The Practice of Defensive Voting

As an Anarcho-Capitalist, I’m frequently informed by my social peers that voting is wrong, as it is just the majority imposing their will on the minority, and therefore just civilized violence.

One of the cornerstones of the Libertarian Non-Aggression Principle (NAP) is the right of self-defense. That is, if someone is trying to steal from you, or make you to comply with their will using force, you have the right to defend yourself and your property.

If that’s true in the individual sense, is it any different in the collective sense?

If a plurality of voters is seeking to either pick my pocket or restrict my liberty via the ballot box, isn’t that just not another form of violence? And do I not have the right (even obligation) to defend myself?

I may-or-may-not derive some supposed benefit from the legislation, but it’s always asserted that “society” will certainly prosper! But this pre-supposes an outcome that is rarely measured, and the long-term effects which are never considered.

Let me give you an example from our most recent ballot, City of Tacoma Proposition 1.

The proposition would raise sales taxes a mere .1%, raising $5 million over a period of 7 years that would be devoted to spreading benefits focused on arts, culture, science and heritage programs. These would be primarily targeted towards creating public school programs, and weighted in proportion to students receiving free and reduced lunch (58% as of 2017). Sounds good, right?

Keep in mind that all these areas of instruction were commonly available in schools prior to No Child Left Behind. Another federal program with good intentions (and funding) that forced conformity across the nation and was eventually replaced with one slightly less restrictive, but the damage was done. Now class time is predominately devoted to increasing scores in reading, math, and science, to comply with state and federal guidelines to the neglect of all the soft-skills which they are only now acknowledging as truly important to childhood development.

So, now the City is trying to rectify a problem that they themselves created due to being incentivized by the all-mighty state and federal dollar, and doing so at additional cost to the taxpayers. Now multiply this type of problem across thousands of cities, each voting on dozens of initiatives every year, and you begin to see that it’s become nothing more than institutionalized theft. But it’s for the children!

1% tax hike here, another 2% there. The cost of a cup of coffee here, the price of a movie there. Surely it’s not too much of a sacrifice if it’s “justified” for safety, security, children, culture, and health. When does the forced fleecing end? When you are naked and freezing on the side of the road? (But you’ll get “free healthcare” so it’s good for you!)

In the past, I did end up voting for the legalization of marijuana and the removal of the monopoly on alcohol distribution by the State of Washington, but both those came with onerous taxes that serve to strengthen the state bureaucracy by feeding it tons of cash. I figured restoration of liberty even with a level of servitude is better than nothing. There are a lot of businesses prospering and people staying out of jail because of it.

Your best bet, and the only one that is fair and consistent with the NAP, is to vote against any incursion by legislators or bureaucrats that takes your money by force or fraud, and curbs your natural rights.

Here’s what you should be voting against in the Washington State and Pierce County November, 2018 General Election:

Washington State:

  • Initiative Measure 1631 (Carbon Tax) – a horrible piece of regressive taxation that will have no measurable improvement on emissions, but will create a huge cash cow ($2,305,470,073) for bureaucrats to buy influence and votes.
  • Initiative Measure No 1639 – another horrible piece of legislation that will make the majority of gun owners into felons if they don’t comply. Redefines a standard semi-automatic rifle as an “assault rifle”, and requires gun registration with local law enforcement.

Pierce County:

  • City of Tacoma: Proposition 1 – Tacoma Creates
  • Pierce County Rural Library District: Special Election Proposition 1: Levy Lid Lift
  • Town of Eatonville: Advisory Vote No. 1 – Recreational Marijuana Businesses
  • Gig Harbor: Special Election – Proposition 1 – Sales and Use Tax for Transportation Improvements
  • Bethel School District No. 403 – Special Election Proposition No. 1 – General Obligation Bonds $443,000,000
  • East Pierce Fire & Rescue – Special Election – Proposition No. 1 – General Obligation Bonds $80,000,000
  • Fire Protection District No. 6 – Proposition No. 1 – Six-Year Levy Lid Lift
  • Fire Protection District No. 17 – Proposition No. 1 & No. 2 – Six-Year Levy Lid Lift

Gun Shop Owner Stands to Challenge Obama on Second Amendment

Homeland Insecurity Status AlertsCreating conflict. It’s what politicians do. Pointing the finger at the supposed boogeyman and saying “HERE! THIS IS THE CAUSE OF ALL YOUR WOES!”, and crying out for more power under the rubric of “safety”.

“I just came from a meeting today in the situation room in which I’ve got people who we know have been on ISIL websites living here in the United States…and we’re allowed to put them on the no-fly list when it comes to airlines, but because of the National Rifle Association, I cannot prohibit those people from buying a gun,” Obama said.

Do you see the problems with the above quotation? Let me spell it out for you:

1) They can add you to a no-fly list simply for visiting a website. This means that without being accused and convicted of a crime, you can lose your right to travel unmolested by government. That is exactly the opposite of rights expressly spelled out in the Constitution.

2) The NRA is painted as the bad guy simply for insisting (in a court of law) that the Federal Government be subject to the limitations placed upon it by the Constitution and specifically the 2nd Amendment. Somehow “they” are the evil ones.

Where does it end? Where does it ever end? 100 new laws? 1000? 10,000? When will the slew of laws, regulations, licenses, mandates, executive orders, fines, penalties, restrictions, public humiliations, etc., etc. ad nauseam, bring about the perfect society?

And when will the American People grow tired of electing demagogues who promise everything and deliver nothing of value?

Source: Gun Shop Owner Stands to Challenge Obama on Second Amendment — Listen Closely to the President’s Response | Video | TheBlaze.com

Don’t Be Fooled by the Political Game: The Illusion of Freedom in America

The shaping of the will of Congress and the choosing of the American president has become a privilege reserved to the country’s equestrian classes, a.k.a. the 20% of the population that holds 93% of the wealth, the happy few who run the corporations and the banks, own and operate the news and entertainment media, compose the laws and govern…

Continue Reading:

Source: Don’t Be Fooled by the Political Game: The Illusion of Freedom in America – The Future of Freedom Foundation

Want to Sabotage Bad Laws? Healthy Contempt is More Important Than Legal Strategy. – Hit & Run : Reason.com

Want to maintain your rights as expressed in the U.S. Constitution? You need to get active opposing bad laws NOW. That oppression you are promised will come? It will come under the guise of and color of LAW. It will be enforced by a thousand layers of bureaucracy. It will ultimately take your lifestyle, if not your life.

Want to Sabotage Bad Laws? Healthy Contempt is More Important Than Legal Strategy. – Hit & Run : Reason.com.

But the key to rendering stupid laws irrelevant isn’t a clever strategy, it’s an overall attitude of defiance that comes up with new creative strategies after the first ones have been countered and flows around enforcement efforts like an ocean of fuck-you.

DOJ, FBI acknowledge flawed testimony from unit: report – NY Daily News

DOJ, FBI acknowledge flawed testimony from unit: report - NY Daily News

Between recent revelations of rampant evidence planting by local law enforcement, unconstitutional asset forfeitures, and now revelations of 20 years of false testimony by DOJ and FBI, you have no reason to believe that there is anything like criminal justice remaining in America.

Twenty-six of the 28 examiners overstated forensic matches in ways that favored prosecutors in more than 95 percent of the 268 trials reviewed so far, the Post reported Saturday, citing information from the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and the Innocence Project.

DOJ, FBI acknowledge flawed testimony from unit: report – NY Daily News.