This article, Public Goods Fallacies: False Justifications For Government, from Faré is dedicated to debunking some myths about why the government is necessary, particularly with regards to having it's hands in the economic pot.#

The Public Goods theory is the idea that some services or goods must be provided by some central organization who will look out for the public's interest and the public's benefit. Of course, the core of Libertarianism is that a private solution can always be found and will always be better.

Unhappily, many libertarians concede some "public goods" to the statists, but then they are on a slippery slope, for there is no reason to stop the public goods argument to any particular service. To paraphrase Emile Faguet: minarchists are libertarians who do not have the courage to accept the full consequences of their ideas; anarchists are uncompromising libertarians. Indeed, using arguments of the "public goods" type, government can intervene into just any domain — and once it does, it will make sure that the domain is so messed up that, by the same argument, it will have to extend its grasp over it until the domain is both completely under its control and completely messed up. But of course, intervention is based on the premise that government intervention is useful, to begin with — and this is precisely the point that statists posit as a petition of principle; it is precisely the point that needs to be disputed.

Faré also eloquently differentiates between government as an organization of force and a monopoly of force. The second case is what most people mean and is the immoral and unproductive one, the first will always exist and is okay. It is okay because one can opt-out and thus it will always exist for the mutual benefit of its members.

The first fallacy is that of externalities, that some activities cause "accidental" problems or benefits to people who are not formally engaged in the activity. Examples are pollution from factories that harm communities. Faré writes that the problem is really that the communities' property rights were not respected in the first place and that this can be extended to any externality.

Actually, governments create new externalities. Indeed, an externality always corresponds to either the lack of definition of a formal property right, or to the lack of enforcement of an existing property right, or to the contradictory enforcement of overlapping property rights. In as much as governments coercively impose their monopoly on the definition and enforcement of new and old property rights, they are the cause of any lasting externality. Governments prevent the use of natural mechanisms by which property rights emerge and externalities disappear: homesteading and the common law.

An example private solution that I can think of for the externality of water pollution would be for the polluting factory to have to negotiate with all the owners of property on the waterfront. These people may be organized, but they may not, and it is not a problem if one refuses to agree to contamination--what right does someone else have over your health?

 

The second fallacy comes from Game Theory, that many services and goods are most efficiently produced or practiced when they are properly coordinated. While Libertarians like Faré do not reject the notion of coordination, he explains the benefit and why it is desirable, they do however reject the monopoly of government in coordination. Faré frames coordination as a service, and like any service there should be a market for different coordinators of difference skill. But like any market dominated by a de jure monopolist, the result will not be best for the consumers,

Let us now consider the case of government as a coordinator. Just like any private service provider — for government is made of private individuals, just like any institution — government is a player that will maximize its interests. The only thing that distinguishes government from a free market coordinator is that government detains the means of coercion, with which it can exclude or discourage any competing service providers. Thus, in equilibrium, a government will monopolize the coordination of a game; it will then reap off most benefits of the game, leaving the players with just what it takes for them to make the game profitable. In an opt-in situation, where people have the choice to either call for government coordination or relinquish coordination, the government will leave to the players barely more profits than the ambient marginal interest rate (with respect to stakes invested in the game) — and that only if this cooperation proves profitable to all concerned despite the monopoly cost of government. Things are much worse, in an opt-out situation, where a government can coerce people into accepting its protection services for some pattern of services. In such situation, government will not only reap out all the benefits of coordination, but will also go further and charge a surcharge that makes players worse off than if they had not played.

So in fact, game theory does not support government, but the Statist will try to blind you with its faux authority of numbers, rather than use it to show the truth.

 

The often central theory of "Public Goods" is that they are different from Private Goods in that their use cannot be restricted and are by very definition public in all sense. Faré refers to this as the "Impossibility to Exclude" Fallacy. It is a fallacy because the non-excludable property is the justification of the use of government force to exclude some from its use. Some might say that the only effect control is then by the government and armed forces, but...

Maybe exclusion is indeed impossible without the use of armed force, but the only reason why the use of armed forces seems impossible without government is because the premise that government should have a monopoly on the use of armed force was silently posited, from the outset, in a hugely circular reasoning: government should have a monopoly on some goods, because it has the monopoly of force — which original sin of a monopoly is admitted as necessary without justification. Once again, the government is supposed to be made of superior people, or to have some magic pixie dust, that enables it to do what is admitted to be impossible to mere mortals. And once again, we find that in the end, the magic pixie dust is nothing but the power of legal coercion.

It seems to me that the vast majority of situations where private solutions are ignored comes from the learned laziness of certain people. These people are constantly told by the government and social norms that they are not responsible or intelligent and must always be told what to do by the Boss--either a government official or a government sponsored "expert." The government claims itself as the only solution to these problems--and why would it not? It serves itself, not the people.

 

Next is the Catastrophe-Prevention Fallacy, that the government is the only organization of suitable power to repair an industry that has been faced with a great failure. Now, either that industry is not desirable by the people, and thus should not exist because no one is willing to pay for it. Or, it is desirable and something has been keeping the people from supporting it for their own benefit. This implies a de jure monopoly imparted by the government to a particular group in an industry that then fails. Upon this fall the government must find a new champion and source of profit. This is the reality of Catastrophe-Prevention and it should be enough to stop it flat out.

 

One of my most loathed fallacy that it warms my heart to see debunk is that of "The Collective Will." The idea is that certain things are good in theory, and thus we should want them, but in practice we don't actually want them and need to be forced to support them. This corresponds to the government saying one thing is the will of the country when there is in fact no consensus and possibly minority support to begin with.

For instance, in democracies, "the people" is to be coerced to do what it is alleged to want to do but is blatantly admitted to not want at all, to begin with (or else, it wouldn't need to be coerced). Indeed, if, say, 50.1% of the population wanted to fund this or this other insurance, charity, research project, army, etc. then there's no doubt that said insurance, charity, research project, army, etc., will be abundantly funded, without the need for coercion. In a free society, each of the "public" goods that a majority of the people want to fund, and even those goods that only a minority wants to fund, will be funded, by people who care, confiding their money to people that they — caring people — deem able to best provide these goods. That is, each "public good", charity, or whatever, will be controlled by those responsible people who are most interested in it. In contrast, in a democracy, these goods are actually controlled by a class of politicians and public administrators, who are not checked by people who do care, but by a vast mass of people who don't care; most people are disinterested in any particular "public good" or charity, and won't vote for one of the two main parties (those who have a chance of making a government) based on any particular issue. Finally, the knowledge that they will have to pay for something on which they have little control anyway makes them cease to care: they are made irresponsible, deprived from any will, by the very system that claims legitimacy from their responsibility and their will.

Even if you do not aspect Libertarianism full on, it would seem easy to me to apply this idea to political campaigns. Rather than the money and monopoly power a few trying to seduce and confuse the people into supporting a particular candidate, a candidate should provide information about themselves and an avenue to get word to that candidate. The candidate should then find the policies that the most people desire and then support those--rather than trying to coerce or confuse the populous into supporting a policy they do not want at all. You can taste this abhorrent style clearly in the way that the two major political parties in America play off each other: the Democrats try to convince that the Republicans are evil and that they must be supported or else; and vice-versa. This renders a situation where it is considered naïve to actual vote for who you want and you should instead vote against who you do not want.

This is not a democracy that serves the people. It is a government that serves itself.

 

The next public good fallacy is the "Broken Windows Fallacy," which I feel is poorly named--not that I can think of a better, but I think it is non-obvious name. The idea is that there a certain goods that only the government can create and if they were to be created by a private individual they would be criminal. Examples center around the application of force: stopping people on roads, charging fees on them, forcing people to support a war they do not agree with, etc.

The only difference between these criminals and government agents is the official seal, this magic pixie dust that creates legitimacy when it is sprinkled over the worst crimes, including mass killings. Ambrose Bierce, in his The Devil's Dictionary, once characterized this superstition in the case of democracy:

Majority, n.: That quality that distinguishes a crime from a law.

Behind this double-standard is the fallacy of What Is Seen And What Is Not Seen: the statists will count only the "positive effects" of intervention on people who benefit from it and conspicuously forget to count the negative effects on people who suffer from it — because the benefits are concentrated, whereas the cost is spread. Although the fallacy is most often used in this crude form, when confronted to its substance, statists will go a long way toward sweeping their fallacy behind the veil of complexity.

A subtle point: Faré is not saying that these are valuable services that the government is preventing others from carrying out. Instead, he says that they are crimes in essence and the government hides behind is supernaturally granted carte blanche power to call them law.

 

The next fallacy is a blatant attack on the sovereignty of Man, that he is too evil or irresponsible to take care of himself and thus needs the government to take care of him. But of course, the government is made of men and if we grant the Statists that men are inherently evil then there is no reason to that the evil does not get extended and become amplified in government. Faré makes this interesting note:

Libertarians are often unduly reproached to worship a myth of the good savage — quite on the contrary, it is statists who worship the myth of the good statesman. To quote Edward Abbey,

Anarchism is founded on the observation that since few men are wise enough to rule themselves, even fewer are wise enough to rule others.

Actually, it is a common pattern that statists will reproach to libertarians what is actually a blatant failure of their own way of thinking.

 

Another related fallacy is that only the State can be altruistic and the people are completely egoistic. Faré notes that not only is self-care an important component of altruism, but also the government is not a magical source of altruism and in fact:

Thus, altruism, in its mutualistic form, is already included in personal self-interest. Not only cannot government increase total utility by magically unleashing a secret source of altruism in people; but government can and will only act in an altruist way if it is actually controlled by the altruist tendency in people, which must preexist to any altruism by government. Government is not a superhuman source of altruism, but can only give back the human altruism that was successfully put into it. And then again, nothing warranties that this altruism rather than antagonism will dominate the coercitive apparatus of the state. On the contrary, by concentrating coercive power, government is a great incentive for people without scruples to strive toward seizing power, whereas really altruistic people won't partake in the struggle for power.

It is important to consistently underlines the ideas that if organization is truly desirable then people will seek it without coercion. And no amount of illogical and hand-waving will change that.

 

This is an interesting fallacy that is a combination of others: Only the government can consider the long-term effects of actions and thus is the ideal place to create those decisions. As stated in the previous arguments, not only the government can not be any greater than the people who make it up, but also there is a fundamental flaw in the perception of the talents of historic governments.

Thus, contrary to the implicit prejudice behind this fallacy, governments only ever manage things on the short run. Indeed, the horizon of foresight of any political party is the next elective mandate. If ever one politician wanted to see further than the rest, his party would soon remind him of his duties toward it; political parties that do not force politicians to think in the short run get quickly wiped out of significance by parties that do; politicians without a political party simply don't get elected; and since even "good" political parties can't remain in power very long, even if their policies are oriented toward the long term, these policies will be changed with next government. In conclusion, politics mean that whatever is politically managed will be led by short term demagoguery.

I am reminded of something Dave Winer said of Gray Davis' comment about the threat of recall elections being a threat for politicians to never stop campaigning. Dave said something to the effect of, "That is the a fundamental lie. Who does he think he is kidding saying that they are not always campaigning anyways?"

Campaigning constantly is an obvious sign that the government and its composition is only interested in the short-term results of their actions. Namely, more temporal power of their own.

 

A concern that seems central to many Statists is uniformity. That for some reason it is desirable for as many things as possible to be the same and discourage diversity. This is seen in regulation and certification of trades. It is considered a major leap in reason to suggest that because uniformity is sometimes useful it must be applied as often as possible.

However, uniformity is not always good in itself; coercion by governments is neither the only way nor the best way to enforce standards; moreover the domains that standards will optimally regulate are seldom either large or territorial; and most importantly, a system of coercion hampers the very discovery of which better standards should be commonly adopted and enforced, because it destroys the points of comparison, neglects most opinions save that of the authority and its lobbyists, and prevents dynamic adjustment to varying and evolving individual circumstances.

When uniformity is desirable, it will be sought naturally by private forces and will be best encouraged rather than coerced.

Liberty and Responsibility are the only possible warranty that people will choose to obey good laws rather than bad laws. Peaceful persuasion through rhetorics filtered by critical reasoning and demonstrable benefits is the only way that good habits, good laws, and good institutions can be durably spread among the population, while at the same time discarding bad habits, bad laws and bad institutions.

 

Any interesting point that Faré makes is that any collectivist scheme contains an essential fallacy, that if this is such a good idea then why not apply it universally and as broadly as possible?

Indeed, why collectivize or not collectivize, say, "toilet paper"? Isn't there but a more specific need to collectivize "green soft toilet paper in 5 inch wide rolls sold under a brand the name of which ends with an S"? (After all, some company may very well have a dangerous monopoly on these!) Or why isn't there instead a need to collectivize production of all paper? Why collectivize at the scale of Great Britain? Why not collectivize at a smaller scale, say Westminster or the block next door? Or at a larger scale, say Northern Eurasia, or our quadrant of the Milky Way? And why collectivize it on a geographical scale at all? Why not collectivize for people whose name begin with an "R", or who wear black socks?

It seems to me that this exposes the power-hunger of collectivists. They seek to control at the greatest scale they can. They recognize that they could control a scale greater than a neighbor and thus seek to do so. At the same time, they recognize that they would like to control an entire continent but sadly cannot directly--instead they try to influence with imperialism and colonialism. What this suggest to me is that these people are fundamentally and unmistakably greedy but recognize the volatility of the system the support, so they take what they can safely get.

I think this point was made clear in George Orwell's 1984 when there was not one totalitarian government controlling the world, but two that cooperated. Each knew that they could not be larger and that they needed the other.

I can't decide if the fear they have is good or bad because on one hand it would nice for them to be arrogant and seek to control everything, but on the other it gives up hope that they know as well as we that their system cannot last.

 

Final words...

In each case we saw, some "problem" without solution was described, followed by the non sequitur claim that government is useful and necessary as the only (or best) possible solution to said problem. Actually, government was not a solution to any of these problems, and could only be seen as such based on a one-sided view of government: a view that insists on the visible benefits of government action, but that doesn't take into account the costs associated to any government action, and the costs of ensuring that government will act in the interest of the people rather than to their detriment. Government is supposed to be a magic wand that bestows services at no cost, directed by some godly will above the failures of mankind — but it isn't.

This article, From Far Right to Far Left -- and Farther -- With Karl Hess, originally appeared in The New York Times Magazine in December 1970. It was written by James Boyd.#

This article covers Libertarianism, as if you would have been surprised, and particularly focuses on Karl Hess--a former speech and platform writer for Richard Nixon and Barry Goldwater--who laid the foundation of the vocal portion of the New Right.

The Hess platform for 1970 is a blueprint for resistance to authority: don't pay taxes; don't submit to the draft; don't move out when the government condemns your neighborhood in the name of eminent domain; pay no attention to permits, licenses or craft certificates; hide political prisoners; support all who resist — whether it be Vivien Kellems, Rhody McCoy or the Panthers.

"The revolution occurs," Hess says, "when the victims cease to cooperate."

There is an interesting bit about the nature of politics and the distorted image that the government tries to paint of anarchists and believes in true Liberty.

Behind his post-Republican beard, Hess is a smiling, soft-voiced sympathetic-eyed man, broad-shouldered in the sturdy blue shirt of a laborer. He exudes that ethereal, inexplicable cheerfulness of a nun scrubbing floors, a gentility that is unsettling; we expect our anarchists to be glittery-eyed bomb-throwers because we get our ideas about them from politicians, whose attitudes sour upon discovering there would be no place for politicians in Utopia.

"Politics has always been the institutionalized way for some men to live off the output of other men," Hess says. "Politics devour men; a laissez-faire world will liberate them."

An interesting note about his growing up...

And there was the matter of his education. Long before he was of school age, Karl's mother taught him to read. "She had a rule. Before I got a toy, I must read a book. Before I got to kindergarten, I had read H. G. Wells' 'Outline of History.'"

Someone whose blog I read wrote something very similar and wasn't sure about the benefits of doing this. Unfortunately I can't seem to find the link because I didn't link to it when I read it. Bummer.

"At age 5 or 6, a child is introduced to the stupidities of state compulsion. School on these terms is a challenge not to learn anything, and most kids rise to the challenge."

His tactic in quitting school foreshadowed the nonviolent resistance he now advocates as the citizen's proper stance toward the demands of government. Instead of just not showing up, he enrolled in two high schools; then at each school he filed transfer papers to the other. "They never caught on. A bureaucracy is always inefficient; the bigger it gets the more vulnerable it is to clerical sabotage. Instead of learning how to make bombs, revolutionaries should master computer programming."

THAT is fantastic.

The reasons behind Karl Hess' political awakening and the realization of its corruption is still as real today as it was then.

Some of us should not be allowed too close a look at our electoral process. For most, such exposure destroys only innocence, but for Hess it destroyed faith. It was not the defeat, he insists, or the temporary exile from party favor suffered by those associated with that defeat. Such bruises hurt, but conservatives were accustomed to losing elections and Hess was used to re-establishing himself afterwards. Certainly it was not disillusion with Barry Goldwater, whom Hess continued to serve and still regards as the most admirable of politicians, because he is the least political. What lingered on was the dawning conclusion that our politics is based on lies. All of us suspect this at one time or another, but with Hess the impact was deeper and began to spread, like an infection or a revelation, questioning all of his past allegiances.

Many people are happy to believe that the government is good for them and that the election really puts those that people want into power. But not only does that power serve only itself, its self-serving quality creates an election process that elects from its own and attempts to ignore or marginalize the contributions of the people.

This is the battle that is being fought today with the Internet.

More on the realization that the political parties were for the same thing and the so-called "conservatives" were not really interested in conserving the ideology of the foundation but in conversing the social boundaries and standings of the elite.

"The subsidies [a conservative] was against were subsidies to poor people. I saw that conservatism in practice was shot through with that sort of thing. Conservatives reject the state as an instrument of beneficence but revere it as an instrument of chastisement. They would deny the Federal Government certain controls over people at the state level, which they say is more effective. This means that conservatives support the coercion of individuals at the most effective level!"

Many seem to think that Anarchists and Libertarians believe that any organization at all is essentially immoral, that is simply in correct. It is not organization that is evil, it is government--an organization whose membership is mandatory and eternal.

"Anarchy is merely the lack of institutional authority," he says. "There will always be 'government' in terms of voluntary, social organizations formed to do specific things — putting out fires, protection against thieves, different kinds of schools. If you want the service, you support it and participate; if you don't want it, nobody can make you use it or pay for it. Why should anyone have permanent authority over you and your kids merely because they provide certain services?"

Final words...

what is certain is that libertarianism has many more obstacles in its path than Goldwaterism ever did. Hess understands this better than anyone, and since he does, perhaps he'll survive the bitterness and the pitfalls after all. He has laid it all out in his own words:

"Libertarianism is rejected by the modern left — which preaches individualism but practices collectivism. Capitalism is rejected by the modern right — which preaches enterprise but practices protectionism. The libertarian faith in the mind of men is rejected by religionists who have faith only in the sins of man. The libertarian insistence that men be free to spin cables of steel as well as dreams of smoke is rejected by hippies who adore nature but spurn creation. The libertarian insistence that each man is a sovereign land of liberty, with his primary allegiance to himself, is rejected by patriots who sing of freedom but also shout of banners and boundaries. There is no operating movement in the world today that is based upon a libertarian philosophy. If there were, it would be in the anomalous position of using political power to abolish political power."

Faré wrote this article, White Magic vs. Black Magic as a prelude to a longer essay, Government is the Rule of Black Magic. First I will read this one and then the second.#

The core of the article is that having faith in the State, which promises that after it takes everything from you it will give it back and treat you well, is very similar to having faith in Black Magic or illogic.

That's the principle of black magic: to expect miracles, happiness, success, redemption from failures, etc., from external and superior entities that feed from the humiliation of those who voluntarily make sacrifices to them and who reduce unbelievers to subjection, from spirits that rejoice from one's destruction of oneself and other people, from gods that demand one's contempt for oneself and other people, from supernatural beings with unlimited powers and arbitrary desires that are not bound by any law knowable by reason but are meant to be influenced by a show of feelings from their humiliated followers. In short, this black magic consists in the irresponsible tying of one's hope of future satisfactions to the whim of external and superior intervening powers.

In contrast to this is what Faré calls White Magic, the ideals that promote knowledge and understandable laws that people are free to make or break. Rather than being forced on their knees in worship and adoration of the all-powerful divinities, the would-be servants are assured of their own responsibility and free will. They are respected as individuals and not just numbered masses worshiping the feet of some deity.

Prayer in black magic is passivity and destruction, in an attitude of humiliation and worship. Prayer in white magic is work and creation, in an attitude of determination and respect. The disciple of black magic does evil with the hope that some good will emerge out of it through a miraculous violation of the laws of nature. The disciple of white magic does good by consenting an effort appraised as the least evil according to the laws of nature. Priests of black magic invoke authority as the source of knowledge, and claim that the ways of their gods are unfathomable to anyone but them. Priests of white magic propose conjectures that are subject to the open review of everyone's reason and experience, and gaining insight into their divinities is the very essence of their religious practice. Priests of black magic extend their cult by subjecting the infidels to their creed, by humiliating and degrading other people. Priests of white magic extend their religion by subjecting their beliefs to the criticism of other people, by freeing and bettering themselves. Believers of black magic are the slaves of their gods. Believers of white magic are the masters of their gods.

While these distinctions exist in religions, and coexist as Faré notes, they can also be extended into any institution. At the core of every organization or institution are a set of values which place importance in the members themselves--or in their contributions. A group that admires the sacrifice of the individual in favour of the mass is one that worships in the style of Black Magic. Opposing this are those who seek to better themselves and realize that this is often done most efficiently when working together. But, they do not work together and sacrifice sovereignty for the sake of itself--organization is a tool that can be used for good or evil, not an end unto itself.

This is the distinction between different forms of government as well. Communism and other forms of Totalitarian governments seek to sacrifice the individual while the Libertarian ideal praises the eternal free will and sole of the self. A dictatorship is always immoral and wrong, no matter how many authorize it.

I imagine that this is the direction that Government is the Rule of Black Magic knowing Faré and his ideological leanings.

This article by Stan Lehr and Louis Rossetto Jr. originally appeared in The New York Time Magazine in January 1971.#

Libertarianism sprung up when the groups and philosophies that once help up it's values--freedom--had become corrupted and distorted. Someone needed to pick up the pieces and return to the enlightenment of freedom.

Prominent conservatives have been making a great deal of noise about violence in the streets. Yet many of these champions of law and order could scarcely contain their glee last May when club-wielding construction workers waded into a peaceful demonstration in New York City and began to pummel antiwar protesters.

Radical activists continue to lament that they are being oppressed by a fascist system. Yet at college campuses under their de facto control, students who disagree with the radicals have been threatened and in some cases assaulted by goon squads.

It is no wonder that so many young people seem to be losing interest in politics. Liberalism, conservatism and leftist radicalism are all bankrupt philosophies. The only question at issue among their adherents is which gang of crooks and charlatans is to rule society, and for what noble purpose. The question of whether an individual should be ruled at all — and, if so, to what extent — is almost never discussed. Freedom of the individual is considered obsolete as a political issue.

The article talks about how the old conservatives and the true conservatives had many issues learning to live with each other and understand the true values of the country.

At the final showdown between the libertarian and traditionalist factions, the 1969 convention of the so-called Young Americans for Freedom — from which many libertarians had been purged — William F. Buckley reportedly announced that his conservative philosophy was the true libertarianism, that the libertarians who disagreed with this philosophy were irresponsible libertines. Jerome Tuccile recounts the incident in "Radical Libertarianism; A Right-Wing Alternative":

"Another interesting fact... is Mr. Buckley's attitude on the question of freedom. In his speech he mentioned that freedom is for those who agree to live within the framework of our traditions."

"Here, precisely, is the mystical element in the conservative mentality which has pushed conservatives so far apart from their former allies: the notion that freedom is a gift to be dispensed among our worthy citizens by a moralistic government. The anarchists claim that freedom is a natural right, and if the state denies it to its citizens they have a right to seize it themselves."

Before we examine the libertarian philosophy closely, it is instructive to note that with the departure of the libertarian wing from the conservative movement, conservatism has become what the left was calling it all along — a defense of the status quo. Conservatives have virtually ceased talking about changing the system, but rather are concentrating almost exclusively on protecting it from the onslaught of left radicalism. The only issues conservatives do seem to be discussing are law and order and the need for pressing on with the cold war.

The article quotes Karl Hess in "The Death of Politics,"

" If it were not for the fact that libertarianism freely concedes the right of men voluntarily to form communities or governments on the same ethical basis, libertarianism could be called anarchy."

Conservatives, liberals and left radicals are all statists — they all believe that the individual should be subservient to the state. All would like to scoff at libertarianism as something reactionary. Yet statism in one from or another has been the status quo virtually throughout history. It is statism that is reactionary; libertarianism is the only progressive, even radical, alternative available.

In talking about economics and the failures of statist economy schemes, the libertarian economic ethic--laissex-faire capitalism--shines.

Liberals and the New Left admit that these problems are the result of economic mismanagement, the misallocation of resources. The solution they propose is the "proper" allocation of resources through the "competent" management of the economy — the capacity for which they obviously reserve for themselves. Aside from being a restatement of the statist ethic that the state should exercise control over the economy and retain the power to control an individual's life, this "solution" is self-contradictory. The state cannot manage the economy "competently," it can only create distortions. Moreover, it cannot "correct" distortions it has already made — it can only create new distortions. In "Man, Economy and State," Murray Rothbard explains why the state cannot successfully manage an economy:

"... [the] state, deprived of the real market and its determination of the prices of producers' goods, cannot calculate and can therefore run a productive system only in chaotic fashion."

Laissez-faire capitalism is the only answer to the chaos statist economics has brought to the world. Through the free market — the only real determinant of consumer need and desire — laissez-faire capitalism produces sustained, natural economic growth. Those who prosper are those who can satisfy consumer demands. Exchanges are made only on the basis of mutual benefit; no one is forced to pay for the construction of a road, the purchase of a bureaucrat's typewriter or the maintenance of a rope company in Massachusetts or tea tasters in New York.

How will this new future present itself? In the 70s it was as unsure as it is today--except that we know it will happen eventually because Man strives for fresh air.

As for the question of means, revolution and working through the system are not necessarily contradictory or mutually exclusive. Libertarian revolutionists realize that a revolution that will bring freedom can be built only by engaging the support of the people through a long period of sustained education. On the other hand, those who advocate working in the system realize that only a revolutionary change (sic) in attitudes and institutions can ultimately bring about the libertarian ideal. Again, each side would be more than happy if the other's formula were to succeed.

John F. Kennedy, one of the leading reactionaries of the sixties, is remembered for his famous line, "Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country." Today, more and more young people are instead following the advice of David Friedman: "Ask not what government can do for you... ask rather what government is doing to you." When Friedman's remark is as widely known and as enthusiastically received as Kennedy's, the libertarian movement will be well on its way toward the liberation of the United States.