not to thread jack but… i tend to agree with the idea that you have a right to retrieve your stolen property.
i have also heard mr block say that he supports a “two teeth for a tooth, plus costs of expenditures.”
he talks about this on a mises podcast. i believe its entitled ‘libertarian analysis of the law’
Why isn’t it the private property of the tax-payers?
When was the last time the government was accountable to the supposed “owners” (taxpayers) of their “private property” (government)?
Yea, I don’t remember either.
The tax-payers do not own the state, but they own the “public” property.
i think we addressed this issue earlier when we made it clear that the thief is so big, and the stolen goods so fungible that its very hard to determine which person has property right to what stolen property. as for tax payers being owners of public property in the sense that government propoganda claims they do, this is patently absurd. have you ever seen a taxpayer exercise his right as owner? this would mean, drive home in a tank with the blessing of the local guard? take computers out of schools with a ‘youre welcome’ from the headmaster?
Whether or not it is moral to accept government grants rests on the way that the government grant is funded. Because the government does not produce and sell goods on the market, the only way it gets money is by taxing, either through outright taxation (taking money directly from taxpayers), inflation (sapping the purchasing power out of everyone’s wallets), or borrowing (taxing future generations to pay for present consumption).
Thus, the real measure of taxation (i.e. state theft) is equal to government spending.
Government spending can be classified in two categories, however.
A). It is earmarked out of a fund that would otherwise go to another branch of the government, or
B). It requires entirely new spending.
Earmarks, for instance, are a very deceptive issue. A lot of libertarians oppose earmarking, but we should actually very much favor the act of earmarking, because any funds in the federal budget that Congress does not earmark will just go to the executive branch. This is why Ron Paul consistently puts in as many earmarks as possible and then votes against the budget in its entirety. It’s as though you and a group of your friends pool some money together and are deciding on what to order for dinner. You say Chinese food, because it’s much more economical, while all of your friends want pizza. So you decide to have a vote, but before the vote you “earmark” two pieces of pizza, assuming that pizza wins. When the vote comes, you vote against ordering the pizza, but when you lose the vote, you at least get the two pieces of pizza.
Likewise, if, in accepting government grants, you are merely diverting funding to yourself (or other taxpayers) that would otherwise go to the executive branch, or some other apparatus of the state, then you are not violating the private property rights of other innocent people.
However, if you apply for a government grant that requires a net increase in spending, then in order for the government to give you that grant, it must steal someone else’s property (either the property of outright taxpayers if the funds come from outright taxation, or the property of everyone who holds Dollars if the funds come from inflation, or the property of future generations if the funds come from borrowing).
So, to determine whether it is moral to accept government grants, one first has to distinguish if the act of applying for a government grant means an increase in government spending, or a mere shuffling around of an already existing pool of government funds.
If someone steals $5 from me, I still own those $5, even if I have no means of procuring that money. I think you may take retribution and restitution, but you shouldn’t take anything more. But if someone is going to take government grants to fund an anti-state campaign, that might be acceptable, because their protecting the tax-payers’ rights, just as the state claims to be doing.
do, you own those exact 5 dollars, or 5 of whatever dollars the thief happens to possess?
There’s no difference.
so, then you mean the latter. im getting a picture of your opinion on this.
and when you say that tax payers own the ‘public’ property, do you mean they each singly own different seperate parts of it, or that they own it in common?
They own the part of the “state’s” resources that would pay for their compensation.
see post 2 of this thread.
either the state is a common because we believe the hype and it has no private owners
or it isnt and its the private property of a bunch of criminals.
so either way homestead what you can of it.
But what about this post? It’s not the theives’ property.
yes, you are right, there is no state, and it owns nothing, because everything is owned, and everything is owned by private individuals.
have i said what you wanted now?
I don’t want you to tell me anything other than your reason for saying the state owns the resources it deploys. Are you saying the state legitimately owns them?
it does not legitimately hold them in the de jure sense, but it claims to , and it defacto does.
as such, all my prior arguments hold.
Bingo!
if you walk into your local DMV office and walk out with a chair. who is the rightful owner of the chair? does it have millions of rightful owners?
The chair is mine. I was the one who stole it back. But if I walk out with one trillion chairs instead then I must relinquish most of them to other taxpayers. I never disagreed with you. What I said was that your saying you only need to relinquish if an owner with a better claim comes forth amounts to nitpicking because in a practical situation the taxpayers will object to a mayor theft (say you stole a state owned company or one trillion chairs) and will demand (and had demanded) their share of the chairs. Of course in practice it is also very easy to ignore their calls and hide behind state courts.