Daily Archives: February 19, 2022

We are living in an authoritarian moment. It has sparked a libertarian pushback.

The authoritarian nature of the moment needs little elaboration. In the last 2 years, Western democracies have used a problematic health rationale to close businesses, restrict movement, censor speech, force unwanted inoculation, and ban alternative medical treatments for Covid. The growing conversation within the federal government to implement no-fly lists, mandated kill switches in cars, and increased surveillance to stop domestic terrorism speaks to how authoritarian governance has crept in even without the Covid rationale.

Other examples of government overreach that existed before the pandemic have expanded in response to it. Federal government spending is now 30% of GDP; national debt has exploded to 133% of GDP; and federal money supply has seen unprecedented expansion, setting the groundwork for years of inflation.

This mix of economic self-sabotage and civil liberty infractions has given Americans the growing sense that their government has too much control of the countryand is causing it to unravel. 72% of those polled believe America is on the wrong track.

This is why a libertarian moment has also arisenand not just in the U.S. From American parents demanding that school boards unmask their kids, to horn-honking Canadian truckers, to anti-lockdown protests across Europe and Australia, theres a renewed language in the West favoring individual rights and bodily autonomy rather than control by unelected bureaucrats.

The question is what will this moment yield in respect to tangible pushback against government abuse. The answer lies in detecting two layers within the movementa Libertarianism 1.0 that pits classical liberal ideals against entrenched governing systems, and a Libertarianism 2.0 that either weakens these systems or escapes them all together, using technology to reduce the power of political actors.

Libertarianism 1.0

By now most people understand what this is: an ideology calling for small government, personal liberty and open economies.

While the concept has several intellectual origins, it is linked today with the classical liberal tradition pioneered by Adam Smith. Libertarianism is distributed in the media sphere nowadays through outlets like Reason Magazine and the Cato Institute; and in the political sphere through mainstream politicians like Rand Paul and the Libertarian Party.

The premise of their advocacy is that liberty-minded ideas should compete in the marketplace against the statist ideas peddled by the Democratic and Republican duopoly. By virtue of being a political movement, libertarianism is fighting against entrenched government structures, especially since its a minority position.

But this can realistically be seen as a losing fight, since governance in democracies will never produce libertarian outcomes. Public choice economists have shown why: democracy creates a freeloader problem where people vote for benefits they dont pay for, and special interests elect leaders who favor them at the expense of the whole. Libertarian governance is even less likely to surface in non-democratic administrative stateswhich the U.S. now resembles. Political actors in such systems are even more incentivized to raise taxes, increase debt, trample human rights and enrich themselves.

Rather, the march towards statism and authoritarianism seems inevitable across the West, with Covid just showing an accelerated version, and it seems there is little libertarians can do to stop itno matter how hard they fight.

Libertarianism 2.0

But an alternate course of libertarianism stresses flight over fight, action over activism, building things rather than saying things, and escaping rather than reforming current systems. It uses technology for these goals, amounting to a Libertarianism 2.0.

I didnt invent this slogan. A 2010 academic paper used the 2.0 term to describe cyber-libertarianism or techno-libertarianism. But technological advances since then speak to its greater current potential. Silicon Valley and other tech hubswhich, ironically, have assisted in the rise of authoritarianismhave also produced ways to fight it through this 2.0 model.

That is, many people working in tech have libertarian leanings, and it inspired them to build decentralized processes that allow escapes and workarounds from state violence. Such technologies (many of them interrelated) include:

Decentralized Autonomous Organizations: these are digital platforms with autonomous operating agreements that are enforced with (or without) member participation. As Ethereum.com notes, they are an internet-native business thats collectively owned and managed by its members. They have built-in treasuries that no one has the authority to access without the approval of the group. Decisions are governed by proposals and voting to ensure everyone in the organization has a voice.

DAOs can be structured to disperse voting power based on what an individual pays into the system (try doing that with raw democracy), and are generally without an executive leader.

Blockchain: DAOs run on blockchain technology, which is a peer-to-peer network that moves and stores information through a database and prevents it from being manipulated by individuals. Blockchain is a way to store sensitive infocurrencies, land titles, voting ballotswith less threat of theft or hacking.

Smart contracts: these run on the blockchain and are often at the heart of DAOs. IBM describes them as programs that run when predetermined conditions are met. They typically are used to automate the execution of an agreement so that all participants can be immediately certain of the outcome, without any intermediarys involvement or time loss. They can also automate a workflow, triggering the next action when conditions are met.

An example would be if two people want to bet on the Super Bowl but dont trust each other to pay upon losing. So they create a smart contract that triggers the payment automatically once the games over. This removes the need for trust between parties.

Cryptocurrency: Also running along the blockchain, these are currencies that have prearranged, coded rules, so as to prevent dilution or other manipulation by central banks. The blockchain aspect of cryptocurrency also ensures the privacy of transactions, so that governments cannot track, seizeor potentially even taxmoney.

Metaverse: this might sooner be called the network state, but metaverse is a more popular term. Societies of like-minded individuals create their own digital communityexcluding unwanted outsiders and operating on the above-mentioned technologieswhere they can conduct business and share common interests. Eventually, writes investor Balaji Srinivasan, who has become a face of techno-libertarianism, this can lead them to create physical communities that, again, are ideally insulated from outside interference.

Speaking ofthe best merging of these Libertarianism 2.0 technologies into a larger governing vision seems to be happening in the private city space. A proposed city in the Texas Hill Country called Montanoso looks to operate on a leaderless DAO (however, it will still answer to the Texas state and U.S. governments).

Prospera, a city being built on an island off mainland Honduras, takes this further. It wants to incorporate these technologies, but has signed an agreement that gives it near-full autonomy from the Honduran government. Estonia is perhaps the most advanced current example of an entity that has used blockchain technology to streamline services, secure public records and reduce the need for human administrators.

As more microstates like these continue to surface, there will be concern that surrounding host nations might invade them if they get too successful (see Hong Kong). However, this will be harder in a techno-libertarian system; if a city runs on algorithms that only internal members grasp, itll be harder for unwanted outsiders to exploit any aspect of it, even if they choose to plunder it outright.

But these technologies can be used to increase the transparency of, or even disempower, current regimes. To name one recent example: when the Canadian government pressured GoFundMe to shutter its crowdfunder for protesting truckers, people started sending the truckers Bitcoin, which is more difficult for the government to track. Another example would be to launch blockchain-based social media platforms that have no curation and automatically elevate the most popular posts, making it harder for politicians to censor.

At the heart of Libertarianism 2.0 is the ethos to become ungovernable by using technology to isolate and outfox the state.

In conclusion, I like both versions of libertarianism. 1.0 gives a framework for how we should think about state power and its downfalls. 2.0 offers a system that helps avoid creating such states in the future, weakens existing ones, and even sets a blueprint for new societies.

This latter aspect is why I think 2.0 will be the future of the libertarian movement. Why bang our heads against a wall within governments that will never change, when we can start from scratch using charter cities, special economic zones, and other experimental communities? If libertarians manage to incorporate these decentralized tech cities around the world, it could help turn their ideas into reality.

Excerpt from:
The rise of a Libertarianism 2.0 | Scott Beyer - Catalyst

To the editor:

A recent letter proudly, if erroneously, proclaimed Libertarian wisdom in calling for the withdrawal of the U.S. from NATO. As an 18-year U.S. Army veteran and having served seven years in what was West Germany, I write this in order to refute both the stated desire to withdraw and the self-proclaimed wisdom of the Libertarians.

First, we should address the origins of NATO. A three-point purpose was stated as NATOs charter. Those three points are:

The first point stands front and center as it pertains to the current Ukraine crisis. With the dissolution of the USSR, the entire European continent is a changed picture from that of 1949 when NATO was formed.

While there is no more Soviet Union, there is still a very belligerent Russia. Putin is a former KGB operative and from the old state state of mind. While he has yet to actually invade Ukraine, I would submit that should he, it would be little different from Iraqs invasion of Kuwait.

The world reacted then, and I think it would be right that the world react again if need be.

The second point calls for us to reexamine the isolationist policies of the U.S. throughout the 1930s. Had those policies persisted, and they nearly did, perhaps Japan would not have invaded Pearl Harbor. Seeing no need to counter our Pacific fleet, the Japanese might not have drawn us into the war and had we not been drawn into the Pacific War, we most likely would not have been drawn into the European one either.

The end result? Imperial Japan would have won out in mainland China. For the result of that, see the Japanese occupation of Nanjing. The Philippines, Guam and New Zealand would have also been occupied, as would have Vietnam, Thailand, Cambodia and Laos. See the Bataan Death March for the likely comparison there.

Australia would most likely have fallen as well, without the aid of British and U.S. military forces. With militant Japanese imperialism undefeated, Japan would be a far different nation/people from what we see today.

As for Europe? Without the U.S. industrial might and without the U.S. destroyers in the Atlantic, it is probable that Nazi Germany would have strangled the United Kingdom with its U-boat forces.

There would have been no defeat of Rommels Afrika Corps and Nazi fascism would control North Africa from the Suez Canal to the Straits of Gibraltar. The invasions of Sicily/Italy would not have occurred, and Italian Fascism would control Greece and Crete, along with Ethiopia on the African continent.

Mussolini would not have been deposed and hung, and his ideals of fascism would have grown. Hitlers Nazi Party was modeled on Mussolinis Fascist Party in Italy. Without U.S. forces and without being able to import adequate amounts of steel and oil, Great Britain would not have been able to stave off simple attrition long enough to defeat Nazi Germany.

With no D-Day and no need to create an Atlantic Wall, it is even possible that Hitler would have succeeded with his invasion of Russia. Bear in mind, the much needed by Russia Lend-Lease program via the port of Archangel would not have occurred had we maintained our isolationist policies.

It is likely that Nazi Germany would control the European mainland from the French border with Spain all the way to Moscow and then south through the Middle East and its oil.

Had we in the U.S. been choked off then from the many millions upon millions of tons of imports we have received over the past 75 years, can we imagine where we would be today? Let me also remind my fellows that it was NATO that responded in our defense following the events of 9/11/2001.

So, sure, support isolationist Libertarians if you wish to stand in support of fascism. And if you wish to call wise the support of fascism, then by all means applaud the Libertarian wisdom.

Jim DirksRedding, California

Read the rest here:
Letter to the editor: Libertarians are wise if you like fascism - theperrynews.com

Its not 2010 again in GOP politics and never will be, but you could be forgiven for having flashbacks to the beginnings of the tea party.

A leaderless grassroots revolt has emerged from almost nowhere, causing outrage in the media and among elected officials, as it opposes government overreach in high-spirited demonstrations.

So, yeah, this is happening in Canada and not the United States.

Still, the embrace of the Canadian trucker protesters by the American right is a sign that the tea party spirit circa the early Obama years was never fully extinguished. It is freedom that remains the most natural and powerful Republican rallying cry.

The Trump era catalyzed an ongoing debate among writers and thinkers on the right about how much emphasis should be put on freedom. One faction associated with populists and nationalists argues that the traditional conservative celebration of freedom has become fetishistic and is an anachronism irrelevant to ordinary people and an obstacle to grappling with the struggles of the working class.

This position has gained adherents in recent years, but it is hard to tell amid the rights reflexive support of a protest movement literally flying under the banner of freedom.

The Canadian protest is a unifying moment for the American right. To simplify, the populists are drawn to the truckers as representatives of the working class, of a rejection of government by experts, and of a willingness to shock and defy the progressive governing class as embodied by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

Limited-government conservatives, on the other hand, tend to sympathize with the opposition to the vaccine mandate on truckers as an irrational, completely unnecessary regulation and with the push to begin lifting COVID-19 restrictions more broadly.

Both elements on the right have denounced Trudeaus invoking of emergency powers. For the populists, the action is a dangerous sign of an impulse to smash anyone crossing elite opinion. For limited-government types, its a dangerous sign of a government that can too easily slip free of constitutional constraints.

It adds up to a kind of populist-inflected libertarianism with an enhanced accent on cultural combat and class conflict.

It was predictable that the first contact with Biden administration policies would revivify a conservative distrust of government, and pandemic restrictions have super-charged a Do Not Tread on Me response across the right.

Of course, the GOP has changed over the last decade or so. Donald Trump broke with the conventional post-Reagan Republican rhetoric and elevated national cohesiveness, sovereignty and strength over and above freedom.

The sense now is less the government is bankrupting us and more these out-of-touch, self-appointed experts are telling us what to do because they have too much power and like lording it over us, with the press, social media, corporations and non-profits all on their side.

This gives the opposition to government a distinct culture war charge, although this isnt necessarily new. In the post-World War II conservative coalition, classical liberals and social conservatives united in opposition to big government because it was believed that an overweening government was a threat both to freedom and traditional values.

The issues and the emphases might change but in conservative politics, freedom is unlikely ever to go out of style.

Rich Lowry is editor in chief of the National Review.

View post:
Lowry: Freedom still the Republican rallying cry - Boston Herald

Jim HartmanCourtesy Photo

Gov. Steve Sisolak abruptly dropped Nevadas mask mandate Feb. 10 by issuing Emergency Directive 052 that masks would not be required in public places effective immediately.In doing so, Sisolak was way behind the national curve in dumping mask edicts. Nevada was among the mask mandate holdouts, with just three states Hawaii, New Mexico and Washington still forcing residents to mask up at public indoor settings.Even California announced it would end its indoor masking requirement earlier than Nevada. Thats notable because California is the state most identified with an addiction to heavy-handed government.Last July 27, Sisolak issued a directive that reimposed an onerous indoor public place mask mandate following a recommendation from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that fully-vaccinated people should wear masks in indoor settings.The governors directive also mandated masks for all teachers, staff and students in Nevadas 17 school districts.As a result of parental backlash and pressure from school superintendents, Sisolak backed off his all-student mask mandate. He issued another directive on Aug. 4 giving 15 rural school districts, those outside Clark and Washoe, the flexibility to determine their own student masking rules.Mask mandates for children in schools have come under increasing scrutiny given the virus represents little danger to young people. The case against masking children in class has been convincingly made by many with serious credentials for many months, but resisted by powerful teachers unions.Six months later theres little evidence Sisolaks July directive has led to fewer COVID infections. Nor do results in the eight other deep-blue states imposing an indoor mask mandate demonstrate any different outcome.The great majority of governors Democrats and Republicans declined to impose a similar requirement. Sisolaks ongoing mask order was extreme and outside the mainstream.Sisolak said his new Directive 052 is based on science and reflects the precipitous drop in positive cases, the considerable drop in hospitalizations. However, the CDC guidance is unchanged and continues to be to wear a mask indoors in public.Republicans characterized Sisolaks decision as politically expedient.The science changes when its politically convenient, Assembly GOP Leader Robin Titus, a physician, said in a statement.The science hasnt changed, only the political science has, she added.From the beginning, Sisolaks response to COVID has been strongly authoritarian in a state with a long tradition of live and let live libertarianism. His Draconian lockdown orders in March 2020 were devastating to Nevadas economy.By April 2020, Nevada set the record for the highest unemployment rate ever recorded, 30.5%, which sent the states unemployment system into meltdown.During 2021, Nevadas monthly unemployment rate was regularly the highest in the nation. While the states unemployment declined to 6.4% in the December U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics report, thats still the second-highest unemployment rate in the U.S. after neighboring California.Sisolaks lockdowns also destroyed many non-essential small businesses, closing them permanently. His arbitrary capacity orders wildly fluctuated from 50% to 25%, then back to 50%, making it difficult for businesses to plan and comply.Joey Gilbert, a GOP far-right firebrand candidate for governor, labeled Sisolak a tyrant and a bully for his COVID directives.Las Vegas Mayor Carolyn Goodman called Sisolak a dictator.Hes been a dictator with whom we have complied every step of the way, Goodman, formerly a Democrat and now an independent, told the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Weve had no choice.A comprehensive State Pandemic Scorecard issued by Politico on December 15 placed Nevada tied for 48th with Mississippi in ranking the states overall COVID response. Only Wyoming ranked lower than Nevada in handling COVID issues, according to the report.For Sisolak, his COVID response has become a serious liability. Its a delusion for Democrats to believe the movement against mandates is driven only by right-wing crazies.Email Jim Hartman at lawdocman1@aol.com.

Read more from the original source:
Jim Hartman: Nevada near last to unmask | Serving Carson City for over 150 years - Nevada Appeal

With his strong libertarian streak, Sen. Rand Paul is arguably the only good U.S. senator, but he shouldnt haveencouraged regulation-protesting truckers to clog things up on L.A. or DC roads, as he did prior to the Super Bowl.

Even a good cause shouldnt resort to using bad methods. In fact, the best legal and moral systems let you pursue whatever causes you likeso long as you stick to voluntary methods instead of, say, kidnapping your neighbors and making them instead of you do all the work for the cause.

Property rights create a nice, clear boundary between you (along with your pet causes) and whatever crazy causes your neighbors want to pursue. But in a society where some things are considered public property, remain an unsettled commons, or are managed by the governmentwhether rightly or wronglycaution is called for. Public property, whether you love it or want eventually to eradicate it, is a gray area where individuals preferences can easily be overwhelmed by the actions of the mob, but they shouldnt be.

Where there are no property rights to enforce civility, individual restraint and self-control should prevail. We dont want a population of people waiting for the first ambiguous opportunity to run amok. So it is that we expect certain things to be treated as effectively neutral ground, not the place to spark, or settle, a conflict. Roads are for traveling, not for hundred-person brawls, just as the middle of the public sidewalk isnt the place to build your dream house.

That means roads also arent the place to block innocent third parties over your disagreement with regulators, much as I may share your dislike of regulators.

Its wrong when Black Lives Matter protestors circle innocent motorists and trap them in place until they somehow atone for the history of slavery, Jim Crow, and police brutality, and its wrong for truckers to physically block motoristswhether on their way to a neighboring city to trade, to a hospital to get treatment, or just to an intriguing nearby hillmerely because those truckers have a beef, no matter how legitimate, with Big Pharma, trucking companies, Canadian regulators, or anyone else who isnt that innocent motorist trying to move down the street.

Some of the same right-wingers who support the trucker blockades that have happened in Ottawa and Europe claim to understand not only the dangers of letting BLM blockade traffic but the broader principle of avoiding partisan attacks that undermine the usefulness of networks meant to serve a broad array of participants with different views. After all, thats the gist of the argument (often a sound moral one even when it carries no legal weight) against letting ostensibly-neutral institutions such as social media sites, banks, and phone companies turn around and become content-policing censors, like a referee suddenly turned aggressive player.

Let people talk, and let people drive. You know thats a shorter route to freedom than letting people hold their fellow users hostage to send a message, whether the message is Fewer mandates, Puerto Rican statehood now, or anything else. You can still pursue countless other tactics for sending such messages. There are many places to drive or park an immense convoy, for instance. In fact, if you want to lose support for your cause, harming or inconveniencing innocent third parties is probably the fastest way to do it.

Burn down enough buildings, for instance, and most people start thinking police brutality might not be such a bad thing after all.

Most people stop caring what the terrorist, hostage-taker, bullhorn-wielding loudmouth, or speech-interrupting heckler is pushing and just hope to see him pushed offstage. Id think people would by now have learned that lesson, one thats both conservative and liberal but apparently these days not suitably right-wing or left-wing, if you follow my nuanced lingo.

But its not just the lone activist interloper who ought to keep that reverse-psychological principle in mind. The people in charge, and those egging them on, should use neutral institutions for partisan ends as little as possible. To varying degrees, its terrible when a parks commission refuses a grant to a theater performance because they consider the play too conservative, terrible when the New Right schemes to use strict fire and building codes to report ramshackle artist communes, terrible when social media sites stealthily de-boost users whose politics they dislike, and terrible when a local zoning board decides it wont grant construction permits to odd religious orders.

Mind you, Im an anarcho-capitalist and would be delighted if there were no public roads at all, just a universe of private property (especially if we all recognized a legal right-to-safe-passage that contributed to efficient roads placement and compensatory toll-taking in the event voluntary land sales alone didnt take care of it, but those details arent important at the moment). While public roads exist, though, I dont want them used to settle culture wars, gender spats, regulatory disagreements, race scandals, or anything except how best to get from geographic point A to point B.

I dont pretend that a clear and easy definition of censorship is at hand for cases that blend the public and private sectoras when New York City mayor Eric Adams recently called on Big Tech to censor the aggressive-sounding music called drill rap. But I know that when in doubt, Id rather leave individuals free to make their own listening choices, presumably still the obvious libertarian default position. And surely real liberty-lovers want innocent individuals to be able to drive without having to worry about whos pissed off about what this week.

There are a thousand other ways to make your displeasure at that Trudeau dweeb known without becoming an even bigger obstacle to everyday life than he is.

Todd Seavey is the author ofLibertarianism for Beginnersand is on Twitter at@ToddSeavey

Continued here:
Who Will Block the Roads? - Splice Today