Libertarianism

A Stitch of Protection

This entry was posted in Capitalism Domestic Terrorism Drug Laws Economics Law Enforcement Libertarianism on by

Adrian doesn’t tell us where he found this:

“Many Chechens have sewn their pockets up in order to prevent anything being planted on them if stopped by police. One young Chechen exclaimed: “This is how we live, thanks to the Department on Fighting Organized Crime. First we were bandits, then became terrorists, and now we are becoming seamstresses.”
This would be good advice for many victems of the drug thugs (many, many more examples available).
Via Pharyngula and Bitch. PH.D.

Convention Things

This entry was posted in bush Capitalism Election 2004 Libertarianism Rand on by

To be precise, 1001 Things to Hate About the Convention.
There really are a 1001 of them ranging from the humorous to the serious and some that perhaps reflect positively about the convention.
And they are generally much more entertaining though I’m going to savor them a bit longer then PZ Meyers who says he has read them all.
Roxanne borrowed #17, Ayn Rand smiling up from hell, to headline a fine picture of these left behind children. I do doubt that Rand would be smiling about anything to do with the RNC convention, its candidates or their programs.

Who Will the Cartels Support?

This entry was posted in Drug Laws Economics Libertarianism on by

Via Eugene Volokh I see that Jesse Walker at Reason picked up on the absurdity of hastert’s fantasy about George Soros:

In addition to being baseless, Hastert’s accusation doesn’t even make sense. Drug prohibition acts as a price support and a barrier to entry; it helps the cartels maintain their market position. They’re about as likely to fund a legalization campaign as they are to give Denny Hastert an all-expenses-paid vacation in Bermuda or — as long as we’re throwing around groundless insinuations — a free sex tour in Thailand.
Well, on this latter point Jesse misses the mark. The cartels are quite likely to include these types of gifts in their funding, direct or otherwise, of those congress critters who support their market position, i.e., who support ongoing drug prohibition.
Update (9/3): I see that Mark Kleiman picked up on this thought from one of his readers.

Drug War Result

This entry was posted in Capitalism Domestic Terrorism Drug Laws Economics Law Enforcement Libertarianism US Foreign Policy War on Terrorism on by

Science and the market are hard at work in the drug war:

DRUG traffickers have created a new strain of coca plant that yields up to four times more cocaine than existing plants and promises to revolutionise Colombia�s drugs industry.
Why was it worthwhile to traffickers to spend �60,000,000 on this effort:
Such an investment by drugs traffickers is small compared to the earnings from what is the most lucrative business on earth. Traffickers can produce a kilogram of cocaine for less than �1,500. That kilogram will sell in Miami for �14,000, in London for �34,000 and in Tokyo would bring �50,000.
We can all thank the articial pricing created by ongoing domestic and international terrorist activities conducted by US and foreign governments for what promises to be a substantial improvement in both quality and quantity of cocaine on the market.
Via Jacob Sollum at Hit & Run.
NB: At the moment �1 equals $1.79

A Plan

This entry was posted in Capitalism Constitution Economics Election 2004 Federal Government Federalism Libertarianism on by

w and his administration are not well known for providing comprehensive public policy plans for public discussion and possible action. For instance, regarding the economy the bush buzzward is ownership. See here and here. There is not much depth and from a planning perspective these appear to be more like action items without any overall strategy direction. And looking deeper on the bush campaign site finds more of the same kind of thing.
Tyler Cowan proposes a somewhat expanded plan for bush (I presume he’d like kerry to adopt it as well)and does include at least a bit of overarching vision in his 12th point:

Get on TV and tell the nation that a free economy is a critical source of our strength. Tell them you mean it, and then mean it. Economic growth is the greatest long-run gift we can give to the world.
The rest of the list is incomplete but, for the most part, a great start toward implementing the proposed vision.
To all of this Ideablog says:
Big problem: it’s politically impossible.
To which I say, well, that’s ok. What is impossible today happens tomorrow but only if you start talking about it.
This is why, whether you ultimately agree point by point, you should go read Cowan’s proposal, think about it, talk about it, discuss your alternatives, refine it, and go at it again, and again, until we get it closer to right.