Author Archives: 20lbcat

Defense Against the Growing State

By 20lbcat | Published: 16 November 2011

Any society needs some defense against crime. Statists claim that this is the state’s job and there’s no other way to do it. Anarchists (anarcho-capitalists, at least) claim that the market can provide this service as efficiently as any other. It has always been clear to me that a free society would develop a system [...]

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Subtle Conflation

By 20lbcat | Published: 19 January 2011

From an AP news article that otherwise had nothing to do with government: The Spokane region and adjacent northern Idaho have had numerous incidents of anti-government and white supremacist activity during the past three decades.

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Recruitment Bonanza

By 20lbcat | Published: 9 September 2010

Headline from the LA Times today: Obama urges Florida pastor to drop plan to burn Koran on 9/11 anniversary According to Obama, “This is a recruitment bonanza for Al Qaeda.” I can think of bigger bonanzas. Like bombing, invading, and indefinitely occupying their communities. He elaborates: “You could have serious violence in places like Pakistan [...]

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I Want You to Get Mad

By 20lbcat | Published: 5 May 2010

If you’re about to work out, and you need to get really pissed off, try watching this first. Missouri cops serve a drug-related search warrant by sending a SWAT raid in the middle of the night. Cops dressed as soldiers bust in the door, shoot both family dogs in front of the suspect’s wife and [...]

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Is Minarchism Libertarian?

By 20lbcat | Published: 23 April 2010

Since I discovered and began to refine my political views in 2007, I’ve categorized them as libertarian, anarcho-capitalist, and most recently free market anarchist. The latter two are redundant; capitalism and the free market are the results of the absence of regulation, anarchy is the absence of a body to enforce regulation. But these terms [...]

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Rothbard and the Nature of the State

By 20lbcat | Published: 16 April 2010

I’ve been thinking about the nature of government and why some form of it exists in every territory on Earth. About two years ago, my thinking brought me to oppose the very existence of the state, on the grounds that it is necessarily a coercive institution. Matt Palmer writes on Mises Daily about Rothbard’s view [...]

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Letters to Ayn Rand

By 20lbcat | Published: 26 February 2010

This is cool! I just found this article, made available by the Mises Institute, from a 2007 volume of the Journal of Libertarian Studies: Mises and Rothbard Letters to Ayn Rand. Both letters were written following publication of Atlas Shrugged. If you’re unfamiliar with Mises or Rothbard, start with their Wikipedias. I’m currently plugging through [...]

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Free Market Defense

By 20lbcat | Published: 7 February 2010

My fundamental principles lead me to advocate total freedom from the initiation (as opposed to reaction) of coercion. The principles are the important part, but sometimes I have trouble explaining what the world might look like in the absence of government regulation. National defense has always been tough. I just found this article on mises.org, [...]

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Target the Legislators

By 20lbcat | Published: 22 January 2010

I wrote yesterday on the Supreme Court’s ruling on campaign financing. A good friend of mine left a great comment. My response ended up longer than any post I’ve made on this blog, so I’ve given it its own post. corporations are solely obligated to act in the best interest of their stockholders. They don’t [...]

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The Distinction Between Corporate and Human Speakers

By 20lbcat | Published: 21 January 2010

The Supreme Court overturned much of the McCain-Feingold legislation today. I like that. I think people, and in this case groups of people, ought to be left unrestricted in their political expressions and financial donations. Five of our justices seem to agree with me. A line from the dissenting opinion, written by Justice John Paul [...]

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