October 2007 Archives

First movers in the modern libertarian movement didn't have the Internet, emerging media or even a candidate for president. When Lew Rockwell received the permission of Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises widow to form an institute based on his life's work it must have seemed a daunting task. After all, how do you convince the body of traditional academics to embrace a paradigm changing approach based on anarchy ?

While von Mises wasn't considered as radical as his American students and colleagues, the passion, logic and dreams of people like Murray Rothbard continue to live in the hearts of the people associated with the Mises Institute. Even though it's not popular fare on the menus of my former colleagues on the LP PlatCom, Lew Rockwell and his merry band of anti-statist cohorts held the 25th Anniversary celebration of the Ludvig von Mises Institute at the Grand Hyatt this last weekend, adjacent to Grand Central Station in New York City. Even this country boy felt compelled to check it out . . . oh yeah, Ron Paul was there too.

"The better we inspect and protect our food supply, the safer we are against bacteria that can come both from unsafe plants and from people looking to cause harm and wreak havoc by tainting our food supply," Schumer said. "We need to be more vigilant than ever, and that applies to everything from airline security to food safety." - Senator Charles Schumer

If Chuck Schumer ever worked as more than a mimeograph boy for Stanley Kaplan in the private sector, he might realize that Joe and Eileen Bailey can fend for themselves in the open marketplace. The recent shutdown of the Topp's Meat Co. is evidence of a market mechanism succeeding. If companies fail because of poor performance or negligence to their customer's, that failure is a success in terms of a mechanism which does not reward failure. One could conceive of an FDA scheme which might let offending companies off the hook if regular inspections failed to catch the problem, limiting liability based on the negligence of inspectors. Perhaps that company might even be eligible for emergency relief funds under the guise of a special fund or grant with lofty aspirations and ideals. After all, companies have an incentive to keep customer's safe and happy, it's simply not the world one hundred years ago when Upton Sinclair was exposing the nightmare world of meat production.

Despite my best efforts to dissuade the RNC of my need to be in their club, they sent me Jay Salwen's Platinum member club card. I'm not sure who this Doctor from Latham NY is, but he's welcome to come pick it up if he Google's himself at all and finds this entry. I guess those envelopes I send back either with a blank form or just empty aren't enough. You'd think some savvy staffer might just Google me.

Apparently Mike Duncan is determined to defeat any Democrat who would " raise taxes, swing America's courts to the left, increase needless regulations on small businesses and undermine America's fight against terrorism. " I'm wondering how he feels about the prospect of Dr. Paul receiving his party's nomination. Here's what the rest of the plea babbles on about . . .

Dave Ridley is a self styled journalist/activist for NHFree.com. Recently Dave's videography on YouTube has been recording some of the activity surrounding tax protesters Ed & Elaine Brown from Plainfield New Hampshire. Ridley seems to be a johnny-on-the-spot chronicler for portions of what is known as the Free State Project.

Even though the 'protests' surrounding the arrest of frequent civil disobedience icon Lauren Canario amount to a handful or ardent freedom activists, it's interesting to see the reactions of average citizens and law enforcement to seemingly accepted legal strictures (driver's licenses & income tax). Ridley always conducts himself with utter seriousness during the report and seems to be grasping the simultaneous importance of impromptu coverage and eventual video editing. It should be interesting to follow his efforts in the months to come. Occasionally he even is the source of activism and coverage himself. Check out the stand off with members of law enforcement over a flap about 'open carry' near porcupine HQ in Manchester, Murphy's Taproom. After the jump . . .

Sometime during the ennui of browsing Ron Paul news and blog posts I came across JustinTV during the outset of Saturday night. Having turned down an impromptu invite to Elvis Costello and Bob Dylan at Albany's Palace Theater earlier in the night, I'm happy to be home with the wife and kids. As part of the cusp of Gen X that turns forty soon, it's kind of disheartening to see a generation approximately ten to fifteen years younger hang out on their computers as the world watches them. A combination of girls on their cell phones and geeks in their geekpads. I did eventually stop on some 'gray hair' who seemed a little different from the twenty something girls showing off their legs. JenniCam has come a long way. My take on it after the jump.

I'm not sure if I was just feeling surly after two days on a roof or an email from Angela Keaton made me do it, but I popped off an acerbic reply to what I thought was an absurd challenge on the Yahoo list for the LP PlatCom. The challenge went something like this:

I repeat my offer of $100 for identifying any other position we could take that 60% of Libertarians and 60% of Americans support and that is not already staked out by the Ds or Rs or Greens or CP.

Last April I was appointed to the National Platform Committee by the outgoing LPNY chair Richard Cooper at the prompting of M. Carling. I guess the thinking was that despite any inherent radicalness I may possess, at least I was more practical/reasonable than the typical Gothamite out to push guns on toddlers. We actually teach them how to use real guns and hunt upstate. It only took until the following Thursday after the late July LNC appointment of the other PlatCom members for me to realize that arguing about nuclear weapons in my garage or the relevancy of Icelandic (circa 1000 AD) anarchism was not my goal until next February. I needed to get some windows into this old wreck of a house I live in. Here's my reply to the challenge and bit from Angela that started this whole thing . . .

It took me a third day of roofing my parents house ( half of the structure . . circa 1850, the other half 1770?) to make the change to jeans instead of shorts and kneepads. While I'm sure there are many bloggers that have 'roofed' in there lifetimes, how many real roofers have a blog about roofing, like runners, politicos, pet people, music folk etc. I'm guessing few to none, since they probably come home so tired and don't give a hoot about what the rest of the world is up to.

One of the keys to Francis Drake's success as an explorer and navigator was the employment of fit twenty-something's for his crew. Along with a musical quartet and paintings to survey foreign coasts, he also figured out how to avoid scurvy. My brother who is a contractor everyday anyway, still subs out his roof requirements. He see's the perfect roofer as anyone from age 19-29 and weighs about 160 lbs. and able to carry half his weight ( those shingle bundles weigh 80 lbs. btw). As a blogger roofing, you do appreciate how 'libertarian' your small group is twenty feet above the ground. In this case very voluntary.