Category Archives: libertarianism

Wendy McElroy On The Invasion Of The Libertarian Body Snatchers

Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim, libertarianism, Political Philosophy, Race, Racism

Libertarian theorist Wendy McElroy worries that she might have to leave the movement she practically founded, because, to use a biblical quote, “there arose a new king over Egypt, who knew not Joseph.” A new generation of self-styled libertarians that doesn’t know the meaning of libertarianism has arisen, according to which Wendy, and certainly myself, are deemed “brutalists.”

I wrote “Fee-Fi-Fo-Fem, I Smell The Blood Of A Racist” about one of their luminaries, before I understood the extent of the revisionism in which the “humanitarians” were engaged.

So numerous are the libertarians who condemn me that I have long since stopped giving a damn. Most are like the proverbial (or metaphysical) tree falling in the woods. We know they say stuff, but nobody wants to stick around to hear them make the tedious sounds they make.

Over to Wendy, who is heartbroken over “the attempt to change the ground rules of libertarianism through introducing left-leaning attitudes and concepts”:

… the absurd and manufactured debates [is] about “”thin” and “thick” libertarianism – the “humanitarians” versus the “brutalists.” It is an attempt to introduce political correctness into libertarianism so that it is not enough to advocate nonviolence; you have to advocate it for the right reason, as defined by those who provide themselves as moral filters. They call me a brutalist. This means I will never violate your rights; your children, your property are safe in my presence because I respect your right to live in peace. But I don’t protect your children for the right reasons. For this, I am to be excoriated. This is the second approach to a new definition of libertarianism: People wish to analyze society not according to whether it is voluntary but in order to ferret out signs of power and privilege which they self-righteously condemn. Consider open source software. It has been castigated as a realm of privilege because it predominantly consists of white men. Open source software is source code that is thrown into the public realm so that anyone can modify and enhance it. It is a pure expression of free speech; the product is available to everyone for free; there are no entry barriers or requirements other than caring enough to learn code. Learning code is also available and free to all.

I think it was the condemnation of open source software that made me crack. Out of the goodness of his heart, my husband has devoted substantial time to what amounts to an intellectual charity. He pursues it for the same reason he repairs and gives computers for free to underprivileged children; he believes in the power of technology to lift people out of poverty. (BTW, I strongly suggest no one criticize my husband to my face on this point; I am likely to render the most Irish of all responses.)

Open source software is condemned for no other reason than it involves few women or minorities. This reflects nothing more than the choice of those women and minorities. It costs nothing to learn coding. Tutorials are available for free to all and everywhere. Correction: It does cost time and effort. The individual has to exert him or herself. I’m not willing to make the investment but neither do I blame the first white guy I see for my own inertia. If there is something in the culture of women and of specific minorities that prevents them from rising, then blame the culture. Don’t blame a white man like my husband who is falling over himself to provide a free service. (Correction: my husband is Hispanic … but that won’t give him a free pass. I mean, after all … the genitalia. And the grand critics of society don’t really care for accuracy.)

Last night, I contemplated my exit from a movement that considers me to be a “brutalist” after years of unpaid work promoting nonviolence. I found myself engaging in an emotional release that I’ve used for many years. I wrote a letter to my father. My dad died when I was ten years old. I loved him. …

Read “A Letter to My Father” By Wendy McElroy

Rand Paul Looks Down At The Little People, Too

Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim, libertarianism, Republicans, Ron Paul

Rand Paul (R-KY) has the eyes of a dead fish. The man is charmless; antipathetic. Not surprisingly, he has a nasty streak. Rand, too, looks down on the little people for finding merit in Donald Trump.

“Wolf,” whined Paul to the CNN reporter, “if you would give [sic] some other candidates time from eight in the morning until eight at night all day long, every day for three weeks, I’m guessing some other candidates might rise as well.”

“I think this is a temporary sort of loss of sanity,” he added, “but we’re going to come back to our senses and look for somebody serious to lead the country at some point.”

Like Rand Paul, another dynastic politician, who, like liberal and Republican regimists, looks down at the little people?

The rest.

Yes, The ‘Banksters’ Are Bad, But So Is Greek Profligacy & Sloth

Debt, Economy, EU, Europe, Federal Reserve Bank, Labor, libertarianism

After midnight, tonight, Greece will turn into a pumpkin. The Eurozone nations won’t be bailing the country out again after the deadline. Or so they say. For the life of me, however, I can’t understand why some ostensibly rational libertarians have joined Max Keiser and Stacy Herbert at RT in shaking the fist at the “banksters,” on behalf of the Greeks robbed.

Because EU manipulations have hurt Greece the most, some libertarians have concluded that Greece is the most victimized. That’s but part of the picture. True, the “apparatchiks of the EU” have aimed to create “one nation under inflation.” The EU superstate is especially bad for the unproductive Greeks. The same can be said for the effects of the European central bank and its beneficiaries: they harm the Greek people most.

But why discount the simpler realities of Greek’s political economy? As even this (unhinged) article concedes, “Greece had been on a steady path toward bankruptcy for 25 years.” Why not Germany, the workhorse of Europe?

Greece is among the least productive and most profligate EU countries. It’s a messy habit of mind that ignores this reality in favor of an analysis of macroeconomics alone. Thus, for example, Greece has a population of about 11 million, close on one million of whom were in the employ of the public sector, in 2009.

Is that 10 percent?????????????????????????????????????????????????????? Do you know what kind of liability that creates in perpetuity in terms of pensions and perks? The sovereign debt crisis has since forced the government to fire some parasites, but you get the drift.

As far as I know, Greeks have not voted to leave the EU and restore their own currency. This would indeed make them more competitive. And the Greek people have elected a socialist government that is resisting cuts to the public pension system, changes in the parasites’ retirement age (ridiculously young), and flexibility in sclerotic labor markets, socialized by the people’s choice. Would the Greeks rather starve than work? It seem so.

More Greece facts: “Greece deal: Seriously, what’s holding it up?”

UPDATED: #JoshDuggar And His Folks Give Me The Heebie-Jeebies (Want Sympathy? Stay Off The Grid)

Celebrity, Family, Law, libertarianism, Sex

Don’t make me write about the simpering, sanctimonious Duggar family, and their priapic son who preyed on his many sisters.

Their enabler, Megyn Kelly, noticed not at all the Freudian slips tumbling from the mouths of these “parents” (and doesn’t the whiny mom give you the heebie-jeebies?):

‘The girls didn’t want their ‘record’ revealed. They wanted to tell their own story.” The girls don’t have a “record.” I was under the impression that the girls were victims of the son (and their fruitful, multiplying parents). And all that, “Over their clothes”; boy Josh Duggar only “touched his sisters over their clothes.”

Look, we libertarians like it when family, church and local authorities handle problems “in-house.” But this was not THAT!

As to Kelly! The woman was so eager to finesse the excesses and phoniness of these parents that she forgot, oops, to mention that Josh’s mentor was later charged with child pornography.

Yuksters all.

UPDATE (6/4): WANT SYMPATHY? STAY OFF THE GRID.

This is the first time I’ve heard of these people. But now that I have, let me say that I have as much sympathy for the Duggars for suffering a legal leak as I have for the Duggar parents for marketing their family, breeding for the cameras; as I have for celebrities who take images of their snatches, upload to some Cloud (cuckoo) and bitch about the theft of these pics. Who cares. Rule of law? What law! Stay private. Stay off the grid.