We need more government.

[Thespis]

Our government was made to work like what happened in the NH senate yesterday. According to the polls, the majority wanted a smoking ban. But, the senate, through lobbying by you guys, upheld property rights, and personal responsibility.

The constitution was an experiment, and it lasted at least a century before things started going downhill. To paraphrase the famous quote, "the price of liberty is eternal vigilance." We (as a country) stopped being vigilant, and while there's a chance that might happen again should we manage to restrict the government again. But, now that we've seen how the first experiment worked out, couldn't we work to frame the constitution better a second time, and give the republic another chance with the lessons from the first one freshly in our minds.

Does that make sense? I think that was a little muddled. I'm having trouble putting my thoughts into coherent sentences this morning.

Anyway, I still haven't decided where I stand with limited small government versus anarchy. I can see both sides of the argument.

[FrankChodorov]

The American Revolution was said to be fought to oppose tyranny. The result? Merely an exchange of tyranny from a King to a Majority.

which took a serious step in the wrong direction by replacing the articles of confederation...

Oh my God!!! I didn't think this would ever happen, but I agree with you on that one, Bill. 

yes - a Hamiltonian, monarchist/mercantilist coup against the Jeffersonian, decentralist/agrarians.

if the Shaysites could have resolve the currency/tax/land issue appropriately I dare say we would not be in the position we are in today...

[FrankChodorov]

Our government was made to work like what happened in the NH senate yesterday. According to the polls, the majority wanted a smoking ban. But, the senate, through lobbying by you guys, upheld property rights, and personal responsibility.

The constitution was an experiment, and it lasted at least a century before things started going downhill. To paraphrase the famous quote, "the price of liberty is eternal vigilance." We (as a country) stopped being vigilant, and while there's a chance that might happen again should we manage to restrict the government again. But, now that we've seen how the first experiment worked out, couldn't we work to frame the constitution better a second time, and give the republic another chance with the lessons from the first one freshly in our minds.

Does that make sense? I think that was a little muddled. I'm having trouble putting my thoughts into coherent sentences this morning.

Anyway, I still haven't decided where I stand with limited small government versus anarchy. I can see both sides of the argument.

in my opinion the problem is that people have attempted to twist the intent of the founding principles around negative liberty into one supporting positive liberty because they are attempting to arbitrarily address what they feel is blatant social injustice because they don't know of a principled way to do it within a negative liberty framework.

[Thespis]

You know, I really don't like the terms "positive" and "negative" liberty simply because the type of liberty we want (self-ownership, no coercive force, etc.) is termed "negative liberty." While I understand why it's called that, to the regular guy on the street saying something is "negative" means it's bad.

[AlanM]

You know, I really don't like the terms "positive" and "negative" liberty simply because the type of liberty we want (self-ownership, no coercive force, etc.) is termed "negative liberty." While I understand why it's called that, to the regular guy on the street saying something is "negative" means it's bad.

Excellent point Thespis. Taking my Liberty away is the most negative thing that can happen to me.

[AlanM]

So who wants to get started?

The building of this TRUE counterculture of freedom was started in 1999 with the publication of "The Handbook for the New Paradigm". The book has spawned growing groups of people all around the country (and now the world) who are quietly and nonviolently working together to build a new society from the ground up. You won't find them lobbying legislators, protesting, "fighting the system", etc. They are simply withdrawing support from the existing system and focusing their efforts on creating something entirely different from scratch. There is a chapter in New Hampshire.

Do you have any info on the NH Chapter?

[Thespis]

Excellent point Thespis.

That happens from time to time. 

[FrankChodorov]

So who wants to get started?

The building of this TRUE counterculture of freedom was started in 1999 with the publication of "The Handbook for the New Paradigm". The book has spawned growing groups of people all around the country (and now the world) who are quietly and nonviolently working together to build a new society from the ground up. You won't find them lobbying legislators, protesting, "fighting the system", etc. They are simply withdrawing support from the existing system and focusing their efforts on creating something entirely different from scratch. There is a chapter in New Hampshire.

this is esentially the same work as mutualists (anti-capitalist, individualist anarchist)...

excerpt:
Mutualism, as a variety of anarchism, goes back to P.J. Proudhon in France and Josiah Warren in the U.S.  It favors, to the extent possible, an evolutionary approach to creating a new society.  It emphasizes the importance of peaceful activity in building alternative social institutions within the existing society, and strengthening those institutions until they finally replace the existing statist system.  As Paul Goodman put it, "A free society cannot be the substitution of a 'new order' for the old order; it is the extension of spheres of free action until they make up most of the social life."

Other anarchist subgroups, and the libertarian left generally, share these ideas to some extent.  Whether known as "dual power" or "social counterpower," or "counter-economics," alternative social institutions are part of our common vision.  But they are especially central to mutualists' evolutionary understanding.

http://mutualist.org/

[FrankChodorov]

You know, I really don't like the terms "positive" and "negative" liberty simply because the type of liberty we want (self-ownership, no coercive force, etc.) is termed "negative liberty." While I understand why it's called that, to the regular guy on the street saying something is "negative" means it's bad.

well I am not a regular guy on the street...

hmmm...you think self-ownership and coercion are terms the average Joe uses too?

you didn't address my point either!

[Thespis]

well I am not a regular guy on the street...

I never said you were. I was stating my disdain for those terms. I think that someone new to the concept of liberty may very well become confused by the terms "positive" and "negativity" liberty, especially if they're just lurking and not asking questions.

you think self-ownership and coercion are terms the average Joe uses too?

Uses? No.

Understands fairly easily? Yes.

you didn't address my point either!

I didn't address it, because I agreed with it. Yes, people who believe government should "save" people did take us down the road we're on now. And, the best description for these people is not "positive liberty," it's "socialism."

Negative Liberty = Liberty
Positive Liberty = Socialism

[FrankChodorov]

I didn't address it, because I agreed with it. Yes, people who believe government should "save" people did take us down the road we're on now. And, the best description for these people is not "positive liberty," it's "socialism."

Negative Liberty = Liberty
Positive Liberty = Socialism

the question is whether or not you recognize a social injustice factor in just "liberty" rather than "equal liberty" (like the individualist anarchists did)?

and if you do how can it be constructed within a negative liberty framework?

FREE MARKET: That condition of society in which all economic transactions result from voluntary choice without coercion.

THE STATE: That institution which interferes with Free Market through the direct exercise of coercion or the granting of privileges (backed by coercion).

PRIVILEGE: From the Latin privi, private, and lege, law. An advantage granted by the State and protected by it's powers of coercion. A law for private benefit.

USURY: That form of privilege or interference with the Free Market in which one State-supported group monopolizes the coinage and thereby takes tribute (interest), direct or indirect, on all or most economic transactions.

LANDLORDISM: That form of privilege or interference with the Free Market in which one State-supported group ?owns? the land and thereby takes tribute (economic rent) from those who live, work, or produce on the land.

CAPITALISM: That organization of society, incorporating elements of tax, usury, landlordism, and tariff, which thus denies the Free Market while pretending to exemplify it.

[Thespis]

the question is whether or not you recognize a social injustice factor in just "liberty" rather than "equal liberty" (like the individualist anarchists did)?

"Equal liberty," as I think you mean it, would require government regulations such as anti-discrimination laws, and such. If a business decides not to hire minorities or women would be a social injustice in your definition, correct?

I don't believe government should involve itself in business, that kind of thing is what brought us to where we are now. If a business does things you don't like, then don't give them your business. Inform others of their business practices. Organize a boycott. Vote with your feet, don't impose laws and regulations to solve "social injustices."

[Dreepa]

Organize a boycott. Vote with your feet, don't impose laws and regulations

[FrankChodorov]

"Equal liberty," as I think you mean it, would require government regulations such as anti-discrimination laws, and such

no - just remove privileges...

[Thespis]

no - just remove privileges...

Well, there would not be any government granted privileges with liberty, which is the way it should be. I don't believe any principled libertarian would advocate government privileges for anyone or any business.