SC) I don't hear you complaining about the asymmetry of the National
LP putting out official publications, press releases, fundraising
letters, etc., that implicitly and often explicitly adopt moderate
premises, tone, etc., while mention of the Non-Aggression Principle
is scarcely anywhere to be seen or heard. (SC
Hah. In the famous Donny Ferguson email that you and other radicals
love to quote out of context, Donny wrote that Libertarians believe in
the principle of "non-initiation of force". I even quoted this for you
four days ago! As for "moderate premises, tone, etc.", that's just more
vague insubstantive mumbling.
As I explained in my previous message, your only substantive complaint
here is that official LP communications aren't saying /enough /of the
things that anarchists agree with. By contrast, my complaint was that
the LP had been saying things (e.g. personal secession) that we
smallarchists DISagree with. Either quote me an official LP
communication that /actually contradicts/ your crypto-anarchist
principles, or admit that your complaint just isn't in the same league
as mine.
SC) Substantive disagreement? The embarrassing lack of detail in our
platform, for one. (SC
LOL. Did you even READ the message from me that you bottom-quoted in
full? I repeat: BH) Radicals claim it's "offputting" to them if the LP
doesn't issue a 14,000-word agreement with the details of their
anarchist agenda -- while hypocritically dismissing the complaints of
libertarians whose principles are actually /contradicted /by some of
those details. In other words: anarchists get to complain if the LP
doesn't say nearly everything anarchists believe, but smallarchists have
to shut up and smile if they disagree with anything the anarchists make
the LP say. (BH OK, now try offering a response that I can't rebut
simply by rubbing your nose in what I already wrote. :-)
SC) The party's failure to adopt ideological standards for
candidates, officers, or delegates. (SC
This is so vague as to be arguably meaningless -- and blatantly ignores
the Statement of Principles on which our Party's ideology and purpose is
grounded. If you think any candidate, officer, or delegate contravenes
these principles, then state your accusation and see if you can make it
stick. I offer myself as a test case. I advocate state taxation of
aggression -- monopolizing, depleting, polluting, or congesting the
commons. Do I contravene the SoP? Am I a Pledge violator? Go ahead,
try to purge me. I dare you.
And if you say the SoP doesn't exclude my geominarchist principles, then
who are you to demand standards different from our SoP? You can either
demand enforcement of the SoP, or you can try to amend it. Any other
complaint about "ideological standards" is hollow.
SC) The failure to adhere to the 1974 Dallas Accord under which
Libertarians agreed to leave the door open to either anarchy or
limited government and not take a position one way or the other (SC
I explained last year why the Dallas Accord is asymmetric:
http://libertarianintelligence.com/2008/05/restore74-with-denver-accord.html.
Wake me when any radical ever offers a cogent response. And by the way,
the Platform still does not contain any language advocating that the
state should have any authority to initiate force. Again, if you think
even a single clause in the Platform contravenes the SoP, then you
should organize an appeal to the Judicial Committee per Bylaw 7.8.
SC) The insistence on treating the Libertarian Party as an end in
itself [...] (SC
Find the quotation mark key on your keyboard. Press it. Then cut and
paste an official LP communication that "insists" as you describe
above. Then type a closing quotation mark. Can you do that, or not?
On this front, all I've seen from you is a six-word out-of-context quote
from Donny Ferguson. I already corrected you by giving the actual
context. Feel free to address it. :-)
