Ignorance of the law is recognised as a mitigating factor. A few years
ago I was out waterskiing on Lake Washington with a freind. We didn't
have a third person to act as watcher. I was driving, so when the Coast
Guard stopped us, I got a ticket for it. When I went to court, I
explained that I was a resident of New Hampshire and was not aware of
the regulations for water skiing there in washington state. The judge
ruled that as a mitigating factor and let me off.
>
> >> Also, if a child is born in an apartment
> >> and its parents die sometime thereafter,
> >> the landlord, in accord with libertarian
> >> theory, has the right to evict the child,
> >> to use force against the child, even as
> >> the child did not sign any contract.
> >
> >SO you are saying that since the parents died in the apartment, in
> >effect abandoning the child, then under the lease, the landlord can
> >claim the child?
> >
> >>
> >> Libertarians seem to think that they have
> >> an inherent right to property upon which a
> >> preexisting claim has been placed: the U.S.
> >
> >Libertarians, as citizens, have the ultimate right, since the US is
> >nothing but responsible to and exists with the consent of the citizens.
> >The population was here before the government was.
>
> This brings up my major question about Libertarianism:
>
> I generally agree with Libertarianism in theory. But as far as I can
> tell, for it to globally replace other systems of interaction, one
> of two things would need to happen:
>
> 1. Everyone would need to voluntarily adhere to it. But as long as there's a
> profit to be made by coercion, I believe that some people
> will always attempt to do so.
That is where civil disputes are still a big part of libertarian theory.
Use of civil legal remedies to counteract coercive acts in a libertarian
society has been fully hashed out.
>
> 2. Some group would need to impose Libertarianism on the world. Of course,
> this imposition would go against Libertarian values.
Well, it all depends on how it is done. If libertarian lawmakers get in
office and merely change the laws in a way that encourages people to
live, work, and think in libertarian ways, then people will for the most
part be free to be unlibertarian, but will pay to beable to live and
work in such anti-freedom ways. People really have no idea how much of
their lives are shaped and influenced by such mundane things as tax and
social welfare policies. For example, people wonder why so many welfare
people seem to be generationally attached to it, but they don't know
that there are, or have been rules that prohibit welfare recipients from
owning assets of such mundane value as a car or even a share in a family
business.
>
> This catch-22 makes me draw a parallel between communism and libertarianism:
> sounds great, if everyone adheres. But usually the only way to get everyone
> to adhere is with guns, which means fascism.
Since this country used to be pretty libertarian, at least much more so
than it is now, any actions taken under arms by libertarians can legally
be construed as merely a the enforcement of a civil law remedy. Freedom
loving people have seen their rights be eroded for several decades, so
any action they take is merely the enforcement of a class action suit.
Our Constitution already recognises that if the people feel the
government is not representing them, is acting in a tyrranical manner,
then it should be overthrown. Thomas Jefferson said, "The tree of
Liberty, from time to time, must be watered with the blood of tyrants
and patriots."
I would by no stretch of the imagination call the US Constitution, nor
Thomas Jefferson a fascist document or a fascist person. The only way
you can even make any parallel between communism and libertarianism is
that they are at extreme opposite ends of any political spectrum.
Libertarians want to be able to prevent others from violating other
individuals while communists consider violating other's rights as an
obvious given.
>
> Can anyone talk me out of this?
Easy, the internet is possibly the largest and most successful
libertarian experiment in history, and you don't see wars, etc.
Obsolescent governments are trying to force sovreignty on the internet
by have found that to be rather problematic. Since anything crossing
state lines is legaly interstate commerce, they can't under the
Constitution legally mess with it, and so long as congress sees a
libertarian policy vis a vis the internet as a positive business
environment, they won't change it, and even the Communications Decency
Act they tried to pass has been tossed out, so even their power is
limited. Because the internet is predominantly a communications medium
between people, the First Amendment is paramount with anything done on
it. WHile there is little case law on the internet, the touchy areas
with things like porno on the net in the end will I beleive, be found to
only be enforceable in the originating data's jurisdiction under the
standards of that jurisdiction. If such a policy is not ultimately
practiced, we can all shortly expect to be living on the net according
to the moral codes of the Wahabi sect of Saudi Arabia. SInce that does
not seem palatable to most people, such a situation would obviously
naturally encourage people to err on the side of libertarianism.
>
> >> The only difference between the smalltime
> >> landlord and Uncle Sam is that U.S. is big.
> >> Yet there is no libertarian rule that places
> >> a limit on the size of an area claimed. Yes,
> >> force was used to wrongfully remove preexist-
> >> ing claims of Native Americans, but none of
> >> the guilty are alive today. If we say that
> >> therefore the U.S. property is forfeit, so
> >> too all land claims, for your dwelling pro-
> >> bably stands on once Indian territory.
> >>
> >> I think the importance of libertarianism
> >> lies in the utility of private property,
> >> such that people are more prosperous when
> >> individuals are allowed maximum control of
> >> areas that they purchase in exchange with
> >> others. In short, if a landlord (Uncle Sam)
> >> that owns a vast area wants his tenants to
> >> prosper, he will allow them a very high
> >> degree of liberty. He will allow them to
> >> control parcels of land and trade them.
> >>
> >> What makes the market work is the ease with
> >> which customers can exit a given establishment.
> >> What makes government not work is the difficulty
> >> with which customers can exist the country. This
> >> difficulty makes it a "landlords market," putting
> >> the customers, or citizens, largely at the mercy
> >> of those who are the de facto landlord. So it all
> >> comes down to size. This places emphasis on the
> >> need to expand beyond the Earth, beyond this
> >> fixed and limited parcel of territory.
> >
> >Since the sovreign power of the US gov't is delegated by the people as
> >individuals, if the people decide to abolish it, break it up in an
> >anti-trust action, or make its role entirely voluntary for each and
> >every individual, allowing people to "go armadillo" in Vinge's terms,
> >then its legal. Since this voluntary principle already exists in the tax
> >code and in the Social Security Act, its not unprecendented.
> >--
> >TANSTAAFL!!!
>
> Although America is theoretically a democracy, in fact we have
> a very complicated series of mechanisms of political control ultimately
> enforced by violence or threat of violence. "The people" may not
> circumvent those mechanisms and remain within the existing laws.
>
Since the Constitution is the ultimate law, and it already recognises
the people's right to revolt against unjust laws, governments, and
rulers, any lesser law that limits that right is in itself unjust and
should be disobeyed. While I personally am not opposed to use of force
in such actions, nonviolent actions can and do acheive their goals of
overturning unjust laws and unjust governments, and would be just as
illegal as an action using force of arms. A mob is nothing more than an
unthinking, unguided missile.
There also is nothing wrong with libertarians using nonviolent means to
acheive their goals. This is essentially what has happened in the former
Soviet Union.
-- TANSTAAFL!!! Michael Lorrey ------------------------------------------------------------ mailto:retroman@together.net Inventor of the Lorrey Drive MikeySoft: Graphic Design/Animation/Publishing/Engineering ------------------------------------------------------------ How many fnords did you see before breakfast today?