Re: The Inducement of Rapid Oxidation of Certain Materials in or Near Government Buildings

[jimbell@pacifier.com (Jim Bell)]

At 19:34 5/13/97 -0700, Kent Crispin wrote:
>On Mon, May 12, 1997 at 05:15:24PM -0400, Duncan Frissell wrote:
>>Governments have murdered 170 million people since 1900.  My
>>back-of-the-envelope estimate is that the civilians of the world have only
>>murdered about 20 million people in the same period of time.  Quite a
>>disparity.
>
>Your estimate seems high to me.  But it is meaningless, in any case.

This isn't the first time you've called information that is detrimental to
your position words equivalent to "meaningless."  I suppose that's easier
than disproving the other person's claim, or proving your own.  

>First of all, it neglects to consider that governments may have 
>prevented more murders than they caused.  This is unknowable, since 
>we don't have any worthwhile control cases.

Your position is laughable.  Statistics on murder rates are knowable for
many countries.  Studying the murder rate for those countries will at least
provide a range against which deaths due to government-caused wars can be
compared.  

>Second, such cases of civil breakdown aside, all humans, for now and
>for the conceivable future, live within the context of some kind of
>government.  The option of non-government simply doesn't exist. 

That's precisely what the governments and their agents want us to believe.
Minarchism is certainly possible, and at the risk of appearing to blow my
own AP-horn, it is indeed plausible that the public can take down all
governments in a reasonably straightforward fashion.  The fact that
governments will strongly dislike this option is no reason to not consider
the possibility.


> The 
>issue is how can governments be improved.


By eliminating them, of course.

>Third, murders caused by governments can't really be separated from
>murders caused by individuals.  That is, in many cases deciding
>whether a murder is a personal action or a government action is
>impossible. 

"Aye vas joost vollowink orderz!"

Sorry, we're still laughing at you.

>Fourth, it's fashionable in these circles to paint all governments
>with the same brush, but in fact, some are much better than others.  
>But it only takes one bad one to start a war.  Furthermore, human 
>motivations are complex and irrational, so wars are started for 
>essentially insane reasons.  This is a human problem, not a problem 
>of government.

No, quite the contrary.  Considered from the perspective of the cumulative
interests of society, wars are not beneficial or "profitable."  Only from
the very limited viewpoint of the military-industrial complex and government
employees does war appear to be a net benefit, and that's true only because
the interests of most of the population (on whom the effect of war is a net
negative) is ignored.  The reason war occurs is that the decision to have a
war is made not by society as a whole, but by that tiny fraction which profits.

Put the decision to have the war back into the hands of the population as a
whole, and war will decrease.  Give the public the option to make war upon
the government parasites infesting their own land, and war will end forever.

>[Parenthetically, it is absolutely amazing to me that he and
>practically everyone on this list just seems to assume McVeigh is
>guilty...do they know something I don't?]

For the purposes of most of the arguments we make, the identity of the
actual bomber is irrelevant.


Jim Bell
jimbell@pacifier.com