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  2. I had been reading some rather annoying Randian criticisms of anarchism regarding the necessity of a “monopoly on the legitimate use of force” by the state and these of sorts of incidents came to my mind. What really annoys me is how so many statist types are against violence committed by private individuals even in the case of legitimate self defense and even support prosecution of such individuals yet almost completely turn a blind eye to these sorts of incidents. It is almost as if the state’s supposed monopoly on the legitimate use on force means in practical terms that whatever force the state uses is legitimate, in other words, basically a license to kill. In fairness and to balance out my point at the beginning, there are minarchists that do not think this way and are very good on both self-defense rights and holding the state to the same standards that individuals are held to. William Norman Grigg as a prime example of minarchists if this stripe and is I think one of the best commentators on the police state.

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  3. “What really annoys me is how so many statist types are against violence committed by private individuals even in the case of legitimate self defense and even support prosecution of such individuals yet almost completely turn a blind eye to these sorts of incidents.”

    The issue of self-defense rights was another that pushed me away from the Left, particularly its mainstream “liberal” variation. For most practical purposes, self-defense rights don’t even exist. It’s a kind of mandatory pacifism.

    “In fairness and to balance out my point at the beginning, there are minarchists that do not think this way and are very good on both self-defense rights and holding the state to the same standards that individuals are held to. William Norman Grigg as a prime example of minarchists if this stripe and is I think one of the best commentators on the police state.”

    Yeah, Grigg is fantastic. I don’t necessarily see anarchists and minarchists as enemies. I look more for where people stand on individual issues of vast significance like foreign policy, the police state, and the economy. There are plenty of minarchists, right-libertarians, objectivists, paleocons, and right-populists who are pretty good on all or at least most of the issues I think are most important and affect the greatest number of people. But some objectivists have horrible views on such questions. They take the most vulgar libertarian lines on economics. For instance, Leonard Peikoff holds steadfastly to Rand’s mantra that “big business is America’s most persecuted minority.” Even worse, some of them make the neocons look sane on foreign policy questions. There are others, like Rob Bidinotto, who have a “cops can do no wrong” attitude towards “law and order.”

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  4. “But some objectivists have horrible views on such questions. They take the most vulgar libertarian lines on economics. For instance, Leonard Peikoff holds steadfastly to Rand’s mantra that “big business is America’s most persecuted minority.” Even worse, some of them make the neocons look sane on foreign policy questions. There are others, like Rob Bidinotto, who have a “cops can do no wrong” attitude towards “law and order.”’

    One thing I found quite bizarre when I was reading a criticism of Ayn Rand’s criticisms of Anarcho-Capitalism was a quote from Rand where she believed that even fully rational people who renounced violence could not live together without a government. Now while I think that there are some real problems with the an-cap idea of competing courts and that some objectivist criticisms of such things have some validity. I want to point out though that even if such mechanisms that an-caps propose for solving disputes are not the way to go, the fact is that there are (and have been used in real life) more ways to solve disputes between people besides either monopoly government courts or high noon at the OK Corral. Roderick Long’s most recent appearance on Lew Rockwell’s podcast had some excellent points on these issues. I would also think that people were truely rational and fully committed to the principle of non-aggression, they would want to settle any disagreements with peacable means whenever possible. You mentioned Robert Bidinotto’s view of law enforcement, who had an interesting debate between himself and Roderick Long which I would recommend as it really revealed who some of these critics go shoot themselves in the foot in order to attack on opponent e.g. Bidinotto’s claim that rights cannot exist without a state. In the interest of fairness, it’s important to point out that there are many minarchists who do make intelligent and fair critiques of the an-cap position while taking their opponents seriously, but it seems to me from what I have read that of the more extreme objectivist critics of an-caps make mainly ad hominem and straw-man arguments in their critiques.

    I think that perhaps what it comes down to is that at bottom, statists of all stripes view all (or almost all) adults as basically children in need of supervision with the state and its agents taking the role of parents, teachers, babysitters, scoutmasters, principals. etc. The difference is that with children people are more honest in that no people endorse authority over children because they belief that children are not competent to control themselves, and also, no one would make the claim that such authority figures rule children with their consent or on their behalf, and they sure as hell would not let kids vote.

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