HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: jwh@citi.umich.edu (Jim Howe)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
Subject: Re: The big difference
Date: 22 Jan 1993 20:45:43 GMT
Organization: IFS Project, University of Michigan
Distribution: world
Reply-To: jwh@citi.umich.edu
NNTP-Posting-Host: tarkus.citi.umich.edu

In article <1jpj4jINN689@armory.centerline.com>, mrh@centerline.com (Mike Huben) writes:
|> In article <1jmce6INNkv1@srvr1.engin.umich.edu> jwh@citi.umich.edu writes:
|> >In article <1jklsnINN3rl@armory.centerline.com>, mrh@centerline.com (Mike Huben) writes:
|> >|> In article <1993Jan18.052324.10297@zip.eecs.umich.edu> positron@quip.eecs.umich.edu (Jonathan Haas) writes:
|> >|> >I want a world where I can rule over myself, and everyone else can mind
|> >|> >their own business.
|> >|> 
|> >|> As soon as you declare something to be your property, you are denying others
|> >|> use of it.  Thus, you make it our business to regulate what is your property
|> >|> (at the very least, lest you or any group impoverish the rest.)
|> >|> 
|> >|> Libertarians complain that they never have signed a contract for the current
|> >|> government.  Well, I don't know anybody who has signed an agreement for a
|> >|> system of property either.  Want to do away with both?  :-)
|> >|> 
|> >
|> >Do you believe that rights exist only because a government (or
|> >'society') created them?
|> 
|> Yes.
|> 
|> >Or do you believe that there are at least
|> >some rights which a person has simply because they exist?
|> 
|> There is NO physical evidence of this, whereas there is ample historical
|> evidence of the former.  Rights come from the exact same source as laws:
|> human societies.  To pretend that they have some Platonic existence outside
|> of a particular human society is the fallacy of reification.
|> 

So, to use a common example, you believe that human slavery is just
fine and dandy, as long as 'society' thinks it's ok?  You believe
that discrimination against blacks is fine as long as the white
majority thinks it ok?  You don't believe that there are some 
things which should not be allowed even if 'society' thinks that
they should?  You believe that there is no right or wrong except
that which is acceptable by 'society'?  Well, you're entitled
to your own opinion (that is, until 'society' says you're not).


James W. Howe                  internet: jwh@citi.umich.edu
University of Michigan             uucp: uunet!mailrus!citi.umich.edu!jwh
Ann Arbor, MI   48103-4943         

Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
From: sals@florimel.uchicago.edu (red-head fancier)
Subject: Re: Libertarian Social Darwinism
Organization: University of Chicago Computing Organizations
Distribution: inet
Date: Sat, 23 Jan 1993 01:37:31 GMT

In article <1jpge3INN67n@armory.centerline.com> mrh@centerline.com (Mike  
Huben) writes:
>> 
> It's funny to hear patriotism espoused by a libertarian: oh, you're a  
big-"L"
> Libertarian, that explains it.  I'd like to hear from small-"l"  
libertarians
> who think they should owe any more to a government than they do to the
> provider of any other service.  Least of all a term of slavery in the  
armed
> forces coercing others in the economic interests of the US.
> 
> There is a free market of governments from which to choose from, and  
ours
> attaches no penalty clause for ceasing to be an American citizen and  
taking
> up Canadian citizenship (as I would have: my mother was a Canadian  
citizen.)
>

a free market of governments??? A government has a coercive monoploy over  
a particular territory. That is not a free market. You can say there is a  
market of governments. however, since governments use force, to prevent  
others from breaking their monopoly it is hardly a free market.
> I too respect people who objected to the draft and stayed: I just have a
> different agenda of my own.  I don't give a fig for your respect if you  
say
> I should have taken a course that violated my contract with the US  
government
> when I could easily have done what I chose without violating any laws.
> 
> Mike Huben
> 
> "One cannot play chess if one becomes aware of the pieces as living  
souls
> and of the fact that the Whites and the Blacks have more in common with
> each other than with the players.  Suddenly one loses all interest in  
who will
> be champion."  Anatol Rapoport in "Strategy and Conscience" 1964.
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
From: bill@verdix.com (William Spencer)
Subject: Re: National Committee endorses facelift for LP
Organization: Verdix Corp
Distribution: usa
Date: Sat, 23 Jan 1993 01:17:00 GMT

positron@quip.eecs.umich.edu (Jonathan Haas) writes:

>I'm the opposite. If the party accepts these new proposals, I will
>be a libertarian but not a Libertarian. I am much, much more concerned
>with standing by my beliefs than with being elected. If the Libertarian
>Party decides that its best interests lie in selling out its positions
>for greater appeal to the public, it can go its way and I will go mine.

Libertarian beliefs concentrate mostly on how things should be, but there
is much less discussion on how to get there. If a libertarian is elected,
there is no way they can suddenly change society even if they could suddenly
change government. Now the libertarian faithful are assured that any elected
"true" libertarian will act in a way that will 
improve things, since libertarians
know how things should be, but the rest of the public might at least like 
to hear some discussion of the matter. I'd go a step further and state that 
even libertarians should be skeptical of other libertarians' abilities to face
the challenge, knowing the complexities involved. Getting us out of the mess 
our leaders have gotten us into will be difficult. 
(To illustrate: Privatization, charitization
and peoples' adjustment to social responsibility will take time, yet would 
proceed most rapidly by immediately slashing the services
and regulations they replace and the
taxes that support them -- but you can't do that.)

It's so much simpler to stand by the sidelines and complain, holding a
grand vision overhead.

You may choose to see only the worst of intentions in those who try to change
the LP, but I think they're facing reality. Effort will be required to keep 
things on track, but forward motion must continue.

Bill s
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
From: clary@iastate.edu (Jeffrey S Clary)
Subject: Re: The big difference
Organization: Iowa State University, Ames IA
Date: Thu, 28 Jan 1993 18:09:59 GMT

Anyone want to venture a definition of the word "rights" as it is being used
here?  Some seem to be saying that a right is a thing that it is "morally 
bad" but not physically impossible, to violate.  Others seem to be saying
that a right is a thing that cannot possibly be violated (hence Linksvayer
says that the Jews killed by Nazis "in fact had no right to live").
Huben seems to be saying that even trying to decide moral bad and good
as absolutes is nonsense.  Perhaps we aren't all even using the same
word-meaning...no wonder there is such disagreement.
-- 
**************************************************************************
* "Rub her feet."  --  L.L.                          * Jeffrey S. Clary  *
*                                                    * clary@iastate.edu *
**************************************************************************
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
From: chris@keris.demon.co.uk (Chris Croughton)
Subject: Re: Libertarianism... 
Distribution: world
Organization: Keristor Systems
X-Mailer: Simple NEWS 1.90 (ka9q DIS 1.19)
Date: Sun, 24 Jan 1993 14:24:53 +0000

In article <C0uuHu.Fyr@dscomsa.desy.de> Hallam@zeus02.desy.de writes:

>Given that no state has ever tried Libertarian policies - or so the new right
>keep claiming I fail to see how they can claim any credit for the fall of
>eastern style communism.

Who's claiming?  I haven't seen any posts here claiming to have caused
the fall of communism...

>In any case I have never defended the Soviet system or its imperialist policy
> in
>eastern Europe. My whole point is that when you allow a group of idealists
>hooked on dogmatic twaddle that is the sort of system you will end up with. It
>dosen't matter if the dogmatic loonies call themselves Libertarians or
>Communists, its the beleif that they alone posses the divine truth revaled to
>the great prophet Marx (or profit Rand).
                            ^^^^^^
Now *that* is a nice touch!  I don't know if you meant it, but I
appreciate the play on words (that's *not* sarcastic).

>If the West had supported the 1917 deposition of the Tzar and allowed the
>Russians to withdraw from WWI the Bolsheviks would probably not have managed to
>take power. It was because the reactionaries in the west wanted to prevent a
>socialist Russia they ended up with Comrade Lenin in charge and a Bolsheviek
>regime with expansionist ambitions to boot.

Oh, so sorry - we happened to be fighting against an expansionist nation
at the time.  If they'd waited until after World War One, I'm sure we
would have been glad to help them...

***********************************************************************
*  chris@keris.demon.co.uk      *                                     *
*  chriscr@cix.compulink.co.uk  *  FIAWOL (Filking Is A Way Of Life)  *
*  100014.3217@compuserve.com   *                                     *
***********************************************************************
From: mrh@centerline.com (Mike Huben)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
Subject: Re: child labor and minimum wage.
Date: 28 Jan 1993 01:10:51 GMT
Organization: CenterLine Software, Inc.
NNTP-Posting-Host: 140.239.2.36

In article <SLAGLE.93Jan27095147@sgi417.msd.lmsc.lockheed.com> slagle@lmsc.lockheed.com writes:
>In article <1k17smINN25d@armory.centerline.com>, mrh@centerline.com (Mike Huben) writes:
>
>> Please name one case where the US government said "you must now
>> own this slave" or "you've never been a slave before, but you
>> are one now."
>
>The US government made people slaves by denying them their full
>rights as citizens under the Constitution.  

Please show where in the constitution (prior to the 14th ammendment)
citizenship is determined.  The constitution clearly had several categories
of persons: free, indentured, indians, and other.  Until the 14th ammendment,
there was no explicit constitutional basis for extending rights to everybody.

People were made slaves by their owners proclaiming them so and enforcing their
slavery.  If their owners proclaimed differently, they were no longer slaves.

>> Slavery has always been initiated by capitalists.
>
>Mercantilists maybe, particularly in the ante bellum South, who
>railed against the Yankee capitalists who were attempting to
>destroy their way of life.  Perhaps you should take your own
>advice and read a little history.

Merchantilism was a theory of government economics.  Slavery was a practice
of individual capitalists who bought, sold, and worked humans in a manner
very similar to the way in which individual capitalists bought, sold, and
worked any draft animal.  (For example, they seldom ate slaves.)

>> I suspect that TJ [Thomas Jefferson] could have freed his
>> slaves somehow; if only by selling them for a pittance to an
>> abolitionist.  I suspect that he didn't to retain his
>> credibility while attempting to legislate their freedom.
>> Howvere these are mere guesses.  I'd like to see the actual
>> covenant.
>
>Why don't you try reading what Jefferson wrote on the subject,
>as I have already recommended, instead of parading your uninformed
>suspicions about.  He has answers for all your questions, and some
>you probably haven't had a glimmer of yet.

If you've read TJ on the subject, why don't you simply relate his answers
and share them with all of us?  There are real-time constraints on our lives,
after all.

Mike Huben

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."
						George Santayana

"Those who misremember the past are pleased to repeat it as `proof'."
						Mike Huybensz
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
From: mlinksva@nyx.cs.du.edu (Michael Linksvayer)
Subject: Re: Objections to the Pledge? (was: NatCom Endorses Facelift...)
X-Disclaimer: Nyx is a public access Unix system run by the University
	of Denver for the Denver community.  The University has neither
	control over nor responsibility for the opinions of users.
Organization: Nyx, Public Access Unix at U. of Denver Math/CS dept.
Date: Thu, 28 Jan 93 06:20:31 GMT

In article <1993Jan27.070808.6284@genie.slhs.udel.edu> starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu (Tim Starr) writes:
>In article <1k2sncINNcde@usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu> bu008@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Brandon D. Ray) writes:
>}Okay, Tim:  I score 100/90 on the WSPQ.  I believe we should:
[...]
>}What's missing?  I am not sure, in my heart, that we can completely 
>}eliminate involuntary taxation.  I checked that box "maybe", and I am willing
[...]
>}So what does that make me?  Unprincipled?  Just "another conservative" who
>}should not be "granted haven" in the LP?
>
>Strongly libertarian, but partly conservative.

This is really bizarre. Not being sure that involuntary taxation can
be eliminated makes Brandon part conservative? His answer moves
him in the liberal direction on the Nolan chart. Rather than
trying to make terms fit your new meanings, you should say that
Brandon is "Strongly libertarian, but not a NAP absolutist
libertarian."

I score 100/100 on any version of the WSPQ that I've seen.
However, I do not categorically reject the initiation of force.
So, what does that make me, very strongly libertarian but partly
nazi?
--
Mike Linksvayer   mlinksva@nyx.cs.du.edu   "I just live 4ever"
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
From: positron@quip.eecs.umich.edu (Jonathan Haas)
Subject: Re: [misc.activism.progressive] Clinton Office Requests Comments
Organization: University of Michigan EECS Dept., Ann Arbor
Date: Sat, 23 Jan 1993 06:09:05 GMT

Chris.Holt@newcastle.ac.uk (Chris Holt) writes:
>positron@quip.eecs.umich.edu (Jonathan Haas) writes:
>
>>But real life *is* a series of prisoner's dilemmas. That changes the
>>payoff matrix significantly and that's what makes it in an individual's
>>best interest to cooperate rather than defect. Defecting will pay off
>>more in the short run, but will make it less likely that others will
>>cooperate in the long run. It's not necessary to have government intervention
>>to make people cooperate... they will do it themselves, knowing that
>>in the long run it is in their best interests.
>
>Have you ever played Diplomacy?  

I am currently involved in one game and am moderating another.

>People are willing to betray others
>if they think the payoff is enough; and in a large society, it is
>possible to move far enough away that retribution is unlikely. 

True, but for one thing, moving "far enough away" is in general a BIG
hassle. You have to quit your job, sell your house or terminate your lease,
locate new housing (under a false name if your crime is serious enough)
et cetera. That certainly helps sway the payoffs toward "cooperation".
And that still doesn't do anything about the "sleep at night" factor.

>In
>other words, the series of prisoner's dilemmas can be terminated
>unilaterally, so cooperative behaviour cannot always be depended on.

Of course cooperative behavior cannot always be depended on... even
with government intervention.

-- 
__/\__  Jonathan S. Haas         | Jake liked his women the way he liked
\    /  University of Michigan   | his kiwi fruit: sweet yet tart, firm-
/_  _\  positron@eecs.umich.edu  | fleshed yet yielding to the touch, and
  \/    Finger for PGP key       | covered with short brown fuzzy hair.
From: bu008@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Brandon D. Ray)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
Subject: Re: National Committee endorses facelift for LP
Date: 26 Jan 1993 08:41:20 GMT
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio (USA)
Reply-To: bu008@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Brandon D. Ray)
NNTP-Posting-Host: hela.ins.cwru.edu


In a previous article, starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu (Tim Starr) says:

>In article <1993Jan23.130330.13274@mnemosyne.cs.du.edu> mlinksva@nyx.cs.du.edu (Michael Linksvayer) writes:
>}In article <1993Jan23.094147.11160@genie.slhs.udel.edu> starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu (Tim Starr) writes:
>
>}I want to go after people who are libertarian, but don't want to
>}join the LP for a number of reasons, such as they arrive at
>}their libertarianism via a route other than the NCP, they don't
>}like oaths, or they just don't want to be involved in a group
>that is perceived by their friends to be fringe or kooky.
>
>The opposition to coercion is a conclusion, not an axiom.  It can be arrived
>at in at least two ways: Lockean natural rights theory, and utilitarianism.
>
>The reason the LP is perceived to be weird is because of what typhoid Murray's
>Radical Caucus did to it after they drove out the Kochtopus.
>
Excuse me...are you under the impression that any significant fraction of the
American public (even of the politically aware portion) even knows who
Murray or Koch *are*?  If you answered "yes" you've been spending too much
time reading the LP News and too little time reading the Washington Post.
The rest of the world has little if any awareness of our little internecine
battles, and they care even less.
>
>}>Yet, many who give money to the LP haven't
>}>signed the membership pledge - and I have seen evidence for this.
>}
>}Don't you think they would be likely to give even more if they
>}weren't considered second class by the LP?
>
>Nope.  Why would you think this?
>
Because people are more likely to give you a gift if you treat them 
respectfully, as if they are people worthy to come in the front door of the
house.  If you treat them like servants, and send them around to the kitchen
entrance, a lot of them will never make it.
>
>Tim Starr - Renaissance Now! - Think Universally, Act Selfishly
>starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu
>
>"True greatness consists in the use of a powerful understanding to enlighten
>oneself and others." - Francois Marie Arouet Voltaire
>

-- 
******************************************************************************
The opinions expressed by the author are insightful, intelligent and very
carefully thought out.  It is therefore unlikely that they are shared by the
University of Iowa or Case Western Reserve University.
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
From: brown@pollux (Daniel Brown)
Subject: Re: Objections to the Pledge?  (was: NatCom Endorses Facelift...)
Organization: University of Georgia
Date: Wed, 27 Jan 1993 01:53:26 GMT

In article <1k2rrtINNc24@usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu> bu008@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Brandon D. Ray) writes:
>
>There are some Jehovah's Witnesses and some Quakers (to name only two groups)
>who will not swear, affirm, certify, etc.  Their position is that the 
>difference is one of semantics, not of substance, and their interpretation
>of their religion does allow *any* sort of affirmation, as it is idolatrous.

So even if it just said, "I do not support....", they still would not sign?
(I'm not trying to argue -- I'd just like to know the answer.)

-- 
Daniel W. Brown (brown@pollux.cs.uga.edu, dbrown@ai.uga.edu)

Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
From: gmw0622@venus.tamu.edu (Mr. Grinch)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
Subject: Re: child labor and minimum wage.
Date: 25 Jan 1993 21:31 CST
Organization: GrinchCo
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: venus.tamu.edu
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41    

In article <1k17smINN25d@armory.centerline.com>, mrh@centerline.com (Mike Huben) writes...
>In article <1993Jan22.111431.16248@genie.slhs.udel.edu> starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu (Tim Starr) writes:
>>In article <1jf7rsINNq3t@armory.centerline.com> mrh@centerline.com (Mike Huben) writes:
> 
>Governments never denied slaves their rights because government NEVER forced
>anyone to be a slaveowner.  Their owners denied slaves their rights.  Owners
>could and did free their slaves if they wanted to, several ways, such as
>shipping them north or returning them to Africa (Liberia for example.)
>The US government was laissez-faire on this issue, a hard-won compromise.
> 
This argument is weak even for you.  You might as well claim that governments
never established a postal monopoly since nobody is forced to work for the
post office.


The simple truth is,  without the government enforcing laws which made people 
slaves in the first place,  any "slave" could simply walk off his "master's"
property and be a free man.  End of story.

Mr. Grinch
>Mike Huben

"As usual,  a knife wielding maniac has shown us the way"
			-Bart Simpson
From: jwh@citi.umich.edu (Jim Howe)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
Subject: Re: child labor and minimum wage.
Date: 25 Jan 1993 18:36:06 GMT
Organization: IFS Project, University of Michigan
Distribution: world
Reply-To: jwh@citi.umich.edu
NNTP-Posting-Host: tarkus.citi.umich.edu

In article <1k17smINN25d@armory.centerline.com>, mrh@centerline.com (Mike Huben) writes:
|> In article <1993Jan22.111431.16248@genie.slhs.udel.edu> starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu (Tim Starr) writes:
|> >In article <1jf7rsINNq3t@armory.centerline.com> mrh@centerline.com (Mike Huben) writes:
|> >}[...]
|> >}The US government NEVER enslaved.  At worst, it started with common law.
|> >}It never brought slaves here: that was entirely a free-market phenominon.
|> >
|> >To claim that the US government has never enslaved is at best to be ignorant
|> >of the fact that slavery consists in the denial of the right to the fruits
|> >of an individual's labor.  At worst, it's lying.
|> >
|> 
|> [...]
|> 
|> Governments never denied slaves their rights because government NEVER forced
|> anyone to be a slaveowner.  Their owners denied slaves their rights.
|>

Hmmm, in a previous post you claimed that people have no rights other than
what the government grants.  Since the government did not grant any rights
to slaves, slave owners were clearly not denying slaves their 'rights',
correct?


James W. Howe                  internet: jwh@citi.umich.edu
University of Michigan             uucp: uunet!mailrus!citi.umich.edu!jwh
Ann Arbor, MI   48103-4943         
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian