Liberty For Utahns!

Social Change: Promoting virtue without government aggression

Liberty For Utahns — Mon, 02 Jul 2007 10:05:16 -0400

"Human freedom is today threatened by regimented statism."
--Dwight D. Eisenhower, October 12, 1948

As Americans celebrate the Declaration of Independence of John Hancock et al in 1776 from King George III's Great Britain, and the Revolutionary War fought to replace British rule, it's worth exploring how liberty has been and can be achieved without resorting to the initiation of force.

Voluntaryists are members of the libertarian movement who seek to achieve a free society without resorting to electoral politics. Nonviolent resistance, perhaps most famously associated with Ghandi's ultimately successful bid to end British rule in India, involves many strategies libertarians can use to triumph over tyranny.

Given the substantial electoral barriers incumbent political parties have erected to protect their power and privilege, libertarians are rediscovering how to promote virtue through "social change."

Break Up the Duopoly: Decentralizing the republic denies power to the political class, yields better diversity

Liberty For Utahns — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 13:55:07 -0400

"So long as libertarians withhold their consent from conservative politicians, those politicians can't win."

--Ryan Sager, columnist and blogger for the New York Post and RealClearPolitics.com

In the American political theory classic, Federalist 10, author James Madison proposed controls on the effects of factions:

If a faction consists of less than a majority, relief is supplied by the republican principle, which enables the majority to defeat its sinister views by regular vote.
...
Either the existence of the same passion or interest in a majority at the same time must be prevented, or the majority, having such coexistent passion or interest, must be rendered, by their number and local situation, unable to concert and carry into effect schemes of oppression.

Unfortunately, the bipartisan scheme of oppression most Americans live under today arose as the result of the single-member district plurality voting systems that underlie almost all elections in the United States, which has yielded two dominant political factions. Combined with the advent of "log rolling" -- a technique through which legislators poorly monitored by voters behave in ways that are costly to citizens -- the two-party system has managed to defeat the U.S. Constitution's checks and balances against "the interested combinations of the majority."

A modern example of the majoritarian erosion of constitutional barriers is the receipt of "significant income" from government programs by more than half of all Americans. In other words, the tax eaters -- both from the political left and political right -- outnumber the taxpayers.

How might those who champion the cause of liberty restore the free America envisioned by its founders; an American society as described in Federalist 51 "broken into so many parts, interests, and classes of citizens, that the rights of individuals, or of the minority, will be in little danger from interested combinations of the majority"?

Jury Service: A lottery that protects liberty

Liberty For Utahns — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 22:13:58 -0400

"Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin to slit throats."
--H.L. Mencken

As the handiwork of the 2007 General Session of the State of Utah's Legislature comes online, Utahns have until April 29th to find the exits, or prepare for the next assault upon civil society by the political class.

One tool used by the members of civil society to protect against institutionalized aggression is the jury, an assembly of citizens selected randomly to resolve disputes.

Is it time for juries to make a comeback in the defense of individual liberty?

Random acts of liberty

The classic film "12 Angry Men" dramatizes how one juror can save the citizen accused from being wrongfully convicted.

And because election-rigging Republicans and Democrats continue to cheat all Americans out of more competitive and representative means to choose lawmakers, randomly-selected jurors are among the few individuals who can stop the enforcement of an unjust law.

The Fully Informed Jury Association is one organization working to raise awareness of a juror's powers.

But what if a juror is unaware of his or her power to evaluate the law?

Abraham Lincoln and Larry H. Miller: Two portraits in corporate welfare

Liberty For Utahns — Sat, 03 Feb 2007 18:00:03 -0500

"Lincoln was a master politician, which means that he was a consummate conniver, manipulator, and liar."
--Murray Rothbard, "Just War"

As the Party of Lincoln's Utah affiliates gather this month to pay tribute to their murdered -- and murderous -- namesake, local corporate statists will genuflect before one of their own who employed political means to enrich himself, Larry H. Miller.

Propagandists reinforce illusions that keep the powerful in power with monuments, holidays, official proclamations, and the "party line."

What are some of the myths perpetuated by the political class that empowered Lincoln, empowers Miller, and will empower future crony capitalists until they are widely debunked by a free people?

Libertarian musings on the Utah Legislature, BCS, and State worship

Liberty For Utahns — Mon, 15 Jan 2007 13:03:55 -0500

Utah's political class convenes to divide up the loot

"Government is a broker in pillage, and every election is sort of an advance auction sale of stolen goods."
--H.L. Mencken, Minority Report: H.L. Mencken's Notebooks

The Utah Legislature's 45-day general session runs from January 15th to February 28th.

Special interests -- which contributed 95.7 percent of all campaign donations made to incoming state legislators -- will be lobbying for a healthy return on their investments in the form of the kind of privileges that can be conferred only by the State of Utah.

Funny Money Meltdown: Is the most boring public policy the most important?

Liberty For Utahns — Sat, 16 Dec 2006 23:29:00 -0500

The warden says 'The exodus sold.'
If you want a way out...
Silver and gold, silver and gold.
-- U2, "Silver & Gold"

"Nothing restrains a central government like sound money."
-- Thomas DiLorenzo

News Item: U.S Mint bans melting pennies, nickels

The motivation for the melting and export ban of U.S. pennies and nickels is the reality that the market value for the coins' metal exceeds the faith-based denomination value stamped into them by the federal government. "In God We Trust," indeed.

Why is the federal government in the money business?

Winning against drug abuse without a war on drug users

Liberty For Utahns — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 09:00:00 -0500

Dear Abby:
My father is a businessman who travels.
Each time he returns from one of his trips,
his shoes and trousers
are covered with blood—

but he never forgets to bring me a nice present;
Should I say something?
Signed, America.

--Tony Hoagland, "Hard Rain"

Unless you count yourself among those who own stock in or are employed by the companies that federal, state, and local governments pay to fight the War on Drugs, -- in places such as Afghanistan -- you're a loser in that war.

"The war on drugs is really a war on people -- on anyone who uses or grows or makes or sells a forbidden drug."

--Ethan A. Nadelman, Drug Policy Alliance

What has the rest of America lost, aside from the tens of billions spent at all levels of government to fight the Drug War?

"The Philosophy of Liberty," by Ken Schoolland

Liberty For Utahns — Mon, 23 Oct 2006 13:01:50 -0400

I've written before about the animated feature "The Philosophy of Liberty," by professor of economics and political science Ken Schoolland.

The eight-minute video has now been posted to YouTube. It deserves your thoughtful consideration this election season.

Privacy: Being a hard target for government snoops promotes liberty

Liberty For Utahns — Sat, 14 Oct 2006 23:56:55 -0400

"Big Brother is Watching You"
--From a poster in George Orwell's 1984

Those who defend the ability of the political class to peek into the most private affairs of ordinary Americans routinely invoke the mantra, "I have nothing to hide."

Of the few problems with this standard, one is that the political class regularly enlarges the list of outlawed conduct beyond common law injuries to persons or property. Armed with such a list, nosy neighbors can lead to busybody law enforcement and petty prosecutions.

More importantly, by what authority does the political class claim the right to intrude into your life to investigate wrongdoing? And who watches the watchers?

Obedience school is for dogs, not children

Liberty For Utahns — Tue, 12 Sep 2006 12:24:53 -0400

"Civic and Character Education
(2) The Legislature recognizes that ... (f) the happiness and security of American society relies upon the public virtue of its citizens which requires a united commitment to a moral social order where self-interests are willingly subordinated to the greater common good.
. . .
(3) "[S]tudents shall be taught ... obedience to law[.]"

--Utah Code section 53A-13-109

"We don't need no education. We don't need no thought control."

--Pink Floyd, "Another Brick In The Wall"