stories/letter001104.html

Submitted by Bill St. Clair on Sat, 04 Nov 2000 14:38:12 GMT

[I wrote this in response to an email I received. The email is indented. My responses are not.]

At 02:10 PM 11/3/2000 -0800, you wrote:

Bill,
First, thanks for the weblog - I appreciate the list of links you keep fresh on there. As an employer, I'm really intrigued by the idea of doing no withholdings...I used to be a consultant, and when my 15% additional tax for being self-employed was enough one year to buy a car, I realized that if everyone had to go through this we'd have a world of conservatives...oh well.

Oh if only every employer would become more than intrigued with no withholdings and just stop doing it. That's how we can beat the socialists. Not by playing the game by their rules. Not by killing them. But by shunning them at every step. Refuse to do business with them. Don't sell them food or clothing. Don't rent them lodging. Refuse to pay their taxes. Etc.

Anyway, I understand your lack of faith in the voting process and the two-party system (I'm still trying to find some good founding-father quotes on why party systems are bad), but I'm really curious as to why, if you prefer Bush over Gore, even marginally, you don't vote for him. Are you voting for another party's candidate? That I can understand, as I was a huge Keyes supporter even when I knew he had no chance of winning.

When they kidnapped Elian Gonzales, at gunpoint, something in me snapped. His kidnapping alone would not have done it, but coupled with the Waco & Ruby Ridge murders, the Clinton death list, the war on freedom, er... some drugs, the year-after-year disappearance of a third to a half of my hard-earned pay into Leviathan's maw, and a host of other abominations, the kidnapping was the straw that broke the camel's back. I realized that I could no longer support a system that is corrupt to the bone. Holding elections is just a way to fool us into thinking we have some input into it. We don't. The state is a criminal enterprise run by very crafty criminals. Don't encourage them by voting. When we get to the point where only 5% of the eligible voters bother to go to the polls, how are they going to hide their obvious lack of a mandate to do anything?

But at this point in the election, don't you think there'd be some good in voting for a candidate that's less likely to infringe upon our rights as citizens? Even if he's far from ideal, we can probably agree that Gore would be an unthinkable president.

Yes, Gore is an unthinkable president. That's why it is important that he wins this election, so that more people will realize sooner that the state must die. Bush will slow the process, but the Union of American Socialist Republics will continue to grow under any of the current slate of candidates except Harry Browne. Mr. Browne is who I would vote for if I still believed in voting. If YOU still believe in voting, I encourage you to vote for him.

I tend to paint pictures in charcoal. Reality is much more subtle and complicated. But I'm shifting my energy to building a consensual society, a world where all human interaction is voluntary. The old world is built on coercion. Pay your taxes or die. The part of me that hates would love to shoot the bastards, but my rational self knows that this will not work. Instead, we must build a new world and leave the old one to whither on the vine. How could I possibly vote when the concept turns my stomach of a majority, no matter how large, telling a minority, however small, what they must or must not do.

Too much flowery language. Yuck.

-Bill

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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