From: kurt@eskimo.celestial.com (Kurt Cockrum)
Newsgroups: sci.med,talk.politics.drugs,pnw.general
Subject: government still at large (was Re: FDA still at large)
Summary: US out of North America!
Keywords: FDA, unconstitutional illegal action,single-issue blindness
Date: 23 Jul 92 18:50:38 GMT
Article-I.D.: eskimo.1992Jul23.185038.3415
Organization: >>> Eskimo North (206)-FOR-EVER <<<

In article <1992Jul23.081405.3582@cbnewse.cb.att.com> doctor1@cbnewse.cb.att.com (patrick.b.hailey) writes:
[...]
>We want to take the guns away from most of the government.  In the case at
>hand, that means that the FDA would be welcome to test and approve all the
>drugs, foods, food additives, etcetera that it wants.  But if your doctor,
>Consumer's Reports, or even just lowly, stupid old you decide that  something
>would be good for you, the government can't send men with guns to tell you you
>can't have it.

I have no problem with the existence of lots of gov't agencies, if they
had their coercive teeth removed.  In the libertarian/anarchist ecotopia
of the future, lots of things will be accomplished by voluntary or pro
bono groups that continue to exist because people find their work useful.
And if it's something that won't get done because not enough people would
support it, it's an indicator that that thing is not worth doing, and
we could get along without it.

[...]

>The Libertarian Party is the country's fastest growing political party.  We
>are further along in our push for 50 state ballot access this year than Perot
>was when he backed out of his little challenge.  And it's the only chance I 
>see of addressing the whole problem.  Not that it's perfect, or that I agree
>with the party 100% on all issues.

My problems with the LP stem from their child-like faith in things like
the so-called "free market" (which seems to be a code word for the existence
of the necessary preconditions for seizing private *control* of the market),
courts and the police [which apparently if the LP got in power would remain
intact, but simply sew on Wackenhut patches on their robes/uniforms].

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.

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".

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.

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*!!!).

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".

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

Hope the foregoing makes sense to somebody.
-- 
kurt@grogatch.celestial.com (Kurt Cockrum)