Month: October 2012

What the Minnesota Constitutional Amendments are Really About

On November 6th the people of Minnesota will be given the oppertunity to vote on two constitutional amendments. One of the amendments would make reversing Minnesota’s prohibition against same sex marriages more difficult by making that prohibition constitutional. The other amendment will require Minnesotans to present state issued photo identification in order to vote. If you live in this state you’ve probably heard all of the arguments for and against these amendments by now and if you don’t live in this state I’ll save you a bunch of pointless reading. Yes I said pointless reading. These amendments aren’t being put on the ballot to solve any problems, they’re being put onto the ballot to get people to the polls.

Consider the majority of candidates being put forth by the Democrats and Republicans. Both parties have managed to put forward candidates that their bases simply can’t get fired up about. Even their presidential candidates are failing to excite the voting base as Mitt Romney isn’t well liked by many Republicans and Barack Obama isn’t well liked by many Democrats. A huge number of Republicans and Democrats have noted that the only reason they’re voting for their party’s candidate is because he’s not as bad as the other guy.

In such a situation both parties need to perform some card tricks to encourage their voters to go to the polls. The constitutional amendments are those card tricks. The Marriage Amendment is getting the evangelicals who traditionally vote Republican and the progressives who traditionally vote Democrat fired up. Evangelicals believe that religion and the state should be tied and therefore laws prohibiting same sex marriages should be placed on the books. Progressives believe that the state should be secular and therefore oppose any law that attempts to enforce religious morality. The damnedest thing about this amendment is that it serves no actual purpose since same sex marriages are already illegal in the state of Minnesota.

The Voter ID Amendment is no different. Republicans in this state are still butt hurt over the fact that they lost two close elections. First Al Franken managed to pull a slight victory over Norm Coleman and then Mark Dayton managed to pull a slight victory over Tom Emmer. Instead of admitting the possibility that Coleman and Emmer sucked as candidates the Republican Party attempted to blame their failures on voter fraud. Meanwhile the Democratic Party in Minnesota has claimed that the Voter ID Amendment is meant to discourage minorities, the elderly, and college students from voting. If there’s one thing the Democratic base loves it’s democracy and they will fervently attack any perceived attempt at discouraging individuals from voting. Much like the Marriage Amendment the Voter ID Amendment is pointless because there has been no proof brought forward demonstrating any notable voter fraud has taken place.

Let’s face it, the Republican and Democratic politicians don’t give a shit if same sex couples can marry or if voter fraud is occurring. If same sex marriages are made more illegal through a constitutional amendment the Republicans can jump for joy and claim a victory while the Democrats can scream about civil rights being violated by the Republicans. Likewise if voters are required to present state issued identification before voting the Republicans can jump for joy and claim victory while the Democrats can scream about much of their base being discouraged from voting by the big mean Republicans. No matter how the amendment votes go both parties win. In the end they’re merely using voters as pawns in a vicious game of chess. Neither party cares about you, they only care about maintaining their power. Maintaining that power requires the support of public opinion and that can only happen if the people are too distracted by these minor issues to analyze the bigger issue of the state itself.

Foxes Guarding the Hen House

Statists often claim that the state is necessary to protect the people. I find it rather strange to argue the need to have murders, extortionists, and rapists employed to protect us from murders, extortionists, and rapists. The police are not men of good will who benevolently protect the people from evil. Instead the police are criminals themselves. They murder anybody who resists their tyranny, extort people by issuing fines for nonviolent actions, and even commit rape:

The FBI defines rape as “The penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object … without the consent of the victim.” By this definition, Vagnini raped multiple people while he was on the job. In one instance, he allegedly caused his victim to experience anal bleeding for days. In another, he added insult to injury by allegedly planting drugs on his victim.

Rather than serving and protecting, other officers chose to aid and abet. In one incident, Vagnini’s victim was held down by other officers while Vagnini raped him. Furthermore, the Milwaukee Police Department was aware of these incidents for “a couple of years.” They waited “until authorities recognized a pattern” before they did anything to hold him accountable. Translation: The police department was aware that Vagnini was committing rapes, but they waited to do anything about it until they had determined that he was a serial rapist.

This story is appalling, but sadly it is not unique. For example, in Utah police officers have been known to conduct “forced catheterization” searches, which consist of forcibly inserting a catheter into the victim’s urethra to perform drug tests. In 2004, Haley Hooper was held down by four officers while a catheter was inserted into her vagina. While this met the legal definition of object rape, her lawsuit was dismissed on the grounds that the officers were protected by “qualified immunity.” Officers involved in another forced catheterization were promoted rather than prosecuted.

State protection is a fallacy because it implies the state actually protects people. In reality the state claims a monopoly on violence and uses that claimed monopoly to do whatever it pleases. Those tasked with enforcing the state’s decrees are often given special privileges including the ability to break the very laws they’re supposedly upholding. While the state claims any form of penetration without consent is rape it often forcefully penetrates individuals under the guise of searches. By their very definition they are committing rape. How can we expect individuals to uphold the law when they are given permission to break the law?

The State Never Forgets to Punish Good Deeds

When the state sees somebody performing a good deed they are usually quick to swoop in and mercilessly punish the good Samaritan. Take the paramedic who had the audacity to give a blanket to a man in need:

Two weeks ago, a house caught fire, and the elderly man who lived there was brought outside wearing only his underwear. Paramedic Jeff Gaglio gave him a blanket. Then on Tuesday, Gaglio was informed that the department was bringing him up on charges for his action. Jerald James, chief of the Emergency Medical Service (EMS), who is responsible for Gaglio’s punishment, said in defense of the charges, “We can’t have an employee who feels that they have a right to give away state property without getting prior approval.” In fact, his department and the city of Detroit are strapped for cash. However, it has also been revealed that the department did not pay for the blanket. The one that Gaglio gave away had been donated.

What I find most laughable is the idea that the state can own property. In this case the blanket was donated by if it was purchased by the state it would have been purchased with stolen money. The state exists solely off of extortion in the form of taxes, fines, and other assorted fees. Failure to pay taxes or fines will result in the state’s boot being brought down upon you and if you fail to pay any demanded fees before doing something you will also find the state’s boot coming down upon you. Considering this fact it’s impossible to say the state can own legitimate property since all the property they acquire is acquired through extortion.

The way I see it the state doesn’t own property and the people have every right to claim any property currently claimed by the state. Every building, automobile, and aircraft carrier was made possible by resources stolen from you and me. Were there any justice these goods would be liquidated and the funds dispersed amongst the population based on the amount of money that was stolen from them by the state. Instead the state punishes anybody who attempts to return even the tiniest of these goods to the people.

Leah Plante Joins Fellow Anarchist in Prison

I have an update on yesterday’s story about Leah Planet. She refused to testify against he fellow anarchists during the grand jury hearing and is now being held in a cage:

A third self-described anarchist from the Pacific Northwest has been jailed by federal officials for refusing to speak before a secretive grand jury that the accused have called a politically-motivated modern-day witch-hunt.

Leah-Lynn Plante, a mid-20s activist from Seattle, Washington, was ushered out of court by authorities on Wednesday after refusing for a third time to answer questions forced on her by a grand jury — a panel of prosecutors convened to determine if an indictment can be issued for a federal crime.

She joins fellow anarchists Katherine Olejnik and Matt Duran as state prisoners in their fishing expedition. Even though the state goons had enough cause to get a warrant issued (in other words they were able to drop the word anarchist near a judge) they apparently couldn’t find enough evidence of wrongdoing to charge the three with any crime so they’ve resorted to coercive tactics to wrest testimonies from the three. Fortunately Leah, Katherine, and Matt are reusing to play the state’s game.

I can do nothing but commend the three’s refusal to cooperate with the criminal gang generally referred to as government. Whether they do anything wrong or not isn’t really relevant in this case as responsibility to gather evidence of wrongdoing falls to the prosecutors. Seeing insufficient evidence exists to even bring up charges this is looking more like an anarchist witch hunt than a serious attempt to get justice for wronged individuals.

President Obama is Trying to Get Us Directly Involved in Syria

President Obama, the man who ran on an anti-war platform in 2008, is working very hard to get America directly involved in Syria. According to Dennis Kucinich, Obama has deployed troops very close to the Syrian border:

Ohio Democratic Rep. Dennis Kucinich believes the deployment of American troops in Jordan — which was announced Wednesday — brings the United States “immeasurably” closer to being dragged into the civil war in Syria.

“I can see in a moment how it happens: we’re a few dozen miles from the Syrian border and all of a sudden we are within the reach of physical danger. All it takes is a single incident,” Kucinich said in a phone interview with U.S. News.

The Ohio congressman complained that the commander-in-chief sent the troops to Jordan “without notifying Congress.” Ironically, Kucinich noted, the Obama administration announced the deployment exactly ten years after the House of Representatives authorized President George W. Bush to invade Iraq.

As Kucinich said our troops will be within reach of physical danger. All that is needed is for one Syrian soldier, or more likely a rebel acting as a Syrian soldier, to fire on our troops and an excuse to enter a direct conflict with the Syrian state will exist.

Why would Obama do this? Why would he purposely put United States personnel needlessly in danger? Probably because he wants to the start the war with Syria less Romney gets the chance if he wins the election. In addition to fulfilling our state’s bloodlust winning against the Syrian government would give us yet another country bordering Iran to build military bases in. The path to Persia will be all but entirely paved soon enough.

The State Protects Its Cronies Part Two

At the beginning of this year the state ruled that telecommunications companies can’t be sued for participating in warrantless wiretaps. Needless to say the decision was appealed to the Supreme Court who, not surprisingly, upheld the ruling:

WASHINGTON – The US Supreme Court let stand Tuesday an immunity law on wiretapping viewed by government as a useful anti-terror tool but criticized by rights activists as a flagrant abuse of executive power.

The top US court declined to review a December 2011 appeals court decision that rejected a lawsuit against AT&T for helping the National Security Agency monitor its customers’ phone calls and Internet traffic.

It’s not surprising to see the state protecting its cronies. If you’re providing a service that allows the state to ignore the declared rights of individuals you’re all but guaranteed some amount of state protection (so long as you’re useful). Telecommunication companies not only receive protection from the state for participating in warrantless wiretaps but they also make a great deal of money off of wiretaps.

For those of you who still believe the Constitution is the be all and end all for fighting tyranny I must ask you a question: do you like the fact that nine assholes in robes get to, according to the Constitution, determine your rights?

Inconsistent Libertarians

Brace yourself, I’m about to go on a rant. If you don’t feel like reading a rant just scroll up to the next story.

I’m easily irritated by inconsistency, which is why I loath the /r/Libertarian subreddit. While the subreddit is a great source for libertarian news the contributing members are extremely inconsistent. Yesterday I posted about the story of Leah Plante. She is facing cage time because she is refusing to testify against her fellows in a grand jury. Most libertarians would find such a situation reprehensible as one has the right to remain silent. This story made it to /r/Libertarian and, in general, most comments were on the side of Leah. As expected a large number of libertarians were opposed to the idea of coerced testimonies and witch hunts against political dissidents. That was until somebody pointed out that Leah has been involved in the Occupy movement. Suddenly the general consensus of /r/Libertarian went from “This case is bullshit, you shouldn’t be coerced into testifying against somebody!” to “Fuck that bitch! Occupiers deserve everything they get!”

What the fuck? People only have rights so long as they’re not involved in political movements you detest? A person has the right to free speech or to remain silent unless they’re not a libertarian? That, ladies and gentlemen, is a hypocritical stance if there ever was one.

As a libertarian I’ve found myself defending some very unsavory characters. I find myself defending the right of racists, bigots, etc. to speak freely. I find myself defending the right of those who have committed fraud to keep and bear arms. I find myself defending lots of people who I vehemently disagree with because libertarianism is, at least I thought, supposed to be able equal rights for all. It shouldn’t matter if you’re black or white, man or woman, libertarian or communist. If you’re a human being you should enjoy the same freedoms as every other human being. These freedoms, at least according to most libertarian philosophies, include not being coerced into actions you have no desire to take.

This “us” vs. “them” tribalistic bullshit needs to end. I’m not a big fan of collectivism and spend quite a bit of time arguing against it but that doesn’t mean I will suddenly do a 180 degree turn on my beliefs when a collectivist is facing a bad situation. Remaining consistent is important when you’re trying to make a philosophical argument. If you’re preaching one thing but doing another people will soon ignore everything you say. Arguing that everybody should live free of coercion one moment and then claiming coercion is perfectly acceptable the next moment makes you a hypocrite and nobody listens to hypocrites.

That’s my two cents, spend it however you want.

Agorism Helping Those in Need

Agorism, as I see it, is a movement with two purposes. First there is the obvious purpose of bringing an end to the violent state by witholding resources, such as tax money, from it. The second purpose is to help your fellow individual. Many goods and services that are necessary for survival are priced far higher than the poor can afford. Often the high prices are due to the increased overhead caused by regulatory compliance, intellectual property laws, and taxes. How long do you think a pharmaceutical company could rake in hundreds of dollars of profit for a single bottle of pills if the state didn’t maintain a monopoly for that company? Without the granted patents on the pill or the regulations that prevent newcomers from entering the market the price of those pills would quickly fall as other producers entered the market and started selling the pills for far less.

Practicing agorism, and therefore loosening the state’s grip and helping your fellow individuals, can be done in many different ways. One can sell their goods and services “under the table” in order to avoid paying taxes, which serves the dual purpose of keeping money from the state and bringing down the overall costs incurred by the producer (and therefore, in turn, the overall costs incurred by the customer). Another way to practice agorism is to exploit currently existing purchasing systems to offer goods and services to others at a lower price. For example, an entrepreneur or entrepreneurs with enough capital to make a bulk purchase of a good could negotiate a lower price per unit than those purchasing low quantities of that good. Once the entrepreneur or entrepreneurs had the goods in hand they could resell them at a cost still lower than would normally be incurred when purchasing low quantities. A second example would be exploiting insurance policies to acquire more goods than were needed and reselling the surplus, which is what some people are doing in order to help diabetics who can’t normally afford testing strips:

Although some estimates peg the manufacturing cost at about a dime per strip, it’s not unusual for a single strip to retail for $1 or more. And it’s not unusual for diabetics dependent on insulin to have to test three to 10 times a day. The cost quickly adds up.

“It’s out of reach of most people,” said Lemoyne Bloom, who advertised on craigslist to buy unused test strips in South Florida with the goal of reselling them at bargain-basement prices — but with enough of a profit margin to still make money.

[…]

One shade away from this black market is the largely legal practice of buying unused strips from diabetics or their middlemen and then reselling them, usually over the Internet. The so-called gray market circumvents full retail prices charged by pharmaceutical companies.

Advocates of such resales say the only victim is Big Pharma, which has priced its products so high that diabetics no longer can afford them. The marketplace is doing what big pharmaceutical companies won’t: providing test strips at a low enough cost that diabetics have a shot at regular testing.

“Some people just give us their strips and we don’t resell those, we donate them,” Bloom said. “That’s why we’re here, to help people.”

[…]

Who sells their test strips to these middlemen? “A lot of people have insurance and get strips they don’t need,” Bloom said.

Even though the state now mandates every American either purchase health insurance or face fines many people can’t afford health insurance. Those who can’t afford health insurance often cannot afford basic medical supplies either. This presents a real problem for those with medical conditions requiring periodic intervention such as diabetes. Normally these individuals would be left with no real option other than forgoing needed medical care but agorism gives them an alternative. Industrious entrepreneurs have found an exploit in the state manipulated health insurances system that grants them access to cheap testing strips. Using this exploit both the entrepreneurs and those in need of testing strips benefit while the state and its cronies suffer (even if their suffering is minor one can be bled to death by thousands of paper cuts).

Agorism is about mutual cooperation and that’s exactly what’s happening in the “gray” market for diabetes testing strips.

Voting for a Third-Party

The presidential election is fast approaching and that means the voting rhetoric is heating up. One of the most repeated fallacies regarding voting is that voting for a third-party is a vote for one of the two major candidates. Republicans will claim that casting a vote for Gary Johnson is actually casting a vote for Barack Obama while Democrats will claim that casting a vote for Jill Stein is actually casting a vote for Mitt Romney. As I’ve explained before voting doesn’t work that way. The premise that voting for a third-party candidate is actually a vote for one of the two major candidates is based on the assumption that the voter would have voted for one of the two major candidates if the third-party option wasn’t available. This assumption states that libertarians voting for Gary Johnson would have voted for Mitt Romney had no Libertarian Party candidate been available. Why would anybody make such an assumption?

I would never vote for Mitt Romney, period. The man supports gun control and wants to murder people overseas. Both of these stances are morally abhorrent to me. My opinion is shared with many people who are planning to vote for Gary Johnson this election season. Gary Johnson isn’t stealing votes from Mitt Romney because many of Johnson’s supporters would never vote for Romney. If Johnson wasn’t on the ballot many libertarians wouldn’t vote for any presidential candidate.

Consider this example: you’re given a ballot to vote for who will be living with you for the next year. This ballot contains three options: a serial killer, a serial rapist, and a man with no criminal record. Which of the three are you likely to vote for? I’m guessing most of the people reading this post would vote for the man with no criminal record because nobody wants to live with a serial killer or a serial rapist. What if the ballot was changed and the man with no criminal record was removed? Would you sudden vote for the serial killer, serial rapist, or simply not vote? I’m guessing most of the people reading this post would simply not vote. Under such a circumstance it’s asinine to claim that the man with no criminal record is stealing votes from the serial killer or serial rapist. If you’re still unsure of what my point is exchange the serial killer for Mitt Romney, the serial rapist for Barack Obama, and the guy with no criminal record with Gary Johnson.