In Woods’ “33 questions about american history you are not supposed to ask” he has a chapter dedicated to MLK’s support of reparations, etc.

To my mind, judging from the contents of his past newsletters, Ron Paul is a white racist (there are black ones too). Martin Luther King on the other hand is one of those rare heroes that humankind sometimes produces.

Discrediting the MLK myth is as important as discrediting the myth of the two good wars and the two great presidents, Dishonest Abe and FDR.  I’m not particularly happy about choosing this day for a money bomb, but then I wasn’t particularly happy about Guy Fawkes day either because of its terrorist and revolutionary implications. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still a supporter of Dr. Paul and I’ll still send more money - but maybe I’ll delay a day or two.

Thanks for remarking on this. It was bothering me.

We don’t have Tory Conservatism in America.  Scratch an American “conservative” and you find a libertarian.  So Mr. Epstein.  Of libertarians many fine things can be said.  I’ll not go as far as Kirk and say we have nothing in common with them. Still it’s time to point out their flaws:

1. Reductionism and “dangerous simplifiers”.  Everything is reduced to “private property”.  Private Property is for them not the highest good; it is the only good.  Private property becomes for them what The State is for Social Democrats: god.  From it supposedly flows all good; there is no god but private property and Locke is its prophet. To oppose it is blasphemy.  The sacrament of this god is the Market. Tory Conservatives know that the social order and human beings are too complex to be reduced to something simple. And many, many good things aren’t for sale. The libertarians are as reductionist as Marx is with labor and racialism is with race.

2.  Labor Theory of Value.  After Böhm-Bawerk demolished the idea, the labor theory of value, founded by Locke, creeps in the back door.  Ask libertarians to justify Private Property, they fall back on Locke: It is the result of their own labor, they say.  The libertarians and the Marxists share this in common.  Real Conservatives know that value comes from other (and Other) sources.

3. Materialism.  For libertarianism, the good is a material object that gratifies the senses.  That man should not live by bread alone is a heresy for libertarianism.  Again, a Marxist idea as well.

4. Epicureanism and Benthamism.  Von Mises, in his economic treatises made sense.  In Human Action he came a cropper.  The good is the satisfaction of desire (which is reduced to a sensation in the glands or in the central nervous system that produces pleasure). Aristotle knew better what the good is, as did Aquinas.

5. No common good, only private goods, a thesis they share with another supposed enemy of theirs, Rawls.  Also with Rawls, they celebrate the common instrumental good, and only differ what is (for Rawls the state, for libertarians the market).  “In short, we’re everything Rawls is without coercion (of private property)”, forgetting all the while that the Market coerces.

6. An atomic concept of society, and a belief in the individual (conceived largely a laborer working to gratify his sensations).  Real Conservatives believe in an organic concept of society and in (joining Catholic Social Teaching) Personalism.

7. Political inaction leading to political oblivion: Libertarians, from my experience, are such free spirits and such “my way or the highway” types, that they cannot unite behind a leader and work for what they believe.  They are in fact comparable to Hyper-Calvinists, Quietists, and Millenarians.  They think that as “sovereign individuals” they can survive the coming of a putative collapse.  “Just do nothing, hoard gold, and wait it out.” Our tyrants-would-be are laughing them to scorn.

8. Ineffective in another way.  cf. Eliot’s splendid critique of what he called “Liberalism” in The Idea of a Christian Society.  “Liberalism”/libertarianism is against things, not for things; “freedom”, like “democracy”, does not have enough positive content to stand alone against Stalinism, nationalism, Fascism, racialism. “If you will not have God (and He is a jealous God), then you must pay your respects to Hitler and Stalin.” (Eliot, Christianity and Culture, NY: 1940, 1949, p.50.  Hannah Arendt put the matter differently in <The Human Condition</i>: If we have only homo labor and homo fabor, and not the pursuit of arete, then we’re going to get Eichmann.  And Eichmann is just as dangerous working in a bank doing subprime loans.  cf finally Orwell’s splendid demolition of Liberalism/libertarianism in his book review of Mein Kampf, The Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters of George Orwell, Vol 2, pp. 27-29: Libertarians just don’t understand human beings.

In short, Buchanan got it mostly right: The Marxists of the “Right”.  We Tory Conservatives do have much to learn from them; they have more to learn from us.  Both of have much to learn from Catholic Social Teaching.

And Jim Crow had to go.  That doesn’t mean that the Civil Right Movement didn’t have a lot of bad fruit.

I wish readers to understand that my objections to Mr. Epstein are gentlemanly, and offered with respect, and with the aim of amendment.

We should also note a third category of proprerty: Corporate.

Mr. Epstein:

I am afraid that you got your defense of private
property backwards. Segregation was “enforced by law”,
it was not a question of buyers and sellers determining
who they wanted to deal with - with the more irrational
ones who passed on potential customers being punished
for they bizarre behavior - but the power of the state
telling people who they should deal with. Everyone had
to adhere to the same lunatic standard.

Have you ever wondered why there are so few black
libertarians or black conservatives? After all, the
theory in itself is supposed to be universal and
true for all. Perhaps it is because of bad memories
of those who, when they asked for help answered
“we will protect private property first”,forgetting
that private property is a means, human dignity the
end.

There are many black people who would love to embrace
publicly conservative values, but get their back up whne
they realize who they have to pal with, or hear comments
that because they are who they are they are ipso facto
lazy criminals. So they pack up and leave to those with
if they do not agree with everything, have been allies
when they needed them.

If you want to write off blacks and latinos, and
minority groups in general, you are free to do so, as
libertarians in general are free to snipe at each
other in public, thus provinding great amusement for
non-libertarians, but it is damn stupid. And if you do
not want to, remember what is the first question to
that people ask when looking for an ally. It is not
“Does this person agree with my views of this matter”
but “Can I trust this person to back me in a tight
spot?” So, try to act trustworthy to them.

Well, what can you say?  It’s the power of totalitarian political correctness to force people to say what they really don’t beleive.  Here is a link to yet one more dreary “King was really a conservative, you know”:
http://www.washingtontimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080121/COMMENTARY/596229281

And here’s a quote that explains it all:

“Political correctness is communist propaganda writ small. In my study of communist societies, I came to the conclusion that the purpose of communist propaganda was not to persuade or convince, nor to inform, but to humiliate; and therefore, the less it corresponded to reality the better. When people are forced to remain silent when they are being told the most obvious lies, or even worse when they are forced to repeat the lies themselves, they lose once and for all their sense of probity. To assent to obvious lies is to co-operate with evil, and in some small way to become evil oneself. One’s standing to resist anything is thus eroded, and even destroyed. A society of emasculated liars is easy to control. I think if you examine political correctness, it has the same effect and is intended to.” - Theodore Dalrymple

I am not happy that Ron Paul has called MLK a “hero,” that someone chose MLK day for a money bomb, and that Ron Paul put out a press release praising MLK, tying it into
our ongoing lose of civil rights. I guess PC really does have everyone by the b***s.

Billy Bob

FAct number one

Jim Crow had to go. It was evil and,worse, it was
lunatic.

Fact number two.

Getting rid of it was for the black community the
equivalent of Exodus in the Old Testment, a foundation
myth, the same way that the Founding Fathers are the
foundation myth of the US

Fact number three

MLK’s failings are no more relevant to that discussion
than Adams’, Jefferson’s, Washington’s, et al. flaw’s
are in the history of the newly erected Republic. Yes,
they were flawed men, but they managed to pull off
something worthwhile.

Fact number four

Conservatives managed to lose that particular bus, and
thus lost a sizeable constituency who wouldd have been
quite glad to espouse their values.

Fact number five

Grumbling about it now only compounds the error.

Adriana Cundiff, the Civil Rights Act was blatantly unconstitutional, period. That any “conservative” would defend that unconstitutional expansion of Federal power is a joke.

Billy Bob

William Outlaw

What we applaud is the ending of the tyrannical abuse
of power by the states.

You may not realize, but one of the functions of the
Federal govenment is to offer redress to the victims of
local tyranny

(and, a friendly tip, if you have to endure tyranny,
your are better off with one far away, and with much
more people to supervise. They are less likely to
want to micromanage and nitpick).

Adriana, I see you’ve returned (as I predicted and welcome back) and on the same note you left - singing the praises of distant tyranny.  How wonderfully well-off the people of Iraq must be today - liberated by the distant boy emperor Bush from their local tyranny.

As for the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the least of its provisions were those which ended mandatory segregation in a handful of southern states.  It also forbade any type of private discrimination in any commercial action or employment or housing.  Within only a few years, it was interpreted (with MLK’s and LBJ’s enthusiastic promotion) as requiring affirmative action (i.e. discrimination) in favor of supposedly victim minorities.

This ill result is still with us, but so is a much worse one - the inclusion of sexual discrimination in the bill thanks to an amendment by the Mississippi segregationist Judge Smith.  This, of course, led to discrimination in favor of white and black women against white and black men with particularly devastating effects on the latter and on black families.  The damage to white families has increased, though not as fast, and the act has been used as a tool by the feminists in their war against the male sex and to help destroy the institution of marriage.  There of course, have been other factors, including the legalization and widespread use of contraception and abortion and the almost universal adoption of “no-fault” (actually unilateral) divorce by the states.  But the Civil Rights Act of 1964 has also played an important role in these long term social ills.  This is the MLK legacy.  It is also the legacy of Judge Smith.  Whether he was making a vain attempt to kill the bill or just making mischief in general, he got his revenge on the blacks - especially on black men.

About Libertarians many fine things can be said. Two in particular,

1. They generally avoid racialism and Judeophobia, and they have a contempt for nationalism.

2. They know that The State is a bad institution.  The State is an invention of Machiavelli, who coined the term, and was philosophically worked out by Hobbes.  The Greeks, the Romans, and the Medievals had government, but not The State. Set up to defend life (Hobbes) and property (Locke), The State has become the worst enemy of both.

@Kirt

No matter what the situation in Iraq is (and I would
classify less as oppresion by a distant ruler as the
inability of such ruler to do the basic job of any
ruler, to keep the peace), on the average distant tyrants
tend to be less meddlesome than local ones. That was
an observation made in medieval times by a medieval
tale, in which a prince asks for advice which enemy to
attack, he is told to worry more about the one nearby
than the one far away, even though he is more powerful,
because a more distant enemy probably has more pressing
business to attend to. Counterexamples do not invalidate
this calculation.

As for the social ills you mention, that is what happens
when the Conservatives lose the bus, and stand by the
sidelines criticizing and badmouthing changes which may
be badly needed, instead of collaborating and influencing
the result.

The Civil Rights struggle was carried out without
Conservative input, so Conservatives should ask themselves
why they did not offer it.  You miss the bus, and these
things happen.

Sid,

I have a more nuanced view of the State, (in which I
follow Lukacs). Of the three examples you mention, I
would be wary of the Greeks and the Medievals. Greeks
lived in city states which tended to go to war with
one another, with disastrous results for all of Greece,
adn the governmetn of such city states could be quite
tyrannical (actually, the word tyrant is Greek, to
describe the behavior of quite a number of their rulers)
Not a model to imitate. 

The medievals had the same problem. Internal warfare
between nobles in the absence of a central authority
who could keep the peace. And nobles could be quite
tyrannical towards their peasants, for that matter.

As for Rome, the absence of the State meant tht conquered
lands tended to be plundered for the good of Rome…

Not a cheering thought. Much as men yearn for freedom,
in fact they have to choose between tyrants, to find
one who is bearable enough and can protect them from
other prospective tyrants.

As for Libertarians, I agree they have their good points,
but I distrust people who do not pay attention to histor.

Dear Adriana,

Your comments make it certain that you know nothing, zero, nada about either ancient Greece or medieval Western Europe (France, Germany, Spain, Italy, England).  Thus your analogies between historical times and the modern era are flat-out silly and without meaning.

Re Sid Cundiff’s comment: “2. Labor Theory of Value.  After Böhm-Bawerk demolished the idea, the labor theory of value, founded by Locke, creeps in the back door.  Ask libertarians to justify Private Property, they fall back on Locke: It is the result of their own labor, they say.  The libertarians and the Marxists share this in common.  Real Conservatives know that value comes from other (and Other) sources.”

As I noted in my post “Misuse of Labor, Value, and Creation Metaphors” (http://blog.mises.org/archives/007614.asp),
our (libertarians’) emphasis on “labor” is a slight confusion. But we can safely slough it off, as I have noted in that post; so Cundiff’s critique is off-base.

His other comments betray confusions typical of those with an unclear notion of property (i.e., non-libertarians).  First, he implies that the “labor theory of value “ doesn’t “justify” “private property”.  This implies of course that Lockean “first use” or “first possession” does not suffice either. But remember: everyone has a theory of property rights. They all think *someone* is entitled to control a given resource. Marxists think it’s the state (on behalf of the collective); Conservatives also think it’s someone other than the private owner.

But what does this mean? We favor private property; Cundiff does not. But he still has a preferred owner in mind. “Private” really just refers to a particular method of assigning title to property--we “Lockeans” say that the first possessor of a resources has a better claim on it than a latecomer or someone who has no objective link to the property other than what amounts to a merely verbal or particularistic claim (see my # How We Come To Own Ourselves (http://www.mises.org/story/2291)).

In other words, the “Conservative,” if he opposes private property, must think that a group of latecomers or outsiders with no link to a given piece of property has a better claim to it than its first and current user. That is, he thinks that a group of outsiders has the right to take it from the current owner.  That is what he favors; that is what he covers up by simply saying he thinks private property is not “justified.”

Cundiff then concludes by saying that value “comes from” “other” “(and Other)” “sources.” Several confusions are evident here. First: it implies value “comes from” or *has* a source. This is both positivistic (law can be “decreed"), and also seems to presuppose an objective theory of value (as opposed to subjective value theory espoused by Austrians).  Second, it assumes that libertarians believes value (valued things? valued ends?) comes “only” from “labor”. Of course not.  Finally, we have the mystical “Other” nonsense. This kind of language is typically used when someone wants what you have in your pocket--they need to make owners think they are not the real owners of their own property, so they acquiesce when the State tells them to hand it over--for the benefit of the Others, of course.

Marcus,

Although I do agree with you that the civil rights act is not what it has been touted as I can still see Ron Paul’s admiration of Dr. King.  Keep in mind that though certain businesses are privately owned they would still no doubt be served by city water and sewer.  Accessed by public roads.  Protected by public police and firemen, and possibly funded through public grant money, etc.  I have no problem with someone owning a club that requires a paid membership and admitting who they choose, but if a business is to be open to the public then it should be open to all the public.  Since all the public pay taxes that provide the infrastructure.

I am a supporter of Dr. Paul, but this reaks with political correctness and has nothing to do with truth.(Admiration for Mike King). The freedom of information act has opened up the truth to this socialist/communist that has now been elevated to a single national holliday that even George Washington no longer has! Hat Tip to Conservative Heritage Times for bringing this article to my
attention:www.newswithviews.com/Stang/alan28.htm

MLK demonstrated the power of a free market.
Free to pay also means free NOT to pay.
What better non-violent way to affect change?
No suprise that the supremes in Washington
wanted in on the act and upstaged MLK with
its typical bad performance.

The state reaction wasn’t to increase liberty
but to further restrict it.
Both sides lost, ultimately.

Ron’s admiration however is focused on MLK’s
use of peaceful influence as a private individual.
In a free market we all have influence.
Such is the power of an honest dollar and all the
more reason to pry it out of the hands of the
money changers.

What?  City states did not go to war with each other?

Did Medieval nobles not go to war with each other?

@willb

You want to complain that both sides lost, because the
State got to hold much power.

Well, why didn’t conservatives and libertarinas not
offer a way to reach the same ends without growing the
State?  Are you saying that conservatives and libertarians
have nothing to bring to a discussion except “tsk,tsk,
you should not do this because it will make the State
stronger?” For people who have to go to the bathroom
on the side of the ditch because they are not allowed
to use toilets meant for only white people (as it
happened to members of LBJ’s staff when he was Vice
President - like a feudal lord, he took personally an
insult to his retainers), that is not much of an
argument. They will ask “OK, so how do you say we get
what want?” “You should not get it, because it will
make the State stronger. Just bear up with the
indignities, because one day, your great-granchildren
might not have to” “That’s easy for you to say, you
are not the one who has to put up with it”.

You had your chance then, and you blew it.

We favor private property; Cundiff does not.
Not what I said, as any reader can read! Either Mr. Stephan Kinsella needs glasses (what I prefer to believe) or he is an obscurantist. My argument is against reductionism and making private property the highest, or only, value.

Nor am I opposed to “first use”.  It is one value to be put along side others in considering matters from the point of view of Distributive Justice.  And what the heck does “use” mean anyway?  (We know what Locke meant: the Labor Theory of Value: only those working the land would be entitled to it, and idea that Rodbertus and Marx loved.) I recommend to Stephan Kinsella that to be consistent, he must return every bit of his real and fiscal estate to the American Indians.

And by the way, Justus Möser has a better theory of “original use” than Locke, one that Tory Conservatives would be more willing to consider. cf “Von dem echten Eigenthum” in Justus Möser, Politische und Juristische Schriften, Munich: Beck Verlag, 2001, pp. 157-160.  Mannheim, in his great essay on conservatism, commented on this. Burkean prescription is also a better idea than Locke’s “first use”.  Even Roman Law, with its distinction between ownership and possession is an improvement over Locke.  Then from Leo XIII there’s Catholic Social Teaching’s view.  I’m arguing that these views of property need to be considered along with Locke’s.

Stephan Kinsella’s remarks otherwise proves all my points about what’s wrong with libertarianism.

Stephan Kinsella is a wise man with respect to economics.  And readers here know how highly I’ve praised his compatriot Thomas DiLorenzo.

@Adrianna

Typical of your comments to offer a false
argument. How were conservatives and
libertarians to intervene? There are none
in Congress today and there were none in
Congress then.
The state is the state and looks after
no one’s interest but its own. In intervening
in the civil rights issue it gave the appearance
of mediating a solution but in fact was only
exercising its own self indulgence.
MLK effected change by confronting people’s
values whereas the state effected change with
the simple use of force.
No real victory in that. Just a repression to
be dealt with by a later generation.

In fact, it was the state use of force that
was the greatest threat to King. His right
to confront the issue was met with state
backed violence and brutality.
The only “solution” was to use even more
force, an even further tightening of the screws.
Ultimately the issue was never resolved, only
repressed. If not, why all the race baiting in
our culture today?
Why all the nit picking such as we are seeing
concerning Ron Paul? Because the issue is not
settled. The state cannot force ethics (your
favorite word) on the people by restricting the
use of private property. In doing so it removes
the private property rather than the bad ethics.
Therefore...the problem remains.

Cundiff: ”We favor private property; Cundiff does not. Not what I said, as any reader can read! Either Mr. Stephan Kinsella needs glasses (what I prefer to believe) or he is an obscurantist. My argument is against reductionism and making private property the highest, or only, value.”

Libertarians do not assert that private proerty is the “highest” value.  We assert that aggression against private property is unjustified. Now, either you agree with this, or you do not. If you do agree with it, then you are a libertarian. If you do not, then you are in favor of aggression. Maybe it’s because of some “Other” or “higher” value. I do not, and do not care--as a libertarian, it is aggression I oppose. (As a human, of course I value things other than non-aggression, and oppose things other than agggression.) So the sole question is are you oppose to aggression, or not? Do you advocate aggression in some cases, or not? Of course, you must, if you oppose the Lockean homesteading ethic. (I go into some of this in my What It Means To Be an Anarcho-Capitalist, http://www.lewrockwell.com/kinsella/kinsella15.html.)

Cundiff: “Nor am I opposed to “first use”.  It is one value to be put along side others in considering matters from the point of view of Distributive Justice.”

This is fine; it is the same, essentially, as the stance of any criminal or socialist. What they all share in common is a desire to take property by force from its current owner.  Instead of prettying it up with fancy talk of “other values” and “Distributive Justice” (or “social justice” as socialists do; or “I am stronger and want it” as private criminals do), just come clean, and admit it: you have some sympathy for the libertarian idea of peace and harmony and non-aggression, but you are not stuck to it; and sometimes you are willing to condone, advocate, endorse, maybe even commit, aggression, for the sake of your “other values”. Fine; we libertarians realize we live in a world of non-libertarians--non-libertarians of a huge variety of stripes. The flavors are interesting, perhaps, in academic discourse, but become less so when force is being actually applied to trespass or kill or take one’s property.

“I recommend to Stephan Kinsella that to be consistent, he must return every bit of his real and fiscal estate to the American Indians.”

I do not know what kind of argument this is supposed to be--how is a “recommendation” to me supposed to refute my assertion that aggression is unjustified? If Mr. Cundiff wants to propose that the non-aggression principle implies that some living Native Americans have better claims to certain tracts of land than the current legal owners, he may well be right. (This is what property title insurance would be for in a free market, no?)

“And by the way, Justus Möser has a better theory of “original use” than Locke, one that Tory Conservatives would be more willing to consider. cf “Von dem echten Eigenthum” in Justus Möser, Politische und Juristische Schriften, Munich: Beck Verlag, 2001, pp. 157-160.”

Interesting--are you aware of an online, English language version of, or discussion of, this?

“Burkean prescription is also a better idea than Locke’s “first use”.” I assume by this you simply mean some kind of long-standing use, as opposed to a brief and ephemeral use. But to me this is merely a detail of what counts as first possession.  What is very relevant is that someone does possess a resource sufficiently that some latecomer wants to oust the earlier owner’s possession. When it gets to this point, when the latecomer or contestant wants the control that the current or earlier possessor already has, then the question is: which of these two has the better claim? The libertarian answer is: the current possessor--the natural owner. The answer of the Conservative is (in some cases): the latecomer.

“Even Roman Law, with its distinction between ownership and possession is an improvement over Locke.” Sure; but this is a mere detail. Ownership is best viewed as the right to possess or control.  The civil lawyers’ work on this is conceptually superior, of course, but it does nothing to undercut the libertarian reasoning in support of the first use-first own principle (which lies at the heart of the non-aggression principle).

“Then from Leo XIII there’s Catholic Social Teaching’s view.  I’m arguing that these views of property need to be considered along with Locke’s.” You can consider whatever views you like while you steal property, if it mollifies your conscience.

@willb

So there were none in Congress?  As far as I can recall
none of the people in the Freedom marches were in
Congress. Nothing kept conservatives and libertarians
from offering support and aiding their voices.

Or do you think that to be effective in today’s society
you have to be an elected official? That kind of folly
has given us a right-to-life movement whose only goal
seems to elect Republicans who bait-and-switch them.

Sir, if Conservatives and Libertarians thought it was
worthwhile to participate in the effort to get rid of
Jim Crow, they would have found a way. They did not,
they thought it was enough to say “tsk, tsk, tsk”..

In politics,such miscalculations have to be paid for.

@willb

So you have made the astonishing discovery that the
State solves problems by the use of force? Where have
you been living all these years.

All problems get solved, at some point, by force, either
evident or implied. At all levels, in all relationships.
You are fighting human nature if you deny it.

As for enforcing ethics by restricting property, it is
done all the time when they take away people’s right to
use their property - their car, if they are caught
driving when drunk. I trust that you have enough sense
of self preservation to prefer that drunk drivers be
kept off the road rather than defending their property
rights. 

And I trust that if anyone tried to set his dog on fire,
you would applaud the SPCA who came to take the dog
away, no matter that it was the property of the person
who tried to lit him up.

@Adrianna
Ok, you got me, sniff.
Freedom is slavery.
Peace is war.
Up is down.
I got my mind right, Boss.

Stephan Kinsella now changes his argument with respect to my original point #1.  Now non-aggression is the highest value or that to which all is to be reduced?  Equally questionable. Let’s all call for government to exercise some serious “aggression” against abortion “clinics”, and lets “steal” the incomes of abortionists (by fines). Adriana’s examples of drunk drivers and animal abusers makes my argument QED.

He’s dropped point #2, apparently agreeing with the Labor Theory of Value, as if Menger and Böhm-Bawerk had not demolished this with “demand drives the market” through marginal utility. 

Silence has greeted points ##3-8.

I again insist that I have respect for Mr. Kinsella as an economic thinker.  Some very good thought is coming out of the Austrian School. Not much, alas, on The Common Good.

To put the matter bluntly to two honorable me, Mr. Epstein and Mr. Kinsella:

1. Do you support the owner of a restaurant practicing Jim Crow?

2. Do you support a the same putting up a NINA sign.

3. Do you support the same excluding Jews?

Mr. Cundiff:

“Stephan Kinsella now changes his argument with respect to my original point #1.  Now non-aggression is the highest value or that to which all is to be reduced?”

It is not my view, nor that of libertarianism, that non-aggression is “the” highest value.  However, aggression is one thing that I oppose--or, non-aggression is one thing that I favor or value; for Conservatives, this is apparently not true, since they are willing, like socialists, to break some eggs (human lives) to make an omelet (achieve your “higher” goals).

“1. Do you support the owner of a restaurant practicing Jim Crow?”

Of course not, since “Jim Crow” is a state law, and I oppose all state laws, especially racist ones like Jim Crow; so of course would not support a private actor somehow “practicing Jim Crow”, i.e., outlawing private interracial assocations among others. But if you mean, do private property owners have a right to refuse service to outsiders based on racial or other criteria, of course they do, just as Mr. Cundiff has every right to refuse to date a yellow woman because she is yellow or to refuse to invite an Aleut to his house for dinner because he’s an aleut.

“2. Do you support a the same putting up a NINA sign. ... 3. Do you support the same excluding Jews?”

I have no idea what a NINA sign is but these questions have the whiff of libertarianism 101 to me. There are plenty of answers to such basic questions elsewhere, and the rationale for them is quite plain.

NINA translates as No Irish Need Apply

Which told prospective employees of Irish origin
that they were not wanted, and that they could
hike their ugly sorry unwashed asses somewhere
else to somene who did not mind their stink.

But if you mean, do private property owners have a right to refuse service to outsiders based on racial or other criteria, of course they do, just as Mr. Cundiff has every right to refuse to date a yellow woman because she is yellow or to refuse to invite an Aleut to his house for dinner because he’s an aleut.

Forget for a minute that Mr. K hasn’t read Hohfield on rights (rights are three terms, not two as Hobbes and Locke wrongly suppose).  Forget that a right needs grounding in natural law and justice.  Forget that he hasn’t a clue with the distinctions of distributive justice and communal justice.  Instead, note how with this faulty analogy Mr. K proves himself innocent of logic and reveals himself to taste of a the Philistine and the manners of a huskster.  To equate a business transaction (eating in a restaurant) with marriage and hospitality shows the utter reductionism that I’ve faulted. For Mr. K. everything is a materialist and economic transaction, and thus the generosity of my dining room is made equivalent to the appeals of barker at the county fair, and marriage is made equivalent to whoredom. 

Frankly, this goes beyond indignation.  If people think that Ron Paul believes this, then no wonder his percentage is in single digits! If Mr. K’s view is the majority, then let’s hand over The West to Abdul and Miss Fatima, for the West would not be worth saving.  Bentham reigns!  Pushpin is as good as Shakespeare! 

Let us thus call Mr. K’s view The Prolegomena to Any Future Ethics of The Last Man.

“No matter what the situation in Iraq is (and I would
classify less as oppresion by a distant ruler as the
inability of such ruler to do the basic job of any
ruler, to keep the peace), on the average distant tyrants
tend to be less meddlesome than local ones. That was
an observation made in medieval times by a medieval
tale, in which a prince asks for advice which enemy to
attack, he is told to worry more about the one nearby
than the one far away, even though he is more powerful,
because a more distant enemy probably has more pressing
business to attend to. Counterexamples do not invalidate
this calculation.” - Adriana

Where to start? First by commending Adriana’s comparison of a distant government to a distant enemy.  The key insight here is the recognition that government is far more often than not, the enemy.  But is it necessarily better to have your enemies at a distance?  What about the Michael Corleone saying of “Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer”? Even in the Medieval times of which Adriana speaks, I bet the citizens of the cities of Kievan Rus gained greater relative appreciation for the petty tyrannies of their local lords when the Mongol hordes, previously so distant as to be unheard of, descended on them like a whirlwind, piling up corpses by the hundreds of thousands.  In like manner has the US descended upon Iraq, not failing to keep the peace, but actively destroying it and piling up the corpses.

It is basic Catholic social teaching that government should be kept close to the governed - this is called the principle of subsidiarity.  In modern times, this principle must be asserted more vigorously than ever since fast communication prevents any moderation of tyranny by distance.  No part of the world is more than an hour away from a US nuclear missile strike.

In my own personal experience, the government services most useful to me - police, fire, and local flood control - are provided locally.  When I had a dispute over my property tax assessment, I reached the assessor within minutes and he made substantial concessions to my complaint, albeit not quite all the concessions I wanted.

Contrast that with my experience with the distant enemy in Washington.  When my youngest son, serving in the army, was stop-lossed to serve an additional year in Afghanistan, I sent protests to the President, two Senators, and “my” Congresswoman.  From one of the Senators and the Congresswoman I heard nothing, from one Senator I got a canned referral to her website, and from President Bush a canned reply thanking me for my support for his war on terror, which needless to say, I was not supporting.  And, again needless to say, my son put in that extra involuntary year in Afghanistan.

No thanks, Adriana, I think I’ll continue to prefer local to distant global tyranny.  If worse comes to worse, I can always move to a different locality.

If Mr. Kinsella is of Irish extraction, we can
only be appalled about his lack of historical
knowledge about his own people. It is one thing
not to be overly proud of one’s heritage to the
exclusion of any other considerations, and another
to be thoroughly ignoran of it.

If so, Mr. Kinsella is another of Paine’s descendants
who believe that all that came before them was
oppresion and falsehood, and the sooner it is put
behind us, and a new society fashioned from their
principles the better. That was the gist of the
disagreement of Paine with Burke. Burke instead
believed in the value of history and tradition, and
whatever reform (and he believed in the need of
reform) should be grounded on history and tradition.

For the record, Burke was right in his assesment of
the French Revolution, whose course he predicted in
the early days when everything was looking rosy, while
poor Paine was so wrong that he nearly lost his head
to the guillotine - being saved from it because
Robespierre got his head chopped first.

(By the way, while not disminishing Robespierre’s
crimes, by the time he got to power all the damage
had been done. He took over country trying to repulse
foreign invasion, suffering from civil war, facing
an economic collapse, and with incipient famines. The
only thing missing was Great Cthulhu. Responsibilty
for this disaster can be laid to the door of Mr.
Paine’s friends - who in that sense could be said to
have deserved the guillotine)

@Kirt

Marauding hordes are not a governemt. Invaders
are not a goverment. Actually, if they settle
down to become a goverment that’s an improvement
as they will not slaughter and loot wholesale,
but try to keep the population around to do their
work.

And while I know the Churh’s teaching on
subsidiarity and approve of it, I recognize that
there are situations when they are trumped by
bigger considerations. As the Church itself
recognizes, and acted in the past. Remember the
Crusade against the Cathars?  They did not ask
the local powers to deal with the heresy, but
came down with iron and fire to stamp it out
“Kill them all, God will sort them out”

Not much subsidiarity there....

Adriana:

Re NINA: My personal heritage is utterly irrelevant. I’m an American, not an Irishman.  Further, of course, a “NINA” sign is perfectly legitimate, if it simply means that the owner of property chooses for some reason not to deal with or employ Irish. Who’s business is it of yours?

Cundiff: “Forget for a minute that Mr. K hasn’t read Hohfield on rights (rights are three terms, not two as Hobbes and Locke wrongly suppose).”

Dredging up Hohfeld is beside the point. This is just a distraction, a fancy way of trying to evade the point that you are in favor of aggression. Eye on the ball....

“Forget that a right needs grounding in natural law and justice.”

Natural law is very problematic. See my New Rationalist Directions in Libertarian Rights Theory and Defending Argumentation Ethics for more fruitful approaches, IMO.

“Forget that he hasn’t a clue with the distinctions of distributive justice and communal justice.”

More hand-waving to conceal your endorsement of the use of naked state violence wielded against innocent people.

“Instead, note how with this faulty analogy Mr. K proves himself innocent of logic and reveals himself to taste of a the Philistine and the manners of a huskster.  To equate a business transaction (eating in a restaurant) with marriage and hospitality shows the utter reductionism that I’ve faulted.”

More hand-waving. I’ve done no such “equating”.  But what all these situations have in common is that they are choices made by an actor about how to use his own body and property.

“For Mr. K. everything is a materialist and economic transaction,”

Actually, all transactions are in a sense economic, in Mises’ praxeological sense, since the laws regarding the implications of human action apply to all human action including all transactions. What I think is the case is that not all transactions are catallactic (market) ones. So what? None of my points have been “economic” in the narrow sense. My points have just been simple analogies: just as you own your home (and body) and *therefore* do not have to marry or sup with or invite as a guest someone you dislike, just as this does not violate the offended party’s rights since he in fact has no claim on your body or property--the same is true of other uses of other property you have. All action employs means to achieve ends--this includes both non-market and market action.  If I build a home for purposes of dwelling, that is my right as a sovereign individual, just as it’s my right to construct a building to use to try to sell food or services to people for the purpose of earning monetary profit.  You Conservatives seem to think--on full display here--that using my time and effort and property to do certain things is rendered “low” and “regulatable” if the end is monetary. I have no such low opinion of people living in the real world. Unlike you, apparently, I do not fault people for the sin of living. Rand has many faults but you’re reminding me of her witch doctor.

“and thus the generosity of my dining room is made equivalent to the appeals of barker at the county fair, and marriage is made equivalent to whoredom.”

This is all hand-waving. First, I made no equivalency. I am simply explaining that proprietors of things may use them as they see fit, without this violating others’ rights. Your getting miffed about the idea that someone might think marriage is similar to prostitution (which is not my view) is nothing but a ploy to sputter indignation while you steal money from our pockets. Eye on the ball, people: the issue is: who owns *this* piece of property, say--a farm, that someone homesteaded from the state of nature with his own hands? I say--he does. You say--the crowd of people who gather around can “decide” who owns it. I call this theft.

Adriana: “If Mr. Kinsella is of Irish extraction, we can only be appalled about his lack of historical knowledge about his own people. It is one thing not to be overly proud of one’s heritage to the
exclusion of any other considerations, and another to be thoroughly ignorant of it.”

My personal history is none of your business, but I’ll say I’m an American; and “my people” are fellow homo sapiens sapiens, since I’m not an atavistic collectivist tribalist.

“If so, Mr. Kinsella is another of Paine’s descendants who believe that all that came before them was oppresion and falsehood, and the sooner it is put
behind us, and a new society fashioned from their principles the better.”

Actually, no, I have many problems with utopianism and constructivism, as I explained in When Did The Trouble Start?. As for all that came before being falsehood--no, Locke was quite good on homesteading.  Anyway, this is yet more distraction. This often happens when an ostensibly civilized person starts to have it made clear that they support naked violence and aggression. They become uncomfortable and seek to change the subject. I have only maintained here that I am opposed to aggression. That in my view--this is the libertarian view--aggression is unjustified.

Adriana and Cundiff squawk and squeek, rattle off Hohfeld and my woeful respect for my Irish ancestors, gnash teeth over any comparison between private and market uses of property, and so on, since they are trapped.  They do not want to say they are favor of aggression, though of course they are, so they change the subject and try to in essence say, “that’s not the question.” They do not want to say they oppose all aggression, since they would then be libertarians, bereft of a way to tax people for their muscular states.  They do not want to argue that taxation is not aggression, because they know that to be silly. Trapped, like a cornered bobcat, they distract and hiss and evade.

Mr. K’s manner of argument is to evade argument.  “Eye on the ball” he says, when his is blind.

Yet his dogmatic fundamentalism—what else to call it?—refuses to see any other reality than his reductionism (which he’s changed from materialism to “anti-agression” and Benthamism.

And his fundamentalism is useful for us Tory conservatives.  He proves that we have very little in common with him and his fellow fundamentalists. I had heretofore thought differently.

And we needn’t worry about him.  Libertarians are too free-spirited to unite even with each other. So they’re no problem.