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Wednesday, June 19

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Eric Field is the guest editor today.

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They Say They Want a Revolution
Original article
Molyneux or Rand (or Long)?
Original article Approaches to libertarian ethics. 
Can I Get Your Number?
Original article
Right and Left
Original article One examination of the relationship between Left and Right.
Memo To Authoritarians: The "Oath" is to the Constitution, Not to Secrecy
Original article Author and former intelligence officer, Barry Eisler examines the recent NSA abuses. 
The Eyes Watching You 1984 and the Surveillance State
Original article
Thank You For Your Service, Mr. Snowden
Original article
We Are All Bradley Manning
Original article
Politics: Michael Hastings, 'Rolling Stone' Contributor, Dead at 33
Original article Michael Hastings, one of the few real journalists in America, died in an auto accident. 
Gary Webb's Glorious Comeback
Original article
What the French Teach Libertarians About Our Own Homophobia
Original article I don't agree with all of the author's assertions, but I do think this is an article that is absolutely worth reading. 
Surveillance Is For Perverts – Stop PRISM Surveillance
Original article
John Stossel on Why Libertarians Have Better Things to Worry About Than the NSA
Original article With friends like these, libertarians really don't need enemies. 
Why John Stossel is Wrong: NSA is Definitely Something to Worry About
Original article Excellent rebuttal to Stossel by Sarah Harvard. 
Flying Bicycle Gets Off the Ground in Prague
Original article
Sometimes When Things Get Really Stressful, I Close My Eyes, Sit Back, And Pretend I’m Back In Kenya
Original article Satire.
The Little Issues
9
Paul Hein 2012-11-05 01:00
Column by Paul Hein. Exclusive to STR Although I have little interest in politics--except as outstanding examples of the madness of crowds--there was no avoiding them during the final days of the 2012 electoral campaigns. There seem to be two predominant campaign types. There are the well-known negative campaign ads, in which candidate A points out the utterly baseless character, lack of...
Who Are the Revolutionaries in a Free Market Revolution?
0
George F. Smith 2012-11-05 01:00
Column by George F. Smith. Exclusive to STR On the dedication page of Ron Paul’s The Revolution: A Manifesto, we find these words: "To my supporters:  I have never been more humbled and honored than by your selfless devotion to freedom and the Constitution." The modifier “selfless” is intended as a moral tribute. Imagine instead if he had written “selfish...
Voting Is Not Rational Recommended
9.66667
Stephen Nichols 2012-11-01 00:00
Column by Stephen Nichols. Exclusive to STR While reading Paul Bonneau’s recent column on STR entitled “Voting Is Not Irrational,” I was taken aback by the obvious flaws in his analysis and the conclusions resulting from that analysis. It’s been a few days since his article was published and I’ve been formulating my response to it for some time. Let me now share with...
A Review of 'Freedom Manifesto' by Steve Forbes
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DP_Thinker 2012-10-30 00:00
Column by DP_Thinker. Exclusive to STR Having just finished reading Freedom Manifesto: Why Free Markets Are Moral and Big Government Isn’t by Steve Forbes and Elizabeth Ames, I found myself deploring government intervention even more than I had before. The “Freedom Manifesto” was a true indictment against big government failure. The theme of the book is to show the reader how...
Technological Transmogrification: Collapsing Government Via the Internet and Beyond
10
Alex R. Knight III 2012-10-29 00:00
Column by Alex R. Knight III. Exclusive to STR Karl Hess once said that historically, technological innovations always changed societies more than voting ever did, and without doubt he remains correct. All the evidence shows this to be true. Fire gave humanity the ability to survive the elements in greater numbers, and transition from the Stone to Iron Age. The printing press enabled Lutherans to...
The Compulsion of Reading and Writing
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Dylan Delikta 2012-10-26 07:53
Column by Dylan Delikta. Exclusive to STR As a self-proclaimed “writer,” I do not take the time to write as much as I often should. In fact, if I was a journalist in this day and age, I probably would have been out of the job and perhaps even evicted from my apartment (if I actually lived in an apartment, so to say). I realize that right now I sound as if I am being a bit self-...
'Indians'
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Jim Davies 2012-10-25 00:00
Column by Jim Davies. Exclusive to STR The coming free society will be rational; residents will live on the basis of reality and reason rather than myth. We will recognize government for what it is and therefore reject it on rational grounds; we will think in rational, economic terms predominantly. I can be sure of this, because a free society will not come into being until everyone does think...
The Curious Species Ordinatio Diutinus
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tzo 2012-10-24 00:00
Column by tzo. Exclusive to STR Modern governments are perhaps quite naturally thick-headed and self-destructive, destined to clumsily overreach and greedily overindulge until they inevitably collapse. It’s seemingly encoded into their metaphorical DNA. But this is just the natural life cycle of any individual government—to be born; to consume, develop, and grow; and to die. And yet...
St. Abe Recommended
0
Jim Davies 2012-10-23 00:00
Column by Jim Davies. Exclusive to STR When the Church of Rome has in mind to elevate one of its heroes or heroines to the status of sainthood, it follows a certain procedure – one element of which is to hear the opinion of an advocatus diaboli – a devil's advocate. His job is to reason against the proposed canonization, so reducing the probability of error. That task fell in...
Voting Is Not Irrational
8
Paul Bonneau 2012-10-22 00:00
Column by Paul Bonneau. Exclusive to STR I just got done reading another article whacking the practice of voting. This one declares that voting is a fool's game. One begins to wonder if this is a productive tack. How many voters are convinced by such arguments? Aren’t we just “preaching to the choir”? Are we hacking at the branches of evil, or striking the root? I have made...
On Standing Up for Our Rights and Bringing Government Criminals to Justice
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Scott Lazarowitz 2011-09-16 00:00
Column by Scott Lazarowitz. Exclusive to STR Recently an Atlantic article on the history of guns emphasized the 1960s Black Panthers exercising their right to bear arms openly on the California state capitol steps. The article highlights one confrontation between a Panther and an Oakland police officer, who sees guns in the Panthers’ car and asks to see one of the guns. Knowing his rights,...
User's Guide to Spreading the Philosophy of Liberty Recommended
10
livefreeretiree 2011-09-19 00:00
Column by Vahram G. Diehl. Exclusive to STR Whatever the collective heading they arbitrarily choose to fall under, the supporters and practitioners of free choice who reject coercion through force or fraud as a viable ethical standard are constantly facing barriers in the path to spreading this moral precept to those around them. Those who believe in a stateless and free society absent of...
A Rationalist's Call to Action: Commence Breeding
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livefreeretiree 2011-09-20 00:00
Column by Vahram G. Diehl. Exclusive to STR Crisis! The planet is in a state of dreary imbalance! Tasks that should take three steps take three hundred! Human affairs everywhere are initiated with unnecessary hardship and carried through with extensive roundabout hoop-jumping and mountains of parlor-trick paperwork! Entire populaces can scantily differentiate their defecatory...
Staying Sane in an Unsane World
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livefreeretiree 2011-09-27 00:00
Column by Vahram G. Diehl. Exclusive to STR It is no secret that most people do not know what they are talking about, most of the time, on most subjects.  As a young person with an inclination toward the exclusive use of reason, this is for me an especially infuriating environmental defect.  People who cannot use reason (most people) will substitute authority in its place,...
Fun and Gun
10
Mark Davis 2011-10-13 00:00
Column by Mark Davis. Exclusive to STR  I’ve had enough of the emotional handwringing about the evil of guns and the chastising rhetoric about gun owners. Of course, inanimate objects like guns can’t be evil or good; they are just tools that can be used for good or evil. Further, gun owners are no more inherently wicked than people who own knives, hammers, shovels or...
On the Road to a Right Education
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livefreeretiree 2011-10-17 00:00
Column by Vahram G. Diehl.   We face a profoundly sad state of affairs in human civilization. What is called a conventional education today is little more than mass cultural training in a particular brand of patriotism, including enforced memorization of the current era's arbitrarily acceptable ideas. The entire public school system operates under one goal: preparing every...
The Spinnerians
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Leonidas 2011-10-17 00:00
Column by new Root Striker G. Asher. Exclusive to STR   Let’s imagine a group of high minded, socially conscious, wealthy individuals. They form a charitable social group called The Spinnerians.   The Spinnerians energetically do all manner of kind works. They diligently raise money for children’s hospitals. They help the elderly. The feed and house the homeless and get them...
The Great Pretender(s)
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Peter McCandless 2011-10-19 00:00
Column by Peter McCandless. The Platters released their famous song “The Great Pretender”on November 3, 1955. It’s popularity drove it to the number one position on both Rhythm and Blues and pop charts in 1956, according to Wikipedia. The words of the first stanza go like this:               Oh-oh, yes I’m...
Tools for Tyrants: Fear
10
Paul Bonneau 2011-10-25 00:00
Column by Paul Bonneau. Exclusive to STR  It occurred to me that it might be useful to dissect the tools that tyrants use to keep us under their thumbs. Knowing what they are and how they use them can help us defend against them. I don’t know if anyone has systematically gone over this before. If someone knows of such an effort, please comment below.   The first tool (ignoring...
To Vote or Not to Vote? I’d Rather Go Fishing
10
Alex R. Knight III 2011-10-31 00:00
Column by Alex R. Knight III.   Exclusive to STR   There resides here in southern Vermont a radio personality and newspaper columnist who prefers to simply go by the handle of “Fish” (no, it’s not Abe Vigoda living out a retirement fantasy in the Green Mountains), who in the October 26th edition of the Brattleboro Reformer began his column titled “To Vote or...
An Armed March on Washington? MUST READ
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Alex R. Knight III 2013-05-07 06:52
Column by Alex R. Knight III. Exclusive to STR Perhaps never before have I encountered a proposal within Liberty Movement circles that has generated more controversy faster and further than Adam Kokesh’s planned July 4th march on Washington, District of Criminals, in which he states that himself and the other participants “will march with rifles loaded & slung across our backs to...
The Orwellian Paradigm--Killing You, For Your Own Safety MUST READ
9.625
fmoghul 2013-04-10 08:12
Column by Faisal Moghul. Exclusive to STR Almost 30 years ago, cultural critic Neil Postman argued in Amusing Ourselves to Death that television’s gradual replacement of the printing press has created a dumbed-down culture driven by mindless entertainment. In this context, Postman claimed that Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World correctly foresaw our dystopian future, as opposed to George...
Frameworks, Virtual Reality and Civil Society: A Manifesto for the Doctrine of Love and Freedom MUST READ
10
Glen Allport 2012-12-06 08:44
Column by Glen Allport. Exclusive to STR Perhaps I should say this paradigm shift is resuming. The healthier incoming paradigm is a modern, more accurate, better-supported, and better-understood version of one that began the shift towards a free, healthy, and prosperous world more than three centuries ago and which informed the creation of the United States itself: Classical Liberalism. - 1...
Timeline of a World-Killing Paradigm Shift MUST READ
0
Glen Allport 2012-05-14 00:00
Column by Glen Allport. Exclusive to STR   Part 3 of "Could the Non-Aggression Principle Stop the Sixth Great Extinction?"   Part One of this series discussed the Non-Aggression principle, calling it "the libertarian half of the Golden Rule" (compassion being the other half) and describing the function of aggression in creating not only tyranny and war but also...
Terrorist Alert: Government Extremists Threaten Americans MUST READ
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Glen Allport 2012-03-26 00:00
Column by Glen Allport. Exclusive to STR   Question: are you more terrified by Muslim extremists, by "domestic terrorists" – or by your own government? Which group is more likely to assault you? To kill you? To unjustly imprison and even torture you?   The U.S. federal government has ALREADY:   Built and is staffing a huge gulag of concentration camps ["...
The State Is a Firing Squad MUST READ
10
JGVibes 2012-02-17 01:00
Column by JGVibes.   Exclusive to STR   Although the common perception of human nature is very negative, the truth is that most people who aren’t mentally ill have a very difficult time committing acts of violence. Usually it takes a sizeable payment and a fair amount of manipulation to convince someone to act violently, and even then a tremendous amount of guilt typically...
How the 1% Took America's Wealth--and How to Get It Back MUST READ
9.25
Glen Allport 2011-12-01 01:00
Column by Glen Allport. Exclusive to STR  - 1 - Plundering Wealth vs Producing Wealth   In recent decades, the rich have gathered an increasing share of the total wealth in the United States. As this wealth disparity grows and especially as large numbers of the formerly middle class fall into poverty and even into homelessness, this flow of wealth from main street (from anyone not...
'Anarchy or Minarchy' Is Only Half the Question, Part 2 MUST READ
9.5
Glen Allport 2011-04-13 03:00
Column by Glen Allport. Exclusive to STR  This is Part 2 of a response to a column by Wesley Messamore. Last week's Part One of this column discussed the following:   ·      Minarchy: Lighting a Match to the Fuse of Tyranny ·      Anarchy: By Itself, Yang without Yin ·      The Missing Key...
Oh, Stanley MUST READ
10
tzo 2011-03-30 03:00
Column by tzo. Exclusive to STR   Stanley Milgram was an American social psychologist best known for his Milgram Experiment, a study conducted in the 1960s.   Dr. Milgram wanted to research the relationship between obedience and authority, and he was at least partly motivated to do so by the events of the Nazi Holocaust. It greatly troubled him that so many supposedly good people could...
The Pathocracy Unmasked MUST READ
10
Glen Allport 2011-02-11 04:00
Column by Glen Allport. Exclusive to STR - 1 - Exposed as Criminals and Psychopaths, the Coercive Elite are Desperate to Stop the Flow of Honest Information     "When Bush cancelled his trip to avoid prosecution, the human rights groups who prepared the complaints made it public and announced that the Bush Torture Indictment would be waiting wherever he travels next." CCR...
The Licensing Effect Recommended
0
Lawrence Samuels 2013-05-10 08:28
The article below contains excerpts from L.K. Samuels’ new book, In Defense of Chaos: The Chaology of Politics, Economics and Human Action. Column by L.K. Samuels. Exclusive to STR Good intentions rarely make good laws. Those who do evil almost always think they are doing good for goodness’ sake. Nobody sees himself as evil. As Will Smith, the American actor, once quipped, “...
The Pugsley Plan Recommended
8.5
Jim Davies 2013-01-14 08:46
Column by Jim Davies. Exclusive to STR Prior to Harry Browne's first run for US President in 1996, his friend John Pugsley wrote him a passionate “open letter” urging him not to. As far as I know, Harry didn't reply, but he did continue his campaign – and repeated it four years later. He got few votes more than the LP normally receives, but his platform and campaign were...
Ed Schultz and His Alleged Middle Class Heroes Recommended
10
Angelo Mike 2013-01-04 01:00
Column by Angelo Mike. Exclusive to STR Ed Schultz has set quite the task out for himself. On his New Year’s Eve broadcast on MSNBC, he announced who his “Middle Class Heroes of 2012” are. Schultz is a self-styled liberal, so his recipients of the title “Middle Class Hero” are predictable and worthy of a certain amount of eye rolling. The general reverence for...
The Trials Recommended
8.33333
tzo 2012-12-11 08:49
Column by tzo. Exclusive to STR To anyone who has seen or read The Reader (a synopsis of the relevant part of the story is here), one of the main questions raised in the story is, "What should be done with Hanna?" Was she responsible for her actions even if she was so thoroughly indoctrinated so as to be completely confused by the charges against her? She asked more than once, while...
464 Lost Years Recommended
8.25
Jim Davies 2012-12-10 08:48
Column by Jim Davies. Exclusive to STR Recently I re-read part of that seminal essay, Discourse on Voluntary Servitude by Etienne de la Boëtie, written in 1548, or 464 years ago. He said that if you want to topple a tyrant, all you need to do is to withdraw support. No violence, no sweat, just stop helping him. Yet 24 years later there was a massacre of Huguenot Protestants, indicating that...
The Duty to End the State Recommended
10
Jim Davies 2012-11-30 08:53
Column by Jim Davies. Exclusive to STR Many reading this already understand the Self-ownership Axiom; that we each own our own lives by right, and hence that all government is an unnatural and ruinous appendage. Among those who do, though, surprisingly there is disagreement over what to do about it. Some hold that resistance by such voluntaryists in the present government-saturated environment...
Why I'm Leaving America Recommended
10
SailboatDiaries 2012-11-07 01:00
Column by new Root Striker Michael Fielding. Goodbye, America. For as long as I’ve lived you’ve been my only home. I’ve had a wonderful life here. Your inhabitants are almost universally kind, and I’ve become lifelong friends with many of your citizens. All of my family lives here, everyone I have ever known or loved, and I will miss them all a lot. But after 22 years, I...
Voting Is Not Rational Recommended
9.66667
Stephen Nichols 2012-11-01 00:00
Column by Stephen Nichols. Exclusive to STR While reading Paul Bonneau’s recent column on STR entitled “Voting Is Not Irrational,” I was taken aback by the obvious flaws in his analysis and the conclusions resulting from that analysis. It’s been a few days since his article was published and I’ve been formulating my response to it for some time. Let me now share with...
St. Abe Recommended
0
Jim Davies 2012-10-23 00:00
Column by Jim Davies. Exclusive to STR When the Church of Rome has in mind to elevate one of its heroes or heroines to the status of sainthood, it follows a certain procedure – one element of which is to hear the opinion of an advocatus diaboli – a devil's advocate. His job is to reason against the proposed canonization, so reducing the probability of error. That task fell in...
A Reason Not to Vote Recommended
10
Stephen Nichols 2012-10-18 00:00
Column by Stephen Nichols. Exclusive to STR I don't know about you, but I take a look at my financial situation pretty regularly. I like to keep tabs on my family's spending and keep things under control. I also like to reduce or eliminate any unnecessary expenses. Take a moment to review this chart of some recent family spending: Notice anything big that sticks out there? Yeah, me...

 

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