There are consistent libertarian objections to both Democrat and Republican philosophies of governance. The primary objection is the notion  in principle that autonomous individuals have universal self-ownership of property and rights. It is the idea that if I earn the right to possess something, I am the sole owner of that property. This also includes social behaviors such as gambling, marriage, smoking pot, religion, education, etc.

It is not to be confused with the typical understanding of conservatism which masks self-ownership of property (contra socialism) with often severe constraints on social behavior such as marriage, recreational drug use, sexual behavior, etc. Republicanism fails to provide libertarian principles in terms of social behavior, while Democratism, albeit its more limiting role in social behaviors, follows more socialist principles in terms of how wealth is distributed according to how ownership is defined. There, the state and not the individual owner, has the responsibility to distribute wealth acquired by the masses.

I have come to the conclusion that my own political disposition comes closest to equal-opportunity left-libertarianism which maintains a limited role in social behaviors and customs, while it balances limited state interference in the distribution of property and wealth and social responsibility to uphold the common good through equal opportunity to acquire resources for all. What problematizes all forms of libertarianism, however, is how natural resources that are not the property of any agent are fairly distributed.

Equal-opportunity left-libertarianism argues “that one leave enough for others to have an opportunity for well-being that is at least as good as the opportunity for well-being that one obtained in using or appropriating natural resources”. Thus it makes the most sense since it is a disposition that specifically targets those who are resource poor in order to give them a fair opportunity to compete for resources. Not to be confused with a socialist distribution of wealth, however, the question is how can we govern ourselves and maintain the balance between equal opportunity and equal competition to acquire resources among those whose lot in life is not something chosen. That is to say, some are born into environments that are resource rich and others are born into environments that are not as rich or resource poor. How can libertarianism, even left-libertarianism, ensure equal opportunity in the midst of such clear inequities that autonomous choice has nothing to do with? This is where I shall list a couple of key problems.

1. In order for equal-opportunity left-libertarianism to work, it requires altruistic voluntary behavior from everyone involved. If one is unwilling to donate an un-equal share of natural resources and property to those who cannot possibly attain even a close share of property, there will always be inequity where the greedy suck up resources, and the resource poor are left with no property of their own.
2. A general position of pacifism is needed from all participants in the system. The key is to support constant cooperation of all members of the society where benefits are maximized to everyone. This means that the resource rich are willing to share and resource poor are willing to do the same in order to achieve equilibrium. While the resource rich can balance the field of competition through altruism, the resource poor can donate a certain amount of “sweat-equity” to maintain that property and begin to earn their own share equally.

Therefore, bargains and negotiations need to follow game theory in which cooperation requires self-imposed limits on wealth in order to maximize wealth for everyone. The goal is for all to compete fairly for wealth through cooperation in order to earn fair shares of wealth as autonomous agents rather than enable inequity through government handouts and distributions of wealth. But is this possible without external agents of enforcement (e.g. the state)?

This is an ideal world that I think is quite counter-factual to human behavior in general where resources are rich and some people will, by their lot in life, aggrandize wealth to sustain their own well being at the expense of others. This is why a progressive tax system, not typically supported in principle by any form of libertarianism, is necessary in order to equilibrate competition on some scale. The question is what happens to that funding. Does it go back into the distribution of natural resources so that those with less competitive advantage can now earn their share of property? Or is that wealth put in programs that enable people not to compete fairly through cooperation and thus enable them to acquire an unfair share of wealth?

This is where I argue that the former option is better and welfare is, by its nature a bad thing. A flat tax should stimulate people to take pride in constructing environments where all persons cooperate with each other to maximize benefits and distribution of good and property. What needs to be enforced, however, is a limit on the self-aggrandizement of wealth when people who were once resource poor now suck up as much as they can perpetuating inequity and mitigating the opportunity of others to succeed.

So how can a society enforce equilibrium through cooperation without the state assuming ownership of the property? This is another way of saying that we cannot assume that autonomous agents will give a damn about their moral obligation to their neighbor even though a recognition of moral obligations to others is precisely what is needed for equal-opportunity left-libertarianism to work.  That’s where the real debate should be and neither Obama, nor McCain directly asks that question or provides an answer for it.

However, Obama’s idea of equal opportunity maintained through progressive taxes in principle arguably comes closer to it in the end. The current financial situation should be proof enough that we cannot blindly trust the wealthy to donate resources in order to equilibrate the opportunity for the resource poor to compete. Even if this is in dispute, and it should be for obvious reasons, all can agree that the G.W. Bush presidency has been the greatest affront to autonomous liberty, rights, and reason that we should hope never to see again in the history of this nation.

McCain continues to piss on us and tell us that it’s raining.

“Republican presidential candidate John McCain has told supporters in Ohio that his Democratic rival, Barack Obama, will raise taxes on the middle class. With five days left for the presidential election, McCain is touring swing states.”

I included a popular image you might find on the back of pick-up trucks in the US that typically features a Chevy or Ford logo (I DO live in the land of guns, religion, and antipathy to people not like me after all). You can put the Obama logo there if you want since that’s McCain’s stump message and basis of government so far. Or you can put a photo of Palin kneeling down to orally catch it. Either works and is closer to the truth than McCain’s stump speeches these days.

If this ticket gets elected, I just want to pre-emptively apologize for the second time to all of our would-be international friends who will think that we have truly lost our minds as a nation - again.

My lovely wife and I took the boys trick or treating tonight and practiced socialism with a side dish of sweet tooth satiation and warding of the evil spirits of death. Or as a certain somewhat cranky Baptist with a fantastic sense of sarcasm has said, Halloween “promotes begging, vagrancy, vandalism, and destruction of property.  It’s the only ‘holiday’ celebrated that encourages deception and lauds evil”. Despite the warning, my 3 1/2 year old went as a slice of cheese (actually two slices), and my 1 1/2 year old went as a mouse…get it? I fixed my wife and I Mexican coffees and it was good! They are plum tuckered out and sleeping soundly now. Bliss.

Anyway, one of the “treats” was a Bible tract. Tracts always give the strangest theology. If I had no sense of the Christian language game, I would think it was just an odd little tale about how bad we all are and how some guy saved us from all our badness. It follows the typical formula for being saved. And as always it’s a piece of cake! Why wouldn’t I want to do it - it’s so easy after all. “All you need to do is tell God that you know you are a sinner, believe that Jesus dies for you on the Cross, and trust Him to be your Saviour and Lord.” And that’s how you get to heaven - done!

Another strange thing is the use of analogies that make the point harder to understand. Like this one: “You see, our sin makes us dirty like a pair of shoes that have waled through the mud. And just like we can’t walk through our own house with muddy shoes, we can’t get into Heaven, which is God’s house, with our sin”. So it’s all about getting to Heaven and how you, the individual, can get there! So we are all dirty and just need those three little steps to guarantee our spot in eternity…nice.

Of course the publisher follows in tow with their maximalist understanding of the Bible:

“We believe that the Bible is the verbally inspired Word of God, absolutely authoritative and infallible.”

and

“We believe in the fall and total depravity of man, making new birth necessary for reconciliation to God.”

and

“We believe in the bodily resurrection (or changing, if living) of the saved at the rapture to be forever with the Lord in the glory and blessedness of heaven, and the bodily resurrection of the unsaved about 1,000 years later into everlasting, conscious torment and punishment in hell.”

Which all goes to say that the publishers should read their Bible a bit closer to realize that there is no “Rapture” and that there is no reference to a “total” depravity. Depravity, yes. Total - that was a doctrinal necessity for the Synod of Dort - not something all that Scriptural. They need to get off the LaHaye train in order to take the Bible seriously.

Finally, the use of the phrase “The Bible says…” has always puzzled me. For them, of course, the term means the literal words of God in the same way that Muslims belive the Qu’ran was transmitted to Mohammed. Yeah, that’s nowhere even implied in the Bible either. Believing in a verbal inspiration is idolatrous. All I can say to these folks is that they should take the Bible seriously enough to study it and to stop confusing and/or scaring our kids into a specific form of salvation which seems to say that you don’t have to work it out. But how could they say that since that actually is rather clear in the Bible?

I am looking forward to the documentary Hell House in the picture above about Christian “Hell houses” that use fear and graphic images of the results of “sin” to scare kids into confessing before God at the end. Same idea, a more “mature” method of filling up their coffers with souls.

I consume more conservative media than liberal media. Some call me masochistic, but I like to hear assertions and arguments that I will probably disagree with. I tend to like much of Bill O’Reilly because he does make good arguments in between partisan bickering which I guess is a necessity if he is to keep ratings. Sean Hannity is a lying f**k-wit and should be removed from the airwaves. He and Ann Coulter can both go to Alaska with Sarah Palin, or hang at Ted Nugent’s territory somewhere where we won’t hear their sandpaper voices of slime ever again.

The point with all of “them” is that I have no clue by listening to them who McCain is, what his platform is, or anything except through the filters of NRA and Right to Life adverts on the radio. This is the most negative campaign I have seen. The only propositions I hear are that Obama is a socialist (without divulging how they interpret that term at all), hangs out with disreputable people who apparently hate America, will lead us to destruction at the hands of terrorists, and has “not one accomplishment” whatever that really means.

Then they say the same stuff over and over again seemingly louder each time - even if it has been proven to be a false claim as if being loud equals truth (in which case Jeremiah Wright was dead on true if that’s their gambit). I guess I am to infer that McCain is the opposite of all “that”, but after endorsing the bank bailout, then coming back to suggest more federal funding to buy banks and nationalize them, Keating 5, G. Gordon Liddy, etc. all of that crap is very hollow.

None of it tells me who McCain is or what he will do that is all that different from the last eight years. I at least know what Obama’s tax plan is, I know that he will place diplomacy in front of unilaterial pre-emptive strike, I know that he will favor stronger monitoring of how we treat prisoners, I know he will accelerate the current progrtessive tax system for people who net over $250,000, I know he favors pro-choice and reducing unintended pregnancies, etc. I know this stuff because he has advertised it repeatedly, and you can check the web sources for more information - which he also has made clear and suggests in his ads. You don’t have to like it, but as O’Reilly said, at least you know where he stands.

Today in Erie, PA, Sarah Palin said that Obama’s infomercial was “short on specifics“. So what? He has been quite specific everywhere else. I have no clue what are the specifics or even what are the generalities of McCain’s plan to govern other than how he will not be like Obama. That’s not helpful and it’s hard to win anyone over that way. My only guess is that McCain will continue the same policies of George W. Bush, but cannot say so to our faces. His maverick days are so long gone, I have no idea who this shell of a man is that is running right now.

On a final note, some advice before sending Sarah Palin into PA - know where you are in the state because it’s pretty big. We residents West of the Alleghenies generally dislike (putting it mildly) Philly sports - all of them. The Pirates are not that great of a team either so it’s best not to mention baseball unless you want to give a vote of confidence to the local minor league team - in your spot that would be the Erie Seawolves.

“Palin received a smattering of boos when she said she was glad to be in the home state of the World Series-champion Philadelphia Phillies. Northwestern Pennsylvania baseball fans favor the Cleveland Indians or Pittsburgh Pirates.”

The sports pandering on all sides is tiresome and stupid.

Quite a good and precise read, as we should expect, here.

“That, however, was Senator McCain; the Candidate McCain of the past six months has too often seemed the victim of political sorcery, his good features magically inverted, his bad ones exaggerated. The fiscal conservative who once tackled Mr Bush over his unaffordable tax cuts now proposes not just to keep the cuts, but to deepen them. The man who denounced the religious right as “agents of intolerance” now embraces theocratic culture warriors. The campaigner against ethanol subsidies (who had a better record on global warming than most Democrats) came out in favour of a petrol-tax holiday. It has not all disappeared: his support for free trade has never wavered. Yet rather than heading towards the centre after he won the nomination, Mr McCain moved to the right.”

“Political fire, far from rattling Mr Obama, seems to bring out the best in him: the furore about his (admittedly ghastly) preacher prompted one of the most thoughtful speeches of the campaign. On the financial crisis his performance has been as assured as Mr McCain’s has been febrile. He seems a quick learner and has built up an impressive team of advisers, drawing in seasoned hands like Paul Volcker, Robert Rubin and Larry Summers. Of course, Mr Obama will make mistakes; but this is a man who listens, learns and manages well.”

Here is an interesting tactic to discourage people from voting if not to revoke their right to vote altogether: disallow voters who have foreclosures.

“The chairman of the Republican Party in Macomb County, Michigan, a key swing county in a key swing state, is planning to use a list of foreclosed homes to block people from voting in the upcoming election as part of the state GOP’s effort to challenge some voters on Election Day.

“We will have a list of foreclosed homes and will make sure people aren’t voting from those addresses,” party chairman James Carabelli told Michigan Messenger in a telephone interview earlier this week. He said the local party wanted to make sure that proper electoral procedures were followed.

State election rules allow parties to assign “election challengers” to polls to monitor the election. In addition to observing the poll workers, these volunteers can challenge the eligibility of any voter provided they “have a good reason to believe” that the person is not eligible to vote. One allowable reason is that the person is not a “true resident of the city or township.”

The Michigan Republicans’ planned use of foreclosure lists is apparently an attempt to challenge ineligible voters as not being “true residents.”

One expert questioned the legality of the tactic.

“You can’t challenge people without a factual basis for doing so,” said J. Gerald Hebert, a former voting rights litigator for the U.S. Justice Department who now runs the Campaign Legal Center, a Washington D.C.-based public-interest law firm. “I don’t think a foreclosure notice is sufficient basis for a challenge, because people often remain in their homes after foreclosure begins and sometimes are able to negotiate and refinance.”

As for the practice of challenging the right to vote of foreclosed property owners, Hebert called it, “mean-spirited.”

It just so happens that most of the foreclosures in the above referenced county are from African-American households. What’s happening is that the Republicans are finding loopholes and back-door methods to stop minorities from voting.

Why is the Association of Community Organizers for Reform Now (ACORN) such a thorn in McCain’s side? Because ACORN is fighting these tactics head-on. The McCain campaign and the RNC are accusing ACORN of voter fraud because they are getting minority and lower income families registered and to get in line to vote in spite of these underhanded voter suppression tactics that we have seen since the 2000 election. ACORN, a community-based organization designed to get out the vote among other services among minority and lower income families, has been under fire since volunteers were caught filling out bogus registration cards in 2006. Barack Obama also represented ACORN along with  the United States of America, the League of Women Voters of Illinois, and the League of United Latin American Citizens in a 1995 suit. However, not only are they doing a better job of internal quality control to ensure accuracy, the voter registration card issue is probably much ado about nothing.

“A University of Washington law professor says the GOP criticism of ACORN is a flimsy attempt to distract voters on the eve of what many consider the most important presidential election in recent history.

Eric Schnapper, who has worked on Republican and Democratic campaigns, said bogus voter registrations don’t translate into actual votes being cast. He pointed out that third-party voter-registration groups like ACORN are required by law to submit all filled-out forms to elections officials, even those that are suspected fakes.

“The casting of ballots by fictitious people is the Loch Ness Monster of election law: much discussed and never seen,” said Schnapper, a UW law professor since 1995. “The attacks on ACORN are like dumping tons of cyanide in Loch Ness to kill the monster.”

The attempt to throw out votes based on faulty databases, foreclosures, etc. is far more egregious than a phony registration card. Minority voices are not going to be heard because of technicalities and there is something not right about that.

So if you see a line, regardless of for whom you are casting your ballot, be patient. It’s worth the wait to make your voice heard as a taxpaying citizen of this country. Don’t let the fear of litigation and challenge from those who would rather you not cast your vote get in the way of your right to choose your chief executives who are there to represent YOU.

HT: To my sister for emailing me the story.

Say NO to Proposition 8 in California!

Whether or not you think same gender coupling or partnering is morally unjustifiable in the Bible is irrelevant to the issue.

“Following a recent spate of television and radio ads on behalf of a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage, a new poll suggests a rise in support for Proposition 8, the ballot measure that would block gay men and lesbians from marrying.

The new poll found that 47 percent expected to vote yes on Proposition 8, which would eliminate the right of same-sex couples to marry, while 42 percent expected to vote no. That is a notable difference from a SurveyUSA poll released Sept. 25 which found 44 percent planned to vote yes, while 49 percent planned to vote no — an apparent 10 point swing.”

New poll suggests support for Proposition 8 in wake of ad campaign - San Jose Mercury News.

Until there is equal regard for marriage or civil union apart from gender as a regulative measure of rights, it is unconstitutional and discriminatory.

You cannot argue that banning same gender marriage is constitutional unless you fall back on arbitrary traditional moorings, religious preferences rooted in sectarian dogmatic propositions, or straw man positions about the expected destruction of the institution or marriage and American society. All of these kinds of typical assertions have no substance, are built of the cheapest straw, and serve one purpose - to justify discrimination.

Either everyone should have access to an equality of marriage and the rights that pertain thereto regardless of gender, or the state should no longer have any role in the ratification of marriage. The latter would relegate marriage as a private religious contract that has no impact on civil liberties at all. To receive the privileges of marriage as it currently stands would require the license approved by the state alone with no religious intermediary involved in the process. it seems only just that civil rights and religious authority to justify them in this circumstance should be clearly distinct. Then, a church can decide if it wants to recognize a marriage or not, but this position would have no bearing on civil rights.

Either of these or other alternatives seem justified that do not diminish legal and social privilege and rights that pertain to partnerships due to gender issues. The current policy is anachronistic and clearly discriminatory against people who are attracted to the same gender. What is clear is that same gender preference is a fact of our life together at this moment in time and it will not go away regardless of whatever reparative therapies NARTH and Exodus International can devise. Since it is a fact that people will continue to prefer the same gender with which to partner in life long commitments, it is simply unjust to deny them the same rights and priviledges as those who prefer to partner with a diferent gender. These are tax paying citizens who simply cannot benefit from the same rights as heterosexuals who choose to marry and that is unjust and un-American. It is taxation without representation and should be illegal.

I will again challenge anyone at all in the world to find one good argument why the state should recognize only marriages and/or unions between a man and woman as the only legally justifiable domestic partnerships. No one has answered this challenge in numerous different debate forums except for dogmatic religious asertions that are unconstitutional and/or an appeal to tradition which is arbitrary and irrational. This is the time to make our collective claim to justice and to do the right thing!

See further reflections on Amendment 2 in Florida where some of these thoughts are expanded. This Amendment deserves the same publicity to get the vote out and vote NO! I have another post on Prop. 8 here as well.

Post originally published on October 9, 2008 but re-published with minor edits for Right to Marry Day.

HT: Shuck and Jive

This looks like a fascinating read from Lawrence D. Brown and Lawrence R. Jacobs

“Despite George W. Bush’s professed opposition to big government, federal spending has increased under his watch more quickly than it did during the Clinton administration, and demands on government have continued to grow. Why? Lawrence Brown and Lawrence Jacobs show that conservative efforts to expand markets and shrink government often have the ironic effect of expanding government’s reach by creating problems that force legislators to enact new rules and regulations. Dismantling the flawed reasoning behind these attempts to cast markets and public power in opposing roles, The Private Abuse of the Public Interest urges citizens and policy makers to recognize that properly functioning markets presuppose the government’s ability to create, sustain, and repair them over time.”

HT: Inside Higher Ed

To join Focus on the Family’s apocalyptic portent, The Call, “a divinely initiated, multi-racial, multi-generational, and cross-denominational gathering to corporate prayer and fasting”, has joined the fray with their own flood of apocalyptic emotional enthusiasm towards the election. Again, the focus seems to be driven solely at the issues of abortion and homosexuality.

The front of the website currently displays the San Francisco skyline and under it this quote: “As California goes, so goes the nation”. This is a clear reference to Proposition 8. Religion Dispatches reports:

“In organizing his California rally, (The Call founder Lou) Engle has deployed the same rhetorical weapon used by Protect Marriage, the main organizational supporter of Proposition 8, the gay marriage ban on the state’s ballot on November 4. Turning San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom’s words, “as California goes, so goes the nation,” on their head, Engle and his allies are portraying California as the bellwether of a national, apocalyptic slide into an irredeemable moral abyss of sexual immorality.”

Such an “apocalyptic slide” is further linked to the whims of the demonic and the mission of Satan to undermine the work of God in the country. Prayer for leaders is important (which is not problematic at all). However prayer for certain leaders seems to overstretch the boundary of what is decent and in order - or rational.

“The praying church deals with the demonic realm, so that God raises up one and brings down the other,” Engle said in a recent video on The Call’s web site, explaining how prayer proved victorious over satanic forces in the spiritual warfare of an election, adding, “I directly attribute [Bush’s election] to the prayers of the saints.”

To say that unmitigated wiretapping, torture and the approval of techniques such as water-boarding, unchecked privatization of the economy that reinforced human greed to perpetuate the financial crisis, a doctrine of unilateral preemptive strike, a war that has been perpetuate in Iraq in unjust and false pretense, and others begs the question of how George W. Bush has special standing in the eyes of God. Are not all governing authorities in place due to God’s will? To say that this is inconsistent theology might be a classic understatement.

To say that it is using religious fervor as a political foil seems more than obvious. It is thus hard to see how it is that with war and poverty so prevalent in the world today, that Satan’s work, if that’s what it is, has not been helped along. The Bush presidency has not had any significant affect on the trend of the ratio of abortions to pregnancies as this has stayed constant. States like Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New Jersey have all passed legislation to allow same sex couple to marry in that term. The evidence that somehow a Republican in office will fix the problems that Engle and others are so hyped to stir up religious fervor to “take back the nation” is more counter-factual than supportive of such apocalyptic soothsaying.

“In one of several laudatory e-mails about Palin, Engle recently began to label Obama as Satan more explicitly. “The ideological beast of Obama’s worldview has been drawn out of its lair and now stands naked and exposed by Palin’s compassion and conviction. The beast,” he continued, “is hunting our children, our nation’s destiny, and us. The rage of the media against Palin simply further exposes the moral bankruptcy, bigotry, and lack of compassion of liberalism.”

If these are the criteria of compassion, I am hard-pressed to understand what that means. There is no talk of the poor, the third world, genocide, oppressive government regimes, slavery, and the ignorance and moral ineptitude of many we have seen among those at the Palin/McCain rallies over the past few weeks. Where is love of neighbor in all of this rhetoric? There is something dangerously wrong with the various gospels that people like Dobson and Engle continue to preach. But this is not exactly a new phenomenon.

“I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— ⁷not that there is another gospel, but there are some who are confusing you and want to pervert the gospel of Christ. ⁸But even if we or an angel^* from heaven should proclaim to you a gospel contrary to what we proclaimed to you, let that one be accursed!” (Gal. 1:6-8)