Francisco Ferrer

You can call it "private" if you like, but once an agency starts forcing people to pay taxes and and prohibits competition, it is a state no different than the ones in Albania or Zambia. Similarly you can call the Presbyterian Church a "state," but that designation would not match reality.

The second film version of 1984 handled it well. It was a story of the future and yet it had all the distinguishing features of a society of the late 1940's: radio tubes, heavy wires, oversize speakers, clunky machinery. It was simultaneously familiar and yet out of time, the very thing you'd expect if technology had come to a standstill.

Your own personal experience of those government operations today is determined by how you are living your life today. You are the only one who chooses the kind of government you are getting today, because that's the government you deserve today. However you try to squirm away from it... the fact remains that you are choosing your own personal experience of the government you are getting by how you are living today. I'm making a point to use the word today in every sentence as your mind is stuck in the dead past. This is why you are so ill equipped to deal with the here and now, and is the reason you blame (unjustly accuse) the government for your own failure to live in the present. Greg That's right. Obama is serving as president today and has all the power, privilege, and prestige of that office today because of how he lived his life. If he had not lived a decent life, he would not have the government working for him today. After all, "government today only works for decent people." You can talk about presidents in the dead past if you want. But you can't squirm away from the fact that Barack Obama is the president in the here and now. He chose it and he deserves it. People who carp, criticize and chastise Obama (unjustly) have only themselves to blame. He is successful. They are not. He lived a decent life. They did not. Obama is the designer of our American system of Constitutional government. And crown thy good with brotherhood From sea to shining sea!

The operations of the government today do not include the design of the American Constitutional form of government. That happened in what you call the "dead past." If, as you say, "government today only works for decent people," then Obama must be a decent man. He has millions working for him and under him. Obama, Biden, the Cabinet, tens of thousands of bureaucrats, and thousands of liberal and Marxist professors are all paid handsome salaries and other tax-funded benefits today because they were able to get the government to work for them. How did they do that? By living decent lives, of course! If you want government to work for you, the answer is simple. Live your life more like Obama.

If by "Rational Anarchist," you mean "anarcho-capitalist," I don't know of anyone in that category who is opposed to laws. Opposing a monopoly law enforcement and adjudication is not the same as opposing laws. Furthermore, breaking stupid laws is not the same as opposing all laws. "Gangs and criminal societies" are not "Rational Anarchists." Since you are referring only vaguely, namelessly to some people you've met in the past, your examples hardly represent any worthwhile or interesting specimens of anarchist thought.

Fine. Any damn fool with a shotgun can proclaim himself a non-aggressor while he's robbing people at gunpoint. Saying he's "non-aggressive" or "rational" doesn't make it so. It's reality that matters in law and justice, not what some brigand proclaims. Obama says, "I believe that the free enterprise system is the greatest engine of prosperity the world's ever known." Must we take him at his word? If you've "never heard of a Rational Anarchist who did not consider himself a superior person, quite capable of defense, aggression and acquisition of resources," so what? Being capable of aggression doesn't mean one is in favor of or likely to commit aggression. Instead of talking about some abstract "Rational Anarchist" "willing and able to become Nietzsches higher man," why don't you provide his (her) name? In my 50 years in the movement I've never encountered any such character.

I am referring to today, Frank. I'm referring to the American form of government as it is today. The American form of government today only works for decent people. It would work for you too... but you first need to change how you are living, to become deserving of a decent government. But you won't... so you are getting exactly the indecent government you deserve. The government you're experiencing is a perfect match to your own values. Only failures blame the government for what is their own personal responsibility. Greg You were not referring to the government as it is today when you wrote, "The American Constitutional form of government was designed only to work for decent people" The government as it it exists today is not designing the American Constitutional form of government. That was done in the 1780's, a period you have referred to as "the dead past." Fact: Barack Obama is president. Fact: He collects a salary, lives in the White House, has Secret Service protection and gives the State of the Union Address annually. Fact: He issues orders, and the hirelings in government carry them out. With the possible exception of Edward Snowden, I cannot think of a single federal government worker who has refused to carry out an Obama order. Clearly, the government is working for Obama. Therefore, following your maxim that "American form of government today only works for decent people," Obama must be decent. The conclusion is inescapable. It is either A or non-A. But not both at the same time. Then you state, "you are getting exactly the indecent government you deserve." What indecent government are you referring to? You have already taken a stand on the premise that "government today only works for decent people." So how in the name of non-contradiction can the government be indecent? Are you saying that the The American Constitutional form of government that was designed only to work for decent people is actually an indecent government?

Moralist writes, "But the difference between us is that I'm referring to the present." False. You have not been referring just to the present. In Post #7, you wrote, "The American Constitutional form of government was designed only to work for decent people." The U.S. Constitution was adopted in 1789. This is 2014. Since you are loath to discuss the "dead past," an era that includes the legal, Constitutional enslavement of millions of people, then there can be no discussion of the design of American government, an act that took place 75 years before the abolition of slavery in America. You write, "The flaw in your mindset is your religious faith in ideological purity. In your religion if someone is not perfect, everything they say and do is null and void." False. I'll disprove that assertion right now. President Obama is the opposite of me in all ideological respects. In his six years in office he has advanced the growth of government on every front. As a free market anarchist, I have sought to whittle the state down to a pile of sawdust. On Oct. 11, Barack Obama said, "Right now, a worker on the federal minimum wage earns $7.25 an hour." Obama is correct on that particular fact. My general disagreement with Obama, while acknowledging his ability to be truthful on one point, demonstrates that your assertion about my ideological purity is false. Now, speaking of Obama, let's return to a point you made in Post #7. You wrote that the American system of government does "not work for the indecent." Therefore, if Obama is not decent, the government does not work for him. He can't get healthcare laws passed. He can't send military forces to various parts of the work. He can't issue executive orders. He can't appoint people to federal office. On the other hand, if he is able to get things done in the office of president, he must be decent. Which is it, Moralist?

That means that Southern slaveholders... I'm not talking about slavery in the dead past, Frank... so you can put your well worn laundry list away. I'm talking about right now how people enslave themselves to the government by their failure to govern their own behavior. Get a critical mass of indecent people failing to govern themselves, and they will create an indecent government in their own indecent image to govern them. Greg You are the one who brought up the U.S. Constitution and its Framers. You conflated the two because of your fixation on the dead past. I was referring to present day slavery to the government due to peoples' failure to govern their own behavior. The American Constitutional form of government" does "not work for the indecent."Yes. Your own personal experience of government will match your own decency. What that actually means is that indecent people use the indecent government to benefit themselves and their indecent ends... ...for they're the ones who created it in their own indecent image. Greg If you are entitled to discuss the Founders and their Constitution of the 1700's, I am entitled to discuss the slavery of the 1800's that the Constitution enabled. If one is in the "dead past," both are. Slavery was not decent, nor was the clause in the Constitution ("designed only to work for decent people") that helped protect it. You write, "Your own personal experience of government will match your own decency." My personal experience is that the government hires thousands of tax collectors, gun grabbers, snoopers, busybodies, and legalized thieves and kidnappers. My personal experience is that the government, from Obama on down, is following an agenda that is borderline Bolshevik. Is it your belief that if I were more "decent," I would see that Obama and his cohorts are also "decent"? You write, "What that actually means is that indecent people use the indecent government to benefit themselves and their indecent ends...for they're the ones who created it in their own indecent image." Government is not the enemy. Government is indecent and is used to benefit evil people and their indecent ends. Government is not the enemy. Doublethink.

GHS is correct. I do not know of a single person who has written seriously on the topic of anarcho-capitalism who has claimed that everyone "within any geographical area, is fully capable of being rational, and to administer their own justice." Obviously, in any population of more than a few souls there will be members who are immoral, irrational or antagonistic to individual rights. It is the right of the non-aggressors in a community to protect themselves from predators, regardless of their motives. Moreover, Nietzsche did not promote anything remotely resembling universal rationality.

That means that Southern slaveholders... I'm not talking about slavery in the dead past, Frank... so you can put your well worn laundry list away. I'm talking about right now how people enslave themselves to the government by their failure to govern their own behavior. Get a critical mass of indecent people failing to govern themselves, and they will create an indecent government in their own indecent image to govern them. Greg You are the one who brought up the U.S. Constitution and its Framers. The Constitution was written and implemented long before slavery was abolished. So if slavery is in the "dead past" and outside acceptable discussion, so is your beloved creation of U.S. government. More to the point, you have made the claim that "The American Constitutional form of government" does "not work for the indecent." That would mean that no indecent person could use the government to benefit himself and his indecent ends. That would mean that there is currently no federal office holder performing "indecent" (or immoral) actions through his current position. Thus, Obama, Biden, Kerry, Holder, Lew, Duncan, Power and the rest of the happy liberal warriors are all either decent people--or the rest of the federal government refuses to follow any orders given by them. Which is it?

Stephen Boydstun recommends a documentary by Stephen Hicks above. Of yet greater importance is Professor Hicks's paper, "Egoism in Nietzsche and Rand," (The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies 10, no. 2, Spring 2009: 249–91.) itemizing the profound philosophical differences between the two. Nietzsche disagrees entirely with all twelve constituent elements of Rand’s egoist philosophy. In consequence, they disagree entirely on the social and political implications of their ethical theories for issues of freedom or slavery, political equality or aristocracy, production and trade or war. And . . . Nietzsche and Rand disagree fundamentally on the issues of metaphysics, epistemology, and human nature; those disagreements lead logically to their radical divergences in ethics and politics. (p. 287)

"Government is a broker in pillage, and every election is a sort of advance auction in stolen goods." "All government, of course, is against liberty." "Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under." --H.L. Mencken

That means that Southern slaveholders who used the U.S. Constitution's Fugitive Slave Clause to get back their runaway human property were decent. That means that, today, government employees who seize the property that others earn through their own labor are decent. That means that government employees who imprison those who grow herbs for their own use or to trade with others are decent. That means that government employees who fine or imprison those who pay whatever wage they want for a job are decent That means that government employees who prosecute people who possess, trade, and sell weapons are decent. That means Obama is decent. Biden is decent. "Feminized liberals" and Marxists at U.S. universities who are largely paid by federal grants are decent. They are all decent because "The American Constitutional form of government was designed only to work for decent people... it [does] not work for the indecent."

Who was it who said, "Government is not the enemy"?

In response to Reidy above, I resubmit what Ellen Stuttle posted earlier in the thread: seddon, on 29 Apr 2006 - 1:18 PM, said:

Always dress for the occasion. Effete cap for effete, amazed cap for amazed. Actually, putt-putt. No doubt Objectivists would be as abundant as Methodists if people on this forum would just shut up about tapping white balls.

The point of the post, as it should have been clear in the first sentence, is that when one addresses a topic that has been previously explored by other thinkers, one does the minimal courtesy by recognizing what they have already contributed to our understanding. Locke saw rights originating in a state of nature. The fruits of labor are by right the laborer's, for otherwise they would not exist. Additionally, the laborer must also own the part of nature that he has exploited because that resource, such land, cannot be simultaneously used for two separate purposes. On the other hand, Rand says, A “right” is a moral principle defining and sanctioning a man’s freedom of action in a social context. There is only one fundamental right (all the others are its consequences or corollaries): a man’s right to his own life. Life is a process of self- sustaining and self-generated action; the right to life means the right to engage in self-sustaining and self-generated action-which means: the freedom to take all the actions required by the nature of a rational being for the support, the furtherance, the fulfillment and the enjoyment of his own life. (Such is the meaning of the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.) Both regard rights and specifically the right to property as an essential aspect of survival.

More on unacknowledged debts: [isabel] Paterson's most significant libertarian disciple was Ayn Rand,·who acknowledged intellectual debts to no one but Aristotle. Nonetheless, Rand told Paterson in a letter that "you ·were the very first person to see how Capitalism works in specific application. That is your achieve­ment, which I consider a historical achievement of the first impor­tance . . . I learned from you the historic and economic aspects of Capitalism, which I knew before only in a general way, in the way of general principles ." In a rhetorical gesture that readers of The Fountainhead will understand as having deep emotional significance, Rand inscribed a copy of the novel to Paterson, "You have been the one en­counter in my life can can never be repeated ." --Brian Doherty, Radicals for Capitalism: A Freewheeling History of the Modern American Libertarian Movement, p. 122

Yes, you're right. June 1945 seems to be when, under Paterson's influence, she bought a thick volume of Aristotle's works and began to read it in order to provide a foundation for the defense of individualism from "the first axioms of existence." In addition to early notes for Atlas ("The Strike"), she was working a non-fiction piece entitled "The Moral Basis of Individualism." It would appear then that her first post-Aristotelian work of fiction was Atlas. See Jennifer Burns, Goddess of the Market: Ayn Rand and the American Right, p. 111.

Marotta has suggested Rand could have written The Virtue of Selfishness "50 years earlier than she did." You seem to agree. Fine, where is the evidence that she had either a system of ethics or a theory or rights in the years prior to the writing of Atlas? In The Fountainhead and Anthem she demonstrated a strong appreciation of individualism and the unique importance of a few gifted creators among the masses. But such an appreciation is not equivalent to a system of ethics, rights and capitalism. It appears that a great deal of groundwork had to be done in the 14 years before Atlas hit the book stalls. Objectivism was still evolving during the 1950's. There was not yet a system.

Ayn Rand's theory of rights is not identical with John Locke's, but there is enough similarity for Rand to have at least acknowledged what Locke originated and shown where she departed from him. (I, for one, don't see how his theory is in error.) In the same manner she could have addressed previous theories of egoism (Stirner, Nietzsche) and made clear how her theory of self-interest and capitalism differs from Adam Smith's. Such acknowledgements were never made because they would have undermined the cultivated image of Rand as a thinker whose only debt was to a Greek who died in 322 BC. .

If I am not mistaken, in Post #52 to counter my statement that Rand "could not have written The Virtue of Selfishness until she had developed her theory of rights," you wrote, "Yes, she could." So she could have written a book that sets forth a detailed philosophical basis for rational ethics, rights, and limited government--and just left out the detailed philosophical basis for rational ethics, rights, and limited government?

I am not presuming that a fully developed theory of rational ethics and capitalism was not or could not be in Rand's mind in the decade or decades before they were published. What I am stating is that if you wish to argue that it was, the onus is on you to show it. If there is evidence that Rand had a theory of individual rights and limited government prior to the 1940's, let's take a look at it.

From Stephen Hicks's excellent comparison of Rand and Nietzsche: Speaking well of the noble races of the past, Nietzsche explains their accomplishments this way: “One cannot fail to see at the bottom of all these noble races the beast of prey, the splendid blond beast, prowling about avidly in search of spoil and victory; this hidden core needs to erupt from time to time, the animal has to get out again and go back to the wilderness” (GM, I). About slavery, Nietzsche says that a healthy aristocracy “accepts with a good conscience the sacrifice of untold human beings, who, for its sake, must be reduced and lowered to incomplete human beings, to slaves, to instruments” (BGE, 258). About war, Nietzsche says, “One must learn from war: … one must learn to sacrifice many and to take one’s cause seriously enough not to spare men” (WP, 982). And about violence in general, Nietzsche says, approvingly, “The beginnings of everything great on earth [are] soaked in blood thoroughly and for a long time” (GM, II:6). Remarks such as these should give pause to any identification of Rand’s views with Nietzsche’s . . . And yet we can see this very mode of thinking in the Kira of the 1936 WTL.