As a path to liberty, violent attacks against the government seem to be a doomed strategy, for several reasons. For one thing, they’re experts at violence; it is their core competency. For another, violent revolutions tend to attract many people who like violence for its own sake. These folks will at best stir up trouble; at worst, they’ll use the turmoil to their own ends, and people with actual functioning consciences will be lined up against the wall and dispatched.
Author: Papa Libertarian
Judicial Activism: When Warranted?
Is “judicial activism” good or bad? Let us first ask, what is a proper role for judges? To hear some folks speak, the only proper role of a judge is to act as a rubber stamp for Congress and/or the current Tyrant-in-Chief. One wonders if they have ever heard of the concept of checks and balances?
People: Resource or Burden?
People do not merely consume and pollute. They also create; they produce. They find ways to turn negatives into positives. For example, the methane gas produced by landfills is now turned into energy. Ores which were of no economic value, now produce valuable minerals. People find ways to produce more efficiently. Today’s computers are vastly more powerful than those of a decade or two ago, and are also smaller; they use less material; they consume less energy per amount of work; and they further allow us to reduce the use of materials and energy for other purposes, in a virtuous cycle.
The Rot of Systemic Biases
Bryan Caplan, author of “The Myth of the Rational Voter,” compared average voter beliefs to the beliefs of economic experts. He found four systemic voter biases – areas where voters as a whole tend to systematically diverge from expert knowledge.
The Dangers of GIGO
Many pundits, politicians, and other wannabes take a few excellent ideas – such as computing and cybernetics – admix them with goals untested by reason, logic, or history, and trumpet the dawn of a New Age, where everything shall be Controlled to Perfection.
Dedication and Leadership
How did communists manage, starting with so few people, to accomplish so much? This is a question which libertarians might well ask, and a question which former communist Douglas Hyde endeavored to explain in a series of lectures, which have been gathered into the slim book Dedication and Leadership.
Deregulation Of Innovation
It has been estimated that the cost to an average household is about $15,000 per year, in terms of more expensive food, housing, education, health care, and many other goods and services. We can look at it this way: the annual costs of an average household are $15,000 more than they have to be, because of federal regulations. Or, an average household could have better food, health care, education at the same cost.
Losing or Making Great Again?
Many of today’s ideas are old nonsense, cribbed from mercantilists and crony capitalists, not from the great liberal ideas which define the best of American thoughts. If we pursue those ideas, greatness will naturally follow; it will not need to be forced.
Why Gun Control?
Why did the British government pass the Penal Codes, denying firearms ownership to Irish Catholics? Was it their deep love for the Irish? How about the British colonial laws preventing Indians from bearing arms? Let’s ask Gandhi about that: “Among the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will look upon the act depriving a whole nation of arms as the blackest.”
Who Cares About Conspiracies?
I spend little time studying and talking about conspiracy theories. Why? Three main reasons. First, who cares? For your knowledge about a given conspiracy to have any use, it isn’t enough for the theory to be true; you’ll need to convince the very people who are already in on it. So, what are you going to do with this information?