EDIT: Apparently IE no longer saves post edits?
Anyway, didn't mean to sound overly harsh or polemical, but still. I know I'm not entitled to automatic discussion on every thread, but it seems strange that this topic falls on deaf ears here since it's such a great opportunity to make a convincing case.
Cortes -- it's a hot topic (one of denial in the An-Cap community).
My arguments tend to focus on how do we get into said "free-society" -- how do we transition?
My belief is that An-Caps cannot solve some of the better "what if" questions that people will bring up -- they just regirgitate Rothbard ad-nauseum and until Ron Paul (the Minarchist) the Mises Institute showed very little growth.
I'm NOT a long-run Minarchist but I believe a model can be created to satisfy the nay-sayers (the wealthy and the poor and the overworked middle class).
---A model that moves toward liberty without permission -- an autodestruct Constitution of sorts; one where "power" diminishes naturally and by design.
I truly believe if we look at Liberty in terms of consumption ("as the consumer" which is how Mises viewed it) and we create a line graph where the highest level of liberty is to the left and the highest level of Statism is to the right and all political models must be placed on this line graph with a right or left directional orientation; then I believe that An-Cap is left of Capitalism with a right directional heading.
Liberty------------An-Cap (Rothbard)--------------Octobox Minarchism (Mises)-------------Capitalism (as it was in reality)--------------Corporatism---------Socialism
An-Cap is Right Heading
My Minarchist Model is Left Heading
Capitalism is Right Heading
Corporatism is Right Heading
Socialism is Right Heading
Further meaning that An-Cap will eventually lead to a form of right-heading minarchism, then on to capitalism etc.
What makes a political model "right-or-left" heading?
----The answer: Whether or not the force-agency to keep the peace is ever-diminishing or ever-increasing
What makes a political model "ever-dim or ever-inc?"
----The answer: One of the Information Control -- Identity Control -- Ownership Control -- Currency Control in the hands of a few
How is An-Cap right-heading then?
First we must look at the fundamental game changer -- where Mises and Rothbard disagreed.
----Answer: Over who the individual was........Rothbard said it was the property owner and Mises said it was the consumer.
For there to be property "rights" (worth their salt) in a Rothbardian-Society then there must be a mechanism to take assets from one individual and give them to another -- there must also be a group of people who are "authorized" to make such a decision.
All anarchists believing in NAP would say the same: the only transition is through education. Educate your children, they educate theirs etc. and after few generations free societies will start to emerge. And I am not dismissing a minarchist state as a transition phase, but it is very unstable system that can easily explode into new empire. Aim for impossible and you will get the best outcome, rather than making a deal for "lesser" evil and surrendering basic princples of anarchism. That's not the example I would like to teach my kids.
(english is not my native language, sorry for grammar.)