[porphyrogenitus]

/signed

[porphyrogenitus]

Austrians critique it on both fronts because while it claims to be inductive, it is often deductive – that is, they sneak in a proiri premises of their own while claiming to have none – and the Austrian critique isn’t just a tu quoque but that these premises are wrongheaded.

Note that almost all Austrian Economists with a PhD got theirs in “mainstream” economics, so they do know both arguments. Professor Herbner can certainly add more here but outside of LC, Robert “Bob” Murphy has given the best compare-and-contrast I’ve seen – he really breaks down the differences in a clear way. But this one by Walter Block is pretty decent too.

Edit: I also really like the two Israel Kirzner lectures that start with this one, which go into the whole background of the difference and the development, the intellectual history of the whole divergence.

[porphyrogenitus]

“Is taxation theft? If so, is theft ok? If not, what are we really arguing?”

It’s Moot Court, not Foundational Principles so he has to play their silly little games – just like the rest of us in somewhat similar situations.

I mean, we can blow off the task he’s assigned but he can’t, he asked for advice on how to proceed in making the argument he was assigned, and pointed out the professor doesn’t put up with substituting some other argument.

In a sane world things would be different.

Now, it is true that deontologically we could all refuse to do anything that would involve trimming of any sort, and not get the credentials they require us to have in order to succeed in what we want to pursue in the society they created, and live as aesthetic monks. But until then it is what it is and I for one don’t like to scoff at the compromises others feel they have to make to survive in this degenerate age, when I know I’ve had to.

If you manage to get through life (by which I mean IRL, not just the tubes, where it is easy to talk a good game) without making any compromises whatsoever when presenting a message in front of NORPs (no link for this acronym; you’ll have to search it yurself and may gawd have mercy on your SOULS if you do), then you’re leading a blessed life and a phalanx of guardian angels are looking out for you and if that isn’t proof of Gawd’s existence, then nothing is, and I envy you. Because not all of us are so blessed and even our gracious hosts sometimes tailor their message to their audiences.

[porphyrogenitus]

Hi and welcome!

I would recommend this lecture by Terrance Kealy; also his book if you can get ahold of it in time.

Others probably have additional recommendations but that’s the top one that comes to mind for me.

[porphyrogenitus]

“Most libertarians don’t tend to have any problems with open borders and if they do it is mostly because we have a welfare state. Other than that they don’t see any problem.”

They are incorrect, though.

That is, they are only looking at one facet – the economic facet of voluntary exchange.

However, libertarianism, especially anarcho-libertarianism, also requires a community of consistent understanding of natural law, or at least libertarian principles. Any specific libertarian society’s legal code, even if that community has multiple competing protection agencies and courts, the legal code will have particularized expressions/understandings of what the libertarian principles entail. That is, as the great David Gordon mentioned, they will be worked out through convention.

A “common law” will develop and the precise details of this could and would vary from libertarian community to another. The common law system of governance in Somali anarchism is different from that of Irish anarchism will be different from North American anarchism. David Gordon mentioned in one of his recent Mises lectures that any given libertarian community will require a common understanding of the law and common conventions in interpreting and applying the principles of libertarianism.

Which is to say, Hoppe is rather correct on this point. People from different cultures will – and it is completely acceptable for them to do so – have different means of governing even under libertarian principles and a libertarian society will have to maintain itself by not having absolutely open borders. Free trade and free exchange, but not absolutely free entry for permanent residency and membership. Joining the community would thus be subject to certain stipulations including to agree to accept the rules/legal conventions as worked out in that particular libertarian society rather than insisting upon the ones from one’s own community (“multicultiralism” in the strong, leftist sense; – something that is not possible anyhow).

Libertarian communities cannot be “neutral among conceptions of the good” anymore than progressive-statist liberalism can be, in practice. Though it can be tolerant of a certain amount of exceptions living among them (say an 80-20 rule; that is to say, 80% cohesion, 80% of people essentially agreeing within any particular libertarian community/society, with 20% being “resident aliens,” metics, holding whatever outlandish beliefs they may want to hold – including a perverse belief in welfare-statism progressivism).

This is not to say a libertarian community will have to be a mind control state insisting upon conformity of belief and conformity of opinion; – it is just to say that if there is wide disagreement, it will break down. Then one will get the “bad” (prototypically-understood) anarchism, the sort of anarchism that is the popular definition of anarchism (Beirut in the ’80s “anarchism”), with factions fighting because they hold widely differing conceptions and beliefs.

Thus, as I have said before; – and so far this is my fullest (but still badly put) expression of why this is – to the extent to which libertarians (including the otherwise great Bob Murphy) have supported “open borders” in the now, under the current welfare-state-multiculturalism system, they have taken themselves out back behind the barn and shot themselves in the back of the head.

They have guaranteed the exact opposite of what they might want.

The only way, the absolute only way, however slim the chance would be, to achieve their goals is to get a libertarian system in place first, and then invite anyone who wants to share in it and who pledges to adopt and accept the same understanding/conventions in how it will be governed to join it, but reject anyone who refuses to live under the same understanding (such people can found their own libertarian society/community, however large or small, and put in place their own particular understanding and their own particular conventions, and likewise invite others to join it) – something like the “Utopia” in Nozick’s “Anarchy, State, and Utopia” (his much-neglected last chapter). [Take one obvious but non-ethnic/cultural example: I wish Left-Libertarians all the best, I hope it works out for them, but I myself have no interest in living in a economic Left-Libertarian community while, even though I’m a minarchist – mostly for pessimistic reasons – I would love to live in a economically Right/Paeleo-libertarian community.]

But the problem with libertarians on this score is they focus on one aspect of things here, the economic aspect, and on the “freedom of association” aspect, in a society (any modern Western society) that does not actually allow “freedom of association” (which includes the right not to associate). So, as a compromise for my above, I would suggest that they fight for, and put in place, true freedom of association before insisting upon “open borders.” But they know that will be folly, futile, they will not get that under the current dispensation; the only thing they will get is harangued for being “closet racists” (which they are not) who want to “return to Jim Crow and Sundown Towns,” (which they do not).

Which again illustrates that while they understand this reality, but continue to push for “open borders” on the grounds of “I should be free to associate with whomever i want, it’s my right – plus it is economically advantageous,” they are doing nothing more than slitting their own ideological throats and lending weight to statists who want nothing more than to reduce liberty to a political nullity. Great job, thanks for playing, better luck next millennium in some other civilization.

[porphyrogenitus]

Personally I think it’s awesome that I’m making this post 7 hours in the future. It’s a great way to maximize my output.

Just think! 7 hours from now while I’m sleeping or watching worthless craps on tee-vee (oh, wait, no: I think I’ll be initiating violence on fellow players in PWI NW), I’ll also be making this post! It allows me to shift my time preference and double my action utility!

[porphyrogenitus]

Thanks tons for the fast and thorough reply! ^_^

Probably the impact will be to make the Debt-to-GDP ratio seem slightly smaller than it actually is, and, perhaps of more significance, make the government-spending-to-GDP ratio seem smaller than it was under the old measurement.

That and make international comparisons a matter of apples-to-oranges statistics, unless everyone else changes over to the “new, revised” method.

[porphyrogenitus]

“ Is the violation of the oath considered a criminal violation?”

No.

Since all the people who take the oaths are also all the people who write, enforce, and interpret the laws, the idea that the oath they take should be enforceable and their violation of said oaths subject to criminal sanction seems to have slipped to the bottom of the pile of legislative priorities.

Mencken had a few thoughts on this subject but no one has taken up their intellectual development since him. Perhaps it’s time someone did.

[porphyrogenitus]

Well, your friend is correct that under the present system of government-funded police/military/law enforcement, Person 1 (the billionaire) doesn’t have to go to the bother of having mercenaries available at his personal beck and call, because the State can just have Person 1’s land seized under Eminent Domain (see Kelo), and the State’s police + law enforcement + courts will enforce this redefinition of property rights (the State is always redefining property rights in favor of itself and it’s hangers-on). Indeed under present law as defined by the State, Person 1 may “own” the house but not the mineral rights under it anyhow, these get assigned by the State to Persons 2 of it’s choosing [this includes the State preventing Person 2, if Person 2 “owns” the mineral or other resource rights, from accessing them or selling access to them, because the State uses a corrupt version of “environmental” laws to prevent many people from accessing/selling/profiting from the resources they theoretically “own” but the state, with it’s police-law-forces-etc that your friend points to as “protecting” Person 2’s property, protects him from either using them himself or selling their use to another person. The point being: in more instances than most people are aware of, the State is not protecting Person 2’s property rights against the rich and influential, but rather allowing the fashionably rich & influential to control public policy in a way that deprives Person 2 of the property rights they are ostensibly “protecting.” Five will get you 10 that your friend approves of, or at least doesn’t object to, this seizure of Person 2’s property rights – under the grounds that, after all, “we” can’t just have everyone drilling oil on “their” land – after all, “they didn’t build that!” – “society” has claims too!]

Ok, ok, I’ll stop being droll, but the Anarcho-Capitalist solution to this is that Person 2 pays “insurance” to a private protection agency, the size of which would probably be of a scale that it would have sufficient resources to back the legitimate claims of its members such that it would be easier/more efficient for Person 1 to simply negotiate in good faith with Person 2 after all.

That is, these private protection firms would have police + law enforcement on the payroll of a power (if not size in number of personnel, because of being run more efficiently) to enforce the legitimate property rights of all their subscribers, to include Person 2.

Anyhow, once again a true AnCap (I remain a minarchist, but I do strive to understand – and want to agree with – the AnCap position) could probably provide a better answer than I just did, but that’s the basic outline.

[porphyrogenitus]

It’s hard to recommend *one* primary source for all of American foreign policy (primary sources being sources of the original actors and original/contemporary reports, so they are rarely a comprehensive overview of any subject. The only time a primary source would be an overview is if you wanted to know what so-and-so’s view of American foreign policy was, and read all the documents written by that person; i.e. “what was Murray Rothbard’s interpretation of American foreign policy? – the primary documents would then be all Rothbard’s writings and recorded speeches, interviews, and lectures. Secondary sources would be things written by other people about Rothbard’s views on American foreign policy). Here for example is just one selection of links to primary documents covering one 16 year period.

It might help if you narrowed it down to a specific topic or period in American foreign policy.

[porphyrogenitus]

Which side are you assigned to argue?

Or do you get to pick? If you get to pick I assume you’re going to argue that the Health Care Act is unconstitutional, or at lease this particular provision is.

Based on your description of the professor I’d stick to the law & constitution, even if the other side doesn’t and argues rhetorical policy points.

Argue that Roberts was correct on the commerce clause et all but incorrect in his reading of the taxing power, as there is no constitutional authorization to tax anyone for not purchasing a good or service.

You could also attempt to argue that this is a case of uncompensated takings, as Mr. Miller will have to forfeit his license and thus livelihood. However I’m not sure how far you’ll get as courts have typically not found much of anything a government does as violating the takings clause. For better or worse you’d probably have a better shot invoking the 14th amendment’s due process clause. :p The idea is almost certainly to find case-law precedent to support your position rather than argue principle.

The other side will probably introduce arguments based on policy and costs; if so you can point out that there are costs to driving people out of their livelihoods as well.

[porphyrogenitus]

Great reading list (I’d also suggest this wonderful Higgs video, again).

And it is interesting how very successful Progressivism has been in 1) constantly trumpeting their accomplishments and progress as a (statist) but 2) still managing to largely succeed, whenever anything goes wrong, in asserting that we still have a laissez-faire free market and thus that’s what caused the problem, and the solution is more of the same (which they always portray as new and a break with the past when the only overall theme is continuity with past policy prescriptions).

Here we keep seeing Progressivism as a failure. But it’s probably the most successful political movement in American history. I mean, to be able to constantly ascribe its failures to a boogyman, and always claim market successes (such as rising living standards) are due to it alone, and get so many people to believe, that’s really amazing.

Plus, these people claim to be moderate, empirically-oriented, and fact-based, but the regulatory code (including financial regulation) grows and grows, the number of regulators – including financial regulators – and the extent of their authority grew and grew under Bush, and yet they claim the problem was deregulation and laissez-faire – and they have so many educated people believing that.

Of course one of the things that pushes this charade along is that it is in the interests of both major parties to pretend that one of them supports free markets.

[porphyrogenitus]

James Kalb – whose book The Tyranny of Liberalism has an additional explanation, which I was reminded of when he referenced it here:

“An established religion has to be accepted by social leaders generally, and the religion of Nothing is actively promoted by the academics and media figures who define what is considered rational and respectable among us. They have good reason to favor it, since it denies the authority of principles higher than the value-free technical expertise and manipulative skill such people stand for. It says that they are truly our intellectual leaders—the clergy and preachers of our New Jerusalem—and there is no one who could outrank them even in principle.

The bureaucrats and businessmen who form the operational branch of our governing class go along with the religion of Nothing as well.”

He doesn’t put his argument at it’s best in that particular article, which is one reason I recommend his book; a short and good early synopsis of his argument is here in the form of a Reply to Paul Gottfried (who has also done a fairly extensive analysis of this phenomenon).

Essentially, Jim Kalb’s argument is that modern liberalism rests on two fundamental beliefs: 1) liberty defined as the equal ability of individuals to satisfy preferences [see also: neoclassical “welfare economics,” or general equilibrium economics generally] and 2) neutrality towards “conceptions of the good” (liberal pluralism).

(but then 2b) any conception of the good that conflicts with or threatens either #2 or #1 is to be driven from the public sphere as illiberal, and anything that conflicts with #1 – such as inequality of any sort – is to be rooted out. Thus you find Jacobinism in places you might not expect).

Kalb argues that: 1) this sort of Dewyite “liberalism” inevitably leads to technocratic-bureaucratic Progressivism and 2) the fundamental commitments of early liberalism, including what it rejected, inevitably lead to modern liberalism. That is, there was a flaw (a deficiency) in even Classical Liberalism that leads inevitably to the version we have today, and that is evidenced in how liberals not just here but around the world end up coordinating towards the same positions: the logic of their first principles leads them to shared conclusions and an inability to define why those conclusions are wrong. [n.b. Progressive hypocrisy also has a source, defined by the late Lawrence Auster as the Unprincipled Exception]. [see also: “bleeding-heart libertarians” and other Rawls-influenced “libertarians,” who generally end up – like Will Wilkinson – not being very libertarian at all and just being left-Liberals. That is, supporters of Progressivism who claim to have “serious quibbles” with it but always end up backing its advance every time it matters].

Note that the flaw in Classical Liberalism that Kalb identifies is not (repeat: not) “the presence of a state.” Nor is it liberty (rather his conclusion is that in order to thrive – that is, in order to not devolve into technocratic Progressivism – classical liberalism needs to exist within a moral framework that is not itself liberal. Therefore I would suggest a more Aristotelian, and less Lockean, foundation for Natural Law, whether anarcho-libertarian or otherwise).

Special Bonus Note: The Kalbian Explaination can explain not only the rise of Progressivism, but of Neoconservatism, and how, yes, the Right was Betrayed but why, from an idea-ological perspective, it was relatively easy to do so; the fundamental commitments of American Conservatives are at root liberal. While there are those within the serious intellectuals threads within conservative movement (such it existed at one time) that opposed liberalism philosophically, most were, at root, philosophical liberals. Thus when the “Scoop Jackson Democrats” moved right (and the popular version of this was “Reagan Democrat Voters”) as a result of abhorence of the New Left, well a Wilsonian foreign policy seemed natural. Plus these people never hid the fact that they admired Teddy Roosevelt and even FDR. Their arguments won the day because, yes, they were often vicious in bureaucratic/movement infighting [but there are vicious libertarian infightings, too; witness the split between the Cato wing and the Mises wing of the movement, circa 30+ years ago; there will always be intellectual infighting]; one of the key reasons Neocons won was because their arguments were rooted in principles that dominated the American political-intellectual scene, including among conservatives (what were conservatives conserving, after all, if it was not an earlier version of liberalism?), while their opponents who advocated non or anti-liberal philosophies were disperate and did not hold principles all – including all those who rejected philosophical liberalism – could agree on.

The tendency of American conservatism is so old that R. L. Dabney made an observation about it that is as apt today as it was when he first said it; simply substitute the issues of the moment:

It may be inferred again that the present movement for women’s rights will certainly prevail from the history of its only opponent, Northern conservatism. This is a party which never conserves anything. Its history has been that it demurs to each aggression of the progressive party, and aims to save its credit by a respectable amount of growling, but always acquiesces at last in the innovation. What was the resisted novelty of yesterday is today one of the accepted principles of conservatism; it is now conservative only in affecting to resist the next innovation, which will tomorrow be forced upon its timidity and will be succeeded by some third revolution; to be denounced and then adopted in its turn. American conservatism is merely the shadow that follows Radicalism as it moves forward towards perdition. It remains behind it, but never retards it, and always advances near its leader. This pretended salt bath utterly lost its savor: wherewith shall it be salted? Its impotency is not hard, indeed, to explain. It is worthless because it is the conservatism of expediency only, and not of sturdy principle. It intends to risk nothing serious for the sake of the truth, and has no idea of being guilty of the folly of martyrdom. It always when about to enter a protest very blandly informs the wild beast whose path it essays to stop, that its “bark is worse than its bite,” and that it only means to save its manners by enacting its decent role of resistance: The only practical purpose which it now subserves in American politics is to give enough exercise to Radicalism to keep it “in wind,” and to prevent its becoming pursy and lazy, from having nothing to whip. No doubt after a few years, when women’s suffrage shall have become an accomplished fact, conservatism will tacitly admit it into its creed, and thenceforward plume itself upon its wise firmness in opposing with similar weapons the extreme of baby suffrage; and when that too shall have been won, it will be heard declaring that the integrity of the American Constitution requires at least the refusal of suffrage to asses. There it will assume, with great dignity, its final position.

[porphyrogenitus]

Was it this one?

Though it might have been this one. (In fact I think this really might be the one you’re thinking of).

If either of them aren’t the one you’re looking for, please let me know (I didn’t re-listen to them, I simply popped the links in because I think I remembered him talking about that in these, but it’s been awhile since I listened to them. I know, I know; if I was really “hardcore” I’d have all the Tom Woods videos on a playlist running an endless loop as I sleep, but I’m not that “pro”).

It’s also possible in his “Libertarian Speech I Would Give to the Whole Country.”

[Edit: Oh, wait, it is quite possibly Applying Economics to American History, which punctures a series of “myths.”]

[porphyrogenitus]

Mises was a Utilitarian, so it’s hard to say. Actually, it’s hard to say where many people would come down on this question until they’ve taken their position and explained how it connects to their general world view.

I mean, Rothbard was a Natural Law theorist, and many (but by no means all) adherents to Natural Law are pro-life, but Rothbard was not.

But be that as it may; what matters most IMO isn’t where they came out on this specific issue, but what you think is the correct position, even if that position is based on accepting their own general principles. I happen to think Rothbard went badly wrong on the whole issue of children (much less the unborn). A fair number of “Rothbardians” also think he did. Even great thinkers are not always correct (Mises utilitarianism I find unsatisfying, to say the least, and I think Rothbard was on firmer ground in taking a Natural Law approach).

But it’s not really possible to ascribe views on this subject to anyone who didn’t explicitly take them, themselves. (It may be that Mises did express himself on the issue of abortion et al; I can hardly claim complete familiarity with all of his statements, alas).

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