Independence Day

Not just another Will Smith, July 4^th weekend blockbuster

By: Matt Fay

“Remember the reason for the season!”

It is a common admonition around the holiday season – not this coming holiday, of course, but the Christmas season.  It is a saying often seen on church bulletin boards and in Christian literature.  It is a saying meant to remind those who are so busy shopping and preparing for large family gatherings that Christmas is not about rampant consumerism but about the birth of Christ.  While there is nothing wrong with buying gifts for family and friends, or getting together with the same to enjoy each other’s company, the reality is that the reason for that holiday was to provide a day for Christians to celebrate the birth of their savior.  All the rest is simply peripheral fun. 

Remembering why Christmas – and its importance – is celebrated is a decision that should be made by subscribers to that faith.  Remembering why we celebrate Independence Day – and its importance – is a responsibility Americans should embrace.

Aristotle on Mixed Economies

By Isaac M. Morehouse

(Originally published by the Ludwig von Mises Institute)

A friend recently commented that he has found wisdom in moderation. He said it seems that truth and goodness are found not at the extremes, but at the place of balance between extremes. This can be very true.

As Aristotle wrote in his Nicomachean Ethics, "Virtue must have the quality of aiming at the intermediate." In Aristotle's examples, it is cowardice and recklessness that are the extremes, courage the middle ground. It is drunkenness and uptightness that are extremes, and moderate drinking the mean.

My friend went on from this concept to state that he believed in neither socialism nor capitalism, but in a mixed economy — or what he called a "messy middle ground." There are two main problems with this conclusion.

George Carlin, R.I.P.

Saying goodbye to the man who made us all laugh by making us feel stupid for what we believed

By: Matt Fay

I once wondered to myself if twenty years from now I’d be watching a ninety year old George Carlin – senile and in a wheelchair – in yet another HBO comedy special.  That question was answered late Sunday night when the seventy-one year old comedian died of heart failure.  Throughout the week there have been a plethora of tributes to the man who gave us the Seven Dirty Words, hosted the first episode of Saturday Night Life after snorting cocaine for a week straight, and also played “Mr. Conductor” on Thomas the Tank Engine.  And while most of these will be more eloquent than mine, I do think it’s important that a website dedicated to liberty have at least some small ode to a man who personified the 1^st Amendment.

Carlin understood that, sometimes, being free entailed pissing people off – often unintentionally, though never in his case.  He went out of his way to make all of us feel a little stupid about the things we believed in.  His gripes ran the gamut from those who believe in God and religion to parents who dared to name their children Todd, Tucker or Kyle.

“Ten times out of ten Nicky, Vinny, and Eddie beat the [crap] out of Kyle, Todd, and Tucker.”          -  From his 2001 HBO comedy special

Electoral Eugenics

By Marty Beckerman

"By the people, for the people.”

By Isaac M. Morehouse

I don't like to solicit donations, but this one is as cheap as $1, and is something that touches the very foundaiton of our American freedoms and values.

The Institute for Justice (www.ij.org) has launched an incredibly bold drive to raise 10,000 separate donations on Monday to fight eminent domain (property rights) abuses. 10,000 also happens to be the number of times government used its eminent domain power to unjustly take property from its owners over a five-year period. Remember Suzette Kelo, whose little pink home was taken by the City of New London, Connecticut so they could hand the land over to some strip-mall developers? That's what IJ is fighting all over the nation.

I pledged a very small amount so I can be considered one of the 10,000. It's not about the amount, it's about getting a whopping 10,000 people to donate SOMETHING to the cause of protecting property rights. IJ has publicly proclaimed that they are seeking 10,000 contributions in one day - an incredible and record breaking number - if they do not reach their goal, it could appear that they do not have strong support from citizens in their mission to protect property rights.

IJ would rather have 100 contributions of $1 each than a few $100 contributions, so even a tiny gift helps them achieve their goal of 10,000 donations. I just went to their www.ij.org/keloday web page and all I had to enter was my first and last name, email address, and pledge amount. They'll email me a reminder to give on Monday.

PI readers should count it an honor to be counted as one of the 10,000 who want to end eminent domain abuse. More information below...

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Friends,

Two weeks ago, you received an e-mail from Susette Kelo inviting you to join the Susette Kelo Liberty Club. Three years ago this Monday, June 23, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that New London, Conn., could take Susette's little pink cottage in order to try to generate more tax revenue.

Now three years after the decision and $78 million in taxpayer dollars later, nothing has happened with the land. All that's left are brown, barren fields.

Yet the travesty here is not only that the lives of Susette and her neighbors were unnecessarily uprooted, but that this type of thing is happening all over the country.

Don't let the fights of these courageous individuals go in vain!

We need 10,000 people to go to www.ij.org/keloday and pledge to make a small donation - just $5 or $10 - to the Institute for Justice this coming Monday, June 23. This will send a message to policymakers and the media that our homes and businesses are not political capital that can be bandied about for personal and political gain.

We have never solicited our members for donations before, but this is a very special occasion and one that we hope you don't pass up being a part of. Your small contribution will help us continue the fight to end eminent domain abuse.

And if you're in the area of New London, Conn., please join us this coming Saturday from 1 to 3 pm when we'll reopen Susette's home at its new location in New London (36 Franklin Street).

Thank you so much, and please don't hesitate to contact me with any questions.

Best,

Christina Walsh
Castle Coalition Coordinator
Institute for Justice
www.ij.org
www.castlecoalition.org

Libertarians are Spoiled Children

Air America’s Thom Hartmann critiques  the “Ron Paul Revolution”

By: Matt Fay

There are no truly libertarian shows out there in talk radio land – yeah, the conservatives talk about free markets and used to talk about the Constitution, but we all know how much they truly believe in them.  So, I spend most of the time I’m in my car switching back and forth between conservative and progressive radio – or ESPN Radio.  I have tended, as of late, to lean toward the progressive radio programs despite the fact that I consider myself much more of a moderate to conservative libertarian.  I guess there are only so many times I can be told how I want to destroy America because I believe in Constitutional principles, how I do not support the troops and provide “aid and comfort” to terrorists by not supporting the Iraq War, and what a moral degenerate I am because I listen to rap music and have a subscription to Playboy (I only get it for the articles!).

The one thing I really can’t stand about listening to the progressives, though, is not that they can’t identify what the problems are in America, but that their solutions consist of government, government, and more government – as well as their fear of allowing private individuals and organizations to make their own decisions about ANYTHING! 

One case in point occurred on Friday, June 6.  I was listening to the Thom Hartmann radio show when a caller made the ludicrous suggestion that Barack Obama may be well served in choosing Ron Paul as his running mate.  This is a ridiculous contention on its face, but what was more ridiculous was the uber-progressive – borderline socialist – host’s contentions about libertarians and the spoiled children that we all apparently are.

Attack of the Moral Busybodies

"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”

—C. S. Lewis

By Isaac M. Morehouse

At the gym the other day I overheard two older women talking as they ran on treadmills. First they were talking (quite loudly – I wasn’t straining to eavesdrop) about the current situation with banks and home mortgages. They both agreed, many people with adjustable-rate mortgages or 5-year ARMS were going to be struggling to make payments if rates continued to rise, and the culprit was greed. The banks were greedy for giving adjustable rate loans to people who may have a high risk of default.

I tried to tune them out and focus on pumping up my already massive 157 lb. body to no avail (both the tuning out and the pumping). Their conversation moved on to last night’s TV viewing. “I was watching that ‘deal or no deal’ show, and I couldn’t believe it!” She went on to share her absolute amazement and disgust with various contestants for choosing to pass up tens of thousands of dollars in order to try for more. Both the treading ladies agreed that this was “a shame”, and that it boiled down to “greed, just pure greed”.

As I strained to lift the smallest denomination of barbells in the gym I thought about these nice old ladies, seemingly concerned with the welfare of all mankind. But what was so greedy? Banks chose to loan money to people, which always bears a risk of default. These women felt the default risk was too great and the loan shouldn’t have been made; the banks, apparently, did not. Game show contestants were faced with a choice to take a sum of money and walk, or to risk walking with nothing for the chance of a larger sum. The joggers thought they should take the money, they thought the risk of trying for more was too great; the contestants did not.

Both of these “problems” were instances where the risk preferences of the ladies differed from those whom they were criticizing as “greedy”. Whose risk preference should be enforced? If these ladies had their way, there would be laws and regulations imposing their risk preferences on everyone else. Would we really be better off if the opinions of these women dictated who got a loan, and not the calculations of banking experts? Would we be better off if game show contestants had to call the treadmill duo and ask permission to hit the big red “no deal” button?

There are two problems with anti-greed sentiment that seeks government intervention:

1. One man’s greed is another man’s self-interest

Greed is an internal condition where a person wants more than is good for them or others. Like lust, envy, or self-deception, it cannot be identified or defined it from the outside. Only the greedy person is really able to know whether or not they are greedy. How is an outside observer to judge whether or not it is greedy for you to seek a pay raise, or try to find a cheaper car, or buy another song on iTunes? They can’t.

2. There are some things the law just can’t do

Even if we were able to find some objective, identifiable, universal definition of greed, how could it be enforced? If the point is to make people less greedy when assessing risk and making decisions, how can any external punishment make them a better judge? To add the additional risk of fine or imprisonment to behaviors deemed greedy (presumably because they bear more risk than the result warrants) the greedy person can still be perfectly greedy in choosing to abstain from the activity. It is the self-interested and “greedy” desire to stay out of prison that motivates to obey the law. Law cannot change the heart.

Both the bankers and the game show contestants were merely assessing risk, and choosing to do what they believed would give them the best result. Isn’t that what we all do with every decision we make?

As one of the ladies stepped off the treadmill and into the tanning booth I wondered to myself if she felt “greedy” for doing so. Her melanin had given her enough tan already. Artificial sunlight increases the risk of cancer. She chose to engage in the risky behavior of tanning anyway, just to have more bronze.

Greed, just pure greed.