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  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago Web link Melinda L. Secor
    Ya think? Genesis 34:10 "You can settle among us; the land is open to you. Live in it, trade in it, and acquire property in it.” How many wars are mentioned after Genesis 34:10? (Hint, I'm quoting the Bible literarily, not literally.) Now, purchase ye a good book on war. I've got it sitting in my lap right now: The Origins Of War: From The Stone Age To Alexander The Great by Arther Ferrill http://www.getcited.org/pub/102389214 You'll find out Mises is as full of bunk as anybody mainstream; i.e., agricultural city-Statism (civilization) cheerleaders. • Domestication (domination over other species) = violence to our own species. • Agriculture (intensive domination over other species) = intensive violence to our own species. It's just that simple; the Marx and Mises city-statist broz missed it. You have too.
  • AtlasAikido's picture
    AtlasAikido 12 years 10 weeks ago Web link Melinda L. Secor
    Apparently enough are seeing thru the difference between The Austrian School at Mises Vs Mainstream economists/political scientists and their abject failure-- perpetual wars and debt bailouts. See post above that starts "At the very least one must be able to see thru the political myths men have lived by since Neolithic times. The Root of the Problem--If one digs--excavates--into the matter more deeply, future social scientists will ultimately arrive at the fundamental cause of the *appalling failure of today's social scientists' to predict or offer solutions to the disaster*: they decided *to adopt empiricism as their method for studying man* much like *main stream economists and political scientists* and a certain empiricist on this site.
  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago Page painkilleraz
    Those who want a quieter "Western Life" far from Mordor-on-the-Potomac had better hope the map begins to close. A Pirate’s Life for Me II: Opening the Map by Jason Godesky | 22 May 2007 rewild.info/anthropik/2007/05/a-pirates-life-for-me-ii-opening-the-map/ P.S. Funny stuff how putting "http" in front of "rewild" makes this post "spam." LOL Let the libertarian censorship games begin!
  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago Web link Melinda L. Secor
    Who listens to economists? LOL! Peak Oil scientists predicted this 30 years ago. Come on, give me a Cornucopian* economist retort, a.k.a., that idiot Julian Simon, the losin'est bettor in the economic field. __________ * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornucopian
  • AtlasAikido's picture
    AtlasAikido 12 years 10 weeks ago Web link Melinda L. Secor
    ...The mainstream political scientists and economists of this generation were completely useless for predicting the disaster we now confront, and continue to pour forth nothing but *the most worthless empirical studies of yesterday's least consequential issues*." At some point in the future, however, after failure upon failure, social scientists will get around to looking at why they *keep failing to predict these important social events*. At that point, we can only hope that nothing will interest them more about this dark period of history than the failure of their predecessors, and that they may finally seek out an alternative to empiricism that can transform them from backward-looking failures into true social scientists... Gathering Data while Washington Burns... Mises Daily: Tuesday, July 06, 2010 by Mark R. Crovelli http://direct.mises.org/daily/4529/Gathering-Data-while-Washington-Burns
  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago Web link Melinda L. Secor
    Quote scholarly sources if you're going to use scholarly terms like "neolithic." OK? Quoting religio-economic ideological sources who eschew empirical data is less that honest. I bet lewrockwell.com and mises.org hardly have a self-styled scholar who would admit that humans are primate mammals - animals. That's stupid multiplied by stupid.
  • AtlasAikido's picture
    AtlasAikido 12 years 10 weeks ago Web link Melinda L. Secor
    At the very least one must be able see thru the political myths men have lived by since Neolithic times. Today it is easier to attack a politically correct shadow with a pitch fork than the statue that darkens the landscape. And thereby avoid the controversial causes and any taint of stigma. I recommend Tom Woods and Stefan Molyneux Take On Wall Street to begin to understand this issue! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXNOxnn7_uA&feature=youtube_gdata Woods asks the Right Question: Would there likely be Less Wars and Bailouts--that enrich the military-industrial complex and politically connected fat cats--Or More if the Fed Gov had a magical money machine? This is not a hypothetical question. They--all the above--Do have such a machine and access to it: it is called The Federal Reserve System. As Hayek points out money is half of every transaction economy wide. And Woods makes a cogent connection: Is there a chance that this magic printing machine has a tinsy chance of creating economy wide up and down boom, bust volatility and classes of people herded, corralled and enriched by Govt? This is not the same as the pyramid of ability or comparative advantages of a division of labor society. What's changed? There is now more impoverishing Wars and the same for Bailouts than can be supported or hidden. There is only one entity that can pit the poor against the rich, the young against the old, the white against the black, this country against another and thrive thru divide and conquer. Woods and Molyneux further discuss: Seeing thru the duality of what is bad, evil and corrupt in the private sector magically rendered good in the public sector. It can only occur on the scale we have via a "coercive" monopoly that can be wielded by the politically connected to bypass the competition of free market. Although I was taught to accept this inverted moral code (until I read Rand's "Atlas Shrugged", Royce's "Holgoram of Liberty", DiLorenzo's "The Real Lincoln", etc), rising prices are not normal . And saying the people running the system are bad and that we need to get Big Bird and Barney the Dinosaur to run the system is also not the answer. The System (Fascism) must be abandoned. Indeed US Fascism is a most insidious mixture of the key ingredients while maintaining the necessary nuance to snooker the masses, the media, and the respectable folks across the spectrum. http://mises.org/daily/5634 Too many say, yes but surely too much freedom needs an authority system to step in is justified? After all Deregulation caused these chaotic issues? And look what happened? Yet the same people who are so-called anti-establishment standing up to prevailing wisdom never ask themselves why do they accept the prevailing wisdom put forth by the same who did not see the crisis coming nor the causes? As long as there are elected politicians, *politically connected* businessmen, banksters and members of the military-industrial complex will *Game the System*--and bypass competition and productive work. Here I think the OWS has a legitimate gripe! But one size does not fit all. Do not throw the baby out with the bath water. *There are honest innovators and entreprenuers who are not politically connected...How does one separate out the two?* The Occupy Wall Street know so much but only go so far. As Butler Shaffer points out: Running to one wing or the other of the same bird of prey is not the answer to undo the effects of that wing. The Repeal of Glass Stegall Banking Act (1933) is a red herring as is the failure to pro-actively regulate. Red herrings put out there by those Gaming the System. Obviously after the fact you can see that the housing bubble blew up. No kidding! The issue is where are the regulators and their chiefs when this is going on! They were the ones telling us everything was fine. And forcing rising interest rates down and thereby covering up the mkt feed back signals that would have stopped the housing bubble. The Banks were ALWAYS allowed to securitize mtgs and hold those mortgages as investments. Nothing changed in that regard. The problem was banks did traditional banking things badly. Why? Because they knew they would be bailed out by the Fed Reserve! http://lewrockwell.com/woods/woods183.html Finally there are bad leadership in the financial institutions but why is it so hard to get rid of them? The people who are protesting now are cut from the same cloth as the people who want and introduced more regulation. The Williams Act...and other legislation against so-called hostile take overs is basically the CEO Protection Act of 1986. Individual share holders have since found it very difficult to discipline bank or corporate management. There are very strict limits on how much institutional investors can own of a bank or financial company. It is 1% at most. The investor's natural oversight--of wanting a company to do well and not do crazy things--as a natural regulator is artificially debilitated and scattered by govt regulators and regulations! Again and again it can be seen that it is Govt consistently protecting the bad and fat cats! Not helping to bring them down. No worries if there is problem the bankers will be made whole with a Greenspan or Bernake put (magic printing press) The banks know they can act more recklessly than they otherwise would!! They have a sugar daddy waiting in the wings. Why don't you see this in the fishing companies nor book publishing? The FED reserve was manipulating interest rates making housing investing look sensible and better investment than it really was! Every time the economy tried to tell people stop spending this is a bad investment the Fed Reserve intervenes and turns those red lights off and make them green! Regulators are not far seeing. They are time serving drones. Stop praying to them and attributing to them super human powers... Stop defending the semi socialist position of OWS nor making the Fed Reserve Bank more socialistic via the US Govt. The problem is The Fed--Central Planing--Reserve system embedded in the free market and drawn up not to increase wealth and prospects for you and me but designed to be The Great Bailout Banker System Extraordinaire that we have today. They are false alternatives... *In some sense Occupy The Federal Reserve would make more sense*. Specifically: Occupy Liberty Street (OLS)! (The Federal Reserve Bank of New York) http://lewrockwell.com/north/north1051.html *Marginalization is the better and to me only solution. Government is marginalized when it is ignored, when individuals eschew the political process*. http://mises.org/daily/5758/Depoliticize-Everything Reference: *The "central bank" is not a real bank. Everything about it is permeated with government power. At the heart of the financial and monetary system of a nation that is supposed to be an exemplar of free markets is a government money-bureau*. http://lewrockwell.com/rozeff/rozeff364.html
  • dkiller88's picture
    dkiller88 12 years 10 weeks ago Page painkilleraz
    Very nice article. I would like to point out that it was not Wild Bill Hickock's Wild West Show; it was Buffalo Bill Cody's. The author seems to have mixed his wild west icons.
  • golefevre's picture
    golefevre 12 years 10 weeks ago Page painkilleraz
    Looks like an interesting book, Jesse. Thanks for the perspective. Definitely worth adding to anyone's reading list. It has been only a couple of generations since getting hurt on the farm could be life threatening and even just a few generations ago that young adults of the "old" age of 12 were driving teams pulling heavily-loaded wagons down steep canyons.
  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Alex R. Knight III
    More white man's Ghost Dance* word magic: "...American [as opposed to UNITED STATE's]..." * "CONSTITUTIONALISM": THE WHITE MAN'S GHOST DANCE by Robert C. Black http://www.spunk.org/texts/writers/black/sp001650.html
  • Suverans2's picture
    Suverans2 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Alex R. Knight III
    The other question, (unrelated to the one above), I have of you, is, once you cross the "10% Rubicon" and anarchy has become the "predominant[1] philosophy" [not in your lifetime, my friend], what are you going to do about the unrepentant percentage who still want a government, a parens patriae, to take care of them from "cradle to grave"? ______________________________________________________ [1] Quick definitions from Macmillan Dictionary (predominant) adjective ▸the most common or greatest in number or amount ▸most important or powerful Sounds a bit like a democracy, in its purest form, to me.
  • Suverans2's picture
    Suverans2 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Alex R. Knight III
    "...the current American [as opposed to UNITED STATE's] population is a rough 312 million persons...", and a handful of nonpersons (non-members). But that aside, you wrote: "Before I begin to turn this into some kind of bizarre murder mystery, one point begins to come clear: There really is no way I or you can establish ownership of anything except in one of two ways. Either we extend ownership of personal property to each other by way of mutual consent, or we establish ownership by means of brute force." Let us begin with this; you are of the opinion that I must have, "mutual consent...or...brute force", to establish ownership of my self? If you are willing to discuss this, we will take if from there. No sense muddying up the waters too soon.
  • Suverans2's picture
    Suverans2 12 years 10 weeks ago Web link Melinda L. Secor
    G'day Sam, Yes, I thought you might, WOW!, like I did, at the first nine tenths of that youtube video. Maybe he's not quite ready to do away with government altogether yet, but he's edging closer every day. And, don't forget, he also said this; "What if the heart of the government policy remains the same no matter who's in the White House?" Would that not possibly negate the Ron Paul questions at the end? They were just questions, after all.
  • Samarami's picture
    Samarami 12 years 10 weeks ago Web link Melinda L. Secor
    The problem is not capital. Capital is simply the resource you will need to open a shop. If you plan to produce widgets you'll need some sort of resource useable to vendors and laborers to purchase the machinery, equipment, labor, sales and raw materials to get widgets on store shelves so people can buy them. Since those individuals who have formed monopolies on coercion ("The-Government") have declared, under threat of violence, that you must use their fiat "currency" (called "dollars" in this part of the planet), that is the resource you will need. The problem is ISM. Once ISM enters the picture, the idea of free market becomes totally befuddled in the minds of those who do not understand the nature of getting a business financed and off the ground in order to provide employment for those who wish to do an honest day's work and receive an honest day's pay. ISM implies interface with those people who make up the monopoly on force. Those are the sociopaths who proceed under the reification of "The-State". They would prefer you call them "our rulers" or "our policy makers" (what a criminal misnomer) to absolve them of responsibility for the ISM (this ISM we're discussing, in case you've forgotten, is "capitalism"). And be sure to get out the vote. Through violent incursions into the free market by way of taxation, regulation, OSHA and other invasions far too numerous to list here, it is damned difficult to know whom to blame, because it's difficult for an honest businessman to seek out honest lenders to finance an honest enterprise because of the prerequisite for him to sleep with and pay prostitute fees to those holding the monopoly on violence. If anybody were to ask me for a one-word definition of government, I would answer, "obfuscation". That sez it all. So they protest. And they occupy. Anything and everything. Which plays directly into the hands of those who maintain the legitimacy of state agents. The talking heads of state media love it. It calls for more government action -- more redistribution of "wealth". Gimme, gimme, gimme! There is a solution. Ask me some day -- although those of you reading this already know. Sam
  • wkmac's picture
    wkmac 12 years 10 weeks ago Web link Melinda L. Secor
    Not that Forbes should get a pass on Crony Capitalism but I quote the following from the op-ed: "Where I think the OWS folks go off the rails is their assumption that this sort of cronyism represents the true beating heart of capitalism...." I'm not willing to say the OWS are off the rails completely on that point but then unlike the author I'm not making the mistake of equating capitalism and free market as the same thing either. Capitalism's mother in mercantilism and it's grandmother in fuedalism was all about state power and there's no reason to see the child having abandoned the dogma and traditions of the family matriarchs! Some of the OWS folk do IMO misconstrue real free markets with the fakery that calls itself such but I can understand why too.
  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Mark Davis
    Agriculture wasn't started because people were hungry (push factors) as commonly surmised. Anthropology has hotly debated that, and the preponderance of evidence is that agriculture was deliberately started for religious-ritualistic-feasting episodes by "Big Men" or "emergent elite." (pull factors) Control freaks started controlling other species (domestication, and ensuing agriculture) to increase their social control over their own species, humans. Agriculture has always been a Bernie Madoff level scam of deficit-spending the "banked" bounty of the soil -- one, unfortunately, upon which lives now depend. At least as long as the scam goes. For a good summary of the anthropological data, see: Thesis 10: Emergent elites led the Agricultural Revolution. by Jason Godesky http://rewild.info/anthropik/thirty/ P.S. I'm all for gardening (permaculture/horticulture,) as a way to step away from the unsustainable Bernie Madoff-ish scam of totalitarian agriculture.
  • Samarami's picture
    Samarami 12 years 10 weeks ago Web link Melinda L. Secor
    If I didn't know better I'd think from the first 3/4 of his video Napolitano was edging toward anarchy. But alas, at the end he confirms his belief that by engaging in politics and electing a Ron Paul "we" can, in fact, tame the beast. Abstain From Beans. Sam
  • Samarami's picture
    Samarami 12 years 10 weeks ago Web link Melinda L. Secor
    I've misplaced my note on a line from one of James Michener's novels where a black man was observing the impudence of the white man's ethnic cleansing practices toward the natives of a given area, then publishes his history books with prevarications like "...Columbus 'discovered' America..." (and erects monuments and statues commemorating the "event"). So I'm in agreement with your take on the murderous behavior of granting homesteading "rights" to stolen land. And I've not been an avid Ayn Rand fan. Even Murray Rothbard toward the end scuttled her along with her ship as I understand it. I'll certainly agree with this statement from the article: Government’s role in making and keeping people poor is just one of the factors that make poverty endemic and make it hard to survive while poor. I will disagree with the author's reification: "Government" has no roll in keeping people poor. Agents OF government fill that roll -- individuals who should know better but choose to ignore truth for the sake of authoritarianism. As Mr. Davies so colorfully outlined in a recent piece, government ("the state") is pie in the sky. I am curious to hear, however, who the "one honest capitalist..." might be. Sam
  • Suverans2's picture
    Suverans2 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Mark Davis
    Now, that, is what I call really "weighing in"!! Thank you, Mark Davis. Well said.
  • Mark Davis's picture
    Mark Davis 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Mark Davis
    Nice story around one man's opinion: Looking about for easy game and abundant grub is more fun than farming. Gee, nobody ever thought about that, what a revelation. All those good ‘ol boys that go fishing or hunting every weekend never thought of just doing it every day. Assuming this opinion is some kind of revealed universal truth that all people must agree with, it still begs the assumption that human populations will not increase past the point of universal abundance such that there will never be scarcity of, or competition for, resources. That's biologically and physically impossible. Bacteria, rodents, insects and men will reproduce to the point of resource depletion unless resource supplies can be increased fast enough. I don't see waves of mass starvation to keep populations low as all that nice a place to be. Not to mention I really like my bed and a roof over my head. But I digress, you see, my planting my own plants and raising my own animals to manage supply, harvest on schedule and eat as I please allows me to control my destiny more so than trusting to providence and perpetual abundance while we reproduce to our hearts delight. The agricultural scenario makes me happier than the alternative of "gamboling about" and apparently a lot of other people too. The position of assuming that the world owes me a living, especially when I'm no longer a young man physically able to "gambol about" is not as wonderful as you make it appear. For example, I have a cabin in the mountains on a little 10-acre farm that I am retiring to when I get tired of the beaches and toiling for The Man here in Florida. My land abuts a large forest of 1,000s of square miles that is owned by an Indian tribe and various state agencies, that are 99% uninhabited and in a natural state. My neighbors and I (and our families and friends) have a clear choice daily of whether to work in the garden, milk a goat, get eggs from the chickens, trade or exchange produce, books and stories with each other, make a fire in the fire-place or take a nap in my cozy abode. At any time we could all choose to gather together and start foraging for food, forsake our beds, roofs, shoes, computers and books to avoid working in the garden. I don't know anybody that would prefer "hunting and living off the land" to farming for longer than a weekend, maybe a week when younger. Anyone that can't see why people took up agriculture has never really tried living off the land, especially in the winter.
  • Suverans2's picture
    Suverans2 12 years 10 weeks ago Web link Melinda L. Secor
    "Commonwealth employees are immune from liability due to intentional misconduct, so long as the employee is acting within the scope of his or her employment," [Chief U.S. District Judge Gary] Lancaster wrote. Interesting! How can "intentional misconduct" be "within the scope of his or her employment"? 'Sounds' like an oxymoron, but then, I'm not a "white...mendacious...domestic...foppish whore", so it probably would seem that way to me. If there are any "white...mendacious...domestic...foppish whores" in the house, maybe we could 'hear' from you next?
  • Samarami's picture
    Samarami 12 years 10 weeks ago Web link Melinda L. Secor
    Butler Shaffer had a good piece over on Lew Rockwell a few months ago: http://lewrockwell.com/shaffer/shaffer239.html In reading Butler's article again, I can see that "environmentalists" can be some violent folks. Sam
  • Suverans2's picture
    Suverans2 12 years 10 weeks ago Web link Melinda L. Secor
    They claimed that "...the officers were intending to serve the purposes of their 'master,' the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania..." according to the court's summary. Say, who is this person, "Commonwealth of Pennsylvania"? Is this so-called 'master' fiction or non-fiction? If (s)he is non-fiction, I would like to talk to him, or her, and, NO, THANK YOU, I do not want to talk to his, or her, 'agent(s)' or 'representative(s)', I want to talk to him, or her, face-to-face. I want to look this non-fiction 'master' in the fricken eye when (s)he falsely accuses me!
  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago Web link Melinda L. Secor
    "Techno-porn." ~Rice Farmer (Japan) News Links, January 7, 2012 http://www.ricefarmer.blogspot.com/ (Rice Farmer lives out in the hills, growing rice and veggies organically.)
  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago
    Where's the State?
    Page Jim Davies
    One could just as easily say "individualism, when its you attempting to induct me into civilization which I have not chosen to participate..." Apparently pronouns aren't the real problem. Domestication and living in large groups beyond human neurobiological limits, whether collectivism or individualism is the political flavor of the day, are the problems. Domestication is the beginning of human violence, as extremely well documented by anthropology and archeology. Large groups require hierarchy, which is the beginning of the state. If you like violence and the state, you'll just love domestication and large groups.
  • Samarami's picture
    Samarami 12 years 10 weeks ago
    Where's the State?
    Page Jim Davies
    "We", when it's you attempting to induct me into a group in which I have not chosen to participate, is the most dangerous word in the world (watch the video at the end of the article unless your ears are tender to foul language). My world. Jim, this is another quotable classic of yours, alongside many dozens of others. The term I hear ringing through your essay is "reification". To reify is to treat an abstract as though it were a living, breathing entity -- to create an image of something out of nothing. Conquerors and their admirers have used this tactic incessantly throughout the ages to maintain legitimacy of state in the minds of people. In early history, once the hordes came to see there was no enduring profit in "scorched earth" practices (raping the women, massacring the entire cities and leaving the corpses to rot in the desert and the cities in smoldering ruins), they would keep the inhabitants alive as slaves...er, producers ("taxpayers", "citizens"); and, led by the kahn, let them Join-the-Family-of-Nations. Have their own flag in which to pledge allegiance. To what? To the Khan, of course. "My country 'tis of thee..." The genius of "democracy" (any party of two robbing any party on one) came much later in history. Thanks for the article! Sam
  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago
    Where's the State?
    Page Jim Davies
    I look forward to studying your voluntary city, or "Free State," if it happens. I predict it will not ever happen, because you're evading the reality of how large groups of people actually behave, no matter what religion, constitution, covenant, or magical incantations they sign, pray to, or swear allegiance to, or pretend to not do any of that.
  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Mark Davis
    A realistic demonstration would be to publicly grow and publicly advertise marijuana or raw milk, or just put up a shingle to cut hair. But you're really not free. Not free to do that or a million other things prohibited by the government of agricultural city-Statism (civilization.) I appreciate your (and Browne's) trying to find ways to cope with mass society. One is "free" to do many things in prison, some even find great enlightenment in prison. But they're still in prison. And still not free in the sociopolitical sense of being free of coercion.
  • AtlasAikido's picture
    AtlasAikido 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Mark Davis
    Actually I do not advocate agri city statism. I have actually been demonstrating that it is possible to live free in a unfree world.
  • AtlasAikido's picture
    AtlasAikido 12 years 10 weeks ago
    Where's the State?
    Page Jim Davies
    I only need to find those who are compatible with me. This is not hard to do. There will always be those who will be attracted to what I stand for. The Covenant of Unanimous Consent makes it possible for all to know what I love and stand for.
  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Mark Davis
    Being that you advocate agricultural city-Statism (civilization,) and thus are a "We"-ist (even as you dodge-and-weave, trying to avoid that reality,) it appears you hold a contradiction. But you won't check your premises.
  • AtlasAikido's picture
    AtlasAikido 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Mark Davis
    Avoiding the observed sociopathic set-up reality of a confirmed "We"-ist makes sense at least to me. Evading such would indeed be foolhardy.
  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago
    Where's the State?
    Page Jim Davies
    Corporations, crews, families, marriages: they don't exist; that is, they don't exist to those who evade reality.
  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Mark Davis
    You're the one evading reality. So thank you for making my point.
  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago
    Where's the State?
    Page Jim Davies
    You're grasping for straws while you evade the empirical data in volumes of scholarly literature that refutes your premises about how people work.
  • AtlasAikido's picture
    AtlasAikido 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Mark Davis
    Thanks for making my point.
  • Suverans2's picture
    Suverans2 12 years 10 weeks ago
    Where's the State?
    Page Jim Davies
    That is correct, Scott Lazarowitz, as was written to you earlier, "The same holds true, by the way, for "IBM, or any other company or club or church" or "a crew on a ship", a "hunting party", a "married couple" or a "family"; the only thing non-fiction about any them are their individual human members." Add to that list, "Goldman Sachs, Raytheon, BP, and Halliburton"; they are corporations and corporations are artificial persons, i.e. fictions.
  • AtlasAikido's picture
    AtlasAikido 12 years 10 weeks ago
    Where's the State?
    Page Jim Davies
    I am grasping that there are those who continue to think and act on the premises of "what are *we* going to do?" When clearly there are individuals who have challenged the premise of "We" and have found freedom in an unfree world and can even point to how they achieved that..
  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Mark Davis
    Evading observed reality is of no value to anybody.
  • AtlasAikido's picture
    AtlasAikido 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Mark Davis
    I don't wish. I trade I offer values...And I don't hang around people who don't believe in such...
  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago
    Where's the State?
    Page Jim Davies
    It's not hard to grasp "I." Egalitarian non-State society has people who are "autonomous and sovereign" individuals who "bow to no external political leaders." (Service, 1975) But that only happens in group sizes under Dunbar's Number. Larger groups of people for hierarchy. And when group size gets to around 5000+, they form city-States. Every. Single. Time. That's the way people work. The best you can do is evade reality. I keep bringing reality into the debate, so I have no doubt that you're rapidly loosing interest.
  • AtlasAikido's picture
    AtlasAikido 12 years 10 weeks ago
    Where's the State?
    Page Jim Davies
    The word *I* would seem to be incomprehensible model. And *I* have observed and traded with compatible others...And I have even provided links to such "hows". How hard is this for some to grasp? As for the rest I am loosing interest rapidly.
  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Mark Davis
    You always evade the empirical data that refutes the way you Wish people worked.
  • AtlasAikido's picture
    AtlasAikido 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Mark Davis
    Speaking for oneself is hardly speaking for me. If someone sets themselves up to be UnFree, when there are clearly alternatives, that is hardly my problem. I trade with those who are compatible. WIshes have nothing to do with it. This is where the Covenant comes to play as a filter. But so does judgment and entrepreneurial skill..And lest I forget there is a price to pay. And it would seem that some here do not make personal provision or foresight for such...
  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago
    Where's the State?
    Page Jim Davies
    "...how that occurs." Where has such an occurrence been observed? Pray tell. "...lots and lots of people who know..." Lots and lots of people make city-STATES. Every. Single. Time.
  • AtlasAikido's picture
    AtlasAikido 12 years 10 weeks ago
    Where's the State?
    Page Jim Davies
    What I have proposed is self-governance and how that occurs. This hardly requires me to be auto-sufficient nor to work out every application of "we"-st. In fact it has everything to do with my proposal, Jim Davidson's and Neil L Smiths of self-governance and nothing to do with controlling "We"ists. I tend my garden. You tend yours. What needs to scale? http://www.ncc-1776.org/tle2009/tle544-20091115-07.html What I have been proposing and living: is being around lots and lots of people who know that you own yourself. They don't want you to be subjected to "limited" state aggression, or "constitutional" state aggression, or their own favorite flavor of state aggression or "We'-ism; they want you to have NO ONE committing aggression against you. How extreme! How often are you around more than three people at a time who want you to be truly free?. If this is a problem for some it is a personal problem. Not mine. More specifically the issue regarding what are "we going to do": Freedom Has No System--Challenge the premise. There is no “we.” http://zerogov.com/?p=2334
  • Samarami's picture
    Samarami 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Mark Davis
    Suverans2: "If it only defends and protects our natural rights it isn't a government". But, just because it isn't, or even has never been, does that mean that it can't be? They then answer, "If it did only that, then it couldn't be called a 'government'." Fine!! What, pray tell, could it be called? Then substitute that word wherever you find the word "government" when we are discussing a collective organization that does nothing more than defend and protect our natural rights. Here's how Delmar England describes the quandary of interpreting what is government: If all “anarchists” agree to self ownership, meaning self determination, how can they be in conflict? Absent explanation of multiple “kinds” of self ownership, I am obliged to conclude they think, talk and write in contradiction. An adamant claim of self ownership is quickly canceled by espousing anti-self ownership ideas. They come full circle without realizing what is going on. Regrettably, they are doing nothing but promoting their preferred form of government under a deceptive label. Socialism, communism, democracy, monarchy, etc, all presumably represent different forms of government. Root level definition of government is initiation of force and coercion. A dark alley mugging is no less government than any other initiation of force and coercion. (emphasis mine - sam) Mark, in my attempt 5 minutes ago to link to your superb essay, Be Free, the link appears to my old computer to have defaulted to today's home page of STR and not to the archive of your article. I was replying to White Indian's "libertarian" comment. Let's see if this link works: http://www.strike-the-root.com/52/davis_m/davis1.html Sam
  • WhiteIndian's picture
    WhiteIndian 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Mark Davis
    So why do you denigrate egalitarian Non-State sociopolitical typology (bands and tribes) when they are the ONLY demonstrated society in which people are observed to be "autonomous and sovereign" individuals "who bow to no external political leaders"? (Service, 1975) Are you willing to take your hand out of the monkey trap of agricultural-city to be free of Statism? Remember, there's never been an agricultural city-State (civilization) without a State. And for good reason. People don't work the way you Wish.
  • AtlasAikido's picture
    AtlasAikido 12 years 10 weeks ago
    Where's the State?
    Page Jim Davies
    Apparently there are IS a "We"ist Utopia monger acting as if *his* drooling beast issues are my problem. Hopeless.
  • AtlasAikido's picture
    AtlasAikido 12 years 10 weeks ago Page Mark Davis
    What I have proposed is self-governance and how that occurs. This hardly requires me to be auto-sufficient. In fact it has everything to do with my proposal, Jim Davidson's and Neil L Smiths of self-governance and nothing to do with controlling "We"ists. What I have been proposing and living: is being around lots and lots of people who know that you own yourself. They don't want you to be subjected to "limited" state aggression, or "constitutional" state aggression, or their own favorite flavor of state aggression or "We'-ism; they want you to have NO ONE committing aggression against you. How extreme! How often are you around more than three people at a time who want you to be truly free?. If this is a problem for some it is a personal problem. Not mine.