One Thing Guaranteed; Oozing Gray Sludge; Power of Twelve; Sociology of Leopard Man; these articles have their titles and text in this color and are featured this week in -
 
Ender's Review of the Web
 

Web articles of likely interest to individualists found during the week of Apr. 18-24, 2004.

 
Comments and suggestions on the content and structure of this review are welcome. To accommodate such discussion I have created a Yahoo group for it. That group is ERevD: EnderReviewDiscussion. Feel free to jump in there at any time.
 
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Political Liberty
Articles showing a positive influence of political action on the cause of Liberty.
 
Tactics and hypocrisy
        by Sunni Maravillosa from The Price of Liberty
"There is no one size fits all in freedom, just as elsewhere. A rational choice for one person, or one organization, becomes a rationalizing agent when applied to other individuals or organizations operating under different conditions."
 
P.C. crowd should learn how to take a joke
        by Gerald K. McOscar from The Daily Times
"Freedom of speech is first among our constitutionally protected rights for good reason. A democratic people must be free to talk to themselves. More importantly, they must be free to laugh at themselves. It is not good when people and nations take themselves too seriously."
 
Cannabis 'Scrips to Calm Kids?
        by Kelley Beaucar Vlahos from FOX News
"As a California pediatrician and 49-year-old mother of two teenage daughters, Claudia Jensen says pot might prove to be the preferred medical treatment for attention deficit disorder -- even in adolescents."
 
Life in Amerika
Articles depicting the negative impact of politics on Liberty.
 
An Oozing Of Gray Sludge - Reflections On Our Media of Communication
        by Fred Reed from FredOnEverything
"If it is your blog (or website), you are the editor. You aren't afraid of advertisers because you don't have any. No one sits at the next desk. If you want to, you can write under an assumed name. Them as wants to read it, will; them as don't, won't. The choice is entirely between you and the reader. The net is...gasp...a truly free press."
 

'They Hate Us Because of Our Freedom'

        by Alfred A. Hambidge, Jr. from Strike The Root
"Freedom is a state of being where an individual does not have to get permission in order to do something that harms no one else's person or property.  How many things can you do without getting some form of government permission? Can you build your house on your own property without obtaining government approval?"
 
Stern Measures
        by Brian Doherty from Reason
"This recent wave of FCC action is clearly a last gasp of a dying mentality regarding public indecency, and of a dying legal structure that thinks it necessary to use force and threats to preserve the chastity of 'broadcast over the public airwaves.' That ridiculous First Amendment loophole will not, I expect, mean anything legally or technologically pretty soon."
 
Ordered Liberty without the State
Some people say it's Anarchy, some say it's not possible. It is an interesting topic.
 
What Should Freedom Lovers Do?
        by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. from Ludwig von Mises Institute
"The thousands of young people who are discovering the ideas of liberty for the first time ought to stay away from the Beltway and all its allures. Instead, they should pursue their love and passion through arts, commerce, education, and even the ministry. These are fields that offer genuine promise with a high return."
 
Here, Please Read My Pamphlet!
        by Per Bylund from Strike The Root
"Truly being libertarian is a necessity for change. Being libertarian is the only way of making the ideas of liberty reality, even if this in the near future means only you and the ones close to you will live in freedom. Speaking to the incentives of people means they too may learn how to identify the fruits of liberty which you have realized in your life."
 
Zen solution to politics
        by Joey B. King from RationalReview.com
"Using the reform strategy, we are obviously fighting with another's bow and arrow and riding another's horse. Everyday, we discuss the faults of the two-party system in America, but we offer few alternatives. Perhaps it is time to work towards an alternative society where we can play by our own rules. The Amish community has done rather well with this non-governmental model for 400 years."
 
Spreading Decentralism
Articles demonstrating an increase in the dispersal of power.
 
The Power of Twelve
        by Jim Davies from Strike The Root
"The astonishing Power of Twelve is that unless a law is popular with at least 95% of a jury pool, a prosecutor has a less than half probability of winning his case, and that to enjoy better than a 75% chance of victory the subject law must face no more than 2% dissenters in society!"
 
Why We Get It Wrong
        by William S. Lind from CounterPunch
"In fact, in Iraq and in Fourth Generation war elsewhere, we are the weaker party. The most important reason this is so is time. For every other party, the distinguishing characteristic of the American intervention force is that it, and it alone, will go away. At some point, sooner or later, we will go home. Everyone else stays, because they live there."
 
Fed up, peasants take over
        by Hector Tobar from South Florida Sun-Sentinel
"People in villages such as Sorata feel that the highly centralized government has failed them. In the face of the central government's broken promises, city council members and Indian leaders in Sorata and elsewhere routinely organize 'methods of pressure,' such as blocking roads."
 
The New World Hegemon
Depictions of the coming Imperial power
 
Iraq: The Moon is Down, Again!
        by William Marina from The Independent Institute
"My favorite book on the integral interaction between occupiers and those being occupied, is John Steinbeck's The Moon is Down (1942), shortly thereafter made into a film starring Cedric Hardwicke, Lee J. Cobb and Henry Travers. I first saw the film in the 1950s, but it is not shown these days." It sounds a bit like the Edge of Darkness (1943) which is shown on TCM occasionally.
 
The emperor's news conference - Caligula as doofus
        by David T. Wright from The Last Ditch
"Folks, here is a man secure about his own righteousness, a man who apparently has never had a moment of self-doubt, who simply doesn't care about any facts he doesn't agree with, who is impulsive and unreflective, and who refuses to acknowlege any responsibility for anything going wrong."
 
Putting a smiley face on an imperial act
        by Bruce Ramsey from The Seattle Times
"American motives are benign, as imperial powers go. We are not in Iraq to steal the oil or to force the Iraqis into Christianity. But we are there to change it. Says Bush, 'My job as the president is to lead this nation into making the world a better place'."
 
Politics by Other Means
War, rumors of war, and politicians fomenting war.
 
In Defense of Spoilers and Quixotes
        by Jesse Walker from Reason
"John Kerry's best chance to win the presidency is to stay out of public and legally change his name to Not Bush. The Democratic grassroots may have accepted Kerry as the 'realistic' nominee, but it's the opportunity to vote for Not Bush that's excited them; and it's Not Bush who's been picking up swing voters in the polls."
 
The "Iraqization" Scam
        by Anthony Gregory from The Independent Institute
"Just as the number of Americans who have died after Bush triumphantly stood in front of the now-famous 'Mission Accomplished' banner exceeds by several times the U.S. death count of 140 before the war 'ended,' the number of American fatalities after the Iraqi handover may make the current death toll seem like a drop in the bucket."
 
9/11 Could Have Been Prevented
        by Sheldon Richman from The Future of Freedom Foundation (via The Price Of Liberty)
"What makes the terrorist threat so frustrating is that it was entirely foreseeable. Anti-interventionists warned about it for many years. But the overseers of the imperial agenda smugly believed they could pursue their objectives with impunity."
 
Spontaneous Order
Articles showing decentralized successes.
 
The Myth of Political Leadership
        by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. from Ludwig von Mises Institute
"To understand the world being recreated before us, we must constantly keep this principle in our mind: trade based on ownership is always and everywhere mutually beneficial. Within the institution of trade -- whether on the most local level or the global level -- we find the key to peace, prosperity, and human flourishing."
 
Buy Gold--Before They Sell Out
        by Douglas Herman  from Strike The Root
"Can you imagine a zinc or chromium certificate--something, anything to reassure a citizenry? When the US government ceased minting pure copper pennies, many older folks assumed the penny was worth far less than the copper content. When a populace awakens to discover their currency is worthless on the worldwide market, fascism becomes a probable next step."
 
Hacks - A Baltimore Way of Life
        by Christina Royster-Hemby from Baltimore City Paper
"There are no statistics on hacking, no academic studies. Yet, as anyone who travels city streets and encounters the finger-wagging hack hail knows, it is a pervasive part of life here."
 
Nonspontaneous Disorder
Articles showing centrally planned disasters.
 
I Am the State, Thy God
        by Dmitry Chernikov from LewRockwell.com
"Oh the destructive might of the world's greatest empire! But destroying is easy. Creating is hard. What does the state know about creating freedom and prosperity? On the contrary, it possesses the opposite of God's creative power; it is entirely impotent to build a civilization. The best it can do is to stay away."
 
Save Space Travel: Kill NASA!
        by Don "Lobo" Tiggre from The Price of Liberty
"Imagine how many more companies would get into the business, and how many more companies would give those entrepreneurs business, if there weren't a prevailing notion afloat in the U.S. that only NASA can do space missions."
 
Government in the Wedding Chapel
        by Robert F. Hawes Jr. from The Libertarian Enterprise
"President Bush and conservatives, this issue of government determining what constitutes a marriage or a family is, at best, so much tilting at windmills when it comes to 'defending' those institutions, and is no more a legitimate or beneficial function of government than the welfare state."
 
War Is The Health Of The State
War is the ultimate State intervention in society.
 
Gearing Up For the Next Military Draft
        by Jerome Tuccille from LewRockwell.com
"If Bush has taught us one lesson, it is that Barry Goldwater and Robert Taft-style Republicanism, with its classical liberal bent, bears as much resemblance to Bush's Republican Party as Aristotle did to Plato."
 
The Great Violet Massacre
        by Catfarmer from The Price of Liberty
"I reflected on the irony of the fact that many people who would consider me crazy for feeling like a mass murderer - simply because I mowed my lawn - might see nothing objectionable in dropping cluster bombs on Iraq or Afghanistan."
 
Locked on Course to Wider War
        by Paul Craig Roberts from Antiwar.com
"Bush's neocon overlords have Bush where they and Arial Sharon want him, locked on a course toward wider war, with American troops, supplied by conscription, serving as Israel's legions. Betrayed by a media that works as government's propaganda arm, the American public has no idea of the tragedy that President Bush has prepared for them."
 
Bits of History
The Past seen with a fresh look.
 
April 19: Freedom's Birthday
        by Scott McPherson from The Future of Freedom Foundation
"The day Americans should mark on their calendar every year is April 19. On that day, 229 years ago, patriot militiamen from the New England countryside rose up against brute force, tyranny, and oppression."
 
Why Men Follow Masters
        by Harry Goslin from LewRockwell.com
"To discover why Americans, who loudly and regularly proclaim to the world that they are the 'freest' people on earth, have been willing participants in their own enslavement for several generations running, we must look to an obscure sixteenth-century text. Etienne de la Boétie penned The Politics of Obedience: The Discourse of Voluntary Servitude...."
 
FDR's Thought Police: Still Alive, Still Censoring
        by P. Gardner Goldsmith from Ludwig von Mises Institute
"What the market does is something the FCC can never do. It lets people decide for themselves, with their own money, what is proper and improper, what is decent and indecent. The threat of FCC fines won't be what keeps network executives from hiring Jackson and Timberlake. The threat of lost business will."
 
War and Peace
Articles showing the nature of War.
 
Eleven Years Since Waco and Very Little Has Changed
        by Anthony Gregory from LewRockwell.com
"April 19, 1775 was the date of the Battle of Lexington and Concord, and a lot has changed in the 229 years since then in the dedication to liberty of the typical American politico. April 19, 1993 was the date of the vicious attack on the Branch Davidians at Waco, Texas, and all that’s changed in the eleven years since then is which of the two political parties is in power...."
 
Freedom Fighters, 'Terrorists' or Revolutionary War Heroes?
        by Anonymous from Strike The Root
"The impasse was broken by a single shot, which was reportedly fired by one of the right-wing extremists. Eight civilians were killed in the ensuing exchange. Ironically, the local citizenry blamed government forces rather than the extremists for the civilian deaths."
 
How Do We Win?
        by Stanley Kober from Cato Institute
"Military power is the power to destroy, but the power to destroy does not translate automatically into political influence. Consequently, if the objective is to use military power to obtain political influence and not simply inflict destruction, the militarily stronger power may confront a troubling choice if the weaker party does not submit."
 
Great Individuals In History
Some people stand out from the crowd.
 
Crusader - Clarence Darrow : Apr. 18th, 1857
        by Douglas O. Linder from The Clarence Darrow Home Page
"There will never be another Darrow. In his time, there was a general belief that intellectual battles could be won, not just fought." Although Darrow would not usually be considered a libertarian - he was a determinist - in my opinion, he was a great individual.
 
Economist - David Ricardo : Apr. 18, 1772
        from The History Of Economic Thought website
"The brilliant British economist David Ricardo was one the most important figures in the development of economic theory.  He articulated and rigorously formulated the 'Classical' system of political economy."
 
Actress - Jessica Lange : Apr. 20, 1949
        by Phillip Oliver from Jessica Lange (a fan site)
Jessica Lange has had an interesting life as this biography shows. She has starred in many films and has always chosen those roles that interested her most. She carried the female lead in Rob Roy (selected for Endervidualism's This Weekend this last issue) and also the recent release Big Fish, both very fine films.
 
Culcha'
Books, Movies, TV, Media, Music, poetry, etc.
 
The Concord Hymn
        by Ralph Waldo Emerson from Endervidualism
"By the rude bridge that arched the flood, Their flag to April's breeze unfurled, Here once the embattled farmers stood, And fired the shot heard round the world." In honor of April 19, Endervidualism's home page salutes the American Revolution.
 
"Not Yours to Give"
        from Mackinac Center for Public Policy
"Disney's new film 'The Alamo' is reintroducing the American people to a once-celebrated backwoodsman-turned-politician. Davy Crockett, who died at the Alamo in 1836, forged his commoner's roots and southern gentility into a Congressional career marked by a principled defense of limited government."
 
Country Joe Band, 2004: "Uncle Sam Needs Your Help Again"
        by Norman Solomon from Common Dreams
"It happens that Country Joe McDonald and the band's other musicians have returned to public space together at a time when many American soldiers -- following the orders of the commander in chief -- are continuing to kill and be killed. An old question is also new: What are we fighting for?"
 
The lighter side
Humor, satire, cartoons, parodies, food, popular music and other things to amuse.
 
When It Rains, It Pours. Acid rain news, from Fallujah to Bangor.
        by Paul Krassner from NewYorkPress
"Many years ago, Carlin and I had a conversation about religion, and -- just like Martha Stewart's friend who testified that she wasn't sure whether it was Martha or herself who said how nice it was to have a broker who gives you private help -- I haven't been sure whether it was Carlin or me who said, 'Did you ever notice that whenever people pray, they're always talking to themselves'?"
 
News Now
        by Mark Fiore from The Village Voice
Iraq, Iraq, Iraq, Iraq....
 
National Endowment For The Arts & Crafts Criticized For Funding Giant Macramé Penis
        from The Onion
"Republican lawmakers and conservative religious groups blasted the National Endowment For The Arts & Crafts Tuesday, claiming that the organization has allocated federal funds for 'obscene crafts'."
 
Deep Thought
Scientific and scholarly studies, philosophical essays, in-depth and longer articles.
 
The One Thing Guaranteed To Work
        by Don "Lobo" Tiggre from The Price of Liberty
"I will feel successful as a parent if my boys grow up to be healthy, happy, and free adults who know that they must respect these same things in others. It is also true that if I succeed at this, I will have contributed concretely and significantly to the world we live in."
 
On Moral Authority
        by Butler Shaffer from LewRockwell.com
"Only in the absence of coercive power can one have moral influence. Coercive power operates as a magnet for division and conflict, as contentious interests compete for the control of its tools of force."
 
The 'Endarkening'
        by Per Bylund from Strike The Root
"This is an era darker than the Middle Ages, dismantling the ideals which were the very foundation of progress, technology, and wealth. It is an endarkening era, where political powers grow at the cost of progress, and destruction at the cost of achievement."
 
Miscellany
Articles not easily classified.
 
Temporary Worker, Permanent Tourist
        by Joel Simon from The Libertarian Enterprise
"Many of us feel a growing sense that something is coming. ... In the face of galloping taxes and fees, cavity searches and universal surveillance and a dark perception that everything's just generally going to hell, here we sit. Deer in the headlights. Stuck."
 
The Art of Moral Self-Defense
        by David R. Henderson from LewRockwell.com
"By challenging him on this [ad hominem] and not letting the discussion proceed until we had resolved this, I was the one getting him to apologize and I claimed the moral high ground. That's probably not what he expected when he started the discussion."
 
The Sociology of Leopard Man
        by Logan Feys from Sense of Life Objectivists
"Conformity can be seen as the world's most prevalent and most pernicious psychological disorder.  The consequences of it are no less than the suppression and destruction of one's self.  To be human is to be an individual human, with individual tastes, talents, values, and aspirations that are distinct from those of others."
 
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