The Present in Plain Text

Barry Bonds and the State

That's the title of my latest article, which runs today at LewRockwell.com and attempts to put all the controversy surrounding Barry Bonds's new home run record in perspective.

Damn Lew Rockwell.com Damn them all to Hell!!!

This post at the LRC blog made me howl in both delight and nostalgia, b/c something terribly similar happened to me:

"You’re turning me into a ^&%$#(*& libertarian," writes Don Brunel on his blog.

"I really must complain about the changes in both my psyche and my thinking being wrought only because I have been spending more time these days on your website. Reading its authors. Weighing their arguments. Trying, usually unsuccessfully, to refute their logic.

[snippage]

..."Please, Mr. Rockwell, stop producing such thought-provoking columns and putting them on line for staid senior citizens like myself to find. If you are capable of changing the thought patterns of somebody nearing seventy, only consider how much damage you can do to the thinking of, say, an impressionable college student or twenty-something. The thought is frightening."

... or thirty-somethings who still acted like they were 20-somethings.  One day you discover anarcho-capitalism, the next day you are one. 

It's a terrible thing to wake up one morning and realize that you're a hypocrite.  And not just a hypocrite, but an arrogant, self-righteous hypocrite, who sneakily knew all along that there was something terribly wrong with the way he viewed things and that maybe, just maybe all the bad things that kept happening to you were *gasp* your fault. 

That's what becoming a libertarian did to/for me.  Humbling really.  Humbling, but necessary.  I owe Lew Rockwell and the other denizens there a lot.  It looks like maybe one of these days Don Brunel will too.  And, if you want to know why the Ron Paul Revolution is gaining steam, you can look no further than the paragraphs quoted above.  For once you take the red pill and jack out of wonderland, you are left only with yourself and the knowledge of what you have to do next.

Ta,

LRC -- Ron Paul’s American Education

Karen DeCoster's article this morning on LRC is, for me, one of the more readable things she's produced in a long time. While I have a great deal of respect for her and her perspective, I've noticed a tendancy in recent years for her towards a dismissive and reactionary tone that, personally, was a real turn off.  It's hard to maintain a respectful and objective perspective when you immerse yourself in the kind of criticism that people like us engage in.  It's easy to succumb to that after you've repeated yourself a thousand times, knowing your analysis is mostly correct ( or, at least, more correct than those you're speaking to) and still the world continues to hurtle towards a government-sponsored abyss. In common parlance that's called 'burn-out.'

That is only just part of the reason why I took a couple of years off from writing about these things, deciding instead to spend my time wiritng about something else that I love nearly as much (Hockey).  I figured if I didn't have the patience to treat my audience with any respect then why should they treat me with any?  Moreover, those that were still reading already agree with me, so, what then is the purpose of continuing to write other than to build a cult of peronality?

"Words are being spoken but communication has not been acheived," is a common refrain in my social circle.  If I'm not interested in communicating with anyone who doesn't agree with me then why not just talk to the wall or the mirror?  The effect is really the same.  In my mind, Ms. DeCoster's work had fallen into this category which is why the article this morning was so refreshing to read.  It almost seemed to me like she was awed by Dr. Paul's ability to maintain his even-keel and humility despite decades of being ignored, reviled, ridiculed and worse. 

For him to truly have an effect on the political landscape next year he is going to need to maintain that tone, never losing that humility, never succumbing (as he pointed out to John Stewart on the Daily Show) to being bigger than the message.  Reading Ms. DeCoster's account of her relationship with her father made it all to apparent to me just how much I miss the opportunity to talk with him at this moment in time.  From the article it seems her father is in a difficult place and I hope for both of their sake's that he lives long enough to see Dr. Paul's story through to its conclusion and beyond.

Ta,

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PPT at LRC Again

James Emrick Dean: Executed by the Police State

Congratz go to our Trevor Bothwell for his great article at LRC this morning detailing the slaughter of a depressed and suicidal Afghan vet by the Maryland State Police.  Stories like this one make me physically ill while reading them and I'd like to thank Trevor for having the intestinal fortitude to work through the details with diligence and dispassion.  I know I couldn't do it. 

On the heels of my screed against the Florida Highway Patrol coming in #8 on the LRC's Top 10 list for most viewed stories of last week, let's hope the good readers at LRC see the same value in the story of Jamie Dean.

Ta,