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The Cardinal;
Borders &
Liberty;
Declaration of Interdependence;
Commencement 2014; 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 July 4 - 10, 2004.
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Political
Liberty
Articles showing a
positive influence of political action on the cause of Liberty.
Putting Bush in His Place
by Nat Hentoff from The Village Voice
"No president, said the Court, is above
the Constitution, and while George W. Bush is commander in chief of
the armed forces, he is not commander in chief of the rest of us."
Rule of
law prevails - for now
by Robyn E. Blumner from St.
Petersburg Times
"In a 6-3 ruling with the
majority opinion written by Justice John Paul Stevens, the
court said habeas corpus was properly denied only because
the German prisoners had already been adjudicated as guilty
of war crimes. In the case of the Guantanamo detainees,
Stevens wrote, 'they have never been afforded access to any
tribunal, much less charged with and convicted of
wrongdoing'."
Independence From Washington
by Rep. Ron Paul, MD from
LewRockwell.com
"Those who signed the
Declaration of Independence envisioned a nation based on
the rule of law and the right of individuals to live their
lives free from oppression. ... That vision has been
challenged throughout our history, however. The nineteenth
century held slavery. The twentieth century saw the rise
of socialism and its sister, fascism."
Life in
Amerika
Articles
depicting the negative impact of politics on Liberty.
Bush Prevails as House
Refuses to Curb Patriot Act
by Alan Fram from Common
Dreams NewsCenter
"The effort to defy Bush and
bridle the law's powers lost by 210-210, with a majority
needed to prevail. The amendment appeared on its way to
victory as the roll call's normal 15-minute time limit
expired, but GOP leaders kept the vote open for 23 more
minutes as they persuaded about 10 Republicans who
initially supported the provision to change their votes."
Our Broken System
by Sibel
Edmonds from Antiwar.com
"Under [Judge
Walton's] ruling, I ... am not entitled to pursue my
1st and 5th Amendment rights.... He arrived at this
decision without allowing my attorney and I any due
process.... He made his decision after allowing the
government attorneys to present their case to him,
privately, in camera, ex parte; we were not allowed to
participate in these cozy sessions."
Dumb and Getting Dumber
by Rodger Jacobs from
Strike The Root
"According to the NEA
report, the number of non-reading adults increased
by over 17 million between 1992 and 2002. ... In
1992, 72.6 million adults in the United States did
not crack open a book. That's a fairly gasp-inducing
number itself, but it gets worse by 2002, when the
number of those who refuse to read a book increased
to 89.9 million."
Ordered
Liberty without the State
Some
people say it's Anarchy, some say it's not possible. It is
an interesting topic.
by Catfarmer
from The Price of Liberty
"The State has
no incentive to protect the independence of the individual,
since it has no power without dependents to justify its
protective authority. The State has every reason to wreak
havoc with our states of interdependence, because it cannot
guarantee our dependence on itself without destroying our
interdependence. The State can only take what we already
have, and can only give back what it has taken from us: It
can take our independence by destroying our means of
remaining interdependent."
My Route To Voluntaria
by James L. Payne from
Strike The Root
"I concluded ... that the
ideal society would be one where the members ...
abstained from the initiation of force to attempt to
solve social problems. ... I tried to show how the
public functions now undertaken by a coercive,
centralized government would be undertaken in a
voluntary regime more efficiently and with less vexation
by small-scale units, especially voluntary
organizations."
The Internet: the New
Tribune of the People
by Steven LaTulippe
from LewRockwell.com
"The reason why
everything is different now is the Internet. It has
provided the American people with a spotlight with
which to observe the inner workings of the Imperial
elite. And it is totally outside the control of the
establishment. People can log on, share information,
and debate opinions in a forum that is wild and
free. It can’t be co-opted, bribed, threatened, or
cajoled."
Spreading Decentralism
Articles demonstrating an increase in the dispersal of
power.
by Andrew
Morriss from The Freeman
"Even though
borders can be an excuse for reducing liberty, a world
with lots of borders is nonetheless a far friendlier
world for liberty than one with fewer borders. They
promote competition for people and money, which tends to
restrain the state from grabbing either."
Morning in Iraq?
by Ivan Eland from
The Independent Institute
"Guerilla-style
fighting is the most successful form of warfare
in human history. And the Iraqi insurgency has
all of the needed prerequisites for a successful
guerrilla operation. To prevail, the insurgents
need a sanctuary, a source of arms and supplies,
and the support of a significant portion of the
Iraqi people."
A Vermont
divided
by Anne Wallace
Allen from benningtonbanner.com
"The town of
Killington is pressing forward with plans to
secede from Vermont and will present draft
legislation to New Hampshire's governor next
week. The town now knows many of the details
needed to make the secession happen, Town
Manager David Lewis said Friday. He said
he'd heard there are New Hampshire lawmakers
willing to sponsor the legislation, though
he didn't have names."
The
New World Hegemon
Depictions of the coming Imperial power
Legal Nonsense
by Charley Reese from
Antiwar.com
"So it turns out old
Saddam Hussein was correct. He is still the legal
president of Iraq; the new Iraqi government is
illegal and has no right to try him. That, of
course, will not prevent him from being tried and
eventually hanged. One of the things I hope
Americans are learning, besides the fact that the
war wasn't worth it, is that the rule of law is a
farce."
Kerry Would Rather
Lose Than Oppose the War
by Anthony Gregory
from LewRockwell.com
"Why doesn't Kerry
change his position, even if it would likely win
him the White House? My guess is that Kerry has
no interest in winning on a pro-peace platform,
simply because it would diminish his mandate to
make war once elected. He approves of Bush's
imperial presidency, voted for Bush's imperial
actions, and now wants the job of Emperor
himself."
Torture as Due
Process
by James Bovard
from The Future of Freedom Foundation
"The story of
how Bush proclaimed and exploited the power
with respect to enemy combatants vivifies
the war on terrorism’s threat against the
U.S. Constitution."
Politics by Other Means
War, rumors of war, and politicians
fomenting war.
Jobs,
Education, Health Care, Who Cares
by Llewellyn
H. Rockwell, Jr. from LewRockwell.com
"The whole
theme of the Kerry ticket so far is
maddeningly reactionary. It seems to date
from yesteryear, when economic affairs
were national as opposed to international,
when government programs were large
instead of bit players in the market, and
when labor unions controlled a sizeable
slice of the labor force. The Kerry ticket
seems completely detached from the reality
of the world marketplace and the growing
implausibility of New Deal-style central
planning."
The Draft
Is Fascist
by Sheldon
Richman from The Future of Freedom
Foundation
"This is the
mark of a closet totalitarian: the
state's presumptions and impositions are
not to be questioned. If the freedom of
the individual must be stolen, well,
that's how it goes. Now shut up and
march."
Thy Kingdom
Come...Undone
by Chris
Basten from Strike The Root
"Logically
speaking, the presidency should be
eliminated if we really are a free
country that wishes to spread freedom
around the world. The president is the
single, most persevering barrier to
world peace and freedom that we have.
Voting for a president only encourages
immorality and death around the world.
How many innocent people have suffered
or have been killed because of our damn
presidency?"
Spontaneous Order
Articles
showing decentralized successes.
Why Capitalism is Inevitable
by Joseph
Stromberg and Jeffrey Tucker from Ludwig von Mises Institute
"In this, the
conservatives resembled their supposed enemies, the
socialists. After all, socialism was, as Rothbard put it,
'essentially a confused, middle-of-the-road movement.' Its
supposed goal of liberty, peace, and prosperity was to be
achieved through the imposition of new forms of regimentation,
mercantilism, and feudalism. Socialism seeks, in Rothbard's
words, 'liberal ends by the use of conservative means'."
Life
After Public School
by Jeff Langr from Strike The
Root
"There would no doubt be
failures in a non-statist system. But at least there would
be no opportunity for those in power to add insult to injury
like they currently do, by ramming their political agendas
down the throats of impressionable children. I'd rather have
the choices that the free market system ensures, as opposed
to the poor odds that the statist system offers."
Crucifying public debate
by Josie Appleton from spiked
"A more genuine kind of
community would mean people being completely free to bash
out ideas in public and to hold each other to account. The
British National Party and mad mullahs would be able to rant
away as they please - and others would be able to tell them
why they are talking rubbish."
Nonspontaneous Disorder
Articles
showing centrally planned disasters.
Government Spending -- A
Tax on the Middle Class
by Rep. Ron
Paul, MD from LewRockwell.com
"Anyone
truly concerned about the middle class suffering from
falling real wages, under-employment, a rising cost of
living, and a decreasing standard of living should pay a
lot more attention to monetary policy. Federal spending,
deficits, and Federal Reserve mischief hurt the poor
while transferring wealth to the already rich."
Government Regulation of
Internet Telephony: Dangerous at Any Level
by Francis Orzechowski
from Foundation for Economic Education
"All regulation
deleteriously affects the economic spheres to which it
is applied. Government meddling with the Internet, one
of the last unregulated spheres, has the potential to
cause disproportionate harm. Legislators may qualify
their VOIP intervention by noting that it is only
voice transmission that it is being regulated, not the
whole Internet. Others, especially those who
understand how government uses vague legislative
precedents to increase its power, will remain
skeptical."
Look Out for Food
Deserts!
by Brad Edmonds from
Strike The Root
"Price supports that would
allow inefficient mom-and-pop operations to stay in
business would have to be directed exclusively at
large grocery stores and chains, and the government
would have to decide what constitutes a 'large' one.
Being unprecedented, this new system of price controls
would require a new bureaucratic infrastructure of its
own, to determine which chains or individual stores
are exempt from the price strictures. This, in turn,
would create incentives for cheating among grocers,
would invite bureaucratic corruption, and would divert
the productive energies of managers to creating (e.g.)
new business structures to get around the price laws."
War Is The Health Of The State
War is the ultimate State intervention
in society.
Global Eye -- Master
Class
by
Chris Floyd from themoscowtimes.com
"It's
the same operation that Hussein ran. He's accused of
skimming $4.4 billion from the Development Fund
while he was in power -- but that took him years.
Bush almost matched him in just 14 months. As the
Iraqis say of the occupation: 'The pupil has gone;
the master has arrived'."
Support the Cause of
Liberty--Not the Troops
by Roger Young from
Strike The Root
"The fact is that
'supporting the troops' only strengthens the
resolve of the tyrants that control them. This
support, wrapped in emotional fervor and
embellished in a wave of patriotic color, confers
legitimacy upon The State's rule and policies--a
legitimacy it must constantly work to protect."
The Horrors of War
by Laurence M. Vance
from LewRockwell.com
"The truth of Randolph
Bourne's classic statement, 'War is the health of
the state,' can be seen throughout the excerpts
from the diaries and letters in 'Intimate Voices.'
To get a war to work -- to get men to kill other
men that have never aggressed against them and
that they don’t even know -- the state must do two
things: convince men to love the state and to hate
the members of other states. The first is always
cloaked in patriotism, and leads to an acceptance
of interventionism. The second is always cloaked
in nationalism, and leads to hatred toward
foreigners within one’s country."
Bits of History
The Past seen with a
fresh look.
The Last Good
Democrat
by
Thomas J. DiLorenzo from LewRockwell.com
"Grover Cleveland was a principled classical
liberal. But even while serving as president, his
own Democratic Party was deserting him as the
forces of statism and unlimited democracy,
unleashed by the death of states' rights in 1865,
were beginning to dominate American politics."
The Fun-Loving
Founding Father
by Will Wilkinson
from Reason
"You can't be
knocked from a pedestal you refuse to mount.
Morris was no statue of Republican virtue. He
liked making money, and he was good at it. He
also liked sleeping with other men's wives. He
was good at that, too, and he wasn't sorry about
any of it."
Democratic
Disillusions
by Carlos A. Ball
from Cato Institute
"Latin Americans
must face up to the fact that government is the
problem. The politicians we have been electing
for decades only manage to sink us into deeper
despair. The U.N. summits and the IMF
bureaucrats will never point the way out."
War and Peace
Articles showing the
nature of War.
by
Scott Palmer from LewRockwell.com
"We
had to forget, had to make ourselves forget,
that our adversaries were as much children of
God as we were. And our civilization, which
boasts some of the proudest achievements of
human history, from the Sermon on the Mount to
the Magna Carta, from Archimedes to Feynman,
from Herodotus to Spengler, now wears a stain of
blood -- the same blood that still drips from
our victorious hands."
On War -- The
October Surprises
by William S.
Lind from CounterPunch
"If Iran could
mass quickly and use effective camouflage and
deception to conceal at least the scope of its
concentration, then suddenly attack into Iraq
with two or three corps, we could face a
perilous situation. Iranian success would
depend heavily on how Iraqis reacted ... it
might win the cooperation of Iraq's resistance
movement."
Kill 'Em All and
Let God Sort Them Out
by Bob Wallace
from Strike The Root
"Instead of
setting up death camps, the US blockades
countries for 10 years, leading to the deaths
of hundreds of thousands of people. We get rid
of our nuclear waste by making it into
depleted uranium rounds and polluting other
countries. The bloodthirsty sheeple cheer from
the sidelines. We all know they have no
intention of making their way to the front
lines."
Great Individuals In History
Some people stand out
from the crowd.
Composer -
Stephen Foster : July 4, 1826
from Center
for American Music
"But as the
child of a middle-class family in an era
before tax-supported public education,
he variously was privately tutored, then
schooled at private academies in
Pittsburgh and in north-central
Pennsylvania. He expressed a distaste
for rote learning and recitation, but
was an avid reader and eventually became
a literate, well-educated person by the
standards of his day."
Actress -
Janet Leigh : July 6, 1927
by Tony
Fontana from IMDb
"Living in
apartments, Janet was a bright child
who skipped several grades and
finished high school when she was 15.
As a lonely child, she would spend
much of her time at movie theaters."
Scientist/Inventor - Nikola Tesla : July
10, 1856
from
Tesla Memorial Society of New York
"In
February 1882, Tesla discovered the
rotating magnetic field, a fundamental
principle in physics and the basis of
nearly all devices that use
alternating current. Tesla
brilliantly adapted the principle of
rotating magnetic field for the
construction of alternating current
induction motor and the polyphase
system for the generation,
transmission, distribution and use of
electrical power."
Culcha'
Books, Movies,
TV, Media, Music, poetry, etc.
by
Bob Tipton from The Libertarian Enterprise
"'Do
you hear that?' Caroline asked. 'What?' replied
Jeffrey. 'The cardinal. There.' Caroline jabbed
a finger towards the sill of the front window.
'Isn't he just great?' The car was parked
nose-in to the garage, so Jeffrey had to crane
his neck around in order to see the window."
Libertarian
Lessons of "Fahrenheit 9/11"
by Jonathan David
Morris from mensnewsdaily.com
"I, for one, don't
believe the Patriot Act protects Americans at
all. If you ask me, the best way to protect
Americans is to keep America out of wars. That
means keeping America out of other countries.
Bush won't change that. Kerry won't change
that. Either way, we're stuck with the status
quo. Which brings us back to libertarianism."
Fred: Mostly
Useless -- Does Splendid Daughters, Though. A
Biologic Idiot Savant, Maybe.
by Fred Reed from
FredOnEverything.net
"Of course there’s
no reason to brag at all. It is better to
convey your virtues by overwhelming inference.
If people don't draw the inference, well, it
probably wasn't there to draw. That has always
been my approach. I haven't impressed many
people, but I haven't made a fool of myself
either. Well, not that way, anyhow."
The lighter side
Humor, satire, cartoons,
parodies, food, popular music
and other things to amuse.
I Agree With Me
by P. J. O'Rourke from
The Atlantic Monthly
"I don't think drugs are
bad. I used to be a hippie. I think drugs are fun.
Now I'm a conservative. I think fun is bad. I would
agree all the more with Limbaugh if, after he
returned from rehab, he'd shouted (as most Americans
ought to), "I'm sorry I had fun! I promise not to
have any more!"
Infographic -
Fahrenheit 9/11
from The Onion
Michael Moore's
documentary 'Fahrenheit 9/11' has broken
box-office records, but some Bush supporters says
its flawed. What is the basis of their objections?
Electronic Election
2004
by Mark Fiore from
The Village Voice
Goodbye, dimpled chads.
Hello, paperless ballots!
Deep Thought
Scientific and scholarly studies,
philosophical essays, in-depth and longer
articles.
Choose Life
by Jeff Langr from Strike
The Root
"Unfortunately, believers in
the secular and non-secular
religions dominate and wield
large amounts of power. Both
groups promote the idea that
things are better off when
you're dead. Non-secular
religion proponents believe
your life here is only a
trial for ensuring you can
bask in a glorious
afterlife. Secular religion
proponents believe your
existence on earth is a part
of the problem."
Freedom's Requisite
by Ralph R. Reiland
from Ludwig von Mises
Institute
"Hayek infuriated much of
the world's political and
scholarly establishment by
being an unabashed
champion of free markets,
individual liberty, and
limited government. Over
the long haul, declared
Hayek, individualistic
objectives cannot be
achieved through
collectivist means."
Deconstructing Sentences
by Jacob Sullum from
Reason
"Although Blakely
ostensibly constrains the
power of judges, the
upshot over the short term
may be more judicial
discretion. Paul Cassell,
a U.S. district judge in
Utah, recently announced
he would henceforth treat
the federal guidelines not
as requirements but as a
useful source of
information about the
appropriate sentence to
choose between the
statutory minimum and
maximum -- that is, more
like actual guidelines."
Miscellany
Articles not
easily classified.
Speechless
by Sunni Maravillosa
from The Price of Liberty
"On June 21 the
Supreme Court killed any pretense that may have
remained of protecting the Constitution, and
thereby U.S. citizens, from abuse at the hands of
the state. And most of America scratched, belched,
and turned on the TV."
Wal-Mart Serves
Humanity
by Art Carden
from Ludwig von Mises Institute
"As I tell my
students, the great virtue of the free market
is that it exhausts all possible mutually
beneficial trades, and trade is the very
essence of wealth creation. Preventing
voluntary trade makes at least someone worst
off, so 'society' is poorer for it."
It Matters Not
How Strait the Gate
by Charley Reese
from LewRockwell.com
"We do not choose
the time or the circumstances in which we are
born. Most of us do not choose the time or
circumstances of our death. Our only choice,
as another English writer has pointed out, is
what we do with the time we have."
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