000719.html

Submitted by Bill St. Clair on Wed, 19 Jul 2000 12:00:00 GMT

[lunch-time update at end]

Kevin Tuma - Carnivore: cartoon commentary on the meat being eaten by the FBI's new internet snooping scheme. Hohohohoho.

Kris Millegan at the Eugene, Oregon Register-Guard - Drug profits claim many as addicts: A report on last month's CIA-Drugs Symposium at the Lane County Fairgrounds. More evidence on the economic basis of the war on freedom (er... some drugs). I ordered Opium, Empire and the Global Economy, recommended in the article. [grabbe]

"There are more people in America addicted to drug money than there are addicted to drugs," Catherine Austin Fitts said. "Most of us don't even know that we are addicted - but whether through the stock market or the banking system or the financing that helps us create jobs, we are."
...
The scope of the corruption presented was chilling, involving both major political parties and our major financial players. The theme that ran throughout was the extent to which the profits from drugs flow through the economy like the blood that flows through our bodies.
...
Our addiction to drug profits is powerful because of our need to support our staggering debt load both here and abroad. The bankers know that the interest on many of their international loans is being paid with narco-dollars, now estimated to be as high as a half-trillion dollars a year.

Lindsay Perigo's Politically Incorrect Show - Libertarians are right - but not Right: Lindsay highlights the huge differences between libertarians and right-wing conservatives. [market]

Right-wingers share with Left-wingers the premise that the individual's life belongs to society - as embodied by the state - whom it is his duty to serve. Contrast for example the Nazi slogan, "The public good before the private good" on the Right with that of Mao's cultural revolution, "Serve the people" on the Left and observe that there IS no contrast! All Rightists and Leftists in between these extremes share this premise. Libertarians, by (genuine) contrast take the view that an individual's life belongs to him, that he may live it as he chooses, and that his only obligation to others is to respect their right to do the same.

Nat Hentoff at the Washington Times - Unwarranted law: another article about the shredding of the fourth amendment by the methamphetamine bill. [market]

J.D. Tuccille at CivilLiberties.About.Com - Pushing propaganda: J.D. comments on McCaffrey's latest push to get anti-drug messages in movies. Challenges his czarness to bring his arguments out in the open instead of hiding it in subliminal media messages. [market]

In fact, the cast and crew of the TV show Murphy Brown invoked the ire of Director Thomas Constantine of the DEA a few years ago with an episode that treated marijuana as possessing some potential medical benefits. Constantine went so far as to threaten a criminal investigation, though such talk quickly died away; somebody must have blown the dust off the DEA's long-neglected copy of the Bill of Rights.
...
On the other hand, if the feds want to play it underhanded, maybe we should take up the challenge to counter official ideology. Do you think we could raise the cash for a series of teen comedies about dope-smoking pranksters who trash the IRS' tax records and outwit a plodding former Army general at every turn?

John Campbell at KeepAndBearArms.com - California State Supreme Court Outlaws Rights!!! The California Supreme Court overturned the appeals court ruling that California's "assault" weapons ban was unconstitutional. In so doing, they have stated that any right not explicitly stated in the constitution is not a right. Fie on them! And again, fie! Mr. Campbell calls their action treason. That's being kind. [kaba]

Found on kaba:

Corrupt politicians inspire assassins. Of course they don't want people to have guns. Politicians never trust the people to whom they give reason to shoot them. -- Angel Shamaya

bob lonsberry - It Doesn't Matter What Hillary Said: the news is afire with commentary on a supposed anti-zionist slur utterred by Queen Hillary 25 years ago. So what? There are much more immediate reasons to fear her.

If your support of or opposition to Hillary Clinton is based on a snippet of conversation from the last century, you're a dolt. There are better reasons, if you're a conservative, to loathe this woman.
She's a commie lib. She subscribes to a series of philosophies which conservatives would consider wildly destructive to America's interests. As America goes to heck in a handbag, Hillary's the one greasing the skids.
Hillary is poison, no matter what she did or didn't say a quarter century ago.

FURI is "A Gnutella compatible, distributed file sharing system for all platforms." It's written in Java, using the Swing user interface components. It has been tested on Win95, Win98, NT4, Mac, Linux, BSD, Sparc/Solaris, OS/2, and NT2000. It was created by William W. Wong. He still considers it beta quality. I downloaded it, but haven't tried it. The JAR file is 530K, but it includes both source and object, so it's really less than half that big. [iowa]

Lew Rockwell at LewRockwell.com - Catholics, Iraq, and Just War: Explores the conditions for a "just" war by Catholic standards, and why the gulf war and even the economic sanctions against Iraq are anything but just. The war of northern aggression was unjust on the north's side, but not on the south's. And dropping the A-bomb? No way. Interesting. [lew]

What makes a just war? Every Catholic Encyclopedia spells it out. It must be defensive and never aggressive. It must be the last resort, undertaken after all possible means of negotiating a peace have been exhausted. It must be conducted by legitimate authority. The means used must be proportional to the actual threat. There must be a good chance of winning (no sending soldiers to their death for no purpose). After the fighting is over, there may be no acts of vengeance.
Finally, and extremely important in our own century: no military action can be undertaken that seriously threatens civilians (much less deliberately aims at them as in Hiroshima and Nagasaki). There's a word for targeting civilians: murder. Wars are for soldiers, not non-combatants, and if all these conditions are met, war may be undertaken in good conscience (though no one can be obligated to participate).
...
There is no threat from abroad that compares with the danger that the federal government represents to our property, our families, our schools, our parishes, and the peaceful practice of our faith. It is not only a danger to us, but to everyone around the world who desires to live in peace.

Charley Reese at the Orlando Sentinel - Not all fascists sport military uniforms and funny mustaches: On America's mach towards fascism. [lew]

Just to keep it simple, a capitalist believes that the means of production should be privately owned; a socialist believes that the means of production should be owned by the government; and a fascist believes that the means of production should be controlled by the government.
It seems to me that folks who favor heavy government regulation are fascists, and most of them don't even know it. Americans have been brainwashed by Hollywood into thinking fascists wear military uniforms and have funny mustaches. In fact, fascists can look exactly like Bill Clinton or Alan Greenspan.

Alex Whitlock at the Houston Review - Adventures at the Canadian Border: a college story tells of his troubles getting into Canada. Problem: laptop computer. Non-problem: expired passport. [lew]

Add comment Edit post Add post

Previous Posts:
000717.html
000715.html
000713.html
000711.html
000708.html
000706.html
000701.html
000629.html
000627.html
000624.html

Navigation

History

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