Cross-Platform Success

Submitted by Bill St. Clair on Tue, 04 Feb 2003 13:00:00 GMT

Cross-platform software is wonderful, when it works. I forgot my Windoze laptop at the office yesterday, so I spent a little time last night getting JMaze to compile under Mac OSX. I had uploaded an image of the CVS repository, so I downloaded that. I tried a few CVS clients for the Macintosh. MacCVS Pro appeared to work, in the OS9 compatibility box, but it was client-mode only. It didn't know how to read a CVS repository from a local file system, at least I couldn't figure out how to make it do so. CvsGui's newest, MacCvsX-3.3a1-1.dmg, installed OK, but complained on launch about libraries that were missing or had the wrong version number. Third time's a charm: MacCVS32b14.MachO.sit worked fine as a native OSX app. This is the same CVS client I've been using for a few years under Windoze. Other versions are available on the download page. Anyway, I managed to extract my code from the repository, and it successully compiled with Java 1.3.1 and Ant on the Macintosh.

L. Neil Smith at The Libertarian Enterprise - Frankly My Dear ... - Mr. Smith shows his daughter good old movies as an adjunct to her on-line home schooling. He talks here mostly about Gone with the Wind. [tle]

My daughter reacted as I thought she would, her horror profound but thought- provoking, rather than mind-numbing. I'm not sure why, but it made a difference to her that they were all human beings up on that screen -- extras -- rather than the figments of industrial light and magic that she's acquainted with from other, more recent blockbuster movies.

At the end of the shot, I said, "Abraham Lincoln did that," and my daughter nodded, well aware of the revisionist struggle I've involved myself in over the last decade, to properly identify the 16th American President as the spiritual predecessor to Lenin, Stalin, and Hitler that he was, and to categorize Grant and Sherman with Himmler and Eichmann. Brought up the way she has been, she doesn't need to be told (as some adult scholars and writers apparently do) that preserving an imaginary political construct isn't worth the loss of a single human life.

Harry Browne - The Incident - how FDR got America into World War II and how GW is likely to do something similar to cement domestic support for war on Iraq.

Bob Wallace at LewRockwell.com - Lies Are Truth - Big Brother is alive and well and living in Amerika. [smith2004]

George Orwell's novel, 1984, is getting more and more prophetic. Everyone should memorize Orwell's three laws: War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, and Ignorance is Strength. Everyone should also keep in mind, Report Thoughtcrime, and Big Brother is Watching You. Oh, yeah, and don't forget the Ministry of Truth.

You could just go on and on with these Doublethink sayings. Death is Life. Promises are Prosperity. Bankruptcy is Wealth. Innocence is Guilt. Guilt is Innocence. Lies are Truth.

All of these sayings have one thing in common. We're From the Government, and We're Here to Help You. Oops, I forgot -- The Check is in the Mail.

William Stone, III at The Libertarian Enterprise - Freedom, Immortality, and the Stars! - Mr. Stone is a big fan of space travel. That's why he's so unhappy to see government running it. Some thoughts on the second space shuttle disaster. [tle]

I'm a rabble-rousing libertarian anarcho-capitalist. I believe that war as a concept initiates force, and I'm likely to go on about it at length. In the daily briefings with the shuttle crews, I'd be likely to grab the microphone and say things like, "You know, too bad we're the only ones that the FedGov will allow into space. Because, of course, if they ever let you little peons get out here, they'd have no control over you at all."

They don't want me anywhere NEAR orbit. Or you. Or anyone else. Space is the next great ocean, as the Atlantic was to the British colonies -- only BETTER. Galactic empires are technically impossible, for the same reason that a world government is technically impossible: too many people don't want to be controlled. In order to enforce your will on them, you need to have every person literally watching every other person. You need everyone WANTING your world government.

The moment we have functionally-independent space stations, moonbases, or extra- planetary colonies is the moment it's all over for Earthly governments, and they know it.

William Stone, III at The Libertarian Enterprise - State of Disunion 2003 - why a true libertarian, someone who believes in the Zero Aggression Principle, can never support war, any war.

On a high level, war requires government, and government requires initiation of force. I know it would be nice to imagine a world in which government didn't initiate force, but it's not possible. Government initiates force against the governed. Government cannot so much as put one brick atop another without paying for it, and it cannot pay for it without stealing the money from someone. Certainly the massing of troops on anyone's border is an affair requiring billions of dollars in this day and age, and these billions must be stolen from the governed.

Government -- as a concept -- initiates force. Government without initiated force is the same as fish without water: e.g. DEAD.

For any so-called libertarian to be in favor of war is to be in favor of government. For any so-called libertarian to be in favor of government is to be in favor of initiated force. To be in favor of initiated force is to not be a libertarian.

Ron Paul's Texas Straight Talk - Welfare for the Left, Welfare for the Right, Welfare for the World - GW's proposals for the union? Socialism, socialism, as far as the eye can see.

The administration also wants to spend a whopping $15 billion in Africa to fight AIDS. Again, this is praised as compassionate and progressive policy. But what about the people who are suffering here at home, whether from AIDS or other diseases, poverty, or unemployment? Of course there is absolutely no constitutional authority to send tax dollars overseas. It is unconscionable to tax Americans, especially poor Americans, to supposedly alleviate suffering in other countries.

I say "supposedly" because the money never really helps, and almost always ends up in the hands of dictators, corrupt government officials, or thuggish leaders of local factions. We could send $100 or $500 billion, and Africa would remain mired in AIDS and poverty. Only freedom, property rights, capitalism, and the rule of law can help Africa. The AIDS crisis cannot be solved by government, but rather requires a combination of truly independent private sector medical research and politically incorrect prevention efforts. Americans are the most charitable people on earth, and we should stop taxing them so much and allow private charities, including charities aimed at combating AIDS, to flourish.

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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