David Davis
…… which hate and fear the minarchists, for the possibility that the enslaved people will want to be like those of the minarchist lot …… see just the history of the last 500-odd years to see my point proved. They HAVE to get rid of us, Britain - not the country, but the CULTURE - for that is all that the Anglosphere is in the end, a culture that is inimical to tyranny, and maximises individual liberty within imperfect institutions, and therefore blasts away the ground from under the feet of warlords, tribal “civilisations”, socialists and other types of Nazis, “community leaders”, dictocrasts, and the like.
For as I so often say, we showed the World How To Live Without Excessive Tyranny (which is to say the normal amount, as seen in North Korea, Brussels, Russia today, and in Cuba) and We Must Be Punished.
Even minarchist states probably have got to have a Head of State. I have never asked Sean Gabb about this but perhaps I ought to; he may have views about what sort of “person” or “corporation” could fulfil this function, but I think he would agree with me that it ought to be a Real Person. All things being equal, the setup we have got in Britain is probably the least bad of all the possibilities. We (or the electing-body-of-the-day, such as “Barons” (early), or “Parliament” (later) ) elect, at some time, a suitably-qualified family to take on the ceremonial functions of Statehood, and provided that it does not dip its hand in the till, get us embroiled in foreign wars with its less salubrious or more European (same thing) relations, or interfere in the agreed processes of government, then we will allow it to personify our self-image and nationhood.
In time, such a family may produce a sequence of basically and innately good, and ordinary, sane people, espcecially if it is influenced by and presides within an increasingly liberal polity of organised, staggeringly violent, opinionated and deeply moral people who will keep the State in line, such as England used to be and ought to be again, were it not for tele-stalinization and socialist-state-Wireless-Tele-Vision. You may get sovereigns such as, say, those from William IV to Elizabeth II. I am specifically excepting Edward VIII, who was a prima-donna and failed to understand what he was expected to do. I even think , in my kinder and less angry moments, that poor tortured mad Charles will make a reasonably sound King, now that he has the woman he has always loved near him at last, and not the diabolilcally-tormented and unstable Diana (not an Officer type, at all.)
If such a liberal State has to go to war, then it will usually will be for the upholding of ideals and not for the personal gain of its own people (see “World War 1″, Iraq 1, Iraq 2, Iraq 3, Korea, Afghanistan-7, Falklands, and “World War 2″ for examples plus others I cannot put my hand on right now.) Such a people does not go to war to scam and to scrag stuff off other peoples and nations, which is what other tyrannical elites do with their peoples to other peoples.
In the Anglosphere case which historically is special, then it is important for the chaps who have to to the heavy-lifting, that an important representative of the Head of State’s family ought to go with them, as the representative of their Commander-in Chief, which is nominally the Head of State.
This did Prince George (later G-VI) serve in HMS Marlborough at Jutland; thus did Prince Andrew fly choppers in the Falklands. Thus indeed did the King threaten to have to go with Churchill to D-Day if the PM insisted on landing with his soldiers (the Queen Mother vetoed both of them in the end.) Therefore Harry went this time, and which meant he got his desire which was to be with his soldiers. Those who have not trained for war, such as incorrigibly-priggish and unreformable leftie scumbags such as “Jon” Snow (oh, the demotic proleness of “Jon”!!! How “in-touch with the people he must be !!! “Jon” !!! I get such a Guevara-esque orgasm from “Jon”…as opposed to “John”, and I bet “Jon’s” T-shirt is not cool! ) do not understand this relationship at all, and they never will, for lefties don’t “do soldiers” - they just kill people with guns and stuff, which is not the same thing at all.
Poor Harry had to be with his soldiers, for not only is he their Officer, and therefore he loves them (that is part of what duty means) but they look out for him in the Field, as opposed to any other Officer. It is disreputable of probably-by-no-means-freedomly-reliable scragbags (in the final analysis, would you trust the freedom and the fate of the world to “Matt” Drudge, or to the Libertarian Alliance?) such as “Matt” Drudge to smarm in and blow a delicate situation, just to make himself more famous than he is.
This is not helpful to the cause of freedom and liberty in an embattled world. Blowing Harry’s cover is an abuse of the toleration that exists between a people which voluntarily accepts a measure of Statism, and for whom family members of the Head of that State accept, nay agree and wish, to go into danger in company with members of that people, on behalf of the ideal for which they fight.
“Matt” Drudge ought to sit down in a dark room, with a cold towel round his head, and think, very very carefully, about whose side he is on in the titanic battle for Western Civilisation.
If he wants to remain a profitable part of it, then he ought to spit on his hands, draw his swordpoint out of the mud, and get alongside us and fight for it.
The enemies of our Prince are his enemies too.
This post is rough, but I want to get it out now. it will probably be refined and improved, as I do with these often.
For Life, Liberty and Property
3 responses so far ↓
Tony Hollick // 1 March, 2008 at 8:14 pm
Dave:
We neither need nor should want the failed Eugenics programme known as the “British Aristocracy” having anything to do with our politics, except insofar as individuals may want to stand for election (which few of them do).
What _is_ urgently required is a system which maximizes the value of each individual vote, and minimizes the influence of Political Parties. As Robert Michels said, “He who said ‘Party’ at once says ‘Oligarchy.’
Herewith such an alternative.
To Karl Popper is owed his analysis of the achievement of
intellectual, moral and practical advance by means of the Open Society of
free and democratic institutions. ‘Democracy’ to Popper means the ability
to change the governing order without violence; and — to this end –
for people to be free to hypothesize, research, discuss and advance
proposals for improving the ways people live.
Any free society must ultimately depend on the broad assent of its
citizens, which can only be practically demonstrated by democratic
arrangememts. Even in an anarchy, people might prefer to have a vote on
the system they live within…
Democratic Agorism proposes a fundamental transformation of the nature
of the State, into a form of Property Company. The process is painless.
The State will own the underlying Strata Title of its present territory.
The citizens will own the State itself in equal shares.
They elect a Board of Directors to manage the Company.
Taxes become User Fees; Laws become Terms and Conditions of Use.
Revenues from User Fees will be returned to the citizen-owners in equal shares
This process effectely “marketizes” the State.
The essential elements of Democratic Agorism are modular and synergistic:
They include:
[A] A contractually-based day-by-day electoral system - Vectored Politics
[B] Full-Liability Personal Indemnity Insurance, enabling full restitution.
[C] Personal Radio Alarms: for event-driven and customer-driven policing
[D] A Restitutive Legal System, with online ‘courts’ and arbitration.
[E] Good Basic Income Provision for all — independent incomes for all.
[F] Networked information services and library facilities
[G] National Health Insurance chargecard and online diagnostic facilities
[H] Online education and skills-development facilities
[I] Tradenet buy/sell/swap/finance/work transaction services
[J] Packaged ‘political’ services provided via elected representatives
It has been estimated (David Friedman’s Law, in his ‘The Machinery of
Freedom’, 2nd edition) that state services typically produce about one half
the value to consumers of voluntary (non-profit or for-profit) provision, at
up to twice the cost. He also espouses Robert LeFevre’s Agorist ideas:
“My own preference is for the sort of economic institutions which
have been named, I think by Robert LeFevre, agoric. Under agoric
institutions almost everyone is self-employed. Instead of corporations,
there are large groups of entrepreneurs related by trade, not by
authority. Each sells, not his time, but what his time produces. As a
freelance writer (one of my occupations), I am part of an agoric economic
order.” [1st ed. p. 199, [1973] and [1978]].
A two- to four-fold misallocation rate may be an over-estimate;
still, the costs of misallocated resources, conflict, inflation, excessive
regulation, waste, bureaucracy, maltreatment and lost opportunities are
not always amenable to precise estimation, but they have certainly lowered
living standards for most people. The problem to be solved is that of
making funds available for different purposes for people to make good use
of, by their own lights, with the fullest possible informed consent of
those participating in generating the funds..
CHOOSING REPRESENTATION: BOLD STROKES AND INCREMENTAL CHANGES
————————————————————-
Rather than having periodic general elections, with very limited
choice as to candidates, each elector is at any time free to choose any
person of his or her preference (who must of course be willing so to act),
to be his or her elected representative, always on a revokeable basis.
Each day is a possible ‘Election Day’ for each elector and each
representative.
Representatives can then delegate their work-load as they see fit, to
those they have confidence in. In this age of easy communications, there
need be no restriction on the total number of elected representatives
meeting in Assembly by means of electronic and tele- conferencing. The
emphasis shifts from ‘winners and losers’ to ‘market shares.’
The relationship between elector and representative is a standard
civil-law contractual one (offer -> acceptance -> performance (->
payment)). Representatives may form mutual-interest groups, which might
in some respects approximate the present political coalitions. New
patterns of support will emerge. They will not be beholden to political
parties. Elections will cease to be periodic all-or-nothing affairs, and
will reflect and accommodate gradual shifts in opinion and support, as
electors change and develop their preferences between representatives -
and their policies - over time.
(A variant of modern public-key/private-key security cryptosystems
can easily be arranged, to ensure a secret ballot for those preferring
such an arrangement. It should be pointed out that most of the present
’secret-ballot’ electoral systems are only as ’secret’ as the authorities
running them want them to be).
The legislative functions of the elected assembly will be carried out
by means of the representatives voting on measures, each casting that
number of votes corresponding to the sum of contracting electors they
represent at the time of the vote. Public laws would require the assent
of a real majority — preferably at least 50% of the electorate’s votes
(after subtracting ‘votes-against’ from ‘votes-for’). I expect this to
result in many fewer — and clearer — statute laws.
It should be worthwhile to introduce ’sunset’ review provisions for
existing legislation, (as distinct from the body of civil law), so that
pre-existing legislation (much of which is dated, inappropriate, corrupt
in origin, harmful or poorly-thought-out) will be subject to review and
re-enactment or repeal.
A Written Constitution, setting out the basic principles of universal
human rights — to facilitate formal and legal enforceability of those
rights by means of accessible _trial by jury_ — is both educational and
advantageous for liberty, with entrenching clauses barring attacks on key
individual rights and liberties, and forbidding cruel or unusual
punishments, and so on. Every country in the world _nominally_
subscribes to these principles already, in the 1947 Universal Declaration
of Human Rights, which preceded the UN:
http://www.hri.org/docs/UDHR48.html
It is usually easier to convince people (and governments) that they
should _respect_ what they’ve already _actually assented to_.
Representatives may go on to appoint an Executive to deal with
defence matters, external affairs and so on. There may also be a second
(non-spending) oversight and revision chamber, or Senate, with
representatives especially chosen for their wisdom, knowledge, character,
standing and so on - as electors and their representatives may wish.
For the honest and ethical political representatives, there are many
advantages to be had from Democratic Agorism, and few disadvantages. Each
can work to build up their electoral constituency (’market share’), and to
offer the most attractive and worthwhile programmes, to ensure ongoing
support and revenue. Each can look forward to promoting their preferred
objectives. Each can have some security from the domination of party,
leader or faction. Every shade of opinion can be proportionally
represented.
For the elector, the available opportunities will be very considerably
improved over the present unresponsive legislatures and government
monopolies. There will be a whole new series of market-places, offering
packaged choices of services with strong incentives to be efficient and
attractive. Programmes compete for electoral support on a basis which
facilitated comparison for quality and value over time. The existence of
a variety of simultaneously available alternatives will considerably
enhance individual freedoms and reduce social conflicts arising from
monopoly provision.
It should be noted that Democratic Agorism can be built up gradually
(or even covertly, or clandestinely) in non-democratic societies, so as to
supplant and replace undemocratic systems by more representative - hence
more legitimate - fully democratic ones.
Regards,
Tony
Churchill's Parrot // 3 March, 2008 at 1:46 am
My Dear Mr. Davis,
Magnificent post!
“They HAVE to get rid of us, Britain - not the country, but the CULTURE - for that is all that the Anglosphere is in the end, a culture that is inimical to tyranny, and maximises individual liberty within imperfect institutions, and therefore blasts away the ground from under the feet of warlords, tribal “civilisations”, socialists and other types of Nazis, “community leaders”, dictocrasts, and the like.”
I believe I could not have said it better myself. Long Live Prince Harry! The devil with Drudge.
Cheers,
Charlie
David Davis // 3 March, 2008 at 1:52 pm
Thank you gentlemen, both, for useful and heartening comments so far!
Leave a Comment