As you can see, no one person is captured by a single label or group. But politicians, news media, and the least secure among us find it a lazy shortcut to group and label individuals into collectives.
Tag: libertarian
Being Forced to Help Not Helping
Being forced to help isn’t helping. Complying with a threat doesn’t make you a compassionate or moral person. It shows you can be manipulated and easily scared into doing what someone else thinks you should instead of acting on your own values.
Government Organizations Shouldn’t Enjoy Trademark Protection
The Marine Corps isn’t a private commercial entity. Nor should its symbols — which date back to 1868 in current form, to 1775 in various forms, and ultimately to the British marines the US based its service’s composition and mission on — be treated as the Marine Corps’ commercial property.
Bernie Sanders, Joe Rogan, the Human Rights Campaign, and Truth in Advertising
I don’t always agree with Rogan, but he grapples honestly with tough issues instead of just pushing a lucrative party line and denouncing all who dissent from that line. The Human Rights Campaign would better serve the community it claims to work for by adopting that approach instead of denouncing it.
US v. Sineneng-Smith: Does Immigration Law Trump Freedom of Speech?
I encourage anyone and everyone who wants to come to the United States in search of work and/or safety to do so, and to stay here for as long as they please, whether the US government likes it or not. I just broke the law.
Walter Block: Defending the Moneylender (15m)
This episode features an audio essay written by economics professor and Austro-libertarian Walter Block from 1976, and which comprises Chapter 17 of Defending the Undefendable.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
I am late for MLK’s birthday’s anniversary. It happened a week ago according to a record source I have seen. MLK’s real birthdate occurred on January 15, 1929. Every year we are reminded of the contributions that Martin Luther King, Jr. made to our society. What I fear now is that we are doing it wrong.
Ben O’Neill: Natural Law and the Libertarian Society (40m)
This episode features a lecture by lawyer and statistician Ben O’Neill from 2011. He looks at different types of law (natural, positive) as they relate to libertarian theory and practice.
A Loophole for the Lawless: “Qualified Immunity” Must Go
On August 11, 2014, officers from the Caldwell, Idaho Police Department asked for Shaniz West’s permission to enter and search her home. They were looking for her ex-boyfriend. West authorized the search and handed over her keys. Instead of entering and searching the home, though, the police brought in a SWAT team, surrounding the building. “[P]olice repeatedly exceeded the authority Ms. West had given them,” a lawsuit she filed complains, “breaking windows, crashing through ceilings, and riddling the home with holes from shooting canisters of tear gas, destroying most of Ms. West and her children’s personal belongings.”
Two-and-a-Half Cheers for Elizabeth Warren’s Student Debt Plan
There’s a strong historical correlation between easy availability of student loans and soaring costs of a college or university education. It’s basic economics. By artificially lowering loan risk to direct money at a good or service, government increases debt and drives up the price of that good or service.