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Friday, May 24

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Mike Stahl is the guest editor today.

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And Then They Came For Me: The Black Bagging of Adam Kokesh
Original article
Reward the Bully- Punish His Victim
Original article "I recently saw a quote* that was intended to show the absurdity of supporting gun owners' rights.  As you'll see, it utterly failed: "When one child hits another with a rock, the answer isn't to give every child a rock." And, if that were the whole story, it might be true.  But it isn't."
Vote With Your Boat
Original article Seasteading you-tube.
N.J Court Upholds Conviction of Man Found Asleep in Car With 21 Guns
Original article Message: don't count on courts.
Who Needs Healthcare When You Can Have a Cheeseburger in Paradise
0
Emiliano Antunez 2009-12-21 04:00
Exclusive to STR   With all the cantankerous arguments filled with minutiae permeating the halls of Congress and the TV and radio talk shows, it’s hard to remember what the core issue of the healthcare debate is: Is there a natural right to healthcare?     Many of the arguments in favor and even against President Barack Obama’s healthcare plans do not challenge or...
The Real Debate
0
Alex R. Knight III 2009-12-20 17:00
Exclusive to STR Most of STR's readers by now are likely no longer deluded by the falsehood of the Left Wing vs. Right Wing argument. Most of you correctly perceive both "wings" as really being one force unified against individual liberty in both economic and personal affairs. However, it occurred to me recently that--even in libertarian circles--there is still a strong perception of...
Oslo
8
Jim Davies 2009-12-15 17:00
Exclusive to STR  There's no doubt of it, Obama is one of the world's two best orators of the last hundred years, and his performance at the December 10th ceremony was stellar. Was there a teleprompter? I didn't see him even glance at a set of notes, yet the delivery was flawless. To his credit also is the way his speech addressed head-on an irony of the occasion; here was the world's...
U.S. Dollar: No Upside to Deceit and Betrayal
0
Les Lafave 2009-12-14 17:00
Exclusive to STR Through decades of economic turmoil, there's one thing we've been able to rely on--when the U.S. dollar weakens, an endless herd of analysts start mooing the same refrain: 'A falling dollar is actually good. A falling dollar has an upside. A falling dollar helps American business to compete and export.' The moos often accompany self-satisfied expressions of self-perceived...
The Revolution Might Begin WHERE?
0
Paul Hein 2009-12-13 17:00
Exclusive to STR Valley Park . That's Valley Park , Missouri . It's a little town of about 6,500 souls, located only a few miles from where I'm typing these words, in St. Louis County . I've been there many times, and never expected to find it in national news. What made it--briefly--newsworthy is a law passed by the Valley Park government. Yes, like every hamlet, village, town, city, or...
How to Win in Iraq and Afghanistan in One Easy Step
0
Bob Wallace 2009-12-13 17:00
Exclusive to STR In one easy step, here's how we do it: pull out completely. That's it. Just leave. The countries will do just fine without us. I'll use history as a guide. In the 20th Century, America won just one war: Vietnam. What's that, you say? We didn't win? We left in ignoble defeat, fleeing in our helicopters and pushing them off of our ships into the blue deep sea? How is that...
Ode to the Average American Citizen
8
tzo 2009-12-09 17:00
Exclusive to STR For the average American citizen (AAC), government is voluntary. The AAC believes that each and every speck of land on the Earth is subject to some national government. The AAC believes that every human being must be a citizen of some government. The AAC believes that the land area of the Earth that we label United States of America on our maps is subject to the federal, state,...
Wheat and Chaff
10
Bill Butler 2009-12-08 17:00
Exclusive to STR 'His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor, gathering his wheat into the barn and burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire.' ~ Matthew 3:12 So much of life is about: (1) making distinctions; and (2) making choices. Indeed, the meaning and consequence of all our lives can fairly be said to be a test of our free will choices and the rational,...
Duty
0
Jim Davies 2009-12-07 17:00
Exclusive to STR  The word comes in two flavors, and I'd like to focus on the second; but both derive from the Latin debere, meaning to owe--hence also a "debit" to an account. In most common use, the word has to do with an obligation, contractual or moral; it is alleged for example that by some mysterious means everyone has incurred a duty to serve one's country, as in JFK's...
A Non-Lawyer Looks at the Law
0
Paul Hein 2009-12-03 17:00
Exclusive to STR I can safely assume you will not recoil in astonishment if I tell you I have not read all 2,000 pages of the latest health care bill. Like you, I know only what I've heard and seen in the media, and on the Internet. For instance, I understand that firms will be required by the proposed law to provide health insurance for their employees, and individuals who decide not to purchase...
Never Volunteer
5.5
Paul Hein 2011-05-11 00:00
Column by Paul Hein.  Exclusive to STR  In the spring of 2008, Senator Harry Reid gave an interview on television in which he stated that the income tax was voluntary. His remark caused quite a stir. Google “Harry Reid and voluntary income tax,” and see for yourself. His kindest critics thought him crazy, the less charitable used the word “idiot.” If the Senator...
The Rump
5.5
Jim Davies 2013-05-06 07:33
Column by Jim Davies. Exclusive to STR Only one credible plan exists, as far as I know, for the elimination of government in short order. It's outlined here and in summary it consists of each market anarchist introducing one of his or her friends per year to a freedom school, and resigning his government job if he has one. Easy, inexpensive, unstoppable, and totally indispensable. No other...
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...
Lustful Money and Hateful Religion
5
Bob Wallace 2009-12-21 17:00
Exclusive to STR The United States is a empire. Some cheer that fact. I'm not one of them, and I consider such people deluded, since all empires fail, and it's going to happen to the United States , too. There are several reasons why all empires fail, but there are two that stand out: the financialization of the economy, and an intolerant "us vs. them" religion. Those two reasons...
Immigration
5
Alex Schroeder 2010-11-01 03:00
Column by Alex Schroeder.   Exclusive to STR   While myriad exceptions certainly abound, in contemporary American politics two prevalent views seem to frame the immigration debate. There are those to whom the label “open border advocates” can be rightly ascribed, typically associated with the political Left. Alternatively, there exists a sizeable grouping of people who...
The Money Ceiling
5
Paul Hein 2011-02-21 04:00
Column by Paul Hein.   Exclusive to STR   4th place in the "Odious Debt" essay contest   Coincident with the swearing in of the newly elected Congressmen is the impending end of the present debt ceiling. It is a topic of much discussion, with various pundits weighing in with this or that recommendation. Universally, they deplore the necessity of raising the ceiling, but...
David Holmes: A Capitalist's Eulogy
5
B.R. Merrick 2011-03-04 04:00
Column by B.R. Merrick.  Exclusive to STR  I was informed of David’s demise on Wednesday morning, December 15, 2010, just a few days before the same holiday that began my correspondence with this fascinating individual two years prior. It was my desire to get as much information as I could about David Lowden Holmes so that I could honor him the way he deserves. Sadly,...
It's Not All That Hard
5
Bob Wallace 2011-07-06 00:00
Column by Bob Wallace.   Exclusive to STR   “The opposite of war is not peace; it's creation.” ~ Jonathan Larson   Back when I was in college (close to worthless then and even closer now, except for the hard sciences) I realized none of my classes that I was really interested in were logically connected to each other, so that I could come up with an accurate model of...
Could the Non-Aggression Principle Stop the Sixth Great Extinction?
5
Glen Allport 2011-07-11 00:00
Column by Glen Allport. Exclusive to STR [A five-part series]   Part 1: Civil Society Requires Non-Aggression (and one thing more)   Unless you're a hard-core libertarian, you probably haven't heard much about the non-aggression principle, or NAP. That's a shame, because the NAP is what would have saved the world from the Fukushima nuclear disaster, from the BP Gulf of Mexico spill (and...
Freedom is Not an Intellectual Pursuit
5
Paul Bonneau 2011-11-30 01:00
Column by Paul Bonneau. Exclusive to STR Every once in a while, I get tired of arguments around here, trying in some way or other to justify freedom and liberty. One can go overboard with this stuff.   After all, does one need a PhD in Philosophy to understand freedom? Of course not. Everybody already understands it. It’s just doing whatever the Hell you want to do. No justification is...
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
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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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