Socialism vs. Capitalism: Which is the Moral System?

http://www.ashbrook.org/publicat/onprin/v1n3/thompson.html

The extraordinary level of material prosperity achieved by the capitalist system over the course of the last two-hundred years is a matter of historical record. But very few people are willing to defend capitalism as morally uplifting.

It is fashionable among college professors, journalists, and politicians these days to sneer at the free-enterprise system. They tell us that capitalism is base, callous, exploitative, dehumanizing, alienating, and ultimately enslaving.

The intellectuals’ mantra runs something like this: In theory socialism is the morally superior social system despite its dismal record of failure in the real world. Capitalism, by contrast, is a morally bankrupt system despite the extraordinary prosperity it has created. In other words, capitalism at best, can only be defended on pragmatic grounds. We tolerate it because it works.

Under socialism a ruling class of intellectuals, bureaucrats and social planners decide what people want or what is good for society and then use the coercive power of the State to regulate, tax, and redistribute the wealth of those who work for a living. In other words, socialism is a form of legalized theft.

The morality of socialism can be summed-up in two words: envy and self-sacrifice. Envy is the desire to not only possess another’s wealth but also the desire to see another’s wealth lowered to the level of one’s own. Socialism’s teaching on self-sacrifice was nicely summarized by two of its greatest defenders, Hermann Goering and Bennito Mussolini. The highest principle of Nazism (National Socialism), said Goering, is: "Common good comes before private good." Fascism, said Mussolini, is "a life in which the individual, through the sacrifice of his own private interests…realizes that completely spiritual existence in which his value as a man lies."

Socialism is the social system which institutionalizes envy and self-sacrifice: It is the social system which uses compulsion and the organized violence of the State to expropriate wealth from the producer class for its redistribution to the parasitical class.

Despite the intellectuals’ psychotic hatred of capitalism, it is the only moral and just social system.

This is one of the clearest, simplest, and most thorough essays on the difference between Capitalism and Socialism I have ever read. It also is an excellent defense of the morality of Capitalism - a defense that few intellectuals have ever proposed (other than Ayn Rand).

The legacy of Milton Friedman, a giant among economists

http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=8313925

Directly or indirectly, Mr Friedman brought about profound changes in the way his profession, politicians and the public thought of economic questions, in at least three enormously important and connected areas. In all of them his thinking was widely regarded at the outset as eccentric or worse.

The first of those areas is summed up by “Capitalism and Freedom”, the title of a book published in 1962 (see our review). To Mr Friedman, the two were inextricably intertwined: without economic freedom—capitalism—there could be no political freedom. Governments, he argued, should do little more than enforce contracts, promote competition, “provide a monetary framework” (of which more below) and protect the “irresponsible, whether madman or child”.

To show where Mr Friedman thought the limit of the state should lie, the book lists 14 activities, then undertaken by government in America, “that cannot...validly be justified” by the principles it lays out. These include price supports for farming; tariffs and import quotas; rent control; minimum wages; “detailed regulation of industries”, including banks; forcing pensioners to buy annuities; military conscription in time of peace; national parks; and the ban on carrying mail for profit.

Celebrating Income Inequality

http://capmag.com/article.asp?ID=5005

Democrat and Republican candidates for President are debating one another on nearly every issue--but nearly all are united on one thing: America faces a crisis of "income inequality." The rich are getting richer, the refrain goes, while the poor and middle class are held back by stagnating wages, lousy schools, and growing healthcare costs. The solution, we are told, is more government intervention: spend more on education, provide "universal healthcare," and force employers to raise wages through minimum-wage increases and union protection legislation.

But all of this outcry is based on a false premise--that income inequality is bad. While some of the problems critics point to are legitimate concerns, income inequality is not. Income inequality is a natural and desirable part of a free, prosperous society.

In America, equality should mean only one thing: freedom for all. If business and wages were deregulated, we would see a dramatic rise in economic opportunity. If education and medicine were left free, with America's businessmen, doctors, and educators liberated to offer education and medicine at all different price points, we would see quality and price improvements like those for computers or flat-panel television sets. But these benefits of freedom require that we recognize the moral right of each individual to enjoy whatever he produces--and recognize that none of us has a right to something for nothing.

Great essay from Alex Epstein of the Ayn Rand Institute. I love topics like this that catch people in the contradiction of their thoughts. Most people instinctively condemn "inequality", but in this case, when they apply their minds to why that inequality exists and what is being proposed to "fix it", they find some difficult pills to swallow. This is yet another example of the two paradigms: one that is risk averse, wanting protection from one's own weakness, and the other that embraces risk and the responsibility that comes with it (and its ensuing rewards).

Too many people see only the rewards gained by some, and covet them. Not understanding why they have those rewards (e.g. proof of their profitable actions), they take on the mentality of the victim, saying that they were unfairly gained, either by unfair competitive circumstances or at the expense (exploitation) of the poor victim.

Introduction to Radical Capitalism - Part III

http://zambia.co.zm/articles/radical_capitalism3.html

There are so many people today who just invoke arbitrary rights without such recourse to logic and reality, which is why we have great confusion in society today, with rights being randomly granted to anything, from animals to trees to God and to just about anything else. Without integrating the factors that make the whole concept of rights viable, such irrational arbitrariness is inevitable.

In our upcoming constitution, we can already see this evidence of divorcing rights from an irrefutable foundation (property rights) which can be derived from common sense, as we have shown. We have had people suggesting all kinds of special rights based purely on their feelings of sympathy. Thus we are going to have special rights for the poor people, for example, which government will be obliged to meet by forcefully taking some property from those who are less poor.

There are no special rights that anyone can claim. Every human being has certain inalienable rights and these are built on the foundation of the principle of property ownership and not on whim or sympathy. This is why the dichotomy of “individual rights versus societal rights” is a false one based on a similarly false reification of society. And it is why the acceptance of property rights leads logically to the absolute acceptance of capitalism and the absolute rejection of socialism and all its variant or resultant forms that reject the sovereignty of the individual in his own life and over his own property (communism, fascism, etc).

This is currently the last of the series - I truly hope Mr. Chisala will continue this particular series of essays, as I have found them very approachable and useful in sharing with people who are misinformed about Capitalism. Chanda brings up the issue of rights in this essay - a crucial topic for any debate on government and the philosophical basis for any moral society. He demonstrates the relationship between rights and property, and shows how a philosophy's definition of rights shapes its entire societal system.

Introduction to Radical Capitalism - Part II

http://zambia.co.zm/articles/radical_capitalism2.html

You suggest that a better method is to simply be “pragmatic”. By this, I believe you mean that we should simply look at what works (or has worked) in practice, for our economic ends, and to follow that path. But pragmatism is a very poor way of guidance in life. Why? Let’s say we discover that corruption is actually good for the economy. Should we encourage corruption in the nation so that we could have economic growth? Your answer, I am sure is no. But why not? From pragmatism, it is not possible for you to simply reject corruption as a way to economic growth if statistics show that it is good for the economy.

The same can be said about slavery. One can possibly argue that some nations have had economic success as a result of using forced free labour (slavery). If pragmatism had had its way in this debate on slavery many years ago, the West would still be practicing it. Indeed there were pragmatists who saw nothing wrong with slavery since the slaves were foreigners and the human trade was helping their economy. But it was banned because a rational moral argument triumphed over mere pragmatism, as it always should. My argument against slavery is simply that you do not have the right to own or control someone else’s property – their mind and their body – and this is the same argument I use for capitalism. Pragmatism does not have a similar moral foundation to be a useful guide.

Bwana says that I should show how capitalism achieves the things that socialism wants to achieve, but in a better way, and so on. But why should I do that? Why should anyone, for example, spend time trying to show why freedom is better than dictatorship, or than slavery? That would be the pragmatic paradigm route, which we have already shown to be morally invalid. Since no one really needs to be convinced that freedom is better than slavery, or that theft is wrong, my responsibility is only to show how socialism is essentially equal to these vices (slavery or theft) – which infringe on property rights - and someone will easily make up their mind after they see this. If this is shown, there is no need to investigate whether it even has any advantages. The discussion simply closes there. Granted, some economists have shown that socialism is actually even counter-productive, but that’s just a wonderful coincidence of the nature of our benevolent universe or our good Lord – the important fact is that it’s immoral, just as slavery is immoral. Corruption has also been allegedly shown to be counter-productive from empirical evidence, but the issue still is that it is immoral, even if it was not shown to be counter-productive, and therefore it is not a valid option for a rational person or society to even investigate.

In Part II of his essays on Radical Capitalism, Chanda Chisala answers his reader's critical comments, particularly an argument for a more pragmatic approach to deciding their society's government. I am impressed with his clear, logical responses. These essays are a very good introduction to what Capitalism entails for those who are unclear or misguided on the subject.

Introduction to Radical Capitalism - Part I

http://zambia.co.zm/articles/radical_capitalism1.html

One of the most common comments one hears whenever there is a discussion on how Africa can solve its problems is this: “we have tried socialism and we have tried capitalism; neither of them have worked. It is time for us to try out a new system of economics, something invented by ourselves.”

This statement always sounds very attractive to many unsuspecting intellectuals and yet it is quite a meaningless statement. To break it down to essentials, what it actually means is this: “we have tried taking the rights of individuals to own their property from them, and we have tried letting individuals keep their rights of owning their property; neither has worked. It is time for us to try out a new system, something invented by ourselves.”

Unfortunately, there is no “third way”. This is a question of very basic logic. Either you allow a person to be an owner of his property or you forcefully assume ownership and control of his property (through government). The former is the essence of capitalism and the latter is the essence of socialism, whether you like those two terms or not.

This is part of an excellent series of essays on Radical Capitalism, written by an editor in Zambia. I stumbled upon these writings by accident, and quickly realized they were very articulate arguments in favor of capitalism. I was further surprised to find out that they were written in the context of a public debate happening right now in Zambia concerning the organization of their society and government! It seems they are in the process of creating a new Constitution, and this writer is advocating the adoption of capitalism as the moral basis of government for Zambia.

AMA is Wrong About Medicare

http://capmag.com/article.asp?ID=4793

Under current restrictions, it is illegal for the doctor to accept a patient's payment for any amount over the government's approved reimbursement for a service covered by Medicare.
The government also prohibits the patient from being reimbursed by Medicare if the patient chooses to privately contract for services with a doctor who does not accept Medicare.

This is a textbook example of why it's wrong for the government to be the middleman for your dollars. If you were freely exchanging your dollars for medical services, you would be within your right to choose which services, which provider (and thereby, what cost) you prefer. But it's not your dollar anymore, it's a dollar that has passed through the hand of government, somehow "sanctifying" it from the taint of profit or greed before being handed to the provider of services you desire.

Unfortunately for you, because you are not the one exchanging the dollar for services anymore, you no longer have the power to negotiate the terms of that exchange (unlike your ability to choose which breakfast cereal you purchase - ironically a real factor in your health). Your options for exchange consist of trying to game the tax system to your benefit, and punching a ballot every now and then to decide who will be your personal benevolent tyrant for a season.

Also working against you is the fact that since your money has been pooled together with everyone else's before reaching this point of medical services, it falls upon the representatives of the People to make sure your best interests (as they define it) are served in this exchange. Unsurprisingly, every incident that brings harm to one becomes a reason to legislate for all - since the only way, in this situation, to keep harm from coming to the one again is to codify the incident into preventative law, transferring the effects of that exchange from one to all. How else could a victim be protected if the terms of their exchanges are dictated by government?

The thousands of pages of directives and regulations dictating the use of what has now become "public money" on your behalf is no different than a hypothetical "government-sanctioned grocery list", posted on the doors of every store, specifying the items you may buy, at what price, and from whom. It would also be illegal in this bizarro world for the grocer to accept any of your personal dollars for his business with you would be funded by the state. Only a selfish, greedy rich person would ever need or want more than the benevolent tyrants had provided.

Would you be surprised to see the shelves eventually sparse and then empty for lack of products to sell? (as all the producers of products chose to do business elsewhere where they could set their own prices with the buyers) Would you be surprised to see lines of disgruntled shoppers, each carrying their apportioned groceries through the "free checkout line"?

We can't forget that medical products and services are not intrinsically different from any other product or service. They must to be bought and sold, and replacing personal choice with government fiat doesn't "wash the (supposed) stain of profit" from the product one buys. That doctor must choose to provide a service, just like the hairdresser - or he is a slave. Those drugs must be manufactured by human beings, who, devoid of the right to choose their incentive, will cease to do so and seek other means of providing for themselves. Treating medical care any different than "food care" results in a world where food is cheap (for the poor), plentiful (for the multitudes), and profitable (for the producers) - while medicine is expensive, scarce, and undesirable to produce.

And don't tell me health care is different because we need it to survive. Starvation is worse than dying from cancer on my list...

The Fear Factor

http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul402.html

While fear itself is not always the product of irrationality, once experienced it tends to lead away from reason, especially if the experience is extreme in duration or intensity. When people are fearful they tend to be willing to irrationally surrender their rights.

Thus, fear is a threat to rational liberty. The psychology of fear is an essential component of those who would have us believe we must increasingly rely on the elite who manage the apparatus of the central government.

A short essay by Ron Paul that highlights the consequences of speaking, legislating, and governing from a perspective of fear. Fear is the hallmark of socialism - the driving emotional force that motivates people to seek protection from benevolant tyrants - those who would promise that nothing bad will ever happen to good people under their watchful care. Stimulated by crisis, both real and perceived, they advocate the restrictions of freedoms for everyone because of the criminal acts of a few. The mindset always boils down to this - prevent anyone from doing anything bad before they get a chance to do so, and forcibly ensure that everyone does good before they fail to do so...

Economists on the Loose

http://www.CapMag.com/article.asp?ID=4991

First, let's establish a working definition of free markets; it's really simple. Free markets are simply millions upon millions of individual decision-makers, engaged in peaceable, voluntary exchange pursuing what they see in their best interests. People who denounce the free market and voluntary exchange, and are for control and coercion, believe they have more intelligence and superior wisdom to the masses. What's more, they believe they've been ordained to forcibly impose that wisdom on the rest of us. Of course, they have what they consider good reasons for doing so, but every tyrant that has ever existed has had what he believed were good reasons for restricting the liberty of others.

Tyrants are against the free market because it implies voluntary exchange. Tyrants do not trust that people acting voluntarily will do what the tyrant thinks they ought to do. Therefore, they want to replace the market with economic planning, or as Professor Blinder calls it — industrial policy.

A short and simple essay on the basic philosophy of the free market economy vs. central planning/industrial policy. I love Walter Williams ability to concisely demonstrate the mindset that inspires both the capitalist and socialist movements.

Where Michael Moore is Wrong

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2007/07/where_michael_moore_is_wrong.html

America's medical system has problems, but profit is the least of it. Government mandates, overregulation and a tax code that pushes employer-paid health insurance prevent the free market from performing its efficient miracles. Six out of seven health-care dollars are spent by third parties. That kills the market. Patients rarely shop around, and doctors rarely compete on price or service.

Private competitors innovate or die. Government workers do what they did last year. That's why I want the private sector to provide my health care. Pursuit of profit will give us our best medicines and medical devices.

I'll pay you $1,000 if you can name one thing government does more efficiently than the private sector.

Third in a series on articles by John Stossel on his interaction with Michael Moore. In it he disputes more claims of how government does a better job of providing services than the private sector. Moore's popular belief that certain services shouldn't be "tainted" by profit is deceptive - and attractive to those who don't understand what profit truly is.

The Romantic Illusion of Universal Health Care

I found all these short essays on CapMag on the same day - so it seemed appropriate to bundle them together and share them here to counter the ignorance I hear every day about Universal Health Care. It's gotten to where the phrase is used as a litmus test - you're either for it or against it (like the abortion issue). Even more perversely, the public consensus has judged that UHC is inherently good (who could possibly be against caring for people?), it is inevitable (everyone else is doing it!), and it is only being held up by selfish, heartless, greedy people (if you're not in favor of the Patriot Act, you must be a traitor!).

Universal Health Care Freedom on the Fourth of July
http://capmag.com/article.asp?ID=4983

The talk about a "right" to health care really means that no one should have the right to any health care at all except through the government. As we celebrate the Fourth of July this year we must remember that our right to manage our own health care as we see fit is as vital to our liberty as freedom of speech or freedom of the press.

Why Health Insurance Should Not Be Universal
http://capmag.com/article.asp?ID=4984

Power-hungry politicians feed off the irrationality of the citizenry. If the citizenry were more rational, there would be no place in the political system for politicians who value power over freedom and justice. Today's problems with medical care are the fault of the people who want the results of capitalism while instructing their leaders to install more socialism.

All Power to the Post Office
http://capmag.com/article.asp?ID=4981

During a recent interview, a talk radio host told me that all private health insurance should be eliminated in order to give us all a reason to work together to make sure the government runs a good health care system.
A better analogy would be that conditions in our prisons might be expected to improve if we were all required to live in them. Socialists and some Liberals would find this level of government-enforced uniformity to be a noble sacrifice to which all citizens must submit. Many Conservatives would reluctantly agree—but suggest a voucher system that would allow us each to select the prison cell of our choice.

Health Care's A Mess--So What's the Solution?
http://capmag.com/article.asp?ID=4980

It's better to consider the possibility that the market didn't fail us in medical care...but it was never allowed to function. If you don't want more of the same, which universal government coverage and control will provide, then consider something radically different: freedom in health care.

Freedom and Benevolence Go Together

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2007/07/freedom_and_benevolence_go_tog.html

I interviewed Michael Moore recently for an upcoming "20/20" special on health care. It's refreshing to interview a leftist who proudly admits he's a leftist. He told me that government should provide "food care" as well as health care and that big government would work if only the right people were in charge...

Moore followed up with a religious lesson. "What the nuns told me is true: We will be judged by how we treat the least among us. And that in order to be accepted into heaven, we're gonna be asked a series of questions. When I was hungry, did you feed me? When I was homeless, did you give me shelter? And when I was sick, did you take care of me?"

I'm not a theologian, but I do know that when people are ordered by the government to be charitable, it's not virtuous; it's compelled. Why would anyone get into heaven because he pays taxes under threat of imprisonment? Moral action is freely chosen action.

This is textbook socialist thinking - first, that government control is the best solution to the society's ills, when lead by the "right people"; second, that because it is right to do something, people should therefore be forced to do so. While people will argue about the results (charity doesn't cover everyone / civilized society should be like this / etc.), they ignore the moral contradiction of being compelled to do what's right. The first attack on those who stand on principle and advocate individual freedom and responsibility is that such people are cold-hearted and unsympathetic of other's suffering. They champion the "charity" of their forced programs and claim the lover of liberty has no love for his fellow man. Unfortunately, many people believe this rhetoric and end up believing that to advocate freedom is to be against charity. Nothing could be farther from the truth...

Time for Another Revolution

http://www.mises.org/story/2633

In 1913 the relationship between the State and Society was reversed. Areas which had heretofore been considered within the private domain, sacred ground so to speak, were now invaded by the arrogant and enriched State, and within thirty years the individual was squeezed into a corner so small that even his soul lacked elbow room. His case was far worse than it was in 1776; in exchange for an income tax King George III would have conceded every point made against him by the colonists, and might even have done penance for past sins. But, such was the character of these Americans that they challenged him to battle because he presumed to impose a miserable tax on tea. What they won at Yorktown was lost by their offspring one hundred and thirty-two years later.

Were the disposition of the current crop of Americans comparable to that of their forbears, a new revolution, to regain the profit of the first one, would be in order. There is far more justification for it now than there was in 1776. But, people do not do what reason dictates; they do what their disposition impels them to do. And the American disposition of the 1950s is flaccidly placid, obsequious and completely without a sense of freedom; it has been molded into that condition by the proceeds of the Sixteenth Amendment. We are Americans geographically, not in the tradition. In the circumstances, a return to the Constitutional immunities must wait for a miracle.

An excellent essay on the need for a revolution - as great a need as existed at the birth of our nation. Too many people are ignorant of the Constitution - its purpose, its principles, and even its weaknesses and why they exist. It all sounds too anachronistic to be taken seriously today. Defenders of the Constitution are seen as blind nostalgic cultists, out of touch with modernity. That's easy to believe when you don't understand the philosophical and moral challenges of our day, let alone the historical context (and the amazing similarities).

Frank outlines the foundations of the Constitution, the social struggle, the loss of liberty, and the slow erosion of protections against the powers of the State. The entire book can be downloaded for free here.

The Myth of the Rational Voter

http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=9340166

Instead, he identifies four biases that prompt voters systematically to demand policies that make them worse off. First, people do not understand how the pursuit of private profits often yields public benefits: they have an anti-market bias. Second, they underestimate the benefits of interactions with foreigners: they have an anti-foreign bias. Third, they equate prosperity with employment rather than production: Mr Caplan calls this the “make-work bias”. Finally, they tend to think economic conditions are worse than they are, a bias towards pessimism.

The make-work bias is best illustrated by a story, perhaps apocryphal, of an economist who visits China under Mao Zedong. He sees hundreds of workers building a dam with shovels. He asks: “Why don't they use a mechanical digger?” “That would put people out of work,” replies the foreman. “Oh,” says the economist, “I thought you were making a dam. If it's jobs you want, take away their shovels and give them spoons.” For an individual, the make-work bias makes some sense. He prospers if he has a job, and may lose his health insurance if he is laid off. For the nation as a whole, however, what matters is not whether people have jobs, but how they do them. The more people produce, the greater the general prosperity.

A good essay exposing the myth that democracy always results in the best choice for all involved (wisdom of crowds, etc.) He outlines four factors that cause voters to act irrationally. In a democracy, he claims, rational politicians give the voters what they (irrationally) want.

Live and Let Live

http://jewishworldreview.com/0707/stossel070507.php3

That same week I happened to interview filmmaker Michael Moore for "20/20." Moore wants government to monopolize health care. His new film, "Sicko," argues that Canada and France approach paradise because their governments provide health care and more. This brought him standing ovations in Cannes.

"But government is force," I said to him. He was incredulous.
Michael Moore: Why do you see it as force?
Me: Because government takes money with force from people and gives it to others.
Moore: No, it doesn't, actually. The government is of, by, and for the people. The people elect the government, and the people determine whether or not they'll allow the government to collect taxes from them.

Is it really necessary to explain that government is force? When the Salvation Army asks you for a donation, you are free to say no, and you suffer no consequences. When the U.S. government demands a tax return and a check on April 15, you can't say no and go about your business. You comply or face fines or imprisonment. Yes, you get to vote for candidates periodically. But having an infinitesimal say in who will coerce you doesn't change that fact that they are using force.

John Stossel is very good at identifying the principles that most people miss when discussing the latest hot-button issues. The universal health care debate is full of misdirection and illusion, and a lot of passionate people championing popular causes while ignoring the foundation of their philosophy. Michael Moore's total absence of awareness about the true nature of any collectivist policy leaves me dumbfounded (yet not totally suprised). When people like him are making sweeping statements in the media that ignore principles, I get worried - it means the public debate is fueled by ignorance.

Socialism, Free Enterprise, and the Common Good

http://www.hillsdale.edu/imprimis/2007/05/

In chapter 21 of St. Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus proposes a moral dilemma in the form of a parable: A man asks his two sons to go to work for him in his vineyard. The first son declines, but later ends up going. The second son tells his father he will go, but never does. “Who,” Jesus asks, “did the will of his father?” Although I am loath to argue that Jesus’s point in this parable was an economic one, we may nonetheless derive from it a moral lesson with which to evaluate economic systems in terms of achieving the common good.

Modern history presents us with two divergent models of economic arrangement: socialism and capitalism. One of these appears preoccupied with the common good and social betterment, the other with profits and production. But let us keep the parable in mind as we take a brief tour of economic history.

This essay is adapted from a speech delivered at Hillsdale College on October 27, 2006, at the first annual Free Market Forum, sponsored by the College’s Center for the Study of Monetary Systems and Free Enterprise.

It makes a thorough argument about what I have often observed in the struggle between capitalism and socialism - that of the difference between the public perception of a philosophy and the actual consequences of the same.

When Talk Isn't Cheap

http://www.opinionjournal.com/diary/?id=110010006

Washington's highest court struck down a decision by Superior Court Judge Chris Wickham, who in 2005 ordered KVI radio hosts John Carlson and Kirby Wilbur had to place a monetary value on "campaign contributions" they made when they argued in favor of Initiative 912, a ballot measure to repeal a 9.5-cent-a-gallon increase in the state's gasoline tax. The antitax measure ultimately lost by 6% of the vote, in part because its opponents outspent its supporters by 20 to 1.

But the "unofficial" support of the measure by talk-show hosts such as Messrs. Carlson and Wilbur, who went so far as to actively tell listeners how they could sign petitions to get I-912 on the ballot, infuriated the self-styled Keep Washington Rolling coalition, which backed the gas tax hike. The coalition convinced a local prosecutor in San Juan County, along with the cities of Kent, Auburn and Seattle, to sue KVI radio demanding that it be brought under the state's campaign finance laws.

In siding with the localities, Judge Wickham insisted he was not restricting speech, merely requiring the reporting of "in kind" contributions to the antitax campaign. But in fact he was equating speech to money, for these "contributions" consisted entirely of speech.

Read to see where our political system is headed...

Security and Liberty

http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul383.html

... The Virginia Tech tragedy may not lead directly to more gun control, but I fear it will lead to more people control. Thanks to our media and many government officials, Americans have become conditioned to view the state as our protector and the solution to every problem. Whenever something terrible happens, especially when it becomes a national news story, people reflexively demand that government do something. This impulse almost always leads to bad laws and the loss of liberty. It is completely at odds with the best American traditions of self-reliance and rugged individualism.

... Freedom is not defined by safety. Freedom is defined by the ability of citizens to live without government interference. Government cannot create a world without risks, nor would we really wish to live in such a fictional place. Only a totalitarian society would even claim absolute safety as a worthy ideal, because it would require total state control over its citizens’ lives. Liberty has meaning only if we still believe in it when terrible things happen and a false government security blanket beckons.

After the Virginia shootings, the age-old debate is once again on the front page: "if we would just ban the guns, these things wouldn't happen" vs. "if the people had been allowed to be armed, they could have defended themselves". Every tragedy brings the same argument of state control vs. self-control (both for the criminal and the victim). Ron Paul makes a great statement here about the true definition of Freedom, and the unseen risks that come with ceding our responsibility to the state.

Democracy or Liberty?

http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?ID=4933

Our founders intended for us to have a limited republican form of government where rights precede government and there is rule of law. Citizens, as well as government officials, are accountable to the same laws. Government intervenes in civil society only to protect its citizens against force and fraud but does not intervene in the cases of peaceable, voluntary exchange. By contrast, in a democracy, the majority rules either directly or through its elected representatives. The law is whatever the government deems it to be. Rights may be granted or taken away...

...In Federalist Paper No. 10, James Madison wrote, "Measures are too often decided, not according to the rules of justice and the rights of the minor party, but by the superior force of an interested and overbearing majority." That's another way of saying that one of the primary dangers of majority rule is that it confers an aura of legitimacy and respectability on acts that would otherwise be deemed tyrannical. Liberty and democracy are not synonymous and could actually be opposites.

I love the seeming contradiction of the title - most people would assume that democracy = liberty. We talk about the two together as if they were inseperable. Unfortunately, most of us are "trained, taught, and educated" that democracy, in and of itself, is the highest form of government possible. It's what we advocate as the cure for oppressed people everywhere - if only all governments would abandon tyranny and become democratic, then their citizens would truly be free...

Without an understanding of the true nature of rights and principles, democracy is nothing more than tyranny of the majority. Freedom is at risk in a pure democracy, because the rights of the minority are forfeit - and every one of us is a minority in one way or another. The smallest minority is the individual. The founders knew this and attempted to create a system where the voice of the people could be heard, while preserving the rights of the individual.

It amazes me how we tout democracy as a panacea for the world's ills, without any mention of the need for the proper constitution and rule of law to protect the minority in any society. But knowing the quality of education that I and so many others have received regarding the proper role of government, I shouldn't be that surprised.

(see principle 12)

In Defense of Income Inequality

http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?ID=4940

Income inequality used to be a rabble-rousing issue of the left. Now it is being raised by mainstream figures, from the head of the Federal Reserve to President Bush, who are apologetically trying to offer solutions. But what is the actual problem they wish to solve? Certainly, it is not a growth in poverty. To the contrary, between 1979 and 2006--the period during which income inequality has supposedly become more acute--real wages for the median worker rose 11.5%. Even workers in the lowest tenth percentile had an increase of 4%.

No, the alleged problem is not that some are becoming poor--but that others are too rich. The complaint is that while the bottom tier enjoyed a 4% rise in income, the top tier enjoyed a 34% increase. The complaint is that over the past 25 years, the share of income of the top fifth of households climbed from 42% to 50%, while that of the bottom fifth fell from 7% to 5%.

But this development represents an injustice only if we use a perverse standard of evaluation. It is unjust only if we measure someone's economic status not by what he has, but by what others have--i.e., only if he benefits not by making more money, but by making his neighbor have less.

This is the standard of egalitarianism--the standard that demands a uniformity of income, regardless of anyone's ability or effort. It is the standard of envy, whereby a problem exists whenever some have more, of anything, than others. And the egalitarian's solution is to eliminate all such inequalities.

Egalitarianism is the antithesis of the valid tenet of political equality, under which we have equal rights. That is, we have the right to achieve whatever our ambition and talents allow, with no one permitted to forcibly stop us. Egalitarianism, however, is a denial of the individual's right to be left free. It is an abhorrent demand that some people be punished for achieving what others haven't. It is a brazen declaration that an equality of condition must be attained.

Highly recommended essay on the fallacy of egalitarianism, and its role in the public clamor over income inequality. This is only an excerpt - click the link above the quote to read the whole article.