WEBVTT

NOTE On Libertarian Political Philosophy

1
00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.080
Today, what I'm going to be doing is speaking to you about libertarianism and Austrianism,

2
00:00:04.080 --> 00:00:09.040
libertarianism in the first hour and Austrianism in the second hour.

3
00:00:09.040 --> 00:00:13.000
I'm going to be giving sort of a smorgasbord picture of libertarianism, looking at the

4
00:00:13.000 --> 00:00:20.080
tips of the icebergs of which libertarianism is composed, as opposed to one sort of meal

5
00:00:20.080 --> 00:00:24.300
or one kind of, one aspect of libertarianism.

6
00:00:24.300 --> 00:00:27.800
But before I get into libertarianism, I should say a few words about the difference between

7
00:00:27.800 --> 00:00:29.600
in Libertarianism and Austrianism.

8
00:00:30.720 --> 00:00:33.320
Libertarianism is a normative enterprise.

9
00:00:33.320 --> 00:00:35.600
It tries to, it's a part of ethics.

10
00:00:35.600 --> 00:00:36.920
It's not all of ethics.

11
00:00:36.920 --> 00:00:38.960
All of ethics is what's right.

12
00:00:38.960 --> 00:00:41.160
Libertarianism is that part of ethics

13
00:00:41.160 --> 00:00:43.360
which talks about what is just law.

14
00:00:43.360 --> 00:00:45.600
That's the only thing it asks about, what is just law,

15
00:00:45.600 --> 00:00:48.640
but that's enough to keep us busy.

16
00:00:48.640 --> 00:00:50.280
It's not a philosophy of life.

17
00:00:50.280 --> 00:00:53.640
It has nothing to do with morality, only with just law.

18
00:00:53.640 --> 00:00:56.700
Austrian economics in sharp contradistinction

19
00:00:56.700 --> 00:01:01.780
To libertarianism, a political philosophy is an economic, a branch of economics.

20
00:01:01.780 --> 00:01:05.140
It's a positive science, not a normative enterprise.

21
00:01:05.140 --> 00:01:09.740
And as a positive science, the goal of it is to explain economic reality,

22
00:01:09.740 --> 00:01:12.740
to understand it, what causes what, why do we have inflation,

23
00:01:12.740 --> 00:01:15.340
why do we have depressions, things like that.

24
00:01:15.340 --> 00:01:17.140
It takes no moral view about them.

25
00:01:17.140 --> 00:01:20.260
For example, you could be an Austrian and a non-libertarian.

26
00:01:20.260 --> 00:01:22.700
You could say, look, I know what causes depressions.

27
00:01:22.700 --> 00:01:25.620
It's just that I hate people and I want to have a lot of depressions.

28
00:01:25.620 --> 00:01:31.120
So I'm not a libertarian, but I'm an Austrian, so don't conflate the two.

29
00:01:31.120 --> 00:01:45.320
There is one similarity in my treatment, though, of both of them, and that is, for each, I will be going over the axioms of it first, and then a whole bunch of examples to fill it out and make it come alive.

30
00:01:45.320 --> 00:01:55.020
Okay, now to libertarianism. Libertarianism asks only one question, asks and gives only one answer. What is the question that it asks?

31
00:01:55.020 --> 00:02:10.020
Well, the question that it asks is under what conditions is it okay to use force against people? Under what conditions is it okay for me to poke someone in the snout or shoot him or take something from him?

32
00:02:10.020 --> 00:02:21.020
And it gives only one answer. We're not pacifists, so it says only in self-defense or in return of stolen property are you justified in using force or violence against someone.

33
00:02:21.020 --> 00:02:24.060
Otherwise, you gotta keep your midst to yourself.

34
00:02:24.060 --> 00:02:27.980
Which I don't think is, how shall I say it,

35
00:02:27.980 --> 00:02:30.180
it's not groundbreaking.

36
00:02:30.180 --> 00:02:33.120
I mean, if you ask anyone, what's the appropriate way

37
00:02:33.120 --> 00:02:34.240
for us to deal with each other,

38
00:02:34.240 --> 00:02:36.220
they'll say something like that.

39
00:02:36.220 --> 00:02:37.700
Keep your midst to yourself.

40
00:02:37.700 --> 00:02:40.380
The only way we should engage with each other

41
00:02:40.380 --> 00:02:41.820
is in a voluntary basis.

42
00:02:43.020 --> 00:02:45.820
Someone wrote a book about rules for kindergartners

43
00:02:45.820 --> 00:02:47.840
and it was hold hands and listen to the teacher

44
00:02:47.840 --> 00:02:50.020
and be nice and don't take each other's toys

45
00:02:50.020 --> 00:02:53.500
and don't be bopping each other over the head with toys.

46
00:02:53.500 --> 00:02:55.860
Well, that's what libertarianism is.

47
00:02:55.860 --> 00:02:57.260
Because it's really uncivilized

48
00:02:57.260 --> 00:03:00.740
to interact with each other in any other way.

49
00:03:00.740 --> 00:03:02.820
What's your name right in the front?

50
00:03:02.820 --> 00:03:06.020
David, if I want David's bag over there,

51
00:03:06.020 --> 00:03:09.580
the appropriate way for me to engage with David

52
00:03:09.580 --> 00:03:11.620
is to say, hey David, I'll give you 100 bucks for it

53
00:03:11.620 --> 00:03:13.780
or I'll give you this great tie or what do you say

54
00:03:13.780 --> 00:03:16.140
or I'm a nice guy, please give it to me.

55
00:03:16.140 --> 00:03:17.820
That would be an appropriate civilized way

56
00:03:17.820 --> 00:03:19.060
if I wanted his bag.

57
00:03:20.020 --> 00:03:27.020
The uncivilized way would be just take it, and if he resisted, beat him up if I'm bigger than him, or if I have a gun or something.

58
00:03:27.020 --> 00:03:37.020
Similarly, if I want to go to bed with one of the lovely ladies in the room, the appropriate way is to try to convince them of the merits of such a course of action.

59
00:03:37.020 --> 00:03:41.020
Seduce them, give them a present, tell them a joke, I don't know, whatever works around here.

60
00:03:41.020 --> 00:03:45.020
I'm sort of a little out of the market for this, but that's sort of a thing.

61
00:03:45.020 --> 00:03:49.020
Whereas if I just forced them to do that, that would be totally inappropriate.

62
00:03:49.020 --> 00:04:19.020
Now, so far, what I've said, I don't think is mind-boggling. I think if you ask the next hundred people that walk down the street, well, do you agree with this? They would say, yeah. I mean, that's civilization. Being nice to people, don't invade them. Any interaction with them should be a mutually voluntary one. So in a sense, libertarianism is for everyone. But here's the cruncher. Libertarianism maniacally

63
00:04:19.020 --> 00:04:24.020
are all crazy about being logically consistent with this.

64
00:04:24.220 --> 00:04:27.900
We apply it to everything with no exceptions.

65
00:04:27.900 --> 00:04:30.540
And here's where we deviate from everyone

66
00:04:30.540 --> 00:04:32.980
such that the Libertarian Party candidate for president

67
00:04:32.980 --> 00:04:35.780
is expected to get two, 3% of the vote

68
00:04:35.780 --> 00:04:39.540
if he's doing very well and one or 2% of the usual.

69
00:04:39.540 --> 00:04:42.100
Whereas, and you don't hear about Libertarianism,

70
00:04:43.200 --> 00:04:47.020
it's because we are rigidly dedicated

71
00:04:47.020 --> 00:04:50.040
to upholding these principles, hell or high water.

72
00:04:54.980 --> 00:04:56.500
Let me give you some examples of this.

73
00:04:56.500 --> 00:05:00.180
I once met some Nazi kids, neo-Nazis, real neo-Nazi kids.

74
00:05:00.180 --> 00:05:01.940
Don't ask, I go to a lot of conferences

75
00:05:01.940 --> 00:05:04.060
and I was trying to convert them to libertarianism

76
00:05:04.060 --> 00:05:06.540
because that's my usual way of dealing with people.

77
00:05:06.540 --> 00:05:07.980
You know, I meet someone, I try to convert them

78
00:05:07.980 --> 00:05:09.980
to libertarianism, so I said, look, you know,

79
00:05:09.980 --> 00:05:12.560
we'll give you a better deal than those guys.

80
00:05:12.560 --> 00:05:27.560
You can't kill people, but you can sing Nazi songs, you can goose-step, you can have ovens if you want, you can do all of it, you can have the swastika flag all over the place, you just can't invade anyone, you can't coerce anyone.

81
00:05:27.560 --> 00:05:31.560
Didn't work, but I gave it the old college try.

82
00:05:31.560 --> 00:05:34.560
Where do we stand on the political spectrum?

83
00:05:34.560 --> 00:06:04.560
Well, the usual political spectrum is a left-right sort of a thing, and you have people further to the left in accordance with their views, as a rough estimate, because some people are left on some things and other people are right on other things, so it's a little complex, but for example, if I were to put Bush over here, Bush here and Kerry here, they're both sort of centrist, Bush is a little to the right, Kerry's a little to the left, I don't think anyone would object. If I were to put

84
00:06:04.560 --> 00:06:13.560
Ronald Reagan, maybe a little to the right of Bush, and if I were to put Karl Marx a little to the left of Kerry, again, no one would object.

85
00:06:13.560 --> 00:06:23.560
Well, where do libertarians fit in on such a political spectrum? My claim is that the political spectrum doesn't really fit in libertarianism so much the worse for the political spectrum.

86
00:06:23.560 --> 00:06:30.560
Let me prove why the political spectrum is a snare and a delusion. The reason it's a snare and a delusion is where do you put Hitler?

87
00:06:30.560 --> 00:06:36.560
Well, most people would put Hitler way over to the right, can't put him over to the left.

88
00:06:36.560 --> 00:06:42.560
Where do you put our buddy Stalin? You put him over here, way over to the left, because he's an extreme leftist.

89
00:06:42.560 --> 00:06:49.560
Well, the political spectrum is supposed to put people close who are ideologically close and far away who are ideologically far apart.

90
00:06:49.560 --> 00:06:55.560
And yet, my contention is that these two guys are peas in a pod. Yes, they had a different rhetoric when they slaughtered people.

91
00:06:55.560 --> 00:07:05.560
by and large, these two guys are going to the same place in heaven or hell, namely the latter, there's not much difference and yet the political spectrum puts them on opposite sides of the place.

92
00:07:05.560 --> 00:07:17.560
Where do you put Mother Teresa? Well, Mother Teresa was no right winger. You have to put her on the left. Right next to her buddy Stalin? The whole thing is silly.

93
00:07:17.560 --> 00:07:21.560
and it's not just because libertarianism doesn't fit in nicely here.

94
00:07:21.560 --> 00:07:24.560
So what we do is we have a different kind of a political spectrum

95
00:07:24.560 --> 00:07:28.560
and our political spectrum is a cross

96
00:07:28.560 --> 00:07:33.560
and over here we have the usual left and right, but over here we have good and bad.

97
00:07:33.560 --> 00:07:36.560
And what is good and bad? Good, you'll never guess,

98
00:07:36.560 --> 00:07:41.560
good are people who adhere to the libertarian axiom of non-aggression.

99
00:07:41.560 --> 00:07:46.560
You keep your midst to yourself, you don't steal, you do voluntary interaction, you're good.

100
00:07:46.560 --> 00:07:59.560
You don't? You're bad. So Hitler might be down to the right and Stalin down to the left because of superficial differences that we still keep with this kind of a political spectrum.

101
00:07:59.560 --> 00:08:07.560
And Mother Teresa might be on the left, but she's high because she never used violence.

102
00:08:07.560 --> 00:08:15.560
And then we can put other people in here depending upon how good or bad they are and how left or right they are.

103
00:08:15.560 --> 00:08:18.280
What about socialism versus capitalism?

104
00:08:18.280 --> 00:08:19.640
How does libertarianism fit?

105
00:08:19.640 --> 00:08:21.560
Are we against socialism?

106
00:08:21.560 --> 00:08:23.220
And again, the answer I'm going to give you,

107
00:08:23.220 --> 00:08:24.640
I think will be a little surprising,

108
00:08:24.640 --> 00:08:26.160
because you might think, well,

109
00:08:27.040 --> 00:08:28.800
libertarians are against socialism.

110
00:08:30.000 --> 00:08:32.880
And in a sense, we are, if you define socialism

111
00:08:32.880 --> 00:08:35.180
as nationalization of the means of production.

112
00:08:36.220 --> 00:08:39.600
But if you define socialism as

113
00:08:39.600 --> 00:08:41.040
from each according to his ability,

114
00:08:41.040 --> 00:08:42.800
to each according to his need,

115
00:08:42.800 --> 00:08:45.560
which is an alternative definition of socialism.

116
00:08:45.560 --> 00:08:47.600
Then you get a very different way of looking at it.

117
00:08:47.600 --> 00:08:49.600
So here what I'll do is I'll put socialism

118
00:08:49.600 --> 00:08:53.560
and here I'll put capitalism, can't spell.

119
00:08:56.400 --> 00:09:00.040
And my contention is that that's not the debate.

120
00:09:00.040 --> 00:09:02.280
The debate is not between socialism and capitalism,

121
00:09:02.280 --> 00:09:06.560
rather the debate is between volunteerism and coercion.

122
00:09:08.000 --> 00:09:12.040
So for example, you could have voluntary socialism

123
00:09:12.040 --> 00:09:14.920
From Each According to His Ability to Each According to His Need

124
00:09:14.920 --> 00:09:17.240
is done in a monastery, in a kibbutz.

125
00:09:18.140 --> 00:09:21.720
Forget about, what do you call it,

126
00:09:21.720 --> 00:09:23.640
government subsidies to the kibbutz.

127
00:09:23.640 --> 00:09:25.840
Forget about that, but just an ordinary kibbutz

128
00:09:25.840 --> 00:09:27.900
or a commune, or even a family.

129
00:09:27.900 --> 00:09:31.240
The family and the commune and the kibbutz

130
00:09:31.240 --> 00:09:32.920
and the monastery all belong there.

131
00:09:32.920 --> 00:09:35.360
In the typical family, the little girl eats in accordance

132
00:09:35.360 --> 00:09:38.620
with her, not ability to earn income, but with her need.

133
00:09:38.620 --> 00:09:51.620
So, we have voluntary socialism. Here is coercive socialism. What coercive socialism is obviously North Korea, the USSR, things like that.

134
00:09:51.620 --> 00:09:59.620
What about capitalism? Well, here is laissez-faire capitalism, where the entire society lives according to libertarian code.

135
00:09:59.620 --> 00:10:05.620
And here would be, call it coercive capitalism, if you will, or fascism,

136
00:10:05.620 --> 00:10:16.620
where you have a veneer of property rights and a veneer of ownership, sort of like Nazi Germany or the present society where the politicians rule vast rules all over the place.

137
00:10:16.620 --> 00:10:28.620
So my contention is that it's not really a debate between socialism and capitalism, rather it's a debate between voluntary socialism and voluntary capitalism on the one hand against coercion.

138
00:10:28.620 --> 00:10:39.620
So the more important political philosophical distinction is not between socialism and capitalism, but between coercion and volunteerism.

139
00:10:39.620 --> 00:10:48.620
Okay, the second premise or the second axiom of libertarianism, second to the non-aggression axiom, is private property rights.

140
00:10:48.620 --> 00:10:53.620
Because, again, to use David, since you're sitting so close, I'll use you as my foil. I hope you'll excuse me for this.

141
00:10:53.620 --> 00:11:08.620
I'm sorry for this. Suppose I grab his bag and I run off with it, or rather, let me put it non-pejoratively. Suppose I grab the bag that's sitting in front of him and I run off with that, and then he chases me and tries to tackle me and grab it back.

142
00:11:08.620 --> 00:11:20.620
Who is guilty of the initiation of violence? You might say it's me, but you don't know, because you don't know who is the proper owner of that bag. It's sitting in front of him. That doesn't mean it's his injustice.

143
00:11:20.620 --> 00:11:24.620
It might be that he stole it from me yesterday and I'm just grabbing it back.

144
00:11:24.620 --> 00:11:27.620
Maybe it's got my picture in the picture of my wife and kids in it.

145
00:11:27.620 --> 00:11:29.620
Who knows? Maybe he's the thief.

146
00:11:29.620 --> 00:11:35.620
The way you can tell whether aggression is being utilized or not, you have to have private property rights.

147
00:11:35.620 --> 00:11:39.620
So how do you have private property rights under libertarian code?

148
00:11:39.620 --> 00:11:43.620
Well, there are two things for which private property rights can apply.

149
00:11:43.620 --> 00:11:49.620
One of them is the person and the other is physical reality, virgin territory.

150
00:11:49.620 --> 00:12:19.620
Well, with regard to the individual person, there are only three ways you can do it. One, we each own ourselves. And this is very much in accordance with homesteading, which is the principle that underlies it for the libertarian, the John Lockean, Murray Rothbardian, Hans Hoppean homesteading, because I know that Ken has a baby, Duke, who's now about a year old. I don't know how it is with you, Ken, with your son, but with my kids, when they were up to about a year old,

151
00:12:19.620 --> 00:12:21.380
You can kiss them all the time you want it.

152
00:12:21.380 --> 00:12:23.420
And they never said squat.

153
00:12:23.420 --> 00:12:25.460
They weren't really homesteading themselves yet.

154
00:12:25.460 --> 00:12:27.700
When they got to about a year and a half or two years old,

155
00:12:27.700 --> 00:12:30.340
all of a sudden they go like this and they learn the word no.

156
00:12:30.340 --> 00:12:31.900
I don't know where they learned that from.

157
00:12:31.900 --> 00:12:34.420
But they learned the word no and it was an incipient

158
00:12:34.420 --> 00:12:37.660
taking over their own bodies through homesteading.

159
00:12:37.660 --> 00:12:39.940
They were sort of awakening in a sense

160
00:12:39.940 --> 00:12:42.740
and seizing ownership of themselves by saying no

161
00:12:42.740 --> 00:12:45.860
and demonstrating that they now are control of themselves.

162
00:12:45.860 --> 00:12:48.340
And my kids now are 26 and 24,

163
00:12:48.340 --> 00:12:58.620
So that's one way, and that's the libertarian way. The other way, or second way, is the

164
00:12:58.620 --> 00:13:05.340
ubermension owned the untermension, or the Joneses, as Murray Rothbard would say, own

165
00:13:05.340 --> 00:13:10.180
everyone else. But what's so special about the Joneses? Why are they any different? And

166
00:13:10.180 --> 00:13:17.340
this is not generalizable. Libertarianism is not a heavy lifting, but it's hot work, so

167
00:13:17.340 --> 00:13:32.840
Okay, so the second way is some people own other people and this we can reject because there's no reason to believe it.

168
00:13:32.840 --> 00:13:41.840
The third one is we all own one over and of everyone. So there are six billion people on the earth. We each own one sixth billionth of everyone.

169
00:13:41.840 --> 00:13:51.840
This too, apart, this is problematic too, because apart from being a recipe for having committee meetings forever,

170
00:13:51.840 --> 00:13:56.840
how could you even have a committee meeting? Because a committee meeting means you have to vote for something, like can I scratch my head?

171
00:13:56.840 --> 00:14:01.840
Well before we, before I can scratch my head, because we need rules to know what you can do and what you can't do,

172
00:14:01.840 --> 00:14:05.840
what's permitted and what's forbidden, if we're going to get along with each other.

173
00:14:05.840 --> 00:14:07.040
Along with Each Other.

174
00:14:07.040 --> 00:14:09.300
Well, before I can eat so much and scratch my head,

175
00:14:09.300 --> 00:14:14.300
I have to get permission of three billion plus one people?

176
00:14:15.220 --> 00:14:16.640
But how can we even vote?

177
00:14:16.640 --> 00:14:18.360
The usual way you vote is you raise your hand.

178
00:14:18.360 --> 00:14:19.280
But how can I raise the hand?

179
00:14:19.280 --> 00:14:20.480
It's not my hand.

180
00:14:20.480 --> 00:14:23.320
I only own one sixth billionth of it.

181
00:14:23.320 --> 00:14:27.240
So the whole thing falls apart as a rational way

182
00:14:27.240 --> 00:14:31.440
of girding or undergirding property rights.

183
00:14:31.440 --> 00:14:33.140
So we're left with the libertarian way.

184
00:14:33.140 --> 00:14:34.520
We each own ourselves.

185
00:14:34.520 --> 00:14:36.360
Slavery would therefore be forbidden

186
00:14:36.360 --> 00:14:40.000
because it's an incursion on someone else.

187
00:14:40.000 --> 00:14:42.840
Not talking about voluntary slavery, it's another issue.

188
00:14:42.840 --> 00:14:44.800
Similarly with private property,

189
00:14:44.800 --> 00:14:48.440
the way you get to own nature is you mix your labor,

190
00:14:48.440 --> 00:14:50.920
the labor that you now own because you own your body with it

191
00:14:50.920 --> 00:14:54.640
and therefore you convert it into own property.

192
00:14:56.040 --> 00:14:59.000
So you can own farmland, you can own theoretically,

193
00:14:59.000 --> 00:15:00.640
and according to the libertarian,

194
00:15:00.640 --> 00:15:02.240
you can own the oceans and the rivers,

195
00:15:02.240 --> 00:15:03.240
but that's a whole other story

196
00:15:03.240 --> 00:15:22.240
which we'll maybe not or maybe get into, but ideally the libertarian goal is that all of the earth should be owned privately so that everyone will now know what they can do with their property and we will in that way reduce conflict, which is one of the reasons for having property rights.

197
00:15:22.240 --> 00:15:30.940
Now there's this guy Proudhon who said property is theft, but that's wrong because you can't have theft without property, right?

198
00:15:30.940 --> 00:15:34.700
The reason that that's David's is because he homesteaded that

199
00:15:34.700 --> 00:15:38.260
or he got it through what Robert Nozick calls

200
00:15:38.260 --> 00:15:41.060
a legitimate title transfer,

201
00:15:41.060 --> 00:15:42.820
which means either you homestead it

202
00:15:42.820 --> 00:15:45.000
or you do any voluntary way of getting it.

203
00:15:45.000 --> 00:15:46.880
For example, he could have traded it or bought it

204
00:15:46.880 --> 00:15:48.500
or rented it or something like that

205
00:15:48.500 --> 00:15:51.940
or have it as a gift or won it in a gambling poker game

206
00:15:51.940 --> 00:15:53.020
or something like that.

207
00:15:53.020 --> 00:15:55.540
All of these are legitimate title transfers.

208
00:15:57.240 --> 00:15:59.100
Okay, well I think that's about it

209
00:15:59.100 --> 00:16:02.180
for the axioms.

210
00:16:03.180 --> 00:16:04.900
The only difference is, as I say,

211
00:16:04.900 --> 00:16:07.220
libertarians apply this very consistently.

212
00:16:07.220 --> 00:16:09.180
And now what I wanna do is to apply it

213
00:16:09.180 --> 00:16:10.660
to a whole host of things.

214
00:16:10.660 --> 00:16:12.900
Now, I thought you were gonna be given out my book,

215
00:16:12.900 --> 00:16:13.940
Defending the Undefendable,

216
00:16:13.940 --> 00:16:15.740
and I see there's a whole bunch of them on that table,

217
00:16:15.740 --> 00:16:19.100
and you haven't been given them, so I'll, I don't know,

218
00:16:19.100 --> 00:16:20.620
I'll deal with that somehow.

219
00:16:20.620 --> 00:16:22.100
I think some of you have it,

220
00:16:22.100 --> 00:16:24.340
but I think the idea was that each person

221
00:16:24.340 --> 00:16:26.780
should pick one up and maybe during the break

222
00:16:26.780 --> 00:16:28.160
you can get one.

223
00:16:28.160 --> 00:16:58.160
So what I'm going to do now is to go over a whole bunch of instances and to apply the libertarian's eyeglasses to all of them and to see how they stack up against the non-aggression axiom and private property rights and the ones I've got on my list and I don't know if I'll get through all of them but I'll make a try, blackmail, libel, government, courts and police, roads, inside trading, abortion, giving back,

224
00:16:58.160 --> 00:17:03.160
Reparations to Blacks for Slavery and Intellectual Property, Patents and Copyrights

225
00:17:03.160 --> 00:17:14.160
As I say, I don't know that I'll get through all of them, but I'll have fun trying to apply libertarianism to them all.

226
00:17:14.160 --> 00:17:20.160
One point about the book that I'm making, all the chapters in that book, what I'm doing is, I call it Defending the Undefendable,

227
00:17:20.160 --> 00:17:31.160
And the people that I defend, could someone lend me a copy of that book? Could you pass it forward?

228
00:17:31.160 --> 00:17:38.160
Thanks. All of the chapters here are instances of being compatible with libertarianism,

229
00:17:38.160 --> 00:17:42.160
in the sense that none of them necessarily violates rights.

230
00:17:42.160 --> 00:17:48.160
Now, a baker could commit a rape, but that doesn't mean that there's something wrong with baking per se,

231
00:17:48.160 --> 00:18:18.160
Okay, so here is a list of people that I defend only in the sense that I say they shouldn't go to jail or that we should not be using violence against them because remember the whole point of the libertarian axiom is under what conditions is it legitimate to use violence against people and the libertarian view is if you murder, if you rape, if you steal then we can use violence against you but if you do any of these things in these chapters and I have a chapter on each then we got to leave you alone even though some of them are not nice because they do not

232
00:18:18.160 --> 00:18:22.660
If you first initiate violence, therefore, it's unjustified to use violence against them.

233
00:18:22.660 --> 00:18:45.660
So here's the list. The prostitute, the pimp, the male chauvinist pig, the drug pusher, the drug addict, the blackmailer, the slanderer and libeler, the denier of academic freedom, the advertiser, the person who yells fire in a crowded theater, the gypsy cab driver, the ticket scalper, the dishonest cop, the one who doesn't give you a ticket for things that you have a right to do in the first place, like do drugs or sex or whatever.

234
00:18:45.660 --> 00:19:15.660
The non-governmental counterfeiter, the miser, the inheritor, the moneylender, the non-contributor, the charity, the slumlord, the ghetto merchant, speculator, importer, middleman, profiteer, one of my favorites, the strip miner, litterer, waste maker, fat capitalist pig employer, the one who pays low wages, the scab, the rate buster and the employer of child labor. None of them are guilty of any initiatory coercion, therefore it is a violation of their rights if we put them in jail or in any other way use violence against them.

235
00:19:15.660 --> 00:19:29.660
Okay, so I now want to go through a list and I think I'll be starting with the blackmail.

236
00:19:29.660 --> 00:19:40.660
Now in blackmail, what you have is a threat coupled with a demand for money or sexual favors or any old thing that seems of value to you.

237
00:19:40.660 --> 00:19:42.420
and we have laws against blackmail.

238
00:19:42.420 --> 00:19:44.500
So if I saw you last night with a woman

239
00:19:44.500 --> 00:19:46.100
that isn't your wife and I threaten you,

240
00:19:46.100 --> 00:19:47.340
then I'm gonna tell your wife,

241
00:19:47.340 --> 00:19:49.420
unless you give me a hundred bucks or a thousand

242
00:19:49.420 --> 00:19:52.700
or a million or whatever it is, that's what blackmail is.

243
00:19:54.380 --> 00:19:56.780
Now, did I initiate violence against anyone?

244
00:19:58.500 --> 00:20:00.340
No, my claim is I didn't.

245
00:20:00.340 --> 00:20:03.020
You have to distinguish that from extortion.

246
00:20:03.020 --> 00:20:05.620
In the case of extortion, what I say is,

247
00:20:05.620 --> 00:20:08.700
if you don't give me big bucks or whatever it is

248
00:20:08.700 --> 00:20:38.700
I'm asking for or favors or something, I'll shoot you or I'll kidnap your kids or I'll blow up your house or I'll do something like that. That's extortion. There the threat is to invade and the libertarian is against not only actual invasions but even the threat of invasion, a serious threat of invasion. You are entitled to use violence against the perpetrator thereof. So I'm distinguishing between extortion on the one hand which I say is illegitimate and blackmail on the other hand which I say is

249
00:20:38.700 --> 00:20:40.700
is not illegitimate.

250
00:20:42.700 --> 00:20:45.700
Paradoxically, if we got rid of the laws against blackmail,

251
00:20:45.700 --> 00:20:49.700
our reputations would be safer than they are now.

252
00:20:49.700 --> 00:20:52.700
By the way, do we own reputations?

253
00:20:52.700 --> 00:20:54.700
Can you homestead a reputation?

254
00:20:54.700 --> 00:20:56.700
No, no.

255
00:20:56.700 --> 00:20:59.700
A reputation consists of the thoughts in the minds of other people about us.

256
00:20:59.700 --> 00:21:02.700
My reputation consists of what you guys think about me.

257
00:21:02.700 --> 00:21:05.700
David's reputation consists of what you people think about him,

258
00:21:05.700 --> 00:21:07.700
including me, all of us think about him.

259
00:21:07.700 --> 00:21:12.700
Can David own all of our thoughts? Can I own all of your thoughts? No.

260
00:21:12.700 --> 00:21:14.700
I can't homestead your thoughts. They're your thoughts.

261
00:21:14.700 --> 00:21:18.700
Unless I buy them from you, which is a different kind of a case.

262
00:21:18.700 --> 00:21:24.700
So you can't own your reputation, paradoxically, even though you can sell it.

263
00:21:24.700 --> 00:21:27.700
You can work hard for it. You can sell.

264
00:21:27.700 --> 00:21:30.700
Goodwill in a business is the business reputation.

265
00:21:30.700 --> 00:21:32.700
So it's a big paradox. You don't own it.

266
00:21:32.700 --> 00:22:02.700
Another paradox is that reputations, even though you don't own them, would be safer in a regime where there was no law against blackmail, so this is another big paradox, because right now in the newspapers you read houses for sale, jobs, personals, cars for sale, you'd then read all sorts of claims that, you know, this guy is, you know, he's a blackmailer.

267
00:22:02.700 --> 00:22:32.700
This or that guys or that and now I'm going to read off a list of various libelous statements and I make two apologies one if I mention your name and you don't like it or two if I've inadvertently left you out so here are cases of libel and I claim that libel too should be legitimized that people should not go to jail for libel so I'm going to start libeling everyone

268
00:22:32.700 --> 00:22:39.940
Mr. Hank Brackmann, you're a pervert. Mrs. Hank Brackmann, you're a commie. Richard

269
00:22:39.940 --> 00:22:47.980
Blyberg, a weirdo. Michael Elkin, pinko. David Gilmorton, takes candy from babies. David Jarrett,

270
00:22:47.980 --> 00:22:57.620
rubber fetishist. Dick Cosman, sicko. Mei-Lin Lin, sadist. Ron Mantle, Nazi. Steve Milanovic,

271
00:22:57.620 --> 00:23:27.620
masochist, David Schatz, heroin addict, Brittany Schaeffer, pornographer, Ann Williamson, lesbian, Pat Barnett, pimp, James Fogle, slumlord, Lew Rockwell, adulterer, Steve Berger, rapist, Rebecca Dassow, murderer, Patrick Burke, thief, Ken Garshina, blackmailer, Josh Gold, extortionist, Peter Jepson, drug dealer, Bill Strong, highway robber, Stu Tabin, pirate, Eleanor Lorge, prostitute, Barbara Fitzsimmons,

272
00:23:27.620 --> 00:23:33.060
Women's Porn Star, Mike Martino, watermelon, a watermelon is someone who's green on the

273
00:23:33.060 --> 00:23:39.380
outside and red on the inside. It's a big curse word in where I come from. David McKnight,

274
00:23:39.380 --> 00:23:46.540
randroid, another in-joke sort of a thing. Mike Hamill takes a bath with a rubber ducky.

275
00:23:46.540 --> 00:23:53.700
Caitlin Murphy is a leather fetishist. Ron LeBeau plays with blow-up rubber sex toys.

276
00:23:53.700 --> 00:24:00.940
Dick Weitzman is a pimp, Daniel Gilbert is a sissy, Adam DeMarc is a wuss, John Grizzetti

277
00:24:00.940 --> 00:24:09.780
is a mama's boy, Ted Goldthorpe is a sicko, and Sarp is a crybaby.

278
00:24:09.780 --> 00:24:15.300
What I've now done is I've libeled everyone. I've besmirched your reputation. If people

279
00:24:15.300 --> 00:24:20.460
out there believe me or if you believe me about each other, the demand curve for your

280
00:24:20.460 --> 00:24:50.460
You will take a hit. You will have been harmed. Is harm a violation of libertarian code? No. Harm is not a violation of libertarian code. If I open up a grocery store across the street from you and I take away half your customers, I've harmed you, but I didn't violate your rights. So libertarianism allows for harm of various kinds. I write a negative book review about your book. I write a negative movie review about your movie. I've harmed you.

281
00:24:50.460 --> 00:25:00.460
I've violated your income, or I've reduced your income, but did I do something for which I should go to jail, or for which you would be justified now in using violence against me?

282
00:25:00.460 --> 00:25:04.460
Yes, in the view of some, but not in the view of libertarians.

283
00:25:04.460 --> 00:25:11.460
Okay, the next thing on my list is government. You're in my favorite institution.

284
00:25:11.460 --> 00:25:41.460
Now, there are a lot of people out there who think that government is necessary, maybe a necessary evil, although I don't believe that and I'll try to show why I don't believe that, but they think that government is, you know, maybe fumbling and bumbling, maybe sometimes inefficient, but the strict libertarian view is that government necessarily violates rights. Therefore, in a free and just society, we wouldn't have it. Now, this sounds a little radical, but remember, we sort of agreed

285
00:25:41.460 --> 00:26:11.460
I think that the libertarian axiom of non-aggression and what do you call it, property rights is something that most people would adhere to and if I can prove to you that government is incompatible with that then I'm counting on you if you agree with the axiom and you're rigorously logical and are willing to make deductions from premises to come out with the conclusion that government is a problem. Okay, why do I say this?

286
00:26:11.460 --> 00:26:21.460
If government wanted Dick's, I'm sorry, David's bag, it wouldn't say, hey David, we'll give you this if you give us the bag.

287
00:26:21.460 --> 00:26:28.460
They'd say, you know, it's April 15th, you have to pay your taxes. You don't pay your taxes, you go to jail.

288
00:26:28.460 --> 00:26:34.460
Well, he's an innocent guy. He didn't do anything. He didn't steal that bag in the first place. Who were they to come and grab it from him?

289
00:26:34.460 --> 00:26:40.460
Well, one argument is, well, they're the majority. Majority vote. We had a vote. We elected the president.

290
00:26:40.460 --> 00:26:42.460
and the President said we have to have taxes.

291
00:26:42.460 --> 00:26:43.800
David, you got to kick in.

292
00:26:44.740 --> 00:26:46.320
Well, look, suppose three of my buddies

293
00:26:46.320 --> 00:26:50.020
and I broke into your house and we were about to,

294
00:26:50.020 --> 00:26:55.020
I won't say steal your TV, maybe I'll be less pejorative.

295
00:26:55.160 --> 00:26:58.500
I'll say liberate it or transfer it from your ownership

296
00:26:58.500 --> 00:26:59.340
to our ownership.

297
00:26:59.340 --> 00:27:01.580
We're going to take your TV and your bicycle.

298
00:27:02.860 --> 00:27:04.320
But we're philosophical robbers

299
00:27:04.320 --> 00:27:05.800
and we're willing to dialogue with you.

300
00:27:05.800 --> 00:27:09.100
So you object and you say, well, you know, it's my TV

301
00:27:09.100 --> 00:27:11.940
and it's my bike, get your mitts off.

302
00:27:11.940 --> 00:27:15.420
And we say, okay, tut, tut, tut, not so fast, don't worry,

303
00:27:15.420 --> 00:27:18.980
we'll be democratic about this, we'll have an election.

304
00:27:18.980 --> 00:27:20.380
And I'm the gang leader, I say, okay,

305
00:27:20.380 --> 00:27:23.820
how many people think it's okay to take, what's your name?

306
00:27:23.820 --> 00:27:25.220
Ted, how many people think it's okay

307
00:27:25.220 --> 00:27:27.620
to take Ted's bicycle and TV?

308
00:27:27.620 --> 00:27:30.940
And me and my three gang robbers, we raise our hands

309
00:27:30.940 --> 00:27:32.060
and we say, well, who's against it?

310
00:27:32.060 --> 00:27:34.380
And Ted raises his hand and we say, say, Ted,

311
00:27:34.380 --> 00:27:38.220
you know, majority vote, well, this is just theft.

312
00:27:38.220 --> 00:27:43.220
The whole thing is superficial, it's silly that we're having an election about his property.

313
00:27:43.220 --> 00:27:47.220
It's sort of two wolves and a lamb are having a vote as to what to have for lunch.

314
00:27:47.220 --> 00:27:52.220
It's just silly. It's no justification. Majority vote is no justification.

315
00:27:52.220 --> 00:27:59.220
I put up our friend Hitler's name before. Hitler came to power as a result of a democratic election.

316
00:27:59.220 --> 00:28:03.220
He didn't win a majority. It was a complex sort of a thing, a plurality.

317
00:28:03.220 --> 00:28:07.220
He lost this vote, he won that one, finally he was appointed.

318
00:28:07.220 --> 00:28:11.100
He came to power not through a coup d'etat, but through an election.

319
00:28:11.100 --> 00:28:14.260
Well, if Hitler could come to power through an election,

320
00:28:14.260 --> 00:28:18.980
so much the worse for elections as justification or as a principle

321
00:28:18.980 --> 00:28:22.420
on the basis of which to decide what's just and what's unjust.

322
00:28:22.420 --> 00:28:26.580
So we libertarians are not electionists or democratists.

323
00:28:26.580 --> 00:28:32.140
We're rather non-aggressorists and private property rightsists.

324
00:28:32.140 --> 00:28:36.380
Okay, let's take another example.

325
00:28:36.380 --> 00:28:44.380
Maybe it's a club. It's the USA club. You know, you join the golf club, or what club are we in now?

326
00:28:44.380 --> 00:28:52.380
Metropolitan club. You join the metropolitan club, they say, okay, pay your dues. If you don't pay your dues, we kick you out.

327
00:28:52.380 --> 00:28:58.380
But the metropolitan club is a voluntary club. If you're in, you pay your dues, and if you don't pay your dues, they'll kick you out.

328
00:28:58.380 --> 00:29:04.380
The US club is not a voluntary club. Let's take the following scenario. Let's go back to, I don't know when the country started.

329
00:29:04.380 --> 00:29:34.380
When the country started, I was very young then, 1776, 1789, somewhere in there, and there was some guy in the wilds of Western Massachusetts, and news travels slowly, so the tax collector gets there maybe six months after the country starts, and he goes to the guy in Western Massachusetts, he said, well, we started this USA club, and the guy in Western Massachusetts says, oh, wonderful, I wish you the best, I'm happy to deal with you on a voluntary basis, I'm a libertarian,

330
00:29:34.380 --> 00:29:43.380
I won't aggress against you. You don't aggress against me. We'll live peacefully. I've been living here for many years. Happy to welcome you. Would you like a cup of coffee?

331
00:29:43.380 --> 00:29:53.380
And the taxpayer says, you don't understand. This isn't a voluntary club. You're in it whether you like it or not. And if you don't like it, leave.

332
00:29:53.380 --> 00:30:01.380
Well, what kind of club is that where they come to your property that you homesteaded and your grandpappy homesteaded and gave it to your father and gave it to you?

333
00:30:01.380 --> 00:30:30.380
So I reject the idea that the U.S. is a voluntary club. And the idea, if you don't like it, leave, is sort of a circular argument, because we're trying to establish if the government has legitimacy. And if you say, if you don't like it, leave, then that assumes that they have legitimacy, the very thing that's in question, the very thing that we're trying to see if they do have legitimacy or not. So I reject that sort of an argument.

334
00:30:30.380 --> 00:30:37.460
That sort of an argument. Look, suppose I buy a house in Harlem and every day I'm robbed.

335
00:30:37.460 --> 00:30:41.420
Did I know that I'd be robbed every day? Yes, I knew it. So what? It doesn't mean they have

336
00:30:41.420 --> 00:30:46.660
a right to rob me, right? So someone who comes to this country, they know they're going to

337
00:30:46.660 --> 00:30:50.500
be taxed. That doesn't make it right. Just because you can predict robbery doesn't make

338
00:30:50.500 --> 00:30:52.840
it non-robbery.

339
00:30:52.840 --> 00:31:07.280
Let me try another one on you. Another argument for the voluntary society is the argument

340
00:31:07.280 --> 00:31:14.540
from world government. If somehow there's some reason that the nation must control the

341
00:31:14.540 --> 00:31:21.320
individual because somehow the individual is too stupid or whatever, for some reason

342
00:31:21.320 --> 00:31:31.320
When the nation has to control the individual, then the truth of the matter is that the world government has to control the national government.

343
00:31:31.320 --> 00:31:41.320
So what I'm saying is that there's an analogy between the individual and his nation, and all the nations and the world government.

344
00:31:41.320 --> 00:31:47.320
And if you accept this, then you must accept world government.

345
00:31:47.320 --> 00:31:51.320
I'm trying to pull a reductio on you good people who so far don't agree with me.

346
00:31:51.320 --> 00:31:57.320
I'm trying to say that this relationship is the same, as shown by the equal sign.

347
00:31:57.320 --> 00:32:03.320
And that if you don't believe in world government, then how can you believe in this sort of government?

348
00:32:03.320 --> 00:32:13.320
And the libertarian would say, no government is justified because governments are inherently coercive.

349
00:32:13.320 --> 00:32:19.320
Okay, how would this work in the case of streets, private streets and roads?

350
00:32:19.320 --> 00:32:24.320
I don't know about you people, I used to live in New York City and get around a lot easier than now.

351
00:32:24.320 --> 00:32:28.320
I mean, to go anywhere takes about a half hour and I'm talking three blocks.

352
00:32:28.320 --> 00:32:33.320
I mean, the traffic is murderous and I don't think it's all due to the storms and all.

353
00:32:33.320 --> 00:32:38.320
It's just horrendous.

354
00:32:38.320 --> 00:32:46.320
But the real reason I think we should contemplate private roads as opposed to government roads

355
00:32:46.320 --> 00:32:51.320
is because, does anyone know how many people die on the roads every year?

356
00:32:51.320 --> 00:32:54.320
About 40,000, 40,000 people die on the roads.

357
00:32:54.320 --> 00:33:24.320
In the United States, just 40,000, or 40,000 in the United States, in other countries, other numbers. Right now, a thousand people on our side have died in the Iraq War, and this is seen as a horrible thing as it is. But we're dying like flies on the roads. And these are government roads, they're not private roads. They used to be private roads, but now they're private roads.

358
00:33:24.320 --> 00:33:34.320
Initially, all roads were private. They were turnpike roads, and they would have, what do you call it, where you pay money, a turnpike gate or something.

359
00:33:34.320 --> 00:33:43.320
They had all sorts of rules as to how much you would pay for road usage based on how many axles and how many horses and how big and heavy the wagon was.

360
00:33:43.320 --> 00:33:49.320
Also, they would have it based on the width of the wheel. If it was a wide wheel, they would charge very little.

361
00:33:49.320 --> 00:33:53.320
Think steamroller because it would sort of flatten out the ruts in the road.

362
00:33:53.320 --> 00:34:01.320
If it was a very thin wheel, think ice skate, you could go fast but you would rip ruts into the road so they would charge you more because you're ruining the road.

363
00:34:01.320 --> 00:34:15.320
So it was a perfectly viable economic activity and the benefit of it is that we know from economics, to look ahead a little bit, that when you have competition you get a better product.

364
00:34:15.320 --> 00:34:22.320
The reason that there's no crisis in wristwatches or ties or pens is because all these things are private.

365
00:34:22.320 --> 00:34:31.320
There is no pen crisis. There's no bubblegum crisis. The crises are all having to do with government.

366
00:34:31.320 --> 00:34:39.320
Why is this? Is it that entrepreneurs are somehow inherently better, rather, they are better, but are they more efficient?

367
00:34:39.320 --> 00:34:47.320
And my answer is no. You can get some bureaucrats who are, you know, on any individual basis, stack up against any entrepreneur.

368
00:34:47.320 --> 00:34:56.320
What the entrepreneur has in his advantage vis-a-vis the bureaucrat is the profit and loss weeding out system.

369
00:34:56.320 --> 00:35:05.320
The reason pens and pizza are pretty good is because anyone who produces a bad pen or a bad pizza goes broke, loses money and then goes broke.

370
00:35:05.320 --> 00:35:13.320
So you have a weeding out of the inefficient, but we don't have it with roads.

371
00:35:13.320 --> 00:35:17.320
When people die like flies on those roads, does anyone lose money?

372
00:35:17.320 --> 00:35:21.320
Who's in a position to do anything about it? No.

373
00:35:21.320 --> 00:35:25.320
There's no one who loses money, so why should we expect efficiency here?

374
00:35:25.320 --> 00:35:31.320
Yes, the mayor will come out, whatever, but he doesn't lose money.

375
00:35:31.320 --> 00:35:34.320
He can't go bankrupt if too many people die on the roads,

376
00:35:34.320 --> 00:35:38.760
or if there's, what do you call it, too much traffic congestion.

377
00:35:38.760 --> 00:35:52.080
Now on that traffic congestion business, the way that you can look at a thing called peak load pricing,

378
00:35:52.080 --> 00:35:57.720
peak load pricing, here is time of day and here is quantity of road use.

379
00:35:57.720 --> 00:36:01.920
And in most cities, I think in New York City, 24 hours, the whole thing is clogged up.

380
00:36:01.920 --> 00:36:10.620
But in most cities, from, say, 12 a.m. to 6 a.m., you have very low road usage.

381
00:36:10.620 --> 00:36:15.880
Then from 6 to 9, you have the morning rush hour.

382
00:36:15.880 --> 00:36:21.440
And then it's sort of intermediately busy until, say, 4 p.m.

383
00:36:21.440 --> 00:36:26.640
And then it pops up again till maybe, I don't know, 8 p.m. or something like that.

384
00:36:26.640 --> 00:36:31.640
and then it goes down to the level of low usage, right?

385
00:36:32.320 --> 00:36:36.360
Is that a fair depiction of traffic?

386
00:36:36.360 --> 00:36:37.560
Okay.

387
00:36:37.560 --> 00:36:41.640
Peak load pricing means you charge more during the peaks

388
00:36:41.640 --> 00:36:44.120
and we all know that demand curves slope downward.

389
00:36:44.120 --> 00:36:47.920
So other things equal, the higher the price, the less usage,

390
00:36:47.920 --> 00:36:49.940
the more you make someone pay,

391
00:36:49.940 --> 00:36:53.120
the less other things equal, they'll use it.

392
00:36:53.120 --> 00:37:05.120
So, if you charge a high price during these peaks, you'll get less usage there, but you say, well, people gotta get to work.

393
00:37:05.120 --> 00:37:16.120
Well, not so fast. Yes, they have to get to work, but maybe the factory will locate closer to them if you charge them more for usage, or maybe they'll have staggered work times,

394
00:37:16.120 --> 00:37:22.120
or maybe you'll move closer to the factory or the factory will move closer to you, or maybe you'll carpool.

395
00:37:22.120 --> 00:37:29.120
Look, if to get across the Washington Bridge or the Lincoln Tunnel is, what is it now, six bucks?

396
00:37:29.120 --> 00:37:35.120
Suppose it was a hundred bucks. That would slow some people down. That would get people to carpool and whatever.

397
00:37:35.120 --> 00:37:40.120
Instead, the government, you know, asks you to add a benevolence to carpool.

398
00:37:40.120 --> 00:37:42.120
But we all know what Adam Smith said about benevolence.

399
00:37:42.120 --> 00:37:46.120
It's not from benevolence that the butcher and the baker and the candlestick maker give us their product.

400
00:37:46.120 --> 00:37:49.120
It's out of a keen appreciationivid their self-interest.

401
00:37:49.120 --> 00:37:56.120
Well, if the prices are higher, then you even out these peaks.

402
00:37:56.120 --> 00:38:02.120
You might increase it a little bit here and increase it a little bit here, but you will decrease the peaks.

403
00:38:02.120 --> 00:38:05.120
What does the government do in its infinite wisdom?

404
00:38:05.120 --> 00:38:11.120
What the government does is it engages in anti-peak load pricing.

405
00:38:11.120 --> 00:38:16.120
Because what it'll do to get across the Washington Bridge or the Lincoln Tunnel or the Triborough Bridge,

406
00:38:16.120 --> 00:38:24.120
They'll give you a monthly ticket and you can buy, I don't know, 20 or 30 round trips for a lower price.

407
00:38:24.120 --> 00:38:29.120
Now who is likely to use these monthly trip tickets?

408
00:38:29.120 --> 00:38:35.120
Commuters who use the facilities during the rush hour or people who come in and shop?

409
00:38:35.120 --> 00:38:39.120
Obviously workers, people who are coming in to work.

410
00:38:39.120 --> 00:38:46.760
so if you give them a lower price what you do is you increase the peak you

411
00:38:46.760 --> 00:38:54.960
make it even worse do you see the point so the government is responsible for

412
00:38:54.960 --> 00:39:04.280
traffic congestion the government is responsible for road deaths now there are

413
00:39:04.280 --> 00:39:07.280
many people who say well how can you say the government is responsible for road

414
00:39:07.280 --> 00:39:14.280
Road Debts, and they start saying, well, what is the real cause of road debts, Block? You're a moron. You don't know what the real cause of road debts are.

415
00:39:14.280 --> 00:39:30.280
And they say, okay, well, here is road debts. And what's the cause of them? The cause is drunken driving, speeding, driver error, and a whole bunch of things.

416
00:39:30.280 --> 00:39:46.280
The National Highway Safety Traffic Administration lists about 103 causes, like how far away the hospital is and how quick the ambulances are, and do your cars have, I don't know, seat belts or airbags or whatever, things like that.

417
00:39:46.280 --> 00:39:55.280
They have 103 causes of it. This is nonsense on stilts. Let me show you why I think that's true.

418
00:39:55.280 --> 00:40:06.080
Suppose I told you that a restaurant went broke and that the reason the restaurant went broke was it had lousy food,

419
00:40:06.080 --> 00:40:17.780
cold food, that is, the heated food, it was dirty, and the location was bad, and I gave you a whole bunch of lists like that.

420
00:40:17.780 --> 00:40:21.080
Would you accept that for a moment? No, you wouldn't accept that for a moment.

421
00:40:21.080 --> 00:40:25.080
You wouldn't say that those are the ultimate causes of the bankruptcy of the restaurant.

422
00:40:25.080 --> 00:40:28.640
What you would say is that those are the proximate causes.

423
00:40:28.640 --> 00:40:31.120
The ultimate cause of the failure of the restaurant

424
00:40:31.120 --> 00:40:34.120
is that the manager can't manage his way out of a paper bag.

425
00:40:35.360 --> 00:40:38.420
The manager is supposed to make sure he hires good cooks.

426
00:40:38.420 --> 00:40:39.920
The manager is supposed to make sure

427
00:40:39.920 --> 00:40:42.280
that the service is good.

428
00:40:42.280 --> 00:40:43.560
The manager is supposed to make sure

429
00:40:43.560 --> 00:40:44.520
that the place is clean.

430
00:40:44.520 --> 00:40:46.400
The manager is supposed to locate the restaurant,

431
00:40:46.400 --> 00:40:49.440
not in a cul-de-sac, but where people can get to it.

432
00:40:49.440 --> 00:40:51.360
The manager is supposed to have good advertising

433
00:40:51.360 --> 00:40:53.080
or good pricing or whatever it is.

434
00:40:53.080 --> 00:41:02.080
I'm not a drug addict, but I have to toke up because I get dry, so excuse me for a cough drop break.

435
00:41:02.080 --> 00:41:08.080
We have to distinguish between ultimate cause and proximate cause.

436
00:41:08.080 --> 00:41:16.080
If I take a gun and I shoot the guy who's in Central Park now, and you capture me,

437
00:41:16.080 --> 00:41:20.080
and I say, it wouldn't me to have done it, it was the bullet, I'm innocent,

438
00:41:20.080 --> 00:41:26.080
I'd be confusing ultimate and proximate cause. Yes, the bullet was the proximate cause, but I'm the ultimate cause.

439
00:41:26.080 --> 00:41:35.080
The ultimate cause is the key, not the proximate cause. Yes, the proximate cause is a driver error and speed and drunken driving and things like that.

440
00:41:35.080 --> 00:41:42.080
But the ultimate cause of the highway fatalities is that the government can't stop it.

441
00:41:42.080 --> 00:41:45.080
How could private enterprise stop that?

442
00:41:45.080 --> 00:41:51.080
Well, when I first started writing about this stuff, I came up with all sorts of weird things,

443
00:41:51.080 --> 00:41:55.080
some of which have actually come to pass many years later.

444
00:41:55.080 --> 00:42:01.080
For example, putting crosses, or I guess Jewish stars or something, where fatalities occur.

445
00:42:01.080 --> 00:42:08.080
Taking a schmushed car, one that's accordionized, you know, flattened and putting it on a pedestal and scaring people.

446
00:42:08.080 --> 00:42:14.080
I don't know, maybe another way that it's not so much the speed limit,

447
00:42:14.080 --> 00:42:44.080
but it's the variation in speed. I used to drive a 90 cc Honda and downhill and with a tailwind I can get up to 40 miles an hour but uphill with a passenger you know forget it I would be chugging along and yet I'd go on the highways because the minimum speed was 40 and I could make 40 some of the time and if the maximum speed is 70 most people do 75 80 the variation is gigantic and there's no rule that you have to do the speed limit in the left lane I mean

448
00:42:44.080 --> 00:42:49.880
I mean, you'd get some duffer in the left lane who's doing 55 or something and everyone's sort of going in and around.

449
00:42:49.880 --> 00:42:53.480
Maybe that's what's causing the accidents. I don't know.

450
00:42:53.480 --> 00:43:03.080
Maybe what we should have on a three-lane highway is an 80-mile-an-hour speed limit there and 65 here and 50 there.

451
00:43:03.080 --> 00:43:07.280
And not only a speed maximum, but a speed minimum. Or rather, you have to do those speeds.

452
00:43:07.280 --> 00:43:10.680
Now, I don't know. But I do know one thing.

453
00:43:10.680 --> 00:43:34.680
I do know that if different people own different roads and different people try different things and some worked and some didn't and the ones that worked made money and expanded and bought out the ones that didn't work just like ties and pens and cough drops and, what do you call these things here, microphones, that we'd have a better product.

454
00:43:34.680 --> 00:43:40.680
This is not rocket science, this is basic economics, that you get a better product when you have competition.

455
00:43:40.680 --> 00:43:52.680
Why ever should we not apply it to roads as well?

456
00:43:52.680 --> 00:43:58.680
Okay, the next thing on my list is courts and police. How would this work?

457
00:43:58.680 --> 00:44:03.680
How would a society work, a libertarian society work without any government?

458
00:44:03.680 --> 00:44:08.320
Suppose you had a robber, or suppose there was a contract violation,

459
00:44:08.320 --> 00:44:11.120
and there was an honest dispute between Ted and myself.

460
00:44:11.120 --> 00:44:13.680
I said, I delivered 100 pigs, I'm a farmer.

461
00:44:13.680 --> 00:44:16.000
He said, only 90 pigs came through.

462
00:44:16.000 --> 00:44:17.760
What do we do?

463
00:44:17.760 --> 00:44:19.600
Well, one thing we do is we look back at history

464
00:44:19.600 --> 00:44:21.880
and we look at the law merchant,

465
00:44:21.880 --> 00:44:24.560
when different traders from different countries

466
00:44:24.560 --> 00:44:27.720
in the 17th, 18th centuries would trade with each other

467
00:44:27.720 --> 00:44:32.680
and have just this sort of a dispute.

468
00:44:32.680 --> 00:44:38.200
And what they would do is they would appoint judges, not based on politicians who didn't make it,

469
00:44:38.200 --> 00:44:42.600
but based on people who were well known for their probity and their brilliance.

470
00:44:42.600 --> 00:44:46.000
You know, they came up with different ways of threatening to cut babies in half.

471
00:44:46.000 --> 00:44:51.360
You know that one about the two women who wanted the baby and the judge said, cut the baby in half.

472
00:44:51.360 --> 00:44:54.200
And the real mother said, no, no, no, you can have the baby.

473
00:44:54.200 --> 00:44:56.760
And the other one said, oh, no, sure, cut them in half.

474
00:44:56.760 --> 00:44:58.000
And then the judge knew.

475
00:44:58.000 --> 00:45:07.200
So you get judges based on wisdom and probity and not the Supreme Court types that we now have that make all these weird rules.

476
00:45:07.200 --> 00:45:17.000
There's this latest case in Connecticut, I think, where they're trying to nationalize a whole community because they can get high rises.

477
00:45:17.000 --> 00:45:21.100
It's just a violation of property rights. And there are courts that uphold that.

478
00:45:21.100 --> 00:45:26.000
I hope the Supreme Court doesn't, but we'll have to wait and see.

479
00:45:26.000 --> 00:45:30.060
Well, this is a big sanction in those days that if you wouldn't,

480
00:45:30.060 --> 00:45:31.780
if Ted and I had a dispute

481
00:45:31.780 --> 00:45:34.980
and Ted wouldn't take it to the court,

482
00:45:34.980 --> 00:45:36.100
no one would trade with Ted.

483
00:45:36.100 --> 00:45:38.680
He'd be out of international trade.

484
00:45:38.680 --> 00:45:40.560
So this is a very serious sanction.

485
00:45:40.560 --> 00:45:44.780
And there's another former student of mine, Ed Stringham.

486
00:45:44.780 --> 00:45:46.800
I don't know if you know him, but he was also at Holy Cross

487
00:45:46.800 --> 00:45:51.800
and he did his dissertation on various diamond merchants,

488
00:45:51.800 --> 00:45:59.800
Merchants Exchanges and Stock Market Exchanges and private groups that have judicial courts.

489
00:45:59.800 --> 00:46:06.800
Another one is the Beth Dean for Orthodox Jews. The reason that there are many Jews in the diamond merchant business

490
00:46:06.800 --> 00:46:14.800
is because they can go through these courts at a very cheap price and they can deal with each other based on religious background

491
00:46:14.800 --> 00:46:19.800
and also these private courts. The American Arbitration Association can run rings around others

492
00:46:19.800 --> 00:46:31.800
and again the same economic principles apply to why we have good crayons and good cough drops because you have competition and if you get the reputation for being a lousy judge, nobody comes to you.

493
00:46:31.800 --> 00:46:48.800
Okay, so much for commerce. I think that's easy to see. Suppose we have a rapist or, you know, somebody who's not a white collar type, the type who if you mess with he doesn't threaten to sue you, he threatens to come at you with a baseball bat. What about that?

494
00:46:48.800 --> 00:46:58.800
It's interesting, in my hotel, I saw a big pussy, the guy on the, what do you call it, show?

495
00:46:58.800 --> 00:47:04.800
The Sopranos, yeah, he was just standing there, a guy like that.

496
00:47:04.800 --> 00:47:09.800
Not him personally as the actor, but a mafioso type.

497
00:47:09.800 --> 00:47:15.800
Not that the mafioso doesn't have private courts to settle internal mafioso business also.

498
00:47:15.800 --> 00:47:45.800
But suppose we have a real problem. Well, or suppose that David and I are having a dispute about something, and I say, okay, we now have private courts, and each court is connected to a police or an insurance society, and David and I are having a dispute, whether it's a physical dispute or a commercial dispute, and I say, okay, David, let's go to my court, and they'll settle it. And David says, your court? The hell with your court. I'll go to my court. And I don't like his court, and he doesn't like my court.

499
00:47:45.800 --> 00:47:50.640
My Court. Now it's possible that both courts will agree with me, in which case the whole

500
00:47:50.640 --> 00:47:54.080
thing is over because if even his court doesn't agree with him and they've got police and

501
00:47:54.080 --> 00:47:59.640
I've got police, David doesn't have much of a chance. Let's take the rougher case. The

502
00:47:59.640 --> 00:48:05.800
rougher case is David goes to his court, I go to my court, and the courts find in opposite

503
00:48:05.800 --> 00:48:09.720
directions. Now it's possible that my court could find in David's favor and his court

504
00:48:09.720 --> 00:48:14.400
could find in my favor, but let's forget about that because it's sort of a weird case. Let's

505
00:48:14.400 --> 00:48:28.400
Let's suppose that my court favors me and his court favors him. Now what? Einran once wrote an essay saying, blank out, you know, it's case closed, you can't have it, it's weird, queer, it's crazy.

506
00:48:28.400 --> 00:48:39.400
Rothbard and Hoppe and David Friedman, who's also in on this, have to give credit where credit is due, says the following, well look, these courts weren't born yesterday.

507
00:48:39.400 --> 00:48:45.900
Do you realize that they can sometimes come to a situation where they will disagree about something?

508
00:48:45.900 --> 00:48:49.900
Like this case between David and myself?

509
00:48:49.900 --> 00:48:54.400
And now the story goes, there are legitimate courts and there are illegitimate courts.

510
00:48:54.400 --> 00:48:59.400
The legitimate courts are courts that will anticipate this and will deal with it in a rational way.

511
00:48:59.400 --> 00:49:05.900
And what they'll say is, okay, court A is my court and court B is David's court.

512
00:49:05.900 --> 00:49:19.900
If A and B will say to each other, if we ever come to a situation where we're on opposite sides of a dispute, we will go to Court C, and we'll pick Court C in advance, just in case that happens.

513
00:49:19.900 --> 00:49:33.900
Or we'll pick Court C, D or E, and we'll flip coins to see which one is called, or something like that, and we'll agree in advance to be bound by that higher court, and that's where it'll end, because all justice has to end somewhere.

514
00:49:33.900 --> 00:49:52.900
Okay, so I say those are legitimate courts, those are rational courts, and there will be no problem because both your court and my court are agreed that they'll go by whatever the higher court says, and then you and I will have to pretty much go along with that because you'll have two police court insurance companies on the case of the loser.

515
00:49:52.900 --> 00:50:00.900
But suppose David goes to his mother, and his mother says, my David? Do something wrong, you gotta be kidding, you gotta be drunk, you gotta be crazy.

516
00:50:00.900 --> 00:50:10.900
My David would never do anything wrong. Namely, his mother, pardon, I don't mean to get on your bad side, but his mother was a bandit court.

517
00:50:10.900 --> 00:50:17.900
And here comes the punchline. Fighting is a lot harder than negotiating. It's a lot more expensive than negotiating.

518
00:50:17.900 --> 00:50:26.900
Legitimate courts, with most courts, will settle disputes in a non-heavy financial way.

519
00:50:26.900 --> 00:50:33.900
They won't have to hire cops to shoot other cops, which is a very expensive kind of a proposition when you do it voluntarily.

520
00:50:33.900 --> 00:50:39.900
So they'll only fight banded courts. Banded courts will fight everyone.

521
00:50:39.900 --> 00:50:47.900
And since fighting is much more expensive than non-fighting, we predict, as economists, that there will be a weeding out of banded courts.

522
00:50:47.900 --> 00:50:52.900
Can there be banded courts? Well, maybe, but they have this competitive disadvantage.

523
00:50:52.900 --> 00:50:57.860
And again, I harken to this phenomenon of economic efficiency.

524
00:50:57.860 --> 00:51:00.100
The reason we have pretty good hotels

525
00:51:00.100 --> 00:51:01.980
and pretty good basketballs

526
00:51:01.980 --> 00:51:04.100
is because competition brings us them.

527
00:51:04.100 --> 00:51:06.380
And the reason we have lousy post offices

528
00:51:06.380 --> 00:51:10.460
and lousy motor vehicle bureaus and lousy highways

529
00:51:10.460 --> 00:51:13.140
is because they're brought to us courtesy of a system

530
00:51:13.140 --> 00:51:18.140
that does not automatically penalize inefficiency.

531
00:51:22.900 --> 00:51:41.900
Okay, what's next on my list? Let's try inside trading. Now, there are, suppose I hire a guy to go look for oil. What are they? Not archaeologists. What are they? They go and look.

532
00:51:41.900 --> 00:51:57.900
Mineralogists? Geologists. I'll hire a geologist. I've got the money. He's got the brains. He knows where the gold or the oil is buried or he can take a helicopter or somehow he's got a dowsing stick. I don't know what he's got. Somehow he's going to find oil for me.

533
00:51:57.900 --> 00:52:01.900
I can make two kinds of arrangements with them.

534
00:52:01.900 --> 00:52:05.900
One, I can say, look, I'll pay you $100,000 a year,

535
00:52:05.900 --> 00:52:09.900
and you find anything, you keep your big yap shut,

536
00:52:09.900 --> 00:52:13.900
and you don't use your knowledge to buy or sell stock

537
00:52:13.900 --> 00:52:17.900
in my company or other companies or anything like that.

538
00:52:17.900 --> 00:52:19.900
No inside trading, that's the deal I make with them.

539
00:52:19.900 --> 00:52:22.900
Or, I can make a second deal, I can say, look,

540
00:52:22.900 --> 00:52:25.900
I'll pay you $10,000 a year,

541
00:52:25.900 --> 00:52:32.900
But if you find anything, you can buy up to X amount of the stock in the company or whatever it is.

542
00:52:32.900 --> 00:52:40.900
Now suppose what he does is he says, okay, I'll take the 100,000 and I promise not to trade on my own account as an inside trader.

543
00:52:40.900 --> 00:52:44.900
And then he does it anyway, the rotten person.

544
00:52:44.900 --> 00:52:47.900
Well, he's guilty of a contract violation.

545
00:52:47.900 --> 00:52:49.900
It's not a crime, it's a contract violation.

546
00:52:49.900 --> 00:53:19.900
Violation. He should not go to jail, but he should be made to pay me back whatever it was, because it was not a crime of violence. It was a contract violation, very similar to the Paola case. Now, I hire Ken to play records, and the idea is you're going to play records. I'm hiring you as the expert to play the best records. Let's say it's rap music. Now, I don't know from rap. I'm into Mozart, but all rap sounds about the same to me, but you know which is the good rap music and which is not. So I pay him to do that.

547
00:53:19.900 --> 00:53:21.660
The Dirty Rat, what does he do?

548
00:53:21.660 --> 00:53:24.420
He gets bribes from bad rap music,

549
00:53:24.420 --> 00:53:26.860
which is a sort of a redundancy,

550
00:53:26.860 --> 00:53:29.520
but he gets bribes from bad rap music

551
00:53:29.520 --> 00:53:30.860
and he won't play the good rap music

552
00:53:30.860 --> 00:53:32.700
because those guys won't pay him off.

553
00:53:33.700 --> 00:53:36.900
He's again guilty of contract violation at most.

554
00:53:36.900 --> 00:53:39.620
Now in the case of Martha, poor Martha, she's going to jail.

555
00:53:39.620 --> 00:53:41.760
That's really despicable.

556
00:53:41.760 --> 00:53:44.100
I mean, I'm a big fan, well, not a big fan of hers,

557
00:53:44.100 --> 00:53:46.220
but you know, it's an injustice.

558
00:53:46.220 --> 00:53:48.260
It's a violation of the libertarian code.

559
00:53:48.260 --> 00:53:59.260
Again, so payola and inside trading are similar kinds of things. They're contract violations, they're not crimes, would be the libertarian analysis of them.

560
00:53:59.260 --> 00:54:08.260
Lou, I'm supposed to go from 4.30 to 5.30? Oh yeah, questions, okay. I have a few more that I didn't get to.

561
00:54:08.260 --> 00:54:15.760
Abortion, Reparations to Blacks for Slavery, and Patent and Copyright, Intellectual Property.

562
00:54:15.760 --> 00:54:25.180
Okay, well that'll be a question, do intellectual property. But I'm now officially no longer

563
00:54:25.180 --> 00:54:30.860
lecturing, I'm now answering questions. The intellectual property, I have to write down the

564
00:54:30.860 --> 00:54:40.860
This is in the name of my friend Stefan Kinsella, who wrote a magnificent paper in the Journal of Libertarian Studies.

565
00:54:40.860 --> 00:54:47.860
By the way, the Rockwell, the Mises Institute puts out the Journal of Libertarian Studies and the Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics.

566
00:54:47.860 --> 00:54:56.860
The stuff I've been talking about so far is mainly Journal of Libertarian Studies stuff, and this, in my view, is the best libertarian journal,

567
00:54:56.860 --> 00:55:01.360
as is the quarterly journal of Austrian Economics, the best Austrian journal now in existence.

568
00:55:01.360 --> 00:55:05.660
So if you're interested in further stuff, I publish heavily in both.

569
00:55:05.660 --> 00:55:09.660
If you're interested in further material on that, I would suggest you read that.

570
00:55:09.660 --> 00:55:14.760
It's all available for free on the lewrockwell.com or the Mises web.

571
00:55:14.760 --> 00:55:17.460
I'm sort of a klutz when it comes to that.

572
00:55:17.460 --> 00:55:21.960
So other people can tell you better how to access that than I.

573
00:55:21.960 --> 00:55:27.080
In any case, there are two things in play here.

574
00:55:27.080 --> 00:55:37.320
One is patents and the other is copyright.

575
00:55:37.320 --> 00:55:45.200
The libertarian view on patents is that patents are illegitimate, illicit, improper.

576
00:55:45.200 --> 00:55:48.440
We shouldn't have patent law.

577
00:55:48.440 --> 00:55:49.560
Why?

578
00:55:49.560 --> 00:55:54.560
Because, let's suppose, what's your name, Mike.

579
00:55:54.680 --> 00:55:57.280
Let's suppose Mike and I are both trying to create

580
00:55:57.280 --> 00:55:58.800
this kind of a pen.

581
00:55:59.800 --> 00:56:01.960
And we're both working for years and years

582
00:56:01.960 --> 00:56:03.080
and Mike and I are racing

583
00:56:03.080 --> 00:56:05.360
and we're getting to the patent office.

584
00:56:05.360 --> 00:56:07.720
And he beats me to the patent office by five minutes

585
00:56:07.720 --> 00:56:11.720
and he gets 100% of the value of this pen and I get zip.

586
00:56:12.600 --> 00:56:14.920
If I try to sell my own pen

587
00:56:14.920 --> 00:56:18.360
that I made with my own blood, sweat and tears

588
00:56:18.360 --> 00:56:21.000
that I homesteaded, it was my idea.

589
00:56:21.000 --> 00:56:23.680
I'll go to jail because he has the patent on it.

590
00:56:23.680 --> 00:56:25.200
That's theft of my work.

591
00:56:28.080 --> 00:56:31.840
So patents are seen by libertarians

592
00:56:31.840 --> 00:56:33.600
as an improper sort of a thing.

593
00:56:35.640 --> 00:56:36.800
What about copyright?

594
00:56:36.800 --> 00:56:38.720
Copyright is a little more complex

595
00:56:39.760 --> 00:56:43.000
because if I have this book, Defending the Undefendable,

596
00:56:44.120 --> 00:56:45.880
and if I sell it to you

597
00:56:45.880 --> 00:56:55.880
With a contract that you agree not to copy it, and you do, and you start selling it, either under your own name or under my name, it doesn't really matter.

598
00:56:55.880 --> 00:56:59.880
You're breaking my, you're breaking a contract with me.

599
00:56:59.880 --> 00:57:14.880
So in that sense, copyright is, if it's a contract, in other words, what we're saying now is we're not saying that you can own intellectual property, we're just saying you can have a contract around it.

600
00:57:14.880 --> 00:57:17.880
Why do we say you can't own intellectual property?

601
00:57:17.880 --> 00:57:21.880
The reason we say you can't own intellectual property is because it's not scarce.

602
00:57:21.880 --> 00:57:26.880
And the only thing to which private property rights can apply are scarce things.

603
00:57:26.880 --> 00:57:30.880
To get back to the point that I started making at the beginning of the hour,

604
00:57:30.880 --> 00:57:34.880
the reason we have to have property rights is to reduce conflict.

605
00:57:34.880 --> 00:57:36.880
You know, do I have a right to stand right here?

606
00:57:36.880 --> 00:57:39.880
Does he have a right to have this bag or should I have that bag?

607
00:57:39.880 --> 00:57:42.880
There can be conflicts about things like that.

608
00:57:42.880 --> 00:57:49.880
There can be conflicts about who has the right to get my body to do what it wants or what other people want it to want.

609
00:57:49.880 --> 00:57:53.880
But with regard to intellectual property, it's not scarce.

610
00:57:53.880 --> 00:58:01.880
If girl A puts her hair up in a ponytail, and girl B sees that girl A has a ponytail and puts her hair up in a ponytail,

611
00:58:01.880 --> 00:58:08.880
did girl B steal anything of girl A's? No. Girl A can still have a ponytail.

612
00:58:08.880 --> 00:58:14.960
She didn't say, take that rubber band out of your hair, I'm having the ponytail, you can have the ponytail.ivid

613
00:58:14.960 --> 00:58:22.960
If only one person can have a ponytail at a time, then yes, we should have property rights over to see who has the rights to the ponytail.

614
00:58:22.960 --> 00:58:28.960
But, anyone can have a ponytail while you have to have a certain length of hair, and some of us don't qualify, but that's another issue.

615
00:58:28.960 --> 00:58:38.680
If we could have rights to intellectual information, then every time I use a word, say the word

616
00:58:38.680 --> 00:58:43.800
word, now somebody invented that word. I'd have to pay them. I couldn't use language

617
00:58:43.800 --> 00:58:48.520
because if you could trace it back far enough, forget about the lack of knowledge problem,

618
00:58:48.520 --> 00:58:52.960
suppose we looked at it from God's eye view and we know who invented every word and we

619
00:58:52.960 --> 00:58:58.040
know who their heirs are, we couldn't speak without their permission. So there's something

620
00:58:58.040 --> 00:59:10.040
I'm feeling a little wonky about a situation where you can't even speak and the problem with it is if I use the word word, David can also use it and Ted and Mike can also use it without taking anything away from me.

621
00:59:10.040 --> 00:59:15.040
So the point is that property rights only apply to things over which we can have a conflict.

622
00:59:15.040 --> 00:59:27.040
They can't apply to things such that there's no conflict possible because you have an infinite amount of it or, you know, anyone could use the word word or the English language or the French language or what have you.

623
00:59:27.040 --> 00:59:34.040
There are some people who come up with, see, so far what I've been doing is answering this on sort of a rights-based answer.

624
00:59:34.040 --> 00:59:38.540
What is the logic of the axiom of non-aggression and property rights?

625
00:59:38.540 --> 00:59:43.540
There are some low-life types who are very pragmatic and say,

626
00:59:43.540 --> 00:59:51.540
but if you didn't have intellectual property, research and development would come to a dead halt.

627
00:59:51.540 --> 00:59:57.140
And therefore, since we have less research and development, we can't possibly tolerate that.

628
00:59:57.140 --> 01:00:02.840
Well, if it was a dispute between pragmatics or research and development

629
01:00:02.840 --> 01:00:07.740
and the logic of the libertarian axiom, I would go with the latter every time.

630
01:00:07.740 --> 01:00:13.440
What Kinsella says is that the optimal amount of research and development is that amount of research and development that occurs

631
01:00:13.440 --> 01:00:16.740
when the law is righteous.

632
01:00:16.740 --> 01:00:20.740
And that if we truly now have more research and development

633
01:00:20.740 --> 01:00:22.380
then that amount would be?

634
01:00:22.380 --> 01:00:24.340
Well then we have too much research and development.

635
01:00:24.340 --> 01:00:26.680
There is such a thing as too much research and development.

636
01:00:26.680 --> 01:00:28.580
Look, suppose we put 100% of the GDP

637
01:00:28.580 --> 01:00:31.740
into research and development and we all starved.

638
01:00:31.740 --> 01:00:35.120
That's no way to run a railroad, right?

639
01:00:35.120 --> 01:00:37.420
So there's an optimal amount of research and development

640
01:00:37.420 --> 01:00:39.020
and the optimal amount is not the maximum

641
01:00:39.020 --> 01:00:40.420
that we're capable of.

642
01:00:40.420 --> 01:00:42.140
I mean, we're capable of way more

643
01:00:42.140 --> 01:00:44.580
if we subsidize research and development

644
01:00:44.580 --> 01:00:46.840
and, you know, tax shoes or something like that

645
01:00:46.840 --> 01:00:48.500
and the scientists wouldn't have shoes

646
01:00:48.500 --> 01:00:51.200
but they'd have laboratories, be a little weird.

647
01:00:52.500 --> 01:00:55.660
But Kinsella continues on this.

648
01:00:55.660 --> 01:00:57.900
As a matter of fact, it's very hard to make the case

649
01:00:57.900 --> 01:01:00.140
that you would have less research and development

650
01:01:00.140 --> 01:01:02.720
because like take the case in the music business.

651
01:01:04.540 --> 01:01:07.860
Ken, what's your name again?

652
01:01:07.860 --> 01:01:09.940
I'm sorry, Ted, sorry.

653
01:01:09.940 --> 01:01:14.260
Ted is our rock and roll rap music person

654
01:01:14.260 --> 01:01:16.500
and he makes a rap music thing

655
01:01:16.500 --> 01:01:46.500
And everybody copies it. So we say, well, he won't make rap music. Well, maybe that's not such a bad thing, but forget about that point. There are other ways that he can cash in on this, apart from selling records. He makes the record, and I pirate it, and I sell it to Olin Sundry. What I'm really doing is serving as his advertiser, as his marketing advancement. Because now everyone wants to hear him sing, because I'm selling so many of his records.

656
01:01:46.500 --> 01:01:51.700
Each record is sort of like a business card or like self-advertisement.

657
01:01:51.700 --> 01:01:55.660
I publish a book.

658
01:01:55.660 --> 01:01:59.060
This lady, what's your name? Anne.

659
01:01:59.060 --> 01:02:05.580
Sells it. She sells millions of copies and now everyone wants to hear me give a speech and I get paid for giving the speech.

660
01:02:05.580 --> 01:02:09.500
I invent the cure for cancer.

661
01:02:09.500 --> 01:02:13.460
Well, I ought to be able to cash in on that in some way or other.

662
01:02:13.460 --> 01:02:20.100
I'll win the MacArthur Genius Award, maybe, or not. That's mainly for lefties, so I might not win that if I cured cancer.

663
01:02:20.100 --> 01:02:27.860
They gave it to Paul Ehrlich, so, you know, I need say no more.

664
01:02:27.860 --> 01:02:34.780
There ought to be some other way that I can cash in on that, and, you know, first you have to find out what it is, but suppose you can.

665
01:02:34.780 --> 01:02:39.820
Well, you know, well, then there'll be fewer cures for cancer.

666
01:02:39.820 --> 01:02:47.820
But who says that we have the optimal rate of finding cures for cancer now would be my point and Kinsella's point.

667
01:02:47.820 --> 01:02:53.220
That my point is that there's an optimal amount of resources for everything and it's not the maximum.

668
01:02:53.220 --> 01:03:01.420
And yes, we want to have resources involved in curing cancer, but it doesn't mean and maybe there's too much now.

669
01:03:01.420 --> 01:03:06.860
Now, maybe the optimal, it's sort of like with space exploration.

670
01:03:06.860 --> 01:03:09.540
When did we send the man to the moon?

671
01:03:09.540 --> 01:03:12.700
What year was that, 60, 69?

672
01:03:12.700 --> 01:03:14.180
Maybe we sent them there too soon.

673
01:03:14.180 --> 01:03:17.540
Maybe private enterprise never would have sent them there in 69,

674
01:03:17.540 --> 01:03:20.580
because in 69, we wouldn't have the rocket technology

675
01:03:20.580 --> 01:03:23.180
and the fuel technology to make it viable.

676
01:03:23.180 --> 01:03:25.180
Now, I hear some people are talking about

677
01:03:25.180 --> 01:03:27.860
making commercial flights to the moon.

678
01:03:27.860 --> 01:03:30.820
Maybe private enterprise will make it

679
01:03:30.820 --> 01:03:33.700
when it's optimal to make it.

680
01:03:33.700 --> 01:03:35.180
Maybe we'll get that cure for cancer

681
01:03:35.180 --> 01:03:36.580
when it's optimal to get it.

682
01:03:37.820 --> 01:03:42.180
But I take another case of the pragmatics.

683
01:03:43.820 --> 01:03:47.100
It used to be when television first came out,

684
01:03:47.100 --> 01:03:49.820
everyone thought that theaters would go bust.

685
01:03:49.820 --> 01:03:50.660
They didn't.

686
01:03:51.640 --> 01:03:53.660
What happened when paperback books first came out?

687
01:03:53.660 --> 01:03:56.060
Everyone thought that there'd be no more hardcover back,

688
01:03:56.060 --> 01:03:58.060
No More Hardcover Books

689
01:03:58.060 --> 01:04:00.380
because you can get a paperback at five bucks

690
01:04:00.380 --> 01:04:02.500
and a hardcover at 25,

691
01:04:02.500 --> 01:04:06.280
but yet we found that the timing is very important.

692
01:04:06.280 --> 01:04:08.580
If you want to get that hardcover book

693
01:04:08.580 --> 01:04:12.040
or go to the movie now rather than wait for it to come out

694
01:04:12.040 --> 01:04:14.420
later and see it on TV or rent it,

695
01:04:14.420 --> 01:04:16.820
people are willing to pay a premium for that.

696
01:04:16.820 --> 01:04:17.940
So even though you don't have

697
01:04:17.940 --> 01:04:21.180
intellectual property rights in that, you still have some.

698
01:04:22.800 --> 01:04:23.860
What's the optimal amount?

699
01:04:23.860 --> 01:04:27.020
Again, it's hard to say what the optimal amount is.

700
01:04:27.020 --> 01:04:29.020
My answer that I get from Kinsella's,

701
01:04:29.020 --> 01:04:32.500
the optimal amount is the amount that ensues

702
01:04:32.500 --> 01:04:34.740
when we don't have any intellectual property rights.

703
01:04:34.740 --> 01:04:36.980
Let me give you one more of Kinsella's cases.

704
01:04:38.100 --> 01:04:41.660
What Kinsella says is the railroad is coming through town,

705
01:04:42.780 --> 01:04:43.900
but nobody knows it yet.

706
01:04:43.900 --> 01:04:46.360
And land sells for $10 an acre.

707
01:04:48.600 --> 01:04:49.820
When the railroad comes through town,

708
01:04:49.820 --> 01:04:51.820
it'll be a thousand an acre.

709
01:04:51.820 --> 01:04:54.420
And somebody breaks into the person's house

710
01:04:54.420 --> 01:04:57.100
who knows that the railroad is coming to town,

711
01:04:57.100 --> 01:04:59.300
and he goes down to Clem's Barbershop

712
01:04:59.300 --> 01:05:00.540
and he spreads the word.

713
01:05:01.940 --> 01:05:04.780
And now, if there's intellectual property,

714
01:05:04.780 --> 01:05:06.900
there's intellectual property rights,

715
01:05:06.900 --> 01:05:08.340
the guy who stole it should go to jail.

716
01:05:08.340 --> 01:05:10.740
But how about all the people that he told it to?

717
01:05:10.740 --> 01:05:13.260
Must they now sell their land for $10 an acre

718
01:05:13.260 --> 01:05:15.620
or can they hold out for a thousand an acre?

719
01:05:15.620 --> 01:05:16.900
If you believe that there's such a thing

720
01:05:16.900 --> 01:05:18.100
as intellectual property rights,

721
01:05:18.100 --> 01:05:19.900
you must believe that you should force them

722
01:05:19.900 --> 01:05:49.900
Plagiarism

723
01:05:49.900 --> 01:06:19.900
I would say you should not go to jail. But we do have sanctions against you. If you're a professor, you lose your tenure. If you're an intellectual, you lose all your credibility. So there are sanctions against that. Not total, but the point is that since you can't own ideas, look, the pipe is yours, the pipe is yours, the pipe is yours, the pipe is yours, the pipe is yours, the pipe is yours, the pipe is yours, the pipe is yours, the pipe is yours.

724
01:06:19.900 --> 01:06:23.580
and Life Hackerian Theorem, we plagiarize that every day.

725
01:06:23.580 --> 01:06:25.940
Okay, it's nice to give a footnote or something,

726
01:06:25.940 --> 01:06:28.100
but the very English language,

727
01:06:28.100 --> 01:06:30.740
if you really believe in intellectual property,

728
01:06:30.740 --> 01:06:32.660
you can't speak, shut up.

729
01:06:34.340 --> 01:06:36.200
So those of you who disagree with me

730
01:06:36.200 --> 01:06:38.200
are precluded from speaking.

731
01:06:38.200 --> 01:06:40.200
I'm just sort of teasing here, I hope.

732
01:06:40.200 --> 01:06:41.040
Ken?

733
01:06:41.040 --> 01:06:51.040
What do the libertarians think about the Iraq war?

734
01:06:51.040 --> 01:06:54.040
What do the libertarians think about the Iraq war?

735
01:06:54.040 --> 01:07:05.040
Well, there are people who call themselves libertarians, who believe that we should have, that the United States was right in invading Iraq.

736
01:07:05.040 --> 01:07:12.040
I belong, I think, to the majority of libertarians, and I would say that the people who disagree with me on this are not libertarian on this issue,

737
01:07:12.040 --> 01:07:18.040
even though they might have splendid libertarian credentials in many other areas.

738
01:07:18.040 --> 01:07:25.040
I would say that the libertarian position is best articulated by George Washington in his farewell address

739
01:07:25.040 --> 01:07:31.040
when he warned about entangling alliances with Europe, which for now read the rest of the world.

740
01:07:31.040 --> 01:07:38.040
and John Quincy Adams who said that we favor the freedom of every country but our government is limited to protecting only our own freedom.

741
01:07:38.040 --> 01:07:44.040
So the question is, was Iraq really going to attack us with any credibility?

742
01:07:44.040 --> 01:07:54.040
And my answer is they didn't. They weren't. If they were, they're no more likely than 20 other countries to attack us.

743
01:07:54.040 --> 01:07:57.040
So I think it was unjustified to go there.

744
01:07:57.040 --> 01:08:03.440
The people who did attack us, well, your friend and mine, Osama, what he said, he said three things.

745
01:08:03.440 --> 01:08:07.240
You see, you have to ask, who started it? Who started up first?

746
01:08:07.240 --> 01:08:12.040
What Osama said, the reason he ticked off at us, not because we have freedom and not because we have mini skirts

747
01:08:12.040 --> 01:08:15.740
and not because we have rap music, he said it was three things.

748
01:08:15.740 --> 01:08:20.040
One, we had soldiers in the Holy Land, which he means Saudi Arabia.

749
01:08:20.040 --> 01:08:22.640
Two, we aid in Abed Israel.

750
01:08:22.640 --> 01:08:30.640
and three, we had that circle around Iraq, the embargo around Iraq which killed millions of people.

751
01:08:30.640 --> 01:08:38.640
Why is it that Osama is not attacking Denmark or Canada or Sweden or Switzerland?

752
01:08:38.640 --> 01:08:43.640
The ideal sort of foreign policy I think that a country would have, any country,

753
01:08:43.640 --> 01:08:48.640
would be sort of the foreign policy of Switzerland, armed neutrality.

754
01:08:48.640 --> 01:08:51.640
Switzerland has stayed out of all the wars that I know of.

755
01:08:51.640 --> 01:09:21.640
Switzerland is a great country, foreign policy-wise, so I would say that the correct view would be, yes, punish the people who killed innocent people in the World Trade Center, but realize that we started first, but still get them because they killed innocent people and the killing of innocent people is improper, and then pull out of Iraq, pull out of Saudi Arabia, pull out of, I mean, I don't know how many countries there are in the world, maybe 250, but I think the U.S. has troops in 150 of them.

756
01:09:21.640 --> 01:09:27.000
If I were a Martian with a pretty good telescope and I could tell the color of the uniforms

757
01:09:27.000 --> 01:09:33.320
and the flags, and I saw that one country had soldiers stationed in every other country

758
01:09:33.320 --> 01:09:38.460
in the world practically, and no other country did that, I would conclude that the country

759
01:09:38.460 --> 01:09:49.460
with soldiers in foreign countries is a imperialist warmonger, an aggressor, what have you. I

760
01:09:49.460 --> 01:09:58.460
Look at it from the Martian eye view, or God's eye view, or any other eye view than the American view or the Bush view.

761
01:09:58.460 --> 01:10:07.460
And again, we have soldiers in bases in every country known to man and some countries not known to man.

762
01:10:07.460 --> 01:10:10.460
They're just all over the place. No other country has that.

763
01:10:10.460 --> 01:10:14.460
Suppose the Chinese had troops in South Carolina.

764
01:10:14.460 --> 01:10:19.460
How would we feel about that? Or if the French had troops in Wisconsin?

765
01:10:19.460 --> 01:10:23.460
Or if the French had troops in Africa or Asia or South America?

766
01:10:23.460 --> 01:10:26.460
Nobody has troops anywhere else except us.

767
01:10:26.460 --> 01:10:30.460
We, I think, are the world aggressor.

768
01:10:30.460 --> 01:10:33.460
Now, some of my best friends are American. I don't hate the American people.

769
01:10:33.460 --> 01:10:38.460
I think I'm a patriot, like George Washington and John Quincy Adams was.

770
01:10:38.460 --> 01:10:43.460
But I don't go along with this aggression.

771
01:10:43.460 --> 01:10:49.460
You know, we used to have a Department of War, and then they changed it to the Department of Defense.

772
01:10:49.460 --> 01:10:52.460
I think they want to change it back. It's the Department of War.

773
01:10:52.460 --> 01:10:58.460
A Department of Defense would say, look, we're not going to mess with you guys, don't mess with us.

774
01:10:58.460 --> 01:11:03.460
Any citizen want to go to Italy or Spain or somewhere, we can't protect you there,

775
01:11:03.460 --> 01:11:07.460
because you can have overlapping sovereignties.

776
01:11:07.460 --> 01:11:12.460
We'll defend Fortress America, isolationism, America First, that sort of a thing,

777
01:11:12.460 --> 01:11:14.460
I think would be the libertarian foreign policy.