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Dave Polaschek's Dave's Picks has pointers to six different declarations of independence, Publius, and Wired's Sealand article. [picks]
Angus Glashier points to The Hypertext Declaration of Independence. [latte]
Sean Hackbarth says "Happy Birthday America!!" and points at the Declaration of Independence text and a high-res JPEG at nara.gov, the National Archives and Records Administration. [mind]
Lew Rockwell at the Ludwig von Mises Institute - Declaration Confusion: how the Declaration of Independence has been misinterpreted over the years. What Thomas Jefferson really meant. [market]
Frank Chodorov was one of the few to write on the Declaration to get it right, so let's let him have the last word, from his 1945 essay, "Thomas Jefferson, Rebel!""It is not at all the charter of a new nation. It is a rationalization of rebellion. The indictment of the British crown was but a springboard from which Jefferson launched a political principle: that government, far from being an end in itself, is but an instrument invented by man to aid him in bettering his circumstances, and when that instrument fails to function properly it is high time to kick it out. And, which is most important, he meant ANY government, not only the particular one which at that time engaged his attention."
Any government. Anytime.
One of my favorite places for text and commentary on America's founding documents is constitution.org, The Constitution Society.
Took the whole family to see Chicken Run yesterday afternoon. A good time was had by all. Recommended (to quote Jerry Pournelle).
Fulton Huxtable will resume his biweekly columns at Fatal Blindness on July 17. He's been off the air for a while due to a health problem with his wife.
Michael S. Berliner at The Ayn Rand Institute - Put The "Independence" Back in Independence Day: The Forgotten Meaning of America: Fulton Huxtable's guest columnist for this period. [blind]
What we hear from politicians, intellectuals, and the media is that independence is passé, that we've reached a new age of "interdependence." We hear demands for mandatory "volunteering" to serve others, for sacrifice to the nation. We hear demands from trust-busters that successful companies be punished for being "greedy" and not serving society. But this is not the message of America. It is the direct opposite of why America became a beacon of hope for the truly oppressed throughout the world. They have come here to escape poverty and dictatorship; they have come here to live their own lives, where they aren't owned by the state, the community, or the tribe.
Cletus Nelson at disinformation - Statutory Death: The Drug Warriors Claim Another Victim: another story on the death of Peter McWilliams. Good list of links. [wnd]
Ryan Lackey at SlashDot - Answers from Sealand: CTO Ryan Lackey responds: I haven't read this yet, but I found it linked in two places, so I'm including it here. [market]
Sierra Times has a nice fireworks Java applet that comes up when you load their home page today. [sierra]
Sharon Hes at her NJ State Assembly campaign website - A Mother's Plea: One mother figures out how to protect our children: a responsible, trained, armed person on site. Political suicide? Not by me. [market]
Closer to home, about ten years ago, there were several days of minor rioting in my suburban town after a policeman shot a teenager who had been brandishing a gun. The rioters approached my neighborhood, near friends who lived up the street. As the rioters approached her house, the husband called the police and pleaded for help. The police, understandably busy in many other sections of town, said they could do nothing unless the rioters were entering her house.That was a moment of epiphany for the wife. She had previously been supportive of the efforts that are called gun control as a means to protect the population, but then she realized the police cannot protect everyone, only pick up the pieces after a tragedy occurs. Her husband legally owned a gun, but she had been quite uncomfortable about it. After this incident, she decided to learn how to use the gun in her house. She finally understood what her husband meant when he had said, A gun is like a credit card. Better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it.
Steve Sexton at the Elko Daily Free Press - Lawmen focus on Jarbidge Fourth: While the rest of us are sitting around our July 4th barbecues and fireworks, thousands will be using shovels to reopen the South Canyon Road in Jarbidge. J.J. Johnson of Sierra Times will be there. It appears that the locals are preparing as they would for any large gathering. Their focus appears to be preserving the peace, and protecting the participants. Noone knows what the feds will do, however. Keep a watch on their Jarbidge Special Feature page for updates. [sierra]
Sarah Foster at WorldNetDaily - Shovel Brigade takes on 'roadless' policy: more news on the Jarbidge event. Points to the Jarbidge Shovel Brigade site from the sponsors of the event. [wnd]
There's a new issue of The Libertarian Enterprise:
- Scott Bieser - Cartoon commentary on the murder of Peter McWilliams.
- Vin Suprynowicz -
Most Americans Should be Ashamed to Celebrate the Fourth: Vin
penned this for Independence Day 3 years ago.
Recently, President Clinton's then-Drug Czar, Lee Brown, told me the role of government is to protect people from dangers, such as drugs. I corrected him, saying, "No, the role of government is to protect our liberties."
Mr. Brown. You may disagree all you like, but you may NOT initiate force, no matter how many people vote for your opinions."We'll just have to disagree on that," the president's appointee said.
- Letter from Jeff Colonnesi: a good comparison of government cops with private cops: FBI agent = Private Investigator, Secret Service Agent = Bodyguard, Police Officer = Security Guard. Except the former jobs get paid well and are somehow "authorized" to use bigger weapons.
- Letter from Don Lobo Tiggre: introduces Doing Freedom!, a project that Don is doing with Sunni Maravillosa. Check it out!
- Letter from Charles Bradford: Mr. Bradford gives some possibly life-saving advice to a woman displaying on her car window a picture of a handgun with the universal red circle and slash through it.
Don Lobo Tiggre at Doing Freedom! - Mission Statement: The (Brass) Ring of Power: In case I didn't convince you to check out Doing Freedom!, here are a couple of excerpts (all emphasis in the original):
"What then," my imaginary average person cries, "are we to do? We must use this power--this governmental rule by force of some over others--or anarchy and chaos will ensue, and greater evil will destroy even more lives!" The answer to this has been written up time and time again, in book after book--it's there for anyone to find if they will but look. Rand, Heinlein, von Mises, De la Boetie, and Smith (both Adam and L. Neil) are good authors to start with. There are many more. I can sum the answer up here by simply saying that this idea that we have no choice is just plain wrong. There isn't a function performed by the modern nation-state that hasn't been performed somewhere and somewhen in history on a purely voluntary basis. There is scarcely a function performed by the nation-states, from building roads to defending a people, that isn't today being done by a private company or charity (voluntary arrangement) somewhere. Between them, churches and theme parks regulate almost every aspect of human life imaginable, by unanimous consent of those who flock to them. Societies do need governing systems to keep chaos from destroying everything, but those systems don't have to use the corrupt and corrupting tool of coercive power. Government can be voluntary.Forget the ring--it's not made of real gold anyway! Forget the next election--it doesn't matter, and can't matter in the long run, because it's only about squabbling over a flawed tool. Forget about the tax bill, the abortion bill, the juvenile justice bill, and all the other great fantasies those under the spell of the ring of power imagine will make any difference. Forget power over others, and concentrate on creating more power over yourself!
Yes, that's right: just walk away.
...
It's time to unsubscribe, people. We've been told by many analysts that the information age will do away with the nation-state, just as the industrial age did away with feudal kingdoms. It's time to embrace that truth, screw up our courage, and seek to become sovereign individuals. It's time to forget about trying to force the world to be free (what a contradiction!), and free ourselves. It's time to declare personal independence from the tottering and brutal relics of the age of coercive power, today's nation-states, and Do Freedom.
Cafe au Lait now has a special reports page. One of the first reports is the C# special report. Check out the URL. Hehe. [cafe]
John Cox at CNN - Java poised for a comeback: Java is returning to the client. Did it ever really leave? I'm using it. [cafe]
