, as opposed to George...
Frameworks, Virtual Reality and Civil Society: A Manifesto for the Doctrine of Love and Freedom MUST READ
10
Glen Allport 2012-12-06 08:44
Column by Glen Allport. Exclusive to STR Perhaps I should say this paradigm shift is resuming. The healthier incoming paradigm is a modern, more accurate, better-supported, and better-understood version of one that began the shift towards a free, healthy, and prosperous world more than three centuries ago and which informed the creation of the United States itself: Classical Liberalism. - 1...
Timeline of a World-Killing Paradigm Shift MUST READ
0
Glen Allport 2012-05-14 00:00
Column by Glen Allport. Exclusive to STR   Part 3 of "Could the Non-Aggression Principle Stop the Sixth Great Extinction?"   Part One of this series discussed the Non-Aggression principle, calling it "the libertarian half of the Golden Rule" (compassion being the other half) and describing the function of aggression in creating not only tyranny and war but also...
Terrorist Alert: Government Extremists Threaten Americans MUST READ
9
Glen Allport 2012-03-26 00:00
Column by Glen Allport. Exclusive to STR   Question: are you more terrified by Muslim extremists, by "domestic terrorists" – or by your own government? Which group is more likely to assault you? To kill you? To unjustly imprison and even torture you?   The U.S. federal government has ALREADY:   Built and is staffing a huge gulag of concentration camps ["...
The State Is a Firing Squad MUST READ
10
JGVibes 2012-02-17 01:00
Column by JGVibes.   Exclusive to STR   Although the common perception of human nature is very negative, the truth is that most people who aren’t mentally ill have a very difficult time committing acts of violence. Usually it takes a sizeable payment and a fair amount of manipulation to convince someone to act violently, and even then a tremendous amount of guilt typically...
How the 1% Took America's Wealth--and How to Get It Back MUST READ
9.25
Glen Allport 2011-12-01 01:00
Column by Glen Allport. Exclusive to STR  - 1 - Plundering Wealth vs Producing Wealth   In recent decades, the rich have gathered an increasing share of the total wealth in the United States. As this wealth disparity grows and especially as large numbers of the formerly middle class fall into poverty and even into homelessness, this flow of wealth from main street (from anyone not...
'Anarchy or Minarchy' Is Only Half the Question, Part 2 MUST READ
9.5
Glen Allport 2011-04-13 03:00
Column by Glen Allport. Exclusive to STR  This is Part 2 of a response to a column by Wesley Messamore. Last week's Part One of this column discussed the following:   ·      Minarchy: Lighting a Match to the Fuse of Tyranny ·      Anarchy: By Itself, Yang without Yin ·      The Missing Key...
Oh, Stanley MUST READ
10
tzo 2011-03-30 03:00
Column by tzo. Exclusive to STR   Stanley Milgram was an American social psychologist best known for his Milgram Experiment, a study conducted in the 1960s.   Dr. Milgram wanted to research the relationship between obedience and authority, and he was at least partly motivated to do so by the events of the Nazi Holocaust. It greatly troubled him that so many supposedly good people could...
The Pathocracy Unmasked MUST READ
10
Glen Allport 2011-02-11 04:00
Column by Glen Allport. Exclusive to STR - 1 - Exposed as Criminals and Psychopaths, the Coercive Elite are Desperate to Stop the Flow of Honest Information     "When Bush cancelled his trip to avoid prosecution, the human rights groups who prepared the complaints made it public and announced that the Bush Torture Indictment would be waiting wherever he travels next." CCR...
The Licensing Effect Recommended
0
Lawrence Samuels 2013-05-10 08:28
The article below contains excerpts from L.K. Samuels’ new book, In Defense of Chaos: The Chaology of Politics, Economics and Human Action. Column by L.K. Samuels. Exclusive to STR Good intentions rarely make good laws. Those who do evil almost always think they are doing good for goodness’ sake. Nobody sees himself as evil. As Will Smith, the American actor, once quipped, “...
The Pugsley Plan Recommended
8.5
Jim Davies 2013-01-14 08:46
Column by Jim Davies. Exclusive to STR Prior to Harry Browne's first run for US President in 1996, his friend John Pugsley wrote him a passionate “open letter” urging him not to. As far as I know, Harry didn't reply, but he did continue his campaign – and repeated it four years later. He got few votes more than the LP normally receives, but his platform and campaign were...
Ed Schultz and His Alleged Middle Class Heroes Recommended
10
Angelo Mike 2013-01-04 01:00
Column by Angelo Mike. Exclusive to STR Ed Schultz has set quite the task out for himself. On his New Year’s Eve broadcast on MSNBC, he announced who his “Middle Class Heroes of 2012” are. Schultz is a self-styled liberal, so his recipients of the title “Middle Class Hero” are predictable and worthy of a certain amount of eye rolling. The general reverence for...
The Trials Recommended
8.33333
tzo 2012-12-11 08:49
Column by tzo. Exclusive to STR To anyone who has seen or read The Reader (a synopsis of the relevant part of the story is here), one of the main questions raised in the story is, "What should be done with Hanna?" Was she responsible for her actions even if she was so thoroughly indoctrinated so as to be completely confused by the charges against her? She asked more than once, while...
464 Lost Years Recommended
8.25
Jim Davies 2012-12-10 08:48
Column by Jim Davies. Exclusive to STR Recently I re-read part of that seminal essay, Discourse on Voluntary Servitude by Etienne de la Boëtie, written in 1548, or 464 years ago. He said that if you want to topple a tyrant, all you need to do is to withdraw support. No violence, no sweat, just stop helping him. Yet 24 years later there was a massacre of Huguenot Protestants, indicating that...
The Duty to End the State Recommended
10
Jim Davies 2012-11-30 08:53
Column by Jim Davies. Exclusive to STR Many reading this already understand the Self-ownership Axiom; that we each own our own lives by right, and hence that all government is an unnatural and ruinous appendage. Among those who do, though, surprisingly there is disagreement over what to do about it. Some hold that resistance by such voluntaryists in the present government-saturated environment...
Why I'm Leaving America Recommended
10
SailboatDiaries 2012-11-07 01:00
Column by new Root Striker Michael Fielding. Goodbye, America. For as long as I’ve lived you’ve been my only home. I’ve had a wonderful life here. Your inhabitants are almost universally kind, and I’ve become lifelong friends with many of your citizens. All of my family lives here, everyone I have ever known or loved, and I will miss them all a lot. But after 22 years, I...
Voting Is Not Rational Recommended
9.66667
Stephen Nichols 2012-11-01 00:00
Column by Stephen Nichols. Exclusive to STR While reading Paul Bonneau’s recent column on STR entitled “Voting Is Not Irrational,” I was taken aback by the obvious flaws in his analysis and the conclusions resulting from that analysis. It’s been a few days since his article was published and I’ve been formulating my response to it for some time. Let me now share with...
St. Abe Recommended
0
Jim Davies 2012-10-23 00:00
Column by Jim Davies. Exclusive to STR When the Church of Rome has in mind to elevate one of its heroes or heroines to the status of sainthood, it follows a certain procedure – one element of which is to hear the opinion of an advocatus diaboli – a devil's advocate. His job is to reason against the proposed canonization, so reducing the probability of error. That task fell in...
A Reason Not to Vote Recommended
10
Stephen Nichols 2012-10-18 00:00
Column by Stephen Nichols. Exclusive to STR I don't know about you, but I take a look at my financial situation pretty regularly. I like to keep tabs on my family's spending and keep things under control. I also like to reduce or eliminate any unnecessary expenses. Take a moment to review this chart of some recent family spending: Notice anything big that sticks out there? Yeah, me...

 

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