Wheylous
Because RP is constrained by popular idiocy. You, on the other hand, are on a forum chockfull of "radicals" and you are still defending some state fantasy (if I may).
Since arriving on this forum I've noted very little tolerance from ancappers for the compromises necessary in order to reach their end goal. Ron Paul is making one after another, including running for elective office in a representative democracy, running as a Republican, instead of a libertarian, and preaching the need for a return to the Constitution. He's also written his own legislation, which tinkers with the state, like I do, rather than ending it: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c111:H.R.539:
All of these actions reinforce the state system in the short run. And he would be fantasizing, if he thought he were actually pulling the wool over anyone's eyes, about his libertarian philosophy: He already ran for President in 1988 as a libertarian. He's running as a Republican, because real compromises are necessary, not only to make real changes, but even to make more people aware of the need for real changes.
I didn't write this document so that I could be accepted as a full member of the Ancap Society of the von Mises forum; I wrote it to appeal to the broadest majority of Americans--to those who might become a little more open to major reform, just by seeing a legitimate, published alternative to the current Constitution. If I'm guilty of any fantasy, it was in expecting that a forum dedicated to such a great thinker would necessarily be chock-full of realistic adults.
@Daryl: I fully understand and accept the necessity of dealing with the world as it is. If you want to be a Ron Paul, then do run for office, do maintain a consistent record of voting your conscience, do avoid leeching off the people and peddling your vote to lobbyists, etc. There's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with running to be on City council or mayor or state legislature. Many of the people in these offices scattered around the country are people of integrity and honesty but they are a minority and the minority status gets smaller and smaller the higher you go up the hierarchy of government.
The problem I have with you is two-fold. First of all, you want to re-write the rules of the game and then pretend that this is a "modest goal." It is not. Re-writing the Constitution is not doable and I don't even see why it's desirable. The Constitution is crappy (even Ron Paul acknowledges its short-comings) but it's what we have... it's like that old saying "better the Devil you know." The same is true of our entire statutory and regulatory structure. I do not desire any kind of sea-change in the law. Those who lobby Congress, lobby the President or pursue legal activism are misguided in the means they are choosing, even if they share the end goal of greater personal freedom - economical and every other form.
Second, you imagine that you are a libertarian but you are not, in fact, a libertarian. You're not even a minarchist. You're not even a Hayekian or CATO-institute or Reason-magazine libertarian. Judging from what I read, you appear to me to be a fairly run-of-the-mill American status-quo statist who wants to take the very radical step of rewriting, lengthening and complicating the Constitution in order to crystallize your particular conception of how American status-quo statism should be implemented. Your views come across as rigid and prejudicial and you expect people to be persuaded by arguments based on your assumptions that are not shared by others.
But even assuming you are a libertarian and I'm just completely misunderstanding and misinterpreting you, we majorly disagree on strategy. You simply assert that your strategy is "more realistic" but you refuse to take seriously the arguments I and others have put forward explaining why a secessionist strategy is the best route forward. A strategy of secession does not require re-writing any laws. It simply requires diplomacy and statesmanship to negotiate the "terms of divorce", if you will. Let's say California were to secede from the United States... no laws would change anywhere outside California and no California laws would change. Everyone would go on as they have always gone on. The difficulties would consist in arranging to compensate the Federal government for its land holdings in California as well as strategic withdrawal of its enforcement arms and administrative presence within California. All of these issues can be resolved without violence - we know this because this is precisely the process that many ex-satellite states of the USSR went through. Non-violent secession has been a regular occurrence throughout political history.
If California secedes, it automatically becomes more democratic. It is no longer affected by the votes and conflicting interests of the representatives of the 200+M Americans living outside its borders. California politics becomes the sole domain of California voters. So, even if your goal is "direct democracy", a strategy of secession is superior. It better achieves democratization and that without ground-shifts in law. The process of reforming the law to be more liberal then becomes a social campaign rather than a political campaign. This is as it ought to be. It's a contradiction of terms to impose freedom on people. The only way to increase human liberty is by persuading them to voluntarily choose their own liberty through reason and evidence. Legal activism (even Constitutional legal activism) is not the right tool.
Clayton -
Jargon
There can be no systemic drift in that which does not exist, namely 'state systems' in an AC society. It very much does matter where they begin. Beginning in an AC society would make the establishment of a state immensely risky and equally improbable. Such is the way of a society in which there is no tax farm. Every decision must be based on risk because there is no spongy mass of humans to inflict the costs on
Jargon, if you don't want to depart from your AC loyalties, just say so; but don't make up an argument like this that completely ignores my point: We ARE living in a STATE SYSTEM, and THERE ARE NO AC SOCIETIES. PRETENDING THAT IT ALREADY EXISTS IS "PLAYING WITH INTELLECTUAL DOLLS."
You can't just say, "Beginning in an AC society..." WE. AREN'T. NEVER. WILL. I DON'T WANT TO PLAY WITH YOUR ANCAP DOLLS. And my refusals to give you an unconditional thumbs-up for ancap theory is not an opposition to a life without government. Your and other ancappers' suspicions and implicit accusations--that I would still prefer a state system to a free society, even were the necessary changes in the Peoples' appreciation of freedom indoctrinated--are childish. Why would anyone not want to live in a free world? I just see way more obstacles to it than most of you do--including REAL "drift" in the REAL WORLD, today.
I'm proposing, and I have published, real changes to the current Constitution, by mechanisms that address the obstacles I perceive to be standing in the way of progress toward a stable free society. As far as I can tell it is the only alternative Constitution in print today. If you or your fellow ancappers want to do the world a favor, make an actual coherent plan of action for how you effectively and realistically deal with the current system, such that it transforms into an ancap society. And spare me the token vote for Ron Paul. Or protestations that there need be only individuals spreading the word individually. That "principled" tact is just intellectual laziness. At least Ron Paul has the guts to compromise.
Why not streamline your constitution: The federal government shall not regulate any industries whatsoever other than the defense and law agencies.
I believe that government has more legitimate functions than that--for now. And there ought to be regulations for all such functions--all government employees, government services and programs, and all government projects, etc. As for regulation of the private sector, the provision I posted on page 6 goes a long way toward ending most regulation of business, "...except those indispensable to the protection of public safety..." Spare me any more crap about how private business has no incentive to cut corners and costs wherever they can--like in the construction of buildings and the production of toys from China. I want, and I feel the public needs, protections against the tendency of business to risk the safety and health of some, for the sake of the profits of others--the cost-benefit/lawsuit-profit trade-offs.
The federal government shall not infringe upon these rights: A, B, C, D, F, etc. There would still be a statist version of order that people could still wrap their heads around.
Amendment IV – No citizen shall be deprived of life, liberty, privacy or property without a reasonable, impartial application of law: issuance of criminal bench warrants for specific objects, persons or places to be searched or seized, upon lawful establishment of probable cause; or else reasonable suspicion of criminal activity established on scene by direct police observation, credible witness affirmation, reasonably-incriminating circumstance, erratic or desperate behavior, or suspect self-incrimination; impounding of property only for evidentiary purposes, forfeiture, or for safekeeping with the consent of the owner or possessor; use of physical force sufficient only to subdue physical aggression, fleeing, or other bodily resistance to lawful detainment or arrest; use of deadly force only against ongoing, lethal endangerment of the public, or of law enforcement.
Also, ceasing to subsidize parasites is not changing human nature, it is closing certain avenues to human nature. That's an important distinction. How about don't give out welfare in the first place
I assumed that you had read the previous posts on this thread, where I stated that I do want to end all welfare; but that I don't consider the MW to be welfare.
Nothing has improved the living standards of the worker and the middle-class like relatively free markets have.
I've already stated that my primary goal is not to turbo-charge the engine of the economy, nor to proliferate the human population. If that is your goal, then let's just agree to disagree about what we want the planet to look like.
This lack of competition for bidding labor may well be a result of restricted market entry.
Huh?
If they're paying less taxes then they'll make cheaper stuff. Then not only the worker, but everybody wins.
If stuff becomes cheaper, then the MW drops, as it isn't an arbitrary number: it's linked to the CPI. So companies can do their part to lower the wages of their low-skilled workers and raise real wages at the same time, by using their tax savings to maximize production efficiencies, rather than, for example, giving the executives raises and bonuses, dumping money into lame advertising, etc.
Real wages rise and demand for labor decreases thus increasing leisure time.
You're actually arguing that low-skilled, low-wage workers, who, without a MW wage, would be making less than they do now, would be able to afford a place of their own, and a basic existence--when they can't afford it now? Because a double cheeseburger at McDonalds will go down to $.69, or an Ipad2 will be $99? Of course this assumes that prices for all of the Chinese and Taiwanese products low-wage workers buy in Wal Mart would drop too--which they would not.
On moral grounds I say, quit the demagoguing and let the people work if they want to, and let humanity as a whole grow.
I'm trying to act on moral grounds, limiting population growth and maximizing moral growth.
The amount of elastic clauses in there frightened me...
The lack of specific direction in the current Constitution has already created a frightening, immoral mess. Lawyers will always try to twist any laws; that's part of living in a civil society. That doesn't mean no laws should be written--or only short ones with little words. Is there a written version of the NAP, in the form of written law?
You can't just say, "Beginning in an AC society..." WE. AREN'T. NEVER. WILL. I DON'T WANT TO PLAY WITH YOUR ANCAP DOLLS.
I think you're missing the general gist, here. Of course there isn't an ancap society and never will be ancap society per se. Arguments that start with "Beginning in an AC society" are thought-experiments... Gedankenexperiment as the Austrians call it. A thought experiment is simply a type of argument that makes idealized assumptions about the world in order to flesh out the consequences of specific concepts. It's like the use of "ceteris paribus" or "all things equal"... all things are never equal, you can never step into the same stream twice. But you'll be perpetually confused and unable to even sort out your own definitions if you do not resort to some sort of idealization in order to set up the limitations of your definitions. Knowing that a definition only holds up to the level of ceteris paribus is valuable knowledge... it frees you to use that definition wherever you do not need to assume ceteris paribus and to correctly qualify your conclusions wherever they do depend on ceteris paribus.
This is what you said:
DarylLloydDavis: I was mainly pointing out that AC societies would be no less prone to this "drift" than state systems--that it doesn't matter so much how they begin: it's where they end up. But the underlying problem that I have with comparisons between the two is one of transition. It seems to me useless to speculate about an AC society as though one were already in existence (in part because this is largely a male fantasy--one that females must come to equally value somehow.
I was mainly pointing out that AC societies would be no less prone to this "drift" than state systems--that it doesn't matter so much how they begin: it's where they end up. But the underlying problem that I have with comparisons between the two is one of transition. It seems to me useless to speculate about an AC society as though one were already in existence (in part because this is largely a male fantasy--one that females must come to equally value somehow.
And then I said:
There can be no systemic drift in that which does not exist, namely 'state systems' in an AC society. It very much does matter where they begin. Beginning in an AC society would make the establishment of a state immensely risky and equally improbable. Such is the way of a society in which there is no tax farm. Every decision must be based on risk because there is no spongy mass of humans to inflict the costs .
and then you said:
Jargon, if you don't want to depart from your AC loyalties, just say so; but don't make up an argument like this that completely ignores my point: We ARE living in a STATE SYSTEM, and THERE ARE NO AC SOCIETIES. PRETENDING THAT IT ALREADY EXISTS IS "PLAYING WITH INTELLECTUAL DOLLS." You can't just say, "Beginning in an AC society..." WE. AREN'T. NEVER. WILL. I DON'T WANT TO PLAY WITH YOUR ANCAP DOLLS. And my refusals to give you an unconditional thumbs-up for ancap theory is not an opposition to a life without government. Your and other ancappers' suspicions and implicit accusations--that I would still prefer a state system to a free society, even were the necessary changes in the Peoples' appreciation of freedom indoctrinated--are childish. Why would anyone not want to live in a free world? I just see way more obstacles to it than most of you do--including REAL "drift" in the REAL WORLD, today. I'm proposing, and I have published, real changes to the current Constitution, by mechanisms that address the obstacles I perceive to be standing in the way of progress toward a stable free society. As far as I can tell it is the only alternative Constitution in print today. If you or your fellow ancappers want to do the world a favor, make an actual coherent plan of action for how you effectively and realistically deal with the current system, such that it transforms into an ancap society. And spare me the token vote for Ron Paul. Or protestations that there need be only individuals spreading the word individually. That "principled" tact is just intellectual laziness. At least Ron Paul has the guts to compromise.
What dolls? I was responding to your claim about AnCap drift. Where AnCap 'ends up'. I know that there are no AC societies and we live in a state system. Obviously. Now, what is the relevance of such statement? The only way to consider the functions of a society that does not exist is through hypothetical models and that should be obvious.
Why "AREN'T NEVER WILL DURR" we get to AC? You haven't given a reason other than throwing your hands in the air and making cybernoise.
Anyways, what virtue is there in compromise when the non-compromise solution is better? When only ignorance is the obstacle to a better outcome, compromise is intellectual laziness because it ignores and permits, not corrects, fallacious thinking.
Gigantic fucking elastic clause there. "For the protection of public safety"? Really? Can you envision no scenario's where that tiny hole gets reamed out to a grand canyon of regulatory capture?
I assumed that you had read the previous posts on this thread, where I stated that I do want to end all welfare; but that I don't consider the MW to be welfare. Neither do I. I just meant that you often use human nature as an excuse instead of examining the avenues which human nature is permitted to expand into by the state. I've already stated that my primary goal is not to turbo-charge the engine of the economy, nor to proliferate the human population. If that is your goal, then let's just agree to disagree about what we want the planet to look like. Cool so just ignore everything I said about economic growth reducing population growth rates and also all of the real world evidence out there to support it. Great. Huh? oligopsonized labor markets. Google it. If stuff becomes cheaper, then the MW drops, as it isn't an arbitrary number: it's linked to the CPI. So companies can do their part to lower the wages of their low-skilled workers and raise real wages at the same time, by using their tax savings to maximize production efficiencies, rather than, for example, giving the executives raises and bonuses, dumping money into lame advertising, etc. Real wages rise and demand for labor decreases thus increasing leisure time. You're actually arguing that low-skilled, low-wage workers, who, without a MW wage, would be making less than they do now, would be able to afford a place of their own, and a basic existence--when they can't afford it now? Because a double cheeseburger at McDonalds will go down to $.69, or an Ipad2 will be $99? Of course this assumes that prices for all of the Chinese and Taiwanese products low-wage workers buy in Wal Mart would drop too--which they would not. Sure let's just ignore history completely where the prices of goods fell faster than the prices of labor. Yeah let's just ignore the fact that a blue collar worker can buy a machine that can go 100 mph and buy a house or an apartment today whereas 100 years ago he could not and had to share living space. Now that we've done that, I wonder how the hell he pulled that off? Neat trick, I wish he'd teach it to me. I'm trying to act on moral grounds, limiting population growth and maximizing moral growth. Great combination of ignoring the population reducing effects of development and arbitrary appeals to a nebulous morality in which workers must consult a monopoly to become employed. As long as you keep writing everything I say off as ideology there's no reason for this to continue. It's a fundamental copout. I can do it too: "STATIST SCUM. WHY DO YOU WANT TO GIVE EVERYTHING TO THE BANKSTERS AND BUREAUCRATS. RETARD, IT'LL NEVER WORK AND IT NEVER HAS WORKED. IT'S IMPOSSIBLE AND I WON'T HEAR OF IT. GO POUND SALT WITH YOUR FUCKED UP STATISM AND SHIT A BRICK OR SOMETHING. YOUR ARGUMENTS ARE BENEATH ME BECAUSE THEY WOULD NEVER WORK." See how easy that is? Not only is it easy, but it has no purpose other than to create a smokescreen for you to hide behind while I waste my time typing out thought-out responses. Land & Liberty The Anarch is to the Anarchist what the Monarch is to the Monarchist. -Ernst Jünger | Post Points: 20
Neither do I. I just meant that you often use human nature as an excuse instead of examining the avenues which human nature is permitted to expand into by the state.
I've already stated that my primary goal is not to turbo-charge the engine of the economy, nor to proliferate the human population. If that is your goal, then let's just agree to disagree about what we want the planet to look like. Cool so just ignore everything I said about economic growth reducing population growth rates and also all of the real world evidence out there to support it. Great. Huh? oligopsonized labor markets. Google it. If stuff becomes cheaper, then the MW drops, as it isn't an arbitrary number: it's linked to the CPI. So companies can do their part to lower the wages of their low-skilled workers and raise real wages at the same time, by using their tax savings to maximize production efficiencies, rather than, for example, giving the executives raises and bonuses, dumping money into lame advertising, etc. Real wages rise and demand for labor decreases thus increasing leisure time. You're actually arguing that low-skilled, low-wage workers, who, without a MW wage, would be making less than they do now, would be able to afford a place of their own, and a basic existence--when they can't afford it now? Because a double cheeseburger at McDonalds will go down to $.69, or an Ipad2 will be $99? Of course this assumes that prices for all of the Chinese and Taiwanese products low-wage workers buy in Wal Mart would drop too--which they would not. Sure let's just ignore history completely where the prices of goods fell faster than the prices of labor. Yeah let's just ignore the fact that a blue collar worker can buy a machine that can go 100 mph and buy a house or an apartment today whereas 100 years ago he could not and had to share living space. Now that we've done that, I wonder how the hell he pulled that off? Neat trick, I wish he'd teach it to me. I'm trying to act on moral grounds, limiting population growth and maximizing moral growth. Great combination of ignoring the population reducing effects of development and arbitrary appeals to a nebulous morality in which workers must consult a monopoly to become employed. As long as you keep writing everything I say off as ideology there's no reason for this to continue. It's a fundamental copout. I can do it too: "STATIST SCUM. WHY DO YOU WANT TO GIVE EVERYTHING TO THE BANKSTERS AND BUREAUCRATS. RETARD, IT'LL NEVER WORK AND IT NEVER HAS WORKED. IT'S IMPOSSIBLE AND I WON'T HEAR OF IT. GO POUND SALT WITH YOUR FUCKED UP STATISM AND SHIT A BRICK OR SOMETHING. YOUR ARGUMENTS ARE BENEATH ME BECAUSE THEY WOULD NEVER WORK." See how easy that is? Not only is it easy, but it has no purpose other than to create a smokescreen for you to hide behind while I waste my time typing out thought-out responses. Land & Liberty The Anarch is to the Anarchist what the Monarch is to the Monarchist. -Ernst Jünger | Post Points: 20
Cool so just ignore everything I said about economic growth reducing population growth rates and also all of the real world evidence out there to support it. Great.
oligopsonized labor markets. Google it.
If stuff becomes cheaper, then the MW drops, as it isn't an arbitrary number: it's linked to the CPI. So companies can do their part to lower the wages of their low-skilled workers and raise real wages at the same time, by using their tax savings to maximize production efficiencies, rather than, for example, giving the executives raises and bonuses, dumping money into lame advertising, etc. Real wages rise and demand for labor decreases thus increasing leisure time. You're actually arguing that low-skilled, low-wage workers, who, without a MW wage, would be making less than they do now, would be able to afford a place of their own, and a basic existence--when they can't afford it now? Because a double cheeseburger at McDonalds will go down to $.69, or an Ipad2 will be $99? Of course this assumes that prices for all of the Chinese and Taiwanese products low-wage workers buy in Wal Mart would drop too--which they would not.
Sure let's just ignore history completely where the prices of goods fell faster than the prices of labor. Yeah let's just ignore the fact that a blue collar worker can buy a machine that can go 100 mph and buy a house or an apartment today whereas 100 years ago he could not and had to share living space. Now that we've done that, I wonder how the hell he pulled that off? Neat trick, I wish he'd teach it to me.
Great combination of ignoring the population reducing effects of development and arbitrary appeals to a nebulous morality in which workers must consult a monopoly to become employed.
As long as you keep writing everything I say off as ideology there's no reason for this to continue. It's a fundamental copout. I can do it too: "STATIST SCUM. WHY DO YOU WANT TO GIVE EVERYTHING TO THE BANKSTERS AND BUREAUCRATS. RETARD, IT'LL NEVER WORK AND IT NEVER HAS WORKED. IT'S IMPOSSIBLE AND I WON'T HEAR OF IT. GO POUND SALT WITH YOUR FUCKED UP STATISM AND SHIT A BRICK OR SOMETHING. YOUR ARGUMENTS ARE BENEATH ME BECAUSE THEY WOULD NEVER WORK."
See how easy that is? Not only is it easy, but it has no purpose other than to create a smokescreen for you to hide behind while I waste my time typing out thought-out responses.
The Anarch is to the Anarchist what the Monarch is to the Monarchist. -Ernst Jünger
Autolykos
Autolykos, you can't say that I didn't give you a second chance to express and defend your own beliefs. (Actually, you probably will say that.) But I'm not interested in trying to have a discussion with someone who sees it as a mutual attack, rather than a mutual exchange of ideas. This below just doesn't cut it:
Regardless, opposing points of view are entirely unnecessary when pointing out logical fallacies.
And this is snarky:
That doesn't answer my question. Try again.
Nor is this responsive to the larger point:
How much, exactly, is this "good portion"? Can you delimit it in actual quantitative terms? (It's more of an evasive technical challenge)
So please actually explain to me now how capitalism must (again, logically speaking) lead to Earth turning into a Death Star.
How about you just re-read my initial posted explanation, or the others I made afterwards, if you're not just being a pain. I was pretty clear. Or else ask a specific question that I did not already answer.
How often these days? Do you really know? Or are you just pulling claims out of thin air?
Aren't you at all ashamed to so transparently try to evade acknowledging a direct, responsive answer? Why would I continue a discussion with you, when you won't allow any progress to be made?
I'm aware that Chinese companies have "dumped" steel in the US. Your phrase was "when China drives steel manufacturers out of business here". Given your use of the word "when" along with the simple present tense, you're either referring to a habitual situation (i.e. "China habitually drives steel manufacturers out of business here") or a future situation (i.e. "China will drive steel manufacturers out of business here"). In fact, with the habitual situation, the assumption is that that situation willcontinue into the future. So either way, you're making a claim of certainty about the future. There is no logical way for you to do this - which was my point. Try again
How embarassing, Autolykos. Not that you didn't know about Chinese dumping, but that you won't just admit it:
Dude, come on. What's this "when" crap? You keep making these asinine assumptions with no logical or even empirical basis behind them. It's just one bare assertion after another
If you mean that judges' salaries would be paid out of the courts' funds, but not directly paid by (losing) litigants, then I stand corrected here.
That's better, Autolykos. Thank you for that.
But once again you resort to being intellectually dishonest, or intellectually lazy:
It's up to you to explain exactly what you mean by the term "experience",(Are you kidding me?) Stop trying to grind discussions to a halt, Autolykos; they're much more enjoyable when they're advancing.
But in another vein, here - where do you think money originally came from? I'm not being snarky here - I'm honestly interested in your answer.
I'm sure you are, Autolykos. Let me recomment von Mises' Theory of Money and Credit. I found it quite enlightening.
Daryl Lloyd Davis, are you going to answer my question:
In your ideal state, how exactly are you going to punish people who do not agree to a $10 minimum wage?
Clayton
The problem I have with you is two-fold. First of all, you want to re-write the rules of the game and then pretend that this is a "modest goal.
Why don't you cite where I have used the term "modest goal" that you put into quotes. I thought it was actually quite bold--both the writing of it and publishing of it; and the nature and magnitude of the proposed changes.
I do not desire any kind of sea-change in the law.
Ah, then our previous discussion of the merits of your common law advocacy were an exercise in arbitrary argumentation? Sure, Clayton.
Second, you imagine that you are a libertarian but you are not, in fact, a libertarian. You're not even a minarchist. You're not even a Hayekian or CATO-institute or Reason-magazine libertarian.
I have explicitly stated on this forum that I do not consider myself a libertarian. Never have. I'll find the post if you insist on my doing so. That's part of the problem with this forum: it's too specialized, such that everyone expects a certain degree of conformity. It's comes across as more of a social-conforming/bonding site, really.
Judging from what I read, you appear to me to be a fairly run-of-the-mill American status-quo statist who wants to take the very radical step of rewriting, lengthening and complicating the Constitution in order to crystallize your particular conception of how American status-quo statism should be implemented. Your views come across as rigid and prejudicial and you expect people to be persuaded by arguments based on your assumptions that are not shared by others.
You don't read far past your own pretensions, I've seen; which is why you continue to misjudge me, no matter my repeated, explicit statements that my ultimate aim is to reduce government until no government is necessary. I think that your continued obtuseness is especially disappointing because you appreciate so much more than most at this forum the necessity of accounting for the statist tendencies of mankind. I've yet to hear any credible proposal from you as to how to address that problem.
And I've never dreamed that my document would in fact be adopted as the law of the land; but like one of your heroes, Rothbard, I thought it wouldn't hurt to put my own, developed ideas onto the public record--which is also what brought me here. If you don't agree with them, fine. I'm not hacking into your email to impose my views upon you. If you don't share my assumptions, so be it. Are you arguing that I ought not share them--ought not offer up my own prescription for what ails my own country? If so, go to hell. (And no lecture on comparative theology, please)
Let's say California were to secede from the United States... no laws would change anywhere outside California and no California laws would change.
We had an exchange the other day in which you made an eloquent defense of radical secessionism--and made no mention of anyone but yourself--and your kids. If you have more to say about how you and your peers could cause a significant collective secession within the U.S., I'd love to hear it. But let's not get carried away with the former satellites of the Soviet Union, unless one is now a free ancap territory--or free from annexation by Putin/Russia.
If California secedes, it automatically becomes more democratic. It is no longer affected by the votes and conflicting interests of the representatives of the 200+M Americans living outside its borders. California politics becomes the sole domain of California voters. So, even if your goal is "direct democracy", a strategy of secession is superior. It better achieves democratization and that without ground-shifts in law
Great, Clayton. Just reduce the state in size and that's much better: the nation of California. No chance that that might make things worse, considering their current budgetary problems--aggravated by the expense of recompensing the U.S. for the land itself. Or how about when Kansas secedes? As private individuals wouldn't they be free to invite the Chinese to rent their land for military bases? Or, I forgot: Once an ancapper, always an ancapper--and their kids too. So nothing for the rest of the U.S. to worry about. Perfect.
The process of reforming the law to be more liberal then becomes a social campaign rather than a political campaign.
What are you saying? What system are you describing for reforming the law here. Are we back to common law? Your transition, like everyone else's here, is ambiguous at best, and suggests intellectual laziness. It's one thing to read endlessly the opinions and writings of others; it's a different feat altogether to come up with something uniquely your own. I wrote something that uniquely expresses what I believe to be a moral step forward, because I felt morally obligated to do so--and I would have felt that proposing something that was not concrete, or was not implementable, would not have been as moral. To each his own.
And I'll use this post to extend my gratitude for the precis on the nature of a thought experiment. I hope at least that it was posted tongue-in-cheek, as a rye jab. Otherwise, how pretentious of you to assume that I needed it. Again, I'm interested in the intellectually-challenging work of developing a concrete transition from where we stand today to where all mature adults would wish to be. I don't want to jump past the crucial transition, to speculate about what would or would not take place afterwards. The transition is everything.
Yet all his actions have been almost entirely with the goal of reducing state power. Your goals are those of twisting state power.
Try to see the difference. This is what he does. He sees 5 agencies:
A,B,C,D, and E.
He wants to reduce government power. Hence, he cuts 3 of them. Because the amount of violence used by the state is objectively on the net less, this is an improvement for liberty.
In any case where he rediverts resources, say from a small chunk of foreign interventionism to giving aid to veterans, or from one large entitlement program to a much more trimmed-down version, his ultimate goal still remains "remove them all!" He uses compromise to work towards the goal of maximizing freedom. His goal is voluntaryist, his methods moderate but always with the goal in mind.
You, on the other hand, are proposing that the end result be a non-voluntary society. You actively work towards it and reject elements of voluntary, non-aggressive action.
The Constitution for Ron Paul is a tool to decrease government. To you it is a tool to legitimize the role of government in people's lives.
I'd also appreciate an answer to my other questions interspersed through the thread.
Why don't you cite where I have used the term "modest goal" that you put into quotes.
I shouldn't have put the quotes, I didn't mean to imply you literally used that term. You have, however, repeatedly claimed about the unrealisticness of "ancap society" generally which is contradictory given the fact that you claim in this very post that your goal is the eventual elimination of the need for government. In any case, you posit that your proposed, model constitution represents some kind of achievable path to the elimination of the need for government (this is why I assumed you were claiming to be a libertarian, it's not the first time you've claimed to desire the elimination of the need for government) and that the strategies which have been put forward by Rothbard, Hoppe, David Friedman and others are simply unworkable... a rather pompous dismissal given that you've obviously never read any of them in any depth and given that each of these men and many others in similar traditions of anti-statism have spent all or most of their careers studying the social sciences related to the State.
I'm not going to appeal to authority because you can trot out many more PhDs to oppose my PhDs... and it's not about that. The point is that if you are seeking the truth, you should look under every rock. The mainstream views hardly need any repetition, they are all-pervasive.
Ah, then our previous discussion of the merits of your common law advocacy were an exercise in arbitrary argumentation?
No. The conditions for common law simply do not exist at present. They will not exist until people are freer to resolve their own disputes outside of the State's monopoly courts. So, a return to common law is more of an end goal than a means or strategy. The strategy to getting there is discrediting and busting up the State's monopoly on courts and reducing the scope and reach of its legislative and executive powers which subvert the natural course of law.
Are you arguing that I ought not share them--ought not offer up my own prescription for what ails my own country?
Share away, I've never complained about you posting here. The problem is that you are recommending more of the very poison which is ailing our country. Democracy is the problem, not the solution. You've never responded to the problems with democracy raised by regular, run-of-the-mill public choice theory which isn't even Austrian.
Re-mapping costs and benefits from decision-makers is automatically a bad idea. You really have to have an insanely powerful argument why this is a good idea. Limiting liability and conferring privileges is a bad idea because it decreases the disincentives for wrong decisions and increases the incentives for wrong decisions. Yet democracy - and any other form of government for that matter but democracy is particularly bad in this regard - inevitably does this.
I object to your ideas not to your expressing them. You seem like a decent person and I think your mistakes are technical but they are mistakes.
When I said, "...that it doesn't matter so much how they begin: it's where they end up...," I was saying that women will influence an ancap society, assuming that people are the same, genetically and psychologically, as they are today--toward the same drift to the left--and into a state system. It isn't productive to posit that women begin as different creatures than they are now, and then assert that therefore there will then be no such drift.....Thanks. Why didn't I think of that? That requires no thought at all: it isn't even an experiment then; it's just turning all women into something they are not, Barbie Dolls, if you like. Tell me how they are changed. Otherwise, they will bond, band together, and eventually influence their ancap hubbies out of a principled resistance to any collectivized, entitlement to the defense of life from their kids needs and want. It's as much an indictment of the modern male, as it is the female.
Genetic diversification and motherly protectiveness: Drift. Why didn't that stick? Ever tried to be logical with a woman? Do you think that all that criminals and a-holes really need is someone to sit down with them and explain the merits of the voluntary exchange and the NAP? Some of you forum guys seem to spend too much time in each others' company. There are a lot of people out their who have absolutely no daily respect for the rights of others. Private self-interest is often an ugly thing, not any force for positive change. And seceding into a separatist society won't preclude that drift into ugly self-interest.
Anyways, what virtue is there in compromise when the non-compromise solution is better? When only ignorance is the obstacle to a better outcome, compromise is intellectual laziness because it ignores and permits, not corrects, fallacious thinking
Let's agree to disagree, Jargon. The only principles that don't get compromised are the ones that never see the light of day. You guys hate my versions of thought experiments, but apply the NAP to this:
What is best for society may not be best for the individual. When a schoolyard bully gets a black eye from a kid he used to pick on every day, this may be good both for the newly-courageous kid and for the newly-humble bully. But society sees none of this--sticks to blind rules that take no notice of Becoming: Moral law is only about Being. Be considerate of others. Be non-violent. But such rules are irrelevant in real human conflicts, because these situations arise from unconscious needs and drives, where people feel that they are doing the right thing. And they have much to learn from these mistakes.
Of course I can. But words are required. And "Thou shalt not commit aggression, except in self-defense." still leaves room for all sorts of lawyerly interpretation. Reams of definitional terms about aggression, self-defense, intent to commit, real versus implied threat to commit, premeditation to commit, defense of reputation, falsehood as aggression, ad nauseum. And if a company knowingly distributes an unsafe product, causing injury to its customers, there will have to be some, presumably-written, interpretation of the NAP as to how the safety of the consumer is addressed; hence a law/regulation--equally subject to challenge and reinterpretation. It only takes one judge, or one lawyer to start a drift.
I just meant that you often use human nature as an excuse instead of examining the avenues which human nature is permitted to expand into by the state.
Welcome to the Avenue:
1) Female protectiveness/pussy-whipped males/SOB kids.
2) Egotistical/Controlling Politicians (No more Congress under my system)
3) Group-think "sheeple" more interested in identifying themselves by their loyalties to groups than through individual accountability
4) A survival instinct stronger than the will to be free
I didn't ignore it at all. I asserted that different populations within a given modernized state do not all necessarily shrink over time. The Arab population in Europe is growing, even as the Anglo population shrinks. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/5994047/Muslim-Europe-the-demographic-time-bomb-transforming-our-continent.html
That is also real world evidence. Your response failed to make note of that counterpoint: You ignored me. And it specifically addresses cultures who one finds in MW jobs, i.e. immigrants from underdeveloped countries. They come over, fail to fully assimilate, and out-populate the shrinking modern, "native" population. If a MW reduces the number of these available jobs, then it discourages immigration--much as our slumping economy has discouraged illegal border crossing to the south. Remember, too, that I don't want to use up the Earth's resources by most quickly spreading the least little bit to the most possible people. Small families good; large families bad.
I did. And if you meant by: "This lack of competition for bidding labor may well be a result of restricted market entry." that companies enjoy an inordinate power to screw low-wage workers over, paying them less than would be a just wage--less than is justified by any competition between the companies--then I agree.
Yeah let's just ignore the fact that a blue collar worker can buy a machine that can go 100 mph and buy a house or an apartment today whereas 100 years ago he could not and had to share living space.
We've had a minimum wage since 1938, so you'd have to know better than I do what would have happened during and after the Depression to real wages, if the largely-unregulated companies of the day had been permitted to continue to pay peanuts. http://www.minimum-wage.org/history.asp
I hope I've made it clear that I didn't ignore you previously, regarding population and development; and I only posted an extensive explanation of my moral scheme at your specific request. The connection between the imposition of an MW and morality is that citizens ought agree to remain law-abiding in their country, only so long as it secures their lives to such an extent that their honest full-time work can afford them at least a basic subsistence. Otherwise, all bets ought to be off.
it's not the first time you've claimed to desire the elimination of the need for government) and that the strategies which have been put forward by Rothbard, Hoppe, David Friedman and others are simply unworkable... a rather pompous dismissal
I don't share the same sense with libertarians of what is the very foundation of a moral society. Voluntary exchange is not an unconditional moral good, in my opinion, even when no direct aggression is committed. And I'm not smitten with the virtues of an unfettered free market, untempered by the common sense and social consciousness of its practitioners. So I reject the premises upon which Rothbard and other libertarian theoreticians extrapolate.
When I say that I want a world free of government, I'm not envisioning the DeathStar, or even a sprawling, spire-filled global metropolis. I envision a planet modestly-populated by a more mature version of the human race, living closer to Nature than they do now, free people freely opting to treat the true innocents of Earth, animals and their own children, with all due care and respect. I invite you to return to our first discussion, about Somalia, where I made this plain--or so I thought. (Thread: How does a free territory remain free from a state(?))
And so I designed a document that would best teach what is naturally my own version of what is moral, including this unique amendment in place of the current, criminal-coddling Fifth Amendment (i.e. pleading the Fifth):
Amendment V – The intentional, knowing, reckless or criminally-negligent infliction of death or grave physical or psychological injury—a disabling injury that is not susceptible to humane, restorative care or natural, restorative healing, absent professional medical or mental health intervention— by an adult upon a minor, a post-partum human being younger than eighteen years of age, henceforth shall be a high crime: an offense so heinous and degenerate that, upon conviction and exhausted appeal of the convicted, the latter shall be confined by the state, apart from the public, until death.
You've never responded to the problems with democracy raised by regular, run-of-the-mill public choice theory which isn't even Austrian.
Every aspect of my document is a direct calculation of public choice theory as it relates to my sense of both human nature and morality. And I have done nothing but respond to often-repetitive challenges--another downside to these forums. Frankly, I have received the least amount of interest from you. I've been left with the impression that you don't even closely read such snippets from as document, as above; hence you blithely say that I "limit liability," when I specifically make an end to the official immunity of politicians against civil and criminal suits, when irreparable harm is done as a result of their actions or decisions. And you dismissed my 95%/51% formulations with nary a second thought. That is of course your prerogative; but please don't accuse me of just scrawling out a random alternative Constitution, when you haven't even bothered to ask me about the choices that went into it.
Voluntary exchange is not an unconditional moral good, in my opinion, even when no direct aggression is committed
But, see, statements like this make me realize that you have no grounding in what morality even is. I have issues with Rothbard and Hoppe on ethical theory, as well, but at least they have the foundations right.
"Voluntary exchange" is simply not a proper object of moral theory - it's like saying "cumulus clouds are not an unconditional moral good" ... gibberish. Morality concerns the choices and actions of an individual. When moral propositions are made regarding an unorganized group (humanity is an unorganized group), they simply mean "for every individual..." "It is immoral for humanity to allow murder" really means "for each and every individual, the act of committing murder is immoral."
Holding organizations responsible for their behavior is a bit more complex and modern law is in horrid shape on this subject. It holds some people responsible for things they should not be held responsible for (e.g. a pawn-shop owner who unwittingly sells stolen goods) and fails to hold other people responsible for things they should be held responsible for (e.g. board members and senior staff at banks that go bankrupt).
I do not hold the free market or anarchy or liberty as ends in themselves. I wrote a post on this issue a long time back, you should take a look. Something much bigger is at stake, here. The root moral cause of the State is the justification and acquiescence to hypocrisy or double-standards. Privilege and special exemption is the essnece of the State. It is the widespread, popular acceptance of bad morality that is the foundation on which the State is built. Without it, the State would collapse in an instant.
So, I think we (all of us) need to go back to the drawing boards on morality. What is right and wrong? How do we know? Parts of the answers are scattered throughout the world's religions and philosophy but they have been and continue to be actively suppressed. Those who rule us understand the root source of their power: corrupted morals. They suppress good moral teaching either through direct oppression and censorship or (the new method) by drowning it out with garbage and propaganda.
What is right and wrong? It is simply pleasure and pain. What brings you pleasure is morally right. What brings you pain is morally wrong. Of course, this has an asterisk on it. Unlike other animals, you are capable of long-range planning and foresight. Your immediate suffering or gratification may lead to other longer run consequences that you prefer or disprefer more strongly than the present pleasure or pain. Hence, your action (choices) has both a long-run and short-run component to it and this is why what feels good at the moment may not always be morally right and what feels painful at the moment may not always be morally wrong.
I'm working on a short book-length treatment on this subject. Minus the stuff on reincarnation and some of the more mystical stuff, the Buddhists (certain schools anyway) have it precisely right. So did Epicurus. Given the immediate appeal of these religious and philosophical ideas to any mature adult (to use your term), ask yourself why these ideas are so rarely heard. I'll tell you why. It's the same reason you're probably afraid to take your car to the mechanic - he just may use his specialized knowledge and superior credentials to bully you into having to pay him for work and parts that you did not need. Mental bullying is profitable just like physical bullying is. The parasitic class utilizes whatever form of bullying it has at its disposal in order to live at the expense of others. Just like the State wants to disarm its subjects in order to render them the more vulnerable to its predation, so it wants to suppress right morality in order to maintain the evil status quo.
I'm not interested in denigrating your proposed Constitution - you clearly went to a lot of work to put it together and I respect that. I just don't agree with your approach and a lot of your ideas and conclusions.
DarylLloydDavis: Jargon When I said, "...that it doesn't matter so much how they begin: it's where they end up...," I was saying that women will influence an ancap society, assuming that people are the same, genetically and psychologically, as they are today--toward the same drift to the left--and into a state system. It isn't productive to posit that women begin as different creatures than they are now, and then assert that therefore there will then be no such drift.....Thanks. Why didn't I think of that? That requires no thought at all: it isn't even an experiment then; it's just turning all women into something they are not, Barbie Dolls, if you like. Tell me how they are changed. Otherwise, they will bond, band together, and eventually influence their ancap hubbies out of a principled resistance to any collectivized, entitlement to the defense of life from their kids needs and want. It's as much an indictment of the modern male, as it is the female. Why "AREN'T NEVER WILL DURR" we get to AC? You haven't given a reason other than throwing your hands in the air and making cybernoise. Genetic diversification and motherly protectiveness: Drift. Why didn't that stick? Ever tried to be logical with a woman? Do you think that all that criminals and a-holes really need is someone to sit down with them and explain the merits of the voluntary exchange and the NAP? Some of you forum guys seem to spend too much time in each others' company. There are a lot of people out their who have absolutely no daily respect for the rights of others. Private self-interest is often an ugly thing, not any force for positive change. And seceding into a separatist society won't preclude that drift into ugly self-interest.
Let's agree to disagree, Jargon. The only principles that don't get compromised are the ones that never see the light of day. You guys hate my versions of thought experiments, but apply the NAP to this: What is best for society may not be best for the individual. When a schoolyard bully gets a black eye from a kid he used to pick on every day, this may be good both for the newly-courageous kid and for the newly-humble bully. But society sees none of this--sticks to blind rules that take no notice of Becoming: Moral law is only about Being. Be considerate of others. Be non-violent. But such rules are irrelevant in real human conflicts, because these situations arise from unconscious needs and drives, where people feel that they are doing the right thing. And they have much to learn from these mistakes.
Gigantic fucking elastic clause there. "For the protection of public safety"? Really? Can you envision no scenario's where that tiny hole gets reamed out to a grand canyon of regulatory capture? Of course I can. But words are required. And "Thou shalt not commit aggression, except in self-defense." still leaves room for all sorts of lawyerly interpretation. Reams of definitional terms about aggression, self-defense, intent to commit, real versus implied threat to commit, premeditation to commit, defense of reputation, falsehood as aggression, ad nauseum. And if a company knowingly distributes an unsafe product, causing injury to its customers, there will have to be some, presumably-written, interpretation of the NAP as to how the safety of the consumer is addressed; hence a law/regulation--equally subject to challenge and reinterpretation. It only takes one judge, or one lawyer to start a drift.
Welcome to the Avenue: 1) Female protectiveness/pussy-whipped males/SOB kids. 2) Egotistical/Controlling Politicians (No more Congress under my system) 3) Group-think "sheeple" more interested in identifying themselves by their loyalties to groups than through individual accountability 4) A survival instinct stronger than the will to be free
I didn't ignore it at all. I asserted that different populations within a given modernized state do not all necessarily shrink over time. The Arab population in Europe is growing, even as the Anglo population shrinks. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/5994047/Muslim-Europe-the-demographic-time-bomb-transforming-our-continent.html That is also real world evidence. Your response failed to make note of that counterpoint: You ignored me. And it specifically addresses cultures who one finds in MW jobs, i.e. immigrants from underdeveloped countries. They come over, fail to fully assimilate, and out-populate the shrinking modern, "native" population. If a MW reduces the number of these available jobs, then it discourages immigration--much as our slumping economy has discouraged illegal border crossing to the south. Remember, too, that I don't want to use up the Earth's resources by most quickly spreading the least little bit to the most possible people. Small families good; large families bad.
My end result would not look like an ancap society, rooted only in free market principles, no. It would be a less densely-populated world, where people show courtesy and respect for one another, and most especially for kids and animals--Earth's true innocents (And I know quite well that this sounds very unsophisticated; but sometimes values are so.)--without the intervention of any government whatsoever. My document is a blueprint for dismantling the state, even while using it as a teaching tool toward an ideal end, imposing a respect for children, discouraging unfettered land development, and encouraging personal accountability. Do I think that my document will lead to the ideal free world I would want? No. But it's the most realistic, and therefore the most honest, concrete, moral plan I could conceive for attempting to take a course to a better world.
I reject the vision of an ancap society as an end unto itself--though it would be a vast improvement over what we have today--because I judge it to be morally incomplete, unstable given human nature, and unworkable upon purely economic grounds, e.g. private road systems, private law enforcement, justice, and money. Yet I would freely acknowledge that my own system aims even further out than an ancap society--educating the people, hands-on, and changing them, using a direct-democracy "twisting" of the current system, such that they forego the obsession with ownership and production of material property, so widely on display at this forum, and accomodate themselves to a more mature, modest, peaceful Life. For me, unfettered materialism and stable, sustainable peace are antithetical.
The Constitution for Ron Paul is a tool to decrease government. To you it is a tool to legitimize the role of government in people's lives
If none of what I have now said to you has sunken in at this point, then I will assume that you believe I am a liar, a secret statist. And in this case, I see no point in making any further assertions, or defenses of my positions, with you, Wheylous.