Recent comments

I like the couch surfing idea. Thirty years ago I hitchhiked between the U.S. midwest and the Rocky Mountain region quite a few times. I did a lot of totally informal couch surfing and camping in those days. This seems like a good way to recreate the fun with less risk, now that I'm not so young and willing to endure hardship. And of course the mutual aid/spontaneous order aspect is a big plus.

"the police state is literally only months away (if not here already)" How would we know?

This NTU.org page was one of my most-referenced sources...so why did they take it down? Has anyone seen the same or similar information elsewhere?

All the more reason not to let the goons arrest you in the first place. See this: http://www.ncc-1776.org/tle2009/tle515-20090419-10.html

Also, as if the evidence Robert L. Johnson has presented us with here is not bad enough, it gets worse, much worse, in my opinion, the book that Juda, i.e. Judaism considers the highest authority is the Babylonian Talmud, not the BIBLE.

Two years from now America will be unrecognizable compared to its current state. I think, as the empire unravels it will have no choice but to shrink its footprint on the globe.

The "right to life" is the “just and legal claim to hold, use or enjoy it[1]”. Every man has a property in his own person. This nobody has any right to but himself. The labor of his body and the work of his hands are properly his. ~ John Locke The “right to life”, like the “right to liberty” and “justly acquired property”, is a “natural right”, which means that it is not created by positive laws enacted by a government. Natural rights. Those which grow out of nature of man and depend upon his personality and are distinguished from those which are created by positive laws... In re Gogabashvele's Estate, 195 Cal. App2d 503, 16 Ca.Rptr. 77, 91. ~ Black's Law Dictionary, Sixth Edition (c.1991), page 1027 And, the only laws enacted by governments that truly have authority are those which derive said authority from the natural law of man. The law of nature is superior in obligation to any other. It is binding in all countries and at all times. No human laws are valid if opposed to this, and all which are binding derive their authority either directly or indirectly from it. ~ Institutes of American Law by John Bouvier, 1851, Part I, Title II, No. 9 [1] Black's Law Dictionary, Sixth Edition (c.1991), page 1324

Ok, so here's the points I was trying to make, hopefully condensed enough to get past the spam filters: 1) Anyone saying that an excludable or rivalrous good is a 'public good' is wrong on the face of it. You can just say so. 2) 'public good' is really a newspeakish misnomer. Non-state entities are perfectly capable of creating non-rivalrous, non-excludable goods. case in point: radio transmissions and digital information. 3) Thus: the existence of such goods is not proof that the state needs to exist, and it's no threat to a market anarchist philosophy. 4) likewise, proving their non-existence wouldn't prove a market anarchist philosophy is right, anyway. There are lots of arguments for state control over rivalrous and excludable goods. example: roads (only so many people can use them at one time, so they're rivalrous) maybe I should submit my full comment as an article?

http://dprogram.net/2010/06/23/a-comment-revisiting-george-orwell’s-nineteen-eighty-four-in-2010/

Let me preface this by stating clearly that I don't think that the State ameliorates the public goods problem - and even if it did, the 'welfare gains' from adding up little triangles of formerly-non-existent consumer surplus from 'correcting' market failure in the public-goods case, are more than wiped out whenever the political-parasite class has a turf war (a.k.a. 'war'). The only defensible position is anarchy, and that involves accepting that certain goods (e.g., national defence, basic education and basic health care such as inoculations) will be underprovided (in some 'utilitarian' framework) - in that a notional aggregate utility functional would be increased if the production of the good was increased (or decreased in the case of a social bad). That said, anyone who has read Buchanan knows that the logic of the theory that there are goods with publicness-aspects (asymmetric utility interdependence) is unassailable, and to say otherwise just makes one look like a bit of a dill. There are issues of utility-comparability and differing marginal valuations of money and consumption goods, for certain - but that is a SEPARATE ISSUE. No economically literate person can defend the assertion that public goods - goods that are non-rival (or partly non-rival) or non-exclusive in consumption - don't exist. We will remain the 'daft uncle' of the discipline of economics while we permit these sorts of whackery to persist. Put it this way: if you believe in externalities, you A FORTIORI believe in utility-interdependence. If you don't believe in externalities, then you don't accept that you should be compensated for pollution associated with my production; you undermine one of the basic tenets of property rights. Under a 'no externalities need be compensated' theory of property, I could build a plant that accidentally spilt toxic waste into a river, and assert that nobody was affected. And public-goods arguments are simply the assertion that in some classes of good, those externalities are economically significant and failing to account for them is a fault if you are trying to participate in discussions of efficiency (the best use of resources to maximise consumption subject to constraints: the CRUX of the economic way of thinking). Now to qualify this, there are some who believe that interpersonal (and intertemporal) utility comparisons are nonsense, and I have some limited sympathy with that: my preference map changes all the time... but at a GIVEN point in time, I know that my preferences satisfy the requirements for a utility functional (ordinal preferences, transversality and so on). Anyhow... too many folks in our world try to score the 'big get' against elements of economic theory without properly understanding them: I think that Hoppe's constant use of straw-man arguments in this matter is faintly ridiculous. Confession: my background is in economic modelling... I was institutionalised at what our enemies called a 'right-wing think-tank' for ten years as an Honours and grad student, but I escaped into the wild in 2002. I got an HD (high distinction) in Public Finance at 3rd year, if memory serves, so I must have known something about this crap once upon a time. Cheerio GT

But a bunch of the examples listed in the second paragraph (electricity, water, sewer, parks, roads, air travel, and sporting events) aren't even public goods. Your own sources say this about public goods: "[public goods] have the special characteristic that their enjoyment cannot be restricted to those who have actually financed their production." (Hoppe), and "A public good, as defined by economic theory, is a good that, once produced, can be consumed by an additional consumer at no additional cost. A second characteristic is sometimes added, specifying that consumers cannot be excluded from consuming the public good once it is produced." (Holcombe) Or as wikipedia puts it, non-rivalrous and non-excludable. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_good The examples are almost all clearly rivalrous, excludable, or both. You say you're making an argument about public goods, but you aren't actually describing public goods.

High praise, indeed, coming from Glen. Thanks!

http://thesuperfluousman.blogspot.com/2010/06/with-enemies-like-these-wh...

Wow. This is a beautiful article. Definitely made me rethink how to change the government. Thank you very much. Very profound and I won't think about the government in quite the same way.

He feels happy-y-y-y! He feels happy-y-y-y-y!! :)

Your "Joe Stack" piece is excellent. You made an interesting point near the end: "I now believe that love and freedom cannot exist without at least two other distinct and indivisible conditions: peace and truth." I agree, and there are additional things needed as well, such as customs and traditions that help preserve love and freedom (and peace and truth) and which can project all that into the future. All of it, though, is contained in the concept of LOVE; the problem is with finding just how much elaboration is needed and what particular wording best gets the message across -- to people who might otherwise misperceive the term "love" yet who are still open enough to grasp and gravitate to the basic message. I'm moving to "Love, freedom, and nurture" because it is more compact than constantly adding "especially for the young." Peace and truth belong within love, but breaking them out and highlighting them as specific needs is important. Other things also need to be highlighted, and again, it's a matter of how much data should go into something meant as a slogan or tag-line, something meant to be as brief, catchy, memorable, and attractive as we can make it while still conveying enough of the message RIGHT THERE, in the slogan itself, that a large number of people will understand it and resonate with it. It's a very delicate thing we're trying to do.

Hi, Ken: Thanks for the comment, and yes, it's unfortunate that the Europeans are adopting the American chain-store way of doing things -- abandoning their various local specialties frequently in favor of the McMeal. Sad. Lawrence

Paul, that was not a definition! This was a definition. "...right, i.e. [that is to say] "Just claim; legal title; ownership; the legal power of exclusive possession..." to your life, liberty and justly acquired property..." ~ Webster's 1828 American Dictionary of the English Language And this is another definition, and "please pay attention" to the bolded part of this definition. “Rights” are defined generally as “powers of free action.” And the primal rights pertaining to men are undoubtedly enjoyed by human beings purely as such, being grounded in personality, and existing antecedently to their recognition by positive law. ~ A Dictionary of Law (c.1891), page 1044 Now, "please pay attention", Paul, because this is important, and because she's right, Paul. IMO ;) Without a moral code no proper human society is possible. Without the recognition of individual rights no moral code is possible. ~ Ayn Rand The most important part of the house is its foundation.

I wholly agree with your observations in principle. The problem with modern society is that we have reached a point where people can remain separated from their neighbors, hiding in the crowd. You said, ". Murder, rape, and theft are acts that essentially make the perpetrator unable to smoothly function in society. Even if there were no law prohibiting such behavior, the market would give rise to mechanisms that effectively isolate the social deviant from civil society..." The lack of community relationship that has become the norm in our society creates a situation where mutual community accountability becomes impossible. When the murderer, thief, rapist or pedophile can walk amongst us unknown, unrecognized, then there is really nothing to discourage the social deviant from his behavior. It is only when neighbors know neighbors and when there exists accountability at a community level that this paradigm works. The answer to this conundrum is, of course, not more legislation and enforcement. The answer is to build communities where there exists true community relationship and mutual, community-wide accountability. How do we do that in our society? Is it even possible, given the status quo of our society's structure and attitudes regarding relationships within a community setting?

Oh, please! Can anyone say "invasion of privacy"? Can anyone say "endangering the many in order to rob the the few"? Can anyone say "enough"?

Alex, there are even better examples of the uselessness, if not actual danger, of having traffic signals and signs. Look at the "shared space" experiments all over Europe. Towns are eliminating all sorts of traffic controls and barriers; even curbs are going. The planners themselves have recognized that anarchy works; imagine that! Here is a fascinating street scene from 1905 in San Francisco that lewrockwell.com posted a while back: http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/47031.html

Well, Suvarans2, you seem to have a religious view of it. I prefer the scientific view, that stuff only exists if you can detect it in instruments, measure it. Then perhaps you'd enjoy The Science of Justice by Lysander Spooner. http://lysanderspooner.org/node/59 I see no evidence that rights exist. Then, perhaps for you, Paul, they don't exist, perhaps you don't have the lawful right to defend your life, liberty and justly acquired property. Bastiat is a favorite of mine, but he's wrong in that quote. Well, it just so happens that your “favorite” author mentions these rights, which you call “phantasm”, I believe, no less than SIXTEEN TIMES in his pamphlet called The Law. http://bastiat.org/en/the_law.html People in government do not make laws to protect the life, liberty and property of people. They make laws to turn men into sheep. 99.99% of the laws have nothing at all to do with protecting our life, liberty and property - in fact a good hunk of them steal our life, liberty and property. And the other 0.01% that are alleged to protect our life, liberty and property are window-dressing, ignored by governments with impunity and designed to make us think government is needed. After all, Lon Horiuchi is still not in jail serving a life sentence. The law of nature is superior in obligation to any other. It is binding in all countries and at all times. No human laws are valid if opposed to this, and all which are binding derive their authority either directly or indirectly from it. ~ Institutes of American Law by John Bouvier, 1851, Part I, Title II, No. 9 “The law perverted! And the police powers of the state perverted along with it! The law, I say, not only turned from its proper purpose, but made to follow an entirely contrary purpose! The law has become the weapon of every kind of greed! Instead of checking crime, the law itself is guilty of the evils it is supposed to punish!” ~ Frederic Bastiat Tell me, the Jews in Nazi Germany, did they have a right to life? What good did it do them? Those Iraqis in that wikileaks video, did they have a right to life? What good did it do them? When you show me a right that actually does something, I'll start believing you. Until then, I'll stick with my opinion that "most of the time, most people don't want to kill you". And that's as good as it gets. There is no "right". If people want to live, they had better arm themselves, and stop believing that phantasms will protect them. As I wrote in the above response, Paul, men don't have a right to live, they have the natural right to try to live, Paul, so "the actual, correct" statement is, "we have the right to defend our life", as do all other living creatures. This does not mean that they will always be successful, Paul. Where did you get these rights, anyway? God gave 'em to ya? A phantasm giving another phantasm. When rational defenses fail, Paul, personal attacks are sure to be the weapon of choice. I don't believe I mentioned anything about God, Paul, but one of your “favorite” authors most certainly did, Frederic Bastiat wrote, “Each of us has a NATURAL RIGHT - from the Creator - to defend his person [body and soul] his liberty, and his property. These are the three basic requirements of life, and the preservation of any one of them is completely dependent upon the preservation of the other two”, so perhaps you should take this argument up with him. Sorry, I'm not a believer. No one asked you to be, Paul. Like I said, I prefer the scientific view. And, like I said, perhaps you should read The Science of Justice by Lysander Spooner. http://lysanderspooner.org/node/59 in which he mentions “rights” no less than TWO DOZEN TIMES, and “natural rights”, FIVE TIMES, Paul. Not that I want to dispute with believers; I suppose we all have a little religion in us. Probably just me, but it sure sounds like you'd like to initiate a dispute. But I refuse to participate. But belief in government is not for me. No one asked you to, Paul. May I ass-u-me that you do not retain membership in or take any benefits or privileges from the god called “government” then, Paul? ″…in modern society, with its religious, ethnic, and cultural diversity, it would be much harder for any single group to demand allegiance — except for the state, which remains the one universally accepted god.″ ~ Roderick T. Long, Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Oh, and it's not a valid debating tactic to say that what I wrote is so full of errors you have no time to address them. Perhaps you are correct, Paul, but I certainly have the RIGHT, since it is my time. But if it is your desire that I refute what you wrote, item by item, I will try to find the time to do so. Let me know, Paul. And arguing some distinction between "lawful" and "legal" is not very impressive. Well, it should be, Paul, since they are, more often than not, contradistinct, notwithstanding that statists will certainly try to CONvince us otherwise. As an example, there is nothing “unlawful”, i.e. immoral, or wrong, about me using my automobile to procure food for my family without the STATE's written permission (LICENSE), but it would most certainly be “illegal” if I was a consenting member of that political society. Lawful. ...The principle distinction between the terms “lawful” and “legal” is that the former contemplates the substance of law, the latter the form of the law. ...Further, the word “lawful” more clearly implies an ethical content than does “legal.” The latter goes no further than to denote compliance, with positive, technical, or formal rules; while the former usually imports a moral substance or ethical permissablility. A further distinction is that the word “legal” is used as the synonym of “constructive,” which “lawful” is not. ...Again, “legal” is used as the antithesis of “equitable”... ~ Black's Law Dictionary, Sixth Edition (c.1991), page 885 [Emphasis added] See that, even they begrudgingly admit that there is a distinction, Paul. They both have to do with government (that's what governments do, pass laws, after all) that same entity you have seceded from. I'm curious, Paul, what are your thoughts on the natural laws, the laws of nature, the laws discoverable by the rational minds of men? Do you consider these to be “phantasms” too?

Next, I went here http://www.depressedmetabolism.com/la-rollins-the-myth-of-natural-rights/ and read, L.A. Rollins – The Myth of Natural Rights and the word that kept coming to mind was "sophistry", in the negative sense of that word. SOPH'ISTRY, n. 1. Fallacious reasoning; reasoning sound in appearance only. These men have obscured and confounded the nature of things by their false principles and wretched sophistry. ~ Webster's 1828 American Dictionary of the English Language It's erie, old Noah's example, "These men have obscured and confounded the nature of things by their false principles and wretched sophistry", seems almost to have been written with that article in mind.

I agree that “blowback”, if and when it happens, almost certainly will affect me, but that will not stop me from refusing to be a part of the cause. I beg to differ with you, Paul, “lawful right” is not a government concept, “legal right” is, and therein lies the distinction. “Lawful” and “legal”, in fact are many, many times contradistinct (“distinguished by opposite qualities”). By that I mean, what is “legal” is very often not “lawful” and vice versa. Lawful rights, or natural rights, are inherent, (we are born with them), they are not given by governments, in fact they are very rarely, if ever, “legally recognized” by governments. Legal rights, or civil rights, are rights that an individual has as a result of his membership in a political association. “Legal rights (sometimes also called civil rights or statutory rights) are rights conveyed by a particular polity, codified into legal statutes by some form of legislature (or unenumerated but implied from enumerated rights), and as such are contingent upon local laws, customs, or beliefs. In contrast, natural rights (also called moral rights or inalienable rights) are rights which are not contingent upon the laws, customs, or beliefs of a particular society or polity. Natural rights are thus necessarily universal, whereas legal rights are culturally and politically relative.” ~ Wikipedia [Emphasis added]