theloniusfleabag

Dear Charles Anthony, The USA is a glaring exmaple of how this idea is not true. Look at the 'lawless' counties (Hugo even used one as an example of modern day anarchism) in Africa, Somalia and Sudan...no guns, you say? Rubbish. There is pretty much an equal amount, whether per capita or by volume, everywhere in the world, regardless of the prevalent ideology. Supposedly Canada has more guns per capita than the USA. Weapons are the world's biggest business, and they will be under state control or 'anarchy'. Usually, though, the less the state control, the more the weapons get used. Coming. I understand what you mean, because the few I went through are all on your side, as it were, but there was one I am still looking for. The definition was something like : 'The notion of overthrowing gov't, established order, etc. and advocating nothing in it's place'". Again, I shall play for time until I can look it up, as I feel it is a valid distinction. Is that the most common result? No, not even societies that advocate the right to bear arms. Actually, not even close. The right to bear arms is actually used for the wrong reasons, over the 'right reasons', by an exponential factor. Anarchy abolishes everything but. Having a stong, healthy Messiah Complex like I do helps, too.

Dear Charles Anthony, What then, after we decide to shun utopia?

Dear crazymf, I am not totally against this, I think a little more brutal honesty might clear up some 'BS' surrounding the issue and force everyone's hand onto the table. This bit, though, is a little much. It is generally Sikhs who wear turbans, not Muslims (although they do often wear 'hats'). I suggest you spend even one day reading a brief history of each of the major religions before you advocate genocide based on limited or erroneous information.

Dear jbg, Ever see a rabbi kill a cow so that it's kosher? Not pretty. I'll stand with the health authorities on this one, and against kooky religious ritualisms from all denominations.

Dear jdobbin, 'Jewish' isn't a race. Nor is it this...http://www.tshirthell.com/store/product.php?productid=625 They traditionally are from the Arabic, or 'Semite' group, which would really be listed as 'caucasian', racially speaking.

I have only read a few of the posts above, but they did make me laugh out loud. For crying out loud, these people are making jokes about themselves, and some here are taking it seriusly. Sheesh. from... http://start.shaw.ca/start/enCA/Entertainm...rc=e010455A.xml I don't even watch television, but I actually might watch this. If people can make fun of themselves to others, it is the best start to any friendship that will ever last.

Dear Charles Anthony, No, I am afraid of your ability to self-control. I would rather have the police watch over both of us that have to trust (or, mistrust and maintain eternal vigilance over) you. No offence (to you personally) intended. People that could be trusted with an absence of law are likely 1 per 10,000,000. I have already arrived at that conclusion (When I have time, I'll go through some of my dictionaries and post why your definition of anarchy is the least accepted one.) Well, again, it is human nature that taints the experiment. The notion "There is safety in numbers" means that individuals will, not just eventually, but pretty much instantly, 'mob up'.

Dear Charles Anthony, I would think that whomever was heir to Johnny Two-fingers business assets would be the primary complainer. Were there no damage to the cemetery, and no witnesses, the cemetery has lost nothing. (The 'no witnesses' bit refers to potential loss of reputation). Only when one fails to wield it effectively over another. It is tremendously productive if you win. I suppose my point is that there is no escape from coersion. State coersion has shown it can be the most brutal, no doubt, but it potentially can be less pervasively coersive than under anarchy. True, there would be no 'state coersion' per se, but that role would instantly be taken up by the individual, likely in spades.

Dear Melanie, Ding ding ding! You guessed it, the bible was written by men. Very swarthy arabic men. At least the majority of it. Sadly, there aren't too many matriarchal mammalian societies, but hyenas are kind of neat.

Dear Charles Anthony, I am not sure if you misread the story or if am am missing something...it was Auntie Myrtle that beat Johnny Two-fingers to death and fraudulently aquired his business. You will have to be more specific. Are you saying that the victim (Johnny Two-fingers and the driver with the new Charles Anthony hood ornament) in each case also holds liability because everyone in each case had free will? Or are you saying that libertarianism also excludes the notion of liability and tort?

Dear Charles Anthony, You are right, my scenario was quite limited, as I was pressed for time. However, there was never any indication that Auntie Myrtle's hired goons private security company ever worked for Johnny Two-fingers, so they would really only be short one potential customer. Auntie Myrtle was also shrewd enough to hire private security men who hadn't the brains to figure out that their customer base might get shorter in the long run. Again, pressed for time as I was, I neglected to mention that she was also packing a very sharp piece of unripened mango and a wooden spoon, just in case. Well, who is going to pay for getting you hosed off of the grill, and any damage to the vehicle and any subsequent vehicles that this may have caused damage to? (And further, who will remove your carcass to prevent further accidents?) Even with fully private insurance (along with gov't and laws), liability must be assessed. Someone has to go to the scene to say, "Evidence suggests that some dimwit jumped out on the highway in front of moving vehicle. Therefore, the driver was not at fault and should be able to collect on his insurance claim."

Dear Riverwind, I'll have to step in here and defend Polynewbie, to a limited degree. It is true, much of the media (or propaganda) generation is done for ulterior motives, when possible. You don't hear a lot about Henry Ford and his connection to the Nazis unless you go looking for it, they just don't seem to put the fact that Ford helped Hitler accomplish his goals with his funding, for example, in their ads. Other things may have been overlooked as well, such as:were the steel girders actuallly up to code? or did someone pocket a few extra dollars by saying, "That sort of thing could never happen...we don't need them to 1400 degree specs, lets sell them the 800 degree ones and make a profit on the difference." I have never heard of Larouche, except on this forum, and I never read the thread. Nor will I. Wikipedia is a good general reference guide, usually when I have remembered an event but forgotten a name, but I never take it as a 'factual representation'. I have seen several conflicting versions of history appear there, as compareed to various other sources I have read.

Dear Charles Anthony, Without gov't, there would be no term such as 'legal', nor 'legitimate'....the free market would be offering mobsters. Hugo thought that that was the govt's job. They actually protect your wealth from said mobsters, for a fee... Let's call one "Auntie Myrtle's Gas Station and Bible Emporium", and the other "Johnny Two-Fingers' Gas Station, Porn and Liquor Outlet." We'll say, for the sake of fantasy, that both are equally profitable. One night, Auntie Myrtle offers to meet with Johnny Two-fingers to discuss selling her business to him. They complete the deal, and at the cemetary where they met, she beats him to death with a fifteen inch black rubber cock. Some hired goons private police force helps her render the corpse into fish food, and she forges the paperwork to make it look like it was Johnny Two-fingers that sold his business to her.The next day, she tells the employees at "Johnny Two-fingers' Gas Station, Porn and Liquor Outlet" that she is their new boss, the cheques will be good as always, so get back to work...(I should note that Auntie Myrtle hired the toothless Mongolian hooker, formerly in Johnny's employ that she always had a soft spot for, as her new personal secretary). With no gov't or laws, who would, and more importantly, to whom, would anyone complain?

Dear Charles Anthony, I see. My fist has just taken a life of its own and knocked some overwhleming sense into my head -- albeit a sense of void that can only be quenched by a fresh cocktail of e8ight delicious Vegetables. Now you are getting it...I think. Except I don't like V8 Juice, and don't regret missing out on it. Perception is irrelevant to truth. It only matters to people.

Dear Charles Anthony, Such an easy one!? Even empty space has the edges of it's reality defined by the infinite amount of what is not there, like sixteen pails of buffalo snot.

Dear Charles Anthony, It would not have been famous if it was. It is based on the application of 'occam's razor' to logic, whittling down to the one thing that cannot be considered an assumption. It requires nothing from us. You need to stop being such a human .That which does be is so without human perception. 'It' doesn't care what we think. Whether existence is the world being held up on a turtle's back, our universe being a single molecule in the big toenail of some giant being in an alternate universe...one,and only one 'that which does be' exists. For this, I can only offer the 'proof' of logic. There is only room for one. As I have said elsewhere, there is a finite amount of 'that which does be', surrounded by an infinite amount of 'that which does not be'. Perception may vary as to how 'what does be' is seen, and imagination may try to envision 'that which does not be', but even that imagining becomes being, though only in a chemical formula sort of way. The number of grains of sand on all the beaches of the world, at any given instant, are static and finite, and they don't care that we are human and can't count them. All of the other counts belong in the realm of 'that which does not be'.

Dear crazymf et al, Happy new year. I concur with your second statement. Though I am devoutly 'left-wing', Harper is the best of a poor lot.

Dear jbg, This bit isn't true, though...at least not universally. I regularly read 'Ask the Rabbi' from Arutz Sheva (which had changed it's format to include only a few archived questions), which has derided christians as 'idol-worshippers'. Jews are supposed to be forbidden from entering the churches of, or attending the religious services of, those 'idol-worshippers'. Granted, there are varying degrees of devotion, as with any religion, with Orthodox Jews being quite literal and strict regarding scripture. Mr. Byfield's article seems to confuse politics and religion, taking the actions of an individual (family) which might rightly be called a 'sales gimmick', as acceptance of his religion by an entirely different group. from... http://israelnationalnews.com/english/news...i-31-Jul-03.htm

Comparing Saddam to Bush is ridiculous. Not really. Far more deaths and atrocities can be attributed to directives, foriegn policy decisions and beligerent actions of the US over Iraq in the same period of time. Admittedly, the US was far more involved, worldly speaking, than Iraq, whose only two current 'enemies' were Iran and Israel. Ask "How many people died because of the will of one versus the other?" After that, you are free to say that the end justifies the means, and, of course, you are free to believe it. Don't forget, GWH Bush has had his finger on the pulse of power, with just a few short breaks (the Carter and Clinton administrations), since before Gerald Ford (GWH was CIA director under Ford).

Dear Leafless, I and another had a long discussion with Hugo about 'what constitutes a right', and it came down to how rights are dispensed and to whom. Hugo asked, "Do you feel that the Jews in the gas chamber have the right to life?" My answer was, "the Nazi's didn't give them that right". Only intervention, and the vanquishing of that power, led to the re-allotment of the right to life to Jews. By the rest of the world. At least in that place in time. So, Leafless, you seem to be marking, in an elitist way, who rates as qualifying for human rights protections and who doesn't. Or, who qualifies as human and who doesn't.

Dear newbie, I am much the same, believe me. I have a tremendous distrust of the US gov't, and have posted lots of things regarding their 'misrepresentations'. I was firmly on the bandwagon that the WMD claim was a load of crap, along with lots of other things. I still remain dubious that JFK was killed by a simple, lone nut and still wonder if he wasn't killed because the military/industrial complex would have lost billions, if not trillions, of dollars had he pulled the US out of Vietnam. I wonder why Len Pelltier is still in jail when the FBI abetted murder, falsified evidence and coerced witnessess, and when this evidence was brought to light the gov't convicted him anyway. Mind you, the US gov't abetted the murder of dozens of it's citizens during the whole incident to procure land containing uranium on behalf of the military.But in this case, I believe that the US was caught with their pants down, and while still being slightly skeptical of some of the elements, I beleive it was a terrorist attack, and a mighty bold one at that. The only thing i would question is whether or not the US gov't had some foreknowledge, but if they did, they kept it well hidden. I have read the 9/11 Commission report a couple of times, and most of what it says bears out, given the information those involved had at the time.

Dear sharkman, Well, this is the whole point, really. No question Saddam was a brutal dictator, albeit with US support at the time of his crimes. However, Saddam and Iraq had become 'no threat to anyone' (an admission from Colin Powell) while N. Korea and and Iran, led by nuts, are actively boasting WMD programs and threatening neighbours. Crazymf, I cannot condone it any more than you would condone the kidnapping, extradition and hanging of GWH Bush for crimes against humanity in a country like Panama, Angola, Liberia, Nicaragua,.....

Dear PolyNewbie, I have seen many controlled demolitions, and only WTC7 looked like one. Your use of the word 'proves' in every sentence does not actually consitute actual (and especially 'legal') proof.The man who masterminded 9/11, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, was caught in 2003. Even Bin Laden himself would have been all over the 'inside job' bit if he wasn't responsible, for it would have been deeply troubling for the US had he issued a statement like: "We had nothing to do with 9/11, it was staged by the US gov't, who stooped to the mass murder of it's own people, to rally support among the US populace for another war". Instead, he praised the heroic 'glorious martyrs' who carried out the operation.

Dear Leafless, Um, actually, the point that you are missing is that we are not saying 'rather', but instead 'also'. This is fine, and you are welcome to it. Perhaps you can lobby have 'the right to personal beliefs that harm no one' included in the Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms. Interesting that you use the term 'their religions'...this is logically opposite of 'our' religion', but more to the point, 'your' religion. Mine and yours are not the same. So, were you to re-write the sentence as: "Immigrants are undermining the supremacy of my religion", it sounds rather silly and selfish. Secularism is the notion of keeping all religions out of gov't (and laws, and the justice system), and in my opinion, rightly so.

A comment from sharkman in another thread... Actually, no, they have it far worse now. Death comes randomly and often.jbg, I would agree. However, this hardly justifies going after only one of the lesser ones, does it? I am not really against Saddam standing trial, nor against his hanging, but I am against it given the circumstances. This was no more legitimate than a 'mob lynching'.