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Submitted by Bill St. Clair on Mon, 28 May 2001 12:19:20 GMT

Leo Standora at the New York Daily News - Cops Call for Boycott Of Bruce Over Lyrics: In Atlanta last Sunday, Bruce Springsteen debuted a song about Amadou Diallo. Good for him. He's going to be playing at Madison Square Garden for two weeks. The lyrics below came from this June 9 article. [wnd]

American Skin / 41 Shots*

*Lyrics performed by Bruce Springsteen in Atlanta on June 4.

41 shots
41 shots
41 shots
41 shots
41 shots
41 shots
41 shots
41 shots and we'll take that ride
41 shots
41 shots
41 shots

Lena gets her son ready for school
She says now on these streets Charles
You got to understand the rules
Promise me if an officer stops you'll always be polite
Never ever run away and promise mama you'll keep your hands in sight

(Chorus)
Cause is it a gun?
Is it a knife?
Is it a wallet?
This is your life
It ain't no secret
It ain't no secret
The secret my friend
You can get killed just for living in your American skin

(41 shots-3 times)
Across this bloody river to the other side
41 shots they cut through the night
You're kneeling over his body in the vestibule
Praying for his life

(Chorus)
(41 shots-3 times)
(Repeat Lena verse)
(Chorus)
(41 shots-3 times)
(Chorus)

41 shots and we'll take that ride
Across this bloody river to the other side
41 shots my boots caked in mud
We're baptized in these waters and in each other's blood

It ain't no secret
Is it a knife?
Is it a wallet?
This is your life
It ain't no secret
It ain't no secret
The secret my friend
You can get killed just for living in
You can get killed just for living in
You can get killed just for living in your American skin

(41 shots-8 times)

S. 2612, The Ecstasy Anti-Proliferation Act of 2000, still isn't available at Thomas.

Steven Yates at LewRockwell.com - Dear Lynn: a letter to a co-worker on her return to college about how to survive in today's bastions of political correctness. A nice light touch on a truly disgusting topic. [lew]

Thomas L. Friedman at the New York Times via Free Republic - The Young And the Clueless: One statist's views on the Microsoft breakup.

For many in Silicon Valley, government is irrelevant at best and obstructionist at worst. For many in the high-tech community, the world runs on electrons and stock options, and government is basically an institution of tax-seeking bloodsuckers. The idea that none of Silicon Valley's innovations would ever have flowered without the rule of law maintained by Washington or without the global stability maintained by the U.S. military -- funded by U.S. taxpayer dollars -- is really a foreign notion to many in the dot-com world. Tell techies that without America on duty there would be no America Online and they will look at you as if you were speaking Latin (or Fortran).

Not! What's amazing is that the high-tech industry managed to do what it has in spite of the government. Lots of good comments by freepers. [lew]

Albert Burns at Sierra Times - Just a Matter of Time: An article about the treaty loophole in the constitution. I noticed this a while back. The constitution says that a treaty that is ratified by the senate becomes part of the constitution. No 2/3 majority in both houses, no vote by state legislatures. Mr. Burns reminds us of the Bricker Amendment, which closes this loophole. [sierra]

Lew Rockwell at WorldNetDaily - 'Death tax' repeal a hoax: Yesterday I pointed at Ron Paul's article about the death tax being repealed. Today Mr. Rockwell tells us that it's original language did indeed repeal the death tax, but that a late-in-the-game amendment may have actually made it worse. I find it hard to understand the language, but it appears to be there. If you're interested in such details, go to H.R.8, click on the third link, "Engrossed in House", then click on "TITLE I--REPEAL OF ESTATE, GIFT, AND GENERATION-SKIPPING TAXES; REPEAL OF STEP UP IN BASIS AT DEATH". Mr. Rockwell's interpretation of this section is that the inheritor has to pay capital gains taxes on inherited property using the basis price of the donor, not the value at death. This hugely increases that tax. [wnd]

Plan 9 is available from Bell labs as open source. Appears to be Intel only, but they say it runs on my work laptop. Tempting... There are a bunch of papers at Plan 9 Manual - Volume 2. From the one entitled Plan 9 from Bell Labs: [wes]

Plan 9 began in the late 1980's as an attempt to have it both ways: to build a system that was centrally administered and cost-effective using cheap modern microcomputers as its computing elements. The idea was to build a time-sharing system out of workstations, but in a novel way. Different computers would handle different tasks: small, cheap machines in people's offices would serve as terminals providing access to large, central, shared resources such as computing servers and file servers. For the central machines, the coming wave of shared-memory multiprocessors seemed obvious candidates. The philosophy is much like that of the Cambridge Distributed System [NeHe82]. The early catch phrase was to build a UNIX out of a lot of little systems, not a system out of a lot of little UNIXes.

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Quotes

Government doesn't work. Never did. Never will. Can't. But there are lots of good people. Love them.

-- Bill St. Clair

The Atlanta Declaration

Every man, woman, and responsible child has an unalienable individual, civil, Constitutional, and human right to obtain, own, and carry, openly or concealed, any weapon -- rifle, shotgun, handgun, machinegun, anything -- any time, any place, without asking anyone's permission.

-- L. Neil Smith

Reread that pesky first clause of the Second Amendment. It doesn't say what any of us thought it said. What it says is that infringing the right of the people to keep and bear arms is treason. What else do you call an act that endangers "the security of a free state"? And if it's treason, then it's punishable by death. I suggest due process, speedy trials, and public hangings.

-- L. Neil Smith

A Penalty Clause for the Bill of Rights

Any official, appointed or elected, at any level of government, who attempts, through legislative act or other means, to nullify, evade, or avoid the provisions of the first ten amendments to this Constitution, or of the Thirteenth Amendment, shall be summarily removed from office, and, upon conviction, deprived of all pay and benefits including pension, and sentenced to imprisonment for life.

-- L. Neil Smith

Based on 253 journal articles, 99 books, 43 government publications, and some of its own empirical work, the panel couldn't identify a single gun control regulation that reduced violent crime, suicide or accidents.

-- John Lott, commenting on the National Academy of Sciences report on gun control laws.

Who is a libertarian?

Zero Aggression Principle ("Zap")

"A libertarian is a person who believes that no one has the right, under any circumstances, to initiate force against another human being, or to advocate or delegate its initiation. Those who act consistently with this principle are libertarians, whether they realize it or not. Those who fail to act consistently with it are not libertarians, regardless of what they may claim."

-- L. Neil Smith

(Formerly called the "Non-Aggression Principle", or "NAP")

Why Did It Have to be... Guns?

Make no mistake: all politicians -- even those ostensibly on the side of guns and gun ownership -- hate the issue and anyone, like me, who insists on bringing it up. They hate it because it's an X-ray machine. It's a Vulcan mind-meld. It's the ultimate test to which any politician -- or political philosophy -- can be put.

If a politician isn't perfectly comfortable with the idea of his average constituent, any man, woman, or responsible child, walking into a hardware store and paying cash -- for any rifle, shotgun, handgun, machinegun, anything -- without producing ID or signing one scrap of paper, he isn't your friend no matter what he tells you.

If he isn't genuinely enthusiastic about his average constituent stuffing that weapon into a purse or pocket or tucking it under a coat and walking home without asking anybody's permission, he's a four-flusher, no matter what he claims.

What his attitude -- toward your ownership and use of weapons -- conveys is his real attitude about you. And if he doesn't trust you, then why in the name of John Moses Browning should you trust him?

-- L. Neil Smith

Concise

"Tell me," I was once asked, "What do you think about gun control? Give me the short answer." To which I replied, "If you try to take our firearms we will kill you."

-- Mike Vanderboegh

Also from The Atlanta Declaration:

... like going to the bathroom, breathing, eating, sleeping, or making love, it turns out that self-defense is a bodily function one cannot safely or effectively delegate to a second party.

-- L. Neil Smith

This does not mean that "Marijuana should be available by prescription." It means that morphine sulfate should be available in five pound bags at the supermarket for a couple of bucks, like sugar... but probably in a different aisle, to avoid confusion.

-- Vin Suprynowicz

If you refuse to pay unjust taxes, your property will be confiscated. If you attempt to defend your property, you will be arrested. If you resist arrest, you will be clubbed. If you defend yourself against clubbing, you will be shot dead. These procedures are known as the Rule of Law.

-- Edward Abbey

The state can only survive as long as a majority is programmed to believe that theft isn't wrong if it's called taxation or asset forfeiture or eminent domain, that assault and kidnapping isn't wrong if it's called arrest, that mass murder isn't wrong if it's called war.

-- Bill St. Clair