I agree with so much that Andrew Napolitano says that it frustrates me that he's so wrong-headed about immigration, as he is in this article, Immigration is a Natural Right, at reason.com.
Yes, humans have a fundamental freedom of movement. I agree with that in principle, just as I agree that people have fundamental freedoms of speech, self-defense, freedom from unreasonable searches, etc.
Now, does protecting these freedoms for Americans entail protecting them for the entire world? Should we go sticking our nose into every nation that doesn't meet our standards of freedom of speech or the right to keep and bear arms?
I think most libertarians would say no.
A libertarian government exists to protect the rights and liberties not of every person in the world, but of its own citizens. That's why a reasonable person would make the implied contract with the government. As libertarians, we expect the government to refrain from infringing our freedom of speech. We don't expect it to spend our tax money to go around the world protecting everyone else's freedom of speech.
We also accept that there are limitations to free speech, such as the classic "fire in a crowded theater" restriction or libel and slander laws.
Our respect of freedom of movement is similar. We expect our government to respect it for citizens, and we don't expect our government to go around forcing China to grant complete freedom of movement of its subjects.
The right also has limitations. Your freedom to move stops at the border of my property. We don't expect government to prioritize freedom of movement over the right to control one's own property. I think most sane libertarians agree that I have a right to kick trespassers off my farm -- they can't just walk onto my property and start building a house on my back acreage, because "it didn't look like I was using it for much." It's mine to do with as I want.
Now, in a pure libertarian society, there might be no public property at all -- no public roads or parks, etc., everything would be privately owned, thus all questions of border policing would be local -- maybe foreigners have a right to move freely, but they don't have a right to cross *my* property without permission in order to do it.
But that's not a world we're ever likely to live in. We're unlikely to have a libertarian society that completely does away with the concept of public space -- public roads, government buildings, etc.
What is public space? It's space that's owned by the public, the citizenry, as a group. It follows that we expect the government to protect our property rights to public property. That would mean that the government would protect it from trespassers. Who is a trespasser? Anyone who's not a citizen. This applies not only to actual public roads and other public spaces, but to the public wealth of the nation -- our tax money and how it is spent.
Just as we expect the government to protect our private property from takings, a reasonable libertarian can expect the government to protect our government property (and thus wealth) from takings, as well.
It is also reasonable that we would want to have some way to invite people onto our public property and that the way we would do so would be to have duly passed laws defining how these invitations would be offered.
Thus, I see no conflict between the libertarian concept of a fundamental right to freedom of movement, and controlling the nations' borders and immigration requirements.
People might say that this implies that they should be able invite foreigners into their private property without government interference. I'd agree in principle, except that it's effectively impossible for a foreigner to come to a nation and make no use of its public property. Do they use public roads to go to a grocery store? Do they expect to benefit from the laws protecting workers? Such laws cost money to administer, money taken from citizens to hire government workers. Will they make use of public utilities? Will they expect to be able to go to public schools or public hospitals? Any foreigner ends up taking advantage of the nation's public wealth in some way.
We, as the citizens who have granted the government a portion of our wealth and allowed it to administer property in our name, have the right to control who gets use of that wealth and that property.
Thursday, January 31, 2013
Tuesday, January 29, 2013
Miley Could Learn Something From Stevie Nicks
I was reading an article today about how Fleetwood Mac's album Rumours is very popular among twenty-somethings. I started browsing through some old YouTube clips of Fleetwood Mac in that era, along with their contemporaries, Heart.
Ann & Nancy Wilson and Stevie Nicks were the object of many teen boys' fantasies back in the mid- to late 70s, but you know what? In contrast to modern pop music girls, you never see those three dancing around half-naked like they're getting ready for a night of pole dancing or street-walking. And nobody expected them to.
Ann & Nancy Wilson and Stevie Nicks were the object of many teen boys' fantasies back in the mid- to late 70s, but you know what? In contrast to modern pop music girls, you never see those three dancing around half-naked like they're getting ready for a night of pole dancing or street-walking. And nobody expected them to.
Friday, January 25, 2013
Lives May Have Been Saved If Holmes or Lanza Had Automatic Weapons
In the Aurora, CO, theater shooting, James Holmes armed himself with a pump shotgun, a semiautomatic rifle and a handgun.
It's reported that his semiautomatic rifle jammed after 30 rounds. I don't know how many of those rounds killed people, but if he'd been shooting a fully automatic or burst-mode weapon the count would almost assuredly have been lower.
Automatic weapons recoil and the barrels climb with each round. Gunners with fully automatic weapons are trained to fire in 3-5 round bursts to compensate for the increasing loss of control. If Holmes was using an M4 with a burst mode, he would have been firing three rounds with each pull of the trigger. Odds are that 1 or 2 rounds from each trigger pull would have either hit the same target or completely missed. No matter what, he would have been reduced to ten targets, ten trigger pulls, from those thirty rounds, not 30 targets. If he'd been using a model with only a full-auto mode, he almost certainly would have had even fewer aimed targets and worse accuracy -- limiting yourself to a three-round burst isn't easy at 12 rounds/sec.
An automatic weapon causes a shooter to burn through ammunition faster, but without a corresponding increase in lethality against unarmed targets.
He used a semi-automatic handgun, a Glock 22. If he'd had the fully automatic Glock 18, he almost surely would have been less effective. Machine pistols are very hard to control. If he'd used one in automatic mode, most of his rounds would have been wasted.
Automatic fire is a tool of warfare. Its purpose isn't to make killing a specific target easier, it's to reduce the ability of an armed attacker to fire back at you and your allies. The term is "suppressive fire" -- as long as there are lots of rounds heading in the general direction of the enemy, they have great incentive to keep their heads down, which means they aren't shooting back. This allows your allies to move, to aim, to bring the battle to the enemy.
For anything other than suppressive fire, they're arguably a huge waste of ammunition.
So, equipping a gun with a feature that causes rounds to be fired less accurately and less efficiently would seem to be a way to save lives in a mass shooting situation. Every round that misses its target is one less round the attacker has to use against defenseless victims. You don't need suppressive fire when no one can shoot back.
I don't know if it would have saved any lives in the case of Adam Lanza and the Sandy Hook shootings, but it certainly wouldn't have cost any. He was shooting metaphorical fish in a barrel. Unarmed women and children. He had twenty minutes all to himself. (Update: It's since been said that Lanza was active for only five minutes before he killed himself. The same logic still applies.) He didn't have to hurry. He didn't have to fire quickly or change magazines under fire. He could have been using a lever-action Marlin .30-30 with similar effect.
However, there is a possibility that his possession of a fully-automatic weapon would have had a positive effect. An M16 can fire more than 12 rounds per second. An undisciplined shooter can empty a 30-round magazine in full-auto mode in a matter of less than three seconds. This causes the barrel and action to heat up, increasing the chance of malfunctions, and it wastes enormous amounts of ammunition. Lanza was just an angry kid, not a trained soldier. It's entirely plausible that with a fully-automatic weapon in his hands, he wouldn't have been able to resist the temptation to spray fire in full-auto mode. He could have depleted his entire stock of ammunition in mere minutes, saving many lives, as most of the rounds would have been wasted.
It's reported that his semiautomatic rifle jammed after 30 rounds. I don't know how many of those rounds killed people, but if he'd been shooting a fully automatic or burst-mode weapon the count would almost assuredly have been lower.
Automatic weapons recoil and the barrels climb with each round. Gunners with fully automatic weapons are trained to fire in 3-5 round bursts to compensate for the increasing loss of control. If Holmes was using an M4 with a burst mode, he would have been firing three rounds with each pull of the trigger. Odds are that 1 or 2 rounds from each trigger pull would have either hit the same target or completely missed. No matter what, he would have been reduced to ten targets, ten trigger pulls, from those thirty rounds, not 30 targets. If he'd been using a model with only a full-auto mode, he almost certainly would have had even fewer aimed targets and worse accuracy -- limiting yourself to a three-round burst isn't easy at 12 rounds/sec.
An automatic weapon causes a shooter to burn through ammunition faster, but without a corresponding increase in lethality against unarmed targets.
He used a semi-automatic handgun, a Glock 22. If he'd had the fully automatic Glock 18, he almost surely would have been less effective. Machine pistols are very hard to control. If he'd used one in automatic mode, most of his rounds would have been wasted.
Automatic fire is a tool of warfare. Its purpose isn't to make killing a specific target easier, it's to reduce the ability of an armed attacker to fire back at you and your allies. The term is "suppressive fire" -- as long as there are lots of rounds heading in the general direction of the enemy, they have great incentive to keep their heads down, which means they aren't shooting back. This allows your allies to move, to aim, to bring the battle to the enemy.
For anything other than suppressive fire, they're arguably a huge waste of ammunition.
So, equipping a gun with a feature that causes rounds to be fired less accurately and less efficiently would seem to be a way to save lives in a mass shooting situation. Every round that misses its target is one less round the attacker has to use against defenseless victims. You don't need suppressive fire when no one can shoot back.
I don't know if it would have saved any lives in the case of Adam Lanza and the Sandy Hook shootings, but it certainly wouldn't have cost any. He was shooting metaphorical fish in a barrel. Unarmed women and children. He had twenty minutes all to himself. (Update: It's since been said that Lanza was active for only five minutes before he killed himself. The same logic still applies.) He didn't have to hurry. He didn't have to fire quickly or change magazines under fire. He could have been using a lever-action Marlin .30-30 with similar effect.
However, there is a possibility that his possession of a fully-automatic weapon would have had a positive effect. An M16 can fire more than 12 rounds per second. An undisciplined shooter can empty a 30-round magazine in full-auto mode in a matter of less than three seconds. This causes the barrel and action to heat up, increasing the chance of malfunctions, and it wastes enormous amounts of ammunition. Lanza was just an angry kid, not a trained soldier. It's entirely plausible that with a fully-automatic weapon in his hands, he wouldn't have been able to resist the temptation to spray fire in full-auto mode. He could have depleted his entire stock of ammunition in mere minutes, saving many lives, as most of the rounds would have been wasted.
Tuesday, January 22, 2013
The Most Narcissistic Generation
From Obama's inaugural speech:
The baby boomers are the generation that built this country? Really? Because that's the generation that's approaching retirement. Talk about historical blindness. It would be more appropriate to say that the baby-boomers are the spoiled trust-fund generation, binging on the wealth of the nation that better generations created.
"We must make the hard choices to reduce the cost of health care and the size of our deficit. But we reject the belief that America must choose between caring for the generation that built this country and investing in the generation that will build its future,"
The baby boomers are the generation that built this country? Really? Because that's the generation that's approaching retirement. Talk about historical blindness. It would be more appropriate to say that the baby-boomers are the spoiled trust-fund generation, binging on the wealth of the nation that better generations created.
Sunday, January 20, 2013
Aggressively, Cooperatively Ignorant
Found this video. Hat tip to Powerline
Jimmy Kimmel live goes out on Hollywood Blvd. and solicits peoples' opinions of Obama's 2012 inauguration ... several days before the inauguration.
Enjoy:
I never claimed to have a lot of respect for the intelligence of the average person.
That's exactly why I am a supporter of Libertarianism/Individualism. A lot of people will say that you have to trust that people are smart enough to make good choices on their own, that they don't need a big government nanny taking care of them in nearly every aspect of their lives. That's not the most important thing, though.
I believe the average person is woefully dim and ignorant. I don't believe people must necessarily be smart to run their own lives. I don't believe that they need to, on average, do a good job doing so. What is far more important is that it is utter fantasy to think that only the good, sensible people in the nation will end up making policy. How could that possibly happen?
No, we end up with people just as ignorant as the poor dupes in the video with huge influence on national, state and local policy. I feel sorry for anyone who has to make the case that our Vice President, Joe Biden, isn't of below-average intelligence. He's just not very bright. And he's a heartbeat away from the Presidency.
We have a sitting congressman who thinks Guam might tip over if we put too many people on it. That is not a joke! He is not joking. He's that mentally deficient. I cannot accept that a deliberative body that contains that man has any legitimacy to make any decisions for me about anything! He's just an extreme example. Congress, and all branches of government, are full of people that just aren't that bright. And of the people who are bright, there's a significant portion that are greedy, self-serving or downright criminal.
This isn't unusual. There aren't mandatory IQ tests for Congressmen, cabinet members, Presidents, or even federal court justices. The same thing holds true down at the state level, and when you get down to the people who actually do the government work that affects you directly and intimately: BMV agents, cops, IRS agents, social workers, building inspectors, zoning enforcement agents, TSA agents, FDA agents, EPA agents -- these guys are squarely down in the "average working Joe" category, yet they wield enormous influence over our lives.
My goal as an individualist is to minimize the power and influence that random citizens can wield over me, just because they have government authority. That's why our Constitution establishes a limited government. To protect us from the people in government and to protect us from the whims of the (not very bright) majority.
Jimmy Kimmel live goes out on Hollywood Blvd. and solicits peoples' opinions of Obama's 2012 inauguration ... several days before the inauguration.
Enjoy:
I never claimed to have a lot of respect for the intelligence of the average person.
That's exactly why I am a supporter of Libertarianism/Individualism. A lot of people will say that you have to trust that people are smart enough to make good choices on their own, that they don't need a big government nanny taking care of them in nearly every aspect of their lives. That's not the most important thing, though.
I believe the average person is woefully dim and ignorant. I don't believe people must necessarily be smart to run their own lives. I don't believe that they need to, on average, do a good job doing so. What is far more important is that it is utter fantasy to think that only the good, sensible people in the nation will end up making policy. How could that possibly happen?
No, we end up with people just as ignorant as the poor dupes in the video with huge influence on national, state and local policy. I feel sorry for anyone who has to make the case that our Vice President, Joe Biden, isn't of below-average intelligence. He's just not very bright. And he's a heartbeat away from the Presidency.
We have a sitting congressman who thinks Guam might tip over if we put too many people on it. That is not a joke! He is not joking. He's that mentally deficient. I cannot accept that a deliberative body that contains that man has any legitimacy to make any decisions for me about anything! He's just an extreme example. Congress, and all branches of government, are full of people that just aren't that bright. And of the people who are bright, there's a significant portion that are greedy, self-serving or downright criminal.
This isn't unusual. There aren't mandatory IQ tests for Congressmen, cabinet members, Presidents, or even federal court justices. The same thing holds true down at the state level, and when you get down to the people who actually do the government work that affects you directly and intimately: BMV agents, cops, IRS agents, social workers, building inspectors, zoning enforcement agents, TSA agents, FDA agents, EPA agents -- these guys are squarely down in the "average working Joe" category, yet they wield enormous influence over our lives.
My goal as an individualist is to minimize the power and influence that random citizens can wield over me, just because they have government authority. That's why our Constitution establishes a limited government. To protect us from the people in government and to protect us from the whims of the (not very bright) majority.
Saturday, January 19, 2013
The Hello Kitty Terror Threat
Pennsylvania girl, 5, suspended for threatening to shoot girl with pink toy gun that blows soapy bubbles
If you read the article, as far as I can tell the headline pretty much covers it. The 5-year-old girl was interrogated about it without her parents present and left crying. Her parents have had to retain a lawyer to fight the suspension. Frankly, I think their money would be better spent on private school or a good home schooling curriculum. The public schools are beyond redemption now that scenes that would seem surreal in a Kafka or Orwell novel are actually happening in real life in our schools.
You see this phrase a lot: "...school officials aren't at liberty to discuss disciplinary actions." I'm getting pretty tired of that dodge. These radicals need to answer to the public for what they're doing to our children.
Every time I read one of these articles I wonder, "Who are these adults?" I don't think I know a single adult who would do anything but chuckle at a "threat" to shoot someone with a soap bubble gun.
This isn't about protecting the children, it's about promoting a radical anti-gun agenda, making children feel trauma and shame at even innocent play involving guns.
If this girl is a terrorist, my house is like an al Qaeda outpost: the three youngest kids all got nerf dart guns for Christmas and spent the next few days in pitched battle through the house. Apparently there are adults walking around out there who think this was a scene of unspeakable terror and horrific human rights violations. Unarmed people and innocent bystanders were sometimes deliberately targeted! Victims were shot in cold blood after surrendering!
My wife responded with a stern diplomatic condemnation of the atrocities: "I swear, if one of you shoots me with those darts one more time..."
This seems a good time to quote Tom Wolfe on Muggeridge's Law:
If you read the article, as far as I can tell the headline pretty much covers it. The 5-year-old girl was interrogated about it without her parents present and left crying. Her parents have had to retain a lawyer to fight the suspension. Frankly, I think their money would be better spent on private school or a good home schooling curriculum. The public schools are beyond redemption now that scenes that would seem surreal in a Kafka or Orwell novel are actually happening in real life in our schools.
You see this phrase a lot: "...school officials aren't at liberty to discuss disciplinary actions." I'm getting pretty tired of that dodge. These radicals need to answer to the public for what they're doing to our children.
Every time I read one of these articles I wonder, "Who are these adults?" I don't think I know a single adult who would do anything but chuckle at a "threat" to shoot someone with a soap bubble gun.
This isn't about protecting the children, it's about promoting a radical anti-gun agenda, making children feel trauma and shame at even innocent play involving guns.
If this girl is a terrorist, my house is like an al Qaeda outpost: the three youngest kids all got nerf dart guns for Christmas and spent the next few days in pitched battle through the house. Apparently there are adults walking around out there who think this was a scene of unspeakable terror and horrific human rights violations. Unarmed people and innocent bystanders were sometimes deliberately targeted! Victims were shot in cold blood after surrendering!
My wife responded with a stern diplomatic condemnation of the atrocities: "I swear, if one of you shoots me with those darts one more time..."
This seems a good time to quote Tom Wolfe on Muggeridge's Law:
While Malcolm Muggeridge was the editor of Punch, it was announced that Khrushchev and Bulganin were coming to England. Muggeridge hit upon the idea of a mock itinerary, a lineup of the most ludicrous places the two paunchy pear-shaped little Soviet leaders could possibly be paraded through during the solemn process of a state visit. Shortly before press time, half the feature had to be scrapped. It coincided exactly with the official itinerary, just released, prompting Muggeridge to observe: We live in an age in which it is no longer possible to be funny. There is nothing you can imagine, no matter how ludicrous, that will not promptly be enacted before your very eyes, probably by someone well known.
Thursday, January 17, 2013
Shall Not Be Infringed
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.There have been entire books written about this, so I know I'm not really saying anything new, but a pet peeve of mine is people who think that the phrase "well regulated Militia" is a blanket authorization for the regulation of arms.
Even aside from the historical and contextual basis for the amendment, the argument simply makes no grammatical sense.
The first clause is an explanatory clause, not a limiting clause. Take this sentence:
A well-educated electorate being necessary to the health of a free State, the right of the people to keep and read books, shall not be infringed.The first clause states why the right to keep and read books shall not be infringed. It's a justification of the right. It doesn't limit which books the people shall be allowed to keep and read. That's completely non-sensical. If you wanted to establish a limit based on the contents of the explanatory clause, you'd write a sentence like:
A well-educated electorate being necessary to the health of a free State, the right of the people to keep and read educational books, shall not be infringed.See, that limits the lack of infringement to books that are related to having a well-educated electorate. Or you might write:
A well-educated electorate being necessary to the health of a free State, the right of the people to keep and read books, shall be regulated to ensure their educational value.This also limits the books that can be kept and read to those that are within the scope of the explanatory clause. My original sentence would be something you'd never write if you were trying to write a rule to explain why it was OK for the government to limit what books you can keep and read.
Back to guns, if you wanted to apply the explanatory clause to the peoples' right to keep and bear arms, you wouldn't just write a blanket "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed." You'd write something like this:
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall be regulated in accordance with the rules of the Militia.These were some of the most educated, erudite political minds not only of their time, but of all times. It is inconceivable that they would write a phrase like "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed" when what was really intended was "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall be highly regulated."
If they had always meant the language of the amendment to apply to the states, not to the people directly, they would have written it in terms of the states, as is done in the 10th amendment:
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.This amendment is a perfect example of how the authors of the Bill of Rights were cognizant of the difference between "the States" and "the people." If they had intended the second amendment to refer to the powers* of the States to maintain a Militia they would have written something like:
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the power of the States to maintain an armed Militia of its citizens, shall not be infringed.(*Governments don't have rights, they have powers. People have rights. This distinction is never violated anywhere in the language of the Constitution or its amendments.)
However, the amendment was not written that way. This simply cannot have been an accident. The language is too plain and clear. To argue otherwise is sophistry,and blatantly dishonest.
They made the language so clear and plain because they realized that government is wont to find excuses to usurp the rights of the people, and they didn't want to leave loopholes for that right to be infringed, thus a clear statement that the right shall not be infringed. The fact that modern readers have managed to find a loophole based in grammatical ignorance is a sad irony.
I could go on into the historical meaning and use of the term "well regulated," but it's not necessary. As an explanatory clause, it doesn't have any limiting grammatical effect on the main object and predicate of the sentence.
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