“Show of force” type practices by people calling themselves “government” toward other people calling themselves “government” that necessarily threaten innocent third parties is a form of hostage holding.
Tag: america
A Voluntaryist Completes the Proust Questionnaire
Remember the premise, to wit: This would be a good architecture for an interview with a very objective voluntaryist. So I have put myself into the personification of a scholarly, principled, individualist voluntaryist to imagine how honest answers to these questions might look.
Talk to, Don’t Provoke, North Korea
There’s little more we can do than hope that some cool heads around Donald Trump are telling him he’d be nuts to attack North Korea. I don’t know who they might be. Still, we must hope.
Who Will Build The Roads? Anarchists.
The Portland anarchists at PARC are out to fix more roads and serve their community, by voluntary action. Without government permission and at government dismay. Only few anarchists are bandana-wearing, Molotov cocktail-wielding protestors, while many are peaceful, liberty-loving people who want to help their community via voluntary association.
23 Ways Big Government Is Hurting the Poor
Advocates for big government often equate expanding government with concern for the poor. But reality speaks to the contrary: Expanding government often has very harmful effects on the poor.
Changing Your Mind Is Good, but Don’t Cut Corners
Political irrationality is ubiquitous. Most people irrationally cling to their political views; most of the rest irrationally revise their political views. This includes, of course, my fellow libertarians. I know plenty of unreasonable libertarians, but I also know plenty of “post-libertarians” who changed their minds for reasons no reasonable libertarian would accept.
Why Our Coercive System of Schooling Should Topple
I’ve been called a crazy optimist, a Pollyanna, a romantic idealist. How can I believe that our system of compulsory schooling is about to collapse? People point out that in many ways the schooling system is stronger now than ever. It occupies more of children’s time, gobbles up more public funds, employs more people, and is more firmly controlled by government – and at ever-higher levels of government – than has ever been true in the past. So why do I believe it’s going to collapse – slowly at first and then more rapidly – over the next ten years or so? Here are four reasons.
What a Perverse Presidential Incentive System!
All I can say is, we’ve got a hell of a political system on our hands when the surest way for a president to win the adoration of those who thought him a dangerous, ignorant, narcissistic, erratic, and bullshitting blowhard yesterday is to drop a bomb or fire a cruise missile today.
Deny Bakery Service? Go to Jail. Deny Airline Service? The Law Will Help You!
In America, if you are a small bakery and you decline to do business with someone—with no contracts broken and no money paid—you can be fined hundreds of thousands of dollars and lose your business.
Politics without Romance? Yes and No
Notice how, today, appointments to the Supreme Court elicit such fierce politicking. (Indeed, this heated wrangling has been the case for a long time.) Such would not be the case if there were no judicial law making. All sides expect it, however, and act accordingly.