liberty

8

80sBaby

0
I will be from time to time adding new pieces to this section.


"As I've been trying to tell you over and over: you cannot demand liberty for yourself but not your opponents. Quite bluntly, it'll probably come back to bite you in the ass eventually.Take a moment to step outside your personal political view for a moment. Stop considering what specific powers your government has, and consider the scale of power it has.Quite simply, it has the power to take away individual liberty for what it perceives to be a greater good. This means every liberty, from speech to association to whatever, is at risk. Under an anti-individual government, there are no sacred rights. None. Zero. Nada. Absolutely anything can be justified on the basis that "We think it's a good idea, so here we go".The principle here is pragmatism: your government believes that liberty can be subjugated to a policy which it believes "works". This is truly scary, and I hope it scares you as well. My goal is to warn you that your specific political agenda is blinding you to the greater situation. Yes, you personally believe it to be pragmatic(!) to persecute the wealthy, for a greater good. But there will always be other Finns with the same plans for you. No society can be made up of a truly homogenous group of people with the same moral values as everyone else. The concept of "society" is commonly but mistakenly used in modern politics to suggest such a monolithic entity.The truth is something that I hope you're starting to grasp: you belong to Finnish society, but you don't agree with certain parts of society. This is normal: intellectual diversity. Society would be tragically dull if everyone truly thought and believed the same things, no?And if certain parts of society (such as the dominant political party) have no authority to enforce its moral values on you, then you have no authority to enforce your moral values on them.I'm sure there are Finns who, like myself, believe that welfare does not equal compassion; in fact, they believe that government welfare is a form of theft, or discrimination. That's their morality: compassion equals private charity. Are these people "wrong"? Are they "right"? It doesn't matter. Their moral values are just as valid as everyone else's!You believe that welfare equals compassion: the more welfare, the more compassionate your country is. And you know what? This is just as valid as the opposite view. Your moral values are exactly as valid as those of your opponents.So what's the problem? The problem is when one of you decides to impose your own moral values on everyone else. Like a Christian fundamentalist, you seek to suppress all other moral systems in favor of your own. And this attitude gives your political opponents the authority to suppress you. Consider this a friendly warning. Only liberty permits everyone to exercise their moral values equally. If you want to give money to the less fortunate, you may do so in any way you choose. Or not at all. That, too, is a moral choice which should be respected.The idea that people will sacrifice some part of themselves without some compensatory benefit is illogical. Are all actions ascribed to altruism? Of course not. But feeling good, emotionally or physically, is a primary human motive. It's universal. It's illogical to say that any sane human being would throw away his most prized possession -- his personal pleasure -- for anything. The danger of the myth of altruism is that it is a fragile excuse to pretend that certain people are angels, depending on how vigorously they insist on their altruism. Marxists, Christian fundamentalists, welfare socialists, and other altruists all insist that they should be given power over people's lives, because they are free of personal interest. This is dangerous. It doesn't matter how virtuous they insist to be in their quest for power, the fact remains that they are demanding power in the first place. Power is seductive to fallible people, and people are fallible. Logical individuals cannot take seriously the idea that power-seekers take no pleasure in it.And if power-seekers take pleasure in what they do, why should we trust them in holding violent power over us? It's dangerous complacency to trust in someone with "mixed motives". How do we know which motive will win out? We cannot.I realize that you'll probably refuse to accept any of this; you'll prefer the pleasant delusion over the harsh reality. Complacency is so, so much easier than personal responsibility. Why not trust smooth-talking, pious leaders who invoke sacred altruism to cover up their earthly motives? Why not absolve oneself of the terrors of adulthood and instead bask in childish naivete? These two questions answer themselves, at least. Much of modern politics is based on the belief that the individual must surrender himself to the collective whole. That collective might be based on many things, such as a specific religious dogma, or a desire to redistribute wealth from one person to another. The assumption is that the individual if left to himself would harm the collective weal; the only way that he can avoid this is to reject any action that betters himself, and concentrate solely on altruistic, or selfless, acts. This assumption is false.Why? Because there is no such thing as altruism. Virtues like compassion, bravery, honesty, etc. do not technically exist. They are figments of cultural conditioning, applied to individual egos. More realistically, we can see that behaving in a way which you consider to be compassionate, brave, or honest merely makes you feel good about yourself. It stimulates your self-esteem to volunteer at a blood drive, risk your life to save an old lady crossing the street, or tell a painful truth. Altruism takes it for granted that certain actions are done with absolutely no reward. And absolutist statements tend to fracture under their own brittleness. The cold, hard truth is that there is always some personal reward in any human activity, even if it's nothing more than a small boost to one's self-esteem. We are all individuals, no matter how willingly some of us desire to subsume ourselves to a cause greater than ourselves.The myth of altruism pervades human culture because it acts as a pleasant buffer against the perceived intrinsic evilness of individual profit. Cultures like America's pride themselves on believing in individual self-reliance and freedom of action, but deep down they take the ancient position that individualism is inherently sinful, and damaging to the greater whole. Any action taken which profits the individual somehow damages the collective, i.e., is selfish. Altruism however provides a sweet illusion, a sparkly pink pillow tossed over reality. If humans in all their flesh-and-blood, desirous fallibility are inherently destructive, then there must be some aspect to them that gifts them with that touch of angelicness which keeps civilization from perpetually collapsing into bloody chaos. There must be a mode of action, altruists suggest, which is free of the taint of crude desire. Altruism allegedly fills that role. But as has just been pointed out, there is no true act of selflessness. There is always a "selfish"(!) motive. It can be as grandiose as religion (be nice, and receive entrance to an elysian afterlife!), pretentious as ideology (play your part, and rescue society!), or as simple as self-satisfaction for engaging in a bit of charity.Altruists grossly cram together the concepts of selflessness and selfishness when they are two very different things. And they do this for one of several reasons, neither of them particularly enlightened: fear and guilt. People are made to feel afraid of what people in general might do if left alone; and people are made to feel guilty for seeking to profit themselves, even when no one else has been actually harmed. The danger of harm is enough; the risk to security is itself deemed an injury to the group. Supposedly "selfish" acts are considered such injuries, and are therefore worthy of prohibition. Therefore certain individuals(!) take the leadership(!) in trying to suppress individualism, claiming that their own(!) theories are superior to all others. They then try to arrogantly force those theories onto others. Individualism can't help but rear its head, even in those claiming to be selfless protectors of the collective! The concept of altruism serves as the justification for tyranny, and the atonement for perceived anarchy. It turns otherwise innocent actions into sins (and vice versa; holding a gun to someone's face magically becomes a virtue rather than an act of bigoted malice). The best and easiest way to make some action seem wrong is to make it seem evil. This makes it easy to demonize one's opponents as being given wholly over to their selfish natures, with little to no concern for the well-being of others. The individual is supposed to surrender herself over to the greater good. If she balks, then she's obviously evil-hearted and little more than a savage beast in the wild. Obviously.The problem with altruism is that it is an illusion; it stubbornly denies human nature, which can't help but be disastrous. It's the best justification for tyranny of all: dissenters aren't just wrong, they're wretched beasts worthy of being hunted down. This is the standard practice of modern politics. And it's all based on a lie. Altruism falsely justifies a vicious gloss on reality. Really, do any of you collectivists consider yourselves to be as nasty and appalling as your fellow human beings supposedly are? Deep down people like flozi, Miller's, babu, and others all think of themselves as being truly awesome individuals. And that's irony, with sparkly hypocrisy on the edges.[1] Government does not create social order.We generally harbor the assumption that society would descend into chaos had we no centralized means of authority. This idea is bunk. Social order stems spontaneously from the voluntary behavior of individuals. We discovered early on as a species that we can cooperate. We need no third party to tell us that a person stands to benefit by trading with others. By freely trading what excess I may have of goods, labor, or services that I produce well, I can obtain those things I desire but cannot produce well on my own. I have an incentive to produce more than I can consume myself. Self-interest in the absence of coercion provides the means for win-win social relationships. This activity, barter, leads logically to indirect trade. If I need something from you, but you do not want what I have, I go to Rufus over here who has what you want, but wants what I've got (still a pretty inefficient way to go, though). Thankfully, over time, this process bubbles to the surface one or two commodities that most people realize just about everyone wants to some degree or another (usually a luxury item). This good becomes the trading standard, i.e., money. With money, we gain the ability to calculate profit and loss, and shift our activities so that they match the desires of other actors in the market. This mechanism of self-interest gives us a way to determine if we use our resources in a way that satisfies others." -Lo Bastido
 
(Mad dope props to Ayn Rand for inspiration)

"The term "socialism" is not merely an economic term; it has other aspects, which all relate back to its very name.

Any government measure designed to manipulate society into what is deemed to be the ideal is socialism. Leftists -- no matter how moderate -- are socialists, since they support the manipulating of the economy to decrease economic inequality, and thus, presumably, social distinctions between rich and poor. Naturally, they also support some -- but not all -- permissions in regards to non-economic activities, such as marriage. Note that I said permissions, instead of rights. There are no civil rights for individuals under socialism, because socialism takes it for granted that "society" -- whether in the form of all individuals, a majority of individuals, or even some individuals as a group -- is superior to the individual qua individual. Those who call themselves "liberals" do not believe in rights; their perceived entitlements to welfare are certainly not rights; groups of individuals cannot have their own rights as a group; the overall principle is that the individual must kneel before the whims of society (although actually the ruling elite in charge of the government).

We must take into account the wide scope of socialist activities. Economic measures designed to manipulate society are a form of socialism, as we have seen. But there are many justifications for socialism, and Marxism is only one of them. (The term "Marxism" may reasonably be applied to the general concept of wealth redistribution from the wealthy to the poor, with the underlying assumptions that under capitalism there is no middle class; that the rich are always getting richer while the poor are always getting poorer; and that the rich can only get rich at the expense of the poor.)

Another justification for socialism is the vague concept of "virtue." Under this kind of socialism, society is manipulated toward the goal of creating a society based on certain religious ideals. The individual is largely left alone in his economic activities, but his non-economic activities are regulated if not banned, even though those activities are conducted between consenting adults with a clear and honest agreement regarding their association.

This form of socialism is as destructive of individual liberty as the more recognized Marxist form of socialism. Bizarrely, the proponents of virtue socialism refuse to recognize their socialism, despite their constant invocation of terms like society, the greater good, and the majority, in the context of manipulating them using government fiat -- classic rhetoric of all socialists.

Any system which aims to respect individual liberty must accept that society (or the greater good, or the majority) is built up from the basic unit of the individual. There must also be the recognition that no group of individuals -- be it a group of only two individials, or of all other individuals -- has any special rights of its own; and it certainly has no superior rights over the individual. Put briefly: society has no rights; government has no responsibility to safeguard society. The term "social contract" clouds the truth that government is basically a contract between the individual and his government; society itself has no political-cum-legal substance, with no rights, privileges, or responsibilities of its own.

Society must be allowed to take whatever course it will, regardless of the outcome. Representative government is founded on the principle that the constituency deserves whatever it votes for, and should be allowed to freely choose its fate. Society must be treated -- respected -- in the same way: whatever society as a whole wants, society as a whole should get.

Now, socialists believe the worst in humanity: they must, otherwise their policies cannot be justified. They take for granted that, if not for their interventionism, society will collapse into unspeakable horror. This belief is based on a bedrock of rank misanthropy. The prediction just mentioned requires the average individual to be a reckless, cruel idiot with no real ability to control himself: a slave to his own impulses and desires. Socialists justify the enslavement of the individual on the grounds that the individual is already a slave to his own passions. This is true no matter how vigorous a socialist's policies are in enslaving the individual: even if a policy only slightly enslaves the individual, it is assumed that the individual is only slightly a reckless, cruel idiot with a reduced ability to control himself. They call this misanthropy pragmatism, as if pragmatism were an ideal which lifts humanity to its greatest heights. (It only lifts those in charge to the greatests heights, which is the entire point of socialist politics.)

There is no real cure for misanthropy. And socialists refuse to acknowledge the value of liberty -- or if they do, they insist that it is inferior as an ideal to misanthropic pragmatism. For them it is better, in other words, to treat their fellow individuals as irresponsible slaves than to allow them to destroy themselves.

Note irresponsible: liberty and responsibility are inseparable halves. Both Marxist socialists and virtue socialists pay at least some superficial homage to responsibility -- more so with the latter -- but in the end neither truly believes in it. Even if an individual will destroy himself if given the freedom to do so, he must be respected in that choice. And if he hurts someone else's property or person, then he must be respected enough to be prosecuted for it. Socialist fiat is essentially preemptive: it seeks to prevent what are deemed criminous actions before they occur. Some activities often lead to other, harmful activities; it certainly feels good to prevent the latter by banning the former. But what such emotion-driven policy neglects is that freedom-based justice cannot survive under such prosecutorial policy. By preventing action B by banning action A, one has essentially declared all actors of A -- all of them! -- to be guilty ahead of the fact. Thus two sacred principles of Western jurisprudence are violated: prosecution on an individual basis, with the opportunity to confront one's accuser; and the presumption of innocence until one has been proven guilty. Briefly: socialism replaces proof of guilt with presumption of guilt.

Assume that, say, 80% of crack users will commit robberies while high, or to support their habit, or both; government still has no right to use statistics to prosecute all crack users. (It should use actual evidence, something which socialists tend to dismiss as irrelevant.) One of the defining qualities -- and evils -- of socialism is that it punishes the innocent (those who would not commit other crimes) along with the guilty (those who were going to commit other crimes). Modern jurisprudence should not run on statistics; a prosecutor should not charge someone with the possibility that he might mug someone in the future. (Those of you whom I am describing in this post, please take a moment to re-read the previous sentence objectively; and ask yourself honestly if such a system as described horrifies you.)

Thus, the man who snorts coke in his apartment, and has no inclination to hurt anyone else or their property, is as wicked as the man who stabs someone on the street to pay for his next heroin fix. No socialist can claim that absolutely all users of such hard drugs commit secondary crimes; and even a 99% possibility of a future crime is no justification for prosecution. It is scarcely appreciated by socialists that people should be prosecuted as individuals for the crimes they have already committed, using evidence collected against them, and with the chance to confront their accusers. No, that whole irrelevant -- to them -- rigamarole should be avoided by simply preventing people from doing things which often lead to those other crimes.

These socialist policies on criminal justice are an indication of how hostile socialism is to responsibility. If an individual manages to get his hands on cocaine, and goes on a shooting spree using a prohibited firearm, socialists studiously avoid putting the responsibility on the individual: the Marxist socialist blames the firearm, while the virtue socialist blames the cocaine. From that kind of perspective, it's not the individual who failed in his responsibilities (for he has none, since he deserves none), it's the government who failed in its responsibilities! No socialist commentator would say "Well, it's his own fault; he chose to do the coke, and so he's responsible for whatever he does even if he's hopped up." Instead a socialist would say "Government failed this man, and failed the people he shot; government must work harder to live up to its responsibilities."

In other words, government is assumed to be more responsible than the individual -- even though the enormous mass of human history has proven the reverse. Misanthropists-as-socialists do not trust people; and since according to human nature they must trust in something to make things right, they place their trust in government. Beware those who would take away responsibility from the individual, for they are putting responsibility into the one human institution which least deserves it: government, which has the power to arrest or even kill those who dare violate the tyranny guarding the current social ideal." -Lo Bastido
 
"- Murder
- Assault
- Property damage and theft
- Copyright and patent infringement
- Breach of contract

All these activities violate one fundamental precept: that we all have the rights to our own bodies and property, and nothing else. (None of us, of course, have any rights toward other people's bodies and property.) The principle is that adults of sound mind may consent to activities with other adults with no interference from government except as an arbiter in case of dispute." -Lo Bastido, on the only areas of gov't intervention

(This is a keystone contribution because until recently no one was able to properly identify what those areas were. Probably the main reason why it was developed in this way is because it violates the individuals right to life. All other areas of morality cannot be legislated, particularly since no one has been able to ever decide upon what that is. But these five areas can be agreed upon because they directly violate the individuals possessions. All others are mute point.)
 
For example...

Taxes are theft. Since gov't never actually "asks" you for permission to have some of your hard earned money, guess what?

Drugs: Lets just say to make the distinction between a drug seller who forces his deals onto children and an adult who proceeds to bother noone else. Adults have a natural right to do what they will with their body. If they wanna fry their brains, so be it. Now if they live in an apartment, those rules on drugs are left to the owner/caretaker; but if they live and own their own home, no one has a right to tell them otherwise (though gov't seems to think differently).

Marriage: to 95-97 percent of the population, that means a man and a woman. To 3-5 percent, that means something else. Marriage is defined by the individual, and noone have a right to tell them otherwise (tyranny). If a church refuses to marry a same-sex couple, that's fine because that is their natural right to discriminate according to their own values. But if an independent church believes otherwise, that is their natural right to. (Notice how the dominating religions are trying to put a vice, an enlisted membership, over all churches via an "organization." Religious history, in this example, is a dark one, and they refuse to acknowledge their tyranny, for if they do they have to acknowledge their own sin by force.) If a German brother and sister wanna marry, or a British woman wants to marry a dolphin, guess what? They have that natural right to do so if someone has no problem marrying them. The example is used to highlight that while most of the population thinks its crazy, they also have no right to forcibly control them otherwise.

I'll think of more later, and I wanna add: anarchy is not a by-product of freedom. Evil does not emanate from the majority, but the minority; and even if it did, it still doesn't give "society" (only but a group of individuals) the right otherwise over others' lives. For as long as I leave you alone, and you leave me alone, that is the criterium.
 
Another one is the smoking ban dressed in nazism (aka The Attack On the Liquor and Tobacco Industry). This is another violation of property rights. The owners of the property know what's best. If a company allows smoking indoors, I imagine its employees can petition/ask for a change in the policy. But it is ultimately up to the employer. If employees don't like it, it is their responsibility to find a job with a non-smoking policy, not the employers. It's a primo example of how the collective diminishes individual responsibility. A business owner asked its committee to allow him to accept smoking if he provided a ventilation system. They said no, not because it wasn't a fair or rightful proposal, but because deep down its about the abolition of tobacco. Yet they sure as hell have less problems with car emissions, which is easily more harmful. (Gov't has no right legislating environmental regulations either. A tainted scientific hoop de doo that one is.)
 
In terms of voting, those areas that can be supported towards state rights (over nationalism) is a step closer to individual liberty. It isn't an end in itself (because there is no entity that owns a state), but it sure is a hell of a lot better than the White House telling you what to do.

The phrase "I believe in voting for the less worse" has and is destroying America. Voting on a bad idea based on the "other" having no good ideas usually gets you a bad idea. That is the two-party system. If you've voted for them recently, you've just placed an empty vote. Not exactly groundbreaking stuff, but voters do it anyway.

That other dangerous phrase, "I believe you need to vote or else someone will vote for you," is like saying, 'Hey, I know all the choices are shitty, but I don't want that shithead over there to vote over my shit." How voting for more of the same mess is considered more acceptable than abstaining is a mystery to me.

Which leads to: Do people really care? No, not really. And there's overwhelming historical evidence to prove it. But we're not suppose to mention it out loud cause people get insulted when you tell them they don't give a shit. History will show that people care during brief and climactic hazards (Katrina, 9-11, etc.), but it is the minute, every day times when people should be caring and fighting for their liberties. Essentially we deserve what we get, which amounts to nothing. Ayn Rand notes that psychologically voters want to hear that no answers are possible. That way they can continue to play. It's a lot easier to hear our revolving door of politicians talk about how they are doing such a good job with Lutz-appointed terminology. We know the bull is coming, but we somehow subconsciously enjoy taking comfort in knowing the suits are doing nothing for us -- I mean for the betterment of society. TV is what counts--and here's a sad thought: if gov't took tv away from its citizens, I'd make a wager that Americans would come out in droves fighting for their liberty.
 
"As opposition to our growing statism, we have nothing but the futile 'willayas' of the so-called 'conservatives,' who are fighting, not for any political principles, but only against the 'liberals.'"

"For instance, consider the conflict between the Republicans and the Democrats (and within each party, the same conflict between the 'conservatives' and the 'liberals'). Since both parties hold altruism as their basic principle, both advocate a welfare state or mixed economy as their ultimate goal.

Every government control imposed on the economy (regardless in whose favor) necessitates the imposition of further controls. To alleviate - momentarily - the disasters caused by the first control. Since the Democrats are more consistently committed to the growth of government power, the Republicans are reduced to helpless 'me-too'ing,' to inept plagiarism of any program initiated by the Democrats, and to the disgraceful confession implied in their claim that they seek to achieve 'the same ends' as the Democrats, but by different means.

It is precisely those ends (altruism-collectivism-statism) that ought to be rejected. But if neither party chooses to do it, the logic of the events created by their common basic principles will keep dragging them both further and further to the left. If and when the 'conservatives' are kicked out of the game altogether, the same conflict will continue between the 'liberals' and the avowed socialists; when the socialists win, the conflict will continue between the socialists and the communists; when the communists win, the ultimate goal of altruism will be achieved: universal immolation.

There is no way to stop or change that process except at the root: by a change of basic principles." -Ayn Rand, "Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal"



"It is obvious that with this sort of theoretical equipment and with an unbroken record of defeats, concessions, compromises, and betrayals in practice, today's "conservatives" are futile, impotent and, culturally, dead. They have nothing to offer and can achieve nothing. They can only help to destroy intellectual standards, to disintegrate thought, to discredit capitalism, and to accelerate this country's uncontested collapse into despair and dictatorship.

But to those of you who do wish to contest it--particularly those of you who are young and are not ready to surrender--I want to give a warning: nothing is as dead as the stillborn. Nothing is a futile as a movement without goals, or a crusade without ideals, or a battle without ammunition. A bad argument is worse than ineffectual: it lends credence to the arguments of your opponents. A half-battle is worse than none: it does not end in mere defeat--it helps and hastens the victory of your enemies." -Ayn Rand, "Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal"



"The US desperately needs Presidents and Congresses who are ready and willing to do nothing.

It should be remembered though that despite whatever Bush has done, and despite his popularity numbers, the American voters really don't care what he does. A poll showing him with ridiculously low numbers, like in the 20s or 30s, means little on election day. People willing to get outraged at a politician during a phone survey does not mean they're going to stomp down to the polling place on election day and vote the rascal out. More than likely, there'll be some new videos at Blockbuster or something, so they don't bother. Bush has not been impeached or even censured because Congress knows that deep down most Americans care more about getting their own entitlements than what happens in Iraq or Louisiana, or how much the government's ability to spy on them is increased.

I think this apathy is more or less intentional. The current system is predicated on the belief that it can fix whatever bugs you, like poverty, disease, crime, homos, guns, wetbacks, smokers, CEOs, ragheads, and so on. Pick a scapegoat, and demand whatever you define as "fairness". This attitude of "Don't worry about it, we'll take care of things for you; you just relax and watch TV" is perfect for politically anesthetizing a voting public. As long as the public keeps believing the blatant lie that politicians can take care of them (and note that public education is supervised by... politicians), the overall status quo can remain unchanged.

And piffling skirmishes like the Iraq War or the Patriot Act are just part of the great game. Neither major party would dare contemplate the notion that the government has no authority to suppress consent; that would be simply out of bounds. What the people can't or won't do for themselves, government will do for them. This is a wonderful liberation: a liberation from responsibility. Children don't have to worry about paying for the bills or buying their clothes, and we're supposed to be as free from responsibility as children. Children don't have the right to think for themselves, either. But that's all right, what the hell do we know. Our parents in the government can do the thinking for us! post-3-1167930995.gif All we little dears have to is decide what we want, and they'll do the rest. We don't even have to worry about how our demands get met; our own needs are all that matters, and we can let the politicians offer justifications. It's a perfect system, if one is willing to exploit the worst aspects of human nature." -Lo Bastido



"If you want me to name in one sentence what is wrong with the modern world, I will say that never before has the world been clamoring so desperately fo answers to crucial problems--and never before has the world been so frantically committed to the belief that no answers are possible.

Observe the peculiar nature of this contradiction and the peculiar emotional atmosphere of our age. There have been periods in history when men failed to find answers because they evaded the existence of the problems, pretended that nothing threatened them and denounced anyone who spoke of approaching disaster. This is not the predominant attitude of our age. Today, the voices proclaiming disaster are so fashionable a bromide that people are battered into apathy by their monotonous insistence; but the anxiety under that apathy is real. Consciously or subconsciously, intellectually or emotionally, most people today know that the world is in a terrible state and that it cannot continue on its present course much longer."

"You might say that the explanation lies in our modern cynicism and that people fail to find answers because they really don't care. It is true that people are cynical today, but this is merely a symptom, not a cause. Today's cynicism has a special twist: we are dealing with cynics who do care--and the ugly secret of our age lies in that which they do care about, that which they are seeking.

The truth about the intellectual state of the modern world, the characteristic peculiar to the twentieth century, which distinguishes it from other periods of cultural crises, is the fact that what people are seeking is not that answers to problems, but the reassurance that no answers are possible.

A friend of mine once said that today's attitude, paraphrasing the Bible, is: 'Forgive me, Father, for I know not what I'm doing--and please don't tell me.'" -Ayn Rand, "Philosophy: Who Needs It"
 
"Throughout history the state had been regarded, implicityl or explicitly, as the ruler of the individual--as a sovereign authority (with or without supernatural mandate), an authority logically antecedent to the citizen and to which he must suBathmateit. The Founding Fathers challenged this primordial notion. They started with the premise of the primacy and sovereignty of the individual. The individual, they held, logically precedes the group or the institution of government. Whether or not any social organization exists, each man possess certain individual rights. And "among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness"--or, in the words of a New Hampshire state document, "among which are the enjoying and defending life and liberty; acquiring, possessing, and protecting property; and in a word, of seeking and obtaining happiness.

These rights were regarded not as a disparate collection, but as a unity expressing a single fundamental right. Man's rights, declares Samuel Adams, often termed the father of the American Revolution, "are evident branches of, rather than deductions from, the duty of self-preservation, commonly called the first law of nature." Man's rights are natural, i.e., their warrant is the laws of reality, not any arbitrary human decision; and they are inalienable, i.e., absolutes not subject to renunciation, revocation, or infringement by any person or group. Rights, affirms John Dickinson, "are not annexed to us by parcHydromaxents and seals... They are born with us; exist with us; and cannot be taken from us by any human power without taking our lives. In short, they are founded on the immutable maxims of reason and justice.

And "to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the sonsent of the governed..." The powers of government are, therefore, limited, not merely de facto or by default, but on principle: government is forbidden to infringe man's rights It is forbidden because, in Adams's words, "the grand end of civil government, from the vary nature of its institution, is for the support, protection, and defence of those very rights...

In this view, the state is the servant of the individual. It is not a sovereign possessing primary authority, but an agent possessing only delegated authority, but an agent specific practical function, and subject to dissolution and reconstruction if it trespasses outside its assigned purview. Far from being the ruler of man, the state, in the American conception, exists to prevent the division of men into rulers and ruled. It exists to enable the individual, in Locke's words, "to be free from any superior power on earth, and not to be under the will or legislative authority of man, but to have only the law of nature for his rule." -Leonard Peikoff, "Ominous Parallels"
 
"It would be different in any other kind of election, but the presidential election has such monumentally high stakes that any candidate has to be willing to do just about anything to their principles to win. If that means figuratively talking out of both sides of their mouth, then fine.

So if you sincerely want to find genuine differences between two candidates of the same party, then good luck to you. But you should accept that the differences will be small to the point of negligible. And these differences are likely to change suddenly without notice.

[pointless philosophical tangent]
Remember though that the lesser of two evils is still evil. The only way to be principled is to hold fast to your principles. In our current baroque system of compromises, principles are commodities to be bartered for votes. No candidate is worth even a portion of your moral values. The days of total evil such as Nazi'sm or Stalinism are hopefully over in the West. Today however evil is to be found in the margins, the silent creeping erosion of principle while everyone is only looking out for their own agenda. Certain values transcend individual ideologies, such as honesty, compassion, and consent. These values are the first victims of compromise. And as I said, no candidate or party is worth what matters to you. "Half a loaf is better than none" is just an excuse to be lazy. It tells the establisHydromaxent that you're willing to settle for the partial infringement of your principles as long as you don't have to sacrifice your comfort, complacency, and convenience for what you believe in.

And if like millions of conforming Americans you want to keep sending that message, then feel free to follow anyone's forthcoming advice in this thread about which Democrat will sell you out the least." --Lo Bastido
 
(excerpts)

http://patrickonpolitics.blogspot.com/2007/04/ayn-rand-on-draft.html
"[The draft] is an abrogation of rights. It negates man's fundamental right--the right to life--and establishes the fundamental principle of statism: that a man's life belongs to the state, and the state may claim it by compelling him to sacrifice it in battle."

...

"...o-called 'conservatives,' who posture as defenders of individual rights, particularly property rights ... uphold and advocate the draft. By what infernal evasion can they hope to justify the proposition that creatures who have no right to life, have the right to a bank account?"

...

"'[L]iberals'... claim that man has the 'right' to economic security, public housing, medical care, education, recreation, but no right to life..."

"...If a country's government undertakes to fight a war for some reason other than self-defense, for a purpose which the citizens neither share nor understand, it will not find many volunteers. Thus, a volunteer army is one of the best protectors of peace, not only against foreign aggression, but also against any warlike ideologies or projects on the part of a country's own government. ... Not many men would volunteer for such wars as Korea or Vietnam. Without the power to draft, the makers of our foreign policy would not be able to embark on adventures of that kind. This is one of the best practical reasons for the abolition of the draft."

Source: Rand, Ayn. Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, "The Wreck of the Consensus," (1966).



http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?ID=2350
"Yet it's Rangel's fundamental motive that is the most vicious one could imagine: in order to dissuade the President from pursuing a war with an enemy that threatens the security of the American people, Rangel proposes the government violate the rights of the American people. Rangel is not alone in his call for the military draft--many conservatives also seek to re-establish the draft and mandatory national service, but in the name of American nationalism.

Supporters of the draft fail to recognize one central truth: a proper government exists solely to protect the individual rights of its people. One can not claim to defend these rights while one simultaneously violates their most sacred tenet: that the individual has a right to his life that may not be violated. The only effective way to share the cost of war equitably is to pay military personnel those salaries that make military service attractive and to give the military the resources it needs and a mission worthy of the men and women who carry it out.

During the Vietnam War, the philosopher Ayn Rand was a fierce opponent of the military draft. Writing in Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, Rand observed, "If the state may force a man to risk death or hideous maiming and crippling, in a war declared at the state's discretion, for a cause he may neither approve of nor even understand, if his consent is not required to send him into unspeakable martyrdom--then, in principle, all rights are negated in that state, and its government is not man's protector any longer. What is there left to protect?"

Ayn Rand was right. There can never be a national emergency that legitimizes the violation of individual rights. In fact, the re-institution of the draft itself would constitute a national emergency worthy of the strongest opposition--not in order to oppose America, as the hippies did during the Vietnam War, but precisely because America ought to mean the most perfect expression of the principle of individual rights we are capable of achieving.
As a veteran of the Marines, I am proud of my five years of military service. Yet that service was predicated on the belief that I defended both my personal freedom and the freedom of the American people. I can not countenance the idea that the government would sacrifice the freedom of someone else in the name of protecting me. Rep. Rangel says he wants a vigorous debate on the question of the military draft. I hope it is a quick debate as well, and that the question of human sacrifice will simply be dismissed out of hand."
 
http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/expectmore/d...03500.2005.html
"Identifying and addressing the barriers to increasing the proportion of children adopted from the foster care system. Milestone: Complete a four-year study by the University of Texas at Austin of the Barriers to Completion of the Adoption Process (AdoptUsKids Project)."

"Developing an efficiency measure, which ties more closely to the program's goals."

"Utilize newly developed efficiency measure to monitor and improve program efficiency and effectiveness. Milestone: Encourage more timely adoptions, resulting in reduced adoption assistance administrative costs, by incorporating into the new Child and Family Service Review (CFSR) composite measures components addressing "Progress Toward Adoption of Children Who Are Legally Free for Adoption" and "Exits to Permanency for Children with TPR" (termination of parental rights), and begin using composites in second round of CFSRs."

"Exploring programmatic or policy changes in order to set more ambitious adoption targets. Milestone: Report FY05 adoption numbers/rate and assess whether current adoption targets are appropriate."

"Increase adoption rate from 9.4% in FY 2003 to 10% by FY 2008."

"Measure: Decrease the gap between the percentage of children nine and older waiting to be adopted and those actually adopted by 15 percentage points between FY 2006 and FY 2015."



Innit good to know the adoption industry plays an active role in stealing children? These figures above prove so because the adoption percentage target increases its goal. They have a vested interest.

I was once at a meeting where a CPS (Child Protection Service) victim sat there and told me how her rights were being evaded but if a prostitute lost her child, she deserved it. The reason why morality cannot be instituted (but does anyway) is everyone has their own set of values. In her case, another "agent" may clamour to your house and demand your child on the basis of a few dirty dishes and clothes thrown in the corner. (Think I'm kidding?) The reasons really don't matter except that CPS refuses to accept that because if they do not approve of a parents lifestyle, it is OK to take away a parents bodily rights in the form of their natural born child. Hey, you're a prostitute. Or you do drugs. It doesn't matter. They have a natural right to their children. Now if the child's survival is threatened, that's another issue which is a very fine line, and requires empirical evidence. But notice how being a prostitute or drug user does not necessarily constitute a risk to the child's survival. Those are livelihood issues which still do not justify confiscation. The majority's values cannot triumph the minorities, like a prostitute or drug dealer. This is because, as Lo Bastido has said, why you cannot demand liberty for yourselves but not others. They've stole their children without their permission, and this is somehow a better alternative than letting liberty run its natural course? This is again socialist politics at its worst: you are guilty before proven innocent. It's a sick program.
 
Today's thought (after all this time) centers around the upcoming presidential election. It's really quite simple: don't vote. Yes, it does mean others will vote for you, but there's no philosophical point in voting. What voting says is some people's rights become more valuable than others'. It says that if you vote for the winner, you will get more privileges/benefits. Voting says that some should have control of others. At the core, why the presidential election is so heavily watched and embraced is because it's a celebration of not having to take responsibility for oneself. It's a lot easier to have gov't do it for you. And the minority (who are working on behalf of the majority) are quite happy having certain special privileges and powers. The only real vote that matters is the one that says a representative will work to their fullest ability to sustain liberty for all.
 
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