For me, the least impactful line of argument I would think is the constitutional argument. That so many constitutionalists nevertheless support uniform immigration restrictions demonstrates how meaningless the constitution is if its most ardent defenders conveniently pervert it so far from the original meaning.

As an Implied Power

A common line is that the Naturalization Clause, which gives the legislature the power to make a uniform process of becoming a citizen, implies the power to regulate immigration in context with the Necessary and Proper Clause.

That is an interesting idea, and it would have been worth mentioning by the Federalists since immigration had been under the domain of the states during the existing constitution. Yet, the framers who supported the constitution never so much as hinted at that idea during ratification. In fact, “Agrippa,” the Anti-Federalist who is supposed to be John Winthrop, lamented that congress would have no such power under the then-proposed constitution.

It was not until 1875, after congress had passed four separate naturalization bills, did the Supreme Court discover the new-found power to control immigration.

As a Protection from Invasion

Further in Article 1, Section 8, congress is also given the power to summon the militia to “repel Invasions.” This line of argument has been given by Ron Paul and other less distasteful politicians as a reason to resist open immigration.

For this to be true, we would need to look at the meaning of the word “invasion” at the time of ratification. The widely circulated Johnson’s Dictionary defined an invasion as “a hostile entrance, an attack.”

I have defended extending open immigration, at a minimum, to peaceful, honest people. Obviously, that would exclude violent criminals who have not offered restitution for their crimes. With that said, peaceful, honest people entering the country to better their lives should not fall within the scope of “a hostile entrance” by any means.

As a Limit on Slavery

I do not encounter this argument often, but the constitution does provide for the prohibition of “Persons as any of the States now existing shall think proper to admit” after to 1808 in the 13 original states. Ironically, this was meant as a check on congressional power to control the importation of slaves.

In all other cases, immigration control should be reserved for the states, according to the constitution. However, as a practical matter, any federal immigration controls like that would break down under political pressure within a generation, so soon enough all the states would be setting their own policy. After all, it is unlikely that the other 37 states would be willing to pay for the immigration enforcement of others states.

Lessons from History

Mary Ruwart once wrote, “We reap as we sow. In trying to control others, we find ourselves controlled. We point fingers at the dictators, the Communists, the politicians, and the international cartels. We are blithely unaware that our desire to control selfish others creates and sustains them.”

The decentralization of power is a good thing. For one, it would slow plans for this New World Order that so many constitutionalists tell me about. The expansion of immigration controls follow closely with the expansion of government power in general.

For the most part, peaceful, honest foreigners are trying to escape exploitation so they might live somewhere they do not have to get permission to create wealth. It is a false choice to have to choose between our own happiness and abundance and that of others. All interests are served by practicing non-aggression. By refusing to aggress against others, the special interest groups and politicians in government have no authority over of us.

The constitution, which is supposed to be a check on government power particularly during times of emergency, has predictably been ignored. That is no surprise since the federal government has the final authority to interpret and enforce the construction on itself.

However fantastical, I would like to see some steps taken in the interim of achieving complete liberty.

Step 1. Withdraw all monetary and military support from the Arabian peninsula, fracturing the anti-American coalition and deflecting animosities to others in the Muslim world

Step 2. Do not torture suspected terrorists, which only serves to heighten grievances

Step 3. Uphold the Bill of Rights by holding trials for suspected terrorists and treat them as the common criminals they are

The controversy stems from the creation of the heretofore obscure Shire Society, the several dozen signatories claiming their “commitment to peace, individual sovereignty, and independence.” The signing of the declaration took place in June at the 2010 Porcupine Freedom Festival affectionately known as Porcfest, which is hosted by the Free State Project. (Note: I am a Free State Project participant, but I do have my own reservations about the Shire Society Declaration.)

The drafting of the precise language of the Shire declaration involved about 10 people and took place over several months. The final document borrowed heavily from Smith’s “A New Covenant.” From what I understand, this fact was acknowledged early in the deliberation process, though some were not aware of this at the time of their signing.

Smith’s twofold complaint is that he has not received enough credit for inspiring the society’s declaration and that he could suffer financially if people decide to back the Shire’s document instead of paying Smith two dollars to archive their pledge to his original work. He is also critical of the revisions made by Shire members.

I cannot say this represents all the facts, but they are the most relevant facts I know of. The primary ethical defense for the action of the Shire Society members is that non-tangible objects are fundamentally different from tangible objects insofar as they can be replicated without the destroying the original object. (I agree that much is true.) Consequently, Smith has not been injured by the copying of his original thoughts. Shire defenders lose me when they say restrictions backed by force on the use of non-tangible objects constitute aggression by restricting how users may use their own tangible property in the duplication of existing works.

This last claim is dubious because it tries to state as fact that non-tangible objects cannot be property. [Edit: In the original copy, this paragraph read as if I was expressing that I believe ideas, in and of themselves, can be owned; whereas, I was trying to express that it was someone’s labor that created those ideas.) It should be a simple matter of demonstrating that labor is owned and can be negotiated on what terms a laborer thinks favorable.

All Property is Intellectual Property

Ultimately, I believe the Shire Society should prevail in this case, but the argument against non-tangible property that its defenders put forth is unconvincing.

All wealth is a product of the ideas of the mind. We may use our muscles and bones to move earth or write a play, but our physical body is just a tool of our mind, which propels the use of those tools. As Lysander Spooner said, “There is, therefore, no such thing as the physical labor of men, independently of their intellectual labor.” The motion of our bodies, our labor, is equally non-tangible, yet no one would deny we own our own labor.

The creation of property (wealth that is possessed) is primarily an intellectual exercise by integrating an individual’s abstract and perceptual knowledge of objective reality into concepts to act upon. That is how, counter-intuitively, writers such as Smith can arrange words, which are limitless and therefore valueless in and of themselves, into highly valued books that people find it worth trading their scarce time and labor to read.

The value is found, not in the printed words themselves, but in the usefulness (or entertainment) of the expression of those ideas. The same is true of tangible property. Tangible property is by its nature scarce, but it is not necessarily finite. Wealth is not finite either. It is a product one’s mind, as Ayn Rand said, and endless imagination.

Whether someone’s work is harmed by duplicating it or not is irrelevant to the question of who may use the work.

Property does not exist so much in the physical dimensions of an object as it does in identifying the decision-making interest of the object. It means acquiring “the full services that can be derived from a good,” as Ludwig von Mises said. A property right is the ability to act freely (without the threat of force) and accept the consequences of that action at the exclusion of that same right to others while simultaneously honoring the property rights in relation to other objects.

Resolving Intellectual Property Disputes

The right to free speech is the right to use his or her property to disseminate information, except in cases to coerce others of their property, and the corollary right not to disseminate information. In that respect, the Shire Society has a case for borrowing from Smith’s work.

One possible limit could exist if the information was first acquired conditionally. To illustrate, if I sell a book under a certain explicit condition, such as a restriction on duplication, then I have not sold the full ownership and still retain certain property rights to that particular copy. Of course, the onus is on the original owner to state those restrictions before the transaction. If my customer transferred or lost ownership of the book, the next owner could not morally acquire any greater ownership rights than the previous owner, because I would retain whatever conditions were originally created.

The problem with existing intellectual property law is that the conditions of ownership are set by government law, that is, by force. The involuntary intervention of government enforcement enables intellectual property owners to place far harsher conditions than they could negotiate freely. Effectively, government intellectual property conditions are made under duress and should not be enforced.

In the case before us, Smith set no such additional property conditions on the use of the work on his Web site. And if he did set forth such conditions, the burden of proof would be on him to prove that someone deliberately copied his work and that it was not mere coincidence. The principle is, not that people owns ideas, per se, but they do own the labor that contributed to those ideas. Smith could not claim ownership of a coincidental duplication since he cannot own another’s labor either.

Had Smith clearly stated on his site the terms of use, he would be in the right. Instead, he owes members of the Shire Society an apology for his caustic language. The ambiguities of intellectual property have haunted libertarians for the past 50 years, and they likely will for some time. On the bright side, this is an opportunity for a proof of concept for a dispute resolution organization to resolve.

In a roundabout way, Schiff admitted that his support has less to do with self-defense than with winning Connecticut’s upcoming Republican primary, saying “If I was going to take a position that a nuclear Iran was okay with me, I couldn’t get elected.”

Martin Hill of the LA County Libertarian Examiner has the full report of the exchange.

Schiff is hopping to follow Rand Paul’s primary success earlier this year by playing what Sarah Palin called “the war card.” But as Adam Kokesh found out the hard way, soft-selling your anti-war stance is no guarantee of winning.

There is good reason to believe that current government policies will not last. The direct and indirect costs of government controls have never been greater. Government debt, already at record levels, is only projected to grow at an even faster pace for the next decade. When central banks are left with no choice but to raise their lending rates to curb monetary inflation, the cost of carrying debt will balloon, putting debt-ridden governments at greater risk of insolvency. In fact, the parasitic political class now constitutes a majority of the population as early as three years ago. Accordingly, it certainly seems likely that the ship of state is going down hard.

As a result, some further fear a violent backlash will follow the collapse of the federal government, which will trigger dependent state and local governments to come crashing down too. It is all nightmarish stuff, which is why those who actually care for the poor and needy should support reducing the size of government now.

Ring Around the Rosey

This is not the first time a government is facing impending doom. All governments at one time or another will collapse or be overthrown. That is no surprise. Even a constitutionally limited government, if one existed, would still employ violence to solve complex social problems. Under political government, ruthlessness is rewarded and productiveness is preyed upon.

A Pocket Full of Posies

I will take my literary license here and say the ashes sung about are the posies, or dollars, becoming worthless. That is definitely the trend for the past 100 years. Prior to 1913, it had been that the value of the dollar gradually increased, save for times of war. But with the creation of the Federal Reserve, the progressive income tax, and later moving to a fully fiat dollar, the decline of the dollar has signaled the transfer of wealth from the productive to the political class, who receive substantial income and privileges from government power.

Governments dreads deflationary periods (meaning a reduction in the supply of money in the economy). The availability of credit becomes harder, so government tax receipts go down as people begin saving more. Incomes and prices fall, which puts even less money in the hands of government.

An inflationary policy, meanwhile, loots people’s savings and tames their judgement of government action in light of their own increasing financial anxiety. The government’s economic outlook does not look as bleak relative to taxpayers’ own conditions. More importantly though, people become compliant when they fear the backlash of openly opposing government actions.

We All Fall Down?

So I have painted a pretty grim picture. And there is really nothing that can be done about it. I mean that. But even if my predictions come to pass, do not fret. That the dollar is backed by nothing works to our advantage. If the the dollar was still on a commodity standard, there would be real assets behind those paper promises, which would give people something to cling to.

When the dollar becomes worthless, people will just stop working for the government. The existing government people with any real power will be too busy slipping away with their stolen loot. Everyone else will just walk away. There is nothing to fight over because the dollar is worthless. Government employees switching to the private sector will rapidly increase productivity in the economy. Resources will be better allocated. It will not be easy, but the invisible hand is an incredible thing. We can soften any crash by getting people more independent, which is a good thing anyway. The federal government will still exist. They might still pass a flury of laws, such as to confisgate gold as happened under Franklin Roosevelt.

It will be a time of confusion for people. I do not expect a great majority are ready to face fundamental questions such as the scope of control they seek over other peaceful people. The more fundamental question worth asking is whether a 600-year-old solution called the nation-state, which has never delivered on the promise of maintaining peace and security, is worth saving.

In my mind, the move toward complete liberty will take place another day. First, it requires a change in people’s respect for themselves, rejecting the cannibalistic view of man as a sacrificial animal for society and, instead, replacing self-effacement with a new outlook that sees each individual’s life an end in itself.

Last week, Supreme Court Justice nominee Elena Kagan, the White House’s solicitor general, was being questioned by Sen. Tom Coburn (Okla.) about natural rights.

The day before, he had unsuccessfully tried to get Kagan to concede that the constitution’s Commerce Clause does not give government the power to mandate by force (“Law is force,” Bastiat said) that Americans must consume fruits and vegetables. Kagan, by the way, never answered definitively but seems to say that non-economic activity, which presumably means eating, falls outside the scope of federal powers. Yet, in the case of marijuana, just possessing the substance was considered a commercial activity if the law were part of a larger regulatory (control) framework. So a stand-alone law mandating everyone in America eat their veggies would be unconstitutional, but if it were part of a national health care initiative, it is probably a go.

In his follow-up questions the next day, Coburn asked if self-defense was a natural right pre-existing the constitution. Kagan’s response was revealing. According to a CNN transcript, she said,”Senator Coburn, I believe that the Constitution is an extraordinary document, and I’m not saying I do not believe that there are rights pre-existing the Constitution and the laws. But my job as a justice is to enforce the Constitution and the laws.”

I am not defending the constitution by any means, nor do I expect the government to abide by its own rules and laws. However, it should be pointed out when government people do not live up to their own rules. Kagan is directly in conflict with the ninth amendment of the Bill of Rights, which states that “the people” possess other rights not previously enumerated. Famously, the founders said that we are endowed “with certain unalienable rights …. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men.” For Kagan to say “I don’t have a view of what are natural rights, independent of the Constitution” means she is completely unfit by the government’s own standards to serve on the Supreme Court.

I cannot just fault Kagan. Though widespread, the idea that government should exist to defend our liberty and property is already completely contradictory. Government systematically assaults our liberty and property. From “all men are created equal” to “Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes” signals a complete defiance of inalienable rights and the natural law of equal liberty. Taxation is modeled on the idea of paying royalties for the privilege of engaging in commerce, owning property or earning a living.

I am aware Kagan is all but guaranteed to be confirmed. She will be one of nine people who ultimately interpret what the constitution means. So when it comes down to it, the rule of law is still the rule of men (and three women). But through indoctrination and guilt-laden propaganda, people have come to accept and embrace the authority over them. The whole show — the law, the authority and, ultimately, the government — are just manifestations of bad ideas.

Ideas fuel fear and avarice. You cannot shoot an idea or dynamite a myth. They are invincible to violence, even self-defense. Luckily, ideas also fuel truth and beauty.

Liberty supporters are at a distinct advantage though. Lies require constant supervision and constant maintenance. Lies must be heaped upon lies. Truth and beauty stand on their own. Like scientists, philosophers and intellectuals must transmit their discoveries if their work is to have any value. In business, that is the role of the entrepreneur, to turn concepts into consumables. For truth and beauty to have any power, they too must be communicated and acted upon to be made real. They must be practiced. That is the most admirable role of the liberty activist. That is how we will get our certainty and our freedom now, by living it.

In his book The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, he said, “It is only in a highly authoritarian society, where sudden, substantial, all-round changes could be decreed that a flexible wage-policy could function with success.” Astoundingly, he thought authoritarian societies were more susceptible to the market process. In an earlier comment, he said that was “because men want the moon. … There is no remedy but to persuade the public that green cheese is practically the same thing and to have a green cheese factory (i.e. a central bank) under public control.” So Keynes thought the role of government was to deceive individuals in the public into making decision they otherwise would not have made. In an authoritarian society, he swooned, there is no need for such pretenses.

Part of Keynes’ confusion was failing to distinguish between the total wage income and the hourly wage rate of an employee. In today’s market, there are all sorts of adjustments that employers can consider when wanting to cut their overall labor costs, such as reducing the number of labor hours and providing fewer health benefits. But those are best achieved in an open, dynamic market process.

Governments, as commonly conceived, are incapable of this downward flexibility because they are anything but open and dynamic. They are a violent assault on reason. Government escalates in a progressively intrusive way, making it what is sticky downward.

For the most part, conservatives, who rightly deplore their stolen tax dollars being redistributed to make welfare recipients more dependent on government handouts, hardly ever talk about reducing government welfare. Not including the automotive and financial industry bailouts, entitlement spending almost doubled under George W. Bush from 2002 to 2009. Instead, conservative politicians look to expand government power in hopes of deterring those who have moved into the country without government permission. They understand how difficult it would be politically to reduce government handouts, even to those without the ability to vote. Their best bet is to advocate for more government power, more police, more laws, more taxes.

Worse still, government is slippery upward. The reason why conservatives do not more vigorously advocate for reducing government welfare is varied. It might be because they do not want to be called racist, or it might be because it would hurt their chances of gaining control of government to impose their own social agenda. It is also not worth much of an individual’s time to lobby congressmen to reduce spending when the extra savings would probably just be spent on some other boondoggle. Violence does not produce positive overall results. It is less than a zero-sum game. In government, you are either stealing or being stolen from. The power of the state is being used immediately for your benefit, or the power of the state is being used against your benefit.

I can understand why conservatives clamor for more laws. On their own, they could not afford to kick out all the foreigners, to hire bounty hunters and deport them. That would be awfully expensive, and people might not look too kindly on using violence against peaceful people, even against those who broke an arbitrary government edict. But somehow, people acquire a different moral nature while wearing a government-issued uniform. If they can lobby for power of their own, they can use the government to achieve something, financially and culturally, not possible otherwise. The government’s monopoly on taxation means they can spend resources they did not have access to beforehand, extinguishing liberty one amber at a time.

We can see why government does not solve problems but only makes them worse. We can also see why reducing government aggression, at least through the conventional electoral process, has been so fruitless.

Originally posted at DFW Alliance of the Libertarian Left

The police are only enforcing the law. If you want it changed, lobby the legislature, said the serf to the slave. After all, it is not the military’s fault they are being ordered to invade nations that pose no threat to the American government’s security, what they call “national security.” It is the commanders and the politicians who got them into this mess.

I agree somewhat. But the troops are the ones who chose to join the military — for the adventure, or for self-improvement, or for whatever lie their recruiter fed them. Soldiers are the ones who bomb wedding parties, who torture other indoctrinated men, and who massacre families. Of course, I bet a good number of troops perform a lot of heroic missions to save their comrades in the field. Most of the troops are just there to do their part to fight for a country they love. I am friends with a handful of them, so I know they are probably in the majority.

We are constantly fed guilt that we should support the troops — and by extension the politicians and bureaucrats who put them in danger. But how should I support the troops?

Should I pay taxes to buy their overpriced toys? Should I support their immoral occupation of countless countries? Or, should I support the hegemonic government of which they play an integral part? I know a more moderate position is to support the troops by insisting they be returned home. But is that much better?

Even if the troops were not abroad, they would be that much easier to deploy in our cities. Conceivably, it would become more difficult to scale down government spending once an influx of soldiers boosted depressed local economies.

With all that said, I believe we should support the troops. I support troops who stop following orders and take personal responsibility for their behavior. I support the troops who stand down and refuse to deploy.

In the video (above), I was returning home from a day of political activism in Dallas a few weekends ago, when I was met by a census worker at the location at which I was present. We had an interesting conversation. Without any provocation, he talked about the proverbial gun in the room and said that I was compelled to answer his questions. He did not believe that compulsion was made by the threat of force, however, because he did not have the police in the driveway. I think I answered that OK, but I need to better expose the violence behind him nonetheless. Looking back, that is a point I should have continued to harp on.

I mostly asked questions about my “legal” obligations and the consequences for not participating in the census. One question I was meaning to ask is what the legal obligation the federal government had to me.

(For privacy reasons, I removed mention of the street address from the beginning of the video.)

To members of the Bilderburg Group, Trilateral Commission, Council on Foreign Relations, producers of Dancing with the Stars, et al.,

I am writing this letter in order to offer my services to the New World Order (NWO). Over the last several years, I have become aware of your activities of installing a one-world government and/or depopulating 90 percent of the world’s population.

As an offer of goodwill, I first want to make some basic house cleaning items that I would suggest implementing regardless of whether or not my services are compatible with the mission(s) of the NWO.

Most importantly, though I am not aware of your current accounting practices, I would strongly suggest implementing stricter confidentiality agreements with whomever is responsible for the accounting records. There is far too much information floating around regarding who is getting paid by whom. I do not mean to be rude, but that should be the top priority of the NWO for the immediate future. Being disclosed as a paid member of the NWO is extremely damaging to one’s character. Should I become a trusted member of the NWO, I would most certainly require that my payroll information be held in the strictest privacy.

Secondly, in my opinion, members need to cease publicly using the phrases “new world order,” “global governance,” or other similarly haunting collectivist phrases. Alledged members of the NWO, like Henry Kissinger and George Bush Sr.,  are most responsible for those phrases becoming a part of the popular vernacular. I might suggest using phrases like “local option,” “smart governance,” or “sustainable security.”

With those suggestions in mind, I want to emphasize again that I do not personally approve any practices of implementing a global government or depopulating the world. However, my education and experience qualify my as being an excellent candidate for your plans for world domination. I have a flexible schedule and am able to work on a part-time or full-time basis under the right circumstances.

I look forward to hearing from you and hope everyone in the NWO has a most wonderful day.

All the best,
justino

As I write this, the Free State Project has topped just over 10,000 signers.

The goal of the FSP is to recruit 20,000 liberty lovers who agree to migrate to New Hampshire and see what happens. There is not much more to it, but it could have major social and political influence.

The idea is credited to Jason Sorens, then a Ph.D. student at Yale in 2001 who studied the historical impact of American migration patterns. He concluded that the reason libertarians had failed so miserable was that they were too dispersed among the population. He proposed that the solution would be to concentrate our numbers.

New Hampshire — the “Live Free or Die” state — was chosen by a wide margin for its general pro-liberty disposition and its relatively small state population, only 1.3 million. New Hampshire has the lowest local and state tax burden in the continental United States, the lowest record of violent crime per capita, and the second-lowest dependence on federal spending. There is no seat belt law for adults, no mandatory car insurance, permit-free open carry.

As a FSP signer, I have agree to move within five years of the FSP reaching its goal of 20,000 signers. The only goal of the FSP is to move liberty activists who believe the “maximum role of civil government is the protection of life, liberty, and property.” Approximately one thousand have already made the move. The population of New Hampshire and its citizen legislature reduces the burden of entry for political activists. Several “Freestaters” have been elected to the state legislature and several more have been elected to local office.

Several others have worked outside the conventional political process in promoting liberty. Notably, Free Keene, with the tagline “Peaceful Evolution,” is focussed on promoting a stateless society. One of the earliest movers, Dave Ridley, has long documented just such an evolution.

The FSP hosts two major social events annually. The New Hampshire Liberty Forum, which features leading speakers from around the world, is taking place this weekend. The Porcupine Freedom Festival (PorcFest) takes place one week during the summer. Why the porcupine? Because its quills do no harm unless it is being aggressed against.

Some of the most active FSP members have come from North Texas. In addition to Ridley, Sam Dodson and Russel and Kat Kanning are all locals to the DFW Metroplex.

Anyone looking to achieve “Liberty in Our Lifetime,” no small feat, should give the FSP a look.

I was reading Rep. Ron Paul’s plan to restore his interpretation of constitutional law to the nation had he been elected president in 2008. He wants to massively curtail the federal bureaucracy, reduce or eliminate several cabinet departments, not just agencies, and slash spending on foreign interventions.

It is all a great start, in my book. Part of the plan is to begin “the orderly withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq and Afghanistan.” I was surprised to learn how pivotal that would be for Paul to carry out the rest of his agenda. He believes that he can divert 50 percent of the savings from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars to offset reductions in entitlement programs, and the other half of the military savings would go to pay down the debt. Both would be politically difficult to manage, but I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt.

But before that could be done, troops would have to start coming home. It is an interesting thought experiment of what would happen.

Don’t beat me up too bad, but it is plausible (I stress “plausible”) more troops could have occupied Iraq and Afghanistan at the end of Paul’s first four years in the White House.

The foreign combattants in those countries might react to a planned withdraw with an escalation in the degree and tally of attacks. The purpose of the 9/11 attacks, as I understand it, was to lure American troops to the Middle East like how the Soviet Union lured into Afghanistan and subsequently into bankruptcy. If the number of attacks did increase and Paul continued course for withdraw, high-ranking generals and any Pentagon and CIA holdovers might threaten to resign out of protest for “cutting and running.” The families of killed soldiers would blanket the news and say that their husbands and sons had died in vain. I hope that Paul would stick to his principles, but he has yielded to political pressure even this past election cycle by agreeing to support Republican congressional incumbents in Texas. If he were elected with only a popular vote of around 40 percent, congressional opposition might be able to secure the two-thirds vote necessary to over ride any presidential vetoes.

Of course, if Paul were elected, other pro-liberty candidates would probably be in office to help. But how much support could he expect if he couldn’t keep his first priority and reduce the overseas empire. Even if a strict interpreter of the constitution like Paul were elected, I don’t know how much support he could expect from long-time government expansionists. The landslide election of Barrack Obama hasn’t won over any staunch Republicans even though he is carrying out George W. Bush’s nearly identical foreign policy. They have become more partisan.

I also suppose that Paul could refuse congresses demands to deploy more troops. Would the “champion of the constitution” defy the legislation of the House and the senate? I don’t know, but it would be an interesting constitutional test.

Two opinion polls are particularly enlightening. According to a CBS-New York Times poll, 81 percent of those polled did not want members of congress reelected. Just 15 percent approve of the job congress is doing. Yet unlike the market, government job performance is not indicative of job security. At least 90 percent of incumbents will get another term, if the historic figures play out.

In a Rasmussen poll, only 21 percent of respondents “believe that the federal government enjoys the consent of the governed.” The poll was further broken into the populist class and the political class. According to the site, the populist class, about 65 percent of the nation, trusts individuals to solve problem better than political leaders. The political class, about four percent of the nation, trusts politicians more than individuals.

Of the populist class, only 18 percent believe the government has the consent of the governed and most them view the government as a special interest group. Nearly two-thirds of the political class believe government has consent. That means a despicable 37 percent of the political class, approximately 1.77 million, trust politicians more yet do not believe those politicians have the consent to act.

~ (Parking) Anarchism in Action

Without having to use the power of the state, individuals find an ingenious solution to the parking problem in downtown Boston. It’s just another example of what F.A. Hayek called spontaneous order.

~ Tarrant County Judge Acted as Prosecutor

I don’t know how common this is around the country, but it is hard to image that the judge can be indifferent when he or she is responsible for acting on behalf of the government prosecutor.

From the Fort Worth Star-Telegram article:

For years, probation revocation cases involving thousands of defendants moved through the courtroom of one Texas judge with remarkable efficiency.

Robert K. “Bob” Gill disposed of nearly 8,000 such cases in 14 years as a state district judge before his retirement in 2007. No other judge in Tarrant County handled more.

But the method he used to clear his docket, detailed in secret testimony obtained by The Associated Press, raises fairness and ethical concerns for legal experts and leads some to believe that many of the revocations could be overturned.

An attorney who regularly represented indigent probationers facing revocation in Gill’s court has testified that the judge personally negotiated plea deals, a role normally reserved for prosecutors. Rejecting Gill’s offer often meant a tougher sentence if he later heard the case and decided a violation occurred, the attorney, William H. “Bill” Ray, said under oath.

Of course, it is no surprise that lawyers did not complain. They are repeat compulsory customers of Gill’s services.

jimposter made a comment on the site that summed up my feelings.

“This was not okay. The system is The State v. the defendant, not the state and the court v. the defendant. The judge’s role is to be unbiased and neutral and to hear evidence and make decisions based on it. His role is not to negotiate on behalf of the state. “How would you feel about the referee catching a pass and then ruling whether it was a completion or not?”

~ Grandview Council Rejects Stimulus Dollars

In some good news from the Star-Telegram, the Grandview city council rejected a $500,000 federal earmark to build a new water tower. In the council’s resolution, the members said “The city of Grandview does not believe such funding is ethical or constitutional.” Chet Edward (D-Waco) defended the pork spending, saying that earmarks represent just two percent of the federal budget. The city council may not be so sacrosanct either.

In 2007, the council requested the money for a new water tower but may not have wanted to spend the $225,000 in required matching funds for the project. The main objector to the earmark is also a supporter of the guy running against Edwards in the November general election.

~ Bob Barr Shouted Down for Opposing Torture

Bob Barr, the 2008 Libertarian Party presidential candidate, was booed for saying that water boarding is torture. Don’t praise him so fast. He later said he supports “enhanced interrogations.”

Some examples in the book demonstrate how big-government conservatives work to transfer wealth from the poor and exploited. The author, economist Dean Baker,  described how the Federal Reserve increases unemployment and inflation among low-wage workers. He also made the case that limited-liability corporations, patents, and copyrights, which are all artificial creations of the government, serve to concentrate wealth. Another interesting point is that conservatives have been instrumental in constructing bankruptcy and tort laws to protect special interests. There are so many more examples to cited in the book.

After reading this book, it becomes clear that anyone wanting to promote peace and prosperity ought to engage all aspects of the political spectrum and not just political conservatives who give lip service to the free market. Of course, some conservatives support the market process more greatly than others. The political implications are revealing, I believe. There is a case to be made that conventional Republicans are more heavily invested in big government (to advance an interventionist foreign policy, to impose a particular religious or social doctrine, or to administer police-state policies) and thus are less willing to reduce the scope of government than big-government liberals might. While they might support Rep. Ron Paul’s effort to audit the Fed for the sake of political populism, they will never favor ending the Fed, because it is critical to finance their plunder.

This confirms my own experience when dealing with big-government conservatives, who more stealthy conceal their agenda for centralizing power. They tend to favor lower taxes rates, but they do so to increase taxes receipts by growing the economic base from which to tax. I find that liberals are just more open, maybe callous, about wanting to control others, even if their solutions have the opposite effect from their stated goals of helping the poor. (Insert the obvious caveat that this is not universally true for either side.) The conservatives, by and large, have been more adept at controlling others for the benefit of the wealthy. I have more patience with big-government liberals to the degree that their policies tend to have a lower mortality rate. The same can’t be said of the hundreds of thousands of victims of the American military or the millions punished for committing consensual yet illicit acts. I disagree with plans to socialize heath insurance, but at least it is intellectually and politically honest. It would probably work far better than the disjointed Frankenstein monster that is bound to come out of a congressional committee or the current fascistic health insurance model in place now. So when their socialism fails, because it will, then the politicians couldn’t blame it on the free market.

In a recent statement, Rand Paul said that terrorism suspects held at the Guantanamo Bay prison, many of whom have been ordered released on a lack of evidence, do not deserve simple civil rights, saying “Foreign terrorists do not deserve the protections of our Constitution. These thugs should stand before military tribunals and be kept off American soil. I will always fight to keep Kentucky safe and that starts with cracking down on our enemies.”

With all the negligence and shameful acts at these prisons, it is hard to interpret Paul’s assumption of guilt as anything but pandering to the torture wing of the Republican Party. For example, in the case of Chinese-born Huzaifa Parhat, the government’s evidence was so flimsy that the most damning proof it could produce was that while fleeing from the religious persecution of his home country, he had camped at the same village as another suspected terrorist who had no relationship with Al-Qaeda or the Taliban. That was grounds to hold him as an enemy combatant for nearly seven years. He was released in June along with three others worshipers who simply sought religious freedom.

I really wish this was my only nugget of contention with Paul. Bizarrely, he also calls for a declaration of war and continued presence in Afghanistan. Elsewhere on his site, he says he supports a law mandating English be used on documents and contracts and wants to build electric border fences patrolled by helicopters. He says that “illegal” immigrants should be punished for breaking a law they had not part in constructing, yet he does not support upholding the constitution and prosecuting the Bush administration for cases of admitted torture. What we see here is a repeated pattern that foreigners should be denied their liberties and any civil protections under the constitution, but the ruling elite are given a pass when the highest law of the land explicitly calls for the president to “faithfully execute” the law. He is caving to the party line. In essence, he is a neo-con on these fundamental issues.

If you ask me, it’s becoming more and more clear that even leading Ron Paul Republicans refuse to acknowledge they do not own other people’s bodies.