Political Theory

Re: Would you support a military coup?

Gavin23 — Sat, 04 May 2013 15:25:36 GMT

Yea its good for the power structure to be shaken up from time to time, and keep the powers at be on their feet .

Re: Would you support a military coup?

ToxicAssets — Sat, 04 May 2013 11:40:46 GMT

But it's not a question of what's perfectly ethical thing to do in the land of imagination and cotton candy.

It's all about what's the realpolitik move in the realpolitik world we happen to live in.

If instead of being insulated from the fact by many years and miles, you were living in Chile during the period, chances are you would have supported the general's coup, not only he was ousting a far worse buffoon, but because it would be foolish to do otherwise.

Re: Would you support a military coup?

Jon Irenicus — Sat, 04 May 2013 11:26:41 GMT

Nah, what follows them tends to be worse, as the Egyptians learnt.

Re: Would you support a military coup?

Anenome — Sat, 04 May 2013 08:38:51 GMT

Unethical ends can never justify ethical means. That's the main problem we have with the existing system, where the legitimate need for police, court, law services are thought by the trusting masses to thereby legitimate government monopoly control and providing of these services, as bumbling as it is.

As the French discovered, a revolution not informed by ideas is simply going to devolve into chaos and aggression. What we need is not a libertarian takeover of a nation that is not ready to be governed by libertarians (ignoring the fact that libertarians would refuse to 'govern' in that sense at all), what we need is a single pure crystal seed of libertarianism that can grow into a much larger crystal, extending the ideas around it.

Libertarianism is too diluted now, libertarians have no influence over their living environment.

"Come out from among them," we found ourselves in the position of diaspora the moment we became true ancaps. Only the internet has allowed us to discover each other. Previously to the modern era, libertarians languished largely unknown, and often turned to political organizations to seek political equals, which limited their potential because it directed them into political action among the mainstream parties by the very nature of those institutions.

But now, we have a non-directed way of communication through forums, one not tasked with winning some random election, not pinning its hopes on a particular kind of political action.

What we need so desperately in an independent jurisdiction, the world's first explicitly free society.

That will be something new in the world. And by god I will be there when it happens.

We've got to move on that front during the present and unfolding epoch. That will be the front of law.

The second front is already in embryonic stages: financial, in the form of bitcoin. Both of these fronts feature political action in the form of leaving the present system to join a new one. They are non-violent, non-aggressive.

Re: Would you support a military coup?

Marko — Sat, 04 May 2013 04:36:08 GMT

Besides Allende's real crime was not his socialism, but the fact he would take his country away from under US dominance. He was friendly with Moscow, but the USSR could never project real power in the Western Hemisphere ergo Chile would have been externally free. Pinochet was a satrap of the Empire who made certain his country remained a satrapy. The Chilean Benedict Arnold.

Re: Would you support a military coup?

Lady Saiga — Sat, 04 May 2013 04:32:45 GMT

To answer the initial question, absolutely NOT.

"Meet the new boss, same as the old boss"...

Re: Would you support a military coup?

NoMoreDemocracy — Sat, 04 May 2013 04:25:25 GMT

Pinochet was clearly a murderer, and though I don't condone him, he did save his country from chaos. Not very well known is that most Chilean copper mining is run by the state to this day.

Re: Would you support a military coup?

Aristophanes — Fri, 26 Apr 2013 20:13:25 GMT

What difference does that make? the CIA spent $350,000 electing 10 members (of the 12 they sponsored) of the Chilean Congress in that same election cycle. OPIC spent something like two million in the next few years...

I was under the impression that you were trying to say that Allende was a military asset of the KGB. the CIA and KGB put money into all kinds of elections and things. His giving political information (which can be easily obtained) is not the same as his doing the bidding of the KGB. And yeah, Allende was a Marxist...

Re: Would you support a military coup?

ToxicAssets — Wed, 24 Apr 2013 13:53:26 GMT

Vasili Mitrokhin and Christopher Andrew, The World Was Going Our Way: The KGB and the Battle for the Third World, Basic Books (2005) hardcover, ISBN 0-465-00311-7, pp. 69-85. Note: Allende made a personal request for Soviet money through his personal contact, KGB officer Svyatoslav Kuznetsov, who rushed to Chile from Mexico City to help him. The KGB claimed it gave $400,000 to influence the election, with an additional personal subsidy of $50,000 directly to Allende. Andrew argued that help from KGB was a decisive factor, because Allende won by a narrow margin of only 39,000 votes of a total of the 3 million cast. After the elections, the KGB director Yuri Andropov obtained permission for additional money and other resources from theCentral Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union to ensure Allende's victory in Congress. In his request on 24 October, he stated that KGB "will carry out measures designed to promote the consolidation of Allendes's victory and his election to the post of President of the country." The KGB file on Allende reported him as having "stated his willingness to co-operate on a confidential basis and provide any necessary assistance, since he considered himself a friend of the Soviet Union. He willingly shared political information...".

Re: Would you support a military coup?

Aristophanes — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 02:09:00 GMT

Pinochet was quite bad, Allende was worse. No one deserve to be rule by any of those two.

I know you are trolling. Where were Allende's massacres? He barely did anything with the military. Sure socialist planning makes people poor, but it was only his ignorance that caused that (as it is almost everywhere else). Pinochet's atrocities are well known and in no way comparable to Allende's incompetence.

Re: Would you support a military coup?

Aristophanes — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 02:04:41 GMT

I don't disagree with any of this, but I see nothing particularly Nietzschean about it.

You don't see how when people are encouraged to find their own moral values it leads them to the conclusions that many anarchist and libertarian philosophers have come to? Nietzsche's will to power is also referred to (by him) as the will to freedom. the questioning of statistical data (science is myth to N), the questioning of words to induce moral and behavioral norms?

"Why is my morality stifled?" "Why do I fund war/welfare?"

I'm not trying to make the claim that the people here are all totally Nietzsche fanboys. i'm saying that there is a stark engagement with subjectivism that both Nietzsche and many anarchist and libertarian grapple with. The problem Nietzsche would have is the (unjustified) imposition of something like NAP.

It's not that the state imposes morality, but that it imposes the wrong sort of morality.

Laws aren't the imposition of moral norms?"

You don't see subjectivism coming out here? or are you suggesting Nietzsche was a fascist as most others do? he had no love for the state and I think he thought of those who will their power into the state as being cowardly as well as liars and thieves.

Re: Would you support a military coup?

Vitor — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 01:28:24 GMT

Allende was a hardcore socialist, so he was quite, quite bad. Pinochet also had little apprecitation for human life, but he was ok with markets and such, didn't go creating all kind of central planning and big state companies like the brazilian military coup doing during the same period. Pinochet was quite bad, Allende was worse. No one deserve to be rule by any of those two.

Re: Would you support a military coup?

Neodoxy — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 01:09:15 GMT

"the state is built on utlitarian/consequentialist ethics. that is how it can justify coups...

Rothbardian/Randian ethics

NAP is a deontological theory (it is basically a different version of Kant - save for the reason why property is justified in the systems). Rand is...not even worth adressing, but "objectivism" is very similar to classic virtue ethics; there is good we know it, there are specific actions (for her self-interest) that can get us to be virtuous.

It's not that the state imposes morality, but that it imposes the wrong sort of morality.

Laws aren't the imposition of moral norms?"

I don't disagree with any of this, but I see nothing particularly Nietzschean about it.

Re: Would you support a military coup?

shackleford — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 00:57:21 GMT

I'm not Nietzschean.

Re: Would you support a military coup?

Aristophanes — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 00:55:06 GMT

the state is built on utlitarian/consequentialist ethics. that is how it can justify coups...

Rothbardian/Randian ethics

It's not that the state imposes morality, but that it imposes the wrong sort of morality.

Laws aren't the imposition of moral norms?