Article: What Is To Be Done? — A Comment on Angelo Codevilla’s “Ruling Class”

Anti-Statism, Articles, Democracy, Education, History, Libertarian Theory, Non-Fiction Reviews, The Right
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In his paper “America’s Ruling Class – and the Perils of Revolution” Professor Angelo Codevilla offers an excellent analysis of the causes and forms of government encroachment into the basic traditional liberties of Americans, and a very good sketch of the reasons why big government ideology succeeded in imposing its tenets upon the country, despite overwhelming opposition by Americans. The problem America faces, according to him, is nothing less than a complete usurpation of power by an alienated elite: the ideologues of big government and the politicians that work in concert to subvert the structure of the American constitution, and to rule over the great majority of Americans against their will. Professor Codevilla paints a very grim (and very true) picture of the complete breakdown of the constitutional form of government in America, under the assault of the modern statist ideology, delivered in a bipartisan manner, and garnered with political corruption. But he fails to provide prescriptions radical enough to deal with the problem, perhaps because he too is a member of that big-government-worshiping elite.

Ivan Jankovic is a graduate student of Political Science at the University of Windsor, Canada. Originally from Serbia, he has published in the fields of Austrian economics, public choice, and classical liberal philosophy.

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An Outrage By Our Neighbors To The North

Police Statism, Political Correctness, Private Crime, Racism
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CTV Edmonton reports the case of a man convicted of “inciting racial hatred” when he burned a cross on the lawn of an interracial couple. This is a clear crime, but the crime is trespass and vandalism, not “inciting racial hatred.” Criminalizing some real or imagined scheme behind his criminal actions is not only unnecessary, it sows the seeds for more and more thoughts being banned. This is little different from prosecuting a religious extremist for inciting religious fervor.  Moreover, as a friend pointed out, in this day and age, burning a cross does not even incite racial hatred. It generates huge outpourings of goodwill for the victims, and widespread condemnation of the ideology behind the criminal behavior. That reaction has far better effects on race relations than prosecutions for thought crimes.

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Down in smoke

Drug Policy, Taxation, Victimless Crimes
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My former colleague and neighbor Jesse Walker, in the course of an “appreciation” of exiting Sen. Russ Feingold — whom he calls “the Bob Barr of the left” — expresses the briefest note of sadness over the failure of California’s Proposition 19, the Regulate, Control and Tax Cannabis Act of 2010. I will demur.

Sadness? At a law that, had it passed, would have regulated and taxed the use of a common plant — a lovely weed and an amazing source of industrial fiber as well as widely used herbal remedy? No. All those regulations and taxes would only have skewed the cultivation and marketing of the plant from personal and small-business operations to Big Business. Right now Californians are increasingly cultivating and openly using marijuana. In defiance of the federal government, no less.

But with the initiative, the state would have started cracking down on little producers, and making it harder for small business to provide their customers with the drug. …

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Don’t Bet on China: Redux

Business Cycles, Democracy, IP Law, Mercantilism, Protectionism
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A Chinese libertarian, Nicolas Dong, who recently did a Mandarin translation of one of my IP articles, recently told me this in an email regarding my earlier post, Don’t Bet on China:

I agree most part of your point of view about China. I believe that after the bust of the current housing bubble and high inflation, there will be much more unrest. The costs to maintain a “stable” social order have exceeded the cost of maintaining the army. Great changes may occur after the Xi Jinpin administration. But democratization will probably make China more socialist, for reasons explained in Hoppe’s Democracy: The God that Failed. There are just too many mobs here. And many social democrats are controlling the media, preaching democracy and equality instead of liberty. Fortunately, some influential media have libertarian-leaning editors or columnists. We also have libertarian and classical liberal university professors. We are trying our best to have a greater influence.

Also, regarding the libertarian perspective on intellectual property and my anti-IP article that he translated, he said:

They [the Chinese libertarians] debated for a while, and now, most libertarians in China are anti-IP.

However its influence is limited since we are just circulating it in our circle, and posting it on websites. Most people in China don’t know what libertarianism is, and they may not capable of catching the idea in the article.

… You know, something nice is that those who control the internet here don’t know what libertarianism and the Austrian School are; thus, most of those sites are not prohibited. The Austrian School does have some influence in academia here, albeit mainly Hayekian.

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Legalize It _\|/_ But Don’t Tax Or Regulate It, Bro

Drug Policy, Humor, Police Statism, Pop Culture, Taxation, Victimless Crimes
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“Should Be Legalized” is a a great, high quality parody of Eminem’s “Love The Way You Lie.” The video reminds us of the dangers of prohibition and urges Congress to legalize marijuana. I must, however, object to the video’s desire for pot to be regulated or taxed.

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