Good question. The only person who has “moral authority to beat up the mugger” is the victim. Of course, through mutual consent and voluntary relationships, this right can be transferred. The victim can hire a body guard, or accept a charitable donation of protection. Someone shooting, “Help!” is soliciting protection services.
If the victim chooses to surrender his wallet rather than accept your protection, you do not have the ability to disagree with his choice.
Your analogy assumes the muggee does not consent, but this is not the case with governments.
The people of Iraq definitely had the right to resist Saddam, but they did not choose to do so. Neither George W. Bush, nor the American people, are justified in resisting Saddam out of their own initiative. They can do it only as employees, hired or volunteer, of a person with a specific claim against Saddam.
For example, George W. might parachute into an Iraqi home and defend it from Saddam’s tax collectors.
But going into a foreign country and assassinating the leader is not much different from walking into a church and shooting a corrupt minister. You may think people will be better off without him, but you have no right to impose your values on others.
Thats what a mugging is, a robbery by force. The lack of consent is presupposed, or we’d call it something else, like charity or gift-giving.
Saddam didn’t take kindly to people who resisted his rule, so that was hardly an option for most Iraqis. There was undoubtedly a sizable segment of the population which wanted US intervention and could be said to be yelling “help!”.
“Corrupt ministers” are hadly mass-murderers. If you saw this minister killing someone who clearly did not want to die, you wouldn’t have the right to intervene and shoot the minister?
The USA’s invasion of Iraq is immoral and stupid on many grounds, but that doesn’t make all instances of defense-by-proxy immoral. The difficult part is not recognizing that heads of states are murderers (most are), but rather how to bring them to justice without cause even more injustice. Saddam couldn’t be removed without something even worse taking his place, and everyone involved should have known that.
As I said, violent defense needs to be on behalf of a person with a specific claim against Saddam. It also needs to be carried out during the commission of the crime. Otherwise it is not defense, but justice. And after-the-fact violent retaliation is not libertarian.
George W. Bush has no right to drive a tank through Iraqi backyards to get to the house to defend it from the tax collectors. His mission of “Defense” does not negate his duty of peaceful interaction with every other person.
War never fulfills these requirements.
War is not defense by proxy. War does not fit the requirements I listed. War is solely an instrument of the state, it is fought only on behalf of the State, it can have no other client.
Now an IED blowing up Hummers as they are on their way to invade a neighborhood might be justified.
People support Ron Paul for different reasons, and are at many different levels of understanding his ideas. Whether you’re conservative, liberal or econo-anarchists, there is something in his message that seems tomake sense. People will vote for him because they support the gold-backed dollar, because he opposes income tax, or because they truly understand the implications of a central banking system. Others will vote for him because he’s pro-life, because he’s honest about foreign policy, because they truly want to end the war, because they’re disillusioned by Democrats and Republicans, or simply because they want to keep their guns. I honestly don’t care why people vote for him, as long as they do. Otherwise, the American empire will continue to grow until it collapses and our liberty and prosperity goes down with it.
Am I the only one who worries that with the rise of private security companies, it seems that in essence, corporations now have the capability to wage war?
If the American empire collapses there will be a lot of very bad things – the collapse of the currency will lead to mass economic confusion, the breakdown of the division of labor and possible mass panic and starvation. If America renounces empire then there can be an orderly transition. One or the other will happen. I’d rather take the path that involves the least starvation, personally.
This is the fruit of giving corporations equal rights with the individual. We need a supreme court that will once again place the rights of the individual above the rights of any corporation. The Declaration and Constitution were revolutionary documents designed to promote the liberty and the worth of the individual. They have nothing to do with corporations. The Ron Paul Revolution must once again champion these individual rights. Corporations. for the most part, are a group of capitalist lemmings who huddle together for collectivist comfort, and gang up on the individual. Dr. Paul and the Jeffersonians who will get elected in his wake must and will bring individual action to the forefront. And this is the promise not only of the Bill of Rights, but also of praxeology. Individual human action is the highest importance.
The world is 98.8% collectivist. The only island of capitalism exists in the minds of a few Ron Paul supporters and Libertarians. We must take back the world for free-market capitalism.
Ron Paul looks good if you only consider economics. But even on the issue of abortion he is at least politically pro-choice. He says “Once we allow federal control over abortion, we lose the opportunity for states to enact pro-life legislation. Numerous states already have laws that punish the act of murder against a fetus. Our focus should be on overturning Roe and getting the federal government completely out of the business of regulating state matters” (http://www.ronpaul2008.com/articles/?tag=Abortion.
Alan Keyes looks good if you only consider economics. But consider the issue of abortion He says “Our rights, including the right to life, are unalienable. If we kill ourselves or consent to allow another to do so, we both destroy and surrender our right to life. We act unjustly. We usurp the power that belongs solely to the Creator, and deny the basis of our claim to human rights.” http://www.alankeyes.com/issues_list.php#abortion
We don’t have to choose between money and morals and we shouldn’t.
I have wondered if it is best to let evil eat it’s self up, or to fight it at every instance.
My illogical preminition is that power replaces itself with more bad power. Like a perversion of “Grisam’s Law”. So, my feeling is to keep speaking out against the control of others by others. Gee, a candidate just doesn’t come about and say why don’t we try the Articles of Confederation in Perpetuity. That would be the representative I’d want. The case is he would sound like a madman.
I see no double agenda in Dr. Paul. I don’t see him advocating a system of private courts, and private police. However, I don’t see that as being contrary to classical liberal ethics. Law should not be monopolized, as for my means, but others do not see that as just means, though we seek like ends, and that is attaining the most peacefull, and wealthy society. It is easy to abstract away what is just for all, but until the actual practice of any system, history does not know.
I can say that he is no sophist, and for that I advocate his assension. Perhaps if we can start to win as many small battles as possible, we will be able to utilize our means to gain that wonderfull dream of a free society.
I would be more Lockean and say a Monoply on the “Legitimate” use of force. Since that, in theory, the state is only supossed to be an enforcer of a social contract. Under this theory of natural rights the ultimate authority lies with the people for whom the social contract is enforced. Of course this is predicated on the idea that all people value safety, and that it is best facilitated in the form of a public good. The idea of a creating a public good in this case, I think is more efficient since the protection of property and basic personal safety is something that is valued equally by everyone. The basic problem I think that arises under this with the elimination of the State is that the wealthiest people will simply buy up all the private security forces and impose their will upon people with less wealth. This would simply amout to a more broken up version of the realist state of affairs we now have in international relations. The value of having a republic with some form of democratic culture with the rule of law is a good thing, mitigating the power of the state at least to some degree. Anarchy would be the most ideal system but it just is not practicle. I have read David Friedman’s arguments for privatizing the law, or what he calls freeing the law but I happen to think there is a role for the state in society. This role is for protection only, with no economic safety nets and no corporate welfare either. I agree that The invisible hand should be the domminering force in society
Microsoft should be given a software monopoly, because if it isn’t, rich people will buy up all the software companies.
Bell should be given a telephone monopoly, because if it isn’t, how will the phones connect to each other? Plus all the rich people will buy all the telephone companies. There will be anarchy!
Surely you cannot only believe in markets except when it comes to protection of property rights. The free market: Serve and Protect. Plus how will this property “protection” be paid for? Thru theft?
A monopoly on justice is no more necessary than a monopoly on software. Goods and services are best provided by the free market, with no exceptions.
No profit motivated organization will engage in open warfare. Its just not worth it.
War is funded either by theft or donation. In the case of Iraq, Americans use theft and the “terrorists” donations.
These “private” security companies are just another branch of government, minus democratic oversight. Another example of corporatism, and not at all related to markets.
I don’t really think that matters, because a great many organizations are not motivated by monetary profit. Governments, for instance, are full of individuals motivated by power. Those individuals won’t change if they go to work in the private sector. The only hope is to change the mindset of the public. Currently, war is legitimized violence. Even in illegitimate wars, such as the current one in Iraq, no one is held accountable for the vast numbers of innocents killed for what has amounted to no reason at all. Unless the public sees through the state’s veneir of legitimacy, they never will be. And as long as the people with the ability to work violence are not held accountable for their actions, you can be sure they will continue to work violence, whatever their motives might be.
But a private organization doesn’t have the abilitiy to endlessly tax its customers to subsidize its uneconomical hobbies, which would drastically limit the scope of wars. A less aggressive company in the same field would be more profitable by foregoing wars, and thus supplant the warmongering one. Naturally, these are tendencies, not iron clad guarantees.
Its not a matter of individuals, its a matter of organizations. No corporations that sells a service will engage in warfare, because of its adverse effects on its legitimate business.
Individuals may be motivated by power but they would be prevented from using market entities by market forces.
People could try to form organizations specifically dedicated to ethnic cleansing or whatever, but they would resemble charities not for-profit corporations.
I’m no anarchist, I want to see if the U.S.Constitution can work first.
What is the role of the government?
I may be wrong when seeing the aggregate of every man’s heart, the desire to be free.
What is a public good? Who, or what can possibly provide one?
Peace may be a good for the public, but how can one or many justify it’s means? It is not peaceful to violate anothers property, without a just cause. What can this jurisprudence by a collective do, but to provide for property. Civil rights, derive from property rights. Action tends to have externialities. Perhaps by proper means these intended or unintended consequences may be favorable. Value is a personal marginal utility scale. Perhaps society needs a system, one provicated by the will for liberty. To have freedom, one must act with responsability, or loose this natural right. Do we all need to be forced into aggregate insecurity? Can any system stand to reason with freedom? Can freedom be regulated systematicly?
Do or die, but don’t force me to do anything I don’t want to, or I may have some right to stop you from doing so.
Monopoly can exist by force, or by superior enterpriser-capitalistmanship. Is there any other way one can flourish?
Only laissiz faire can allow truly free enterprising. Resources are not allocated correctly by any other means.
Since everyone consumes, wealth does not last unless maintained. History has proven that even abject power can not sustain wealth long term. Men, all of whome consume, will desire liberty.
All the animals on the farm can share freedom, or destroy themselves.
As was touched on by someone above, it already has been shown to not work. It was defied almost from day one and the post-civil-war federal government, and especially the post WWI federal government, essentially has little to no resemblance to the document. The constitution already has failed, so I don’t see the logic in trying the exact same thing again. Clearly, the document can either be interpreted in a manner that implies the opposite of its original intent or meaning, or outright defied anyways. The document was flawed in the first place (not to mention that it was expansive in comparison to the document that preceded it, namely the AOC). And, furthermore, the document did not represent an actual voluntary contract with the people in the first place, it was designed and signed by a small band of men, irrespective of the consent of those living at the time.
The idea of a contract that I never signed that binds me to the authority of the state from birth, is akin to slavery from birth. I never signed no stinking contract. How is it that I am binded by this document for merely being born within the territory? How is it that I am obligated to serve a particular band of men for merely being born within the territory? How can a document be self-enforcing? It cannot, it must be created and enforced by flesh and blood individual men. How can the law rule all on its own? It cannot. The rule of law is more often than not a concept meant to, or that at least functions to even without such intent, disguise what is really the rule of men. For all of the reasons stated so far, I reject the idea of the social contract, at least as it is commonly understood and advocated. The state can not be contractual. If such an institution truly is contractual, it ceases to be a state in any rational definition of the word.
Not only can the constitution not work and has been empirically shown to not work, but it cannot be ethically justified to begin with.