From: lewis@aera8700.mitre.org (Keith Lewis)
Subject: Re: government still at large (was Re: FDA still at large)
Organization: The MITRE Corporation
Date: Fri, 24 Jul 1992 12:18:17 GMT

In article <1992Jul23.185038.3415@eskimo.celestial.com>, kurt@eskimo.celestial.com (Kurt Cockrum) writes:
>Can you say...private army? warlord? feudalism?  I don't want to trade
>publicly supported thugs for private thugs, who, if they don't beat me
>to death, can bill me to death.

Agreed.  We'd have to keep the public-supported police/army in place until
we came up with a plan to avoid feudalism.  

>I am also disturbed by the apparent sacredness of "private property"
>and its accumulative aspects.  A lot of LP types appear to have a naked
>desire to control a lot of property, or to "get rich", or to "be powerful".

The free market rewards those who work hard, make responsible decisions, and
get lucky.  Nobody can control their luck, so the really greedy people will
be stuck working their asses off and making responsible decisions.  Assuming
the government does its job in preventing force and fraud, this idea doesn't
frighten me a bit!  Let them get wealth; they will mostly just re-invest
that wealth in bigger and better enterprises.  What's the problem?

>Somehow structures would have to evolve that function as checks and balances
>on race conditions ("race condition" is control theory jargon for "inherently
>unstable state".  It has nothing to do with blacks, etc.).  For example,
>perhaps giving currency a half-life property that would preclude the
>usefulness of unlimited accumulation.  Interest is another thing that could
>bear close scrutiny.  I have always had problems with the self-replication of
>money under certain conditions (but not others) (really, the *opposite* of
>the half-life property) where no toil or energy is expended.

"Currency with a half-life" is equivalent to a constant rate of inflation.
(I can derive formulas for converting one to the other if anybody's
interested.)

Inflation is currently controlled by the Federal Reserve Board and the free
market.  I don't know what the LP position on the Fed is.  Personally, I'd
keep it.

>Could some symbolic representation of value be invented that would have
>desireable properties but would preclude absurdities of magnitude such as the
>"national debt" or Bill Gate's "fortune"? (I hope some innovative ideas come
>out of this without forcing me to go out and suffer thru Ayn Rand's novels,
>or slog thru the Accumulated Dry Works of Friedrich von Hayek, in order to
>understand said ideas -- both are *consummately* *boring*!!!).

I'm currently reading _Atlas Shrugged_.  After the first 100 pages, it gets
exiting.  BTW, does anybody else see parallels between Rearden metal and
Hemp, as described in _The Emperor Wears no Clothes_?

>Another thing I've never liked is the concept and apparent necessity of having
>to sell one's toil/time or the best part of one's life to others in order to
>stay alive (or the other leg of the so-called "free choice": starve), an
>inherently irreversible transaction.  In other words, "work sucks".

Work is what keeps us all alive.  If *nobody* worked, *everybody* would
starve.  I see nothing wrong with applying this concept at the micro level.
(In the case of the human species, micro = by family.)  Call me an animal; 
I am one.

>I would have no problem if I could simply, whenever the need arose, quickly,
>and with a minimum of hassle, make a mutually agreeable win/win deal with
>somebody else to satisfy a need of theirs for their satisfying a need of mine.

That would be your absolute right.

>How this could be done without a "system" springing up, I have no idea.
>One thing is for certain -- I don't trust "systems".

You've already got one.  Libertarians want to change it in a way that will
make it more trustworthy and less powerful.  I'd think you'd agree with
that.

Keith Lewis             klewis@mitre.org          "Mr. Cheap"
I don't dance to music; music dances to me.  Email me for my corrected PGP key.
The above may not (yet) represent the opinions of my employer.
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