Objective Environmentalists?

Alex answers his mail, re: "Eco-Terrorists Sentence Skeptics to Death."

This article proved rather polarizing, even among the Objectivist-leaning audience of The Atlasphere. Most all ratings that weren't five stars were one star.

Marlize writes:

Excellent column. Disgusting videos. I'm tempted to watch them again — as I still can't believe these even exist in the world — but I'm eating breakfast as I write this and would prefer to keep it in.

I hope you're right when you say the video makers may have misjudged the situation and thought their views more mainstream than they are. I fear that all too many environmentalists, or even college students who are doing the hip thing and "going green," would find these commercials somehow amusing.

Great column, though.

Thanks a lot. Glad you liked my article.

Yeah, I know more people that apparently absorbed green through social osmosis than I care to. Seeing basically only defiant comments at the Armstrong YouTube interview was quite encouraging, though.

Maybe hip environmentalism is only skin deep. As long as they think they're green if they recycle their bottles and switch off the light when they leave the room, it's cool with them. But once they realize that environmentalism means no cell phones, no internet, and no flying and/or that noncompliance is answered with a death threat, it's a lot less hip.

I guess if civilization dies from environmentalism, it won't be with a bang, but with a whimper. One democratically enacted, environmentally friendly law after another until the lights go out.

Like some years ago in California. Of course the moon bats blame that on the free market, and not on the fact that too few if any new power plants get built…

Ramon writes:

Wow, the "Thompson Harmonizer."

I'm sure they'd love to have that. Only they'd call it the "harmony with naturizer."

Turns people into carbon. They couldn't get any more in harmony with nature.

Carbon is people!

Adrian writes:

I agree with you wholeheartedly with respect to the fallacy of global warming and the brainwashing of the unsuspecting public by the governmental encouragement of the propagation of incorrect "scientific" information. (Whew! Mouthful)

I have not yet formulated a philosophical opinion to the actual existence of an environmental issue which happened to be true.

Objectivists, of which I am one, are only too happy that this particular environmental issue, namely Global Warming, is false.

What if one lived on a volcanic island inhabited by 500 to 1000 people and his property was so situated that it was the highest in elevation of all owned properties where the main river ran through it before it flowed through or near anyone else's property — would it be legal and/or moral for him to poison the water while it flowed through his land? (I use "volcanic" merely to demonstrate the island's topographical characteristics).

This realistic situation has been plaguing me for a while now. Obviously harming the unsuspecting rest of the population is murder. If we agree on that premise, then the best answer I could come up with is that the water in the river is only his if he claims it. The only way to claim that water is to claim its molecules. The only way to do that is to gather and store that water in a container. THEN, he owns that water and can do whatever the hell he wants to do with it.

This may seem to be elementary but it surfaces contradictions with accepted Objectivist views on the environment.

Though it is quite possible to contain air molecules, should it be only legal/moral to poison the air that one contains? When one is afflicted with a highly contagious deadly virus, we all agree that he should be legally quarantined.

How is this different to poisoning the air or water with factory waste? I am all for production and do not believe that smoke stacks generally affect the environment enough to cause more unhappiness to my life than the products it produces promote happiness. However is there no waste that a factory can produce that would tip that happy/unhappy scale? If so, what then?

Blank.

A philosophy is a system which equips man with a code of morality, according to reality if it is Objectivism, to achieve his own happiness. Just as man must know legal law before he acts, so too should he know moral law beforehand.

The example I illustrated above is far from farfetched. Yet we have no answer for it should it occur. Yet other Objectivists do not seem to care.

We need an answer.

Of course no one has a right to physically harm someone else negligently — otherwise anyone could murder anyone and pretend it was just negligence. And of course no one has a right to emit anything onto anybody else's property.

But to avoid unnecessary bloodshed and destruction, no one should use force unless he can prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the other party is guilty of aggression. And no one should use force over trifles, like you don't kill someone for pushing you.

So if the acid rain from someone's smokestack eats the laundry on your line, you have a right to stop his pollution by force. But if you can't prove that his carbon dioxide is causing any material damage, you should not.

John writes:

That ad campaign really misses the point with the death threats and all, I'll give you that.

Just let me tell you this, if your happiness and independence are going to be sacrificed to mother earth just by making a conscious effort to make this earth more livable then you're probably doing something wrong.

I agree that the video is way over the top and really takes the idea too far, I also think that joining a religion won't make the world a better place but cutting your emissions will have immediate benefits for the most important person: YOU!

Check your premises. Or rather, theirs.

They are not out to abolish waste. They're out to abolish flying.

Aaron writes:

Let me get this straight. You actually believe that global warming activists all secretly would act this way if given the chance. That this is "incontrovertible proof" of "their totalitarian anti-man designs to have everyone who refuses to sacrifice their happiness and independence to mother earth murdered."

Let me get this straight. You watched that video and Franny's comments and still aren't convinced that these global warming activists would act this way if given the chance?

As for all global warming activists, even if they have nothing to do with the video, not very many of them are "libertarian environmentalists" or "Quaker environmentalists" acting on their own beliefs and restricting their interactions with skeptics to nonviolent persuasion. Almost all environmentalists I ever heard of advocate the use of (government) force against dissenters ("polluters," "deniers," etc.).

Are you just hyping this idea to get attention, or are you some kind of dumbshit?

Actually, I'm more of a jerk. You're the dumb shit.

Of course I'm hyping it for all it's worth. To let the mainstream media hush it up would be irresponsible.

There is nothing inherently "anti-man" about wanting the planet that every single human lives on to possess a healthy environment. Quite the opposite actually.

It couldn't be more anti-man. The eco-terrorist don't want a healthy environment. They want to force people to make do with less just to make everybody as miserable as the eco-terrorists are.

Can people of all political persuasions make ads that are in bad taste? Certainly. But, to argue whether and how well this ad is trying to make a point with dark humor is beside the point. To truly believe that all "greens" really want to murder those that don't think exactly like them requires an extraordinary lack of judgment on your part.

You mean, "greens" do not advocate environmental legislation, and those who break those laws and defend themselves against the subsequent government aggression will not be murdered? To blank out the fact that eco-terrorists have the state aggress against "polluters" requires an extraordinary lack of judgment on your part.

Kyle writes:

Okay, so this particular ad campaign is in poor taste. It is a logical fallacy to attribute this poor taste to all environmentalists.

The scientific truth is that if we don't reduce our carbon emissions, the world will become unlivable. Most environmentalists are pro-science and pro-humanity. They are true objectivists.

The fallacy is all yours. It's called bait and switch, switching my "the environmentalists" for your "all environmentalists." I don't have to prove anything about every last environmentalist.

There were north of a hundred people involved in making this video, and it didn't occur to a single one of them to say, "Hey, wait, a terror threat, even tongue in cheek, might not be such a good idea"? That's a pretty good sample for me.

And if that's not enough, see the lack of nonaggressive greens noted above.

BTW, I'm not emitting any carbon. On the contrary, I have plenty of carbon in the form of coal burned for power generation.

As for your carbon emissions, I could sell you some carbon offsets. Or you could see a doctor. Something must be wrong with you if you emit carbon.

Or wait, what kind of carbon do you emit? Coal? Graphite? Diamonds? If it's diamonds, I'm willing to dispose of your carbon.

The snake oil salesmen who deny global warming are the ones who despise humanity, coddling them into committing global suicide by ignoring the scientific warnings and continuing to pollute with abandon.

"Global suicide"? Now, that sounds objective and scientific. You have me convinced.

You are aware that your "pollutant" is actually a nutrient? Our plants would need it if they weren't plastic.

Objectivists should be the first to embrace science and reason, to face our problems squarely and seek solutions boldly. When I see so-called objectivists denying science, I have to shake my head and roll my eyes. Get with it, people!

This kind of "science"?

Really, if it was 1930 and I showed you guys a funny nazi silent movie about gassing Jews, you'd say they don't mean it. The nazis hate Jews, and once they established a totalitarian nazi government, they exterminated Jews. The commies hate businessmen, and once they established a totalitarian commie government, they exterminated businessmen. The eco-terrorists hate everyone who produces carbon dioxide, and guess what they'll do once they establish a totalitarian eco-terrorists government?

Evidently, if the Franny Anderson types are the rulers, there will be death camps. How could anybody mistake the fanaticism evident in her videos for dark humor?

If your garden variety greens are the rulers, there may not be death camps, but there will be murder nonetheless. Everybody who refuses to have his standard of living reduced to Stone Age standards will be arrested and legally murdered once he resists arrest.

We're talking about a "problem" here whose science is very much not settled and that even if the worst-case scenarios are true can be solved relatively cheaply by building levees and replacing trailer parks and light-frame firetraps with real houses from steel, concrete, and masonry, as they should be anyway.

We're not talking about vilifying Jews or businessmen here, but a gas that is produced by any human activity, including breathing. You really want to put the most murderous invention of man, government, in charge of reducing that?

The RLC Franny Armstrong Challenge

"We 'killed' five people to make No Pressure — a mere blip compared to the 300,000 real people who now die each year from climate change."

— Franny Armstrong

Not that it matters, but I count at least seven "blips" murdered in Franny's wish-fulfillment fantasy: two student blips, three office blips, one soccer blip, and the blip that is Gillian Anderson.

(BTW, is it only me, or do those raised hands of all those climate nazis in the office at 1:40 remind you of the Hitler salute? Climate Heil!)

Not only is Franny unable or unwilling to count her victims, the 300,000 number is a lie, too.

Anyway, is it "kill" or kill? Sounds like those fascists would happily murder five to seven human beings in real life to save 300,000 others.

Well, we capitalist polluters are a little more moral than you hippie fascists.

"Be that as it may, this is not about practicality, but about inalienable rights. If the lives of one billion people could only be saved by sacrificing the rights of one individual, I would always choose to save the one and let the billion go to hell. Anything else is cannibalism."

"But aren't you then sacrificing the billion to save the one?"

"No. There is a difference between eating others and refusing to be eaten, whatever the consequences. My refusal to be fodder does not make me a murderer. My rights are inalienable. If others can only survive by sacrificing me, they have no right to live, to live by sacrificing me. They have no right to live as cannibals."

(Mysterious Boat, p. 146.)

So I ask that ugly, murderous hippie bitch Franny Armstrong: If killing five people to save 300,000 is OK with you, how about killing just one to save 300,000?

Yes, that's right, only one. The only person you have a right to kill — yourself.

In the name of the humanity you wish to exterminate, I challenge you to put your life where your big, lying mouth is. How many tons of carbon dioxide do we have to save in exchange for you to kill yourself?

I'm sure there's no better motivation for mankind to cut emissions — in fact, to do anything, whatever it takes — than the prospect of getting rid of a terrorist monstrosity like you.

You remind me of the day I crossed a mantis with a termite and got an insect that said grace before it ate the house. Only you're a cross between a nazi and a hippie. Can there be anything grosser in the universe?

Name your number, make a bid, and if mankind succeeds in cutting the required amount of carbon dioxide, you kill yourself. No excuses.

No pressure. Only honor. Oh, wait, I should spell that to a hypocritical liar like you…

Eco-Terrorists Declare War on Mankind!

It is in vain, dude, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, peace, peace — but there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms!

(Hat tip to John Stossel.)



So that's how All Gore got his name!

If you never understood why they're not properly called "greens" (though they sure vegetate) or "environmentalists," but eco-terrorists, or why Ayn Rand correctly identified them as anti-man, now you have proof from the horses' asses' mouths.

Apparently, we threaten the eco-terrorists' existence by breathing, using power, and stuff, or at least they're deluded enough to believe that:

"What to do with those people, who are together threatening everybody's existence on this planet? Clearly we don't really think they should be blown up, that's just a joke for the mini-movie, but maybe a little amputating would be a good place to start?" jokes 10:10 founder and stupid film maker Franny Armstrong.

They must have amputated her brain…

Well, if the eco-terrorists want a civil war, they can get it. We'll win it hands down.

After all, they can't use jetfighters (emissions), tanks (depleted uranium), or even lowly handguns (lead pollution). OK, eco-terrorists, draw your sticks and stones, and make my day.

(As for that half-assed apology, you can shove it next to your head. One false move, and I amputate the shortest appendage of your unwashed hippie body.)

Update:

So what's the result of their stupidity?

Currently boycotting Gillian Anderson. Boycotting Richard Curtis, too, though I never heard of that limey fucktard.

Planning to fly somewhere, in spite of the airport nazis. Does anyone know what airline has the best fleet in terms of emissions? Anyone still have 707s or Concordes? :P

Obama Fire Insurance

Obama's next big deal:

The Obama fire insurance law requires fire insurers to sell coverage to burning orphanages starting this year, and that protection is extended to all houses on fire in 2014.

The law requires insurers to cover children regardless of health problems starting this year, and that protection is extended to people of all ages in 2014.

Ruin your health by smoking, pigging out, or BASE jumping, and an insurer and its shareholders and customers will be forced to pick up the tab for your stupidity by providing coverage for a nominal fee.

And if ruin or risk your health by smoking, being obese, or engaging in suicidal "sports," any premium you could possibly pay is purely nominal. To the insurer, you're basically a house on fire.

Of course, once all insurers have been successfully bankrupted, the taxpayer will be forced to pick up the tab. Of course, to protect the taxpayer, tobacco, hamburgers, and parachutes will be outlawed and their possession persecuted, just like the possession of weed.

There ought to be mass lynchings of smokers, fatties, and skydivers, too. Why should governments have all the fun?

Obama Insurance. Transforming capitalist insurance into socialist welfare schemes since 2009.

Welfare is our business. Totalitarianism to protect you from yourself is the lagniappe.

A word from our sponsor:

A hundred percent of Alex agrees — buildings are supposed to be from steel, stone, and concrete.

So you built a light-frame McMansion instead? Because with a wood-framed house you get more space for the same money? So you can impress your equally IQ-challenged friends?

Fear not, we've got you covered! Here comes Obama Disaster Insurance!

Build a house in a brush-choked canyon, on tornado alley, on the beach, or below sea level, and once it naturally gets destroyed, taxpayers will buy you a new one, in the same indefensible place!

(Hey, wait, we already had that in New Orleans…)

(And in case you live in a wooden house in a brush-choked canyon, you're not only a burden on the taxpayer, you're a burden on the gene pool.)

Obama Insurance. Protecting fools from the consequences of their irresponsibility at the expense of their betters since 2009.

Fine Print:

If you succeed in burning down your house on you own, you are on your own. We only pay if the disaster is big enough to get on national TV.

(We don't get any political mileage out of charity nobody ever hears about. Our charity is paid for by other people's money, so we have to make sure we get the biggest bang for the buck.)

Dryworld

The times, they are changing: With global warming theory ever more discredited by the day and the lack of sunspots threatening to bring about a new ice age, even liberal Hollywood is changing its tune:

Universal Pictures proudly presents Kevin Costner's new prophetic picture: Dryworld.

Starring Kevin Costner as the Nomad, a lone maverick with humps and camel toe who roams the endless deserts of earth after the complete freezing of its oceans into glaciers and polar icecaps due to runaway global cooling. Wending his way between the few remaining freshwater oases, he must lead his small band of starving misfits to the last body of seawater, the mythical Wetland of the Mariana Trench, where fishing is still possible.

Latest news: The movie's budget passed the billion-dollar mark this week.

And a Levee around Every City

Another good article from Wing Nut Central: "One Man, One Horse, One Acre, One Day — Turning Back the Agricultural Clock."

One of the organic farmers involved plans "to use horses full time and keep his costs down." I encountered this kind of "thinking" occasionally when I was an organic inspector. A few seemingly intelligent organic farmers actually think horses are more cost effective than diesel just because they eliminate a fuel bill. Wait until they start feeding those horses all year long, even when they're not working.

There are 20,000 man-hours of energy in a single barrel of oil, which even at its peak price never exceeded $160 US. Even if oil jumped to $300 a barrel, that works out to just a penny and a half per oil-powered man-hour.

…

In their single-minded effort to eschew fossil fuels, this CSA used four sailboats to deliver the wheat from the farms at one end of a lake to consumers (sorry, to the "community") at the other end; a 56-hour round trip for less than 225 bushels of wheat. (I guess they're lucky the harvest was a paltry 15 bushels an acre; abysmal even by organic standards.)

Instead of embracing basic, modern, mechanical technology, Canada's first organic grain CSA literally sailed its way into the history books; without doubt one of the most inane examples of modern-day Luddism; it's like they're playing a game of "farm."

Maybe these people don't think their time is worth anything, but I'm going to go out on a limb and say that most Canadians would rather leave food production and handling in the hands of people who are far more efficient. Even small organic grain farmers know that a standard super-B truck holds over 40 metric tons of wheat, more than 6½ times this CSA's entire harvest. One man, one truck, and only a fraction of a day.

Those bat-shit insane moon bat eco-terrorists indeed don't value their time. And they are so dumb that they don't realize the obvious:

Even if global warming did exist, were manmade, and could be stopped by going back to horse, buggy, sailboat, and cave…

Even if global warming did lead to melting icecaps and rising sea levels, even if global warming did lead to more extreme weather like an increasing frequency and force of storms…

The productivity, the economic output, wasted by going back to horse, buggy, sailboat, and cave would buy a steel-framed building in every lot and a levee around every city, with plenty to spare for a decent standard of living. But no, those brain-dead moon bats want to go back to the mass starvation of pre-industrial times.

This kind of thing can hardly be explained by fears of global warming, air pollution, and a dependence on foreign oil. The only possible explanation is open hatred for the human mind, for its inventions, for progress per se. They can eschew the effort of thinking and inventing better agricultural technology and at the same time be perceived as cool by all the other reindeer moon bats.

How would Ayn Rand put it? Anti-reality, anti-reason, anti-man, anti-life. QED.

Texas Annexed by Krautistan

The Texas state government seems to have settled on the dirty trick they want to use to deprive innocent people of the ruins of their properties.

Hundreds of people whose beachfront homes were wrecked by Hurricane Ike may be barred from rebuilding under a little-noticed Texas law. And even those whose houses were spared could end up seeing them condemned by the state.

…

Worse, if these homeowners do lose their beachfront property, they may get nothing in compensation from the state.

The reason: a 1959 law known as the Texas Open Beaches Act. Under the law, the strip of beach between the average high-tide line and the average low-tide line is considered public property, and it is illegal to build anything there.

Over the years, the state has repeatedly invoked the law to seize houses in cases where a storm eroded a beach so badly that a home was suddenly sitting on public property. The aftermath of Ike could see the biggest such use of the law in Texas history.

So the government can steal your land just because it happens to be under water now.

The former state senator who wrote the law had little sympathy.

"We're talking about damn fools that have built houses on the edge of the sea for as long as man could remember and against every advice anyone has given," A.R. "Babe" Schwartz said.

At least now we know what he thinks of his peons.

"And whether you like it or not, neither the Constitution of the United States nor the state of Texas nor any law permits you to have a structure on state-owned property that's subject to the flow of the tide."

What is the saying? "In America everything is permitted except for what is prohibited by law. In Germany everything is prohibited except for what is permitted by law."

Isn't that patently un-American? What's become of "a government of limited and enumerated powers"? Looks like it took only two hundred years to turn into a dictatorship where people have only limited and enumerated rights.

This is exactly what those Founding Fathers who opposed a Bill of Rights feared: That some future government running amok would turn it into a finite list of the few rights the government has granted to the people.

Of course, no constitution can ever be a final arbiter. Even if a constitution did grant a government the power to pass a fundamentally unfair and cruel law, that wouldn't make that law right. It would only make that constitution wrong.

And what if some flood deposits sediment on a public beach? Do local landowners get to keep the land so created?

No? The law doesn't cut both ways?

As always: rulers and peons, rulers and peons.

Sheeple and Heroes

This speaks for itself:

True Grit: well I never doubted that Mrs. Isaacks at 81 would show that. I asked her granddaughter, now that we know she is ok what do you think she doing? She said... she out helping to clean up the mess… and sure enough that's what you tell us in your report. I had the pleasure of being her guest last summer on High Island. I saw the damage from Rita, she had just completed putting her house back on its foundation. What a difference from what I experience here in Marshall at the shelter. These people lay around all day on cots, demanding service and complaining that nobody is helping them take care of their children. They better be glad Mrs. Isaacks isn't here. She would have them organized and working to help themselves. The WalMart employees are telling me that these evacuees are rude to the staff, they come into the store on busses and go thru the store like termites… buying [cosmetics] and complaining about the shelter being nasty. Hey... wait a minute, who making it nasty? You can't keep up… these people are slobs and they wont' do the simplest things for themselves. They complaining that by now FEMA had already given them their $2000 checks… and on and on...while on High Island Mrs. Isaacks and her neighbors are simply cleaning up and trying to stave off a government determined to remove them permanently from their Island. Who do I admire? the High Island people. But who does our government honor? the lazy slugs laying up in the convention center complaining.

A Deal with the Devil

It looks like reason and liberty are prevailing on the Bolivar Peninsula — for now.

"We can get through this; we have for many storms, although this is probably the worst," said firefighter Orbin Thompson, who along with EMS coordinator Robert Isaacks, persuaded authorities Tuesday not to force residents off the island.

...

Isaacks said the deal with the higher authorities isn't without caveats.

"If we leave, we can't come back," he said.

That means no one can go out to get supplies.

"We're working on a plan to address that," he said. "We got gasoline today and we're pooling resources for food. We'll find a way."

Still, it looks like government agents are making life hard for the heroes of Bolivar, instead of helping them. Of course, 250 residents driving to buy supplies in 250 trucks on a highway already half blocked by debris might interfere with a cleanup. Yet, what harm can one man in one truck do if he drives out for supplies, to sell, trade, or gift them to his neighbors?

How much of the government bureaucrats' obstructionism is due to wanting to go ahead with the cleanup, and how much is due to the sadistic pleasure of using force against people, while being able to appease the world and their own conscience: "I'm doing it because it's in their best interests"?

Public Health? You're Insane.

If the fascists try and force the heroes of the Bolivar Peninsula from their homes, it looks like their stratagem, their commerce clause, their — literally — dirty trick will be an argument from "public health."

The sliver of land is just too damaged for residents to stay there, and the population must be cleared so that recovery can begin, officials said. With no gas, no power and no running water, there is also concern about spread of disease.

So what if diseases like cholera spread from contaminated water? Those who are afraid of catching cholera are free to leave the peninsula voluntarily. Those who stay because they don't care whether they catch cholera endanger nobody but themselves.

And don't try and tell me that the shit of 250 people is enough to trickle down to some aquifer. By that "logic," shitting in national parks would have to be illegal, too.

The only valid public health issue is somebody infected with a contagious disease that can be spread from person to person running around in public. Only against such a person, who negligently endangers others' health and life, force may be used.

Forcing the heroes of the Bolivar Peninsula from the ruins of their homes is as legitimate a public health issue as incarcerating everybody who's infected with HIV. Mind you, I'm not trying to legitimize incarcerating anybody infected with HIV, unless he or she has unprotected sex with someone in the dark about their condition. I'm showing you how insane the "public health" argument in the Bolivar case is.

If Judge Yarbrough is worried that the people out on the Bolivar Peninsula have no safe drinking water, he should get his fat, bureaucratic ass moving, load his car (no doubt paid for by tax money) with water bottles, and drive out to said peninsula.

The only public health that is in question is the mental health of those government clowns that dare to resort to such sophistry.

What Kind of a Person Are You, Judge Yarbrough?

What kind of a person would abduct innocent people, people who lost nearly everything, from the remains of their homes, robbing them of the rest of their property? Who out there believes that if those people are "permitted" (as if they needed a permit) to return to their homes, anything of their property will be left?

Will it be the first time in recorded history that law enforcement officers succeed in protecting an abandoned neighborhood from looters? If they do, how many homes will have been bulldozed with everything in them because government agents declared them unsafe?

Even if neither of the above outrages happens, does it make any difference? Initiating the use of force is wrong per se.

Whenever one person initiates the use of force against another person, the result is disaster. Committing such a crime "to help" the victim even adds insult to injury.

Every individual values things differently. No man can make a decision for another man, much less enforce it.

As I'm writing this, 250 innocent individuals on the Bolivar Peninsula are desperately trying to save what can be saved of their treasured possessions. Instead of helping them, their government schemes to kidnap or murder them.

Now you may say the government will give those people money towards rebuilding their homes. Tax money, by the way.

Bear in mind that nobody, particularly no government, has the right to take anything by force from anyone to give it to someone else. If individuals want to donate money for rebuilding, that's fine. But there can be no right to hurt one person to help another.

Nevertheless, for the sake of the argument, let's ignore the fact that it's tax money. So the victims of the hurricane and of government aggression will get money from said government. Does that make any difference?

Imagine some dude trying to move his, well, uh, say, his stuffed lizard collection to higher ground. Now some jackbooted thugs drag him from the remains of his home "to help him," "for his own good," "because it's in his best interest," "to save him from himself." After all, it is obvious to every collectivist on earth that he should not be risking his life for his stuffed lizard collection.

The actual motives of the collectivists may vary. The worst fascists among them truly believe his life belongs to "the people," that he should not be allowed to "throw away" his life, because his labor is needed to benefit his fellow man. Less extreme collectivists may believe they have the right or even the duty "to save him from himself" if he does something they regard as insane and suicidal.

Yet the facts remain: Even if the jackbooted thugs don't murder that dude for "resisting" them, his stuffed lizard collection will have been spoiled by mold by the time he's allowed to return to his home. If it hasn't been bulldozed in the first place.

Even if the federal government were to turn over its entire multi-trillion dollar budget over to him, there's no way he could buy another stuffed lizard collection like the one he lost. Well, he has the money. But maybe he liked his stuffed lizard collection better than all the money in the world.

Maybe he loves his stuffed lizard collection so much he will risk his life to save it. Who are you to make that decision for him, you fascists?

Many, if not most, of you so-called human beings out there may believe that no man should value his property above his life. But who are you to tell anybody what to do with his life, what value to assign to what entity?

It's his property, not yours. It's his life, not yours.

How would you like it if I were to make decisions for you there in front of your computer? If your wife were trapped in rising water, and you're setting out to save her — how would you like it if I forced you at gunpoint to stay and watch her drown, because I believe you should not value your wife's life above your own?

Open Letter to Judge Yarbrough

Delivered via email

James.Yarbrough@co.galveston.tx.us

Re: Forcible Evacuation of Bolivar Peninsula

Judge,

Just a short note to remind you that another person's life is not yours to dispose of.

Regarding your plans for a forcible evacuation of the Bolivar Peninsula residents, you are being quoted: "I'm doing it because it's in their best interests."

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26695458

Did you ever hear, "all men are created equal, … are endowed … with certain unalienable Rights, … among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness"?

So because you don't believe in those folks' idea of the pursuit of happiness, because you believe it's risky and maybe suicidal, you are proposing to deprive them of all three.

You are aware that any legal action is a threat of lethal force, aren't you? If your agents aggress against those people, they may end up killing innocent individuals.

If you go ahead with initiating the use of force against innocent folks who are harming no one except maybe themselves, I hope some freedom-loving individual in your neck of the woods will get himself elected to office and then force you to do something he thinks is good for you.

Finally, you are being quoted: "I don't want to do it."

Interesting. You are the first person I heard of who doesn't have free will. How can you be qualified to be a judge if you lack free will?

If you agree, additional letters would be appreciated. By me (and probably by the residents of the Bolivar Peninsula), not by the judge, of course.

James.Yarbrough@co.galveston.tx.us

Fascists Are at It Again

"Ike Holdouts Told to Leave Ravaged Area — or Else"

The few hundred holdouts on Texas' ravaged Bolivar Peninsula will be required to leave in the next few days, and officials said Tuesday they are ready to use emergency powers to empty the barrier island scraped clean by Hurricane Ike.

The threat came as the death toll in the Houston area rose by six, bringing the number of people killed in Texas to 17. The new deaths, all after Ike made landfall, were tied to carbon monoxide poisoning, a home fire and falling tree limbs. Ike has claimed 47 lives in 10 states as it spread inland.

In the Bolivar incident, Judge Jim Yarbrough, the top elected official in Galveston County, said the roughly 250 people who defied warnings they would be killed if they rode out the storm in the rural coastal community are a "hardy bunch" and there are some "old timers who aren't going to want to leave."

The Texas attorney general's office is looking into the legal options available to force the remaining residents leave, Yarbrough said. Local authorities are prepared to do whatever it takes to get residents to a safer place.

"I don't want to do it," he said. "I'm doing it because it's in their best interests."

I'm not a guy who goes, "I told you so," but I told you so.

Hey, if they resist arrest, why don't we shoot them dead "for their own good"? Will teach them bastardly individuals a lesson to never disobey the authority of the fuehrer, uh, the collective, uh, the police, uh, the people, uh, whoever.

I mean, what is that Yarbrough clown thinking? Nothing, probably.

Not one thought in his whole life. That's the way you do it, that's the way you get elected.

The sheer horror.

Hey, why doesn't some freedom-loving individual in Yarbrough's neck of the woods try and get elected to office and then force Judge Jim to do something he thinks is for Jimmy-boy's own good?

Don't Use THE Force

Recently, New York

Governor David Paterson "made a bold statement" in support of the construction of Moynihan Station when he announced conditions related to the future of Moynihan Station at New York Building Congress forum. He emphasized the critical importance for the project to emphasize infrastructure improvements and to that end announced that the Port Authority of New York would be taking over the project.

Scare quotes mine; apparently, everything politicians say is bold.

"By any measure the 20th century was the New York Century. We entered it as a burgeoning metropolis and we left it as the greatest and most powerful city in the world. We can make the 21st century the New York Century as well, but only if we invest wisely in our infrastructure."

Paterson said the Federal government must put together a plan for the nation's infrastructure so we may reduce our dependency on fossil fuels and avoid catastrophic disasters like last year's bridge collapse in Minneapolis. He also decried the Federal government's "starving" of Amtrak and reduction of slots at the city's airports. The Governor said that we must bolster the rail options between Washington DC, Boston and other cities within 300 miles of New York City. Rail is the most fuel-efficient way to move people, and it is critical that we lighten the loads of our airlines and on our highways.

…

"If we are to realize our full potential for growth in the 21st century, then we must look to increase our rail capacity."

(Thanks to Dave for forwarding.)

I agree wholeheartedly that rail is the most efficient means of transportation and that the Tri-State Area's infrastructure needs investment badly for New York to remain competitive. But why should the state be doing it?

Originally, building railroads was principally funded by private investors. As for Amtrak, privatize the Northeast Corridor and ax the unprofitable rest.

But is that the end of the line? Far from it.

In the first place, passenger rail was destroyed by government subsidies for highways and airports. If all highways and airports are privatized, and distorting subsidies removed, establishing many more intercity passenger services between cities outside the Northeast Corridor will become profitable once more, thanks to the unrivaled economy of railroads.

Railroads will dominate commuter markets and mid-haul intercity travel. Airliners will dominate long-haul travel, where a train would take days. Automobiles will dominate rural markets that cannot support railroads or airports.

Besides, making passengers pay the full price of their actions will result in less commuting and less traveling. Once people realize how much it costs to drag their asses from place to place, much more business will be done via the internet.

Now, socialists will say that the government has the duty to provide "socially desirable" services the market fails to provide because they're unprofitable. Never mind that even if 299,999,999 people deem a service "socially desirable," that doesn't make stealing from even only one man right.

But let's for the sake of the argument ignore the fact that taxes are theft. What "socially desirable" benefits do commuters get out of indiscriminately subsidized plane, train, and automobile mileage?

Families can afford to move out to suburbia, where their dollars buy more square footage. But what kind of square footage do they get? They trade an admittedly cramped apartment in a reinforced concrete high rise or a brownstone walkup in Manhattan or a similarly pricey downtown for, say, a wooden house in a brush-choked canyon or a single-story house on a floodplain in hurricane alley.

They may want their kids to attend suburban schools perceived as better than inner-city schools. (In my experience, there's no such thing as a better government school. If you have to have children, home schooling is the only option.) They may hope to be safer from crime in the middle of nowhere, and be glad to pay the price of cultural anemia.

Of course, people who really want to pave over a swamp or move their families into a wildfire or a hurricane should by all means be free to do so, but they should not be subsidized with tax money. Why should suburban sprawl be subsidized with money taken from taxpayers by force?

Privatize all means of transportation, and if the Trans-Hudson Express (THE) Tunnel project is profitable, let the free market fund it. Incidentally, fewer people moving out to suburbia would not only increase demand for apartments in Manhattan, but also bolster New York City's tax base, which for so long had been suffering from white flight to suburbia (assuming you believe in taxation).

Hurricane Is Lesser Evil

A mandatory evacuation order was in place, but there were no signs anyone was being forcibly removed.

"We're not going to drag them out of there and handcuff them," Davison said. "They've made their decision."

Wow, fascists being generous. Well, to answer that, what's the appropriate saying? Too little, too late.

The very idea of dragging someone from his own land "for his own good" turns my stomach. Anyone who even just entertains a monstrous idea like that disqualifies himself as a human being and should hand in his application for the gestapo.

Hey, if they resist arrest, why don't we shoot them dead "for their own good"? Will teach them bastardly individuals a lesson to never disobey the authority of the fuehrer, uh, the collective, uh, the police, uh, the people, uh, whoever.

As for those fascists handing out markers to scare heroes, asking them to write their social security numbers on their arms for identification purposes, my knee-jerk advice would be to hurl the marker right in the face of that jackbooted thug. But come to think of it, that would be exactly what they want: an excuse to arrest you.

The best course of action is to write on your arm, instead of your name or number, "Fuck you, fascists!" Best worn with something short-sleeved.

This, by the way, is one of the situations where it's good to have no family for whose sake you'd want to be identified. Why make work easy for those Quincy wannabes?

When you're dead you're dead. An unmarked grave is as good as any other grave.

At By George Automotive repair shop, owner George Elizondo and others in Freeport gathered to grill chicken leg quarters, shoulder steak and tortillas with pico de gallo. Coolers from the nearby grocery store sat filled with soda and beer.

The hurricane block party tradition began with Hurricane Rita in 2005, when Elizondo and others stayed behind to offer mechanical help to anyone those heading out.

Well, rock on! More power to you!

"If my stuff is going to get washed away, I'm going to watch it get washed away," Norton said.

That's the spirit. I couldn't have summed up the moral any better.

Yet, that was where things started to decidedly go south (excuse the pun).

Many of them evidently realized the "mistake" too late, and pleaded with authorities in vain to save them overnight.

(Scare quotes mine.)

Some emergency officials were angry and frustrated that so many people ignored the warnings.

"When you stay behind in the face of a warning, not only do you jeopardize yourself, you put the first responders at risk as well," Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said. "Now we're going to see this play out."

Steve LeBlanc, Galveston's city manager, said: "There was a mandatory evacuation, and people didn't leave, and that is very frustrating because now we are having to deal with everybody who did not heed the order. This is why we do it, and they had enough time to get out."

Of course, anybody who stays should equip himself to be self-sufficient: food and water for several weeks, fire extinguishers, maybe an inflatable boat if you live in a single-story home on a floodplain. Nothing is as disastrous for the cause of liberty as getting picked off your roof by the same fascists you told to go fuck themselves the night before.

After all, the fascists' sophistic reasoning is that they should have the power to drag people from their homes — and murder them if need be — because otherwise they would be responsible for rescuing them during or after the hurricane, risking the "rescuers" lives. Never mind that no man can ever have a duty to save another man.

As always, the fascists are intellectually dishonest. After all, the city government of Washington, DC, went all the way to the Supreme Court to secure a ruling that cops are not responsible for protecting victims from an armed burglar, even though the government disarmed the victims in the first place, even when the cops are physically able to help and just decide they prefer to fight some donuts.

Obviously, the fascists can't have it both ways. Either they are responsible for saving civilians, or they are not.

In Surfside Beach, retired carpenter and former Marine Ray Wilkinson became something of a celebrity for a day: He was the lone resident in the town of 805 to defy the order to leave. Authorities found him Saturday morning, drunk.

"I consider myself to be stupid," Wilkinson, 67, said through a thick, tobacco-stained beard. "I'm just tired of running from these things. If it's going to get you, it's going to get you."

He added: "I didn't say I had all my marbles, OK?"

Oh yeah, man, you do, you sure do. The only reasonable thing to do in such a situation. ^5

House Mulls Assault Breathing Ban

Today, Congress Critter Nancy Pelousy introduced HR ID10T, popularly dubbed the Assault Breathing Ban.

Whereas, carbon dioxide output has been scientifically proven to lead to global warming via the greenhouse effect;

Whereas, global warming causes manmade natural disasters like tornados, hurricanes, and storm surges;

Whereas, natural disasters cause loss of life, injury, loss of property, and public cost for flood control and emergency management;

Whereas, causing said disasters amounts to a negligent initiation of the use of force against the victims and the government: Now, therefore, be it

Resolved that Congress shall regulate carbon dioxide output…

To summarize the bill, which is quite lengthy:

Once the bill is signed into law, all Americans will have two weeks to have their lung capacity measured by the ATF, which will issue a Lung License to each individual, stating their Sustainably Allowable CO2 and Karbonium-equivalent Output Future Footprint (SACKOFF).

Under this license, individuals have the privilege to emit an amount of CO2 corresponding to at-rest breathing at their lung capacity. Individuals wishing to participate in sports such as jogging or any other activity that breaks their SACKOFF will have to buy carbon offsets.

Unauthorized breathing will become a class one federal felony. Transgressors will be transported to Centers for De-carbonization Compliance (CDC), where their CO2 output will be permanently terminated.

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Crazy Al — his prices are insane!

Money from Exxon or Pull for Free

How is it that a global warming skeptic is discredited by taking money from Exxon, while a global warming believer is somehow not discredited by taking money from governments and the UN?

Exxon is acting in its own best self-interest if it fights the enslavement of oil producers and consumers. Just as politicians are acting selfishly in the worst sense of the meaning when they fund bugbears to make the lemmings vote more power to politicians and make said lemmings permit the UN to be turned into a totalitarian world government.

Without bugbears, there is hardly any need for politicians or governments.

What is the chain of causality here? Do scientists doubt global warming because they get money from Exxon? Or do scientists get money from Exxon because they doubt global warming?

Do witch doctors get money from the government because they believe in global warming? Or do witch doctors believe in global warming because they get money from the government?

Now look at them fascists that's the way you do it
You play the voter at the UN see
That ain't workin' that's the way you do it
Money from the UN and pull for free
Now that ain't workin' that's the way you do it
Lemme tell ya them guys ain't dumb
Maybe get a blister on their little Johnson
Maybe get a blister on their thumb

We gotta pay world government taxes
Pay for all their fuckin' freebies
We gotta believe these freakin' bugbears
We gotta make these insane moneys

See the little moon bat with the phony movie shit 'n' crap
Yeah buddy that's his bugbear
That little moon bat got his own jet airplane
That little moon bat he's a millionaire

We gotta pay world government taxes
Pay for all their fuckin' freebies
We gotta believe these freakin' bugbears
We gotta make these insane moneys

I shoulda learned to play the voter
I shoulda learned to command them pigs
Look at that moon bat, he's gonna stick it up your asshole
Man you will have some fun
And he's up there, what's that? Dissenter's death screams?
Bangin' on their heads like a chimpanzee
That ain't workin' that's the way you do it
Get your money from the UN get your pull for free

We gotta pay world government taxes
Pay for all their fuckin' freebies
We gotta believe these freakin' bugbears
We gotta make these insane moneys

We gotta pay world government taxes
Pay for all their fuckin' freebies
We gotta believe these freakin' bugbears
We gotta make these insane moneys

Doomsday Called Off

Comrade Al: Watch this and weep — the death knell of your beloved bugbear, global warming.

Everybody else: Before you give the aforementioned Comrade Al any more power or money, watch this video.



Comments Big Red Chief Al "Warming Bull" Gore: "****. Now I have go back get job. How!"

Thanks to Ted Keer over at Rebirth of Reason for bringing this to my attention. The documentary has been around for some time, yet many still believe in manmade global warming. Thus, it was high time to give it a rerun — here at Reason and Liberty Central, where it's open season on bugbears year-round.

Howard Roark in a Tricorn

My latest article on The Atlasphere.

BTW, The Rider on the White Horse is also available for online reading. Comes with popups, though. If you don't like popups (and who does) get the PDF version.

Levees without Levies

One excuse for the government's hammerlock on the economy is the fiction of so-called "common goods." Bureaucrats fearing for their sinecures will tell you that there are goods that due to their nature cannot fairly and efficiently be supplied by the free market.

Take flood protection as an example, and you'll see that those "common goods" aren't all that common after all. Given the recent performance of the Army Corps of Engineers, having flood protection supplied with the efficiency of the free market would be a welcome change, right? So how will so-called "common goods" be supplied in a fully free, purely capitalist country?

Let's look at the original "state of nature," which is the epitome of what its detractors call atomistic individualism: Everybody would build a levee around his own property.

Now, of course, there are savings possible through cooperation. Instead of building a levee on all four sides of each lot, one wall along the waterfront of each lot will suffice, for a savings of three quarters — if and only if all owners of waterfront property cooperate to some degree.

What if one of them refuses to cooperate? He may or may not have good reasons for his refusal. Maybe he wants the river mud as fertilizer on his fields, or he's an eco-terrorist who hates all levees on principle, or he's just a contrarian. Maybe he says he likes to have a periodic pool in his living room. But maybe he's in fact stingy and hopes the others will pay for his share of the levee, so they can complete it and realize their huge savings. If they do pay for him, he becomes what economists call a "free rider."

In fact, that kind of a holdout is not a problem. Instead of building the levee along the river, the levee cooperative can build it bending around his property, on the land side. He would still have his periodic flooding and not get free flood protection.

The levee cooperative would have to pay for the length of levee added by the detour deviating from the course of the river, but that extra expense is negligible given the huge savings. Plus, it will protect them from blackmailing by additional "free riders." To paraphrase the old saying, "Millions for defense, not a penny for blackmailers." In any event, avoiding that additional cost is no excuse for initiating the use of force and coercing all property owners to participate.

A problem requiring more creative solutions is the fact that once the levee has been completed all along the river or all around the island, those property owners not living on the waterfront get flood protection for free.

The simplest solution is to say that flood protection is the problem of owners of waterfront property, and the price they have to pay for their views and access to navigation and irrigation.

Yet they can make those "free riders" in the hinterland pay if they want to, without using force. All they have to do is to look at the law of causality.

Let's first look at the simplest case possible, all landowners in the hinterland refusing to join. Everything it takes to induce them to pay is a floodwall on the landside and some pipelines to deliver them the water that is due to them. Savings to the levee cooperative would still be fifty percent, from not building levees between their lots.

If some landlocked landlords decide to join up, that might grow into a complex network of levees, floodwalls, spillways, and pipelines. However, that would still be still cheaper than building a levee around each and every individual lot. And it would be cheaper than running an IRS in perpetuity to collect taxes.

What's more, once one or two such systems have been built and put in operation, would-be "free riders" across the country will see that levee builders are not bluffing but mean business. Consequently, the number of holdouts will drop with every additional project.

Note that flooding "free riders" is not an initiation of force. They only get delivered the water that is rightfully coming to them, as they did not pay for being protected from it. It's not actively pumped. It's not more water than would reach their property in the absence of a levee system. It's not stopped from flowing back out when the flood recedes.

Do I hear the collectivists howl? Could you howl again? Ah, you say it's cruel to flood a man and his family if there's a perfectly good levee between him and the river?

So I guess going for a man and his family with guns to force him to pay taxes is somehow not cruel? No way.