From a Kevin Carson post on the Mutualists Yahoo! Group:
Pension fund obligations should be given the same standing as those of any other creditor in Chapter Eleven proceedings, even if it means the reorganization completely expropriates the shareholders. I'd guess GM's pension fund liabilities were far in excess of any debt held by bond holders, and when the company defaulted on paying its full obligation the workers should have got shares sufficient in value to make up the difference.
It never ceases to amaze me (though it shouldn't) that the same people who defend Ch. 7 "bankruptcy reform" on the grounds that the "deadbeats" chose to take on debt and shouldn't be able to whine their way out of it, are the same ones who whine about poor old GM's pension and healthcare liabilities and think it's only fair for them to weasel out of them.
Jim Henley at the Art of the Possible blog has a great article on agribusiness and sustainable farming, touching on the neglected libertarian issue of humane farming as well:
Liberals should also work to remove the impediments to small-scale farming and food production that the USDA and other agencies have thrown up. I'm not asking you to end all health and safety regulations, but the burden on the farmer that I can look in the eye, and who will let me walk her land before I buy anything from her, should be less than the burden on the slaughterhouse that won't even allow cameras inside. Joel Salatin's Everything I Want to Do is Illegal is a good place to start. Smaller, even part-time slaughterhouses. Freedom in marketing.
Liberals are now asking what libertarians are supposed to do while they carry out all my assignments. Answer: bug you guys to get all this done. You're the ones with the power anyway. Honestly, it's a naive program anyway. I don't think the large interests who benefit from existing policy are going to yield, and I don't think most progressives have the interest to see comprehensive agriculture policy through.
Anarchists should remember that we don't have to use every opportunity during this election season to remind people of how voting sucks. We can just be douches about it like most people. They seem to not vote just fine without having to preach to people.
Over at the RLLA blog, I wrote an article reporting on a talk I attended in Richmond on alternative decision making mechanisms in anarchist organizations. Check it out! Here's an excerpt:
The talk's emphasis was on large scale organizational behavior: who makes the decisions, how they are arrived at, and what conditions are attached to those decisions. By "prefigurative", Keyser was referring to the need for groups and practices which are structured according to the principles and values we'd like to engender in the world at large. While postulating decision making mechanisms that could scale up to the kind of mass movement we all want to build, he was cognizant of the immediate application of these ideas to our small activist groups. Certainly if we intend to be successful, we cannot ignore the challenges that growth poses to our organizations, let alone to the future anarchist society we envision.
'The police' is an institution designed to enforce the law, whatever the law may be, and to process those suspected of violating it. Only if the law is just does an individual policeman stand any chance of 'producing' justice. To a large degree, current law is designed to produce morality (e.g. enforcing victimless crimes), social 'ideals' (affirmative action) or the protection of political power (gun control). As long as the well-intentioned policeman uses the institution's materials - the law - and complies with its procedures, he will not produce justice. All he can do is to minimize the viciousness with which unjust laws are enforced.
I do not belittle the importance of reducing police brutality. Yet I believe attempts to reform this aspect of the problem are doomed as well. I do not use 'bad apples' like Officer Justin Volpe, who sodomized suspect Louima with a broom, as a paradigm around which to level criticism. I am willing to believe that Volpe's sort is as unusual as the idealistic policeman who treats suspects with real compassion. The vast majority of people in any profession fall in the middle of the bell curve, not at either end. I think most officers simply wish to process the goods - that is, the suspects - with as little trouble as possible. When the goods resist processing, the police respond with the same frustration anyone would feel. Only police carry guns. They often view suspects as less than human. And, as with domestic violence, their brutality has the protection of occurring behind a closed door.
If I may elaborate further, I think it's fucking awesome that people find ways to live without bosses, disposable income, and the general bullshit that goes along with mainstream society. That's freedom! I aspire to find a way to do meaningful, fulfilling work that pays my essential expenses of living in less than 40 hours a week one day, so I can concentrate on activism, writing, and leisure more.
I don't think you could propose a more freedom-oriented approach to life than living off the foolish waste and excess of the self-important, upwardly-crawling corporate yuppie. Part of me wants to find ways to dig through DeCoster's trash, just to piss her off. And given that the corporate culture DeCoster so cherishes working for has (A) mooched off the public for decades, and (B) long manipulated the level of unemployment through the Fed for elite benefit, I think there's a certain poetic justice in living on unemployment and welfare at the expense of overprivileged snobs like DeCoster.
By the way, when I was laid off, I filed for unemployment. It was so meager I didn't even bother collecting. Now I wish I had; there's gotta be a way I can charge my bumming directly to her paycheck, isn't there? That may be a bit hypocritical for a libertarian to say, but if it distances me from DeCoster's brand of careerist libertarianism, it's a small price to pay.
If you've been following me on Twitter, you know a lot's been going on with me right now. Let me break it down for you.
I'll be working on a new contract with a company that does monitoring and logistics software for the beer industry. I'm excited - they seem like a dynamic, small company where I can sink my teeth into some serious programming. While they're Java-based, I'm really hoping to introduce them to the power of Ruby, since I think Rails could help them keep their web interface more flexible and help them organize their business logic better.
I'm helping Jim with a rewrite of CISV's website, focusing initially on integrating PayPal. It's fun to work on something like this where we're both using rSpec from the ground up to drive development.
I've restarted the threadspinner project I've had for a while, but I'm taking a new tack on it. I've been thinking about this idea for about two years, and I've always found my ideas about implementing it clunky - until now. In the next week or so I should be pushing an initial version to github. The first release will be specifically geared towards replacing Wordpress+Feedwordpress on leftlibertarian.org, just because I'd like some software that can mashup discussions, bookmarking, and blogging more tightly than plugins for a blog platform can.
Last week I met up with my friend and RLLA partner Brady and Keith Preston of attackthesystem.com, and we had a good time drinking beer and discussing the ways in which local, issue-based coalitions can be formed. There's a lot more to be said about what we discussed, and I hope to write something up soon, if I get the time.
A week ago I also attended the RVA blogging meeting and met some of my fellow Richmond bloggers. That was cool, although the community seems to be a lot tighter than I expected - it was like everybody knew each other from high school, and then there was me: the wierd radical dude. Which is fine, except I drank on an empty stomach and almost knocked over the table. Style Weekly was there and I talked with them at length about the RLLA, though their article focused less on the serious things we were doing and more on the "aw, shucks - aren't they cute" aspect of blogging.
Finally, last week I attended refresh:richmond, the web design user group. The meeting was geared towards allowing different area user groups to introduce themselves, and CVREG gave a short presentation. There's a lot going on for geeks in Richmond, and I'm especially interested in the user experience group.
What does the future hold? Who knows. I have some topics that I want to flesh out, most vitally a critique of natural rights philosophy. I also want to focus more on a form of libertarianism that looks inward, rather than outward, for validation. Ideas seem to coalesce into prose on an irregular schedule, though, and right now I'm pretty damn busy with my new work. I'll try to stay on top of things here, though.
It takes a deep historical awareness to recognize the legacy of revolution in this country. Modern American society worships at the feet of a god called Stability, and both American revolutions are painted as quaint relics of a time before antibiotics, mass production, and automobiles. The idea of people like you and I standing up to the greatest empire in the history of the world, let alone successfully seceding from their dominion, strikes most people as a frightening thought.
But it's also a very confusing concept, given that at the start of the 21st century it is "we" who are the world power, the globe-trotting empire on which the sun never sets. With a military deployed in hundreds of countries throughout the world, ultimate control over international finance, and a culture of images, packages, and plastics that is readily exportable, it's hard to reconcile our agrarian, decentralist beginnings with what we've become. Now that U.S. foreign policy has expanded from mere internationalism to preemptive warfare, the myths of American exceptionalism and goodwill are becoming more hollow, which causes the blowhards of national politics to bellow them with ever increasing shrillness. It's as if a country founded on individual liberty and restricted government has paid its dues and is now allowed to be what Britain in the 18th century couldn't pull off.
And yet, our national story is still strong enough to pay tribute to that humble but bold spirit of 1776. At least, that's the story when it serves the purposes of the politicians in Washington, D.C. It's as if, contrary to the warnings of the founders, the now safely distant revolution already worked, and that's the end of any of this revolution nonsense. An ancient event bequeathed upon us a constitutional government and guaranteed us rights of whole cloth - after all, it says so on those scraps of parchment at the Archives. Any serious talk of independence in this day and age is likely to get you a ticket to Guantanamo Bay amid vague references to "national security".
If you don't read the FlexYourRights.org blog, you're missing out on good legal information that can seriously help you out on police encounters. There's even a video they've produced to train people on how to deal with the police. While I think it's good operating procedure to behave as if none of your rights will be upheld by cops, knowing your rights gives you insight into police tactics and actions to which you are likely to be subject. And if you silently observe police behavior, rather than complaining about how bad the cops are on the scene, you may be more likely to simply get out of the situation or at least present evidence to a court that catches police off-guard. Remember: no information you provide on the scene can help you; save any argument you want to make for the judge.
Anyway, the latest FlexYourRights.org blog article deals with a predictable complaint: that helping people protect their rights impedes law enforcement work. As I've previously remarked, that's a feature, not a bug. We should put up the maximum resistance possible to all authority, because it is our cooperation with and obedience to the state that enables and empowers it. However, since the state has a monopoly on the investigation and prosecution of legitimate crimes, should we always refuse to cooperate?
The first thing I'd say is that the maxim of conduct I've emphasized is my opinion; before adopting it, you think about it carefully. There are undoubtedly exceptions - my point is that, ideally (and when is a police encounter "ideal"?), you should be in control of the encounter rather than them. You should choose what to say rather than them directing the flow of information; you should choose whether you stay or go rather than them. When in doubt: shut up and trust nobody!
Via Rad Geek I found some great footage that demonstrates just how difficult it can be to be silent in the face of aggressive police tactics:
When this guy tried to remain silent, the cop threatened arrest for "impeding an investigation". It's important to know that cops can lie. Legally, they are under no obligation to be honest with you in any way, shape, or form. So how are you possibly going to be able to negotiate with these people?
Did you know that at least 92% of all fatal car accidents are caused by drivers who make mistakes? It's true. Human errors while driving can be deadly, not just to the driver, but to pedestrians and other motorists as well.
We all have a responsibility to ensure that everybody on the road is safe. So the next time you see somebody make a mistake, do everybody a favor and take their keys away. You just might save a life.
While I think the name of this blog is interesting in its own right, it started out on Blogger as a P.R. vehicle for a musical project at the time. I've been in a few bands in my life, and I've also done some independent work. Given that I've been playing more music (thanks, CraigsList!) and have even been composing again lately, I thought it'd be appropriate to sort of catalog my past efforts and mention my current work.
In high school and college I was in a band called "Chakram Juice" that did kind of bluesy / classic rock stuff. The guitarist and I wrote songs, and I played bass. I even composed a whole 20-song cycle centered on my metaphysical and spiritual beliefs at the time (heavily influenced by A Course in Miracles). We played very few shows and broke up sometime during my freshman year of college. I have some 4-track analog recordings from that era I hope to digitize soon (when I find them).
Sometime after that I was introduced to a very talented drummer named Matt Case who I clicked with immediately. I had been getting into jambands at that time and was really internalizing the idea of music as communication - both between musicians and between players and the audience. To that end, I started studying jazz theory and focused on improvisation. Matt and I worked well together because we both listened to and reacted to each other. It was wonderful, and when we brought in Greg Thompson on guitar we had a great power trio that we named "River Road".
It takes a deep historical awareness to recognize the legacy of revolution in this country. Modern American society worships at the feet of a god called Stability, and both American revolutions are painted as quaint relics of a time before antibiotics, mass production, and automobiles. The idea of people like you and I standing up to the greatest empire in the history of the world, let alone successfully seceding from their dominion, strikes most people as a frightening thought.
Did you know that at least 92% of all fatal car accidents are caused by drivers who make mistakes? It's true. Human errors while driving can be deadly, not just to the driver, but to pedestrians and other motorists as well.
