Thursday, September 30, 2010

Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Can Politicians Help Us? – Kel Kelly

Kel Kelly says, “The only way politicians can really improve the economy — and our lives — is by (1) getting out of the way, and (2) undoing the policies they've previously implemented that hamper it.” helpful politician

http://mises.org/daily/4726

Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Ludwig von Mises Quotes

A man who chooses between drinking a glass of milk and a glass of a solution of potassium cyanide does not choose between two beverages; he chooses between life and death. A society that chooses between capitalism and socialism does not choose between two social systems; it chooses between social cooperation and the disintegration of society.

Socialism is not an alternative to capitalism; it is an alternative to any system under which men can live as human beings. To stress this point is the task of economics as it is the task of biology and chemistry to teach that potassium cyanide is not a nutriment but a deadly poison.

AND

The champions of socialism call themselves progressives, but they recommend a system which is characterized by rigid observance of routine and by a resistance to every kind of improvement. They call themselves liberals, but they are intent upon abolishing liberty. They call themselves democrats, but they yearn for dictatorship. They call themselves revolutionaries, but they want to make the government omnipotent. They promise the blessings of the Garden of Eden, but they plan to transform the world into a gigantic post office. Every man but one a subordinate clerk in a bureau.

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

What the Hell is Conservativism and Liberalism? Who are Conservatives and who are Liberals?

VB002206.tif

You know what's interesting is the change in meaning the word "liberalism" has undergone from "classical liberalism" to the modern "social liberalism."

Also, "liberal" basically means a person that is open minded and willing to work toward political change. I think you could actually say that tea partiers are liberals, although not espousing the modern social liberalism, but a more classical liberalism.

Who we normally consider as liberals today could be considered conservative in that they are attempting to hold on to the present system of increasing taxation and centralization of power in D.C.

Food for thought.

Wednesday, September 8, 2010

The Private Production of Defense – Hans-Hermann Hoppe

Among the most popular and consequential beliefs of our age is the belief in collective security. Nothing less significant than the legitimacy of the modern state rests on this belief.

Here he addresses the problem concerning democratic governments’ defense practices: Hans-Hermann-Hoppe

“Moreover, under democratic conditions, insult will be added to injury.  For if everyone - aggressors as well as non-aggressors and residents of high crime locations as well as those of low crime locations - can vote and be elected to government office, a systematic redistribution of property rights from non-aggressors to aggressors and the residents of low crime ares to those of high crime areas comes into effect and crime will actually be promoted…[government] taxes more in low crime and high property value areas than in high crime and low property value ones, or it even subsidizes the residents of the latter locations – the slums – at the expense of those of the former and thus erodes the social conditions unfavorable to crime while promoting those favorable to it.”

How would a private system operate and solve the problems created by a democratic government’s system?  Hoppe thinks people would basically buy defense insurance and lauds the superior sufficiency of the private sector:

“Based on its continually updated and refined system of statistics on crime and property values and further motivated by the noted migration tendency from high-risk-low-value (“bad”) to low-risk-high-value (henceforth “good”) locations, a system of competitive aggression insurers would promote a tendency toward civilizational progress (rather than decivilization).

He also discusses what would happen if a state were to attack a stateless area protected by private defense associations.  What would the attacking state face?

In this case the aggressor would not encounter an unarmed population.  Only in statist territories is the civilian population characteristically unarmed.  States everywhere aim to disarm their own citizenry so as to be better able to tax and expropriate it.  In contrast, insurers in free territories would not want to disarm the insured.  Nor could they.  For who would want to be protected by someone who required him as a first step to give up his ultimate means of self-defense?  To the contrary, insurance agencies would encourage the ownership of weapons among their insured by means of selective price cuts.

People would actually have economic incentives to own weapons.  The insurance agency could weigh the risks and effectively pay people to help defend the territory voluntarily.  Futhermore, if the insurance agency failed to protect your property, it pays you.  In our world, when the government fails to protect your property, it still charges you and tells you better luck next time.

https://mises.org/journals/jls/14_1/14_1_2.pdf