HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu (Tim Starr)
Subject: Re: Labelling laws.
Organization: UDel, School of Life & Health Sciences
Date: Sun, 13 Dec 1992 10:49:06 GMT

In article <1992Dec12.092316.12864@pasteur.Berkeley.EDU> wchen@beirut.berkeley.edu (William Chen) writes:
}We've tried this already!  About 130 years ago.  And it wasn't just a small 
}state like Lituania either-- a third of the country tried this.  But to be
}fair, name a nation that has not tried to prevent part of itself from 
}seceeding.  

Unless you discount it as a nation, how about Czechloslovakia?  The Czech
Republic will be happy to drop Slovakia.  Bohemia and Moravia are in much
better shape.  Go, Vaclav Klaus, you Hayekian!

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." - Voltaire
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
From: arromdee@jyusenkyou.cs.jhu.edu (Ken Arromdee)
Subject: Re: Labor Standard
Organization: Johns Hopkins University CS Dept.
Date: Fri, 18 Dec 1992 06:21:19 GMT

In article <gfA9nCW00WB78IXn1p@andrew.cmu.edu> at15+@andrew.cmu.edu (Andrew Lewis Tepper) writes:
>Fix the currency at 1 unit=1 hour of unskilled labor. To keep the system
>honest, the way to produce currency is to have an actual person do 1
>hour of labor (either needed labor or unneeded), and then to give him a
>newly minted currency unit. This isn't as crazy as it sounds: We now
>have people dig up gold from the ground and then (investors) just hold
>on to it. Also, we would have no limits on currency in circulation;
>anyone could do some unskilled labor and get currency from the
>government. One side effect would be that an implicit minimum wage would
>be in effect: 1 unit = 1 hour. What other side effects would this scheme
>have?

The problem with the currency is that it's just like having the government
print paper.  With paper printing, the government could print lots of paper and
inflate away the money people already have.  With this scheme, the equivalent
to printing lots of paper is to change the rules to allow print lots of paper
and then print lots of paper.  (It would have to change the rate to 2 units
or more per hour to keep government employees, of course, but the basic problem
remains: the government could change the rules in the middle of the game.)
--
"the bogosity in a field equals the bogosity imported from related areas, plus
the bogosity generated internally, minus the bogosity expelled or otherwise
disposed of."  -- K. Eric Drexler

Ken Arromdee (arromdee@jyusenkyou.cs.jhu.edu, arromdee@jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu)
From: mjsimko@sumax.seattleu.edu (Matthew Simko)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
Subject: N-C abortion
Date: 17 Dec 1992 16:01:45 -0800
Organization: Seattle University
NNTP-Posting-Host: sumax.seattleu.edu
Summary: Continued debate on abortion leads to debate on overpopluation.


Recent posters under this heading have opened up the debate quite a bit.
Good. With that said I want to deposit my $.02.
The rights of the living outweigh the rights of the yet to be living.


Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
From: starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu (Tim Starr)
Subject: Re: Labelling laws.
Organization: UDel, School of Life & Health Sciences
Date: Sat, 19 Dec 1992 10:11:19 GMT

In article <1gt4rhINNpof@armory.centerline.com> mrh@centerline.com (Mike Huben) writes:
}What nonsense.  You are demonstrating a tremendous poverty of imagination,
}not to mention conveniently forgetting basic ideas of libertarianism.
}Start by privatizing the roads.  Show the benefit.  Yes, the state will
}prevent you from achieving some libertarian goals: do what you can to show
}how you can improve things.

Many roads are private, and the benefits are well-known.  Many other things
have been privatized, too: police, fire, and garbage collection services are
some of the more common examples.  If you haven't heard about these, then
ask the Reason foundation in LA for some info.

}>The part about "free country projects."  This
}>has been tried, and the American Empire has stopped it every time.  The
}>Minerva project got stopped when the USA induced the King of Tonga to claim
}>it; the case is still in international court, as I understand it.  Another
}>libertarian activist was organizing an overthrow of the marxists in Suriname,
}>made the mistake of telling the CIA about it, and they put a stop to it.
}>They'd rather have the commies in power than have a free society in existence
}>anywhere on the planet.
}
}I'm not surprised that so-called libertarians were stopped when they
}initiated use of force or attempted to.

Attempting to overthrow communists is initiating force?  What if they were
Nazis?

>I pointed out that you need
}political support from another nation: something that can be bought.

That's been tried, too.  Papa Doc Duvalier gave his permission to the Atlantis
to have an enterprise zone within his jurisdiction, then changed his mind
and drove the ship into a hurricane.  All hands were saved, but the ship was
lost - at a cost of $11 million.

}I explained a
}simple, politically viable way for establishing a libertarian nation:
}persuade (bribe) a small nation to form an enclave or sponsor secession
}of a province.  Get the idea?  That way it's consensual.  As well as
}supported by at least one recognized external political entity.

Sounds good to me.  The problem is finding such a country.  There was one
that this was considered for, but I forget its name.  One of the small
caribbean island countries.

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
From: kris@bsg8.Corp.Sun.COM (Kris Skrinak)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
Subject: Re: Somalia, Liberatarian State
Date: 11 Dec 1992 20:58:09 GMT
Organization: Sun Microsystems, Inc.
Distribution: world
Reply-To: kris@bsg8.Corp.Sun.COM
NNTP-Posting-Host: bsg8.corp.sun.com

In article 23318@genie.slhs.udel.edu, rich@genie.slhs.udel.edu (Rich Schwartzman) writes:

>    Libertarianism is based on the principle that no individual or group of
> individuals has the right to initiate the use of force or fraud.  Somalia
> is hardly an example of that premise.

And how are those rights enforced? By a privately-funded police force?
I think that's what the Somalian warlords are!

Let me phrase my question differently.

Anarchy exists in Somalia, an vacuum of political structure exists.

How can a liberatarian structure be implemented in this country? What
are the steps? Is it possible? Most importantly, does it make sense in
Somalian culture?
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
From: starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu (Tim Starr)
Subject: Re: Why not feudalism?
Organization: UDel, School of Life & Health Sciences
Date: Sat, 19 Dec 1992 10:18:21 GMT

In article <1992Dec18.145949.10846@ornl.gov> jfmcbray@sacam.OREN.ORTN.EDU (Jason F McBrayer) writes:
}All I was trying to establish in my description of Paleo/Mesolithic
}society was that the necessities of life were practically infinite.

Which is patent nonsense.  Gathering and hunting of them had to be done.  If
it hadn't, they would have spent all their time fucking, procreating, and
overpopulating to the point where they either learned better or consumed
all the natural resources.

}	What I meant by production being unlinked from labor and capital
}was that the production is done automatically by something that you don't
}have to work for hours to benefit from.  An antelope or a ground squash
}were just there for the taking; no one had to work a 40 hour week for them
}to be produced.

They had to work some in order to hunt or gather these goods.


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
From: Dr. Norman J. LaFave <lafave@ial4.jsc.nasa.gov>
Subject: Re: voting for the enemy.
X-Xxdate: Thu, 17 Dec 92 08:32:33 GMT
Organization: Lockheed Engineering & Sciences Company
X-Useragent: Nuntius v1.1.1d12
Date: Thu, 17 Dec 1992 14:36:10 GMT

In article <1992Dec17.134052.1059@news.DKRZ-Hamburg.DE> Bakayaroo Banzai,
k206027@smog.DKRZ-Hamburg.DE writes:
>You obviously missed out on the fact that many people responded to this
>event with the distinctly non-partisan response of "There goes Congress
>abusing it's privileges again". As for those bad Republicans smearing
>Democrats you're not going to seriously sit there and try to imply
>that the Demos have *never* launched a misinformation campaign against
>their opponents with a purely political goal in mind? So it was the
>Republican's turn to smear this time...I obviously don't share your 
>touching faith in the Democratic Party. Pardon me if I don't join you
>for a weep over the injustice of it all...

OK Buckayroo....tell me....list one smear tactic used by the Clinton
campaign
to defame Bush's character. Jennifer doesn't count since Clinton himself
disavowed that rumor. Keep in mind that "smears" based on actual data
on issues which pertain to the office are not smears.

I am not naive. I realize that in the huge number of campaigns
across the nation there has been a disgusting amount of mudslinging on
both
sides. I try to ignore it when I vote and learn about the candidates
records
and program proposals. I also try to vote for the best candidate
regardless
of party (I voted for three Republicans in our local elections). However,
this
particular issue was twisted by several Republican candidated nationwide
in an attempt to use it to bludgeon the Democratic incumbent. Take a look
at some of the TV adds if you need proof. There are alot of perks that
representatives and senators have set up for themselves that we, as
citizens in a republic, should be justifiably outraged about. However,
1.) this
so-called "scandal" doesn't even rate, and 2.) The abuses have been a
bipartisan effort.

Norman

Dr. Norman J. LaFave
Senior Engineer
Lockheed Engineering and Sciences Company




When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro
                               Hunter Thompson
From: Chris.Holt@newcastle.ac.uk (Chris Holt)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
Subject: Re: Why not feudalism?
Date: 16 Dec 92 16:01:26 GMT
Organization: University of Newcastle upon Tyne, UK, NE1 7RU

starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu (Tim Starr) writes:
>In article <1992Dec12.215840.1920@pasteur.Berkeley.EDU> wchen@beirut.berkeley.edu (William Chen) writes:
>}Agreed that our government has gotten much more socialistic this century,
>}and has veered away from the original intent of the framers of the
>}Constitution.  However, I don't believe we really want to return to some
>}of the 19th Century govt. practices.

>Whether "we" want to or not is irrelevant.  Whether we should is the issue.

And the answer is that we should not.  Let's say it again: it was
not a Golden Age.

>For example back then there were
>}sweatshops, child labor, Chinese rail workers and more cases of extreme
>}worker exploitation which the government ignored.  Some regulations like
>}safety conditions and child labor laws had some good effects.

>Wrong.  The permissibility of "child labor" was supported by liberals of
>the time, in opposition to both conservatives who wanted them kept in cottage
>industry, working harder in worse conditions, and Romantics who glossed over
>their medeival alternatives with a veneer of fantasies of an idyllic youth.
>My understanding is that the canonical text on this is "Child Labor and
>the Industrial Revolution," by Clark Nardinelli.

>What's wrong with exploitation (all it means it to benefit from), and how
>were either sweatshop workers or the rail workers oppressed?

They suffered a low standard of living, a high rate of ill-health,
and the knowledge that they had little if any chance of moving out
of their situation.  Children who worked 12 hour shifts down coal
mines ended up with black lung.  Children who didn't get paid
enough to eat well suffered from rickets.  Rail workers were economic
slaves, with conditions not far off from those of South African miners
today.  If someone suffered a work-related injury, there was little
if any recompense, and little if any chance of future employment.
How nice.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Chris.Holt@newcastle.ac.uk      Computing Lab, U of Newcastle upon Tyne, UK
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Discord, the Goddess of the Net, was developing a taste for blood sacrifice.
From: kris@bsg8.Corp.Sun.COM (Kris Skrinak)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
Subject: Re: Somalia, Liberatarian State
Date: 14 Dec 92 23:32:21 GMT
Reply-To: kris@bsg8.Corp.Sun.COM
Organization: Sun Microsystems, Inc.
NNTP-Posting-Host: bsg8.corp.sun.com

Thanks for all the responses both posted and private. I've recovered from
the brink of the precipice that would have landed me back in the Rep/Dem
netherworld. However, I must add that the consensus is that Liberatarianism
_is_ culturally-based, and, there's nothing wrong with that!


The two most important things I forgot were:

1)	Libertarians != Anarchists

and 

2)	Where there is no responsibility there can be no freedom.
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
From: cmk@athena.mit.edu (Charles M Kozierok)
Subject: Re: Views? :
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 1992 19:01:30 GMT

In article <Bz9C3p.H7A@encore.com> rcollins@1.com writes:
>In article <1gi8khINNhd5@armory.centerline.com>, mrh@centerline.com (Mike Huben) writes:
>|> Gold went up in value because its price had been artificially maintained
>|> very low for quite a while by the US government.  That was one of the reasons
>|> why we went off the gold standard: it was impossible for the federal government
>|> to keep saying an ounce of gold was worth (approximately) $20.  This sort
>|> of deflation was very harmful for foreign trade, and threatened to depelete
>|> US gold reserves.
>
>Please explain.  If 20 dollars was backed by an ounce of gold, how was it
>"impossible for the federal government to keep saying an ounce of gold
>was worth" 20 dollars?  It would seem a lie to say that 20 dollars was
>worth any more or less than an ounce of gold since that's exactly what
>it represented.  (The 20 dollars = 1 oz. gold is just an example.
>What was the actual ratio when our currency was backed with gold?)

i believe it was $35.

i'd like to hear Mike answer some of the problems with a gold backed
currency too, but i can give you my explanation of the above. gold
would always be equal to $35, as you say. the problem was not that
gold wasn't worth $35 anymore, it was that $35 wasn't worth an ounce
of gold. meaning that the goods which could be had for $35 were
not worth an ounce of gold given what other countries would pay
for an ounce of gold.

the US could announce tomorrow that gold was once again worth
$35 (they could announce that it was worth 35 cents too, for that
matter). all that would happen is that the value of our currency
would inflate about ten-fold, because the rest of the world doesn't
look at it as "how much gold can i get for this dollar?" but rather
"how many dollars do those crazy yanks say i can get for this gold?"
with no gold standard, the market decides the answer to that question.

commodities still are the only currency that matters. the rest
is just paper.

--
charles
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
From: cmk@athena.mit.edu (Charles M Kozierok)
Subject: Re: Wither the gold standard (was: Re: Views? :)
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Date: Wed, 16 Dec 1992 22:54:56 GMT

In article <1992Dec15.191554.3565@samba.oit.unc.edu> bolden@beta.math.unc.edu (Jeffrey Bolden) writes:
>In article <1992Dec15.011406.3695@athena.mit.edu> cmk@athena.mit.edu (Charles M Kozierok) writes:
>>the net effect is that the US loses control of price stability.
>>too little gold in the market --> real value of dollar relative to 
>>gold goes down --> prices go down.
>>too much gold in the market --> real value of dollar relative to
>>gold goes up --> prices go up.
>>
>>the US could handle these fluctuations with its gold reserves
>>back in the 50's. now it would just take too much gold.
>>
>>please tell me if that makes more sense.
>>--
>>charles
>
>	Yes that was definitly more clear.

thanks! it sure is hard to understand, isn't it?

>However, what your arguing is
>what happens if the price of gold deflates.

no, i covered both cases -- please re-examine the lines i left
in above

>If $35 dollars buys X amount
>of stuff in the US and $1 ounce of gold = $35 buys 2 ounces of stuff
>outside the US, then the problem isn't the price of gold, its the price of
>the stuff.

that doesn't make any sense.  the cost of the stuff is based on inherent
value and therefore is always right, at least according to the market.
the problem is the cost of the (inherently valueless) pieces of paper...

>Basically you forget that a gold standard means that the
>government guanrentees to convert both ways.  So if gold becomes more
>valueable outside the US, people in the US will trade in their dollars for
>gold, and then buy the stuff outside the US, causing deflation here.  
>	Basically what were saying is the price of everything in the US
>economy would move relative to gold.  However note, that on the other hand
>this would tend to stablize the price of gold, so it wouldn't move so much.

i don't think it works that way. there are too many other nations out there
who control much more of the supply and the demand than we do. just one of
the big companies in Japan, which has many companies sitting around with so
many US dollars they're ready to roll them into firelogs, could move the
market all over the place with *very* little effort.

--
charles
From: cb926@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Edmund Joseph Ryan)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
Subject: Competing Defense Agencies
Date: 12 Dec 1992 01:41:22 GMT
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio (USA)
NNTP-Posting-Host: hela.ins.cwru.edu


Recently, Bill Henley expressed concerns about how anarcho-
capitalism--when it comes to defense agencies--has the potential
for distrastrous results. Mr. Henley's examples were the situations
("disastrous") in Somalia and Lebanon. In regard to defense,  
this argument has also been used for gun control. Pro-gun 
control advocates cite that society would turn into anarchy
if the government was not able to establish order.

The problem with these arguments is that it assumes that only a
defense agency that is publically owned--such as the U.S. army--
is the only one capable of protecting property rights and will
more than half of the time act in the interests of society. As
we've seen before, government defense agencies are prone to the
same problems that private defense agencies are prone to. 
These problems include: serving the industry-military complex,
going to war to milk the public at large, and infringing on
the property rights of foreign nations. 

The best way to rectify this situation is to embrace the idea
of competition. If one ignores that the situation may come up
where one must fight--yes fight--against other individuals or
groups without the guidance of a defense agency, one is 
denying one's opportunity to choose the best defense agency.
(Guidance of a defense agency i.e. choosing a defense agenc
that is designated to represent some national entity and  
both of which being or not being legitimate.)

The situations in Somalia and Lebanon are far from   
undesirable, but this is not a condemnation of anarcho- 
capitalism. This is a condemnation of the refusal of 
anarcho-capitalism. Particularly--our refusal of 
anarcho-capitalism. 

I suggest that the U.S. government and other governments
allow for the creation of private profit-making armies.
Ideally, an army of this type will look at the situation
in Somalia, and most likely find a profit making venture.  
This army would be hired for profit and most likely
successfully defend its portion of Somalia that it is 
paid to protect. Naturally funding would come from 
private citizens. 

If there is no profitable ventures in protecting Somalian
citizens, then there must be one in bringing Somalians
out of Somalia. In Somalia, there are profit making 
ventures to be made. The tragedy is ignoring this while
the opportunity is at hand. 

In this situation, we have some private armies going in    
and pillaging Somalia--then again they're might be
private armies going against them. Whatever the situation,
the result would be beneficial to Somalia--and to Lebanon.
In both countries, there is not enough customer choice in    
defense agencies. This is because Western governments and
others alike ignoring the favorable consequences of 
embracing anarchocapitalism.

Virtually,

Edmund J. Ryan
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
From: bolden@beta.math.unc.edu (Jeffrey Bolden)
Subject: Re: Views? :
Organization: University of North Carolina
Date: Sun, 13 Dec 1992 02:27:56 GMT

In article <1992Dec12.173017.21527@athena.mit.edu> cmk@athena.mit.edu (Charles M Kozierok) writes:
>In article <1992Dec12.044058.16557@samba.oit.unc.edu> bolden@beta.math.unc.edu (Jeffrey Bolden) writes:
>>In article <1992Dec12.012334.3472@athena.mit.edu> cmk@athena.mit.edu (Charles M Kozierok) writes:
>>>In article <11339@prijat.cs.uofs.edu> bill@triangle.cs.uofs.edu (Bill Gunshannon) writes:
>>>>In article <1992Dec9.221200.20158@athena.mit.edu>, cmk@athena.mit.edu (Charles M Kozierok) writes:
>>>>|> 
>>>>|> also, if your statement #2 is true, why did gold go up in value by
>>>>|> an order of magnitude after the gold standard was *removed*?
>>>>|> 
>>>>
>>>>You are assuming the value of gold went up when it is much more likely that
>>>>the value of the pieces of paper actually dropped once they were no longer
>>>>tied to anything of real value.
>>>
>>>say what?
>>>i must be missing some important neurons somewhere...
>>>
>>>what exactly is the difference between the value of gold going up
>>>and the value of money going down? they are measured against one
>>>another, and since the gold standard was abolished the market has decided
>>>that one ounce of gold is worth ten times as many pieces of paper as
>>>it was worth before (it was actually 25 times at one point, of course).
>>>that is exactly the point i was trying to make.
>>>
>>>please explain.
>>>
>>>--
>>>charles
>>
>>The difference is what you can buy.  Say for example that $10=ounce of
>>gold.  Then they remove the restrictions.  Now $400 = ounce of gold.  Did
>>gold, go up or money go down.  Well, 100 years ago, I could probably buy
>>about 100 chickens for an ounce of gold.  Today I could probably do the
>>same.  However, I'd be hard pressed to buy a hundred chickens for $10.
>
>ok, i see your difference, thanks. but that reinforces the value of having
>a commodity-backed currency, because the only thing which is important
>is how many chickens an ounce of gold is worth, or a haircut, or whatever,
>not a portrait of george washington.
>
>btw, we are still waiting for the person (i believe it was mr. huben) to respond
>to my response to his claim that a backed currency over-values the 
>commodity used to back it. that is really the important issue.
>
>--
>charles

	Well on that you and I agree completly.  I think the gold standard
is really not worth much.  It was useful in ancient times, because gold
was relativly rare and highly prized.  In modern times, who really needs
gold for anything.  The best thing we could do is sell of all that
worthless garbage in Fort Knox.
	Givin all this though can you think of a good commidity for the
modern world?