Author: Kevin

Flashbunny.org Strikes Again!

AR15.com contributor Bastiat runs a site called Flashbunny.org, which I have in my blogroll over there on the left column. He does excellent Flash movies and some damned fine photoshopping.

Well, he’s done it again. Check it out.

And spend some time perusing the other offerings. Especially Soldiers of Surrender!

An Encouraging Start

A quick check of Technorati this morning brought me to a new blogger, Pajama Pundit. Only two posts up, so far, but the author is literate, and I like her attitude:

I don’t see Americans as valuing education nowadays. Unfortunately, many teenagers and young people I see have this terrible creeping sense of entitlement–because I’m American, in the land of the free, I’m owed something. Then they end up having to work at Wal-Mart, bitching and moaning all the while, conveniently forgetting there ain’t no such thing as a free lunch.

“Oh yeah?” you might say. “And where do YOU work, Ms. Smart-Ass?”

Currently, I work as a pharmacy technician at a local institutional pharmacy. But for most of the past twenty years, I worked in low-paying service jobs: fast food, retail, delivery driver. This was because I dropped out of school in the 8th grade, although I later got my GED. Finally getting fed up with what I was doing, and realizing I was not getting any younger, I decided to shoot for a tech position.

This involved four months of study, one and two hours a day, for the Pharmacy Tech Certification test. I am not terribly good at math, so this level of immersion was necessary. I studied all on my own, with no help from anyone, and paid for the test myself. And passed it, by crackey! I was rewarded with a substantial raise–in fact, I’m making more now than I ever have. I now have access to good insurance, paid vacations and holidays, 401(k), and easier and more secure employment than I had before. All because I put my nose to the grindstone and decided to make something of myself.

—

You can swallow your pride and take a temporary low-paying job (hey, any money is better than none), and retrain yourself for something else. Screw your age. It can still be done.

I did.

There’s more to the post than just that, but THAT is the attitude we need more of.

Keep an eye on this one.

Guest Blogger Announcement

Reader Aaron Gunn has joined The Smallest Minority for a discussion on the topic of the political philosophy of Anarchism. (See post immediately below.)

I hope it will be an interesting conversation! (Or I’ll boot yer arse, Aaron!);-)

More on Anarchy

If you’ve followed the comment thread at No Treason, you’ll understand this post. If not, it’s going to leave you going “huh?” Because HaloScan has a “feature” of dropping comments after some time, I want to record this exchange in the blog.

Reader Aaron Gunn took exception to my dismissal of the Anarchist position. Here is our comment exchange (to date) on the subject:

Kevin,

It’s Aaron Gunn from Phoenix. I read most of the comments on No Treason and I’m on the side of the anarchists (and have been for two years now). I even went so far as to go to the Mises Institute for their Summer University session, and got a nice piece of paper for the trouble.

On your comments at No Treason, I sympathize with your objections but I don’t agree with them. Most of them seem to attack anarchism for not preventing things the government claims it can prevent, but is equally powerless to affect (corrupt judges, suicide bombers, etc.). In fact, I posit that it is in any government’s primary interest to create as many of these evils as possible, so that it can continue to find fault with any human freedom and guaranty ever more of the ideal.

Anarchy isn’t a utopian ideal because it doesn’t promise that everything will be hunky dory. An anarchist recognizes that true anarchy is not possible because imperfect man will always engage in aggressive coercion, even in the absence of a formalized state.

Truly the only thing that separates the anarchist from the rest is that he regards all coercive aggression as equally evil, whether it comes from a thug, a burglar, or a formalized state. A real anarchist’s goal is to reduce all forms of coercive aggression through private, cooperative (voluntary) solutions (the market).

Finally, on your last comment about most people preferring security over freedom, I can only respond with a Ben Franklin quote that I’m sure you know very well: “They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security.”

However, Aaron, Wince points out one flaw in the anarchist’s theory: Organized crime can and will flourish in the system. And that leads to my objection: Organized crime is just another name for “government.”

Government just won’t go away. People will allow themselves to be coerced, because when presented with the choice of “yield or die” most will choose to yield, Franklin notwithstanding. Only complete equality of power can prevent organized crime from flourishing, and “complete equality of power” is a utopic ideal.

Since government won’t go away, the best option is to have a form of government that is least offensive to the rights of individuals. A Constitutional Republic appears to be that best option.

I think I made it pretty clear that I agree that even in the absence of formalized government, there would exist coercively aggressive organization (mafia, for instance). So I don’t disagree with you. However, I do disagree with you that the solution is to compromise those principles that we know to be right (namely, that coercive aggression is wrong).

A society that places voluntary moral limits on its behaviour precludes the necessity for a state. Therefore, my solution to create a society free from both state AND mafia is to encourage everyone around me to adopt higher moral standards.

P.S. …and also to keep a loaded gun in the house. Almost forgot that part.

“A society that places voluntary moral limits on its behaviour precludes the necessity for a state.”

And this isn’t a utopian ideal?

Well, just like a perfectly anarchist society is a utopian ideal, so is a perfectly moral society impossible to achieve. Rather, it’s a matter of degrees. The more moral society begets a freer society, as a freer society necessitates moral rectitude in its members. It’s a matter of degrees.

Understanding that they are complimentary parts of a whole, I move forward to encourage more of both.

That’s the difference between anarchism and socialism/communism. S/C requires you to violate principles in order to achieve them (coercion will bring cooperation). Obviously, that is fallacious and disingenious. Anarchism is much harder, because it requires strict adherence to the selfsame principles it espouses.

In fact, this is the source of most Austrians contempt for the general libertarian movement, which more often than not desires freedom from morality, not freedom from coercion.

Let me know if I’m weighing in, or even making sense.

And that’s the very point I was trying to make. Because we cannot achieve the utopian ideal of an anarchistic society based on people all voluntarily living under uniform moral limits, instead we end up with coercive rule.

The best option, then, is to make the coercion as minimal as possible. History indicates that we are trending towards less and less coercion, but also that things are cyclical. Each iteration of the cycle seems to produce a “more free” society, and a greater percentage of the total population experiences greater freedom, but the down-cycles are pretty damned bad.

Perhaps, after a few or a dozen or a hundred more cycles the anarchist’s ideal might be reached, but I doubt it. Freedom from morality seems so much more attractive than freedom from coercion.

I guess it comes down to differences in perspective. My dad pounded in to me relentlessly as a child that no matter what other people do, it is never okay to use other people’s lack of morality/principles to justify violating your own morality/principles. Legitimizing any form of coercion opens the door to legitimizing all forms of coercion, and I won’t do that.

On a more every day note, I actually would be okay with small city states, on account of the limited amount of trouble they can get into. My rule of thumb for government is that the more power I give you over me, the closer I want you to live so that I can more freely hand out knuckle sandwiches to those who abuse their position. Grant you, I wouldn’t think it was right for them to exist, I probably would just have much bigger things to worry about then.

In that case, it’s people like you that should be the ones running the government – and that’s the problem. Over time, the power-hungry are the ones who seize the reins and drive the whole shebang over the cliff. That’s the part of the cycle we seem unable to break.

I understand that coercive government is a given. Anarchists pine for that utopic people with self-inforced morals who will render such government obsolete, and kick it like a crushed beer can to the side of the road, but I don’t. I’m willing to live in a world where coercion is reality, but where I and others do what we can to minimize it. The Anarchists detach themselves from the political process because coercion is illegitimate, so they don’t help restrain it. They give up, and just hope things get better after the inevitable crash.

Granted, living in the declining era of a great civilization isn’t all it could be, but I don’t see it as reason to quit.

Wince Picks Up the Gauntlet

As I noted below, I was engaged in a discussion with the anarchists over at No Treason. Our discussion got redundant, so I withdrew, but Wince from Wince and Nod has engaged – and tellingly, I think.

Let’s see: The options appear to be a government, or pure anarchy. The first is evil, because it takes the product of our production by coercion. I grant the evils of government, but I don’t sing the praises of anarchy, and Wince illustrates precisely why.

Go read.

Good job Wince.

Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition!

I read Doc Russia’s blog Bloodletting on an occasional basis, simply because I don’t have enough time to read everything I want to read. It’s a uniformly excellent blog, too, but he outdid himself with this post.

How does this sound;

We are constantly under siege by the gun-grabbers to take our arms away, and they seem quite content to mess with the 2nd ammendment in order to do so. How about we add an extra layer of difficulty to their efforts.

I hereby proclaim the establishment of the of

the Holy Equestrian order of the Knights of Saint John Moses

Where the ownership, display and use of naughty weapons is part of religious worship.

Where we pray fortnightly at the altar of our blessed lady of holy trigger control.

Where are hung the many tenets of our faith:

Thou shalt not point the naughty end of thine weapon at any that thoust dost not intendeth to pink mist

Thou shalt keep thine finger straight as the lords staff and off the holy trigger until thou ist most ready to release the fire and brimstone of the wrath of Saint John Moses

Thou shalt always treatest thine shooting rod as thou it were loadedeth whether thee hast loaded it or nay

Thou shalt know the design of thine sidearm as the good lord did intend for man to know his armaments; thou shalt know its function and use; thou shalt know its cleaning and maintainance; thou shalt know its ballistics and metrics

Thou shalt always rebuke the devil in all his forms; as Senators from California, and as Mayors from Chicago.

Thou shalt have the sacred honor to carry a holy artifact of Saint John Moses wherever thou walkest that is not the home of another man.

Thou shalt be charged with defence of and true allegience to the faith.

For, in the beginning, God did give a great gift upon Saint John Moses, and He said unto him:

“Go, John Moses, and create what I have designed for you to create. Create Holy Artifacts for the just and righteous to carry by their side, so that they shall not fear wherever they roam for all the days of their lives.”

And John Moses did hear the word of our lord and didst followeth His words.

The lord saw, and it was Good.

And the lord rejoiced and sent to aid his servant, other saints.

Saint Samuel, who didst follow the guidance of the lord and made men peacemakers.

Saint Smith and Saint Wesson. Saint Heckler and Saint Koch.

And the lord looked out upon the faces of his servants and said:

“Go forth now, and proliferate your works throughout the earth”

And the servants of the lord did.

The Gospel according to Cyclic rate.

Let us pray.

As it was in the X-ring, now and until the depletion of the magazine,

forever and ever.

Cleared Hot.

Can I get a “Hell yeah!”

While I’m Not Posting Here…

If anybody’s interested I’m having a kind of interesting discussion with John Lopez on government over at No Treason.

John’s a Spoonerist. I’m a supporter of Constitutional Republicanism.

We are being civil, though.

In Praise of Lileks

Occasionally, not very often, I get a Wayne & Garth urge to drop to the floor, prostrate myself and proclaim “We’re not worthy! We’re not worthy!”

I love the written word. I admire those who write well. I rank James Lileks at the top of his craft, and today’s Bleat is a sterling example of why.

Please read.

Bloggus Interruptus

Sorry about the light posting and general lack of content. I’m WAY busy, and when I get home I’m pretty burned out.

Don’t expect much for a while.

Had to add this, though: The Democrat Presidential Ticket, Lurch and Opie!

There’s an image for ya!

Welcome readers from Instapundit! It would figure that something I just slapped together would draw White Glenn’s attention, especially when the last week or so of posting has been, shall we say, less than my normal stellar stuff. Please, check the archives, or the “Best Posts” over on the left sidebar. Really, I’m normally much better than this!

This is Better

According to a poster on AR15.com, the John Edwards VP choice has been described as:

“Breast implants for the Democrat ticket”

That is, he adds to the appearance and makes it look sexier, but adds nothing of substance on the inside.

John Edwards: The Implant Candidate. (Silicone or saline?)