• 5Nov 07

  Why an anarchist might support Ron Paul

  This was a particularly good posting by Larken Rose on his 861 list. If you don't know who Larken Rose is, you might investigate further, especially if you believe it is wrong for anyone to initiate violence against people who have committed neither force nor fraud nor theft.

  Now here is Larken's message:

  Dear Subscriber,
  
  Remember, remember, the fifth of November... (For those of you who
  haven't yet seen "V for Vendetta," do.) Well, today is the Fifth of
  November, and after much internal debating, I decided to send this
  message out.
  
  As most of you know by now, I am not a Constitutionalist. The
  Constitution pretended to delegate to politicians the right to rule
  the rest of us. Yes, it was supposed to be a rather limited form of
  dominion, but it still pretended to give politicians the right to
  initiate violence (via "taxation" and "regulation") against people
  who have committed neither force nor fraud. As such, the document
  is absolutely bogus and illegitimate, as is the "authority" it
  pretended to create. (See "The Constitution of No Authority," by
  Lysander Spooner, for a more thorough explanation.)
  
  Ron Paul believes in the Constitution. As a result, he believes
  that those in Congress have the right to forcibly take money from
  people to whom it rightfully belongs. He does, however, think that
  such robberies should be done within the rules of the Constitution
  (e.g., via limited "excise taxes"). But while he is appropriately
  offended by the very concept of an "income tax," for example, he
  accepts the legitimacy of smaller, more avoidable types of
  authoritarian robbery. I don't.
  
  That is my disclaimer, so no one misunderstands the REST of this
  message as actually condoning "limited" injustice.
  
  ------------------------------------------
  
  There are many reasons why the cult of "democracy" is an insane
  farce. One is that it is used by tyrants to create the illusion
  that the people WANT the tyranny which is imposed upon them. The
  old rhetoric that in a democracy, the people are the government,
  and thus are ruling themselves, is as popularly accepted as it is
  insane. What kind of a self-destructive schizo would even WANT to
  forcibly boss himself around, and how delusional is it to think
  that when Congress bosses you around, YOU are really in charge?
  
  Anyway, the power of the democracy myth comes from the illusion
  that somehow the tyrants "represent" us, and so it's okay for them
  to do what they do. There are many reasons why such a belief is
  silly, but the one I want to mention today is the goofy idea that
  public opinion dictates the "government" we have, instead of the
  other way around.
  
  The current political circus is a fine example. The establishment--
  both of its faces (Republican and Democrat)--gives us ONE choice,
  with two names, and pretends that it's what the people want. The
  people are offered a choice between Tyrant A and Tyrant B, and when
  they choose one, that is painted as the CONSENT of the governed.
  
  Ask yourself, who in this country would, in the privacy of his own
  thoughts, without the influence of media propaganda, think, "Gee, I
  really want my life to be run by Mitt Romney"? Who would, on his
  own, think "I really want that guy Rudy Giulliani running my life"?
  What is there about ANY of the Republican candidates that would
  make anyone actually WANT them to become President? There is only
  ONE reason we have heard their names: because the tyrant club has
  advertised them to us. They have accomplished NOTHING, aside from
  fabricating their own importance, in the hopes of obtaining the
  power to control others.
  
  But, as I know many of you are now internally screaming as you read
  this, there is an exception. His name is Ron Paul. Lots of people
  REALLY want him to win, because they REALLY believe in what Dr.
  Paul believes in. He doesn't have to put on a show, or keep up an
  act. Unlike every other candidate in either party, he really IS
  what his supporters WANT. He is who he says he is, and believes
  what he says he believes--and a LOT of people like that.
  
  And that's why the tyrant machine has been doing its scam of
  fabricating popular opinion for months now. The Republican
  establishment, not to mention the statist media, are doing
  everything they can to give the impression that Ron Paul doesn't
  matter: he can't win, he's only supported by a few kooks on the
  internet, he's not worth talking about, etc. In short, they are
  doing everything they can to convince the public that what YOU want
  is the tyrants THEY want you to support.
  
  Who in their right mind would be even slightly enthusiastic about
  the prospect of having Hillary Clinton, or John McCain, or Barrack
  Obama in the Whitehouse? What do those lying thieves even believe
  in? Well, it changes week to week, depending upon what they think
  will get them votes. The reason that BOTH faces of the
  authoritarian ruling ****really want to belittle and marginalize
  Ron Paul is that: 1) he actually believes what he says; 2) he
  believes in a lot more freedom than we have now, and; 3) lots of
  people like that.
  
  The tyrants must keep up the facade of public-supported tyranny, to
  keep their perceived legitimacy intact, and Ron Paul is the biggest
  threat to that to come along in a very long time. While it is true
  that constant collectivist propaganda from the media and
  "government" have pushed a lot of people into believing that
  freedom is bad and authoritarianism is good, far fewer people
  believe that than you would think from watching the mainstream
  media. And the powers that be are scared to death that the massive
  support Ron Paul is receiving will mess up their little charade.
  
  And it is for that reason, and that reason alone, that today--this
  Fifth of November--I invite all of you to financially support the
  campaign of Ron Paul. No, I don't think he'll win, and if he does,
  I don't think he'd be able to accomplish much (if anything) in the
  way of "legal" reform. However, having the American people hear
  from someone who actually believes in the Constitution, which
  hasn't happened in a very long time, would be a very refreshing
  change from the constant collectivist authoritarian tripe which
  spews out of the radio and TV day in and day out. Who knows, maybe
  a few Americans might even start THINKING about such things.
  
  In the daily statist propaganda (usually disguised as "reporting"),
  you can just hear the underlying message dripping from the rhetoric
  of both "wings" of the ruling **** "No, no, THIS is the
  respectable spectrum of discussion! THESE are the beliefs and ideas
  you're allowed to consider! THESE are the kings you're allowed to
  choose from! THIS is what you're allowed to think!" And Ron Paul is
  way outside that usual, accepted realm of discussion. And that's
  what I love about him, and why I want to see his message rip
  through the bland, predictable totalitarian propaganda of EVERY
  other "candidate" currently being forced onto the American public
  under the guise of "democracy."
  
  In conclusion, though I remain an anarchist, knowing that the
  superstition of "authority" is inherently insane and horribly
  destructive, today I'm going to be giving my $100 to Dr. Paul's
  campaign, for the simple reason that I really want to watch the
  tyrant propaganda machine choke on its own rhetoric, as just a dash
  of truth pollutes its persist collectivist indoctrination message.
  I encourage all of you to do the same, and to do it today.
  
  http://www.ronpaul2008.com/
  
  Sincerely,
  
  
  Larken Rose
  • Posted Nov 5, 2007 10:24 pm PT
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• 13Sep 07

  Socialism is Evil

  Socialism is evil. Here is why.

  Socialism seeks to transfer the means of production from private ownership to the ownership of the State. The socialistic State owns all material factors of production and closely directs it. Central planners determine how much of what goods and services will be produced and made available and they set the prices for them. This command type of economy is an inefficient system that cannot hope to match the natural supply/demand economic adjustments of a free market.

  A high level of coercion is required to maintain the strict control of the economy that must be highly regulated to prevent the emergence of entrepreneurship, capitalism, and free markets, all of which are natural behaviors of humans seeking to improve their prospects. In a socialist system, people are not free to produce or purchase what they want; socialist states do not place a high value on individual liberty, thus all regular members of socialist states are effectively slaves. The planners are the rulers, and they inevitably wield far greater power and have access to far more luxury and liberty than the common people whose lives they orchestrate. It is the need for strong coercive control that both produces and sustains the ruling class, and that mocks and violates the utopian ideal of equality and collective ownership of property that socialist theories tout.

  A socialist state cannot come into existence without first stealing all private property away from its owners. It sustains itself by the same means. Governments produce nothing, so everything they do must be funded by wealth redistribution and theft. There is no way to characterize this except as immoral, and therefore evil. While one might say that charity is noble when a man reaches into his own pocket to benefit his fellow man, it is universally recognized as despicable when a man reaches into another person's pocket to benefit his fellow man. But that's how socialist states operate.

  Something that a lot of people don't realize is that most western democracies and nations with so-called representative governments today, including the US, are largely socialist and embody much of the same evil characteristics as the conceptually pure socialist states envisioned by people like Marx and Bakunin.

  • Posted Sep 13, 2007 8:57 pm PT
  • Category: Opinion
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• 29Aug 07

  Linux on the PS3, so easy a blind man can do it

  I finally did it, and it was dirt simple. I installed Yellow Dog Linux on my PS3. I'm not going to try to describe the process in detail this time because I plan to do it again, the right way. The RIGHT way? Yeah. You see, I did this install blind, mostly guessing at the proper responses to the graphical install because I couldn't really read them.

  My TV is an old Pioneer Elite Pro-520HD, vintage 2003. It was billed at the time as HDTV capable, but the reality is that it only supports 480p as the maximum resolution, and that is now considered to be EDTV (enhanced definition TV). YDL 5.0.2 requires 720p to do a graphical install. What you get at 480p is four ghost-like images of the screen half overlayed on each other, with text that is practically illegible. D'oh well, I installed it anyway. YDL is so easy to install that you can just take all the defaults and you'll be good to go.

  LInux boots up on my ps3 now, and I still can't read the screen. So for the moment, I've reset my system to boot back into the game-OS. But, I happen to have two 1080p TVs in my living room that I haven't unpacked from their boxes yet. They are both Panasonic plasma sets, a 58 inch and a 50 inch. These are the latest plasma sets from Panasonic, the TH-50PZ750U and TH-58PZ750U, and they are NATIVE 1080p res!!!

  So, just as soon as I get them set up, I'm going to start over from scratch and install YDL again. I will take good notes, and give the full story here in a future blog post.

  But no matter what, I've proven what I set out to prove... Linux is so easy to install on the ps3 that even a blind man can do it.

  Stay tuned for my future "vision-assisted" install, with full details...

  • Posted Aug 29, 2007 6:18 pm PT
  • Category: Computers
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