A good article by Ross Kenyon from the Center for a Stateless Society, illustrating the pervasive stereotypes that are perpetuated against anarchists.

How would the NAACP respond if a politician or other public figure had said this about all black people?

Recently, US Representative John Boehner (R-OH) odiously mischaracterizedanarchist philosophy and painted an inaccurate portrait of its core values, saying that at Tea Party events there are “Always a couple of anarchists who want to kill all of us in public office.” Anarchism is an ideology based on individual freedom and opposition to institutionalized aggression, not on some insane love of public mayhem.

Yes, when people hear the word “anarchist” their neurons start firing on images of Molotov cocktail-wielding, black bandanna-wearing street fighters at G20.

That impression is more a product of 200 years of Boehner-style smear rhetoric than an accurate perception of what anarchism means or what anarchists do. It’s on par with any other stereotype — the “lazy/violent Negro” used to justify Jim Crow, the “potential pedophile” trotted out to support discrimination against homosexuals and other sexual minorities, the hopped-up robber or rapist offered up as justification for the war on drugs.

Yes, there are violent and insurrectionary anarchists, just as there are people who resemble those other stereotypes. No, those particular people are not representative of this diverse movement any more than those other stereotypes are representative of African-Americans, LGBTQ persons, or recreational drugs users.

I’ve attended Tea Parties as an anarchist because I’m a sincere libertarian who cares about limiting the power, scope, and size of government and fighting its unjustified intrusion upon the lives of peaceful individuals. Many of of my fellow Tea Party attendees intuitively and intellectually grasp the danger of the unlimited state and seek to reduce its influence over their personal lives. Anarchism is a radical extension of that reasonable impulse, not the nihilist tantrum that Boehner makes it out to be.

At Tea Party events, I like to ask questions of people who care about limiting governments.

How is land is justly acquired? Most people accept homesteading, occupancy and use as appropriate justification to call a parcel of land one’s own.

In reply, I note that the state homesteads nothing, produces nothing, but merely draws a political boundary and declares that if one lives within the stated arbitrary geographical area one must buy defense and justice services from its monopolistic organization.

What happens if someone attempts to buy competing services not linked to artificial political borders? Agents of the state will throw that person in a cage (and kill them if they resists).

Market anarchism is such a basic and consistent idea, an idea so in tune with the values professed by the Tea Partiers, that it’s only natural for anarchists to show up and challenge fellow freedom-lovers to adopt it.

I agree that a consistent philosophy which values and respects the peaceful choices of the Tea Partiers and their neighbors is indeed a threat to Boehner and his ilk, but not a threat of the type he claims. It’s not a death threat, it’s the threat of a pink slip.

—–
C4SS News Analyst Ross Kenyon is a senior of American History at Arizona State University. He is a member of the ASU Students For Liberty leadership team, as well as a summer intern in Washington, DC.

In 2001, three years before his death, SEK III provided the website Libertarian Peacenik, with a brief history of the new libertarian philosophy that emerged after the movement split in 1969.

In July 1969, the Students for a Democratic Society split in Chicago four ways and the Anarchists were purged. Over Labor Day Young Americans for Freedom split.  The Anarchist Caucus and then-separate Libertarian Caucus were purged the following month. In October (Columbus Day weekend) the two groups met at the Hotel Dipomat [sic] in New York City at the first Libertarian Conference hosted by Murray Rothbard and Karl Hess.  The following February, Los Angeles (USC) hosted the Left- Right Festival of Liberation, with such luminaries as SDS ex-president Carl Oglesby (who recently ran for Congress as LP), Robert LeFevre, Karl Hess (again), and many others not as well remembered.

Five Hundred people showed up. The conference was covered in the LA Free Press and many Establishment papers, got extensive reporting on KPFK (which had a Libertarian radio show) and KUSC (which had TWO Libertarian shows, Lowell Ponte’s and Ron Kimberling’s).

I attended all of the above except the first-mentioned (since I was a YAF “libertarian” minarchist until September 1969); I worked side by side with Dana Rohrabacher on the last-mentioned.  He may be an Orange County congressman now, but back then he was the Johnny Grass-seed of the movement, travelling to YAF chapters, singing his libertarian folk songs, and “turning on” the conservatives so they would “tune in” to Libertarianism.

Our Movement grew exponentially through 1972 and even 1973, going from a few thousand students to over 100,000 and recognition in such publications as TV Guide (where Edith Efron, a sympathizer, equated us with conservatives and liberals in an article about equal time provisions).

One of the terms I personally coined, “minarchist,” partly to amuse Murray Rothbard, appeared in Newsweek.

Also in 1971, two Libertarians I had recruited from Columbia University (with the help of David Friedman), got a full-color, full-page cover in the magazine section of the New York Times, standing in front of a red fist above the words “Laissez Faire!”  That was Stan Lehr and Lou Rossetto.  Some of you know the latter from his entrepreneurial days as the original publisher of Wired magazine.

We then organized an East Coast Libertarian Conference at Columbia with the help of Gary Greenberg (remember my posting, “One of Ours at Ground Zero”?).  During that Conference, Jeffrey St. John attempted to defend minarchy from Roy A. Childs.  St. John’s trouncing pretty much ended minarchy as a serious intellectual position within the Libertarian Movement.

Then and only then did David Nolan (who had been active in the earliest formation of the YAF Libertarian Caucus in 1967 but missed the explosive events “under the arch” in St. Louis in 1969 and had not been radicalized) announce the formation of the Libertarian Party.

New Libertarian (my magazine, begun 1970, currently up to 188 issues, and usually #3 in circulation after Reason and Liberty/Libertarian Review), then called New Libertarian Notes, published a debate between David and me in the November 1972 issue which came out just before the presidential election.  The Libertarian Party idea was met with universal scorn by movement activists, either on principle (LeFevrians, Revolutionary Rothbardians) or as hopelessly premature (Right Rothbardians, more conservative types).  And Hospers-Nathan did get a pathetic vote total.

Remember, few people calling themselves Libertarians in 1972 would vote and those were arguing over who would stop the war without socializing the economy the worst: McGovern or Schmitz (theBircher candidate of the American Party).  Surprisingly, both Rothbard and Ayn Rand came out for Nixon!

What kept you partyarchs (a term meaning “sell-out anarchist who claims to oppose the State but embraces a State’s Party,” so technically you minarchists cannot be partyarchs) in the running was the defection of Roger MacBride, a Nixon elector, breaking his pledge (i.e., breaking a contract, appropriate for the start of a State or a Party) and voting for Hospers-Nathan.  Thus was the LP put on the political map, and MacBride was rewarded with the next nomination (1976).  The LP was taken over by “anarchists” (i.e., partyarchs, which is why I coined the term) starting with New York’s Youngstein for Mayor Campaign in 1973.

Then Ed Crane brought Charles Koch’s billions into the LP (bought the national party) and the LP’s highest vote total (for president) was achieved for Ed Clark in 1980 in an orgy of wasted spending. The LP has yet to recover to that level.

Most anti-political Libertarians simply avoided contact with party supporters after 1974.  Ironically,Harry Browne, who had made his fortune denouncing any form of political action, or even overt social action, in 1973, denounced me for going to LP meetings and inviting LPers over to debate us. The LP’s total membership has never been more than 5% of the total number of people calling themselves Libertarian.

There is a LOT more detail, but this should get you started.  Feel free to check any and all facts presented here.  Back in 1974, much of this was published in a special issue of New Libertarian called “Anarchist Graffiti: Where Were You in 1969?” and the rest in 180 or so other issues of NL.  You can also find some of it in back issues of Reason and Libertarian Review, and if you can find them, The Abolitionist and Outlook.  The Society for Individual Liberty, which ultimately absorbed most of the old YAF Libertarian Caucuses had a magazine (Rational Individualist) and a newsletter (SIL News); if you can find the issues, you’ll get a lot of first-hand views of the events at the time.  SIL was merged with the Libertarian International in 1990 to form the International Society for Individual Liberty (ISIL) which still hosts the majority of Libertarian Conferences around the world.

Other countries with major Libertarian Movements (very few with parties) include England, Estonia, Costa Rica, Canada (especially Alberta, my home province), Australia, France, The Netherlands and New Zealand.  Last I checked, only Costa Rica and NZ had parties, although Costa Rica calls its party Movimento Libertario or Libertarian Movement.  They have a very popular congressman in office.

Estonia has both a large Agorist (counter-economic, black market) AND an above-ground political movement.

Although they didn’t call themselves Libertarian, you might include Czechoslovakia’s recent government of Vaclav Klaus.  Then again, since they were ousted for corruption, you might not want to.  Poet, playwright, and intellectual leader Vaclav Havel is still pretty hard-core.

This is just a taste. At least you can’t claim ignorance in our future exchanges. (Yes, some back issues of NL are still available; I sell them on the literature table at the Karl Hess Club every Third Monday of the month. KHC traces its history all the way back to 1971 when Dana Rohrabacher and Seymour Leon started the very first Libertarian Supper Club of Los Angeles.)

–  Freely as ever, SEK3 (Original Libertarian, who earned his Capital L in the streets and the convention halls of the Battle of St. Louis)

“War is the Health of the State.”  – Randolph Bourne, 1918.

This is the ninth chapter from Les’ online novel titled, Spiritual Survival In A Temporal World, for our companion site JustGetThere. This chapter again covers diet on multiple levels and how it relates to  inner peace and relative harmony.

Spiritual Survival in a Temporal World

Chapter 9

I’ve been thinking about what’s been said so far and I thought it might be a good idea to do another chapter on diet before moving along to something else. Although ‘eating’ is a physical act, it has major spiritual implications. In a certain sense there is no such thing as the physical. It is just a more manifest expression of the spiritual which is… everything. It’s all spiritual. Light is life and there are degrees of light precipitating downward into the manifest until light becomes solid. The sun is an expression of something finer and that is, itself, an expression of something finer and so on and so on up and in; the reverse being more and more down and out; for the sake of illustration.

The sun causes plants to grow. There is a fiery nutrition there which is absorbed by animal forms which consume them, including your own. Sunlight transforms into a power which makes the physical body possible. So, let us think of your body as frozen sunlight; light in extension.

This power can take the form of many things beneficial and many things poisonous. It’s a mere alteration of one thing assuming a myriad of states all as a result of the operation of the sun which, as has been said, is itself an expression of something finer.

Alcohol is a poison. Snake venom is a poison, whereas the serpent power is the resident motive force in everything. Snake venom anti-toxins are made from snake venom. There are many powerful truths that can be intuited from this by the inquiring mind. It appears from this that life and the conditions in which we find ourselves are all a result of the choices that we make. We make these choices based upon our reasoning and knowledge. When reasoning and knowledge are sound we make profitable and correct choices. When they are not, our choices are unsound and lead to undesirable conditions and complications. One of these is dis-ease or, the loss of harmony. Harmony in being is the optimum goal.

In today’s world, the common diet is more garbage than gold. So it is with our other diets; what we take in with our minds, what provokes our feelings, what we breathe and HOW we breathe. Proper breathing and eating both require a similar degree of attention. Fifty percent of the digestion takes place in the mouth. If you don’t chew your food long enough for this to take place well, …you do the math. It is the same with breathing. People who do not have control of their breath are in a poor position to manage negative emotion or to center their mind. Their energy is much less than it could be. Every organ is affected because posture is affected which effects everything else. Much of what I say may seem simplistic. It is up to the reader to extrapolate from what they read.

It’s the reverse of what it natural and normal for you to put shit into your body. Shit is supposed to come ‘out’ of your body. We’ve come to a point as a society where we put garbage in and garbage out. It’s a small percentage of humanity that takes the proper course.

Unfortunately, with many who are attempting to do the right thing another feature enters the mix and that is to become extremist in one’s practice and in one’s judgment of others. Keep in mind what has been said about snake venom. You can poison yourself trying to do the right thing, just as much as by doing the wrong thing. It is harmony you want, not some idealized white dove in the meadow of personal purity. Don’t scrub the pot so hard that you break it.

Some alternative dietary modalities verge on insanity, such as those who proclaim that eating honey is stealing from the bees, or that milk is only for calves and so on. I’m not a meat eater but I know that for some people at their level of personal development it is necessary. I’ve seen as many healthy meat eaters as I have unhealthy vegetarians. The thing to remember is that some meat may well be better than other meat. Some vegetables are better for you than others and, more importantly, some vegetables are better for you personally than others. A lot depends on your heritage and where you live and the particular genetic complex you have arrived at in your ongoing journey which does not end with death or begin at birth.

You can stop all input from the world outside and wind up unhappy in a room alone with no idea where to go. Consider balance above everything else and include ‘intention’ and a sincere desire to encounter the indwelling self. I have said in other places that if anyone were to go into a room for several days and take only water and for the duration ‘pray without ceasing; falling to sleep when it is unavoidable and awakening to immediate prayer with out ceasing that they could not fail to have an experience with the indwelling self. Think about it. You could not fail to have an experience. But who would do this? Not many would do this.

This is preferable to walking away from the world when you are not ready. But you do want to step away from the world at this time because the world has become a whirlpool that is sucking the inattentive and the willing down into a maelstrom of darkness. It is so because the opportunity for spiritual transformation is so great. Whenever the door begins to open for a spiritual quantum leap, all of the forces of ‘the world’ manifest strong attractions for the purpose of distraction from this possibility. It’s physics really.

Develop a burning need for union within. Let is accompany you on your daily rounds. In the midst of the chaos and lies and false advertisements for something that cannot be acquired or purchased in the marketplace, let your mind and heart be made aware that all is well and that none of this can touch you.

Diet is one of the keys to being able to do this. Breathing is also diet because you are eating air. Investigate the blood, oxygen exchange. The mind eats as well. Controlling your diet on all of these levels will grant you a positive state in which to experience inner peace and relative harmony.

People get stoned because they don’t feel good. They don’t feel good because of all the bad diet on all the levels of consumption. You would become very high if you were judicious and cautious about your diet. When you practice meditation as well, the collective benefits are truly impressive. It’s not only the bad advice that you need to avoid. It is also the bad advice that masquerades as good advice.

The key to gaining benefit from this book is to think about what you have read and then let your intuition guide you toward realizations that are uniquely your own. You must seek out your intuition and thereby widen the gateway through which the information passes. Think of it as doing spiritual sit-up and push-ups because it is just that. You must exercise something in order to develop strength and ability. Good diet on all levels is a good start.

In That Shape Again

___

By Les Visible | JustGetThere Featured Author

Letters from the Devic Realm

Les Visible is a writer and recording artist. He has had a lifelong love affair with the Hermetic Sciences and the Martial Arts. He is a seasoned traveler in psychedelic realms and prefers the Devic Kingdom over the suffocating confinements of the Sub-Matrix. Along the way he has matriculated from the military to prisons and the maximum security wards for the criminally insane.

He has owned a metaphysical bookstore and some restaurants and worked in construction, as a cook, a club bouncer, a newspaper editor, a resort manager, a radio announcer, a standup comedian, as a lead singer in a rock and roll band and whatever he had to do to get by.

He lives somewhere in Europe with his wife Susanne and his memories. The truth has not been injured in the writing of this blurb. A collection of his works in various media can be found at www.lesvisible.com

Before currency, people used barter to exchange services or goods in the marketplace. Within the last decade, there has been a renewed interest in bartering, especially online. Below is a free online bartering site that allows you to swap, sell, buy or giveaway services and items.

Via ~Swapace

3 Easy Steps To Using SwapAce

SwapAce allows you to SWAP, SELL, BUY & MEET.

You can exchange items and/or money. The diagram below shows how SwapAce can be very powerful for swapping items and/or money.

For more information, you can view our help article for Getting Started

Our Vision

SwapAce is an organisation with the vision to be “the fun, unique, trusted marketplace, where millions worldwide interact”.

Buy, Sell, Swap, Meet

• Want to barter and swap?
• Want to buy and sell?
• Want to meet people?
• Want to recycle and save money?

If you’re here, it means you are looking for an online marketplace with a difference. Frustrated with traditional forms of buying and selling online (which has mostly been limited to auction sites and classifieds), SwapAcewas born from the desire to trade with versatility.

If you wanted to simply buy something online for the best price, then some of these existing systems would be adequate for the task. But what if you wanted to choose who you bought from? What if you wanted to make a choice based on factors like distance, feedback, or simply how much you like the person selling what you want? Existing systems would not allow this sort of versatility, and so SwapAce was created to bring you a greater range of choice.

We wanted to give sellers a bit more of this choice as well. Normally, you would simply advertise your item and at the end of the advertisement period you would be pretty much stuck with having to sell your item to a particular person. We make it possible to negotiate the terms of an agreement with other parties. You can make offers and counter-offers until both of you are happy.

The vision of SwapAce is also to extend the online marketplace to people who might want to swap or barter goods and services. If you don’t use something anymore, you could certainly give it away and recycle. But you don’t have to; you can also swap it for something you might want to use. Bartering worked long before the introduction of currency, and it works today. Swapping or trading stuff is a great way to recycle.

You can also meet people at SwapAce. We think this is a simple extension of a marketplace; meeting people with similar interests and forming online communities. To this end we’ve created forums for people to discuss well, anything, and we encourage people to trade within their communities (either interest based or location based).

Okay, if you’ve read enough about how SwapAce rules and other sites drool (no more bad jokes, we promise), then why don’t you give it a try? Register an accountand see for yourself.

Hat Tip PuppetGov

An article from the Vancouver Sun, is a great illustration of how black markets rise in response from increased theft from the State. The article highlights the rise of Canada’s black market trade of cigarettes, due to increased taxation from the state.

The State seeks to invade every facet of our human experience, in this instance, gaining revenue from the invasive taxation of behavior. The social controllers believe a tax increase targeted on behavior, will be easier to implement on the public. Although they say it’s for behavior modification, they simply want your money, the trick is how to get you to go along with it. As the State seeks to increase their theft, people inherently turn to the Agora for solutions.

Via Vancouver Sun

High tobacco taxes intended to cut the smoking rate in Canada help create a black market where organized crime profits from the increased demand for contraband cigarettes, according to a new report from a Canadian public policy think-tank.

“Smuggling and trafficking of contraband cigarettes is an unintended consequence of federal and provincial tobacco tax policies,” said Diane Katz of the Vancouver-based Fraser Institute in a statement.

The study, Contraband Tobacco in Canada, documents various federal and provincial tobacco tax policies and anti-smoking initiatives that have been implemented in Canada since the 1980s, and describes how governments have attempted to counteract the black market.

The research showed that the illicit trade of cigarettes increased whenever tobacco taxes were raised, and that anti-smoking campaigns are just as effective at cutting smoking rates.

“If smokers are evading taxes by purchasing black market cigarettes, increasing taxes to discourage smoking is essentially ineffective,” said Katz.

This is the inherent flaw of the statist, they believe that they are justified stealing money from you in order to keep you safe. If someone wants to ingest something, it’s their right to do so. In addition, the State always seeks new ways to extract wealth from the public, transferring it into their corrupt system, with little to no benefit for the citizens.

Through propaganda public relation campaigns, they target demographics, then categorize it as negative social behavior. Citizens who live in fear of true liberty, applaud these efforts, even though it’s highly likely that a demographic that they fit in will be targeted next. This is how government works; they tax the public dry, say it’s not enough, increase taxes more, complain that people are cheating the system, then claim the need to increase taxes even more. Complete insanity.

No matter how regulated and oppressed society might become due to statist policies, the Agora is always present. The organic market will always be ready to provide a beneficial solution for the public, whenever the State interferes with liberty.

Agora! Anarchy! Action!

Another useful DIY from instructables could help you resurrect your old iPod without having to shell out FRN’s for a new one.

Via member bryceronie

If you have a broken ipod , with a business card and five minutes it will be fixed!

I enjoy instructionables that are easy to do , short to complete, and will work for anyone!

(!!Please VOTE for me so I can win a prize!!)

This is a common problem among many, many people that have a warranty that has expired.

Now you could just send it back to apple to get a new one, but if your warranty expired, like mine did, they won’t give you a new one. You need to fix this pretty $350 piece of apple!!

Instead of having a nice paperweight (hopefully you didnt throw yours out) , you will need these with three things before starting:

1. a flathead screwdriver
2. a broken ipod and 5 minutes
3. a new and or old, but crisp, business card

p.s. No memory loss either, all songs, data, ect will still be on the iPod.

Step 1. Easy does it

The first thing is to take the iPod apart.

This is not a big deal, there are little plastic holds around the iPod, and the flat head screwdriver will allow you to pry it open at the plastic parts. (see pic)
Once completed, you can just snap the ipod back together so it looks exactly the same, just dont get too frustrated if it takes a few minutes to get the first clip.

Use a MICRO flat head screw driver. Go in from the side as shown in the demo, but to get it started angle the screwdriver down so that it slides in between the plastic and metal, then take a bigger sized micro screw driver to open it the rest of the way.

Step 2. Careful

When all the plastic parts are un-snapped ,  you can pull the ipod apart an inch or so , you only need to do one more step.

Here is where this gets neat:

Fold the business card twice. So it is still springy.

Put the folder business card in the iPod on top of the blue sponge that is inside.

shut and snap the iPod back together.

So now it your iPod is back to normal, and all you needed was a folded business card!!

The blue sponge needed a little more pressure over time.

Originally appeared in “The Dandelion”, spring 1980

Read from “Mostly on the Edge”, by Karl Hess, in the selected readings section. The book is an autobiography

Karl Hess (1923-1994) was an American writer and libertarian activist. He joined the Libertarian Party and was the editor of its newspaper from 1986 to 1990. This short text first appeared in the magazine “The Dandelion” in 1980. It stresses the position already highlighted by the historian and theoretician of the anarchist movement, Max Nettlau that anarchy means freedom and voluntary self-organization and no one in the anarchist movement is interested in prescribing which of the various “isms” (capitalism, communism, mutualism, Catholicism, etc.) any anarchist should follow. This message is very relevant now that the interest for anarchy is growing and that some people, who profess to be anarchists, are battling in order to promote very vigorously (and in some cases trying to impose) their own brand of anarchism, either anarcho-communism or anarcho-capitalism. To all of them the message from Karl Hess is: neither anarchist-communist nor anarchist-capitalist, because “there is no hyphen after the anarchist”

Frank Chodorov, individualist

I recently ordered Fugitive Essays by Frank Chodorov (1887-1966), a collection of his essays, and have been thoroughly enjoying the read. In it, he rails against statism of all stripes. He is a staunch individualist who opposed intervention in the marketplace and foreign affairs.

I just finished reading his essay entitled If We Quit Voting, and felt that it would fit in quite nicely on JustLive. It originally appeared in July 1945 in a monthly newsletter Chodorov established called “analysis.” It later appeared as a chapter in his book: Out of Step: The Autobiography of an Individualist (1962), and finally as an included essay in Fugitive Essays. Below is the text for If We Quit Voting:

—————————

If We Quit Voting
by Frank Chodorov

New York in midsummer is measurably more miserable than any other place in this world, and should be comparable to the world for which all planners are headed. Why New Yorkers, otherwise sane, should choose to parboil their innards in a political campaign during this time of the year is a question that comes under the head of man’s inscrutable propensity for self-punishment. And if a fellow elects to let the whole thing pass him by, some socially conscious energumen is bound to sweat him with a lecture on civic duty, like the citizeness who came at me.

For twenty-five years my dereliction has been known to my friends and more than one has undertaken to set me straight; out of these arguments came a solid defense for my nonvoting position. So that the lady in question was well parried with practiced retorts. I pointed out, with many instances, that though we have had candidates and platforms and parties and campaigns in abundance, we have had an equivalent plenitude of poverty and crime and war. The regularity with which the perennial promise of “good times” wound up in depression suggested the incompetence of politics in economic affairs. Maybe the good society we have been voting for lay some other way; why not try another fork in the road, the one pointing to individual self-improvement, particularly in acquiring a knowledge of economics? And so on.

There was one question put to me by my charming annoyer which I deftly sidestepped, for the day was sultry and the answer called for some mental effort. The question: “What would happen if we quit voting?”

If you are curious about the result of noneating you come upon the question of why we eat. So, the query put to me by the lady brings up the reason for voting. The theory of government by elected representatives is that these fellows are hired by the voting citizenry to take care of all matters relating to their common interests. However, it is different from ordinary employment in that the representative is not under specific orders, but is given blanket authority to do what he believes desirable for the public welfare in any and all circumstances, subject to constitutional limitations. In all matters relating to public affairs the will of the individual is transferred to the elected agent, whose responsibility is commensurate with the power thus invested in him.

It is this transference of power from voter to elected agents which is the crux of republicanism. The transference is well nigh absolute. Even the constitutional limitations are not so in fact since they can be circumvented by legal devices in the hands of the agents. Except for the tenuous process of impeachment, the mandate is irrevocable. For the abuse or misuse of the mandate the only recourse left to the principals, the people, is to oust the agents at the next election. But, when we oust the rascals do we not, as a matter of course, invite a new crowd? It all adds up to the fact that by voting them out of power, the people put the running of their community life into the hands of a separate group, upon whose wisdom and integrity the fate of the community rests.

All this would change if we quit voting. Such abstinence would be tantamount to this notice to politicians: since we as individuals have decided to look after our affairs, your services are no longer needed. Having assumed social power we must, as individuals, assume social responsibility; provided, of course, the politicians accept their discharge. The job of running the community would fall on each and all of us. We might hire an expert to tell us about the most improved firefighting apparatus, or a manager to look after cleaning the streets, or an engineer to build us a bridge; but the final decision, particularly in the matter of raising funds to defray costs, would rest with the town-hall meeting. The hired specialists would have no authority other than that necessary for the performance of their contractual duties; coercive power, which is the essence of political authority, would be exercised, if necessary, only by the committee of the whole.

There is some warrant for the belief that a better social order would ensue when the individual is responsible for it and, therefore, responsive to its needs. He no longer has the law or the lawmakers to cover his sins of omission; need of the neighbors’ good opinion will be sufficient compulsion for jury duty and no loopholes in a draft law, no recourse to “political pull,” will be possible when danger to his community calls him to arms. In his private affairs, the now sovereign individual will have to meet the dictum of the marketplace: produce or you do not eat; no law will help you. In his public behavior he must be decent or suffer the sentence of social ostracism, with no recourse to legal exoneration. From a law-abiding citizen he will be transmuted into a self-respecting man.

Would chaos result? No, there would be order, without law to disturb it. But, let us define chaos. Is it not disharmony resulting from social friction? When we trace social friction to its source do we not find that it seminates in a feeling of unwarranted hurt, or injustice? Then chaos is a social condition in which injustice obtains. Now, when one man may take, by law, what another man has put his labor into, we have injustice of the keenest kind, for the denial of a man’s right to possess and enjoy what he produces is akin to a denial of life. Yet the power to confiscate property is the first business of politics. We see how this is so in the matter of taxation; but greater by far is the amount of property confiscated by monopolies, all of which are founded in law.

While this economic basis of injustice has been lost in our adjustment to it, the resulting friction is quite evident. Most of us are poor in spite of our constant effort and known ability to produce an abundance; the incongruity is aggravated by a feeling of hopelessness. But the keenest hurt arises from the thought that the wealth we see about us is somehow ours by right of labor, but is not ours by right of law. Resentment, intensified by bewilderment, stirs up a reckless urge to do something about it. We demand justice; we have friction. We have strikes and crimes and bankruptcy and mental unbalances. And we cheat our neighbors, and each seeks for himself a legal privilege to live by another’s labor. And we have war. Is this a condition of harmony or of chaos?

In the frontier days of our country there was little law, but much order, for the affairs of the community were in the hands of the citizenry. Although fiction may give an opposite impression, it is a fact that there was less per capita crime to take care of then than there is now when law pervades every turn and minute of our lives. What gave the West its wild and woolly reputation was the glamorous drama of intense community life. Everybody was keenly interested in the hanging of a cattle rustler; it was not done in the calculated quiet of a prison, with the dispatch of a mechanical system. The railriding of a violator of town-hall dicta had to be the business of the town prosecutor, who was everybody. Though the citizen’s private musket was seldom used for the protection of life and property, its presence promised swift and positive justice, from which no legal chicanery offered escape, and its loud report announced the dignity of decency. Every crime was committed against the public, not the law, and therefore the public made an ado about it. Mistakes were made, to be sure, for human judgment is ever fallible; but, until the politician came, there was no deliberate malfeasance or misfeasance; until laws came, there were no violations, and the code of human decency made for order.

So, if we should quit voting for parties and candidates, we would individually reassume responsibility for our acts and, therefore, responsibility for the common good. There would be no way of dodging the verdict of the marketplace; we would take back only in proportion to our contribution. Any attempt to profit at the expense of a neighbor or the community would be quickly spotted and as quickly squelched, for everybody would recognize a threat to himself in the slightest indulgence of injustice. Since nobody would have the power to enforce monopoly conditions none would obtain. Order would be maintained by the rules of existence, the natural laws of economics.

That is, if the politicians would permit themselves to be thus ousted from their positions of power and privilege. I doubt it. Remember that the proposal to quit voting is basically revolutionary; it amounts to a shifting of power from one group to another, which is the essence of revolution. As soon as the nonvoting movement got up steam the politicians would most assuredly start a counterrevolution. Measures to enforce voting would be instituted; fines would be imposed for violations, and prison sentences would be meted out to repeaters. It is a necessity for political power, no matter how gained, to have the moral support of public approval, and suffrage is the most efficient scheme for registering it; notice how Hitler, Mussolini, and Stalin insisted on having ballots cast. In any republican government, even ours, only a fraction of the populace votes for the successful candidate, but that fraction is quantitatively impressive; it is this appearance of overwhelming sanction which supports him in the exercise of political power. Without it he would be lost.

Propaganda, too, would bombard this passive resistance to statism; not only that put out by the politicians of all parties— the coalition would be as complete as it would be spontaneous—but also the more effective kind emanating from seemingly disinterested sources. All the monopolists, all the coupon-clipping foundations, all the tax-exempt eleemosynary institutions—in short, all the “respectables”— would join in a howling defense of the status quo. We would be told most emphatically that unless we keep on voting away our power to responsible persons, it would be grabbed by irresponsible ones; tyranny would result. That is probably true, seeing how since the beginning of time men have sought to acquire property without laboring for it. The answer lies, as it always has, in the judicious use of private artillery. On this point a story, apocryphal no doubt, is worth telling. When Napoleon’s conquerors were considering what to do with him, a buck-skinned American allowed that a fellow of such parts might be handy in this new country and ought to be invited to come over. As for the possibility of a Napoleonic regime being started in America, the recent revolutionist dismissed it with the remark that the musket with which he shot rabbits could also kill tyrants. There is no substitute for human dignity.

But the argument is rather specious in the light of the fact that every election is a seizure of power. The balloting system has been defined as a battle between opposing forces, each armed with proposals for the public good, for a grant of power to put these proposals into practice. As far as it goes, this definition is correct; but when the successful contestant acquires the grant of power toward what end does he use it? Not theoretically but practically. Does he not, with an eye to the next campaign, and with the citizens’ money, go in for purchasing support from pressure groups? Whether it is by catering to a monopoly interest whose campaign contribution is necessary to his purpose, or to a privilege-seeking labor group, or to a hungry army of unemployed or of veterans, the over-the-barrel method of seizing and maintaining political power is standard practice.

This is not, however, an indictment of our election system. It is rather a description of our adjustment to conquest. Going back to beginnings—although the process is still in vogue, as in Manchuria, or more recently in the Baltic states—when a band of freebooters developed an appetite for other people’s property they went after it with vim and vigor. Repeated visitations of this nature left the victims breathless, if not lifeless, and propertyless to boot. So, as men do when they have no other choice, they made a compromise. They hired one gang of thieves to protect them from other gangs, and in time the price paid for such protection came to be known as taxation. The tax gatherers settled down in the conquered communities, possibly to make collections certain and regular, and as the years rolled on a blend of cultures and of bloods made of the two classes one nation. But the system of taxation remained after it had lost its original significance; lawyers and professors of economics, by deft circumlocution, turned tribute into “fiscal policy” and clothed it with social good. Nevertheless, the social effect of the system was to keep the citizenry divided into two economic groups: payers and receivers. Those who lived without producing became traditionalized as “servants of the people,” and thus gained ideological support. They further entrenched themselves by acquiring sub-tax-collecting allies; that is, some of their group became landowners, whose collection of rent rested on the law-enforcement powers of the ruling clique, and others were granted subsidies, tariffs, franchises, patent rights, monopoly privileges of one sort or another. This division of spoils between those who wield power and those whose privileges depend on it is succinctly described in the expression, “the state within the state.”

Thus, when we trace our political system to its origin we come to conquest. Tradition, law, and custom have obscured its true nature, but no metamorphosis has taken place; its claws and fangs are still sharp, its appetite as voracious as ever. In the light of history it is not a figure of speech to define politics as the art of seizing power; and its present purpose, as of old, is economic. There is no doubt that men of high purpose will always give of their talents for the common welfare, with no thought of recompense other than the goodwill of the community. But, so long as our taxation system remains, so long as the political means for acquiring economic goods is available, just so long will the spirit of conquest assert itself; for men always seek to satisfy their desires with the least effort. It is interesting to speculate on the kind of campaigns and the type of candidates we would have if taxation were abolished and if, also, the power to dispense privilege vanished. Who would run for office if there were “nothing in it”?

Why should a self-respecting citizen endorse an institution grounded in thievery? For that is what one does when one votes. If it be argued that we must let bygones be bygones, see what we can do toward cleaning up the institution so that it can be used for the maintenance of an orderly existence, the answer is that it cannot be done; we have been voting for one “good government” after another, and what have we got? Perhaps the silliest argument, and yet the one invariably advanced when this succession of failures is pointed out, is that “we must choose the lesser of two evils.” Under what compulsion are we to make such a choice? Why not pass up both of them?

To effectuate the suggested revolution all that is necessary is to stay away from the polls. Unlike other revolutions, it calls for no organization, no violence, no war fund, no leader to sell it out. In the quiet of his conscience each citizen pledges himself, to himself, not to give moral support to an unmoral institution, and on election day he remains at home. That’s all. I started my revolution twenty-five years ago and the country is none the worse for it.

————–

Other works by Frank Chodorov:

• The Economics of Society, Government and State (1946)
• One is a Crowd: Reflections of an Individualist (1952)
• The Income Tax: Root of All Evil (1952)
• The Rise & Fall of Society: An Essay on the Economic Forces That Underline Social Institutions (1959)
• Flight to Russia (1959)
• Out of Step: The Autobiography of an Individualist (1962)
• Fugitive Essays (1980)
  

During this embryonic stage of identity, we have sought after the historical beginnings and trailblazers who helped shape these ideas. The one thing you notice when researching, is that there isn’t much new material on the subject presented in the 21st century. This is the very reason we decided to launch this site, coupled with self-sufficiency and personal empowerment. The idea of making an updated documentary, or series of videos on the subject in a practical modern sense, is something we are working for in the future as well.

It seems that some other non-statist brothers and sisters have had the same idea, they are seeking to produce a modern documentary on anarchism. We applaud the efforts of Aragorn, Steffi and friends, as they take on this big project.

Please help them in anyway you can to help their idea manifest to a reality that will benefit us all.

Agora! Anarchy! Action!

—–

Via Anarkismo.net

To the best of our knowledge, no comprehensive documentary about anarchism has ever been made. This is a project to create a documentary which is as much a basic introduction to anarchism, as well as a story which looks at anarchism historically and globally.

Anarchism: A Documentary

Fellow anarchists!
To the best of our knowledge, no comprehensive documentary about anarchism has ever been made.

Of the often very dated films on anarchist themes that are available, most either misrepresent anarchism (1981’s pro anarcho-capitalist ‘Anarchism in America’), are focused on specific moments in anarchist history (‘Living Utopia’, ‘The Angry Brigade’, ‘Lucio the Anarchist’, etc), or discuss the wider social justice / alter-globalisation movements (‘Fourth World War’).

Such an absence is unfortunate, for we think that now, more than ever, a broad, accessible documentary introduction to anarchism would be of tremendous value to those of us who wish to share the history, ideas and promise of our diverse, protean movement with a general audience.

Instead of complaining though, we’re just going to knuckle down and make it ourselves!

We envisage creating, over the next year or so, an engaging, entertaining, relatively mainstream film that will cover – via interviews with prominent anarchists mixed with archival footage, narration, person-on-the-street discussions and explanatory animations – a historical overview of anarchism, an explanation of the core principles (anti-authoritarianism, anti-capitalism, mutual aid…you know the stuff!) and an exploration of all the contrasting but ultimately complementary views held by contemporary anarchists from around the world.

We’d also like to deliver a message of realistic hope and a call for action in this time of social and ecological crisis.

Being long-time anarchists ourselves, we recognise the importance of a supportive community in ensuring our project succeeds in fairly portraying both contemporary and historical anarchism and does not fall prey to personal biases or prejudices. We will thus be communicating openly and honestly with the broad anarchist community about our progress and underlying vision.

More pressingly though, we also recognise the importance of mutual aid and so, even though we’re soliciting it through capitalist channels, we humbly request your modest donations (at http://www.indiegogo.com/Anarchism-A-Documentary). These will help us with our frugal travel, eating and living expenses, as well as with editing and post-production costs. Those who cannot help financially are more than welcome to offer couches for the night. Shared dinners and good company will also be essential to the completion of this ambitious task we’ve set ourselves, and if you donate some music to the soundtrack we’d be eternally grateful

We eagerly await your participation, your suggestions and your constructive criticisms. We promise to weigh them up fairly as long as you promise not to pepper pie us if, in some cases, we respectfully disagree.

With love and hope,
Steffi, Aragorn and friends

PS: Our facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Anarchism-A-Documentary/1…=info
Both pages linked here contain a FAQ section for further information.

Related Link: http://www.indiegogo.com/Anarchism-A-Documentary

Anarchy logo at top of article by anarchia89

Another great diy project from instructables.com by member hpstoutharrow. If you plan on working on this project, check out the original article for comments to improvise your design, and additional pictures to help you visually. Below are step-by-step instructions and a quick video showing the setup process, build and sink in action.

While this new wash station can’t make campers wash their hands, it can make it easier, and prevent a soaking; all while conserving water.

Pumping water, even with a foot pump, requires effort so you know water use will be kept to a bare minimum…letting gravity spill it on the ground is easy… and fast!

The same 5 gallons now lasts all day even with everyone washing their hands for meals.

Intro: Field Sink

Bring running water to remote locations with this foot pump operated wash station. Perfect for camp or the patio. Ideal for campfire or BBQ grill-side food prep clean-up.
Ready for a duch oven or BBQ outdoor cook competition yet miles from running water? Our scout troop uses this Hand Washing Station to clean up before, and during meal food prep.

Even if you are just grilling on the back deck, use this set-up grill-side to keep from from running into the house for a quick rinse every time sauce is slopped.  And if its a party…just watch guests try to open a screen door with sticky BBQ covered hands. This pump is made to be operated with a foot…can’t say the same for a sliding screen door!

This is ideal for an outdoor group washing-up before meals. Especially when cooking at camp, it would be nice for the cooks to easily clean-up while preparing food with a more traditional sink with running water to promote:

Safe Food Handling Practices

- No Faucet Handle to turn  ON and OFF with Dirty Hands.

- Its easy (and fun) to use…so it gets used!  (apparently its cool to squirt water with a foot pump)

- There’s room for a soap dispenser right there on the table (up off the ground).

It also helps with:

Water Conservation

- The on-demand pump system uses a lot less water (compared to letting gravity spill it from a water jug spigot.

How it works:
A foot pump transfers clean water from the lower bucket up and out the spout for hand washing. The wash water is collected a basin and drained and stored in a gray water bucket receptacle.

When all the fresh water has been transfered to the in the gray water bucket, the gray water is emptied into the fire ring to douse the campfire

The video shows the set-up, convenient “all-in-the-bucket” storage, and the Hand Washing Station in action.

Step 1: Materials

The central components of this project are 5 gallon buckets with lids and a marine (outboard motor) fuel primer squeeze bulb and hose assy.

The Squeeze Bulb is the pump
that moves the water from the Fresh Water Bucket
up to the Spout and out,
collected and funneled by the Basin
into the Gray Water Bucket
the rest is just plumbing and support

Major Components
(3) 5 gallon utility buckets
(2) 5 gallon bucket lids
Marine fuel primer bulb and hose assy
3/8″ brass fittings
Rubber O-ring
3/8″ tubing
various 1″ and 1/2″ plumbing pipe sections and fittings
Automotive steel fuel/brake line
Door hinge
Scrap wood

Step 2: Fresh Water Bucket

Drill a 3/8″ diameter hole about 1″ from the bottom of what will be the Fresh Water Bucket.

1. From the inside of the bucket, feed the male end of a 3/8″ 90 degree brass fitting though the hole in the bucket.

(Place an O-ring on the inside of the bucket at the base of the 90 degree fitting before pushing it though the bucket wall (Photo 2).  When the fittings are tightened the O-ring will seal the hole in the bucket.)

2. From the outside of the bucket, thread on a female 3/8″ barbed hose fitting.

3. Thread a second male barbed hose fitting into the 90 degree fitting inside the bucket. (Photo 3)

4. Angle the open end of the barbed fitting downward until it touches the bottom of the bucket. (photo 3) This will help to pull water from the very bottom of the bucket allowing it to almost completely empty the bucket before it needs refilling.

Alternate Construction Note: If you don’t want to add a hole to a perfectly good bucket to dedicate it to this project, you may be able to cut a hole in the fresh water bucket lid at the very outer edge and snake the hose down into the bucket (make sure the buckets will still stack).  This should also work, and eliminate the need for the brass hose fittings (less $) but, the hose may curl and not stay submerged especially because the hose will be coming out of the top of the bucket and will have to travel down to the pump on the ground.

Step 3: Basin

The Basin is a nice finishing touch.  It is not entirely necessary but it serves a few purposes.

Number one…it is a lid for the Grey Water Bucket. It keeps you from staring at bucket of dirty, soapy water from the last guy, while you wash your hands.  It also keeps that same dirty, used water from splashing back up on your clean hands while your are washing.

The Basin also allows hands to be washed inside the basin’s high side walls – keeping the falling spout water from splashing off your hands onto your pants.

Because the Basin sits almost entirely above the grey water bucket it does not compromise the storage capacity of the gray water bucket. This means that the gray water bucket does not need to be emptied until the fresh water bucket is exhausted and ready to be refilled.

Hand washing could be done directly over an open Gray Water Bucket without the Basin but, as it fills; imagine trying to wash-up with water splashing into a nearly full bucket of used water.

A similar commercial product (Wishy Washy) selling for $90 (buckets not included, shipping extra) is set up with an open gray water bucket.
The addition of the basin shown here and the provisions for stacking the two buckets to bring hand washing to counter height, improves on the comercial product and go a long way to make the system more practical than splashing water from a waist high spout into a open bucket of gray water on the ground.

By the way, the material to make the system shown here did not cost anywhere near $90..nor even Half that!   And both systems use similar Marine Outboard fuel primer squeeze bulb and hose assemblies that cost around $15-20. (or buy cheaper hardware hose (Chemical resistant hose is not necessary with water) and the squeeze bulb with check valve is around $12 by itself).  Another $15 for plumbing, tubing & fittings; throw in some scrap wood and it will land far less than $90!

Step 4: Basin Construction – The Bottom

The Basin is constructed from the the upper portion of a third bucket and a bucket lid.

Removing the Outer Rim of a lid creates the Trimmed Lid which will be the bottom of the Basin.

1. Remove the rubber seal from the underside of a bucket lid.

2. Cut along the bottom of the trench that the seal was in. (dotted path in Photo 2)
Cut all the way around the lid to remove the Outer Rim. (Photo 2 & 3 shows where to cut)

3. After cutting off the Outer Rim, clean-up the outer diameter of the lid by trimming any excess material so that the outer diameter of the lid is flush with the Upstanding Rib Wall.

When complete the overall lid diameter should not extend beyond the Upstanding Rib Wall.

Note: In the completed basin photos in step 5, notice that the bottom of the basin is concave.  To achieve this “bowl shape”,  the lid was heated in the oven at about 275 degrees F for about 15 minutes to soften the plastic.  While hot, it was worked over the bottom of a large glass mixing bowl to impart the concave shape.  The removal of the Outer Rim was done after this forming.

“Stretching” the lid to form this shape is not necessary, and was in fact, the most difficult part of the process.  (handling hot plastic while stretching and keeping it from buckeling and over-thinning is not so easy).  Well worth the effort thought…It gives it a true sink look and better funnels the water to the center drain…much better than a flat lid basin bottom.

Step 5: Basin Construction (cont.) – Join the Side Wall & Bottom

The Basin is just a shorter bucket with a center drain hole, that sits inside the top of the Gray Water Bucket.
The Trimmed Lid from the previous step, added as a bottom to the cut off top portion of another bucket, creates a shortened bucket Basin.

1. Cut-off the top rim portion of a third bucket.  The cut should be about 3/4 of an inch below the last flange on the bucket.  When cut, the removed upper portion of a bucket forms the Basin Side Wall.

2. Fit the the Trimmed Lid from step 4 into the Basin Side Wall.

3. From the underside of the Basin Side Wall, make sure the Upstanding Rib Wall on the Trimmed Lid is flush with the bottom of the Basin Side Wall. (photo 2)

4. Drill (4) 1/8 inch diameter holes through the Upstanding Rib Wall on the Trimmed Lid and the Basin Side Wall. Drill the holes at North, South, East, West)

5. Use Aluminum pop-rivets (with washer) to secure these two components through the four drilled holes.

Note the interface between the Trimmed Lid and the Basin Side Wall does not have to be a full waterproof seal.  Because the finished Basin will fit inside the Gray Water Bucket, any water that seeps through at this joint will drip into the Gray Water Bucket.

Step 6: Foot Pump

The pump is made from a marine (outboard motor) fuel line primer squeeze bulb.  The hose and bulb (with integral check valve) was purchased as an assembly from a sporting good / hardware store that sells marine supplies for outboard motors.

The pedal assembly was made from scrap wood, a door hinge, wood dowels, and a foam rubber toy ball.

The dowels (glued into holes in the wood base) allow the bulb to move up and down freely when pumped. The open top of the dowels make for easy installation and removal of the bulb for storage.

The foam rubber ball prevents damage to the rubber squeeze bulb.
The ball was cut in half and epoxied into a recess on the underside of the pedal.  The recess was cut with a hole saw drill bit and then the material inside the hole saw cut was chiseled out.

Step 7: Support Table

The Support Table serves a few purposes.  The wider stance of the table provides stability for the two buckets.  A nearly filled Gray Water Bucket stacked on top of a nearly empty Clean Water Bucket can be a bit of a top heavy tip hazard on uneven ground.

The table also holds the Clean Water Bucket a few inches off the ground.  This reduces the impact to ground cover when compared to a a bucket sitting directly on the ground for an extended period of camping.

The table is also a place for a bottle of pump soap and a wrist watch removed for hand washing.

Step 8: Spout Riser

The main purpose of the Support Table is to attach the Spout Riser.  The Spout Riser is a combination of 1″ dia. and 1/2″ dia. galvanized pipe sections threaded together and attached to theSupport Table.

The galvanized pipes that make up the Spout Riser threads into a plumbing mounting flange attached to the table.

Step 9: Spout

The Spout is formed from an automotive steel fuel/brake line.  (purchased as a generic 4′ section at the local auto supply store)

1. Bend it into a 180 degree cane shape.
The diameter of the bend should be 1/2 diameter of the bucket.  This will position the Spout nozzle over the hole in the bottom of the Basin.

Note: The flared end of the brake line adds a finished look to the open “Nozzle” end of the Spout.

2. Slide a 2″ section of clear hardware tubing onto the other end of the Spout.

3. Slide a 1/2″ to 3/8″ galvanized reducer fitting on the Spout.

4. Then slide about a 24″ length of tubing onto the Spout.
The reducer fitting will be trapped in location on the Spout by the two sections of tubing; yet free to spin and thread onto the Spout Riser.

Note: The contact area of several inches of tubing “sleeved” over the bottom edn of the Spout, and the low pressures involved, means a clamp is not required to retain the tubing or to prevent leaks at this joint.

5. Feed the Spout, and Tubing Assembly down through the Spout Riser pipes and thread the reducer fitting onto the top of the 1/2″ Spout Riser Pipe.

Ignore the wine cork shown in the photos it is remenents of an earlier spout locating scheme.

Step 10: Connect the Pump

After feeding the Spout and Tubing  through the Spout Riser pipes connect the clear tubing to the tubing attached to the squeeze bulb pump. (or it could connect directly to the squeeze bulb but because I bought the bulb and hose as an assembly I wanted to leave the factory clamps in place)

The reason there are two sections of tubing is so that the unit can be disassembled for storage.  The upper clear tubing remains attached to the Spout as a friction fit.  There is no room for a clamp inside the smaller diameter upper Spout Riser pipe so the servicable connection is made under the Support Table.

Step 11: Ready for Clean-up

Now that this handy wash station is assembled its time to clean-up.

Fill the lower Fresh Water Bucket with… you guessed it…fresh water.  Put a lid on the Fresh Water Bucket place the Gray Water Bucket on top and cover it up with the Basin.  Start pumping.

Health Note: One of the scouts suggested this would be a good “bug juice” (Lemonade) dispenser.  Sounds cool except, the Marine grade chemical resistant primer bulb specifically indicates it is not food grade safe. Water for hand washing should be fine…prolonged contact with ingestible liquids - not good.

Step 12: Storage

Note: Each of the components - Pump, Pedal, two sections of Spout Riser pipes and the Spout and Tubing Assembly are sized to fit within the height of the bucket for storage.

- Everything is stored inside the Gray Water Bucket.
- This bucket fits inside the Fresh Water Bucket
(The brass fittings in the Fresh Water Bucket are mounted low enough that they do not prevent the buckets from nesting fully together.)
- The Basin fits inside the top of the Gray Water Bucket
(the 1/2″ pipe portion of the Spout Riser fits through the drain hole in the Basin)
The Fresh Water Lid fits on top of the Basin to close everything up.

Source: Mises.org

The article highlights a significant rise of “unbanked” households, seeking financial privacy from unwarranted actions by the state. Federal, state and local tax revenues are decreasing, due to the increase of personal transactions “off the books.”

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC) released a report last week concluding that 7.7 percent of U.S. households, containing at least 17 million adults, are unbanked (i.e. those who do not have bank accounts), and an “estimated 17.9 percent of U.S. households, roughly 21 million, are underbanked” (i.e., those who rely heavily on nonbank institutions, such as check cashing and money transmitting services). As an economy becomes richer and incomes rise, the normal expectation is that the proportion of the unbanked population falls and does not rise as is now happening in the United States.

People also avoid having bank accounts because they are vulnerable to asset seizure, judgments, levies, etc. Increasingly, bankers and others who provide financial services are forced by governments to spy and snitch on their own customers, and this is a real turnoff for many people, which causes them to find other ways of maintaining financial privacy.

I think this is a good indication of the spread of agorism and the inverse relationship it has with the state. The beauty of this is the fact it’s not a movement, this is occurring as a natural reaction against the states growing oppression. I would say an overwhelming majority of the people involved have never heard of agorism, but we all share a common enemy, the state. This organic rise of agorism, also coincides with the growth of activists subscribing to the philosophy in the present liberty movement.

Many studies have shown that when people believe the taxes they are required to pay are reasonable and the political leaders tend to spend their tax dollars wisely, tax compliance rises, and vice-versa. In the United States, there is increased evidence that many tax dollars are not being spent wisely and are often used to pay off political cronies.

Over the past year in particular, the public has become aware that many in Washington who advocate higher taxes and argue that everyone has a responsibility to pay taxes are themselves not complying with the tax laws and regulations.

When you have a secretary of the Treasury and the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee (the tax writing committee) accused of cheating on their taxes, it greatly undermines the moral authority of the tax collectors, making the common citizens feel like chumps and, hence, much more willing to try to legally avoid or illegally evade taxes themselves.

These two rising vectors will further increase agorism in the social dynamic by social interaction on the web and direct actions publicly. The philosophically aware agorist explaining the basics to those already practicing it, will help demystify and introduce the concept.

The summation of the article, contends that the ever oppressive and corrupt state, conversely gives rise to the black market.

The evidence is unambiguous; governments cannot increase tax compliance and decrease the size of the underground economy by ever increasing and more onerous regulations.

It is no accident that those governments that allow their citizens a high degree of personal and financial liberty, including financial privacy, and spend taxpayer dollars wisely, honestly and competently, have much smaller underground sectors than corrupt and oppressive governments. Washington, take note.

The public is detaching from the statist mindstate incrementally, awakening to a paradigm shift of liberty from the state. There is no need to protest and hit the streets, just invest that energy into direct action in counter-economics that don’t empower the state.

Agora! Anarchy! Action!

Learn more about Agorism in this informative audio series based on Konkin’s theory of counter-economics in order to defeat the state. Background info and Youtube audio via Pete Eyre.

ARLINGTON, VA -Last summer Mike Gogulski posted an audio version of himself reading The Agorist Class Theory(.pdf from Agorism.info), written by Wally Conger based on the notes of the late Samuel Edward Konkin III (which includes a foreword by Brad Spangler).

In an effort to encourage more people to reject the violence of the State and life free, moral lives, I decided to take Mike up on his suggestion that somebody turn the mp3’s he created into videos and a playlist on YouTube.

For a bit more on Agorism check out this exchange between Rothbard (Konkin on Libertarian Strategy) and Konkin’s response (Reply to Rothbard).

Agora! Anarchy! Action!

Click here to order!

Today (July 8th) is Samuel E. Konkin III birthday, he would have been 63, in memoriam I posted a great audio version of his classic work ‘New Libertarian Manifesto’, with text included. The video is narrated by Mike Gogulski [www.nostate.com].

Free download of SEK III’s New Libertarian Manifesto in .pdf form.

New Libertarian Manifesto — The 25th Anniversary Edition, by Samuel Edward Konkin III (1947-2004), brings the groundbreaking work back into print. First published in October, 1980, the Manifesto is the most concise treatise on Counter-Economics and Agorism available to the public. Five chapters encompass Konkin’s unique view of libertarianism: I. Statism: Our Condition; II. Agorism: Our Goal; III. Counter-Economics: Our Means; IV. Revolution: Our Strategy; and V. Action: Our Tactics. The 25th Anniversary Edition is the fourth printing of the book, which has been an underground anarchist classic. Also included in this edition are critiques of New Libertarian Manifesto by Murray N. Rothbard, Ph.D., Robert LeFevre, and Erwin S. Strauss, and replies by Samuel Edward Konkin III, which were published in Strategy of the New Libertarian Alliance in 1981 and long out of print until now.

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Agora! Anarchy! Action!