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I am very happy to see the new advances. Anything that makes STR more friendly for our community of libertarians/anarchists/agorists is a good thing. I look forward to the addition of a discussion forum if possible, as in earlier days. Else how will I know what Log from Blamo thinks? -- Mitrik Spanner
Glad you like it! We'll consider a forum, though spammers and flamers usually become a problem.
I really do miss the forum. It has been awhile now.
Really happy to see the changes to the site. Please keep up the good work! A new design might be a useful next step to make it more visually appealing.
Until Dec 30, I received STR in my email box. Has that feature been removed?
We're going to use a different system from now on, and our developer just hasn't set it up yet.
love the fact that i can get feeds now. i wish the big blue intro box would go away. personally, i don't think much would be gained by adding a forum other than cluster headaches for the admins. strike the root is perfect in this format. the quote at the top left, the beautiful or haunting photograph, and my cup of coffee.
peace, love and kudos to str.
Is it supposed to be impossible to leave comments for STR-specific posts, or am I just missing something? And if it is, might I inquire as to why this is so?
If you're referring to John deLaubenfels' latest column, that's been fixed. You should be able to leave a comment at the bottom of every STR column. If you find one where you can't, please let me know and I'll fix it.
I was, and I'm happy to see that it was fixed and that I was mistaken about it being a problem for all STR columns.
I was very concerned when you were down due to the virus. I am glad to know that the world has not lost a great friend of human liberty.
Welcome Back.
Agreed, I'm very happy to see STR back online. I must have checked the site 20 times a day for the last week.
Me too. STR was always the first site I looked at in the morning. Welcome back.
Welcome back STR! I was checking 4-5 times a day waiting for the site to come back up. A good friend is back!
Glad to see STR is back. . . the first time I hit the site after it went down, my Anti-Virus alerted me. . . so nice that all wasn't lost.
STR is the first site I hit in the morning, it goes great with the first cup o'mud and a cig.
You guys rock.
"No nation, ancient or modern, ever lost the liberty of speaking freely, writing, or publishing their sentiments[1], but forthwith lost their liberty in general and became slaves." ~ John Peter Zenger ~ Quote of the day, 5/28/2011
To be more precise, "No nation, ancient or modern, ever lost the liberty of speaking freely, writing, or publishing "the truth"" [about their rulers, government, and/or the acts perpetrated by them], "but forthwith lost their liberty in general and became slaves".
________________________________________________________________________________
[1] In a popular sense, Thought; opinion; notion; judgement; the decision of the mind formed by deliberation or reasoning. Thus in deliberative bodies, every man has the privilege of delivering his sentiments upon questions, motions and bills. ~ Webster's 1828 American Dictionary of the English Language
STR Quote for Sunday, August 28: "Liberty is the possibility of doubting, the possibility of making a mistake, the possibility of searching and experimenting, the possibility of saying No to any authority – literary, artistic, philosophic, religious, social, and even political." ~ Ignazio Silone
It is revealing when one takes the time to investigate the authors of these quotes. This one is no exception.
Secondino Tranquilli, a.k.a. Ignazio Silone, a.k.a. ‘Silvestri’, it turns out, was writing anti-Fascist material while, in fact, he "was by far the most important spy working for the Fascist regime within the Communist movement." With the aid of this magnificent cover, he "informed for far longer than any other agent." ~ The Secret Life of Ignazio Silone
"Free speech is the whole thing, the whole ball game. Free speech is life itself." ~ Salman Rushdie
That, in my opinion, is a ridiculous statement! Well, that is, unless one is a "novelist and essayist", like Salman. ;-)
Need a new source for quotes? Here's one: http://www.islandone.org/~amon/QuotesAndAphorisms.html
How do we write a script that would cause a revelation in the minds of the police, judges, prosecutors, governors, military personnel, state officials etc. etc.. To get them to stop and think about who and what they are serving and how to get them to know that the same dark forces that they are serving will turn on them, and that what they are perpetrating is total slavery for all of mankind including themselves as well as their current and future family. ~ Anonymous
Quote from Saturday, September 17
"I have no respect for the passion for equality, which seems to me merely idealizing envy." ~ Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
Not even equality of rights, Oliver?
In Oliver's first edition of the book, The Common Law, he sets forth his view that the only source of law, properly speaking, is a judicial decision, i.e. the "judicial" animals are more equal than the others.
As an individual secessionist, i.e. a natural man, I totally disagree, Oliver; your "common law" i.e. your "judicial decisions" mean absolutely nothing to me, unless, of course, they just happen to be based on the natural law, which is the true "source of law, properly speaking".
"The natural law is, in essence, a profoundly “radical” ethic, for it holds the existing status quo...up to the unsparing and unyielding light of reason. In the realm of politics or State action, the natural law presents man with a set of norms which may well be radically critical of existing positive law imposed by the State. At this point, we need only stress that the very existence of a natural law discoverable by reason is a potentially powerful threat to the status quo and a standing reproach to the reign of blindly traditional custom [common law/judicial decisions] or the arbitrary will of the State apparatus [statute law/positive law].
In fact, the legal principles of any society can be established in three alternate ways: ...by slavish conformity to custom [common law/judicial decisions], by arbitrary whim [statute law/positive law], or by use of man’s reason [natural law]". ~ Murray N. Rothbard
http://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/one.asp
http://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/two.asp
http://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/three.asp
Four surgeons were sitting around discussing who they like to operate on.
The first surgeon said, "I like operating on librarians. When you open them up everything is in alphabetical order".
The second surgeon said, "I like operating on accountants. When you open them up everything is in numerical order".
The third surgeon said, "I like operating on electricians. When you open them up everything is color coded.
The fourth surgeon said, "I like operating on politicians."
The other three surgeons looked at each other in disbelief. One of them asked why.
The fourth surgeon replied, "Because they are heartless, gutless, spineless, and their ass and head are interchangeable".
_*Congressional Reform Act of 2011*_
1. No Tenure / No Pension.
A Congressman/woman collects a salary while in office and receives no
pay when they're out of office.
2. Conviction of FELONY, NO PENSION!
3. Congress (past, present & future) participates in Social
Security.
All funds in the Congressional retirement fund move to the
Social Security system immediately. All future funds flow into
the Social Security system, and Congress participates with the
American people. It may not be used for any other purpose.
4. Congress can purchase their own retirement plan, just as all
Americans do.
5. Congress will no longer vote themselves a pay raise.
Congressional pay will rise by the lower of CPI or 3%.
6. Congress loses their current health care system and
participates in the same health care system as the American people.
7. Congress must equally abide by all laws they impose on the
American people.
8. All contracts with past and present Congressmen/women are void
effective 1/1/12. The American people did not make this
contract with Congressmen/women.
Congressmen/women made all these contracts for themselves. Serving in
Congress is an honor, not a career. The Founding Fathers
envisioned citizen legislators, so ours should serve their
term(s), then go home and back to work.
THIS IS HOW YOU FIX THE BUDGET, THE DEFICIT, SOCIAL SECURITY AND CONGRESS!
If each person contacts a minimum of twenty people then it will
only take three days for most people (in the U.S.) to receive
the message. Don't you think it's time?
Debra Wilenski
OCCUPY BP GLOBAL...Candis Kalley
Congress' cushy pension system: http://www.wnd.com/index.php?pageId=9971
"Men do not walk barefoot for lack of government shoe factories." ~ Frederic Bastiat
Is strike the root under attack or something? Anyone else getting this DRUPAL message all too often? Look at the last line to see what the error is.
Site off-line
The site is currently not available due to technical problems. Please try again later. Thank you for your understanding.
If you are the maintainer of this site, please check your database settings in the settings.php file and ensure that your hosting provider's database server is running. For more help, see the handbook, or contact your hosting provider.
The mysqli error was: User strike already has more than 'max_user_connections' active connections.
G'day strike,
Found this; hope it helps.
After setting the same directives (via php.ini) on my local server, I could not get the problem duplicated on my local machine (I still don't know why ... ), so I set out to dig deeper. Seeing as this was ALSO limited to my (user 1) account, I started to investigate which permission might be triggering it. When I found the pathauto connection, I also saw (in the module code) that notify of path changes permission was checked alongside with the verbose setting. As soon as I selected the Verbose option in my pathauto settings (which had been unselected) the problem ceased. I can browse my website hindered.
Workaround:
I have no idea what causes this bug, or even where else to continue my investigations. I'm willing to help troubleshoot more, if I can get some direction. But for now, at least I have a workaround. Keep Verbose option selected, in pathauto preferences !!
Free. Not subject to legal constraint[1] of another. ~ Black's Law Dictionary, Sixth Edition (c.1991), page 663
State. ...The circumstances or condition of a being or thing at a given time. Ibid. page 1407
[1] Only a sophister* would intentionally confuse "legal constraint" with "physical restraint".
*SOPH'ISTER, n. [supra.] 1. A disputant fallaciously subtil; an artful but insidious** logician... ~ Webster's 1828 American Dictionary of the English Language
**INSID'IOUS, a. [L. insidiosus, from insideo, to lie in wait; in and sedeo, to sit.] 1. Properly, lying in wait; hence, watching an opportunity to insnare or entrap; deceitful; sly; treacherous; used of persons. ~ Webster's 1828 American Dictionary of the English Language
This is so cool!! Watch, for yourself, just how limited the ELIZA abuse program really is!
For anyone who is genuinely interested, I use dictionaries, secular, legal, religious, et al, for two primary reasons, first because I believe this to be true, "they with feigned words make merchandise of you" (and me), and, because I wholeheartedly agree with this statement, attributed to Voltaire, "Define your terms...or we shall never understand one another..."
Next, anyone who knows me at all, knows that I am not, in any way, a CONstitutionalist. In fact, I have withdrawn my consent to be a member of any group commonly referred to as “the STATE”, and by that I mean I have formally seceded from all man-made governments, which are created by these so-called constitutions, (which is more than I can say about all the accusers I have thus far had the displeasure of meeting).
This should not be construed to mean that I have, gone to any office, stood in any line, used any special, magical words or incantations, asking permission to secede, or that I am awaiting any acknowledgment from the human representatives of these so-called STATES. In fact, it really doesn't matter whether the minions who represent “the STATE” legally recognize my natural right[1] of secession[2], or not, though it would, obviously, be nice if they did. And, I am not foolish enough to believe that being a non-member will somehow magically protect me from being persecuted by some of these same STATE minions; not any more than not being a member of the schoolyard-bully-gang will protect me from having my lunch money stolen by them.
It does mean that I cannot rightfully be held responsible for the lawless actions of its members and representatives. But, I also realize that this does not mean that some individuals may mistakenly hold me responsible for their actions nonetheless; it does not mean that non-membership will somehow magically protect me if someone should drop a nuclear bomb on the area in which I live. Again, it simply means “that I cannot rightfully be held responsible for the lawless actions of its members and representatives”.
...oh, and one more thing that it means...
It means that I am not lawfully obligated[3] to obey their peculiar laws[4]. "All things lawful are mine, but all things are not expedient..."
______________________________________________________________
[1] "...the primal rights pertaining to men are undoubtedly enjoyed by human beings purely as such, being grounded in personality, and existing antecedently to their recognition by positive law". ~ A Dictionary of Law (Henry Campbell Black's first edition, c.1891), page 1044 [Emphasis added]
[2] Secession. The act of withdrawing from membership in a group. ~ Black's Law Dictionary, Sixth Edition, page 1351
[3] OB'LIGATED, pp. Bound by contract or promise.
[4] “In medieval England, a town crier might have been heard to say, “Hear Ye! Hear Ye! His Most Royal Highness and Excellent Majesty, Emperor of the Irish Republic, Lord Duke of Wales, King of England and high King of the British Isles, does hereby decree...” This is an enacting clause. If you are a subject of this monarch then his decree holds jurisdiction over you; if you are not his subject, you do not have to obey”, i.e. you are not lawfully obligated to obey.
Caveat: "If you are a subject [citizen/subject] of this monarch then his decree holds jurisdiction over you..." And, simply saying that you are not a citizen/subject of the STATE, and the STATE does not, therefore, hold jurisdiction over you, is not enough; "actions speak louder than words". Most times, it is just a matter of checking an individual's wallet or purse to see if (s)he carries a monarch's chattel number.
At approximately 0600 hours, on the 30th day of December, in the year 2011, when I performed a search for "chattel number" at DuckDuckGo, https://duckduckgo.com/?q=chattel+number the sixth item on the list was this:
Taxpayer Identification Numbers (TIN)
A Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN) is an identification number used by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) in the administration of tax laws.
irs.gov/businesses/small/international/article/...
"SOME writers have so confounded society with government, as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins." ~ Thomas Paine
The Right to Ignore the State by Herbert Spencer (Excerpted from "Social Statics" 1850 Edition)
The following post shows on the side bar but not in the body of the article link below. And I cannot update the like the author's button on the last page the same article. http://www.strike-the-root.com/jay-stuart-snelson-mighty-influential
"WhiteIndian *METHODS* have been attacked for good reason (as opposed to the details. But even that has been seen thru by the author of the article on this thread and others.....)
Let ALL reflect on his use of strawmen, context dropping, intellectual dishonesty in place of refutation and actual debate. http://www.strike-the-root.com/vision-of-free-society-1
Now this issue of trolls would make a proper subject to address. I think that others have provided good summation of why WhiteIndian fits this bill. His arguments have been seen thru...did he expect me to let him walk into this camp (yes I live in the wilderness, I doubt he does but I care not). It is hilarious to see someone who speaks about subjects and assumes and assumes yet is such a self congratulatory tender foot...
His methodology has been shown for what it is...He is a troll. That is NO common ground for me.
Now please think about it for a moment. Say dear reader WhiteIndian appears on your proximate horizon and starts his evidenced ways in your camp...What will you do hmmm? Will you pretend that his purposes are peaceful? Well, there is an answer for that. Now I think WhiteIndian has a taste for rabbit food...That is not my problem".
I recommend that WhiteIndia be banished from this community. He is not here to debate or trade ideas but to tie up this site in all the ways he has already shown.
Ultimately his evidenced failure to execute his primary function on himself/his data is a dead give away. (Because his own data issues are just a set piece ruse). His primary directive is setting up the climbing up of vertical walls when there are clearly stairs. example abound of he the unnecessary testing of others but never himself or his data. The trolls subterfuge is exposed and now understandable.
Some clues: WhiteIndian's--self admitted--separatness from its own biological anthopological data units is illogical. But not if he has dishonest intellectual intentions. His failure to discover his first error is a second error and his refusal to correct these errors is a third error And clue. Ultimately evidenced failure to execute his primary function on himself/his data is a dead give away. (Because his own data issues are just a set piece ruse).
Hmmmmm.
No room for diversity of opinion in the STR social?
If the Ideals promoted in the cyber-space of STR won't work ,without resorting to the gun in the room(Banning White-Indian).................... than this is an effort in futility and has no chance in the real-world.
To even suggest Banning someone already screams defeat.
How is that translated into the free world veiw?
Protecting your own property is not tyranny... jesus...
It's called "proprietary interest"; Rob presumably pays for this domain, so he has the natural right (a "just claim") to refuse service to anyone he wishes, and for any reason, or no reason at all. "Free world" doesn't mean that someone can move into your home and take over.
If WI, or any other dissenter, is banned then I will lose a lot of respect for STR.
Evan:
If WI, or any other dissenter, is banned then I will lose a lot of respect for STR.
I'll second Evan's observation.
If I can't learn from dissension without projecting threats or rudeness I might need to find another milieu. Sam
What remains of the dear readers on this site are posting messages on the guest editor thread (essentially its basement) because the rest of the site has been jammed by a malware troll on a computer. Removing it has nothing to do with a biological creator nor defeat of the free market but I digress...
It would appear that an analog to this troll situation is "Nomad" in "The Changeling". Nomad tells Spock that its mission is to "find and sterilize imperfection". Since Nomad's definition of imperfect includes all living things, it travels from [site to site I mean] world to world, sterilizing everything and everyone (except itself). Though repulsed by the machine's words, Capt Kirk decides to play along with Nomad's mistakes...and tells Nomad not to "sterilize" anything further...
One way to shut down the troll before it shuts down this site completely is to access deny and ban it.
"Nomad" in "The Changeling" analog on this site continues....a season two episode of Star Trek: The Original Series, first broadcast on September 29, 1967 repeated here...
Kirk now realizes Nomad is a device completely without conscience that is capable of wiping out entire posts, threads and great swathes of site access (not to mention some folks solar systems) in the blink of an eye and with copious repetitions of outrage, and there seems to be no way to stop it.
But why? Where does it get this capability? Does one need a Vulcan mind meld? No, just look at the empirical data says Nomad's equivalent on this site...It's prime function and directive is to engage (divide and conquer) and sterilize imperfect beings and their ideas but not its own....
The solution seems to escape Nomad's adoring victims (sanction)... but thankfully not others...
But I must hurry and post this if it gets thru because this site is down more often than up....
Oh, groan, now, I suspect, we have trolls supporting trolls. If there are any legitimate anarchist/libertarian members left at this alternative news website, it will be a wonder. And, there most certainly won't be any new ones. Is this the ultimate goal, I wonder?
I do realize that this comment will earn me the "paranoid, conspiracy theorist" title from the foppish whores of the STATE, [watch 'em come out of the woodwork], but as Craig Hulet put it, "When they call you a conspiracy theorist, it means you are closer to the truth than they want you to be.". ;)
Don't worry Suverans2, STR will survive and move on after it becomes evident to WI that nobody pays attention to what he says anymore. I found his Neanderthal model for social organization interesting at first and still appreciate some of his insights and links to essays on how civilization has evolved. Unfortunately his goal appears to be to create chaos on this board while avoiding any direct challenges to his shallow thinking. It is very broad, but not as deep as he seems to believe. The premise that civilization and the state are synonymous doesn't get you very far. The ideal of humans living forever as free roaming hunter-gatherers is refuted by his precious empirical evidence as well as the basic human desire to improve one's lot in life; but that pales in comparison to the hurdle of de-evolution required to take us back to the (pre-?) stone-age. This scenario would, of course, require the death of billions of people, so he keeps dancing around our pointing out this psychotic desire.
The only chaos created is by evasion - evasion of checking premises against empirical data.
Your thinking is shallow. All I do with a critique if civilization is to show your premises are completely false.
Yeah, I understand what has happened. Might has made. You think it's right, and somehow modifiable.
But I've even said it's impossible to go back.
And I've pointed to intensive horticulture and permaculture as ways of climbing down from tower when mommy calls for dinner without cracking everybody's head on the ground.
G'day Mark Davis,
Yes, and I apologize for not heeding my own advice. :(
I too found some of it interesting, in fact some of it even parallels my own thoughts on the subject.
But, as I wrote some time back, (and now edited a bit):
"So, when will [we] be allowed to "gambol about plain and forest", you may rightfully ask? Why, that's simple, when the e-vile ACS "civilization" has completely collapsed, and at least three-quarters of the earth's human population is dead, and all knowledge of growing our own food and domesticating animals has been completely lost."
Because, if this basic knowledge is not "completely lost" we will eventually end up...right back where we are today, because, as you put it, the "basic human desire [is] to improve one's lot in life".
The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.
Quote of the day, should read as follows.............
Carpe Libertatem
Tuesday, January 31
God has given to men all that is necessary for them to accomplish their destinies. He has provided a social form as well as a human form. And these social organs of persons are so constituted that they will develop themselves harmoniously in the clean air of liberty. Away, then, with quacks and organizers! Away with their rings, chains, hooks, and pincers! Away with their artificial systems! Away with the whims of governmental administrators, their socialized projects, their centralization, their tariffs, their government schools, their state religions, their free credit, their bank monopolies, their regulations, their restrictions, their equalization by taxation, and their pious moralizations! And now that the legislators and do-gooders have so futilely inflicted so many systems upon society, may they finally end where they should have begun: May they reject all systems, and try liberty; for liberty is an acknowledgment of faith in God and His works. –Frederic Bastiat, excerpt from “The Law”-1848
Why take a surgeons knife to the truth that Frederic eloquently wrote?
''Those people who will not be governed by God will be ruled by tyrants."
“Are we disposed to be of the number of those who, having eyes, see not, and, having ears, hear not, the things, which so nearly concern their temporal salvation? For my part, whatever anguish of spirit it may cost, I am willing to know the whole truth; to know the worst, and to provide for it. Let us not, I beseech you, sir, deceive ourselves... ”
The “whole truth” includes not only an unfaltering honesty about the condition of this world, but also the often unflattering “whole truth” about ourselves.
The Bible tells us that, “The hand of the diligent shall bear rule: but the slothful shall be under tribute.” Freedom is not for the slothful and selfish. It is for the diligent.
Abraham, Moses, and Jesus were presenting a plan and strategy to liberate whole nations from both religious and civil bondage. They spoke about 'one form of government' that would 'set the captive free'.
Abraham came out of Haran with many “souls”. Moses brought thousands out of the civil bondage of Egypt. And Jesus preached the kingdom of God getting the faithful cast out of the civil Corban of the Pharisees which had made the “word of God of none effect” according to Mark 7:13.
Proverbs 6 Go to the ant, thou sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise:
7Which having no guide, overseer, or ruler,
8Provideth her meat in the summer, and gathereth her food in the harvest.
9How long wilt thou sleep, O sluggard? when wilt thou arise out of thy sleep?
People must learn the practical application of a network of intimate groups bound by faith, hope, and charity who understood that to love your neighbor as yourself meant to equally care about their right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as our own.
Rom 13:8 ¶ Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law.
"People must learn the practical application of a network of intimate groups bound by faith, hope, and charity who understood that to love your neighbor as yourself meant to equally care about their right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as our own." ~ Darkcrusade
“Love your brother like your soul [life], guard him like the pupil of your eye.”
First they came for the communists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew.
Then they came for the Catholics,
and I didn't speak out because I was Protestant.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left to speak out for me.
~ Martin Niemöller
Some of us could be diagnosed with this newly "discovered" mental disorder.