Tired of Drug Prohibition? Here Are Some Arguments Against it.

In written words:

http://www.econlib.org/library/Columns/y2013/Powelldrugs.html
http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1893946,00.html
http://mises.org/daily/6230/

In pictures:

 

Ron Paul Delivers Again

"This might be a radical idea but maybe we can do it the other way round. Anything the government assumes they have a right to do to us, we should assume we have a right to do that to them. Would it be too radical to say that if the government lies to us we have the right to lie to the government?"

Woodrow Wilson and His Expectations for WWI

Tom Woods, an economic historian, tells the tale of Woodrow Wilson and his expectations going into WWI, a story which seems to be especially amplified in light of the current situation in Iraq and Iran:

"Wilson believed that the German Kaiser, the constitutional monarch of Germany, was a wicked man, this was the epitome of evil, we need a whole new regime in Germany. And he thought that by going to war he would replace a bad regime with a good one. But what he discovered is what a lot of people who want to plan economies have discovered - it's that when you intervene you don't often replace a bad situation with a good one. These interventions have unpredictable consequences - well, a lot of times they are predictable but the officials never seem to be able to predict them. What in fact happens is that you take at least a tolerable situation and replace it with a completely intolerable one. And unfortunately, although Wilson didn't live to see it, Americans learned the hard way that sometimes you remove an objectionable regime and the result is not a better regime, the result is a horrendous one."

You can find this quote here in his lectures on American history.

Understanding Economics

By Robert Higgs:

"You cannot understand the social world without understanding economics. And it doesn't mean everybody has to be an economist. It's not necessary for everybody to be an economist. But you have to know the basics of economics; if you don't you are doomed to be at the mercy of people making very fundamentally flawed arguments about why things happen as they do."

Anarchists and Minarchists

There is a group of people who hold individual liberty to be a value and an end in and of itself. We believe that man cannot be fully human without the capacity and freedom to chose how to lead one's life. A life of servitude and obedience to the master and to unjust authority is not the life deserving of the word human. It is rather a reduction to the level of an animal or a plant. A plant cannot draw its own path. It cannot choose which action to take in light of its circumstances. So too are the animal's choices strictly limited to its ability to adapt itself to the environment. Only humans are unique in their, in the words of Murray Rothbard, "ability to reason, to make conscious choices, to transform their environment in order to prosper, or to collaborate consciously in society and the division of labor." To reduce one's ability to chose based on one's reflections and values is to deny in part the humanity to this person.

One might hastily object that this reasoning entails also the freedom to aggress against another person or their property. But the argument does no such thing. It puts forth exactly the opposite. Every aggression is necessarily denying humanity to the person on the receiving end of the aggressive act and is therefore contrary to the argument, which states only that one person should not deny the freedom to choose to another person. The argument puts natural limits on choices where aggression against another person or property is involved.

Yet within this group of people who defend individual liberty there are factions, as there must be wherever people differ in opinion or principle. As one faction, known as the minarchists, believes that to secure individual liberty and the rights which are its corollary a government with a monopoly on force and taxation is necessary, the anarchists like to point out that this very institution is the antithesis to the principles it is supposed to be protecting and that even provided that this limited government situation should be reached, as it arguably was in the earliest hours of the American Republic, the situation is not sustainable and the institution always grows into an intrusive entity.

However, this might not be the central issue of our day. As we look around we see that the various governments round the globe in their military boots and with all-invasive powers have practically no limits on what they can or cannot do. Our society is worlds away from the ideal of either one of these two factions. Even as the ideal worlds we paint in our respective imaginations do not overlap perfectly, we should and must concede that the road we wish to travel is to a large extent the same road. We should therefore as fellow travelers join hands and may our paths then once again split in honest disagreement when our dissent can, by the blessing of all that is good, actually make a practical difference.

This is not to say we should compromise on our principles and stop advocating what we think is right. There is a difference between opportunism and pragmatism. An opportunists is a person without any principles who takes selfish advantage of any situation. A pragmatists deals with actual occurrences and tries to better the situation by working towards his ideal without having to compromise his principles. And I, for one, shall certainly never tire of conveying what I think is the proper framework of human interaction.



Matej Avsenak Ogorevc

The Next US Dictat-- Khm, I Mean President

You are probably familiar with the fact that the US Congress passed a law called National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) in 2011, which President Obama (conveniently) signed on December 31st after having first promised to veto it. Of course the veto threat was removed after the bill was changed so that, as the White House stated, "the language does not challenge or constrain the president’s ability to collect intelligence" and "incapacitate dangerous terrorists". In other words, after the bill gave more power to the President. And you thought Obama had threatened to veto because of his civil liberties concerns.

Either way, the 562 page long Act contains some language that you can easily imagine a dictator using. In fact, it does seem to lead the US down the road of presidential dictatorship. Here is section 1021:

"Congress affirms that the authority of the President to use all necessary and appropriate force pursuant to the Authorization for Use of Military Force... includes the authority for the Armed Forces of the United States to detain... A person who was a part of or substantially supported al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners, including any person who has committed a belligerent act or has directly supported such hostilities in aid of such enemy forces... The disposition of a person under the law of war... may include... Detention under the law of war without trial until the end of the hostilities authorized by the Authorization for Use of Military Force."

Notice the vague language. As rollingstone.com noted, what does it mean to be a part of? Or substantially support? What is substantial? What are associated forces and what can be meant as hostilities? What is a belligerent act? And so on and so forth. These are not trivial questions in any way. Substantial can mean almost anything. So can hostilities. Demonstrations, or even criticism can easily be interpreted as being hostile. Normally these terms would be decided in Court after due process of law but remember, we are talking about "Detention under the law of war without trial". This means that any person in the world can be indefinitely detained if the US President expresses such a will or wish. Not that this has not been the practice thus far but at least it was not codified in a Statute. 

Furthermore, the NDAA may be understood as allowing indefinite detention of US citizens also. It's true that the Act contains the language that "Nothing in this section shall be construed to affect existing law or authorities relating to the detention of United States citizens...", but, as the tenthamendmentcenter.com explains, "there is no Supreme Court case providing the necessary protection preserved by the law’s provision that “existing law or authorities” are preserved." NDAA also includes "The requirement to detain a person in military custody under this section does not extend to citizens of the United States." But again, as per the tenthamendmentcenter.com "This section says that the administration is not REQUIRED to keep a U.S. citizen or legal resident alien in indefinite military custody. But it does not prevent the administration from doing so."

No wonder the political race for the White House is so fierce. Up for grabs potentially is a military dictatorship of the world. Nice!

Matej Avsenak Ogorevc 

Mitt and His Love for Students

"We're also gonna have our loan program so that people are able to afford school", said Mitt Romney, the presidential hopeful, in the last debate. No surprises there but it might be a good idea to reiterate just how toxic this student loan bubble has been.

Now typically when you borrow money from your friend, what do you say to them? Give me some money so that I can afford this or that? Of course not! You tell them "give me some money because I can't afford this or that. When you don't have your own money to pay for something, that's precisely when you can't afford it. And the fact that you have to borrow money for it proves exactly this. When you borrow money it doesn't magically reverse this and make you afford it. It means that you still can't afford it and that you will have to make sure you can afford it at the point of time in the future when you have to return the loan.

Of course students don't benefit from any of this and it doesn't make schooling affordable. It does the opposite. When government gives or guarantees student loans it makes it possible for Universities to jack up prices. So it makes schooling even less affordable. Naturally. The old story of government programs - they tackle a problem, make it worse and then blame everyone else for the outcomes. And then at the end students are graduating with mountains of debt and very few jobs out there with which to pay off the debt. Today student loans in the US are north of $1 trillion, which is higher than credit card debt. Great, congratulations!

But I'll tell you who does benefit from all these loans. The banks. They love it!



Matej Avsenak Ogorevc