Pushback

Dear Ed,

See, I doubt that’s really the case. I can’t see IP laws as the foundation of the industrial revolution.

I agree.

In fact, a number of free market economists have argued persuasively that “IP” laws have been a serious drag on industrial and economic progress.

How “Intellectual Property” Impedes Competition
SEPTEMBER 23, 2009 by KEVIN A. CARSON
http://www.fee.org/the_freeman/detail/how-intellectual-property-impedes-competition/

Excerpt:

Any consideration of “intellectual property rights” must start from the understanding that such “rights” undermine genuine property rights and hence are illegitimate in terms of libertarian principle. Real, tangible property rights result from natural scarcity and follow as a matter of course from the attempt to maintain occupancy of physical property that cannot be possessed by more than one person at a time.

“Intellectual property,” on the other hand, creates artificial scarcity where it does not naturally exist and can only be enforced by invading real, tangible property and preventing the owner from using it in ways that violate the supposed intellectual property rights of others. As Stephan Kinsella points out, had a particularly gifted Cro-Magnon man been able to patent the building of log cabins, his heirs today would be entitled to prevent us from building cabins on our own land, with our own logs, until we paid whatever tribute they demanded.

Another excerpt from the same article, worth displaying, just in case people don’t get around to following the link.

And copyright is no more necessary for artistic creation than patents are necessary for invention. In the open-source world there are many businesses that manage to make money from auxiliary services even though their content itself is not proprietary.

A business model that isn’t profitable without government intervention should fail.

Dear Tor, Ed,

LOL at your banter!

Ah! There you go Bevin, you made the point I was clumsily attempting earlier.

There IS such a thing as decency; and in a completely free world, I believe it will compensate authors sufficiently.

For example, I regularly throw 20 bucks or so at the Firefox guys; because it’s something I use hours per day and I appreciate it so much I freely give toward it. I’m “paying” voluntarily.

Likewise if someone did what you describe Eric–blatantly ripping you off–I’d be indignant on your behalf and call them out on it, while encouraging others to go to the original site.

Isn’t that what “voluntaryist” means, after all?

Eric remember too, we live in an amoral society. Freedom breeds better morality, because it has survival value. Our present system erodes those finer (and coarser too) morals.

Eric,

Philosophically I am probably more in agreement with you.

One should not profit from the work/labor of another without their consent/permission.

This idea could also be extended into the field of photography.

On a practical level, I am not sure how one can effectively protect one’s work from being used by others for their profit.

I am not sure how many sales would be lost from people taking stuff without paying. In some cases, I would think that people would not buy something if they thought the price as too high. OTOH, if the price was low enough or free they would be willing to get a copy.

There are many books/CDs/DVDs/etc. that I did not buy because I considered the price too high for my situation. If I came across a copy that was at a lower cost to me, I would consider getting it.

When I took classes, I looked online for school books, since the cost was very high and I was trying to save money. I did not care where the book came from so long I could get the book in time for my classes and save some money.

Depending on the product being purchased, I would be willing to purchase something at a higher cost if I perceived I was getting a better value overall (service, quality, etc.) for the money spent.

Back to music: I think part of the reason that many musicians go on tour is due to tours being one way that they can keep much of the money generated.

Music put out through a label gives them a (much) smaller percentage of the money generated.

Dear meth, Eric,

I agree.

Creative people must be fairly compensated.

The question is “How?”

As some of the back and forth suggests, solutions are not beyond reach, and need not be incompatible with liberty.

In any event, I highly recommend the articles at the Molinari Institute website on the non-IP, anti-IP views on copyright and patents.

Dear Eric,

If you’re asking whether I think it’s something “wrong,” that people should not do, I believe I already answered that.

They should not. I know I would not.

I would not, to use your previous example, mirror your website and attempt to profit from it.

But… as we libertarians know better than anyone else, many things that are “bad” or “wrong” must not be made “illegal.”

Many addictive drugs are objectively harmful to human health, but libertarians are pretty much unanimous in their opinion that people must be free to sell them to people willing to buy them.

The issue of “IP” cannot be settled on the basis of whether I or anybody else considers it “bad” or “wrong.”

It must be settled on the basis of whether “intellectual content,” which is non-physical, can legitimately be considered “property.”

Yes, I see your side of it, eric. I see it differently because I don’t actually write for a living. I only meant to speak for myself, and should have said so.

Being a professional writer, you do have a right to seek redress in any way available to you. I really didn’t mean to put it the way I did.

Eric in a pure AnCap, your PDA would enforce your right to your work…IF you belonged to a PDA that did that.

Others might belong to PDA’s that don’t enforce copyright.

Ech…it would be quite interesting.

At the end of the day, I suspect it would Just Work Out; especially considering we’d all be about four times as rich (twice as much money with zero taxes, things cost half as much for the same reason). With that much money, we’d probably be more ethical about “stealing” IP.

Dear Meth, Eric,

“At the end of the day, I suspect it would Just Work Out; especially considering we’d all be about four times as rich.”

I agree!

Whenever in doubt, I never say, “There oughta be a law.”

I always say, “Freedom works. Trust it to work.” People never tolerate unresolved problems. It’s in our nature to seek solutions. We just need to remain free to find them and apply them.

I suspect this “IP” conundrum is only persisting because cloverite controls have frozen the problem in its current semi-free, semi-controlled state, with its copyright laws, patent laws, ambulance chasers, prosecutors, and judges.

Jettison this statist baggage!

Do any of us, especially hardcore market anarchists, really believe the problem would persist, and creative people remain uncompensated?

I don’t.

I always say, “Freedom works. Trust it to work.” People never tolerate unresolved problems.

Yes, exactly! People have been conditioned that government solves problems. That problems are solved through the application of violence. Rid them of that conditioning and better solutions will naturally come into being.

Bevin, once again you provided me with a key piece missing from my thinking. Filled in another gap.

Dear Brent,

Thanks for the kind praise.

As usual, not due to any brilliance on my part.

Merely the application of earnest, even ingenuous common sense reasoning.

It’s funny. All the Rhodes Scholars and Fullbright Scholars purportedly “running the country” can’t (or won’t) figure out what ordinary run of the mill Gen Y supporters of Ron Paul already know — “Those who are governed the least, are governed the best.”

Dear Brent,

Also,

I strongly suspect the solution to the problem of just compensation absent “IP” would simply go away if market forces were given free rein.

The answers are probably not subsumed within the “either/or” alternatives that Eric and I were struggling with.

They’re probably contained within “lateral thinking” that nobody has happened on yet.

That’s one of the difficulties champions of laissez faire, especially market anarchists, constantly face — demands from clovers that we lay out in detail how this or that problem would be solved without the blessings of government.

The fact is, we can’t know for sure. Not in advance. Nobody can.

Privatized road systems, privatized consumer safety measures, privatized reward systems for creators of literary or musical content included.

Dear Eric,

Not to worry.

I for one, have absolutely no doubt about your commitment to natural rights and individual liberty.

I understand completely that this is one of those difficult areas where sincere libertarians can disagree due to their differing understandings of “life, liberty, and property.”

Another such area is abortion. Ron Paul for example, considers the embryo a human being with rights.

I think he’s wrong. I think the embryo is only a future, potential human being. Future, potential, is not current.

But the point is I know Paul is not a clover attempting to rationalize statist tyranny.

Ditto Ayn Rand and “IP.”

The example I gave is someone who purchased books from retail stores in another country and brought them into the USA to sell at a profit. He didn’t make any copies.

The publisher of the text books would sell soft cover editions with B&W photos in foreign countries. In the USA only a hardcover with color was sold by them. Many US students were fine with the lesser edition, just like you prefer a more basic car.

Let’s say GM made this simplified lighter weight version of the camaro and sold it in *roll dice* Saudi Arabia. Let’s say there were no laws blocking importation. Someone imported these camaros to the USA. He purchased them retail overseas fair and square. He’s selling them in the USA. GM sues him.

Who’s side are you on? The importer or GM?

That’s what this case on textbooks is about.

Music artists have been ripped off by the music publishers since the days of sheet music. I vaguely remember reading the story of an early jazz artist who got ripped off by the sheet music publishers. I think it was Jelly Roll Morton but my memory is vague. Key to the story for us car guys was that he had this Lincoln he bought at the height of his career that was about the only thing he had towards the end as battered as old as it was.

I’ll take a step back…

In making/selling products, they are often customized for different markets. What I am discussing is that market customization.

In foreign countries people are poorer and/or cannot get loans to cover educational expenses. Thus they can’t afford the fully loaded textbooks. Thus the market, there being less interfered with, resulted in the textbook publisher selling stripped down, cheaper versions. No hard cover, no color, etc and so on.

It’s the same with a car. It might be, for whatever reason stripped of the hundred airbags and countless other crap. It’s the same car, it is just sold with less stuff. Or it could even be an older model. Say GM still sold the 1970s generation firebird somewhere. It’s done by a lot of companies.

Would you find fault with the importer who brought these products into the USA for resale at profit? He sees a market that the publisher or GM isn’t serving in the USA. So he buys the legitimate product in another market and brings it to the USA for resale.

He’s not copying anything. He’s just buying in one place, hauling it to another and selling it. The product is made by the manufacturer who holds the copyrights and patents. They just don’t sell it that way in the USA.

According to court decisions, this is violation of intellectual property.

Eric I’d like to comment on your example of the Franklin Stove– not just because it’s now possible to duplicate *identically* a physical object, but because the issue of whether or not the item is identical seems to be a problem even with digital media like music, books and films. The problem even occurs with software.

Digital media that are copied are rarely identical and it takes significant labor on the part of the copier to perform the translation. Why shouldn’t the copier take money in compensation for that effort?

Maybe an example is in order. A publisher puts out a DVD format movie. The buyer purchases it, then copies it onto his computer using some copy/library management tool and put the DVD in a box in his attic and never looks at it again.

Under current law, the buyer has committed a Federal Crime and may be subject to 5 years imprisonment and $250,000 in fines. The outfit that wrote the software that conversted the DVD into a format the computer could use is subject to even more sever prosecution. All this for a simple format conversion with no gain on the part of the buyer.

On top of all this, the result of the copy is not an identical duplicate of the original. There’s no point in converting the DVD in the first place if you’re just making an identical copy. The whole reason for making the copy was to convert it to a different format and maybe remove all the junk advertising.

I think you’re probably going to agree that this non-commercial use should be ok, but it isn’t. On top of that, the copied work isn’t identical; value was added by the software developer who wrote the conversion tool, but by law that person can’t offer the product for sale or even give it away.

So the “identical” distinction doesn’t hold up under current IP law. Perhaps there is where the law, which was written by people who wouldn’t understand the difference between a format conversion and a wingnut, is broken.

This is about to become far more troubling in light of three dimensional printing.

Copying in China. I’ve already dealt with this for my work. I’ve designed stuff that within days of shipping there was knock off stuff and accessories in stores in China. (This product’s primary market was China BTW, and is the only made-in-China product I’ve ever had a part of. Sourcing for parts however is always global)

Accessories were a big deal, the look of the product was a big deal too. They could copy the accessories very fast. What did my employer do? Nothing. While there is some sorts of IP law in China there was no doing anything about it.

The product made its money, went through its life cycle, and went out of production. It was followed by the new hot thing in a few months which was in turn followed by something else and so on.

The knockoffs were never quite the same. They were cheapened. Much like pirated music is often badly copied. Where books don’t have the same paper or you’re reading a badly scanned PDF. That’s the reality out there. While it is possible to make an exact copy of the music as an mp3, that’s rarely the case IME. It’s usually degraded somehow. Copiers aren’t much into quality and to even rip a CD right takes attention to detail. By the time you find that good copy out there, you’ve probably used more time than just earning the money to buy the CD would have taken.

I saw on LRC ages ago, someone who was trying to move digital music beyond the over compression of the mp3. Beyond even the CD. He wanted to innovate to bringing better quality to people. And that’s what it takes. The copier is always second-rate if that’s all he does.

All it means is a shortened life cycle really. It means innovating more. It means that things naturally revert into the public domain.

A product I put into the market 3-4 years ago now has competition. I wanted to do generation two right after I was done with generation one. Of course leadership where I work has a build-it-forever patent mentality. Well now in the next week or two I’ll be starting the first steps to generation two. Problem is, the competition already took product improvements I wanted to make.

Now I have a big uphill battle, because they probably patented it. After all mine got patented. But generation two never got past conceptual. I might be able to use those notes, maybe not. But likely I’ll have to work around their patents now if I want to get the price down.

So-it-goes.

Innovate or die. That’s all I can say. It’s what I was brought up under. Newer, better, faster, cheaper…. Last year’s product is last year’s product. Same with a book or song or anything else. One has to have faith that people want the real thing and want it right away.

Music and books have always been short lived items as far as their ‘hot’ period. That’s where the money is made. I would not underestimate the ability of publishers and record companies to be using ‘piracy’ as BS excuse to screw over creators. It’s not like that isn’t their track record.

I don’t buy books the way I used to because simply I spend my reading time online 😉 Being able to interact occasionally is better than passively reading all the time. I’ve also gotten into works that aren’t available either. Oh do I hate reading books on the screen, but I’m not going to find these books at amazon or barnes and noble. Usually I get them from the -author’s- website or if it’s some 100 year old book, it’s up on google or archive.org or something.

summoning my inner Colombo… just one more thing…

Product for other markets really can bounce back into the USA. It’s happened with stuff made along side stuff I’ve designed for the US market. Old designs stayed in production for places such as South America. Somehow it bounced back and ended up in a big box discounter’s stores in the USA.

This would have really angered federal regulators because the reason it went to south america was because it didn’t meet what US regulators said it had to, so they pulled it when they were informed they bought product not for sale in the USA. If the big store hadn’t been at risk from the feds they probably would have sold it.

Dear Eric,

This is a great back-and-forth, Brent (and Bevin and Don) and I just wanted to say that – and also let you all know I’m not mad at any of you guys; just trying to sort out the problem.

Right! I hear you loud and clear.

Like I said, I know from past experience that you are sincerely committed to natural rights and individual liberty, and are only trying to clarify what they are.

There is no disagreement about underlying principles, only about definition, specifically of the term “property.”

I converted to the “IP is bullshit” position relatively recently. Only a few years ago.

I myself am still sorting out all the logical implications.

Believe me, I know the gut level sense of “This ain’t right!” that you are referring to.

But I then read many market anarchist arguments at LRC and FEE proving that “intellectual property” is an oxymoron, a contradiction in terms.

Since then I haven’t been able justify the invocation of state violence against “pirates” of “IP.”

I agree with you ethically. I don’t get worked up about it. I worry more about making stuff that isn’t good enough to copy.

Also I rather run the hazards of copying to allow additive and derivative work now rather than 20 or 100 years later. If someone patented the best way to do something it could send things down the wrong path for decades.

Plus I’m really good at building on the work of others. To take it to the next level. Patents prevent that. That’s not really an issue for copyright with fair use and all. Someone can write their own book and cite yours. Patents not so much.

Dear Eric,

Thanks for all the insights into your industry. Here is my account of how I became an “infringer.”

In about 3rd grade, I started listening and recording college alternative music from a distant radio station.

All kinds of anti-establishment niche music was played. Songs with taboo themes and expletive laden anthems which raged against the PTB. I’m sure this station inspired some of its small audience to do what I did: Place record store orders for lots of albums that otherwise, one wouldn’t know about.

I made mixtapes from my collection and recorded songs directly from the radio as well, skipping the artist middlemen completely. I owe a great debt to all the talent and labor of those “starving artists” for the impact they had on my development, though of course my mental debt never paid their bills.

In retrospect, it became a type of second-hander looter activity, where I mostly recorded my music. “Infringing” is a magical type of looting where the lootee suffers no direct loss of property, and doesn’t even know you exist.

Over the years, I enjoyed the status of having a collection of music my peers had no conception of amassing. Rather than being a fan and patron of the artists, I kept my source confidential and basked in the alpha-nerd glory of being the only one of my peers with such an adult eclectic collection of cool music.

The karma of giving away mixtapes then, or digital files today, is exactly as you say. People are happy to get free stuff, but don’t display the same level of thanks or gratitude they do when acquiring your property through “legitimate” channels.

Second-handerism is the new norm, and I am loathe to invite the state in to crush it. Unquestionably though, the best and most rewarding policy is to trade one’s own creations, and not be either a “legitimate” or an “infringing” second-hander at all.

You’re being morally inconsistent, regardless how distateful it might seem to you.

Borrowing someone’s car is not remotely the same. I did not pay for the car. I do not own the car.

“They have merely taken something made by someone else”

If they paid for your book then they’ve taken nothing. They purchased it and now they own it.

It’s surprising to me to hear you contend that doing with your private property as you wish is an act of aggression if it’s a “particular” kind of private property AND condoning gov’t mandates to boot.

I know it “seems” wrong because you are in the print media business but if you don’t like it then get into another business. Isn’t that what you’d say to someone complaining about making minimum wage?

You don’t want someone copying your shit? Don’t put it out there. Nobody’s forcing you. You want to produce something that isn’t so easily copied? Produce cars.

You seem to feel ‘violated’ that your creativity is being stolen, but it’s not, it’s being purchased. It’s the nature of your creative medium. Isn’t a car designer’s creativity sold with the car? A home designer’s? A fashion designer’s?

“you’ve produced something new. It’s not the same piece of furniture. It may be similar – but it’s a new thing”

A copy of a written page is also not the same written page. It too is similar but it’s an imperfect reproduction of the original just like a chair.

“If it were possible to somehow break into a doctor’s mind and transmogrify his skill/learning into our heads, to be used for our benefit without asking the doctor’s permission or compensating him for the work he did and the years he spent acquiring his skill/learning, I expect most of us would see the ethical wrong.”

If I buy your book ( I didn’t sorry man, I’m not into cars ) then I didn’t break into your mind nor were you not compensated.

Buying your book, or sharing a copy of it with someone else, in no way imparts me or someone else with Eric Peter’s journalistic skills. I’d still be a shitty writer. It’s simply a product of those skills that I now own. I own the product not the skills. You own the skills and have every right to do with them as you please, including not use them to produce things that you think you will not be ‘adequately’ compensated for because of the nature of your business.

I’ve experienced someone stealing software I and others created. They tried to compete. It did damage, they ultimately failed.

I know more about patents than copyright. But let’s say in the curent system I managed to go out on my own with something I created and patented. Megacorp could simply copy it entirely and exactly and then I have an uphill court battle to stop them. The system as it exists as I see it is to herd creative people into the system. Those that break from the heard often end up broken.

One supplier I worked with tells the tale of woe of how his prior company, the successful one, was taken by the banksters. He’s still fighting the good fight not knowing what he doesn’t know. Which is probably my problem, I’d be better off not knowing what I was up against.

I guess a big part of my attitude on copying is because I first worked out of school in the consumer electronics industry. Copiers were always behind. To be a copier meant being a no-body. It was an innovate, make the money, let the product die, come back with more innovation, rinse repeat. Not this make the same thing for decades with government protection deal.

Also I wouldn’t worry too much about the cheapskate who found a bittorrent download. That’s for people who have time but not money. They weren’t a customer anyway. The ROI on finding pirated stuff is negative for anyone who can earn a decent living. Even without copyright law, looking every night to see if someone had what you want to share up, and then fighting to get enough bandwidth to grab it, and so forth? Not worth it. Look at porn. Most profitable thing on the internet. Copied and pirated to the nth degree and has been since the days of 8bit computers and 300 baud modems. It hasn’t died.

I think the paper funny money, and constant threat of socialist appropriation of property skews the entire spectrum of human cooperation. We need sound money, and comprehensive deferred transactional settlement record keeping.

A true copyright would be indivisible and never removable from any duplicates.

This could be accomplished by mutual cooperation among productive gentlemen. Even from Gutenberg days, every press owner could intermix the attribution chain of original creators on every page in an permanent unobtrusive way. (watermark/hash total/check sum/unique seals)

Each of the now 6 billion bibles printed historically could reference the scribes they copied from. Scribes could reference the scribes they copy from. A UCC of references could be maintained.

Every photocopy, pasted text clipboard, duplicate file, mp3, flashvideo, should still provide a way to identify its maker.

Each creator would choose his own remedy. Record labels could block your video, insert ads of their choosing in your video, embed redirects to their content areas within “your” copy of their property.

The younger Cyber World deserves special privileges, being it is an emerging realm.
It makes little sense to allow content creator claims to overburden the internet until everyone suffers a loss of property.

Some kind of internet appliance could keep a cyberdollar bank of all infringements. Lets say Lady Gaga is owed 3 billion dollars. Perhaps each content creator on the WWW should be issued shares of the world wide web internet based on the total value of their infringement. These shares imply rights and authority of aspects of code and click through and advertising revenue.

Otherwise, what we have now is the following neagive trend: Primitive 3rd World Evicts Colonialists Yet Keeps Their Property, Old World Europe subjugates New World America, America subjugates Newer World Cyberspace.

Imagine that Kevin – a thief stole Larry’s bike from Larry’s yard a week ago. In my eyes, possession is 9/10ths of the law.

Primary claimant is Kevin the “new” owner because Larry “let” the bike leave his property. Larry failed to stop him in a timely fashion.

Under a NAP theory of property rights, the burden is on Larry to have a convincing method of proof that it is his bike. An even heavy burden is Larry has lost the opportunity to legitimately use force, when he negligently lost his personal property. He is only due the bike if he can get it back at a reasonable cost to everyone else.

Better that the proven theft be recorded in the record and Larry is forced to wait for the return. Larry should be encouraged to offer a lesser liquidated damage amount to resolve what in part was his own failure.

There are different degrees of aggression, there are no shortcuts, new thoughts are needed. If someone takes a picture of your daughter at the beach and runs off before you can catch him. You’re SOL unless her bathing suit had a barcode hidden in the fabric or she has a special tattoo on her for just such an occassion.

Nobody is due their day in court. Every trial has a cost and a benefit. The public cannot be forced by the gibsmedat justice mentality to provide infinite justice for every imagined slight.

“Writers (and musicians) are uniquely vulnerable because their work is so easy to steal.”

Would you say that if a musician didn’t write his music down, didn’t sell his music but that he just chose to play free concerts in the park from memory, that it would be ‘wrong’ for someone to listen to his concert and try to write the notes down as he was listening to be used for whatever he wanted?

According to everything else you’ve said your answer has to be “Yes”.

Because otherwise ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ would depend on the medium used (paper, electronic, from memory), the price of the good (free, sold), geographic location (within earshot, front row), intended use (personal enjoyment, for sale) etc…

But right and wrong do not change based on those things or anything. They have to be solid, consistent, as much as one hates to admit it. Moral inconsistency is the hallmark of the staties not moral men.

Dear Eric,

IPR is a Randian minarchist fallacy, that unfortunately allows the camel’s nose into the tent, and will eventually lead to the evils of maxarchism.

I used to buy it. But no longer.

The short rebuttal to “IPR” is encapsulated in this quote from Thomas Jefferson.

If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it.

– Thomas Jefferson

The long answer is, needless to say, much, much longer.

Well, that was a nice primer for the Wenzel-Kinsela (IP vs. Anit-IP) debate coming up:

http://www.economicpolicyjournal.com/2013/02/an-attack-from-north-on-my-ip-position.html

Dear Eric,

“I agree with regard to ideas. But that is not the same thing as a finished work. An idea is not an actuality – a finished work, is.”

I understand the distinction you made perfectly, from a creative perspective. I too, am a published writer and translator.

But from a natural rights perspective, it is unfortunately not possible to enforce “intellectual property” without authorizing the Leviathan State to resort to brute force physical coercion against individuals who are merely making use of their own bodies and real property.

Here is an article that lays out why.

Intellectual “Property” Versus Real Property
JUNE 12, 2009

http://www.fee.org/library/detail/intellectual-property-versus-real-property#axzz2MItFsXiU

An excerpt:

Intellectual “property” (IP) is a sleeper issue. It seems uncontroversial: Someone invents or writes something and therefore owns it. What could be plainer? But IP contains the power to destroy liberty.

IP is a peculiar form of property, indeed.

“Since “pirates” of “IP” did not resort to brute force physical coercion when they “pirated” my “IP,” they did not violate the NAP, and I cannot justify brute force physical coercion in response. ”

Bevin, I agree. Some people have stated the NAP in a way that includes fraud as “the initiation of force or fraud”, etc. I ask myself if a pirate’s use of my material would amount to fraud, and the answer is no.

The pirates aren’t fraudulently presenting themselves as the authors, or even as the owners of the right to produce copies. They are simply flauting a law made by people who have no legitimate authority over them.

I’ve seen bootleg copies of popular films being sold at flea markets while the film is still being shown in the theaters. They are usually made with digital video cameras in the theater and are poor quality, but that’s the only reason I don’t buy them.

It’s kind of silly the way the legitimate producers of films on DVD threaten the viewers of the DVD they just bought. There’s the old threat of the FBI, of course, but now they threaten you with the DHS and something else called the IPRC as well.

What’s really funny is the warning that Interpol has “expressed concern” over DVD piracy. Pirating is so widespread that it’s really sort of a non-crime these days.

Dear Eric,

This is no doubt a difficult issue – at least, it is for me. I absolutely do not want to commit an act of ethical inconsistency or in any way violate the NAP. But that’s just it (as I see it). People are being aggressed against when their work is taken without compensation.

It is a really tough question. I don’t doubt for a moment your commitment to natural rights and individual liberty.

I myself went through a transition period, similar to the transition period I went through when I forsook the limited government Classical Liberalism of Locke and the Framers for hardcore Daoist/Rothbardian market anarchism.

So I know it’s a tough nut to swallow.

I’m the author of two screenplays, one a psychological thriller, and the other a SF alien invasion tale.

Believe me, I am deeply ambivalent, at least feeling-wise, about openly asserting that “IP” is invalid!

Dear Ed,

The pirates aren’t fraudulently presenting themselves as the authors, or even as the owners of the right to produce copies. They are simply flauting a law made by people who have no legitimate authority over them.

True!

For example, the movies and songs that have been uploaded to various torrent sites are not advertised as being the uploaders’ creations.

They are merely being offered for download, as is, take it or leave it.

However one might feel about them is one thing.

Is it despicable? Is it contemptible? Is it “wrong?”

From a rights perspective that is beside the point. From a rights perspective the only relevant question is “Was the NAP violated?”

This is a fascinating thread on a topic that has confused me. Here’s my perspective: I work for a publishing company. We spend millions of dollars creating content that will be useful to our subscribers. Without some form of protection, a single subscriber could destroy our business by paying the subscription price, then selling the content that we created for, say, $10 to thousands of people who would otherwise subscribe to our product.

That seems to me to be theft, but if there were no protection for IP, it would be perfectly legal. In that case, nobody would bother putting out useful information and analysis. Why would anyone spend all the money so that someone else could get all the profit?

Perhaps the anarcho-capitalist solution is contractual terms prohibiting resale of the content. But as Don has pointed out, those already exist but are ignored because people don’t read them. It would be possible to have everyone buying a book/CD/subscription or attending a live performance to sign a contract not to reproduce, etc., the content, but that would be an administrative nightmare.

Personally, I would prefer administrative nightmares to the existence of the state. But as long as we have government, it seems that copyright law is a simple way of providing contractual terms for the use of people’s publications or performances.

As I said at the beginning, this is a confusing issue. I will enjoy reading clarifications.

Dear Mike,

It is a difficult issue. Emotions run high.

I highly recommend scanning through the article titles at

Molinari Institute Anti-Copyright Resources
http://praxeology.net/anticopyright.htm

and skimming through the articles that strike a chord.

The bottom line is whether one truly believes anarcho-capitalism/market anarchism/voluntaryism is workable, or whether one still needs a state monopoly on the use of force in certain areas of life.

I myself have concluded that property must be defined as physical.

Any attempt to define property as “intellectual,” and not just physical, must of necessity, intentionally or otherwise, lead to compulsive Cloverite control of other peoples’ behavior (translation: freedom).

The example of copyrighted choreography restricting how others may move their own bodies in one example.

Another is song copyrights. According to some accounts, a certain number of notes in progression can be copyrighted.

Minimum number of notes to be copyrighted? I believe it’s 8. I heard Stephen Schwartz speak on writing the music for the hit Broadway musical Wicked on how he would borrow some tunes from The Wizard of Oz, but only 7 notes, because that’s the limit to avoid copyright issues.
— posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 11:02 PM on February 12, 2005

Once that song/sequence of notes has been copyrighted, other people are prevented by law from playing those notes in the same progression.

Those notes [!] now “belong” to the song copyright holder. Those notes are now his “intellectual property.”

Such are the logical absurdities that the anti-concept of “intellectual property” lead to, as opposed to the real, natural rights concept of physical property.

@Mike re: intellectual property…

Mike, people WILL still create content. For example, I regularly contribute to open source programs–no pay, just glory. And a feeling of belonging to a community that’s given me more useful tools than I could ever repay.

Look at the wealth of software out there; the free stuff–not just Linux–but Firefox, Thunderbird…thousands of excellent programs, FREE. That’s intellectual property done right.

So how do we make our money? Writing for companies that pay well for proprietary code.

I don’t pretend I’ve worked it all out for myself yet with respect to books, both fiction and non-fiction, and other items currently covered by copyright law.

Perhaps in a pure AnCap/agorist society, the moral reproach for copying something without paying the author will keep the authors in rent money.

In fact just such a thing is happening on the music scene already. I’m not up to date, but last I heard Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails were completely self-publishing. Both ask nothing to download their work; you are free to pay or not.

Radiohead made more off their first self-published album than any of their studio-associated productions.

It’s late so I’m not fact-checking myself, just going off memory; please verify my statements.

But given what I see in software, I bet you could make a go without government thugscrums backing your efforts.

Yup! Any gov’t barrier to entry is a privilege given to some – at a price of course – and a violation of the rights of others.

Excellent references and points. As a NAP anarchist, I can only say that way is one way that must be respected in my case.

Most likely in the greater world, copyright and lawsuits will be modernized but not eliminated.

I have sociokleptopathically obtained a lot of property through the open internet. Via big data and big algorithms in every computer could be made to recognize that fact and keep a tally.

Lets say I “owe” 2 million dollars to various creators. Just as my every cell keeps track of all kinds of biochemical data. Why can’t cyberspace keep equivalent tally of my infringing.

Each of my devices has an IP, my current IP provider knows all my device IPs. Why shouldn’t it also know I have a deficit of 2 million cyberbucks?

Upon my death, my largest claimant Robert Heinlein is owed $Cyb-100,000 and my smallest claimant, John Stossel is owed $Cyb-0.75 whatever that would mean.

A cyberdollar banking system would serve as a basis for a meritocracy. Perhaps the world owes Kim Kardashian $C 800 trillion for all the netizens who have ogled her online for free.

These are the types of important financial things that will make the primitive, rural, urban, international-commercial, and cyber-worlds more prosperous and enjoyable for all.

Dear Don,

Consider the choreographer of a dance who gets the right to stop another from moving his body in a certain fashion.

To me that is one of the most The most striking examples illustrating the fallacy of “intellectual property.”

Another example is the song “Happy Birthday.” Most people don’t know it, but it is copyrighted.

You are not legally permitted to sing it without paying royalties to the current holder of the copyright, the Warner Music Group.

How about this, we copyright everything we do. Then when the government records it, it’s a copyright violation and subject to lawsuit.

Dear Eric,

But I think a line has been crossed when Smith takes Jones’ work – not a general idea, but his literal work, something he produced with his mind pr body – makes verbatim/identical copies and sells them to make money, without permission and without compensation.

As an author myself, I agree with the feeling aspect of it.

But from an objective, natural rights perspective, I don’t see how I can justify siccing the cops on someone who does not actually use brute force physical coercion or the threat thereof against me.

That’s the sticking point.

To me, it’s sort of like traffic laws, including speed limits, stop signs, and drunk driving.

The mainstream considers the status quo “safe” and “stable.” They fear what would happen if these rules were eliminated.

But market anarchism is predicated upon the premise that unless the NAP is violated, resort to brute force physical coercion cannot be justified.

Since “pirates” of “IP” did not resort to brute force physical coercion when they “pirated” my “IP,” they did not violate the NAP, and I cannot justify brute force physical coercion in response.

All of us trust that a market anarchist system would evolve some sort of free market mechanisms that would ensure traffic safety.

We should also trust that a market anarchist system would evolve free some sort of free market mechanisms that would ensure economic rewards for creative people.

That’s a whole ‘nother topic that I will set aside for the moment. But the market anarchist website I mentioned has some good info on that too.

Besides, even from the author’s perspective, “IP” as conventionally defined by Leviathan State, is not necessarily in the author’s best interests.

See:
Authors: Beware of Copyright
by Jeffrey A. Tucker
http://www.lewrockwell.com/tucker/tucker121.html

Excerpt:

When an author signs a publication contract, insofar as it contains strict and traditional copyright notices, he is pretty much signing his life away. It used to be that the publisher would maintain control only so long as the book is in print. Today, with digital printing, this means forever: your lifetime plus 70 years.

” Q: Do patents and copyrights undermine private property?

Yes: They are a burden to marketplace transactions and discourage business startups.”

Yes, that’s a very real effect of IP law.

LOL U R funnee. “harble”–that’s a keeper!

Your right. Its nerve wreckin. it has lead us to this.

I’d cut my face to pieces….

I must have a mirror to shave… and emulating ZZ Top is not for me!

Absolutely. Not in a self-reflective kind of way. You have to brush teeth, align hair follicles, etc. to do the mandatory grooming rituals, but don’t gaze at your inner medusa.

The way people stand there and look at zits or grey hairs or bald spots, hell no. That’s for chicks man. IMHWO. (W is for weird). And not even for them if they are putting on makeup out of fear, and not out of fun. Your chick needs to look physically good enough for you to want to sleep with, and that’s it. Screw all the Cover Girl and Macy’s crap.

A cheap gimmick? Maybe, but it works. Like Chevy Chase in Caddy Shack was asked, “How do you measure yourself against other golfers?” “By height he answered.” Just enjoy the course, let the clovers count your strokes.

Don’t take the “free” guns that emanate from Zardoz’ mouth. Don’t hate your own penis and love finding and killing all your imperfect brothers in the world.

Most of Their TV voodoo is about youth and beauty worship. And making you fear your lack or losing of it.

The violations of NAP spring from fear. Look at Tinsley and his fantasies of killing billions. Blacks are animal and apelike. All men are naked apes. One time he mentioned hating being giggled at by crowds of kids for taking a piss. I think he hates himself because of his part in global warming even. Against all evidence, you have to love yourself, mang.

In my case, being happy in most areas. I performed a “prep” if you will of not judging myself where I am most vulnerable. My appearance.

For others, your self-loathing might come from your career, your family, your morality, your destroying the ozone or whatever.

Communism, Christianity, Democracy, and all world systems are a failure. Because they put the blame on the individual. There is so much potential, once the NAP is adopted as a system, and your social vehicle for taking your self-hate out on others is destroyed and no longer available.

I usually take a razor into the shower, only rarely at a sink with hot water, no perfumy menthol cocktail gel for me.

ZZ-Top is in accord with natural law. It is us shavers who make a choice to appear more… what exactly? How can we call the long-beards the weird ones.

Come to think of it, I’ve been in SHTF mode for decades. It was a drooping Salvador Dali fan, and the “sh!t” was fava beans as painted in “Soft Construction With Boiled Beans – Premonition of Civil War”.

One of the few attractive teachers in grade school was the art teacher, who liked Dali, and I’ve followed his philosophy in many ways ever since.

Pink Floyd’s Time + Dali’s Boiled Beans
http://www.youtu.be/0CcawJR-gNA

Salvador Dali Mike Wallace Interview 1958
http://www.youtu.be/XhyHlKHIeZY

I’ve grown several flavor savers in my long life and none of them ever stopped itching.

Mercifully, my hairy balls rarely itch so I don’t bother shaving them.

tgsam

Dear Tor,

You’re a vampire. You have no reflection in mirrors!

Dear PM,

On the same page with you!

I believe I mentioned it in an earlier comment.

Read it decades ago. But never forgot the freedom seeking pioneers’ acronym, “MYOB,” or “Mind Your Own Business.”

A sometimes overlooked libertarian SF classic.

“First, those of us who have a copy could share it with those who don’t but wish to read it.”

I’ve never had a “shared” book returned. Maybe we could ask Mr. Ross to publish the book on Amazon Kindle.

Yeah, they’re a drag, but doing a Kindle edition would be a way to get the book out where it’s instantly available to anyone seeing it mentioned in a discussion.

The book’s publisher could have it tied up by IPR law to keep it out of print.

The point of the new technology is that it will cut the corporatist creatures out of the loop entirely. To break their stranglehold on creation. A hold they got by a concentration of capital followed by laws, that’s government, to prevent new entries into the market. To keep creative people in their grip. Breaking out is happening first in writing and music and it is becoming true for other areas as well.

Times of transition are difficult. I get as stuck in ways of doing things as anyone else can, but I welcome breaking the hold on us all. That gangster like hold these companies have had since the days of sheet music or before. No doubt there will be complaining through the transition even by me, but on the other side the PTB will be the PTW. (the powers that were)

I have no doubt that the actions we see today by the governments and corporations of the world is because they don’t want to be the the powers that were.

Maybe book writing won’t pay like it used to when knowledge was more restricted, maybe it will pay more for those who do it really well. But writers won’t have to sell their creations away any longer. The gate keepers will be gone. A person won’t have to ‘behave’ to keep making a living and settle for a tiny percentage of what their creation is really worth.

Even my profession could vanish, although its already vanishing from the USA for the reasons of the stranglehold on the creative processes, so I don’t see much danger in processes that could result in the old ways of manufacturing dying and replaced by something else. Staying with them won’t stop my career from going to China.

Technology has the ability to remove much of the virtual chains creative people have on them or chain us even more, and that’s a big part of the battle now. These companies may be using as it excuse to take even a greater percentage while they still can or to even discourage people. Who knows? The non-creators have always sought to control those who do and take the fruits of their creativity. That’s the system we live in, but can that system ultimately end for something more beneficial to those who do the creating?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGM8PT1eAvY

Sheriffs are to be preferred over the police department Obergruppenfuhrers with four stars on their shoulders… however –

I know of no sheriff who has announced he won’t cage/point guns at people caught with arbitrarily illegal “drugs” or who has stated he will refuse to enforce “buckle up” laws… and what does that tell you about their mindset? A peace officer would never countenance such things. But law enforcers don’t bat an eye.

And sheriffs are law enforcers.

I don’t mean any disrespect, but that’s rather naive. If they had you on a list as being a potential gun owner in the present because you had been one in the past, they wouldn’t treat it on the principle of being a criminal matter where they had to prove you were guilty. No, they would treat it just as they do anything administrative, where you have to do all the work – like proving you don’t owe tax according to their rules.

After all, if they had to do all the work of finding a potential gun owner, it wouldn’t make any sense turning him loose without a good reason, not after all that work, now would it?

I remember reading a Dennis Wheatley novel in which the hero thought he could avoid being killed by the bad guy by impersonating an innocent man, on the theory that the bad guy wouldn’t know which of them was the real one. So the bad guy decided to kill both of them, just to make sure…

Eric, I think the actaul “crime” the gun-vernment sees in these examples of non-crimes is primarily two-fold. On the surface people who are entrepreneurs in alternative and recreational pharmaceuticals cut into the alcohol-income-tax-sales tax revenue stream. Can’t have private citizens, “the people”, starving the beast, now can we?

Yet under the surface we have the CIA (and very probably other alphabet soup agencies) actually running drugs to fund “black ops” and other unsavory things that even the whore’s in congress can’t stomach. So a private pharmaceuticals dealer is doomed to run afoul of system because he dares engage in free market competition cutting into the shadow gun-vernment’s covert revenue stream.

But those are just the “official” players who stand to directly lose some of *our money* when people decide to exercise their right to self medicate. We also have all of the downstream law enforcement recipients of that revenue stream (and the value of any “guilty” property they can confiscate) with their hands out. And they are granted the power to essentially ignore the Bill of Rights and even common decency and compassion while prosecuting this so-called “War on Drugs.”

The drug-court-prosecutorial-prison-unicor-rehab nexus siphons off a tremendous amount of the people’s wealth annually as well. Then there are all the private actors; the contractors, manufacturers, accountants, privatized security and prison firms, car dealers, police and prison suppliers, etc. with their hands in the till.

We know from a 1970’s study conducted at the Medical College of Virginia that cannabis not only eases the side effects of chemo therapy and nuclear medicine, but in fact can regress some brain tumors. But there’s a problem with this for the key “drug” players; no major pharmaceutical company can patent a naturally occurring plant (as opposed to Monsanto patenting unnatural plants). So there’s very little money in herbalism and naturopathy because wise people will simply grow their own remedies and drive market prices to the lowest levels.

Therefore, the only viable answer for big pharma to maintain their stranglehold on “healthcare” (and that of their wholly owned gun-vernment toadies) is to vilify the various pharmaceutical plants and deem their cultivation and possession a crime. Thereby the threat of free market competition is all but eliminated. Prohibition also creates a risk to reward ratio generating obscene profits for the underground players the world over who either have gun-vernment sanction (like the CIA) or a big enough set of Cajones to put some skin in the game (like the average street dealer).

So…we have the very same laboratory (the various levels of gun-vernment and their corporate owners) that created the poison (prohibition) offering us an antidote (the war on “some” drugs) that apparently must be taken in perpetuam since (according to them) there is no “cure.”

The parasite class learned a lot from their experiment in alcohol prohibition it would appear. And I would argue that alcohol prohibition was at least partially a false flag to distract the public from the international banksters’ real intent which was to implement the modern equivalent of the opium trade / opium wars we are now forced to live under.

Let’s face it, the increase in opium production in the “Graveyard of Empires”, the upsurge in heroin use in Amerika’s inner cities and the U.S. military presence in the opium fields can hardly be coincidental. Everyone from the local courthouse to the state department knows the “War on Drugs” is as much a farce as the “War on Terror” is. Washington State and Colorado have finally reached sufficient public critical mass to take some minor steps in limiting the stupidity. But California and other “liberal” states are still facing an uphill battle because the growers and dealers stand to lose their collective ass if pot prohibition falls by the wayside. We do indeed live in interesting times.

You need to broaden your horizons, meant without offence.
Family law / divorce, and “sex offender registry” are two things to examine a bit.

I’ll let you find out what’s happening rather than hijack the thread; short story, one results in penury, one in lifelong punishment, and neither requires an actual CRIME. Statutes are all that matter in several cases, and the result is total devastation. To the point where people have immolated themselves.

“Government means they rule over us, they govern us. ”

But, but… they’re PUBLIC SERVANTS!

Don’t you even get it? 😉

“Words seem to have meaning.”

Why do you think the gov’t keeps changing the meaning of words. If gov’t does nothing else, it changes the meaning of words to suit the outcome they desire. I’ll toss out a word, actually two, that used to have meaning: indentured servitude. What do those two words mean today vs. when it was ‘common’ knowledge?

I disagree that violence can ONLY serve their purpose(s).
That being said, I DO intend to win.

If the vast majority of people want to be “safe,” or “left alone,” or (in whatever way they phrase it) free to indulge in their “bread and circuses,” this will be fairly peaceful, even its worst times.

But even if we were talking near-instantaneous, violent replacement of all the Gov’t cretins – we wouldn’t be changing the puppet-masters.

I believe in playing the long game, yes. Eduction is part of that. A Blaze of Glory – isn’t. Glorious, OR effective, OR long-term.

But the occasional forced retirement at the right time, with the correct tools… THAT could work miracles. “Something” happened, no one knows WHAT… But Mr. X the Almighty is to be buried today. Only an assassin could’ve pulled off that shot / poisoned that drink / known where he’d be to set that bomb / etc.

In reality, it was someone who had a tool at the right time, and happened to notice the High Value Target. Today it’s Jim, tomorrow it’s Julie, next week Wan Fei is in the right place at the right time… You get the idea.

Moral High ground doesn’t matter to someone like me; results do. Consistent removal of the human excrement over a period of time. No rhyme or reason; one day a Senator, one day a mayor, one day a foreign diplomat, one day a staffer.

That’s the total war we’re headed for. If we wait until they aggress, they may have their whole house of cards ready to fall on OUR heads. They’ve been agressing already; we’ve been retreating, because no sane man (and even some lunatics) dno’t want the war. But THEY DO, because they’ve played all the angles, run all the simualtions, have contingency plans for A, B, C, etc to Z to AA to AZ etc. to ZZZZZ. And yes, they are PLANNING on someone on “our” side making the first move. They are not above creating such a person, and making an example of that person. But rather than wait until they are all ready and think they’ve got it all set up to implode on US while they look on from far off, we should proactively snag “targets of opportunity.”
A False Flag operative will be Expended; those who don’t just parrot the “official story” will be removed.
But a handful of irregulars, without a plan, without “intent” per se? Impossible to overcome.

Further – to bookend this – INACTION, or passivitiy, on our part – is currently serving them QUITE WELL.

“It is not just the Obammy left seeking control, the Shrub right are just as bad . . .”

Exactly! The critical thing is to see through the false left-right, Republican-Democrat paradigm. They are all on the same side – their side. The side of authoritarianism and collectivism.

” It is not just the Obammy left seeking control, the Shrub right are just as bad . . .”

True, and a good point. Ruby Ridge was the GHW Bush administration and The Branch Davidian massacre and OKC bombing were done by the Clinton gang. W’s administration pulled off the biggest one since FDR’s Pearl Harbor setup. Seems the Reds and Blues just take turns assaulting us and assuring us that they’re doing no such thing.

The two parties merged right out in public a long time ago, and we’re expected to believe that there’s a difference between them.

Another Idahoan here. I’ve finally come to the point where I call it “hard” or “soft” statism. There isn’t any left, right, liberal or conservative. That’s all BS. In other words it’s THEM against US and that’s it. Everything else is an illusion meant to keep people off kilter and angry at “those… (fill in the blank)” while getting screwed on your dime. It’s a sick game.

Different sides of the same coin. You can call them Demlicans or Repubocrats. Their mascot is the Elephonkey.

It is.. Even more so though, I received a call last night from my buddy in the service (USMC Officer). He didn’t sound so good. He was one of the most cheerful happy go luck people I’ve ever known. He hasn’t been the same since his Silver Star. He wants to get the families together he said. I’m going to try and meet up with him this weekend over by Quantico. After I talked with Eric I called my buddy Dan in South Carolina. He said everyone down there is singing the same song and that he just hopes he’s off the grid enough to not feel the ripples. I told him wishful thinking is nice, but he should still prepare.

Yep, you never can be to careful when meeting people off Craigslist! HA

I hope you’re right. The combination of Eric’s coffee drinking habit combined with my tobacco/coffee/red bull habits and hyperactivity makes for an interesting dialogue.

I wonder, Brent…

We have the object lesson of nahhnleeeven. Consider that. What it took – the mindset – to drop skyscrapers and kill thousands of innocent people. It does not take much, as I see it, to extrapolate from that to something much worse. Because the people capable of doing that are literally capable of anything.

The problem is we’re not psychopaths. Therefore, it is hard – almost impossible – to even conceive of the things psychopaths are capable of doing without batting an eye.

Hell, just consider these new civilian targets. Pregnant women. Old people. Little boys. What sort of sick mind would come up with that?

It gives you some insight, does it not?

Even after nahhnleeeven there was no sudden step change. They gathered a bunch of failed Clinton era police-state legislation and passed it. They started a couple of wars.

A step change wakes people up. There won’t be a step change. The worst we can expect is an event they can exploit to get failed legislation to pass. We just saw one in December.

The targets are just another incremental step in a process that has been ongoing for decades. The conversion from police officers to law enforcers to occupiers. They are now training in the tradition of occupiers. This has been plainly evident since those who served the empire in the occupied territories started returning and entering ‘law enforcement’ and other domestic departments of various levels of government.

A step change might get people to figure out us “konspiracy kooks” were right all along. Instead they must slowly condition the public to respond ‘but it’s a good thing’ when we say ‘we told you so’.

The desire is for the general public to be in a prison and think its a good thing. To be too scared, too institutionalized, to live outside its walls.

http://vimeo.com/32569553

Has anyone started a harassment and shaming campaign against this company? It’s probably time some of us did.

Has anyone started a harassment and shaming campaign against this company?

For what it’s worth, it looks like someone started a Facebook page: Boycott Law Enforcement Targets, Inc

The challenge is to construct a society in which genuine crimes are punished, but mala prohibita (aka “victimless crimes”, aka “not crimes at all”) are not meddled in by nosy assholes. Without a clear consciousness by at least a sizable minority of the populace, the best we can do is try to hold back the worst offences of the ravaging state.

While I agree with you about crimes needing to be defined based on someone being a victim, I keep thinking about how do we handle situations which fall (in my opinion) into a gray area.

For example, suppose you live next door to Old Man Calley, the crazy guy. Every time you mow your lawn, he sits on his porch with his shotgun aimed at you. What tangible damage has he done to you? Hurt your feelings? Perhaps that should not be a crime. To me, having someone place you in his shotgun sights is threat, even without stated intent to injure, even without physical damage being done. On the other hand, marijuana or alcohol usage is not a threat. Speeding, per se, is not a threat. For me, even without physical damage, intentionally placing someone in a situation where they no longer have a reasonable ability to defend or protect themselves is a threat. We need to have some sort of way of dealing with that. Maybe jury trial is not the answer, but we need some procedure. In my opinion… 🙂

maybe the ol’ coot knows, and you don’t, that his twelve bore is not loaded…. he’s jes’ “messin with ya” to be ornery. Didja ever think of walking over there one fine afternoon with a beer, or a lemonade, sitting down and having a chat? Maybe asking him some curious questions about his ancient, damascus barreled side by each rabbit ear duck gun? For him to be a messin with ya thet a way, ye musta done, er not done, sumthin he didn’t tek kindly to. Maybe keepin yer own nose on your side the fence, rather than beinn neighbourly and askin him how he’s a doin, in maybe the first week you were living there. Folks have different ideas about what’s “proper”, and can git uppity if you aren’t the way THEY think you should be… like you railing on him for “being dangerous” by pointing his unloaded ol rabbit ears at ya. Do you KNOW he’s being “dangerous”> City folks sometimes git skeered at the dangest thangs….. but then ,so do country folk.. on’y a diff’rent batch a thangs…..

No such thing as a ‘good’ cop. They are all thugs who make their living by robbing, beating, intimidating, lying and killing. Cops are scum and should be treated as such. They aren’t hero’s and they don’t ‘protect and serve’. The day will come when the people turn on them as they have turned on the people. I look forward to that day. “Payback is a bitch.”

You’re right, Eric, I’m being too generous with one percent.

Ah yes, the mythical “good cop”. I think you would have a better chance of finding unicorns.

“If only that were true, Rich.”

I think he’s right, eric. He puts it a little differently than I did: the 98% of them that are bad cops give the other 2% a bad name. 😉

Dom – spread the link with pictures to everyone you know. If enough people want to throw up over this then maybe the gengle push back will become a shove.

I located the terrorist and posted images of them here:

http://ericpetersautos.com/2013/02/21/company-behind-shooting-targets-of-children-received-2-million-from-dhs/

A local, indoor range used to sell targets of a turbaned, bearded man but eventually stopped selling these as insensitive. Targets of pregnant women, children and grandmothers is not too insensitive? WTF?

Now, if someone were to come up with targets of blue-gloved zombies, badged and uniformed zombies, helmeted and SWAT-emblazoned zombies, it would all be in good fun, right?

One thing I found especially nauseating was the descriptions of the old guy or grandma in a bath robe as ‘in their own home’.

I’d say that’s all in good fun, Ferret. How could anyone say otherwise after the recent DHS-zombie exercises? I’d be willing buy a few targets like that. 😉

well this explains why they havent been hesitating. I was trying to figure out why they would shoot people in there own beds but now i see theyve been training to do just that. We are in a war boys weather you know it or not you are already designated enemy combatants. USA is already designated a battle zone. Don the only thing that can be done properly is to team up with other like minded ppl like ypou said sacrificing your stuff for the freedom of us all but nobody is willing to give up there precious heating and air or TEE VEEs or any of the shit that weighs us all down. Then the day comes when your a refugee and you have to leave behind all your shit anyway. I dont understand ppl maybe its bc im poor and dont have alot of shit to deal with? If any of you guys want to start making connections maybe Eric can facilitate a meeting room here or something, and remember non aggression is key but you have to be willing to stand up for your neighbor to the death so think hard on it.

The PTB aim to impoverish us and control us. We want liberty to prosper. I don’t see how impoverishing ourselves in the hope of living outside the radar screen of the PTB accomplishes anything.

The state control freaks are now harassing people who have fled to the most inhospitable corners of this country to be left alone. They have accepted the poverty that comes with that to be free but now find themselves looking down the gun barrels of the ‘code enforcers’, the epa, the fda, and countless other government departments of all levels.

Accepting poverty to be free is no longer an out the control freaks of the state accept. That poverty now makes a person a target for their sadistic pleasure of causing pain and grief to others. The pleasure they get from bullying people. Nobody who isn’t part of the club is to be left alone now.

Dear Eric,

Funny how liberal TV and movie script writers invoke “cop killer bullets” in every cop show or movie, and expect audiences to nod in sheeplesque approval.

The clear implication?

The death of a cop is far more outrageous and intolerable than the death of a mere mundane.

So much for these liberals’ “liberalism.”

The only purpose I can see for these photo targets is exactly what they said… to condition the cops to be more comfortable shooting at people they would normally not want to harm. And being in fear of their lives is obviously not going to be any part of that.

I guess if there can be said to be any kind of silver lining to this situation, it is that any hesitation or qualms I might ever had about shooting a cop have gone right out the window.

As the “liberals” have so aptly demonstrated, when you control or redefine the meaning of words, you can shift public perceptions. In the 1800′s a “liberal” was what we would now call an anarcho-libertarian. The word “liberal” was hijacked first by the socialist party, then the “progressives” and today a liberal is someone who freely spends other people’s money in the name of “social justice”.

No, Shazaam, you are just being US-centric. That simply isn’t true anywhere in the English speaking world apart from the U.S.A. and its cultural possessions. As a case in point, here in Australia the Liberal Party is the main right wing party.

“When the battle of the mind is won, the physical is just a mopping up exercise”

Yea? And when in the U.S. has that ever worked? I agree that the people have to be “deprogrammed” but I do not discount using any means necessary to defend our rights as a means to that deprogramming.

I refuse to believe that if a crowd of sheeple saw a man defending another man from the goon squad with physical force if necessary, that they would not find his actions moral and courageous and feel shame that they did not intervene themselves. That someone in that crowd woudl not be inspired.

If that is not the case, if people are so conditioned as to just stand around and cheer for the state agent beating the shit out of the pregnant woman then what we’re doing is a waste of time.

The mighty USSR collapsed when the illusion collapsed. So did eastern european governments. The whole thing runs on illusion. So killing the illusion has worked.

Americans by and large still side with the cop in any struggle. The cop lies. They believe the cop. People have stood aside while cops murdered people who were not even fighting back. And ones that were. But the change is now they take video of it. The cops still lie, they still get away with it. But the video is destroying faith in the state.

To secure power the abuse has to become SOP, just the way things are done, people have to get used to it. That means slow. It’s who wins the mind. We can sit by as the state conditions people to accept being beaten, which then it’s lost or keep planting seeds that bring about doubt.

Every time I am called names, insulted, labeled a conspiracy theorist or worse I have planted a seed of doubt. A person who lashes out does so because his worldview has been questioned.

I don’t see fighting a cop in the street turning out well for me at present. So I will keep on with my use of jedi mind tricks. It’s kept me from arrest so far.

Have you read, The Moon is Down?

It’s very short.

Brilliantly said, Brent!

“A fiction of the mind cannot be fought with physical force.”

That’s a keeper.

And:

At some point part of the crowd will record and the other part will come to the aid of the individual.

Don–THAT’S what I’m trying to impart. Start a fight now, you lose. But every passing day we’re winning hearts and minds–until the day comes when the quote above is true, and half the people jump in to restrain the pig while the others record the evidence.

In your post, you allude to this–that they might do it now even.

In a month, or two, a year or two, they WILL.

And then we can go on the verbal offensive, and start arresting the PTB who are behind all this.

Don’t shoot the enforcers. It’s what they want, so badly they’re doing everything in their power to push us into it, because we will lose the moral high ground.

” It just boggles my mind that, despite hundreds of years worth of examples, the sheeple majority still haven’t awakened to this self-evident truth.”

I’ve been saying it for years, including the saying that you can’t kill a snake by living in its belly, but….

I still fell for the siren song twice lately. Once in ’08 when Ron Paul tried for the nomination and again last year when he did it again.

Maybe I really learned this time. I amaze myself with my own stupidity sometimes, goober that I am. ahaha

If any regular wants tax return / financial reports / legal process crap / anything doable online / done pro-bono, just email me or scan the docs to me at [email protected].

Better if you use pseudonyms and dummy numbers, I’ll set up an account; complete and send you the return, stipulation/order or whatever, but you’ll have to change the name, id numbers, and passwords yourself.

Once people – enough of them – begin to empathize with the victims of government violence – see them as victims – the battle will be won.

Before that point, resistance is futile beyond whatever moral satisfaction one may derive from standing one’s ground.

Yes, but can you do that naked?