William: "... Ever share a neighborhood with Hell's Angels? Or a crack house? ..."

William, you seem able to communicate. You bring up a couple of the evils that the "war on drugs" has given us in defence of government. I figure you know that I will respond that all drug laws are bogus.

Have you ever researched the history of "illegal drugs" in these United States. At one point you could send your grandson down to the corner druggist to bring you heroin back. There were not millions of "addicts" nor street gangs to sell the drug. There were no violent turf battles.

Why?

(your turn)

The Hell's Angels, and their subculture of ritual domination predate the War on Drugs, bucky. It's strictly Lord of the Flies stuff. (I suppose you'll now tell me that if the government hadn't started WWII, the Hell's Angels subculture wouldn't exist, because the disaffected veterans who founded it wouldn't exist.)

If you travel by train across northern Italy, you'll notice the remnants of a castle on virtually every hilltop. Why are they there, do you suppose? Mussolini didn't build them, nor the Medici Popes. Why were the Lakota and the Pawnee (if you're to believe Kevin Costner) sworn enemies? What government, exactly, do you suppose was to blame?

bucky1 -

I don't know much about poli sci and it will mean nothing to me if you cite writers and use specialized terms, but I am curious in a layman's terms kind of way:

Are you saying that private property and enforceable right of contract exist without a government?

And, in the "in for a penny" department, are you saying that warlordism and strong-man status quo did not exist anywhere until after western european colonialism?

-- Desert Son

"P.S. bucky1, I just wanted to say thanks for your recent post to William Timberman. I've been following your posts, and while I disagree with much of what you have said, I think your recent post has, for me, at least, begun to clarify a little bit more where you are coming from (I'm not phrasing this well, hope my meaning is apparent). So, thanks for that."

Your welcome, and thanks for the kind words. They come infrequently as of late. :-)

I do not mind folks who disagree with me; there would be nothing to talk about if we all agreed. I just hate the constant attacks on people. I have even decided that the "shooter" may well be a sock-puppet of a regular who just does that to give everyone a common enemy that is an easy target. Hmmmm. Who has that kind of time?

William: "...depending on the condition of the body politic at the time, it's hard to see how the mere existence of a third party necessarily provides the B we're seeking.

What if there is no "B" to look for?

LWM: "... Wow! I had no idea ...

Not surprised.

there'll always be a B, b.

I've been down this path many times before with a number of the same individuals, and they are never going to ease up on the lobbing insults (albeit often elegantly worded ones) at libertarians and mischaracterizations of what it is that most of us believe, and our motives for believing it.

That all said, I glean that you are a defender of Lew Rockwell. So please answer me this: how in the name of holy reason can Lew host all those articles by Gary North? North is about as much a libertarian as Stalin was. He literally is a fascist, of the "clerical fascist" species. A total Christian Reconstructionist, who, if he had his way, would see the author of this blog stoned to death as per Leviticus.

So why does Lew associate with North at all?

As for the abomination that is the war on (people who use some) drugs, Glenn opposes that. Moreover, he has written critically of the prescription drug system, which is part of the apparatus upholding the statist and evil drug "war."

El Cid writes (excerpted from his post):

"In today's context, many of those formerly 'Liberal' positions would be among the more 'conservative' positions in Latin America. Actually conservative political parties are often named 'Liberal' due to this historical legacy. For example, the Partido Liberal in Colombia is not the liberal party.

"Actually existing liberals in South America go by many newer names -- leftist, socialist, Democratic, or less traditionally political terms such as renovation', etc. -- but rarely 'Liberal'".

El Cid, I'm afraid you've run the very serious risk, with this post, of confusing with historical facts some violently prejudiced people in this forum, who may not know what their being a "liberal" or a "conservative" actually *means*, but who know that the *word* liberal makes them feel better than *other* words they have heard, but don't actually know the meanings of, either.

But the words cannot possibly mean, (they assume), different things to different people in the present, let alone over time. So when they hear their *good* word said, warm and fuzzy feelings pervade them. But when they hear the *bad* words said, by them or others, they grow troubled and afarid.

And the people who call themselves those *other* words that are truly bad and dangerous, are nasty and dangerous people (if they weren't bad people, why would they call themselves those bad and dangerous words?) who definitely are not people you want to associate with, and they feel the same about the good-word people, except for *them*, the good-word people's word are actually *bad.*

So politics becomes, to these *word-people*, a matter of "DOWN with the bad-word people, and UP with the good-word people, by both groups of word-people, who have opposite feelings about the words.

So try to not make them think about words so much, with facts concerning the evolution of the meanings of words, good and bad, because it might make them testy to think their words are not like rocks, solidly and stolidly where they're supposed to be and nowhere else.

I think you meant no harm, but try to remember that words are magic and they're scary when they get outside their real meanings. Words should, like wet, sleeping dogs, be left alone.

OK?

Ken R.