Author: Keith Preston

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Sufic Notes on Proudhon, Rothbard and Anarchism 5

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(Thanks, Sean!) 

[These are my musings from correspondence with a like-minded proprietor of a homepage, which I thought some here would find interesting. -SJ]:
 
Sufic Notes on Proudhon, Rothbard and Anarchism
 
I concur with your disavowal from the false dialectic of Left and Right: We have transcended beyond that limited spectrum and have arrived at a Third Position, one which seeks a comprehensive solution outside the dominant framework. We should not remain conditioned to this evolutionist dialectic which views everything based upon an ill-defined spectrum of “right” and “left”. Shaykh Abdalqadir as-Sufi has written on this matter under his Scottish birth-name:
 
“The false dialectic of capital and communism, right and left, has for decades veiled from thinking people the possibility of grasping that what happened after 1945 was not only the collapse of the final phase of christian culture but the rise of a syncretic pseudo-culture, grafted onto the ruins of the old. A juden-kultur disguised as the previous model, but replacing it with a set of new values and expression whose unique driving force was the thrust of the market economy in its moments of expansion” (Ian Dallas, Oedipus and Dionysus, Freibourg Books, 1992).
 
I would also agree with your admiration for anarchism, purely in its classical sense and not the modern (mis)understanding. True anarchism is the anarchism of the Syndicalists and not the Cultural Marxists who have hijacked the movement to promote “alternative lifestyles” and the Cult of Political Correctness. It is a harmless nuisance which the elite tolerates since it does nothing to disrupt their power-structures.
 
Economics the Enemy of Anarchists
 
Proudhon’s maxim that “Anarchy is Order” brings to the surface a deep metaphysical reality latent until then. For he recognized that economics was a new religion and that economic ideas would become deified on an altar of ritualistic servitude. The masses are conditioned to believe that usury and taxation are two necessities of life (i.e., the old adage that nothing is certain except for death and taxes, and the fact that the Federal Reserve’s manipulation of interest rates is accepted as a gospel truth by those in awe of the economists).
 
Umar Ibrahim Vadillo has pointed out that the deification of economics has an esoteric underpinning. The rise of the State cannot be divorced from the rise of the modern bank. The two have a symbiotic relation, as both derive from esoteric origins. The State serves to perpetuate Finance, and vice versa. To increase their hold upon the society, they have reduced the temporal power of religions so that the latter serve to provide theological justification for the State. To quote Proudhon:
 
“The economic idea of capitalism, the politics of government or of authority, and the theological idea of the Church are three identical ideas, linked in various ways. To attack one of them is equivalent to attacking all of them….What capital does to labor, and the State to liberty, the Church does to the spirit. This trinity of absolutism is as baneful in practice as it is in philosophy. The most effective means for oppressing the people would be simultaneously to enslave its body, its will and its reason” (Les confessions d’un revolutionnaire, Paris: Garnier, 1851, p. 271). 
 
Nihilism and Violence for its own Sake
 
Proudhon shunned nihilism, warning in no uncertain terms about the need for political movements to adopt a political agenda. He was reluctant to support the revolutionaries of 1848 at first, due to their violence. He came to oppose the new revolutionary regime, since it sacrificed socio-economic reforms for political reform. History demonstrates that revolutions have always succeeded when they had a clear program outlined and failed when they worshipped violence. Proudhon understood this danger of political movements:
 
“He saw that their intellectual paralysis was the cause of helpless nihilist terrorism. Political idealism, once put in place, enforces an increasing separation between the outside world and the membership. In order to create a sense of progress among the membership, the critique of the outside world, seen as part of education, has to aggressively increase in magnitude week after week. This tendency, once adopted, leads inevitably to an absurd dualism consisting of an utterly demonised outside world and an undeserved assumption of pure goodness on their own part. This is what Carl Schmitt (d. 1985) defined as political theology. One side of this nihilistic philosophy produces helpless terrorism and suicidal strategies” (Vadillo, The Esoteric Deviation in Islam, CapeTown: Madinah Press, 2003, pp. 534-535).
 
Proudhon understood clearly that the socio-economic reforms were more pertinent than the political reform, as reforms at this realm would naturally lead to those at the political realm. In this regard, it is quite interesting that all those screaming for “change” in this country likewise talk merely in political terms, ignoring any consideration for monetary reform or changing the economic structures at a fundamental level. Rather, they all serve to perpetuate the State just like their alleged opposite.
 
His opposition to nihilism also has relevance to our own opposition to the neo-Takfiri heresy. They scream at the top of their lungs about “Jihad” and declaring takfir of the governments, but they offer no program once they (hypothetically) come to power. In this sense the program of the Jihadi movements is nihilistic: an endless cycle of violence seemingly for the sake of violence, hence their focus on martyrdom. So rather than providing real solutions to remedy the situation, it is actually an escape from realities.
 
Usury and Wage-Labor
 
Proudhon opposed anyone who earned their income from rent, interest, and wage labor. He recognized that the workers create a productive capacity greater than their individual sum, but they don’t come to benefit from their own labor. Here the materialist device of “freedom” comes to play: Exercise your “freedom” to enter into a subservient work position or your “freedom” to not work, at which case the conditions of the society will ensure that you lose the basic human freedoms.
 
This is why successive opponents of the State have called for a return to the Guild-System, which they now understood was the only structure which could transform the society and eliminate the State. The workers of the Guilds were far more “free” (to use the modern rhetoric) than the workers in this age of “rights”, where employment is the new framework of relations and wages become the only fruits of labor. This fact has been expressed by Vadillo:
 
“The slave is now called the employee. This employee belongs to a class of employees. Freedom, as understood by medieval guilds which upheld a social ethos in which the master/apprentice relationship dominated the degrading employer/employee relationship of today, was already superior to what was being aimed at under the banner of rights. But guilds became viewed as centres of resistance to the
centralisation of the power of the state and therefore in their view an impediment to progress. The words liberty, equality, fraternity meant very little more than the paper they were written on. In their name the guilds that dominated the Middle Ages were abolished giving way to the capitalist wage system. We have accepted the idea that employment is a decent goal for the unemployed, without confronting the fact that employment is the lowest form of economic activity: that is, a man reduced to mechanical functions,
deprived of the capacity to fully enjoy the fruits of his work. This fact is today ignored, neither understood nor realised by the modern analysts within the new economic ethos. And yet this man, who is a slave by most standards of the past, is considered free because it says so in the constitution” (Vadillo, op. cit., pp. 142-143).
 
Private Property
 
I would finally concur with your point about an individual’s right to hold property. The “property” that was condemned by Proudhon was solely the type that was used and abused according to the whims of the one holding it, while true private ownership of land possesses it so as to maintain economic independence. He championed the rights of the small landowners against the State, for which he was criticized by Marx (who actually sought to increase the power of the State against the workers). Proudhon recognized “property is the only power that can act as a counterweight to the State” (Theory of Property).
 
The right of private ownership of property was already recognized before even the creation of human beings as was noted by the Qur’an: “Wa iz’ qaala Rabbuka lil-Malaa’ikati, ‘Inni jaa’ilunfil-ardi Khalifah'” (Sura al-Baqara, verse 30). “Behold, they Lord said to the angels, ‘I will create a vicegerent on earth.'”
 
This verse speaks about successive generations upon the earth, but more importantly it mentions that we have been entrusted with the land as an awqaf. This was also exemplified in the Guilds, which ensured a social network of welfare for the members and through which they could find their livelihood. We recognize that any elimination of the State means the evolution (excuse the word) of decentralized Guilds and communities as the new structure of our societies.
 
Rothbard as a Complement to Proudhon
 
The importance of private property as a protection of individual rights at the expense of the State was studied by Murray Rothbard. He was in many senses a complement to Proudhon, providing further intellectual framework for anarchism in a mass-industrialized society. This is the importance of Anarcho-Capitalists or Anarcho-Libertarians, who covered up the faults of the Anarcho-Syndicalists in monetary issues and closed these gaps within anarchism.
 
Rothbard defined property as that which is acquired and transferred without any interference from the State. It should only be acquired through voluntary trade, gift, or labor-based original appropriation, rather than through aggression or fraud. He defined the self-ownership principle:
 
“The basic axiom of libertarian political theory holds that every man is a self-owner, having absolute jurisdiction over his own body. In effect, this means that no one else may justly invade, or aggress against, another’s person. It follows then that each person justly owns whatever previously unowned resources he appropriates or ‘mixes his labor with’. From these twin axioms – self ownership and ‘homesteading’ – stem the justification for the entire system of property rights titles in a free-market society. This system establishes the right of every man to his own person, the right of donation, of bequest (and, concomitantly, the right to receive the bequest or inheritance), and the right of contractual exchange of property titles” (Rothbard, “Law, Property Rights, and Air Pollution,” Cato Journal, Spring 1982, Vol. 2, No. 1, pp. 55-99). 
 
This matter of property represents the fundamental difference between the modern Cultural Marxist, PC form of “anarchism” and the pure anti-Statism of the individualist anarchists. The former propose the abolition of private property, which would certainly increase the authority of the State and make people vulnerable to its inherent excesses. On the other hand, Anarchism by its very nature is voluntarist. In true nihilist fashion, the anarcho-communists advocated the abolition of money (see Rothbard, “The Death Wish of the Anarcho-Communists,” The Libertarian Forum, January 1, 1970), but this is another matter entirely. What is the meaning behind anarchism?
 
“I define anarchist society as one where there is no legal possibility for coercive aggression against the person or property of any individual. Anarchists oppose the State because it has its very being in such aggression, namely, the expropriation of private property through taxation, the coercive exclusion of other providers of defense service from its territory, and all of the other depredations and coercions that are built upon these twin foci of invasions of individual rights” (Rothbard, Society and State). 
 
Sufism and the End of Metaphysics
 
These individual rights mentioned by Rothbard were already protected by Islam. We have transcended these other forms of thinking about the world, including the heresies of fundamentalists and modernists alike. Our belief is an-archic, in the sense that it reflects the culmination of the Heideggerian understanding that metaphysical foundations of thinking have been eliminated.
 
We understand that with the end of philosophy, Islam is the only force which can take over the gauntlet to roll back the power of the State. The other religions have already been subverted by the Global Capitalist world-view which have relegated them to mere theologies without any relevance on the social, economic and political realms. Hence, all have acknowledged the superiority of Economics – except for Islam.
 
Islam stands as a distinct alternative to the process of deconstruction which has reduced other religions to a position that will not disrupt the Capitalist order. Jean Baudrillard condemned this trend towards a relativism which defines itself in terms of political correctness and the cult of victimology, confiding to the Catholic conservative Rene Girard that “the whole world, including China and Japan, is implicated in the postmodern fragmentation and uprootedness that leaves values behind. There is one exception: Islam. It stands as a challenge to the radical indifference sweeping the world” (Global Viewpoint, 11 May 2005).
 
The potential role of Islam, in its purest Sufi understanding, to reverse these trends has been recognized by a number of truth-seekers who have submitted to the truly “anarchist” understanding that there is no Might nor Power except Allah – La Hawla wa la Quwata illa-billah. There is no Force except the Lord, hence our submission is only to Him because we find in this Tawhid the key to realizing our liberation from both our own soul (nafs) and the coercive pressures of others.
 
Sufi masters have always challenged the powers that be, whether they be tyrants or invaders. The ranks of liberation struggles have always been illuminated with their example. There is a lengthy story where Harun al-Rashid sought out a true teacher who was not a sycophant. He found such a teacher in Fuzail, who told him when the former asked if he could enter: “There is no such thing as authority. If you enter by force, you know what you are doing.”
 
There is much behind the aphorism “Anarchy is Order”. The Islamic conception of order is structuring one’s life according to the transcendent Divine Will, not according to the concepts of authority and control now dominant in this world. This understanding of Islam attracted such anarchists as Isabelle Eberhardt, Ivan Agueli, and Gustave-Henri Jossot, each of whom found its fullest expression in the Sufi tariqas. I have found that this structure is manifested in the Shadhili-Darqawi movement Murabitun, whose communities are quite de-centralized and have forged an alternative at all levels to the dominant Capitalist order.

Dr. Tomislav Sunic Writes to the Los Angeles Times Reply

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Los Angeles Times
 Letters to the Editor
 letters@…
 timothy.rutten@…

 
Re: The extreme-right way to make a buck,” by Tim Rutten, LA Times, Aug. 16, 2008

 Dear Sirs,
 
The title of Mr. Rutten’s piece suggests that the surest way for a conservative scholar to become rich is by embracing an extreme right philosophy. This proposition does not sound convincing given that Rutten’s target, Dr Jerome Corsi, in his book The Obama Nation, discusses a topic which defies the canons of political correctness and which, in addition, could easily fall under the legal category of hate speech. In Europe, Dr Corsi would likely be subjected to thought police scrutiny, his tenure revoked, and his circle of friends would shrink to ground zero.
 
Also, Corsi was to be interviewed by a relatively small radio station, the “Political Cesspool” from Memphis, whose source of income is very frugal. Having been myself a Political Cesspool guest, I was amazed at the quasi monastic modesty and genuine courtesy of its staff. Its main host, Mr. James Edwards and his guests, debate issues ranging from ante-bellum Southern literature to international politics, including the rising tide of political censorship in Americ. The Southern Poverty Law Centre, which Mr Rutten cites as his source, would have us believe that the Political Cesspool is run by baseball club wielding skinheads, sporting swastikas and harassing minorities. This is not true. Labeling a person “white supremacist,” if he or she opposes the multicultural experiment, is the ugliest form of hate speech in which apparently the SPLC excels. Feigned multicultural conviviality, as recent history shows, always yields opposite results regardless of someone’s racialist or ecumenical beliefs. What happened in the Balkans yesterday is happening today in the Caucuses and will likely be tomorrow’s scenario in LA. Both Mr. Rutten and myself had some foreboding of race riots in April 1992. Note being able to reside on my professorial salary in a gated community in south LA, I decided to search for safer pastures, i.e. my “in-group” of my native and racially homogenous Croatia.

 Pursuant to the prevailing codes of intellectual duplicity Mr. Corsi and scores of other thought criminals in the USA and Europe, who lost their jobs or who are often maligned as racists, would have been better off had they not rocked the boat of political rectitude, and had they wisely avoided guilt by association. Instead, there are brave enough to tackle the topics that secretly preoccupy the minds of millions of white Europeans and Americans; uncontrolled non-European immigration and US military over-extension around the globe. Alas in the land of the brave and its appendage the European Union, modern Soviet-style ukases of political correctness prevent hundreds of “right wing” intellectuals from being heard.
 
Which purported right wing scholar, which white supremacist — as modern masters of discourse, dub their traditional conservative opponents — would not be happy to have access to the mainstream media or even catch a glimpse of his photo next to some op-ed in a big mainstream journal? This opportunity is rarely granted to them. They can only go on air at some small radio shows like Political Cesspool, a rare conservative outpost still resisting the onslaught of left-leaning intellectual mendacity.
 
On a personal level let me add the following. Having spent a good portion of my life both in communist multicultural Yugoslavia and in the capitalist West, including America, I pride myself on knowing rather well how these two systems work. The advantage of communism was that its party hacks and scribes lied so brazenly, they themselves had a hard time believing in their Communist Kingdom Come stories. By contrast the liberal discourse, coached in the fine semantics of human rights and masquerading as free speech, is more difficult to decipher. Its meta-language relies on generic expressions that are successfully deployed against would-be dissidents. Dreaded, shut-up words, such as “Nazi”, “anti-Semite”, and “white supremacist” float over dissenting opinion like an intellectual death sentence. Among academics in America and in Europe the intellectual ostracism of opponents is total. A professor without tenure must comply with an inventory of bizarre legal and verbal constructs of Bolshevik provenance, such as “ethnic sensitivity training,” “affirmative action,” “diversity,” etc, just to keep his job.
 
The author of the article might have avoided hasty conclusions about the right wing scene. May it come true, though, one day when he writes that “American publishing houses decided that there’s money to be made in funding right-wing boutique imprints…” Alas, with the current leftist-liberal cultural hegemony this is far likely for now.
 
Sincerely,
 Dr. Tom Sunic
 http://doctorsunic.netfirms.com
 Croatia
 Tel. 00385-1- 6261-55
 cell: 00385-91-793-9454
 tom.sunic@…
 
(Tom Sunic is a former US professor in political science, author and translator). His latest book is Homo americanus: Child of the Postmodern Age, 2007. He currently resides in Croatia.

Updated News Digest August 24, 2008 Reply

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Quote of the Week:

“In 2042, the Republican Party platform will include a plan for comprehensive reform of the US’s national health care program.  Republican Congressmen will engage in furious debate in an attempt to limit the penalties for discrimination against homosexuals to fines rather than imprisonment.

Anybody who really merits the moniker “conservative” had better prepare to be a revolutionary at this point.”

  –“Senor Doug”

 

Afghanistan: Where Empire Goes to Die by Michael Scheuer

Jackbooted Airport Thugs by Emily Feder

ATF Hoodlums Attack Gun Store Owner

Buffalo PIGS Terrorize Family

Fat Children To Be Taken From Parents?

Texas School District to Arm Staff

Neocon Crybabies by Steven LaTulippe

The U.S. Government is Corrupt from Top to Bottom by Charley Reese

Warp Speed, Mr. Sulu?

Russophobia: A Political Pathology by Justin Raimondo

War in Georgia Shows US Foreign Policy is a Bust by Sheldon Richman

Who Started Cold War Two? by Pat Buchanan

For Most People, College is a Waste of Time by Charles Murray

Back in the U.S.S.R. by Daniel Koffler

Antiwar Conservatism by Dylan Waco

Georgia Versus Mother Russia…Another Neocon Scam? by Werner Scott

What is the White House Smoking? by Eric Margolis

Ambivalence of War by Charley Reese

George, Stay Out of Georgia by Bill Lind

Are You Ready for Nuclear War? by Paul Craig Roberts

Constitutions and Organic Bases by Shawn Wilbur

Blood in August: On Avoiding World War Three by John Zmirak

What Will a White Minority Mean for America? by Steve Sailor

Russia Threatens Nukes from AnarchoNation

Neocon Michael Ledeen Labels Italy a Terrorist Nation

“Sweet Neo Con” by The Rolling Stones

America’s Outrageous War Economy by Paul B. Farrell

Western Political Correctness Obscures Communist Atrocities by John Markley

I Resign from the Imperialist-loving Mount Pelerin Society by Paul Craig Roberts

Back in the USSA by William Norman Grigg

Gore Vidal: The Last Republican by Bill Kauffman

What Libertarianism is Not  by Johnny Kramer

The Narrative Versus the News by Justin Raimondo

Rice Goes Deeper Into the Absurd by Glenn Greenwald

War: Why Your Gas is so Expensive  Scott Horton Interviews Greg Palast

US Role in Georgia Cannot Be Ignored by Stephen Zunes

Musharraf Out, Like Nixon; Bush Still In, Like Flynn by Ray McGovern

Why Is Norman Finkelstein Not Allowed to Teach?  by David Klein

Norman Finkelstein: A Pariah in Exile   by Stewart Ain

The Pyramid of the Capitalist System  by Francois Tremblay

America’s New Economic Plan…Nationalize Banks? Werner Scott

Extending NATO to Russia’s Borders is Insane by Thomas Sowell

Yellow Peril!-How the Beijing Olympics Became the Most Politicized Show on Earth by Brendan O’Neill

Drug Legalization as a Defensive Measure

Berlin: Seven Banks Attacked in Protest of Energy Companies

The Politics of Prisons

Thoughtful Anarchy by John Steele

Martial Law in America

International Criminal Court Should Leave Georgia Alone  by Helen Rittelmeyer

China’s Religious Problem-And Ours by Grant Havers

And None Dare Call It Treason-McCain Advisor’s Georgia Connection by Pat Buchanan

Scalia on the Loose by Daniel Koffler

The Paradoxical Nature of the Geopolitics of Secession by Thomas N. Taylor

Interview with Pam Africa and Ramona Africa

The Anarchists Are Coming

National Day of Action Against Electoral Politics

The Military Commissions, So Far by Joanne Mariner

The Middle Kingdom’s Middle Way by Jean-Louis Rocca

All Experts Agree-Legalize Drugs by Julian Critchley

The Shape of Cuba’s Reforms by Saul Landau and Nelson P. Valdes

The Futility of Hope by James Leroy Wilson

Soldier Worship by Laurence Vance

The State’s Legitimacy Crisis by Bill Lind

Bizarro Imperialism by Justin Raimondo

Why Not to Trust Your School

For or Against? Attitudes Towards Capitalism in German or Italian Fascism by Troy Southgate

Street Justice: Good or Evil?

Afghanistan Invasion Going From Bad to Worse by Werner Scott

More Mischief from the Gangsters in Blue by Rad Geek

Texas Truant Students to be Tracked by GPS Anklets

Why Not Let the Republicans Deals with this Mess? by Dave Lindorff

Biden: “I Am A Zionist”

Please Donate to Antiwar.Com!

Updated News Digest August 3, 2008 Reply

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Quote of the week:

SOMEWHERE there are still peoples and herds, but not with us, my brethren: here there are states.

A state? What is that? Well! open now your ears unto me, for now will I say unto you my word concerning the death of peoples.

A state, is called the coldest of all cold monsters. Coldly lieth it also; and this lie creepeth from its mouth: “I, the state, am the people.”

It is a lie! Creators were they who created peoples, and hung a faith and a love over them: thus they served life.              

                                                                 -Friedrich Nietzsche

ACLU Obtains Key Memos Authorizing CIA Torture Methods

There Is No Statute of Limitations on Murder  Vincent Bugliosi Speaks to the House Judiciary Committee

Plug the Plug on the War State  by Charley Reese

Daniel Ellsberg’s Lesson for Our Time  by James Bovard

Book Review-Reclaiming the American Right by Justin Raimondo  by Dylan Waco

Christopher Hitchens vs Waterboarding: Waters Wins   by Francois Tremblay

McCain More Hawkish Than Bush? from Thus Spoke Bellinsky

Exit Strategies  by Pat Buchanan

Batman: Anarcho-Fascist or Unassimilated Jew?  by Richard Spencer

Republican Hypocrites  by Paul Gottfried

The Birth of an Obsession by Paul Gottfried

Founder of Utopian Commune Dies at 77

The Military-Industrial Complex  by Chalmers Johnson

The War Party’s Credo: Power Before Profits-why the left’s analysis of imperialism is inadequate by Justin Raimondo

The Death of Rachel Hoffman  by Paul Armentano

Call for a Chicago Student Strike How About a Nationwide Student Strike??!!

Obama Plans to Make Afghanistan into Vietnam  by Pat Buchanan

Twenty Years for Pot Possession  by Paul Armentano

A Peoples’ Court for America?  by Jacob Hornberger

Foundations for the New Economy  by Kevin Carson

Feudalism vs Anarchism?  by John Zmirak

Feminazis Say No Platform with Weightists

The Public-Private Imperial Police State  Interview with Chalmers Johnson

Is the Surge Working?  by Justin Raimondo

Choosing a King in November   Glenn Greenwald Interviews Daniel Ellsberg

The Father of Lies  by Philip Giraldi

In Praise of Inequality  by Richard Spencer

Worthwhile Books

2008 Connecticutt Liberty Forum

Against Trademarks  by Stephan Kinsella

The Unfortunate Case of Herbert Spencer  by Damon W. Root

Cop Assaults Man on Bicycle

SWAT PIGS Who Terrorized Innocent Family Rewarded with Medals

Cops Shoot Cop in Long Beach

Ron Paul Defends Marijuana Legalization

Maryland PIGS Terrorize Family, Kill Two Dogs

Remembering Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn  by Enrico Peppe

Ecuador Resists Drug War

He Ventured Forth to Bring Light into the World  by Gerard Baker

Hegemony Everywhere But At Home by Paul Craig Roberts

The Believer: Obama Gets the Left Closer to God  by Daniel Flynn

Egoism vs Natural Rights Theory by Wendy McElroy

Whitey Need Not Apply  by Pat Buchanan

Authentic Black Conservatism  by Dylan Waco

Federal Slavery  by William Norman Grigg

“Common Knowledge” About World War Two  by Richard Spencer

Was Wilhelm Just Another W?    by Paul Gottfried

Central Banks Warn of Great Depression

A Free Market Agenda for Healthcare Reform  by Kevin Carson

Jewish Neoconservatives  by Daniel Koffler

Medical-Industrial Complex Supports Ban on Midwifery

McCain’s Police State and Military-Industrial Complex

Demagoguery Works  by Charley Reese

Achieving a Pan-Secessionist Critical Mass 9

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Of all the contemporary scholars and theorists of the state of which I am aware, the one whose work I find by far the most compelling is the Dutch-Israeli military historian Martin Van Creveld. It is his position that the conventional nation-state system that emerged from the time of the Treaty of Westphalia is rapidly becoming a thing of the past, for a variety of reasons. Van Creveld outlined his theories in a lecture to the Mises Institute some years ago. The text of it can be viewed here:

http://mises.org/story/527

A recent work that has gotten some attention in the mainstream press is Bill Bishop’s The Big Sort, a book that describes how Americans are in the process of mutually self-segregating along cultural, political, economic, ethnic, racial and religious lines, not only on the basis of the well-known “red state/blue state” divide but also on a more localized, neighborhood basis.

Now comes a new poll from the highly respected Zogby International polling group, commissioned by the Middlebury Institute, that indicates support for secession is much higher than many, including myself, would have suspected. What do the numbers show?

More than 20 per cent of American adults – one in every five – agrees that “any state or region has the right to peaceably secede from the United States and become an independent republic.” Another similar percentage (18.2 per cent) even says that they “would support a secessionist effort in my state.”

This is rather extraordinary. I would have predicted something like three percent agreeing on the “right to secede” with maybe one percent supporting such an effort.

The support for secession held true for every region in the country, though the percentage was slightly higher in the South (25.8) and the East (23.6). The figures were also consistent for every age group, but backing was strongest among younger adults, as high as 39.9 per cent in the 18-24 year category and 23.6 for 25-34 year olds.

Not much surprise here. Of course, support for secession is going to be highest in the South. The higher support among young people is consistent with Van Creveld’s view that the state is breaking down in part because of its inability to hold on to the allegiance of younger people. The super-patriotic WW2 generation is starting to die out, and the older generation is now the Vietnam generation.

Broken down by race, the highest percentage agreeing with the right to secede was among Hispanics (42.6) and African-Americans (39.5), with “other and mixed” accounting for 21.1 per cent and whites 17.1 per cent. On the question of giving support to secessionist efforts, slightly more blacks (32.7 per cent) than Hispanics (31.6) agreed, with 20.2 per cent “other” and 14.5 per cent white.

This is interesting. Apparently, many racial minorities do not regard secessionism as “racist”, despite the claims of professional “anti-racists” to the contrary. The higher support among Hispanics is possibly due to the influence of the reconquista movement, and it is also possible that the influence of groups like the Nation of Islam have much to do with the higher support among blacks. Indeed, the higher support in the South may ironically be due in part to the large black population in the South. Also, I have long believed that a genuine revolutionary movement would have to be rooted in the lumpenproletarian and underclass populations, and the racial minorities are disproportionately represented in these socio-economic groupings.

The currently faltering economy may have played a part in the endorsement of states’ right to secede, with 18.7 per cent of those considering themselves in the “investor class” agreeing, along with 21.2 per cent of non-investors.

This is a bit confusing. How is an “investor” defined? An “investor” can be anyone who owns a single share of stock anywhere. A method of defining class positions more precisely might have indicated a wider gap between classes on this issue than what these numbers would indicate, although it is certainly possible support for secession can come from the affluent as well as the poor. The Lombard League of Northern Italy has considerable middle to upper-middle class support.

To gauge the extent to which support for secession comes from a sense that the country as it is now made up is not working, a separate question was asked about agreement that “the United States’ system is broken and cannot be fixed by traditional two-party politics and elections.” As many as 44.3 per cent agreed strongly or somewhat, as against 29.9 per cent who strongly disagreed.

These are about the numbers I would have expected.

-32 percent of mainline liberals were sympathetic to secession as an idea.

-28 percent of “ultra-liberal” were supportive.

-17 percent of mainline conservatives were supportive.

This should dispel the myth of secession as a “right-wing extremist” movement. What this seems to indicate is that “conservatives” are hindered by jingoism and can’t bear to countenance an end to the empire, and the hard-core Left does not want to cede territory to the Right. Hence, the lower numbers of supporters among these than among “liberals”, a generic term that probably includes a wide assortment of people who are genuine liberals, moderates, non-jingoist paleoconservative types, libertarians, progressives, anti-authoritarian leftists, ecological radicals, counterculturalists, ACLU-types, populists or simply those who would classify themselves as “not a Republican”.

-38 percent of those with less than a high school diploma would support secession, while less than 10 percent of college graduates were pro-secession.

This probably represents a class division as much as anything else. The more educated tend to be more affluent, with a greater stake in preserving the system, and less inclined to sympathize with radicalism or upheaval.

-18 percent would support a secessionist effort in their state.

That’s roughly one in six. We need to double or preferably triple this percentage so as to give ourselves either a majority or a large, well-organized, vocal minority. So how do we do this?

As I see it, supporters of secesssionist movements could probably be broken down into three basic categories:

1. Leaders and Activists. Many of these are likely to be people who are culturally and politically alienated from the mainstream to a much greater degree that the “average” person expressing political discontent. For instance, thus far the leadership of various secession groups has been drawn from the ranks of environmental radicals, anarchists, hard-core libertarians, neo-confederates or “southern nationalists”, members of the religious right who are to the right of the Republican Party, anti-establishment conservatives and others whose ideology is not exactly representative of prevailing opinion in American society at large. This is to be expected, as a greater degree of political alienation is naturally going to spawn greater support for something like secession.

2. Constituents. These would be those who support secessionist ideas and sympathize with secession movements in their own communities or regions, but are probably not as ideologically radical as many hard-core activists are. For instance, these people simply think the Empire has gotten too far out of hand with its war-mongering or civil liberties abuses, or its economic policies, or they might simply think it would be better if their town, county, city, state or region had more or complete autonomy over their own affairs.

3. Critical Mass. A “critical mass”, as I’m using the term here, would be those persons who either support secession, either actively or passively, or who do not actively oppose secession, out of a sense of immediate personal self-interest or some single issue they feel will be advanced under a secessionist regime. These people are not likely to be ideological radicals in any serious way, and may well be indifferent to higher political considerations like foreign policy, the overall state of the economy, and major social questions but feel, for example, that they will simply profit personally from the likelihood of lower taxes in the event of secession, or the greater availability of health care (whether public or private), or that some issue of importance to them personally, like the right to bear arms or abortion rights or the repeal of municipal zoning ordinances or legalized marijuana, will be advanced if secession takes place.

If one in six Americans would support a secession movement in their state, then it is important to have a secession movement in every state and also to identify those states where secesssion is likely to be the most popular (probably in the South and the East according to the Zogby poll). It is also important to begin cultivating leaders, activists, and constituents for such movements with the eventual goal of achieving a critical mass. Individual secession movements should orient their political programs towards the political and cultural environment they find themselves in. Most of the currently existing secession movements are doing this. The League of the South reflects the conservative values typical to many Southerners while the Second Vermont Republic represents the unusual liberal-libertarian hybrid that state is known for.

The need to reach a wider constituency can present certain conflicts. One of these involves the radical versus moderate dichotomy. Should secessionists “tone it down” in order to make secession more palatable to those with stronger residual attachments to the empire? Or should secessionists “turn up the volume” and adopt a more confrontational approach? I think a happy medium is in order. There is a such thing as trying to appeal to fence-straddlers to such a degree that the hard-core that acts as the real engine of any movement loses its morale in the face of perceived constant sell-outs. However, the inflammatory approach is not necessary advisable, either. Not only will this drive away potential converts, but it will be increasingly dangerous in the ever-degenerating political environment we find ourselves in. A certain amount of prudence is in order.

Another matter concerns the issue of ideological conflicts within particular secession movements, or between the leaders and activists of these movements and their prospective constituents. Here, a certain amount of prudence and pragmatism is necessary as well. Serious ideological conflicts can only be resolved with still more secession. Bishop’s The Big Sort indicates that Americans are naturally separating themselves not only on a regional but on a highly localized basis. Therefore, some degree of hard-core decentralization is in order. A realistic pan-secessionist movement will likely feature “red state” secessionist tendencies with “conservative” leadership and values, with serious territorial concessions made to others, while “blue state” secession movements will display “liberal” values, and make similar concessions out of necessity. Alan recently raised this issue in the Comments section:

“Most and perhaps all secessionist movements need to reduce their territorial claims and this certainly includes the LOS. They need to claim only a small contiguous area that avoids the big cities and probably the communities of color. SVR will probably have to reduce their territory as well, and Cascadia certainly must abandon it’s claims on Idaho and Montana. There just aren’t enough secessionists to build majorities in whole states and regions like that. Ideology is OT but territoy is certainly not and both LOS and Cascadian territorial claims are hugely excessive. Secessionists without excessive territorial claims include Christian Exodus, Free Town Project, and Liberty Districts.”

There is nothing inherently wrong with a secession movement making seemingly extravagant territorial claims. After all, that’s the way it’s frequently done in business negotiations or in lawsuits. One party asks for an outlandish price or settlement and then negotiates their way down. Yet, as a practical matter, secession will only work if large numbers of people do not view it as forcing them under a political roof they find even more objectionable than the present system.

It is also important to distinguish the single-issue of secession from wider ideological agendas. An excellent role model on how to deal with this matter is conservative Christian and Texas Independence activist Larry Kilgore. Mr. Kilgore would be considered a “right-wing Christian theocrat” by the standards of all “mainstream” ideologies, yet he ran for the Senate in the Republican primary this year and received around 225,000 votes. He did so not as an ideological Christian theocrat but as a single-issue advocate of Texas independence, campaigning on a platform of using his position as Senator solely for the purpose of advocating and negotiating Texas independence if he were to be elected.

The issue of the relationship between “extremist” movements and secessionism is likely to be a sticky one. Some secession movements may be guided by ideological outlooks that are relatively middle of the road while others may seem bizarre or threatening to many people. The standard answer to objections raised by the participation of “extremists” should be that the worse their ideas or beliefs are, the better that they be separated from others. Also, persons with unusual beliefs are likely to be much more motivated to do the groundwork for a secession movement that someone who shares many beliefs with supporters of the System. As a hypothetical illustration, a secession movement in Oklahoma or Kentucky might have cults of polygamists, UFO believers, racists, or users of hallucinogenic drugs among its most hard core adherents. It may well be from the ranks of these people that the movement’s most dedicated activists and even some leaders are drawn. Yet it is unlikely that such groups would ever be numerically large enough to conquer significant pieces of territory. Instead, the scenario might be that a state secedes, and the “extremists” who comprise its hard-line activists congregate into a single town and set up a sovereign city-state while everyone else goes about their business as usual.

There is also the need to actually address issues that are of interest or concern to large numbers of people. Economic questions are foremost among these. What will be done about Social Security? Welfare recipients? Veterans? State-dependent business entities? Banking? Some like, Sean Gabb and Kevin Carson, have offered some viable and practical solutions to these matters. Race is another issue. Support for secession is apparently surprisingly high (relatively speaking) among the minorities. Perhaps an offer of reparations and sovereignty along the lines proposed by the Americans for Self-Determination Plan would push those numbers higher.

Of course, there is the wider consideration of how to proceed once the critical mass is finally achieved. In Democracy: The God That Failed, Hans-Hermann Hoppe offers some suggestions. Hoppe argues that “an important lesson must be learned by comparing the failed second American experiment with secession with the first one.”

The first American secession was facilitated significantly by the fact that at the center of power in Britain, public opinion concerning the secessionists was hardly unified. In fact, many prominent British figures such as Edmund Burke and Adam Smith, for instance, openly sympathized with the secessionists. Apart from purely ideological reasons, which rarely affect more than a handful of philosophical minds, this lack of a unified opposition to the the American secessionists in British public opinion can be attributed to two complementary factors. On the one hand, a multitude of regional and cultural-religious affiliations as well as of personal and family ties between Britain and the American colonies existed. On the other hand, the American events were considered far from home and the potential loss of the colonies as economically insignificant. To be sure, at the center of political power, which had shifted to the northern states of the U.S. by then, opposition to the secessionist Southern Confederacy was not unified, and the Confederate cause also had supporters in the North. However, fewer cultural bonds and kinship existed between the American North and South than had existed between Britain and the American colonists, and the secession of the Southern Confederacy involved about half the territory and a third of the entire population of the U.S. and thus struck Northerners as close to home and as a significant economic loss. Therefore, it was comparatively easier for the northern power elite to mold a unified front of “progressive” Yankee culture versus a culturally backward and “reactionary” Dixieland.

I’m not quite certain how the first part of Hoppe’s argument applies to the present political situation in the United States. To be sure, secession by regions of any size would be a significant and, from the perspective of the “power elite”, unacceptable economic loss. That much is understood. However, it is far less clear that cultural homogeneity of the type shared by American colonists and Englishmen in the eighteenth century is currently present. If anything, the “cultural divide” is wider today than it was at the onset of the Civil War in 1861. The Confederate Constitution was virtually identical to the U.S. Constitution minus certain points of economic contention. Then as now, the South was a hotbed for religious fundamentalism, but there was a thriving evangelicalism in the North that would be considered “fundamentalist” by today’s standards. Slavery was certainly a major point of contention, yet most whites of the time, North or South, were certainly “racist” by modern standards and not a few opponents of slavery actually favored repatriation of the slaves to Africa. It is likely there are fewer “cultural bonds and kinship” among Americans today than there were in 1861. The Civil War was to a large degree a war between left-wing evangelical Christians and right-wing evangelical Christians and anti-slavery racists and pro-slavery racists. Other than that and some regional economic differences pitting southern agriculture against northern industry, the Union and the Confederacy were virtally identical in terms of race, religion, preferred political and economic systems and, for the most part, culture.

Where Hoppe’s analysis is more solid relates to his point about the efforts of the northern elite to depict the “war between the states” as a battle of enlightened progressives and backward reactionaries. This is precisely how groups like the SPLC attempt to depict anti-government movements today. It doesn’t appear to work very well if the statistics gathered by Zogby are accurate, as sympathy for secession appears to be higher among the “left-wing” constituents like racial minorities, young people, the poor, the less educated and “liberals”, though there’s no doubt plenty of secessionist sentiment among the “far right” (those so far right as to be outside the Republican Party) as well. Hoppe offers his own ideas on how secession might be achieved:

” In light of these considerations, the, it appears strategically advisable not to attempt again what in 1861 failed so painfully: for contiguous states or even the entire South trying to break away from the tyranny of Washington, D.C. Rather, a modern liberal-libertarian strategy of secession should take its cues from the European Middle Ages when, from about the twelfth until well into the seventeenth century (with the emergence of a modern central state), Europe was characterized by the existence of hundreds of free and independent cities, interspersed into a predominately feudal social structure. By choosing this model and striving to create a U.S. punctuated by a large and increasing number of territorially disconnected free cities-a multitude of Hong Kongs, Singapores, Monacos and Liechtensteins strewn out over the entire continent-two otherwise unattainable but central objectives can be accomplished. First, besides recognizing the fact that the liberal-libertarian potential is distributed highly unevenly across the country, such a strategy of piecemeal withdrawal renders secession less threatening politically, socially and economically. Second, by pursuing this strategy simultaneously at a great number of locations all over the country, it becomes exceedinly difficult for the central state to create a unified opposition in public opinion to the secessionists which would secure the level of popular support and voluntary cooperation necessary for a successful crackdown.”

I would agree that a strategy of secession by scattered units rather than by a contiguous geographical region is more viable for a number of reasons. First, such an arrangement is more conducive to the prevention of the emergence of yet another tyrannical central state following secession from the present tyrannical central state. Second, such an approach is likely more compatible with the need to accommodate the kinds of cultural and ideological diversity that would be found in a modern pan-secessionist effort. Third, as Hoppe recognizes, secessionist potential varies widely from location to location. Fourth, the current process of self-separation Americans are undergoing is just as much a matter of conflict between cities and counties, races and ethnic groups, social classes and religious, cultural or “moral” outlooks as it is a conflict between regions.

However, I am not convinced that the present ruling class would be any less offended by secession on the part of scattered clusters of city-states than it would by secession by a unified block of states in the South, West, East or on the West Coast. Yes, the latter may end up suffering the same fate as the Confederacy, but the former may well suffer the same fate as the people at Waco in 1993. This is an empire that claims the right to interfere in the internal politics of remote African nations. The overlords of this system will certainly not let, say, Chicago or Dallas or even Kennesaw County simply say, “So long, feds, we ain’t payin’ you no more taxes.”

Secession will likely need to be done by clusters of insurgent city-states of the type Hoppe suggests, and these may well reflect an amazing variety of beliefs and cultural systems, but they will need to be at least somewhat supportive of one another in the political and military realm (though not necessarily in the wider cultural or ideological realm) if they are to avoid the fate of the Tibetans at the hands of the Chinese.

Updated News Digest July 27, 2008 1

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Quote of the Week:

“Soledad O’Brien, at the beginning of CNN’s “Black in America:  Reclaiming the Dream,” cited as evidence of the at least partial fulfillment of Dr. King’s dream that “Some are CEOs.  Some are Secretaries of State.”

Well, I have a dream of my own:  To strangle the last CEO with the entrails of the last Secretary of State.

Seriously, there’s something really nauseating about a model of “Progressive” politics that’s perfectly willing to leave the present structures of political and economic power intact, so long as the board rooms and cabinets contain a representative selection of races and genders (”look like America,” as Slick Willie put it).

As a white man, I can tell you, I derive very little satisfaction from the knowledge that I’m being screwed over by people who look like me.  Instead of worrying about the racial and gender makeup of the board rooms and cabinets, I’d like to tear them down.”

                                                                                                           -Kevin Carson

End Refugee Immigration by Abolishing Imperialism 

When You See a Turtle Sitting on a Fencepost  by Kevin Carson

James Dobson: Neocon Stooge  by Dylan Waco

The Mother of All Messes  by Paul Craig Roberts

A Brazen Evil  by Justin Raimondo

How Good Was the Good War?  by Thomas E. Woods Jr.

Obama: The Democratic War President  by Eric Margolis

Good Alice, Bad Alice

The State is Above the Law  by Glenn Greenwald

A Tattoo for Every Politician’s Forehead  by Charley Reese

Children in Guantanamo  from AnarchoNation

The Un-Tied States of America  by Chellis Glendenning

Zogby Poll Finds a Nationwide Support for Secession

Who Really Rules?  by Paul Gottfried

Psychiatric Patient Dies in New York Hospital

The Rebellion in Oklahoma  by Walter Williams

Can the Hammer and Sickle Merge with the Pentagram?

The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder: The Legal Framework for the Prosecution  -Vincent Bugliosi

The Religious Right is AWOL From the Real War   by Chuck Baldwin

Thoughts on the Canadian Genocide and the “Apology”  by Larry Gambone

 Man Dies After Cop Hits Him With Taser Nine Times

TSA Thugs Molest Woman, Assault Elderly Disabled Man

Who Killed the Constitution? Tom Woods Interviewed by Lew Rockwell

Now That the Ban is Lifted, Washington, D.C. Tries to Regulate Guns to Death

National-Anarchist Asia Tour 2008

Videos from 15th London New Right Conference:

War  by Soren Renner

Cosmotheism by Larry Nunn

Imperium  by Norman Lowell

On Carlyle  by Jonathon Bowden

The State vs. Guerrillas  by Bill Lind

Obama on the Brink  by Robert Scheer

Are You Ready to Face the Facts About Israel?  by Paul Craig Roberts

Honorable Exit From Empire  by Pat Buchanan

Labor Struggle in a Free Market  by Kevin Carson

Ron Paul vs the Corporate Police State

Obama Will Probably Win  by Christopher Roach

Grand New Party, Same Old Illusions  by Austin Bramwell

Memphis Cops Beat Up Transexual

Look at the State You’re In: Absaroka

Having an Agenda: The Black Libertarian’s Greatest Fear?  by Wilton Alston

Los Angeles Plans to Ban New Fast Food Restaurants 

Quagmire Exchange  by Charley Reese

Abetting Police Aggression: The COPS Effect by William Norman Grigg

Hitchens on the Sectarian Left  by Alexander Linklater

Pim Fortuyn and the Next European Liberalism from BraveNewWorldWatch

Why a Critique of the Totalitarian Humanist State is Essential to a Genuine Radicalism 3

Anarchism/Anti-State, Anti-Imperialism/Foreign Policy, Culture Wars/Current Controversies, Political Correctness/Totalitarian Humanism, Secession

If we were Soviet or East European citizens in the 1950s, 60s or 70s, and we were attempting to build a revolutionary underground, classical criticisms of the state would certainly be helpful. For instance, the Augustinian view of the state as a “robber band writ large”. However, we would be selling ourselves short by simply criticizing “the state” as an entity unto itself without focusing the nature of the particular kind of state we wished to resist. For this, we would need to look further than simple critiques of statism qua statism and delve deeper into criticisms of Marxist states as particular manifestations of the state. Further, we would need to critique the ideological underpinnings of Marxist states: the ideologies of Marxism, Leninism, Stalinism, Hoxhaism, etc.

So it is with those of us who would resist the present day regimes of the West. Most manifestations of the state except one are considered illegitimate in modern societies. Very few people take seriously the supposed philosophical justifications for monarchy, theocracy, aristocracy, fascism, communism, or military dictatorship. Only “democracy” is considered legitimate, and not just any kind of democracy. Iran is arguably just as democratic in the political sphere as any of the Western countries, yet it is considered a pariah nation. Instead, “democracy” must be fused with “the free-market” (state-capitalism), “the public sector” (the welfare state), “multiculturalism” (state-enforcement of compulsory racial/ethnic/cultural integrationism), state-regulation of “public health” (the therapeutic state) and a number of other things.

Additionally, the Western nations have, over the past 30-50 years, undergone a de jour cultural and social revolution and a de facto revolution in politics, law, education and a number of other institutions. Fifty years ago, racism was nearly universal and frequently mandatory. Today, it is regarded as the ultimate horror. A friend of mine’s sixtyish mother was told as a young girl that her aspirations to become a physician were inappropriate, “as boys become doctors, girls become nurses”. Such sentiments would be considered laughable today, even by most social conservatives. A generation ago, homosexuality was a serious felony. Five years ago, the US Supreme Court declared it to be a constitutional right. Abortion and pornography were once criminally prohibited vices, akin to drug use at the present time, yet these have likewise been declared constitutional rights.

No doubt many people, including myself, would consider most of these changes to be positive in nature. No one wants to return to Jim Crow, or endorse crass sexism, or hail the persecution of homosexuals by the state. And the rights of free speech, freedom of the press and privacy are essential to keeping the state at bay. But that brings us to another interesting matter. As all of this supposed liberation and breakdown of oppressive social structures has occurred, the state has become increasingly ruthless and pernicious in its expression. For instance, the US Constitution allows for the prosecution of only three federal crimes-treason, piracy and counterfeiting. Today, there are over 3,000 federal crimes and forty percent of these have been created since 1970.  Prior to the mid-1980s, drugs were illegal, with drug crimes being treated in a manner comparable to serious property offenses like burglary or grand larceny. Today, even the most minor players in drug offenses are frequently sentenced to greater periods of incarceration than even some who commit violent crimes. Asset forfeiture laws were originally used to go after the holdings of members of drug trafficking cartels. Today, such laws apply to 140 other types of “crimes”. The US prison population has increased a dozen times over since the 1960s. Paramilitary policing was a new phenomenon in the 1970s, and originally intended as a means of dealing with either civil unrest or particularly difficult matters of law enforcement like hostage situations. Today, paramilitary policing is normal, even for routine police work, like execution of a search warrant. Even at the height of the Nixon era, the idea that a president would claim the right to unilaterally suspend habeus corpus and imprison suspects indefinitely in secret prisons without trial would have been considered absurd.

As the state has grown more pernicious, so has the economic position of the working class declined as US elites have adopted the Third World economic model. The American state, for the first time, is openly proclaiming a policy of reserving the right to wage “preemptive war” against virtually any other state it wishes, for any reason, at any time. Further, the cultural revolution of the past generation is being used as the foundation of a whole new kind of authoritarianism. Babies are now accused of “racism” for disliking exotic ethnic foods. A university janitor is reprimanded for reading a book about the Ku Klux Klan during his break time, even though the book in question was anti-Klan. A mother is arrested for spanking a child even when no evidence of genuine abuse exists.

One thing that is rather interesting about this new totalitarian humanism that seeks to establish a Big Brother state to make sure no one is ever being abused or discriminated against is its arbitrariness. Spanking a child is “child abuse” yet the US federal government can roll over dozens of children with tanks at Waco and no one from the System raises an eyebrow. “Racism” is regarded as the ultimate horrorshow, yet the single policy that inflicts the greatest amount of harm upon black communities, the War on Drugs, continues unabated.

It is this totalitarian humanism that is the foundation of modern state tyrannies. Just as we need the traditional critiques of statism found in the works of various historic thinkers, just as we need a coherent critique of the relationship between “big government” and “big business” of the kind that Kevin Carson has developed, so do we need a similar critique of totalitarian humanism and its tentacles like cultural Marxism and the therapeutic state.

The overwhelming majority of North American and probably European “radicals” still proceed as if it were perpetually 1968, if not 1928. Just as the simultaneous rise of the global economy and the decreased viability of the welfare state has mandated a search for new economic alternatives, so does the rise of totalitarian humanism necessitate a critique of this phenomenon beyond what most “radicals” could ever offer. A primary barrier to the formulation and dissemination of such a critique is the fact that most “radicals” essentially share the same value system as the proponents of totalitarian humanism. Yes, many liberals and leftists, for instance, oppose some of the excesses of Bush and cronies concerning civil liberties, but most of them also hold to the view that state-enforced multiculturalism, state-regulated “public health”, state interference in private institutions and local communities to prevent or deter illiberal social practices are legitimate and share the view of the current ruling class that racism, sexism, gay discrimination, fundamentalism, xenophobia, carrying a handgun, failing to attend public schools until age eighteen, etc. are the ultimate sins. Perhaps this explains why the antiwar movement has been utterly impotent and ineffective in opposing the neocons’ wars,i.e., because they share they same fundamental values of spreading “enlightenment”, “democracy”, “equality”, yet may have some reservations about the neocons’ methodology (like American unilateralism and defiance of international law). And, of course, some, like Christopher Hitchens, do not possess even those qualms.

One reason I find tendencies like the national-anarchists or the left-conservatives or the national-Maoists or the neo-secessionists to be rather refreshing is that they represent an outlook that genuinely rejects establishment values. After all, what would be more frightening to the American ruling class and political establishment: A bunch of college students, middle class leftists and hippies marching in the streets in a manner that looks more like a rock concert protesting global warming, racism, and Third World honor killings or a disciplined, orderly march of hard-core revolutionaries drawn from the ranks of inner-city gangbanger/ghetto types, Appalachian rednecks, or ex-convicts and other genuinely lumpen elements carrying banners with menacing slogans like “Death to the System!”, wearing all-black and red outfits and demanding overthrow of the government, smashing the ruling class and dissolution of the system into separatist/secessionist communities?

I know which team I’d pick.

Updated News Digest July 20, 2008 Reply

Uncategorized

Quote of the Week:

“ Those who expect to reap the benefits of freedom, must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it.”

– Thomas Paine

 

Strip Search a Thirteen-Year-Old and Keep Your Job

Proudhon Seminar: What is Property?  Ch. 2 notes, Pt. 1 by Shawn Wilbur

Gangsters in Blue

Proudhon Seminar: What is Property?  Ch. 1 notes, by Shawn Wilbur

Bush Acts Like an Oaf at Gang of Eight Conference  by Eric Margolis

 Iowa Mom Busted by Police for Spanking Child

Indiana University Janitor Reprimanded for Reading Anti-Ku Klux Klan Book

Take a Picture of a Cop, Go to Jail

A Phony Crisis—and a Real One, On The Path To War With Iran by Pat Buchanan

Enabling Tyranny—Brigitte Bardot And Other Victims by Paul Craig Roberts

Police Quotas Motivate Unfair Treatment from Left Conservative Blog

The Lesser Evil Just Keeps Getting More Evil by Kevin Carson

 All You Need to Know About Obama   by Brad Spangler

Why They’re Called “Cockroach Caucuses”  by Kevin Carson

Black Baltimore Drug Dealers Use “Far Right” Legal Theories

“Have Nothing to Do with Conquest”  by Michael Scheuer

Tom Woods Speaks at Ron Paul March

Conservative Confusion on Iran by Philip Giraldi

Just Another Drug War Rant  by Kevin Carson

You Say You Want a Revolution  by Kevin Carson

One Million Terrorists?   by Paul Craig Roberts

Nothing Honorable About the Vietnam War  by Ted Rall

John McCain is the Candidate of Mars, God of War  by Doug Bandow

Little War Criminals Get Punished, Big Ones Don’t  by Paul Craig Roberts

America’s First Affirmative Action Candidate  by Pat Buchanan

Is There Sovereignty Beyond the State?  by Thomas E. Woods, Jr.

The Myth of the Conservative Legal Movement     by Kevin R. C. Gutzman

Housing and Squatting      from AnarchoNation

Notes on the Revolution March      from Social Memory Complex

Report Finds Horrendous Conditions at Chicago Jail

Military Court Upholds Free Speech for Soldiers

Heavy Metal Monk

Drug War Hogwash     by Charley Reese

Panarchy: A Means to Jeffersonian Ideals  by Mike Rozeff

We’re in a World Economic Crisis by William Norman Grigg

Blow it Out Your Ass, Phil Gramm!

Duty to Resist Reply

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(Thanks, Jeremy)

Text of a speech from Adam Kokesh of Iraq Veterans Against the War

 

http://kokesh.blogspot.com/2008/07/duty-to-resist.html

Saturday, July 12, 2008

Duty to Resist

Text of speech delivered 080712 at the west lawn of the capitol:

When I joined the Marines at a little strip mall in Santa Fe, and when I was in boot camp in San Diego, and when I was dodging mortars in Fallujah, I could not have imagined that I would one day share a stage with such renowned speakers. However, to march shoulder to shoulder, and to stand in solidarity with you, is a far greater honor.

It has been said that when in the course of human events, an oppression so revolts its subjects, it becomes necessary to alter or abolish the means of that tyranny. Is it that time when our Bill of Rights is defiled every day? When our adventures abroad threaten our security at home? When the Federal Reserve keeps our free nation enslaved by debt? When the people of the world tremble under the thumb of corporate imperialism? And now our nation is drifting dangerously from freedom to fascism. So I have to ask, is it time? The time is now, the threat is clear, the bands of tyranny are tightening around America, and it is our duty to resist!

As empowered patriots, let us take stock of our commitment to the ideals upon which this country is founded. America without her freedoms is like a body without a soul. The challenge before the Freedom Movement is no less, than to bring about a revolution of values, inspire a renaissance of American politics, and breathe new life into the tortured body of our nation. We will meet that challenge with courage and love, and as always, we the people, will prevail!

To rally the troops of the Revolutionary Army in the winter of 1776, Thomas Paine said, “These are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot, will in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands by it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered.”

As Iraq Veterans Against the War, we are resisting an occupation that we once risked our lives for. We swore to support and defend the Constitution of the United States of America, but we found out the hard way that the greatest enemies of the Constitution are not to be found in the sands of some far off land, but rather right here at home! We are your new winter soldiers and we are still defending America.

We bring the values, skills, and commitment that make us warriors to the fight before us today. We are working to end the war by strategically withdrawing our material support and inspiring others to do the same. By advocating for veterans, we honor those who served, and empower soldiers to become successful civilians. With Truth In Recruiting, we are inspiring a generation of young Americans to find a better way to serve this country than dying for empire. By supporting those who are actively resisting, we inspire further resistance, and ensure that soldiers still have the right, as is their duty, to disobey illegal orders.

During the siege of Fallujah, a young Lance Corporal was shot through the side of his flak jacket in a firefight to the west of the city. The bullet hit an artery near his spine. My team was called to help get him to the field hospital at Camp Taqadum. He was on a stretcher in the humvee in front of me, and I watched the Corpsman treating the external wound in a frightened, hurried panic, as the dust from the hot road swirled around us. When we got there, I carried him in as he moaned and writhed in pain, barely conscious. He flailed his arm off the stretcher, and as I put it back by his side I told him, “Don’t worry. You made it. You’re gonna be OK.” But he died only minutes later from the internal bleeding.

I have to live with that memory every day, but I have learned from it. I will not tell you that the band-aids applied by Republicans and Democrats will heal us. I will not pretend that everything is just going to be ok while we are bled dry by tyrants. And if it takes the last full measure of devotion, I will not allow the same fate to befall this country!

This young movement, is getting past the external wounds to the greater evils plaguing this nation. We know, that the greatest threat to American security is the current corruption of our government! No politician has ever ended a war. Civil rights were won in this country not by any legislator, but by a movement. I have great hope for America, but not because of an election. No, my hope comes from you!

Our tragic love affair with the state, has led us to put far too much trust in a government that we hoped could improve our lives, but has instead come to run our lives for us. We have become, as a people, like a frightened, battered, beat down victim of an abusive relationship. A servile, unquestioning, obedient people, will always produce tyrants. We must, as a nation, once again, embrace defiance, rebellion, and resistance!

Every day more and more Americans are avoiding unenforceable taxes, leaving government jobs out of disgust, and sending their kids to college instead of combat. But our efforts as a movement must become unified and deliberate to fully withdraw our compliance and support. Be it with your lives, labor, or tax dollars, stop investing in your own oppression! Guard your communities from the police state! Do not waste a single vote, or a single dollar, on the two-party system! Do not be content merely to grumble and to march while they are using fear, force, and violence as weapons of oppression. We must embrace the opportunity to resist civilly while we still can!

We are compelled to be here for many different reasons, and there is strength in our diversity. As within Iraq Veterans Against the War and Veterans For Peace, we do not need to be uniform to be unified. Take a look at the thoughtful, passionate people around you on this field, and throughout this country. Do not leave here without meeting a new brother or sister in the struggle. Take with you the inspiration to share your passion with someone who does not know they are yet part of our movement. Seek out where you can be most effective in the cause of liberty.

Challenge our force fed culture of unquestioning conformity and compliance. Embrace a world that is not defined by the politics of fear, our obedience producing schools, or the false prophets of the corporate media. As we have been awakened, we must stir the sleeping masses. As the forces of oppression are diligent, so must we toil. As they are committed, we must surpass them. As they step up their efforts, we must rise up to defeat them as a unified movement!

We have been labeled rebels, traitors, enemies of the state. All terms King George would have used to vilify our founders. I, for one, will always rebel against oppression, a traitor only to tyranny, and I would be remiss to not be the enemy of a state, that so blatantly tramples our freedoms.

American values have been nearly vanquished by consumerism, militarism, and authoritarianism. Yellow ribbons and lapel pins will not save this country. When injustice becomes law, resistance becomes duty. The utmost manifestation of love and devotion to America, is today as it always has been, resistance of tyranny! Resist we must, and resist we will! We will not be silent! We will not obey! We will not let our government destroy our humanity! We will not wait another moment in fear to stand up for what we know to be right! It is time the government starts fearing the people again! It is time that we meet oppression with resistance!

They cannot stop us! Humanity marches on. You can fight it, or fight for it. When we say revolution, we say it with love. As we march onward from this place where we have pledged to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor, let us embrace the struggle, cherish the fight, and live in that love. The passion of our hearts will be raised with our fists!

A Man Among Men Reply

Anarchism/Anti-State

Thanks to Josh Rhodes for digging this up:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7420469.stm

Meeting Spain’s last anarchist

By Alfonso Daniels
San Buenaventura, Bolivia

Hours after flying on a rickety 19-seater propeller plane and landing on a dirt strip, you get to the village of San Buenaventura in the heart of the Bolivian Amazon.

Here, in a simple one-storey brick house next to a row of wooden shacks, is the home of Antonio Garcia Baron.

He is the only survivor still alive of the anarchist Durruti column which held Francoist forces at bay in Madrid during the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) and the founder of an anarchist community in the heart of the jungle.

Mr Baron, 87, was wearing a hat and heavy dark glasses. He later explained that they were to protect his eyes, which were damaged when he drank a cup of coffee containing poison nine years ago.

It was, he said, the last of more than 100 attempts on his life, which began in Paris, where he moved in 1945 after five years in the Mauthausen Nazi concentration camp, and continued in Bolivia, his home since the early 1950s.

Stateless

He was keen to share his views on 20th Century Spanish history with a wider audience.

THE DURRUTI COLUMN
Column of anarchist fighters during Spanish Civil War
Led by Buenaventura Durruti until his death fighting Franco’s forces on outskirts of Madrid in November 1936
After defeat of Republican forces in 1939, many surviving members fled to France. Many interned in French prison camps.
After Nazis invaded, many imprisoned in concentration camps, others joined resistance

“The Spanish press has covered up that the (Catholic) Church masterminded the death of two million Republicans during the civil war, not one million as they maintain,” Mr Baron said before launching into one of his many anecdotes.

“I told Himmler (the head of the Nazi SS) when he visited the Mauthausen quarry on 27 April, 1941, what a great couple the (Nazis) made with the Church.

“He replied that it was true, but that after the war I would see all the cardinals with the Pope marching there, pointing at the chimney of the crematorium.”

On the walls of Mr Baron’s house is a picture of him taken in the camp. Next to it is a blue triangle with the number 3422 and letter S inside, marking the prisoners considered stateless.

“Spain took away my nationality when I entered Mauthausen, they wanted the Nazis to exterminate us in silence. The Spanish government has offered to return my nationality but why should I request something that was stolen from me and 150,000 others?” he said angrily.

View of San Buenaventura

Mr Baron wanted to be as far from modern life as possible

Mr Baron arrived in Bolivia on the advice of his friend, the French anarchist writer Gaston Leval.

“I asked him for a sparsely populated place, without services like water and electricity, where people lived like 100 years ago – because where you have civilisation you’ll find priests.”

Some 400 people, mostly Guarani Indians, lived there at the time, but in fact also a German priest.

“He was a tough nut to crack. He learnt of my arrival and told everyone that I was a criminal. They fled and made the sign of the cross whenever they saw me, but two months later I started speaking and they realised I was a good person, so it backfired on him.”

Convinced that the priest still spied on him, a few years later he decided to leave and create a mini-anarchist state in the middle of the jungle, 60km (37 miles) and three hours by boat from San Buenaventura along the Quiquibey River.

With him was his Bolivian wife Irma, now 71.

They raised chicken, ducks and pigs and grew corn and rice which they took twice a year to the village in exchange for other products, always rejecting money.

Dunkirk

Life was tough and a few years ago Mr Baron lost his right hand while hunting a jaguar.

For the first five years, until they began having children, they were alone. Later a group of some 30 nomadic Indians arrived and decided to stay, hunting and fishing for a living, also never using money.

“We enjoyed freedom in all of its senses, no-one asked us for anything or told us not to do this or that,” he recounted as his wife smiled, sitting in a chair at the back of the room.

Recently they moved back to the village for health reasons and to be closer to their children. They live with a daughter, 47, while their other three children, Violeta, 52, Iris, 31, and 27-year-old Marco Antonio work in Spain.

Mr Baron commissioned paintings of a concentration camp victim to hang in his house

Paintings of scenes from the camp are a visual reminder of his past

They also share the few simple rooms arranged around an internal patio with three Cuban doctors who are part of a contingent sent to help provide medical care in Bolivia.

The hours passed and it was time to take the small plane back to La Paz before the torrential rain isolated the area again.

Only then, as time was running out, did Mr Baron begin speaking in detail about Mauthausen and the war – as if wishing to fulfil a promise to fallen comrades.

How the Nazis threw prisoners from a cliff, how some of them clung to the mesh wire to avoid their inevitable death, how the Jews were targeted for harsh treatment and did not survive long.

His memory also took him to Dunkirk where he had arrived in 1940, before he was caught and imprisoned in Mauthausen.

“I arrived in the morning but the British fleet was some 6km from the coast. I asked a young English soldier if it would return.

“I saw that he was eating with a spoon in one hand and firing an anti-aircraft gun with the other,” he laughed.

“‘Eat if you wish’, I told him. ‘Do you know how to use it?’ he asked since I didn’t have military uniform and was very young.

“‘Don’t worry,’ I said. I grabbed the gun and shot down two planes. He was dumbstruck.

“I’ll never forget the determination of the British fighting stranded on the beach.”

Clarifying the Left/Right labels Reply

Left and Right

In response to my statement “Is the Left salvagable? In and of itself, it does not appear to be,”, Jeremy raises some helpful points concerning the defintions of “left” and “right”:

That begs the question: what is this “Left”? If it is merely establishmentarianism with a cultural attachment to civil disobedience and protest, then one wonders whether the term “left” even applies. And so when you characterize the entire Left by its most objectionable qualities, it does give me pause. This is a very broad movement, with a wide variety of personalities.

And at least historically speaking, it seems like the Right has a much more basic need to align with established norms and power than the Left (whether we’re using it in the traditional anti-establishment sense or in the modern, pejorative sense you employ). I’m all for transcending left and right, but not as an alternative to performing a much needed analysis of the current political conditions.

I’m not accusing you of laziness, but merely suggesting that we make sure we qualify our generalizations of convenience as such. There’s no need to turn anybody off by attacking their label of preference, is there? I’ve always liked the tack you’ve seemed to take where you out-left the left, and out-right the right, demonstrating that they lack the conviction of their own principles. This is the way to get serious people to think seriously about their own motivations. We transcend the political poles by not by dispensing with them but by clarifying what they were originally intended to represent.

In strictly historical terms, virtually all people in modern societies (those of the West and others with similar politico-economic systems) are “leftists”. The “right”, properly understood in its historical context, was the ideology of defense of the monarchy, theocracy and aristocracy: “Throne and Altar”. Such sentiments are marginalized to say the least in liberal democracies, particularly the United States, which has no “throne and altar” tradition of its own. In other words, nearly all Americans and most Westerners in general start with the American or French Revolutions and move leftward from there, often considerably leftward. The closest thing the United States has to a “right-wing” is the so-called “religious right”, which is rather liberal by historical and even contemporary world standards. For instance, compare the “religious right” in America versus that in Saudi Arabia.

Most contemporary “right-wing” ideologies are historically on the Left. For instance, the godfather of modern philosophical “conservatism”, Edmund Burke, was a Whig who opposed British imperialism in Ireland, America and even India. American “conservatism” owes much to the classical liberalism of Locke and Adam Smith. The neoconservatives are an outgrowth of either Cold War liberalism or Trotskyism (depending on who you ask or which neoconservative you’re talking about). “Right-wing” libertarianism is really the radical classical liberalism of Herbert Spencer. American “right-wing populism” is distinctively rooted in the American republican tradition and owes very little to European royalism to say the least.

The mainstream Republican-oriented right is really a kind of “right-wing liberalism”, and therefore historically on the left, particularly since the neocon takeover of the right. What is now called “liberalism” in the US is really social democracy, and this is very much a centrist, if not reactionary, position in modern societies. American “liberalism” and European “social democracy” both maintain roughly the same levels of state intervention into the economy, though the European social welfare system is slightly more extensive (and mad possible only by the absence of a large military-industrial complex of the kind found in the USA). This system, whether European or American, is becoming an archaism, given the fiscal difficulties of modern welfare states.

The Left established itself as the party of the welfare state several generations ago. That’s why a distinction was initially made between the Old Left and the New Left. As we all know, the New Left abandoned class politics for a cultural politics that is now relatively status quo. At the same time, as all of this cultural “liberation” has occurred, the grip of political totalitarianism has tightened. The “Campus Progress” group I mentioned in the previous post seemed, from the contents of DeAnna’s review, to represent a wide cross-section of the Left, from the mainstream Democratic-oriented left to The Nation to the radical gay/trans,etc. left to the Weathermen-friendly. Yet I also noticed from the content of that article that most of the issues covered involved the same cultural politics that has defined the Left since the 60s.

The fundamental problem I see with the Left is that not only does it not offer anything new, but does not take many fundamentally anti-establishment positions. Of course, if we wish to define “left” in the historic sense of opposition to the status quo, then it would seem that most of the currents I previously identified as “revolutionary right” would also be the true “left”. This would certainly include the “left-libertarian” tendency that Jeremy leans towards, particularly considering that many liberals and leftists consider libertarianism to be just a variant of fascism. It would certainly include Dylan Waco and Daniel Bein’s “left-conservatism”. Of course, it would include “national-anarchism” or the “national-Maoism” of the Patriotic Workers’ Party.

The problem I see is that most orthodox leftists would consider all of these positions to be heresy. If the “left” is the orthodox left, then are all of these genuine anti-establishment positions on the left, or are they something entirely new, or are they just a “left to the left of the left”? I remember Sam Dolgoff saying once that “there’s the left and then there’s the further left and then the even further left, and then there’s an even further left and that left is me.”

Maybe that’s what we are.

I wrote in the “Liberty and Populism” article that the real struggle in modern times is a continuation of the historic battle between Marxism and Anarchism, with Marxism representing the status quo, whether right-wing liberalism/Trotskyism in the form of the Neocons, centrist totalitarian humanism of the US Democratic Party and the ruling classes of the European nations, the crypto-Stalinist cultural Marxism of the PC Left, the post-Maoism of the Chinese Communist Party, et.al.

I suppose the true left is whatever is resisting all of this. Are religious conservatives standing up to totalitarian humanism by opening home schools leftist or rightists? Are gun nut militias left or right? Are the cultural nationalists of Vlaams Bloc advocating an independent Flanders left or right?

It’s a complicated question.

Pan-Secessionist Militant Street Actions 3

Uncategorized

NA23 offers this suggestion:

The key is the breaking down of the Left/Right dichotomy with a real social alternative. We have to disrupt the labels and stereotypes held by the left, right and the media. This can only be done succesfully through frequent street actions and public involvement, on as many issues as is possible.

The strategy of tension and the disruption of dogmas through confusion.

This may well be correct, as it has been the National-Anarchists of Australia and New Zealand that have been achieving the highest level of recognition so far as “neither left nor right” movements go, and they have been doing it through street actions.

Some examples:

http://www.newrightausnz.com/?p=110

http://www.newrightausnz.com/?p=109

http://www.newrightausnz.com/?p=4

What the folks in Australia have shown is that even a small group that acts correctly can make something of an impact.  A few years ago, I was having a conversation with a non-political acquaintance who told me that most leftist demonstrations he had observed appeared to be nothing more than chaotic, incoherent nonsense with a bunch of people swarming around and heading off into all sorts of different directions and often carrying signs (usually exhibiting the quality of what a third-grader with a box of crayons might produce) with slogans that were irrelevant to the purpose of the protest itself, for instance, “Save the Whales” signs being carried at an antiwar demo. I suggested in response that it would be more effective if a group of protestors simply marched in an organized way, carrying one big banner that was professionally done and that got the message across, with relevant literature available to give out to interested passersby.

From the photos of the New Right Aus/Nz actions, it appears that this is precisely what they do. Hence, their effectiveness. Also, notice that many of them are wearing black outfits and some are wearing masks (warning: wearing a mask in public is illegal in some US jurisdictions). This is good as it gives the marchers an appearance of seriousness that counterbalances the hippy-dippy, hysterical leftoid image of protest demonstrations.

So how would we do what our Australian/Nz friends are doing in the USA? NA23’s position of adopting such tactics towards many issues seems appropriate. No doubt different issues will be more significant in certain places and at certain times. On the secession question itself, image a demo similar to that depicted in these NA-NR Aus/NZ photos outside of federal buildings in the capital cities of individual states demanding autonomy for regions and cities. Imagine such demos outside courthouses, jails and police stations demanding an end to the police state and the legal racket and prison-industrial complex built up around it. Imagine demos outside the headquarters of corporations, banks and businesses institutions involved in nefarious activities. Imagine such a demo outside military recruitment centers handing out antiwar literature making serious arguments as opposed to the usual “No Blood for Oil” leftoid crap.  There could be similar actions against the eradication of low income housing, or against corporate welfare-funded development projects, and many other targets.

What would be particularly advantageous is if anti-System groups from opposite ends of the political or cultural spectrum could get in the habit of marching together against common enemies, not out of a sense of brotherly love, but out of recognition of common enemies. For instance, religious fundamentalists and environmentalists demanding an end to the feds’ harassment of pro-life, environmental or animal rights groups. Left-wing anarchists, black nationalists and white nationalists marching over, say, police brutality or housing issues (yes, such groups have actually engaged in joint actions in the past). Homosexuals and motorcycle gangs marching in protest over harassment of gay bars and biker bars by zoning and liquor licensing boards.

You get the idea.

Of course, any such actions have the potential for violence as well as legal complications. Go in with your eyes open. Consult with lawyers, train your people in how to deal with the police when arrested, do your homework, etc.

Maybe we can reclaim the good name of protest.

Is the Left Salvagable? 3

Culture Wars/Current Controversies, Left and Right

Jeremy raises an interesting question in the Comments section:

I don’t think the Left is so utterly irretrievable as you seem to, but a line must be drawn in the sand when it comes to revolutionary potential. Many on the Left (and Right, no doubt) will be found wanting.

And Mike offers a few important observations as well:

The analysis of today’s “liberalism” as totalitarianism is spot on. I would only add that there is a like tendency of thought from those on the “conservative” side of the political sphere that would likewise recognize no limitation or boundary to the use of state power to create their utopia.

Over at the Ancien’ Regimer page Taki’s Mag Kevin DeAnna has a piece that is highly relevant to this issue:

http://www.takimag.com/blogs/article/rules_for_radicals/

Most of DeAnna’s piece is an attack on the Left, but look at what he says about what passes for the mainstream “Right”:

In contrast, the majority of young CPAC attendees believed the purpose of political action was wearing a suit and preparing for a career. It is the difference between activists and politicos. Many Beltway conservatives are not activists and despise those who engage in protests or think of political alternatives beyond voting for Team Red. A mainstream conservative organization awarding young activists for direct action is simply unconceivable. Conservative organizations systematically funnel them into the dead end of Republican business as usual. Culture is largely ignored. The result is a youth “movement” that is actually less committed and effective than the older conservative grassroots. Campus Progress is building activists and the campus Right is building politicians and politicos.

In other words, the mainstream Republican-oriented “Right” is simply a movement of careerists and opportunists for whom political or party affiliation is simply seen as a career move. Well, duh, who would have ever thought that about Young Republican-types? This gets us to the difference between “conservatives” and a wide body of perspectives that might be called the “revolutionary Right”. What is a “conservative”? Roughly defined, a conservative is someone who wants to conserve a particular status quo (in the tradition of De Maistre) or is suspicious of change, or at least rapid or radical change (in the tradition of Burke). American conservatism also has a classical liberal strand to it, particularly the Lockean emphasis on property rights, though many right-wing histrionics over “property rights” amount to little more than an apology for the state-capitalist status quo (see Kevin Carson).

There is still another branch of “conservative” thinking, and one which I personally adhere to, that does not necessarily commit one to a particular ideological outlook in the political realm. This perspective draws on the realist tradition of Machiavelli and Hobbes and is found in modern thinkers like Carl Schmitt, Ernst Junger, Vilifredo Pareto, Georges Sorel, James Burnham, Lawrence Dennis, Robert Michaels and Gaetano Mosca. This point of view is elitist, anti-egalitarian, pessimist, anti-utopian, social Darwinian (or at least recognizes the inevitability of conflict), anti-humanist, cynical and espouses no small degree of moral skepticism. Unlike other brands of “conservatism”, this outlook does not commit one to the preservation of any particular status quo. One can be a “rightist” in the Machiavellian tradition, as I am, and also be an extreme revolutionary, as I also am.

The bottom line is that most of the American right-wing is a bunch of jingoistic flag-wavers or a bunch of middle-class people whining about taxes. Of course, we should want nothing to do with such people. Instead, we should seek to cultivate a “revolutionary right” that is far outside the mainstream “conservative” milieu. But what about the Left?

Back to Kevin DeAnna’s experience of attending the conference of some lefto-freakazoid outfit called “Campus Progress”. Here’s some of the better gems from DeAnna’s review:

I reported to registration to receive my official totebag, T shirt, and condoms. In the bustle, I was only able to grab three packs, but luckily, Students for a Sensible Drug Policy and NARAL were handing out prophylactics in the display area (unfortunately labeled “Screw the Drug War”). The Campus Progress National Conference had begun.

This is genuinely sad, because the drug war is a serious issue, a foundation of the exponential expansion of the American police state over the past twenty or so years, and a means by which the state has tyrannized millions and brought about all sorts of social wreckage in the process. However, the approach of these folks is to make opposition to the drug war look like just another PC joke issue like demands to change the names of sports teams named after American Indian tribes or the right of men to use women’s restrooms in public buildings.

New Republic editor James Kirchick made an appearance during the panel on gay rights,”his Barack Obama-style flag pin being the only American flag at the entire conference. At CP, Kirchick was the official representative of right-wing extremism in that he argued that gays should become “normal” by gaining entry to bourgeoisie institutions such as marriage and the family and disowning terms like “queer.” This prompted cries of disapproval.

We know we’re in the Twilight Zone when the “conservative” representative at a leftist conference is a neocon homo who did a hit piece on Ron Paul for the center-left New Republic.

Richard Kim of The Nation argued the queer agenda should be about pan-sexual liberation, including liberalizing divorce laws and pushing for acceptance of alternative family models beyond squares like Kirchick and his hypothetical partner. A matronly trans-queer named Mason rumbled in a deep baritone that before openly becoming “trans,” he had “no identity.”

If the purpose of radicalism or activism or whatever we want to call it is simply to promote one big fuck-fest, wouldn’t it be easier to forget about politics altogether and just open an adult film company?

The Young Democratic Socialists handed out a flyer featuring Martin Luther King stating, “We are saying that something is wrong with capitalism, there must be a better distribution of wealth and maybe America must move toward a democratic socialism” which would shock my movement colleagues who tell me every January that MLK was a conservative Republican.

Compared to these folks, MLK was a conservative Republican.

The fact that an organization that has hosted senators, presidents, and the current Democratic nominee shares space with racists, communists, and homosexual activists that consider gay marriage to be reactionary is newsworthy.

Gay marriage is reactionary. The radicals of yesteryear would denounce marriage as a bourgeois institution and burn their marriage certificates, and this was true not only of free-lovers, free-thinkers, anarchists and bohemians but even many old guard socialists of the Fabian ilk. Nowadays, we have gays running out to join the bourgeoisie. Well, actually, we don’t. In Holland and other countries where gay marriage is recognized, only a small number of homosexuals have taken advantage of this “opportunity”.

As Campus Progress also recruits and advertises at the even more radical National Conference on Organized Resistance, which openly promotes force against military recruitment centers, the links between Democratic Party leaders and violent extremists goes well beyond Obama living in the same neighborhood as Bill Ayers.  Campus Progress’s magazine’s feature on the “Lessons of the Weather Underground” is no aberration.

Well, now we might actually be getting somewhere. All Hail Violent Extremists!

It is to Campus Progress that U.S. Congressman Keith Ellison can speak, in his own words, “vanguard to vanguard.” The tendency of attendees to speak of overthrowing the “system” and in the next sentence talking about the upcoming Obama Administration is exactly how activists should think. While participating in Democratic campaigns, Campus Progress and the activists that work with it are building a force independent of partisan efforts, but not irrelevant to it. They understand that the role of activists is to push politicians towards an independently defined agenda rather than serving as cannon fodder.

Hence, a common concern of many activists was how to avoid being “co-opted” by the Democratic establishment, even if that establishment is headed by the most liberal candidate in American history. Similarly, a comment during the civil rights panel about how any movement needs a “militant resistance” was met not with nervous glances but agreement to what all perceived to be an obvious point.

This is an illustration of the split between mainstream liberal totalitarian humanism and the more hard-core PC cultural Marxist Left. I don’t know that there are any significant doctrinal differences, except maybe on a few economic points, e.g., welfare-capitalism vs outright socialism/Marxism. It’s basically the same as the historic divisions between Social Democrats and Commies. How fast do we want to go, and all that.

Is the Left salvagable? In and of itself, it does not appear to be. Instead, it appears to be more along the lines of a demented cult whose counterparts on the Right might be folks like the followers of Rev. John Hagee. But before I get too self-righteous about it all, I should point out that as a pan-secessionist I would welcome the development of both “Campus Progress” lefto-freakazoid secession movements as well as John Hagee Fan Club secession movements. Also, I was an evangelical Christian with views not unlike Hagee’s until I was a teenager and I also participated extensively in lefto-freakazoid activities not unlike these “Campus Progress” loons for a few years when I was in my early twenties.

I basically see both “movement conservatism” and lefto-freakazoidism as useful transitional phases for superior people who will eventually move on to something more concrete. For instance, some of the better people in the paleo milieu – Tom Woods, James Wilson, Joe Sobran – came out of “the conservative movement” (forgive them, for they knew not what they were doing). And many in the “beyond left and right” milieu came out of the Left-myself, Ean Frick and a number of other folks around Attack the System. I think we should look at both movements – conservatism and leftism – as sinking ships that may contain rare individuals actually worthy of being thrown a life preserver or picked up by a rescue boat. Let the rest of them drown.

What do others think about this? Is the Left salvagable?

For a Revolutionary Right That Out-left’s the Left 2

Anti-Imperialism/Foreign Policy, Culture Wars/Current Controversies, Economics/Class Relations, Environment, Left and Right, Police State/Civil Liberties, Race and Ethnicity, Secession, Strategy

What does it mean when the Right is becoming more revolutionary minded than the Left? Nowadays, there are “left-conservatives”, “left-libertarians”, “left-secessionists”, “conservative revolutionaries”, “left-nationalists”, “national-syndicalists”, “national-anarchists”, “national-bolsheviks”, “national-maoists”, “left-populists”, “left-decentralists”, “national-communists” and lots of other labels that defy the left/right stereotype. What does is mean that the official Left has become a haven of moribund predictability regurgitating the most superficial cliches’?

What if a revolutionary Right emerged that was able to outmaneuver the totalitarian humanists of the Left by maintaining a more revolutionary position, absorbing untapped social energies ignored by the Left, undercutting the Left’s support base, and operating within a general populist framework?

There are a wide variety of lumpen elements and outgroups that are ignored or despised by the Left, despite the leftoids claim to be the champion of the oppressed and downtrodden? What about the handicapped, the mentally ill, students, youth, prostitutes and other sex workers, prisoners, prisoner’s rights activists, advocates for the rights of the criminally accused, the homeless and homeless activists, anti-police activists, advocates of alternative medicine, drug users, the families of drug war prisoners, immigrants, lumpen economic elements (jitney cab drivers, peddlers, street vendors), gang members and many others too numerous to name?

Who is it that stands for the workers and the poor? Is it the Left with its commitment to New Class managerial bureaucratic welfarism? Who stands for the people of rural American farming communities? Is is the cosmopolitan Left with its hostility to all things traditional? Who stands for the environment? Is it the middle class do-gooders of the Sierra Club? Or is it the ecological revolutionaries of the Earth Liberation Front?

What kind of economic outlook is more revolutionary? A Left offering more welfare statism or a revolutionary Right offering a negative income tax that by passes the bureaucratic middlemen of the welfare state, cutting taxes and regulation from the bottom up and eliminating corporate, bank and military welfare from the top down, and developing worker cooperatives, mutual banks, community development corporations, land trusts, kibbutzim and anarcho-syndicalist unions.

In the area of race relations, which is more revolutionary? More affirmative action, welfare, coercive intergrationism and multiculturalist propaganda? Or a system of reparations to America’s minority nationalities, political autonomy, cultural self-determination, economic development and self-sufficiency?

In foreign policy, what is more radical? “Human rights internationalism” or shutting down the American empire, dismantling the standing army and replacing the military-industrial complex with a decentralized militia confederation?

In criminal law, who has the more radical position? Liberals advocating civilian review boards and drug courts or revolutionaries favoring shutting down the police state and prison-industrial complex altogether along comprehensive prisoner amnesty?

As we build a movement towards such ends, look for the Left to attempt to obstruct our efforts at every turn.

Pan-Secessionist Anti-Universalism Vs. Totalitarian Humanism 4

Anarchism/Anti-State, Anti-Imperialism/Foreign Policy, Culture Wars/Current Controversies, Left and Right, Political Correctness/Totalitarian Humanism, Race and Ethnicity, Secession

The primary ideological war of the future will not be between the left and right, or between socialism and capitalism, or even between nationalism and imperialism. The struggle will be between anti-universalism and decentralism on one end and totalitarian humanism on the other.

I first became aware of this sometime during the mid-1990s when I was something of an oddity; a leftwing anarchist participating in the right-wing patriot/militia/survivalist movement. After observing the police state atrocities at Waco and Ruby Ridge, and the similarities of these to prior Cointelpro repression against the Black Panthers and the American Indian Movement, and noticing the insufficient response of the Left on these matters, I started to understand the need to move past the conventional left/right political model. I was pleased to find many on the far right with many of the same ideas and interests as myself, particularly opposition to the US empire, the corporate ruling class, the federal Leviathan, the internal police/surveillance state and much else. For the first time, I came across contemporary groups advocating secession from the United States. The first of these was the Republic of Texas.

It occurred to me that I had finally found the means of overthrowing the US ruling class,i.e., a tactical alliance of decentralists from the far right (like my militia comrades) and from the far left (like revolutionary anarchists). Observing such tendencies on the far right as the sovereigns, common law courts, militias, neo-secessionists, the land rights movement and county autonomy, and noticing the similarities of these with libertarian municipalism, anarcho-syndicalism, individualist-anarchism, and green decentralism, it seemed like a perfect solution: an alliance of left and right against the ruling class middle. Sure, there were some serious cultural differences, but decentralism seemed to be the solution to all that. Liberal communities like big cities, metro areas, suburbs and culturally mixed neighborhoods would govern themselves according to liberal values while conservative communities like rural counties, small towns, sparsely populated regions and culturally homogenous enclaves would govern themselves according to conservative values. And we would all be free of the superstate that is oppressing us all.

In the ten years I have advocated such an approach, interest in this idea has grown considerably. Dozens of secession groups of varying sizes have emerged in North America and some of these have been featured in major national media outlets. The relative popularity of a maverick presidential candidate like Ron Paul would have been unthinkable ten years ago. At various points, hundreds of US localities and a few states have issued resolutions condemning such excesses as the Iraq war and the Patriot Act. A fairly large movement against the institutions of international capitalism such as the WTO, IMF and World Bank emerged for a time.

Along the way, I have noticed another trend that is less admirable and one that I have written extensively about. I call this trend “totalitarian humanism”. I first started noticing this when I would propose the aforementioned left/right decentralist alliance in some leftist circles. “But they’re anti-abortion, they’re homophobes, they’re racists, they’re nationalists, they go to church, they eat meat and chew tobacco and fuck in the missionary position….” would be the increasingly familiar response. Me: “Yeah, so what, you don’t have to associate with them, you don’t have to live among them and in a decentralist system you don’t even have to share a political roof with them….”

What I found absolutely astounding was the inability of some leftoids to even understand my position. It’s not that they could follow my arguments but simply disagreed. Instead, what I was talking about-a system of decentralized anti-universalism where incompatible cultural groups simply separate themselves from one another-was utterly incomprehensible to them, as though I was trying to explain advanced theoretical physics or infinitesimal calculus to them. A real turning point came with the emergence of an anarchist tendency called “national-anarchism” which basically advocates the formation of ethnically homogenous village communities for the sake of preserving indigenous European racial, ethnic and cultural identity in the face of the increasingly global uniformity that has accompanied the global economy and Americanization of the world. It seemed harmless enough to me, and very similar to what many non-European indigenous peoples’ and traditional religious groups (like the Amish) have advocated in the past.

But the reaction to the “national-anarchists” among many leftists and left-anarchists was similar to what one might expect from a little girl when confronted with a spider or snake. Absolute, sheer hysteria.  I had previously become aware of the therapeutic state through my studies of the ideological underpinnings of the War on Drugs, whereby the imprisoning of millions of people and the creation of a police state in the name of “public health” is considered a legitimate and appropriate governmental activity. The writings of Dr. Thomas Szasz were quite beneficial to me in this regard.

I started noticing a similar phenomenon concerning such matters as race, gender, religion, sexuality and other things. I recall a conversation with a devout liberal who expressed his “outrage” at having attended a Muslim mosque and noticing the gender-segregated seating arrangement. Me: “It’s their mosque, for God’s sake, if you don’t like it, don’t go in there…” The same argument I have made for years to social conservatives who are offended by adult entertainment facilities.

What I eventually came to realize is that many liberals and leftoids simply cannot stand the idea that someone, somewhere, sometime may be practicing “un-liberalism”. For instance, a small private school teaching creationism, a private religious community or house of worship practicing “sexism” or “homophobia”, an isolated village practicing racial/ethnic exclusivity, a single individual hidden away in a broom closet silent thinking politically incorrect thoughts to himself.

What is called “liberalism” in modern times is really totalitarian humanism (some have also called it cultural Marxism). It is a totalitarian movement every bit as much as the totalitarian movements of the 20th century: communism, fascism and national socialism.  It aims to regulate every aspect of life down to the most minute detail including day to day personal habits like diet, language, smoking, family relations, recreational activities and much else. It is 1984, Brave New World and A Clockwork Orange all rolled into one.

Totalitarian humanism is the ideology of the ruling classes of the Western nations.  This ideology has formed the basis of a new Inquisition. Even those with status and positions of high esteem are vulnerable. Notice the fates of Dr. James Watson or Harvard’s Lawrence Summers. Even infant children are not immune:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/education/2261307/Toddlers-who-dislike-spicy-food-racist,-say-report.html

Politically disapproved speech can now land you in jail in many “democratic” countries, in spite of their much-flaunted phony “tolerance”, just as it could in many previously existing communist, fascist or theocratic regimes. Totalitarian Humanism is Robespierre, Mussolini and Mao all over again.

Resistance to this villainy is the defense of liberty and civilization. No compromises or concessions should be made to these cretinous elements.  The governments that these elements now control must ultimately be eradicated. The development of secession movements by regions, communities, towns, cities or by non-territorial groups wishing to defend themselves against increasing attacks by the state should be given every possible means of support and encouragement. All who would resist the forces of totalitarian humanism should be welcomed into our resistance forces, whether they be adherents of some eccentric religious doctrine, some seemingly perverse sexuality, racial separatists, environmental radicals or simply persons with more conventional political views who see danger ahead.

The Second Vermont Republic, the League of the South and the Southern Poverty Law Center 3

Anarchism/Anti-State, Police State/Civil Liberties, Political Correctness/Totalitarian Humanism, Race and Ethnicity, Secession, Strategy

Recently, Thomas Naylor of the Second Vermont Republic issued something of a challenge to the League of the South:

http://vermontrepublic.org/to_the_league_of_the_south_from_vermont_with_love

Naylor begins:

When the Second Vermont Republic, through its sister organization the Middlebury Institute, first began reaching out to other independence movements in November 2006, four such groups were at the top of our priority list. They included the Alaskan Independence Party, the Hawaiian independence movement, the New Hampshire Free State Project, and the League of the South.

Within three months after the First North American Secessionist Convention met in Burlington, Vermont, the well-financed race-baiting Southern Poverty Law Center opened fire on SVR and the Middlebury Institute accusing us of racism for having attended a meeting which included four LOS members as well as representatives from fifteen other secessionist organizations representing eighteen states.

First thought: The SPLC is a scam organization that should not be taken seriously. They are not merely do-gooder anti-racism activists. They are, as one of Morris Dees’ former law partners says, “the Tammy Faye Bakker of civil rights.” Further, groups like the SPLC epitomize the modern ruling class ideology of totalitarian humanism. They will oppose secession or decentralization of any kind, no matter what, as this is incompatible with their goal of a global totalitarian order organized as a caste system with group privilege assigned according to victimological status:

http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig8/preston1.html

In other words, the SPLC and others of their ilk are our mortal enemies, and should be given no recognition whatsoever. To recognize them, to attempt to rebut or accommodate them, is to grant them legitimacy. We should treat them as we would treat an enemy army during wartime.

Naylor discusses the difficulties an alliance with the League of the South poses for his own movement:

The knee-jerk response of most Americans to secession is typically, “We’ve been there, done that, and it didn’t work out very well.” Secession always brings to mind images of the Civil War, slavery, racism, violence, and preservation of the Southern way of life. Secession is often equated with Southern, redneck, Christian fundamentalist racism. Anyone who is a secessionist is considered a likely racist, but a Southern secessionist is a racist a priori. Since the LOS is a Southern secessionist group, it’s hardly surprising that there is a widespread perception that it is racist.

To achieve its twofold objectives of Vermont independence and the peaceful dissolution of the American Empire, SVR needs all the help it can get from other independence movements. But so long as the albatross of racism hangs around its neck, the LOS can never be a truly effective partner for SVR. SVR, on the other hand, risks being tainted by the scourge of racism simply by associating with the LOS.

And offers this assessment of the state of race relations in America vis-a-vis the Empire:

Starting with the election of President Richard Nixon in 1968 and continuing through the 2000 election of George W. Bush, racism, particularly in the South, did pay for the Republican Party. Its so called Southern strategy was thoroughly grounded in racism. But things began to change when President Bush named Colin Powell and then Condoleezza Rice Secretary of State. This sent a very clear signal to white racists everywhere that racism was no longer part of the national agenda. When Bill Clinton tried to play the racial card against Barack Obama in South Carolina and elsewhere, he soon learned the hard way, that racism doesn’t pay anymore. White South Carolina Democrats got the message and voted for Obama.

When Bush II was elected in 2000, the favorite scapegoats of many white, conservative Southerners were blacks, gays, lesbians, abortionists, and so-called secular humanists. Tolerance was not the name of the game. But eight years of Bush II have convinced many Southerners that the real enemy of the South is the corrupt, unsustainable, ungovernable, unfixable American Empire. The white, conservative social agenda has been trumped by the Empire.

To bring down the Empire peacefully will require the support of all Southerners, not just like-thinking, white Southerners. The vision of a free and independent South can never become a reality unless all Southerners participate. Even the hint of racism has the potential to derail the entire independence movement.

Starting with the election of President Richard Nixon in 1968 and continuing through the 2000 election of George W. Bush, racism, particularly in the South, did pay for the Republican Party. Its so called Southern strategy was thoroughly grounded in racism. But things began to change when President Bush named Colin Powell and then Condoleezza Rice Secretary of State. This sent a very clear signal to white racists everywhere that racism was no longer part of the national agenda. When Bill Clinton tried to play the racial card against Barack Obama in South Carolina and elsewhere, he soon learned the hard way, that racism doesn’t pay anymore. White South Carolina Democrats got the message and voted for Obama.

When Bush II was elected in 2000, the favorite scapegoats of many white, conservative Southerners were blacks, gays, lesbians, abortionists, and so-called secular humanists. Tolerance was not the name of the game. But eight years of Bush II have convinced many Southerners that the real enemy of the South is the corrupt, unsustainable, ungovernable, unfixable American Empire. The white, conservative social agenda has been trumped by the Empire.

To bring down the Empire peacefully will require the support of all Southerners, not just like-thinking, white Southerners. The vision of a free and independent South can never become a reality unless all Southerners participate. Even the hint of racism has the potential to derail the entire independence movement.

The American South is as culturally and ethnically diverse as other regions. It has a large black population, a rapidly growing Hispanic population, and its metropolitan areas exhibit the same cosmopolitanism common to big cities in general. The South also has plenty of transplanted Northerners with “liberal” social or political views. This situation likely make a unified Southern secession under neo-confederate ideology or symbolism unlikely. A more viable approach would be to dissolve the southern states into regional federations of communities organized along cultural, ideological, political, economic, racial, ethnic, religious, linguistic or sexual lines. Naylor continues with some suggestions of his own:

1. Renounce Racism

The leaders of the League should draft a statement which takes the form of the unconditional denunciation of all forms of racism. This statement should be presented to LOS members at their next convention for ratification.

A problem here is defining “racism” in the first place. As anti-racism has become more and more powerful, “racism” continues to be defined in ever more extravagant and implausible ways. Is merely opposing affirmative action “racist”? Is opposing a completely open borders immigration policy “racist”? Is refusing to take the Al Sharpton line on controversial court cases like that of the Jena 6 “racist”? Once again, the enemies of secession or decentralism will be never placated no matter how “anti-racist” a particular secession movement may be.

Perhaps a more direct approach would be for the League to issue a statement indicating precisely what kind of racial policies they would prefer an independent South to have. Do they wish to keep present day antidiscrimination laws or even affirmative action? Do they favor slavery reparations? Or do they wish to reinstate slavery or Jim Crow? Do they favor a regime of meritocratic libertarian individualism? Do they favor a regime that is race neutral in the political and legal sense but recognizes the right of private self-segregation?

2. Recruit Black Members

LOS leaders should embark on a strategy to recruit African American members into the LOS. This will be a tough sell, because Southern blacks will be understandably suspicious of the motives of a formerly lily-white secession organization. It will most likely be necessary to offer scholarships or discounted memberships to attract blacks. The importance of this step cannot possibly be overemphasized.

Bad idea. Most blacks who are politically motivated prefer to have their own organizations for themselves. If even the most fanatically anti-racist leftist groups are constantly lamenting the lack of interest in their movement by racial minorities, then it’s unlikely a Southern secessionist movement will do any better. Blacks will regard such efforts as patronizing acts of pandering. Blacks who actually accepted such offers would feel like tokens. Others, black, white, left and right, would see such efforts as groveling on the part of the League, creating a sense of smug satisfaction on the part of the likes of the SPLC.

A better idea would be for the League to simply state its preferred racial policies, in detail, and then if this is shown to be incompatible with the interests of others in the South (blacks, Hispanics, liberals, secularists, gays, et al.) starting seeking out dialogue with organizations that actually represent these culturally incompatible groups for the purpose of achieving mutual and equitable separation.  The League has a variety of positions it could take. They could position themselves as “white nationalists” along the lines of Jared Taylor’s American Renaissance and explicitly advocate decentralization or voluntary self-segregation along racial lines. They could be “southern nationalists” advocating independence for the entire South with a decentralized governmental system along the lines of the Swiss cantons as a means of accommodating the cultural and racial differences of the people of the South. They could be Christian conservatives along the lines of the Christian Exodus Project favoring non-racial but socially and politically conservative government for the Southern states after achieving independence. Again, I think this latter approach will work only if some means of accommodating non-Christians or non-conservatives is established (for instance, making the large metro areas into independent “liberal”  city-states a la Monaco or Singapore).

3. Black Speakers

One way to attract black members is to invite black speakers to participate in local LOS meetings as well as the annual convention. A wide variety of black speakers should be considered. For example, Professor Walter Williams of George Mason University is a black, conservative economist who favors secession. One might also invite left-wing, black political leaders who oppose secession.

Why not invite black nationalists who also support decentralization, secession or separatism? For instance, why not invite representatives of the Nation of Islam, New Black Panthers, Pan-African International Movement, All-African Peoples’ Revolutionary Party, Peoples’ Democratic Uhuru Movement,  or the Republic of New Afrika? How about inviting similar tendencies from the American Indian Movement, Aztlan Nation or decentralists from the Left?

4. Civil War

Having attended two of the LOS annual conventions, I am not sure that all LOS members realize that the Civil War ended in 1865. Much of the literature on sale at LOS conventions highlights Confederate symbolism, the flag in particular. Whether justifiably or not, most Southern blacks view the Confederate flag as an overt racist symbol aimed at rubbing salt in their 400-year wounds. If the LOS wants to be an effective secession organization, then the Confederate flag has got to go! And in a similar vein, nothing enrages Southern blacks more than the singing of “Dixie.”

Bad idea. Every group has the right to recognize and appreciate its history and heritage and I suspect this is a non-negotiable issue for a group like the League. Also, Civil War revisionism is important to the advancement of the secessionist cause in the intellectual arena, e.g., Tom DiLorenzo’s debunking of many of the Lincoln myths.

5. Southern Unity

Ironically, to achieve our common objective of disuniting the states of America, I am calling for Southern unity. And I am proposing that there is no organization better qualified to lead the way than the League of the South.

In the divisive 1860s the Confederate states tried unsuccessfully to lead our nation into disunion. After military defeat, occupation, and Reconstruction, they were dragged kicking and screaming back into the Union. I believe that it is high time the South and the rest of the nation reconsidered dissolution. The League of the South is in a unique position to help lead the South out of the Union and the nation into disunion.

May God bless the untied states of America.

Of course.

This brings us to an issue that will eventually have to be addressed if any movement to dissolve the U.S. empire is to be viable. The dissolution of the empire will necessarily have to include some kind of settlement to America’s historic racial divide. Many minorities have gotten used to looking to the federal government as the protector of civil rights, and they’re not going to give that up without compensation. Yet, minority support is essential to dissolving the empire, giving their prominence among the ranks of the lower socio-economic levels that would out of necessity be a primary class basis of an anti-empire movement. This is why I’m inclined towards the proposals outlined by the Americans for Self-Determination:

https://attackthesystem.com/americans-for-self-determination/

The gist of the ASD Plan is that reparations would be used for the cultivation and economic development of politically autonomous black states in exchange for the abolition of compensatory preferences like affirmative action and restoration of the right of private discrimination along ethnic or racial lines.  I would add to this legal amnesty for the huge numbers of blacks currently being held in American penal institutions. The sum total of these ideas amounts to a position on race relations far more “liberal” than what most mainstream liberals and even many radical leftists advocate. Blacks gain political and cultural sovereignty, economic reparations and a chance for economic self-determination and self-sufficiency, and, I would add, legal amnesty. Meanwhile, the reverse discrimination of compensatory preferences would be eliminated and those whites who prefer a racially or ethnically homogenous environment for themselves would be able to obtain it.

Rest assured, conventional “liberals” and professional “anti-racists” will oppose such a plan. Their ambition is a totalitarian humanist multicultural state, not self-determination for peoples’. They are our enemies in a battle to the death.

Jefferson on the Blood of Tyrants 6

Uncategorized

‘Tis the day to consider the immortal words of Thomas Jefferson:

“God forbid we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion.
The people cannot be all, and always, well informed. The part which is
wrong will be discontented, in proportion to the importance of the facts
they misconceive. If they remain quiet under such misconceptions,
it is lethargy, the forerunner of death to the public liberty. …
And what country can preserve its liberties, if it’s rulers are not
warned from time to time, that this people preserve the spirit of
resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as
to the facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost
in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from
time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants.
It is its natural manure.”

Let’s not let Uncle TJ down!