The Anti-State Blog

on Lewrockwell.com: http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig8/bryan2.html

This examines what we have done to the Iranians over the past 50 years by imagining what it would have been like here if they had treated us as we did them. It is a convincing condemnation of American imperialism.

” I have little interest in streamlining government or in making it more efficient, for I mean to reduce its size.

I do not undertake to promote welfare, for I propose to extend freedom.

My aim is not to pass laws, but to repeal them.

It is not to inaugurate new programs, but to cancel old ones that do violence to the Constitution … or have failed their purpose … or that impose on the people an unwarranted financial burden.

I will not attempt to discover whether legislation is “needed” before I have first determined whether it is constitutionally permissible.

And if I should be attacked for neglecting my constituents’ “interests”, I shall reply that I was informed that their main interest is liberty, and in that cause I am doing the very best I can.”

– Barry Goldwater

 There is no reason why insider trading should be illegal. It should be prohibited, but outside of government regulation it would be adequately restricted. All securities firms (such as brokerages and investment banks) have policies forbidding their employees from insider trading. All large public companies also have such policies.

One could argue that the reason those policies exist is because of the government regulation, and that would be correct. But the regulation is no longer necessary (if ever it was necessary) to prevent insider trading. Who is harmed in insider trading? Anonymous traders who sell to those with insider knowledge, certainly. Also, the companies involved, such as investment banks, suffer a loss of reputation when their employees trade on insider information. That loss of reputation is a definite, if neither concrete nor easily quantifiable, tort. It is a theft. Therefore, firms that discover employees who trade on insider information would fire those employees and then sue them for damages–a reasonable amount would be treble the unjust profits of the insider traders.

What about the firms themselves? What if they made a decision to trade on insider information? A small consultant on a large acquisition could easily justify the cost of reputation in light of potentially huge profits. But the trading on inside information also harms anonymous traders in the stock and stock options of the traded companies. So it would be in the best interests of the stock exchanges to prevent insider trading. If they did not do that, their reputation would suffer and traders would use an exchange that banned insider trading. The exchanges (such as NYSE and NASDAQ) would thus formally prohibit insider trading and would be liable if to the outside traders if it happened.

Overall, the market would regulate itself, insider trading would remain infrequent, and those employees of the SEC could go find productive jobs. The world would be a better place.

[originally published 30 May 2007]

And he gives several more good reasons how US interventionism in the middle east has engendered hatred of us.
Article here

[originally posted May 24, 2007]

From an MSNBC interview March 29, 2007. See my earlier post [link] for reasons why you should vote for Paul, even if you don\’t think he can win. The classic American position on foreign wars is that they are not necessary and they certainly cause harm both to our finances, our image, and to the people killed or wounded in those wars. Why do we need to spend money to house troops in Germany, the Phillipines, Korea, Japan, Saudi Arabia? The people of those countries do not want us there, and their resentment fuels the terrorists and gives the terrorists more recruits.

[originally published 15 May 2007]

Christianity affirms the 10 Commandments of Jewish law, and among them are “Thous shalt not kill” and “Thous shalt not steal”. All our governmental officials who profess Christianity should believe these things. And keep in mind that a key teaching of Jesus is that sin has no degree–stealing is wrong whether it is a penny or a million dollars. Adultery is wrong whether it involves 37 prostitutes or simply an idle fantasy.

That being the case, it is not very hard to reach the conclusion that government is theft because it involves coerced taking of property and money. Therefore, government is wrong and perpetuating it is a sin. The statist response to this is to argue in a Locke-ian maner that the government arises by the choice of the people for a social compact that provides them with certain services at the expense of certain freedoms. This is a fallacious argument that is easily refuted by a mild reducto ad absurdum: imagine a group of people getting together and deciding by majority vote to enslave one of the group. Is this right? Of course not. So it cannot be right for the majority to take from a minority even if the theft is less severe than total slavery (which is the theft of body and freedom). For Locke’s social compact theory to be ethically tenable, individuals would have to have the ability to withdraw from the compact. Try not paying your taxes and you will quickly find out that you cannot withdraw from the social compact.

Another possible response to my argument that Christians must be anti-government is to quote Jesus when he said, “render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s, and render unto God that which is God’s.” It is important to keep in mind that this was in response to the Pharisees’ attempt to trap Jesus by asking him if it was okay to pay Roman taxes. If he had yes, he would have been seen as supporting the oppressors of Judea. If he said no, the Romans would have seen it as an act of rebellion and he would have been executed before his work was done. The most cogent explanation of this is that Jesus meant exactly what he said, but what he said is not what most people think he said. He said that you should give to the government that which belongs to it. But the key question is what belongs to the government? If it is wrong to steal then it is wrong to tax, in which case nothing belongs to Caesar. Examined from the other side we come to the same conclusion–if we give to God everything which to him belongs, then we give everything to him and nothing is left for Caesar. This explanation sense because by speaking in this manner Jesus was able to subvert the Roman order without directly seeming to oppose them.

I am not the first to interpret this passage in this way. See wikipedia for more info.

[Originally posted 10 May 2007]