We have a volunteer

Submitted by Bill St. Clair on Fri, 05 Oct 2001 13:29:52 GMT

FROM MOUNTAIN MEDIA
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE DATED OCT. 5, 2001
THE LIBERTARIAN, By Vin Suprynowicz
We have a volunteer

It's only a footnote in history today, but on Dec. 11, 1941 Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini made one of the most serious errors of their highly quixotic and volatile careers, and it didn't involve the failure to correctly equip and prepare their forces for the Russian winter.

While Franklin Roosevelt faced little resistance in Congress or among the American people to his call for a declaration of war against the Empire of Japan following the undeclared attack on Pearl Harbor, it was less clear that the American public was as unanimous in its wish to take on Germany and Italy in a "purely European conflict" at the same time.

Sympathy for England was widespread, and the Roosevelt administration had been lending as much logistic support to Mr. Churchill's government as it could while maintaining even a shred of the fig leaf of "neutrality," but neither Germany nor Italy had joined in the Dec. 7 attack, after all.

Although Mr. Churchill later admitted he slept his first sound night's sleep in months after receiving word of the Pacific attack which he knew would bring the U.S. into the war, both he and Mr. Roosevelt still had to calculate how much resistance the American public -- and a traditionally isolationist U.S. Congress -- would offer to what the two leaders saw as the strategic necessity of concentrating the main war effort in Europe, while waiting for more resources before assuming the offensive in the Pacific.

Then -- in an apparent gesture of solidarity with their Axis ally so ill-considered as to leave historians dumbfounded, the usually cunning Hitler (not previously known for his insistence on honoring any agreement not in his current best interest) promptly arranged for Germany and Italy to declare war on the United States.

This did not work out well for the dictators, in the end.

On Sunday, Sept. 30, in a step which -- at least from this vantage point in time -- would appear equally suicidal, the sole remaining ambassador to the outside world from Afghanistan's ruling Taliban militia reversed Kabul's previous stance on the top suspect in the Sept. 11 terror attacks on the United States -- Osama bin Laden.

Previously, the Taliban had insisted bin Laden could not have played a role in the hijacked-plane bombings, insisting that the United States bring forth evidence of his involvement (though indicating he wouldn't be extradited in any case) ... while simultaneously declaring they had no idea where the multi--millionaire Saudi construction heir and financier of world terrorism was, anyway.

Then, Sunday, in an interview with a small group of foreign reporters, Taliban ambassador to Pakistan Abdul Salam Zaeef -- the increasingly isolated regime's sole remaining official spokesman in the outside world -- proceeded to admit everything.

"He has been in the control of our forces," Zaeef said through an interpreter. Bin laden has been "under the security" of the Taliban and "any action that he makes has to go through the knowledge of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan."

The relationship between bin Laden and the Taliban government "has been like this for more than two years now," Zaeef declared, denying rumors that bin Laden has disappeared in recent weeks.

Zaeef said a previous Taliban statement that bin Laden had "gone missing" had been "misconstrued" and that Taliban officials have always known bin Laden's location. "It doesn't mean all the Taliban know exactly where he is," Zaeef made clear. "There are very special people who know his location."

It's unlikely the Bush administration would have been drawn into any foolish dog-and-pony show, debating the strength of its evidence with some Taliban proxy before a supercilious, foot-dragging panel in Geneva or The Hague, anyway. Nonetheless, the Taliban itself has now eliminated the worry that any home-front foot-draggers might hold out for such legalistic delaying tactics.

Since President Bush has warned that if the Taliban does not surrender bin Laden and other terror suspects it will "share his fate" -- and now that the Taliban has dropped its increasingly absurd insistence that it has no idea where the chief suspect is -- even this fig leaf of a "legal defense" has vanished.

Is there some grand strategy of national suicide at work here? Does the Taliban hope that by bravely standing up and taking its medicine -- allowing itself to be immolated by the Yankee war machine -- it can stir a more generalized uprising against capitalism and western culture among 100 million radical Islamics from Indonesia to Morocco?

If so, it's time to call their bluff. There are plenty of accounts for America to settle in the months to come, but there's no reason not to start with those who volunteer to step to the front of the line. The rest will have their turn.

Vin Suprynowicz is assistant editorial page editor of the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Subscribe to his monthly newsletter by sending $72 to Privacy Alert, 561 Keystone Ave., Suite 684, Reno, NV 89503 -- or dialing 775-348-8591.

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