The Parade of Collectivism marches on

Submitted by Bill St. Clair on Mon, 28 May 2001 10:03:04 GMT

FROM MOUNTAIN MEDIA
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE DATED NOV. 12, 2000
THE LIBERTARIAN, By Vin Suprynowicz
The Parade of Collectivism marches on

I have witnesses: I said early on Nov. 7 "This election will come down to a couple thousand Cubans sending a message to Al Gore about the way Jackboot Janet decided to 'resolve' the matter of Little Elian Gonzales."

Who, by the way -- Elian, that is, not the murderess troll -- will come to America and have his own talk show after Papa Fidel finally becomes the last hero of the World Socialist Revolution to be embalmed and laid out for public view. (The Russians are apparently running out of money to keep re-embalming Lenin. I'm not -- as Dave Barry would say -- making this up. Of course, the Russians are running out of money for pretty much everything, despite the best efforts of the thieves at the World Bank to divert an artery coursing with U.S. taxpayer cash right into the angiogenic tumor which the Kremlin has become, concluding in that secret deal recently OK'd by our point man in the kleptocommissariat, Al Gore, encouraging the Reds to unload all their left-over engines of death on Iran and other friendly powers. Not that I mind a free market in weapons, mind you. I'd just like to know, if the average barefoot goatherd from Zahedan to Samarkand can now buy his own a shoulder-launched heat-seeking missile, why I can't pick one up at Home Depot. Fair is fair.)

The AP reported after the Kursk disaster this fall that "Not a single rescue system functioned on this top-of the-range submarine. ... Disasters ranging from crashing airplanes to industrial accidents have become commonplace in Russia. ... A string of plane crashes were blamed on overloading after pilots accepted bribes to take extra cargo, weighing down their aircraft. ... In rural areas, people hack holes into oil pipelines to siphon fuel, often causing fires or explosions. ... Hundreds of people are electrocuted every year while trying to pilfer communication wires, electric cable and train and plane parts for sell as scrap metal." Airplane parts taken out of planes which then try to fly the next day, mind you -- remember the missing parachutes in Joe Heller's "Catch-22"?

It's all thoroughly predictable, after decades of teaching a nation's youth in the government-run propaganda camps that acquiring private property and investing in hopes of future profits are both bad; that everything belongs to the first person to get there with a pair of pruning shears; that "excess earnings" should be confiscated and "redistributed." You know -- the political philosophy which has been in control of Washington City since 1932, now being genetically encoded through the reproductive organs of our own collectivist state, under the secure guardianship of the National Education Association.

Give it a few more months: the Russians will try to auction off Lenin's yellowed corpse to either Disney or Maddam Tussaud's. I say that in the interest of international cooperation and historical irony the State Department should approach Ringling Brothers, heirs to the great P.T. Barnum. Decked out in a top hat and Uncle Sam suit, strung up on wires, I know I'd pay to see the old assassin dance like the skeleton marionettes in that famous music video of the Grateful Dead's "I Will Survive" -- preferably performed by the Wheaton College Department of Feminist Studies Faculty Chorale.

Meantime, from the front in the ongoing Wars on Guns and Drugs, comes word that four senior citizens, owners of Granicy's Valley Wide Feed Store in Lancaster, Calif., may become the first citizens imprisoned under another Brave New Law of the People's Republic, this one requiring merchants to record detailed personal information about people who buy iodine crystals.

Yes, iodine -- you'll remember it from the periodic table of the elements in Mr. Stewart's 11th grade chemistry class. Not only is iodine the rust-colored stuff that stung when mom spread it over your childhood cuts and scrapes -- it's also used to treat hoof and mouth disease in horses, and to purify water. What a lot of us might not know is that the stuff is also used in the manufacture of methamphetamine, which makes it OK for the cops to kill you on the spot if you're caught with any. (Las Vegas cop Bruce Gentner, for instance, got off after emptying the magazine of his .40-caliber automatic into 32-year-old local resident John Perrin last year, when it turned out Perrin -- otherwise armed only with a basketball -- was in possession of a vial of iodine crystals.)

So in a way, maybe the four California oldsters should count themselves lucky. State prosecutors merely busted the four, in the words of The Associated Press, "after becoming frustrated by the store's refusal to comply with the law." Which is to say, refusing to take down the names and other intimate data of their iodine customers, thereafter turning in said data to The Proper Authorities.

If convicted, the four powderheads could spend a year in jail.

Did I mention guns? In late September, a 41-year-old Hamilton, Ontario, man was eating lunch with his family at a crowded restaurant after being fitted with a heart monitor by his cardiologist that morning. Canada being the Land of Snitches, a customer at a neighboring table noticed the bulky outline and leather strap of the heart monitor and, mistaking it for a shoulder holster concealing a handgun, summoned police.

Shattering the moment of family togetherness, a team of SWAT-clad Canadian cops suddenly dashed to the man's table, grabbed him, and threw him up against the wall. One of the thugs tore off his shirt and was trying to pull out the monitor, which was hooked to the man's belt, when he finally realized it was actually some kind of medical device.

The Hamilton chief of police later apologized for the incident, explaining it was an honest mistake.

Hey: You can't be too careful. The guy could have turned out to be an Afghan goatherd.

Vin Suprynowicz is assistant editorial page editor of the Las Vegas Review-Journal, and editor of Financial Privacy Report (subscribe by calling Nate at 612-895-8757.) His book, "Send in the Waco Killers: Essays on the Freedom Movement, 1993-1998," is available by dialing 1-800-244-2224; or via web site http://www.thespiritof76.com/wacokillers.html.

Vin Suprynowicz, vin@lvrj.com

"When great changes occur in history, when great principles are involved, as a rule the majority are wrong. The minority are right." -- Eugene V. Debs (1855-1926)

"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed -- and thus clamorous to be led to safety -- by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary." -- H.L. Mencken

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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