Liberty For All

by Brian Irving

“Of course the game is rigged.
Don’t let that stop you - if you don’t play, you can’t win.”

- Robert Heinlein

Libertarians are very passionate people. We’re often called weirdoes (we have our share) and fanatics, a characterization we embrace with pride, believing “extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice.”

As with most “revolutionary” movements, libertarians have formulated some basic tenets or wisdom we, more or less, accept without question: Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Politicians lie. Government doesn’t work. There’s no such thing as a free lunch. Taxation is theft.

Unfortunately, as with all too many revolutionary movements, this devotion, dedication and adherence to our tenets sometimes ignores reality.

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by R. Lee Wrights

“President Bush will have his war. He has made it clear that nothing will satisfy him short of Iraqi blood. Not even complying with his every whim and fancy will stop the war machine that is warming up all over the Middle East. It is sacrilege to say it is in the name of peace. It is blasphemy to kill innocent people and have innocent people do your killing for you, all the while proclaiming to the world you are doing it in the blessed name of Peace.”

- R. Lee Wrights, Making War in the Name of Peace, December 8, 2002

What is the quickest way for an individual, elected to high office, to gain approval for a war plan from a particular populace? Apparently it is all in the marketing magic of proper packaging and presentation. That’s right. It is just a matter of presenting the message in such a way that it becomes a “friendly idea” to most people. Generally, people have to feel good about a leader’s intentions before they will freely show support for anything as drastic as a battle plan for all-out war. That is why the present presidential administration has, from the beginning, propagandized the invasion of Iraq as a necessary use of force to bring everlasting peace to the world. After all, what could possibly be a friendlier concept to more people than the idea of achieving and maintaining world peace?

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by Matthew Hunter

We have a two-party system. Fans of this system say it gives us the benefits of an antagonistic system without the relentless coalition-building that often seems to force foreign nations (with stronger minor parties) into crisis when conditions change. Opponents say that it denies third parties a significant voice in the government of their nation.

Both are correct; the two party system acts to mute dissent and provides the illusion of broad consensus around the party positions. But increasingly, the two-party system is providing another illusion: an illusion of conflict.

As originally intended, our nation’s government could be best characterized as obstructionist. For a law to be valid, it was required to pass through the House of Representatives, and thus gain the approval of the people; then it would pass through the Senate, and thus gain the approval of the state governments; then the President himself would be asked to sign the bill, and he also has the power to block it unilaterally, representing the interests of those who would be required to enforce the law. If a law is passed and signed following that procedure, it must still be enforced by the court system, which can declare it unConstitutional, and by the people individually in each case (in the form of a jury).

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by Donna Mancini

Getting sick is high on my list of life’s biggest hassles these days! Excuse me if I am sounding like an “old fogie” when I reminisce about the “good old days;” but, I can’t help thinking back on my childhood (in the 50’s and the 60’s) when my mom and dad would call our family doctor who lived in the neighborhood.

Dr. Greenfield would keep my dad calmed down who was such a worry-wart that he would get sick along with me and my two sisters. Sometimes the doctor would just send a prescription, which I know is considered a no-no these days, however, I must confess to still being alive at the ripe old age of 55 and 7 months young! Other times we would go to his office, or would you believe he would even make a “house call.” For those of you who are too young to have experienced this extinct phenomena … this is when the doctor actually comes to see you at home. Yes, you get to lie in bed in your jammies, under the covers watching TV and eating popsicles where you belong when you are sick. Such a novel idea.  

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by George Phillies

Having gone on at considerable length about the Republican Party and its War on America, we now reach the momentary denouement: The Republicans have lost. 

They lost the House.  They lost the Senate. With the Senate, they lost the ability to install far-right judges.  With Congress, they lost the ability to field ultra-right legislation.  In the next two years, there will be no more Patriot Acts.  There will be no more Military Commission Acts.  There will be no more Real ID acts.

And while the Democratic Party deserves much of the credit, in the end it is the Libertarian Party that plausibly has saved the America judiciary, at least for the moment:

I turn to three Senate elections:

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by Matthew Holmes

A few weeks ago in an article titled, “Conscription, Standing Armies, and Love of Country” I wrote that the Federal Government had outlawed the state militia’s mentioned in the 2nd Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.  This was incorrect. 

The state militias have been “nationalized” into the “National Guard” and are now being used unconstitutionally for foreign occupations.  Governors across the country are complaining to the Bush administration that their National Guard units are being depleted for the War in Iraq, and that they do not have enough manpower to handle emergencies in their home states.

The U.S. Constitution, Art. I, Sect. 8, states that Congress has the exclusive power “To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions [...].”  First, we must notice that this grant of power exists under Article I, where the powers are enumerated for the U.S. Congress, the representatives of “We, The People.”

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by Mike Renzulli

During my eight years in the libertarian movement I have observed that in many libertarian circles there is a debate not only on whether it is legitimate to vote, but also what is the most effective method needed to bring our ideas to the forefront.

While there is in my view no central LP plan for achieving freedom - aside from “running Libertarians for office” - the most effective way to bring our ideas to be debated, discussed and enacted in the public arena would be through the ballot initiative process.

From 1999 until 2005 I lived in Mesa, Arizona, and had the pleasure of being a member of a political group that has gotten ideas enacted, while remaining mostly on the libertarian side of the economic spectrum. The group I refer to is the Valley Business Owners and Concerned Citizens (a.k.a. V.B.O.). In 1996 Mesa voters approved a city smoking ban. Many people who presently make up the V.B.O. board owned home-based businesses at the time. They attempted to get the ban repealed soon after it was passed, by filing a class action lawsuit aimed at overturning the law based on its infringement on their personal and private property rights.

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by Mike Ruff

There is a fundamental difference between statists and non-statists, one which goes beyond the acceptance of the NAP (non-agression principle) (or ZAP (zero-agression principle) if you prefer).

This difference is the value which each places on human life. The non-statist values life highly–which is why the non-statist holds to the NAP. The statist does not value human life-except his own-which is why he does not subscribe to the NAP.

This is why the statist sends others to kill those who haven’t paid their share of the extortion money (i.e., what is euphemistically known as “taxes”). Yes, I know, the government doesn’t always, or even usually, kill those who “owe” taxes. But if you send an agent with the “authority” to kill someone, a qualitative line has been crossed which cannot be ignored lightly. The fact is the statist values your money more than he does your life; and, values the example killing you would make for others more than he does your life.

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by Jonathan David Morris

In last week’s column, I referred to myself as a libertarian, which I defined as “nicepeoplespeak for a ‘guy who doesn’t like government.’” After that article published, I got a letter from a guy named Mike.

Mike’s worried that many of his friends are becoming self-professed libertarians without really knowing what libertarianism is. “It seems to me that they are anti-establishment because they believe it is trendy,” he says, “rather than because of some rational thought process.” With Mike’s email in mind, I’d like to take this chance to answer the age old question, once and for all: What the heck’s a libertarian? With any luck, I’ll end up providing some insight.

Now, I should probably start by telling you that the exact definition of the word “libertarian” is a point of controversy within the libertarian community. Part of the problem is that libertarians, by nature, don’t really belong in communities. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be libertarians. They’d just be curmudgeons. Or communists. I’m not sure I’d be highly regarded in the libertarian community anyway-even if there was one. But this is a good thing. The less fellow libertarians respect your libertarianism, the better a libertarian you are. It means you’re objective. Which is how I’ve justified writing this article.

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by Lady Liberty

I don’t know that there was anybody who knew much of anything about politics who didn’t expect Republicans to get spanked on November 7.

But as much as I expected the backlash generated by unpopular policies and broken promises, even I was taken aback at the extent of that backlash. The Democrats now control both the House and the Senate, and George W. Bush’s remaining years in his “lame duck” presidency are likely all but crippled.

While I certainly understand the reaction, I’m inclined to see it as an overreaction and not a pleasant one. It’s akin in my mind to the dieter who errs in eating a piece of cheesecake and then determines to punish himself for his mistake by eating the remainder of the cheesecake. “I’ll show me for messing up! I’ll mess me up even more!” That’s self-defeating at best, and only contributes to the deepening of a downward spiral the vast majority of us claim we don’t want.

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