Tell you what, when you’re ready to take up arms against the government, you can call me a moral coward

False dilemma. I don’t have the power to do such a thing and would not want to risk innocent casualties, anyway. I’d rather employ civil disobedience, given the chance.

For one thing, I don’t vote. Never will again. That’s just feeding the beast.

Whether I bore you or not doesn’t change the facts. I’ll be boring as all hell if it means I’m not aiding what I clearly see as evil. Yawn yawn yawn. Yep, government is still evil. Snore. Still evil. But, you’re clever and funny, and make things interesting.

I very much appreciate when you expose government corruption, which journalists aren’t doing, for the most part. I just can’t stand when you waste your time on elections and minor executive decisions. But it’s your blog and you do what you want with it.

Might it be that some of those who “returned to the battlefield” were never there in the first place, and would not be there today but for their mistreatment at our hands?

Tell you what, when you’re ready to take up arms against the government, you can call me a moral coward.

I’ve actually achieved some results with what I’m doing. Have you? Exactly how is taking to the comments section of blogs to question the principles and courage of someone who agrees with you 90 percent of the time advancing your anti-state cause? Working out well for you?

You anarchists are boring.

President Barack Obama is taking far-reaching steps to centralize decision-making inside the White House, surrounding himself with influential counselors, overseas envoys and policy “czars” that shift power from traditional Cabinet posts.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0109/17908.html

#62Les:
Also, if you’re suggesting that folks like Radley, or, say, Will Willkinson are ”…completely ignorant of history (cult of personality, socialism, New Deal prolonging the Great Depression, etc.)”

They shouldn’t be ignorant of it. In fact, Balko has made a passing mention to the cult of personality, for one thing. The problem is that these pragmatists’ principles run shallow–they give lip service to individualism, but won’t follow the basic principles to their logical conclusion.

Take the War on Drugs, for example. We’ve all seen the endless stories of how it has corrupted LEOs, bureaucrats, and politicians. It has ruined countless lives and wasted billions (or trillions) in taxpayer money and private property. Civilians have been made numb to the infringement on their rights, used to the ideas that their lives are not their own, that the special people have a justified power to stomp on those who have hurt no one else, and that they (civilians) have a duty to pay for it and to keep giving their imprimatur (vote) every two or four years to the people perpetuating this evil on their fellow Americans. Balko has a lot of criticism for the WoD, but he stops short of facing the underlying truth: you have exclusive ownership of your life and you have the absolute right to do whatever you want to your own body, so long as you are not harming anyone else. Anyone who sticks a gun in your face, handcuffs you, locks you up, and takes your property because you have some dried plants is violating your rights and should be held accountable. Those who empower them should also be held accountable. I realize that isn’t going to happen, given the amount of power the government wields. And yet, isn’t cheering on one party or another, despite this evil (as well as many others), basically the Stockholm syndrome?

To argue that this party or that party is improving things by being more open is to give this evil a pass. It’s moral cowardice to accept it for pragmatic reasons, hoping in vain that we could work the very system that created such evil in the first place to stop itself.

Of course, it’s obvious (to those who aren’t so angry that they can’t see the obvious) that many people who actually are “happy about any of this” ALSO oppose the “new economic policies.”

Also, if you’re suggesting that folks like Radley, or, say, Will Willkinson are

…”completely ignorant of history (cult of personality, socialism, New Deal prolonging the Great Depression, etc.)”

…well, just so you know, that would be a pretty fucking stupid thing to suggest.

Calling people names (especially people you don’t know anything about) isn’t the best way to be taken seriously.

#49 Kit: Elliot, you want to know why people are happy?

I know damned well why people are happy now. They are blithering idiots with no knowledge of history and no clue what freedom means.

When you’re dying of thirst and dehydration in the desert, don’t be pissed off that all you get at first is a glass of water when you’ve been thinking about swimming pools.

Why are we dying of thirst? Follow the arc of history: watch the expansion of government and the corresponding suppression of individual rights. Bush and Obama are symptoms of this decline. There is no swimming pool in the future. Things are going to get much worse, and soon.

#51

Elliot:You’re all crazy for being happy right now.

Les: Just the fact that McCain and Palin weren’t inaugurated this week is worthy of celebration.

Why? McCain, Obama, and Bush all signed TARP, so they are all as equally culpable in the massive theft of our money to accomplish a huge leap toward socialism in this country. McCain is also a RINO, as evidenced by his admonishment of Republicans who made objections to Obama’s economic plans, plans which ought to horrify anyone with a semblance of respect for individual rights.

If McCain were sworn in, he’d be chastising Republicans for standing in the way of the Democrats’ plans for unilaterally putting more of the economy under the government umbrella.

Bush was horrible. McCain would have been horrible. Obama will be horrible.

Anyone who is happy about any of this is completely ignorant of history (cult of personality, socialism, New Deal prolonging the Great Depression, etc.), and a functional moron for being unable to logically follow the consequences of the new economic policies. Start with TARP, which is creating disincentives for banks to give credit or for investors to buy stocks (the government’s bailout money gives them preferred status, thus reducing the benefit of additional investors). Then there is socialized medicine, which will be catastrophic for individual rights, not to mention an economic disaster. And, to top it off, the climate change fraud will be worse than the War on Drugs as an excuse for the government to get into every corner of your personal life and to arbitrarily destroy your ability to be productive.

Celebrate this insanity, this wholesale destruction of that which made this, the “Land of the Free”, special among all nations? Why?

A small fraction of them. There’s zero evidence that most of the people released from there were guilty of anything but bad luck.

Jason is too cool to care about the 4th amendment. Or maybe he’s just too scared. Either way, Jason, thanks for the most un-American sentiment expressed on the board today!

By the way, your deep, child-like fear has made you forget that the government never needed to wait for eavesdropping to get a warrant under FISA, as they could be issued retroactively. This fact makes your post, incredibly, even dumber.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article5575883.ece

“Missiles fired from suspected US drones killed at least 15 people inside Pakistan today, the first such strikes since Barack Obama became president and a clear sign that the controversial military policy begun by George W Bush has not changed.

Security officials said the strikes, which saw up to five missiles slam into houses in separate villages, killed seven “foreigners” – a term that usually means al-Qaeda – but locals also said that three children lost their lives.”

Somalia, a functioning anarchy pre Ethiopian invasion? The various sections of Somalia are either defacto independant, with functioning (albeit weak) governments, while other areas have shifted violently between various factions which have imposed their own laws and rules on the people there. While this does indeed fit my definition of anarchy, it doesn’t really seem to jive with definitions you’ve given in the past. It seems more like chaos. I may agree that outside intervention just made things worse, but I’m going to need more explanation on how it was a “functioning anarchy”.

You don’t get to slaughter hundreds of thousands and then blame repurcusions on someone who closed your immoral prisons. C’mon…my 6 year old knows better.

You could use one for anarchism…as the responses are always predictable. “Move to fill-in-blank-with-3rd-world-country” would be a center square.

Just the fact that McCain and Palin weren’t inaugurated this week is worthy of celebration.

Close Gitmo, close CIA black prisons, declassify docs and honor Freedom of Info Act (creates opportunity for others to go after Bush), end “war on terror” chant, and “END” TORTURE.

Slappity slap slap slap. As impressive a first few days as any president I’ve seen and I LOVE that he made these his focus as priority #1.