Category Archives: Political Philosophy

‘The Program’ Behind The Occupy Wall Street Protests

Business, Capitalism, Democracy, Economy, Individual Rights, Political Economy, Political Philosophy, Private Property

Tired of listening to mealymouthed left-libertarians laboring to find commonalities with the Occupy Wall Street “sleepover”? You should be. I know I am. I have no sisterly solidarity for socialists.

Here’s the stark reality of this extravaganza: Within the buildings are people beavering away, working for a living. Railing against them without—sitting idle in the parks, streets and on sidewalks—are individuals who trash, scream, sleep for hours on end, loiter, strip down and publicly body-paint each other, copulate and defecate.

Economist George Reisman dissects the farrago of economic errors the protesters and their sympathizers commit: “What the protesters do not realize is that the wealth of the one percent provides the standard of living of the ninety-nine percent.”

Read “How a Highly Productive and Provident One Percent Provides the Standard of Living of a Largely Ignorant and Ungrateful Ninety-Nine Percent” by George Reisman.

UPDATED: Rick Gets Rabid; Ron Paul Endures

Economy, Elections, Political Philosophy, Politics, Private Property, Ron Paul, Taxation

The following is from my new WND.COM, “Rick Gets Rabid; Ron Paul Endures”:

“CNN must be desperate for the ratings the network receives whenever it hosts a Republican presidential debate. As moderator of the Tea Party Debate in Tampa, Florida, last month, Wolf Blitzer worked it. And not once did leftist activist-cum-anchor Anderson Cooper mention bullying in Las Vegas, Tuesday night: Viewers of the Western Republican Debate got off lightly. The excuse for a newsman known as Anderson Cooper did only one stupid thing: Demonstrate to the seven presidential contenders how to introduce themselves.

CNN was on its best behavior, which is more than one can say about Governor Rick Perry (R-TX). He sounds a lot like a slightly less stupid ‘W,’ which is still plenty stupid (and cunning to boot). The man is so much like The Decider in demeanor that it’s unsettling.

In bashing Herman Cain’s 9-9-9 tax-reform plan, Perry persistently called Cain ‘brother’ (‘I love you, brother, but…’). This phony, patronizing touch was plainly insulting.

For colorful metaphors that capture the tapped arteries of taxation in the Cain plan—destined to balloon with the lifeblood of the taxpayer—it’s hard to beat Grover Norquist. The president of Americans for Tax Reform likened 9-9-9 to putting ‘tapeworms in your tummy to try and maintain your weight.’ And to ‘having three needles in your arm drawing blood instead of one.'” …

Read the complete column, “Rick Gets Rabid; Ron Paul Endures,” now on WND.COM.

My book, “Into the Cannibal’s Pot: Lessons for America from Post-Apartheid South Africa,” is available from Amazon.

A Kindle copy is also on sale.

Barnes and Noble is always well-stocked and ships within 24 hours.

Still better, shipping is free and prompt if you purchase Into the Cannibal’s Pot from The Publisher.

UPDATE: Barely a Blog participants and readers, please “Like” “Rick Gets Rabid; Ron Paul Endures” on WND.COM. Remember to “Like” the “Return to Reason” column on WND.COM, every week. Thanks.

Percolating Euroskepticism

Debt, Economy, EU, Europe, Foreign Policy, Nationhood, Political Philosophy, States' Rights

Last month I warned that European “politicians had better beware: Ordinary Germans have come to realize that adding an overarching tier of tyrants—the EU—to their own government has benefited them as a second hangman enhances the health of a condemned man.”

Mainstream media is catching on:

“…there has been a colossal misunderstanding,” writes Ambrose Evans-Pritchard of The Telegraph, “around the world of what has just has happened in Germany. The significance of yesterday’s vote by the Bundestag to make the EU’s €440bn rescue fund (EFSF) more flexible is not that the outcome was a ‘Yes'”.

This assent was a foregone conclusion, given the backing of the opposition Social Democrats and Greens. In any case, the vote merely ratifies the EU deal reached more than two months ago – itself too little, too late, rendered largely worthless by very fast-moving events.
The significance is entirely the opposite. The furious debate over the erosion of German fiscal sovereignty and democracy – as well as the escalating costs of the EU rescue machinery – has made it absolutely clear that the Bundestag will not prop up the ruins of monetary union for much longer.

Left and right, American statists want to believe that work-horse Europeans (Germans, for instance) support the Eurozone and the wider European Union (EU). As I ventured in “Euro-Bondage & the Next Tier of Tyrants,” it is but a matter of time before patriotic Euroskeptics, to whom our press makes only veiled mention, reject the absurd claim that the EU colossus would or could advance their interests.

Fans of freedom, and hence of nullification and secession, should watch the developments in Germany with great interest. That country’s government and high court have flouted the people’s sovereignty for too long. A change is a coming…

UPDATED: Can the Incredible Hulk Strike at Socialism? (Clutching @ Straws)

Barack Obama, Business, Capitalism, Economy, Elections, Free Markets, Free Will Vs. Determinism, Political Economy, Political Philosophy, Socialism

The excerpt is from “Can the Incredible Hulk Strike at Socialism?”, now on WND.COM:

“New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie may be planning to join the Republican presidential thrust and ‘Perry.’ … references to Ronald Reagan do not make a speech Reaganesque. To be Reaganesque, Christie will have to expose the spirit of socialism—envy, entitlement, aggression—and juxtapose it with the morality of capitalism: commerce, creativity, comity.

Gov. Christie boasted that his ‘Executive Branch’ showed the requisite leadership, not least in educating the public before enacting solutions to New Jersey’s problems.

If Christie wishes to ‘educate’ the rest of the country, as he claims to have done for New Jersey, he would have to first strike at the assorted zero-sum, socialist notions, whereby one person’s plenty is portrayed as another’s poverty. Chief among these is the concept of ‘the American economic pie.’ This pie-in-the-sky is perverse in the extreme because it feeds the idea of a preexisting income pie from which the greedy appropriate an unfair share.

Wealth, earned or ‘unearned,’ as egalitarians term inheritance, doesn’t exist outside the individuals who create it. Wealth is a return for desirable services, skills and resources rendered to others. Labor productivity is the main determinant of wages—and wealth. Most wealthy Americans produce what they consume—and much more; they don’t remove or steal it from poorer Americans.”

Read the complete column, “Can the Incredible Hulk Strike at Socialism?” on WND.COM.

My new book, “Into the Cannibal’s Pot: Lessons for America from Post-Apartheid South Africa,” is available from Amazon.

A newly formatted, splendid Kindle copy is also on sale.

Barnes and Noble is always well-stocked and ships within 24 hours.

Still better, shipping is free and prompt if you purchase Into the Cannibal’s Pot from The Publisher.

UPDATE (Oct. 1): Clutching At Straws. Rasmussen Reports: Obama 44%, Christie 43%:

Few expect him to run, but New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is essentially even with President Barack Obama in an early look at a hypothetical Election 2012 matchup. A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey of Likely U.S. Voters shows that Obama earns 44% support in the matchup, while Christie attracts 43%. Six percent (6%) prefer a third option, and eight percent (8%) are undecided.