Wednesday, November 21, 2007

Rights vs. Privileges

This article is a reproduction of Chapter 2 of Michael Badnarik's book Good to be King. It very clearly explains the principal difference between rights and privileges, and how the constitution does not grant you your rights, but merely lays them down. Any “rights” that are granted are mere privileges, that can be taken away at a whimp. This fundamental difference is very important in understanding individual freedom. Learn and enjoy.

The most important concept in this book is the difference between rights and privileges. For that reason, this chapter can be downloaded from my web site at no charge, and may be reproduced and distributed without written permission, as long as it is copied intact and without modification. A right is defined by Black’s Law Dictionary as “a power, privilege, (sic) faculty, or demand, inherent in one person and incident upon another … the powers of free action.” Please note that rights are “inherent” in a person. This means that it is physically impossible for rights to be extracted from a person by any means.

Imagine a brick made of lead. The first thing that will cross your mind is that this object will be heavy. Extremely high density or weight is an inherent quality of lead. If an object isn’t heavy, you can be certain that it’s not made of lead. You cannot put a lead brick into a vacuum and “suck out the heavy.” You cannot put a lead brick into a microwave and zap it until it becomes light and fluffy. The quality of being heavy is one of the distinguishing attributes of lead.

Now recall some of the dreams that you’ve had. You can’t put the unpleasant ones into a bag and bury them in the back yard. You can share your dreams with others, but you don’t have to worry that someone will steal them from you when you’re not looking. Your dreams are an inherent part of who you are. No one can extract your dreams from you. The same thing is true about your rights. When you die, your dreams will die with you. If someone kills you, they will deprive you of life, but they can never deprive you of your right to life.

I define a right as something you can do without asking for permission. The opposite of a right, therefore, is something you cannot do without asking for permission. Any time you need permission to do something it is a privilege. Black’s Law Dictionary defines this as “a particular and peculiar benefit or advantage enjoyed by a person, company, or class, beyond the common advantages of other citizens. An exceptional or extraordinary power or exemption.” Rights and privileges are opposites. I have three corollaries to the definition of rights. They are:
• All rights are derived from property;
• Every right implies a responsibility; and
• The only limitation on your rights is the equal rights of others.

Let me demonstrate the principle behind my first corollary with an example. Suppose I walk out of my house onto my land. I can walk back and forth, back and forth, across my land anytime I want without asking anyone’s permission. Walking across my land is a right. Now suppose I want to walk to the store located on the other side of your land. Can I walk back and forth across your land anytime I want to? Certainly not. Not without your permission. It is a privilege to walk across your land. Assuming that we’ve been neighbors for a while, it is possible that your response would be, “Sure you can take the shortcut, Mike. What are friends for?” So on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday I walk to the store making my way across your land. Let us now assume that something unpleasant happens to you. You misplace a winning lottery ticket, or your significant other leaves you for your best friend. You wake up Thursday morning in a terrible mood, looking for an opportunity to vent your frustrations. As I begin to make my way across your land you shout, “Hey, mister! Walk around! That’s what fences are for!” The important concept here is that privileges are granted, and they can be revoked at any time for any reason. Once again, rights and privileges are opposites.

Property! This is the one-word answer to any question regarding the Constitution. Any time there is a dispute about rights, the argument can be settled by determining who owns the property in question. Prior to the American Revolution, a man born into the proper family was thought to possess all of the land in England, and he claimed all rights as well. The king could bestow privileges on the people he favored and, being the king, he could revoke those privileges at any time. He could also have a person sentenced to death for any action he found insulting. All his power came from his ownership of property. When Christopher Columbus marched out of the water onto a beach in North America, he immediately proclaimed ownership of the entire continent for Queen Isabella of Spain. Subsequent settlers would each declare ownership of the land for the royalty they felt they owed allegiance to. The king’s power and prestige was directly related to how much land he possessed—which explains why human history consists almost exclusively of continuous warfare.

The Declaration of Independence states “they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights.” This statement refutes the idea that only the king had any rights. Instead of accepting privileges controlled by a human king, we claim the same rights that every king has ever claimed. We consider this to be “self-evident” now, but it was necessary for us to defend this idea by fighting a bloody revolution that ended with the Treaty of Paris in 1783. The significance of this treaty was to transfer ownership of the land from the king to the people in America. Hence, the American Revolution was ultimately about the right to own property. The ownership of property is the most important distinction between freedom and tyranny. This idea is so important that John Adams, the twelfth president (right after George Washington) wrote: “The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the law of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence.”

Regardless of your religious views, I think it can be safely said that anything as sacred as the law of God would hold considerable weight in any argument. Unfortunately, not everyone in America holds property in such high regard. Most of our problems in the United States can be traced to a blatant disregard for private property. Examine the quote of another American president, Theodore Roosevelt: “Every man holds his property subject to the general right of the community to regulate its use to whatever degree the public welfare may require it.” If I own a piece of property, I control what happens to it. If the community has the “right” to regulate my property whenever it wishes, then I do not truly own the property. I am merely occupying it through the generous will of the majority. Both statements cannot be true at the same time.

This is a very simple concept understood by every two-year-old. Every two-year-old has two favorite words. Both are attempts to express their will over their environment. The first word is “no!” which is the equivalent of a royal veto — an attempt to forbid mother from doing something we don’t approve of. This statement is rarely a successful veto, but it is uttered with the same assumption of autonomy as any king who ever lived. Their other favorite word is “mine!” frequently shouted with a presumption of unquestioned authority, regardless of the item being claimed. The child claims ownership of any item they wish to have control over. They already understand that if it is “mine!” then I am the one who will determine what happens to the item. In other words, “I have the right to do what I want with it.” Of course children have an incomplete understanding of property, having a much more difficult time with the concept of “yours.” Parents spend countless hours trying to teach their offspring not to touch other children’s toys unless they are given permission. The problem does not go away in later years, either. Siblings sharing the same room will often draw a line down the center of the room to establish “ownership” and control over a given area and the property that it contains.

Adults assume that they have a much better understanding of property than children do, but that is not necessarily the case. Americans do not legally own property in the manner that they believe they do, because they do not exercise autonomous control over their property. What would happen if you erected a derrick in your backyard and started drilling for oil? Would you be surprised if the county sheriff drove up and asked to see your permit? In order to drill for oil you must own the property under “allodial title.” Unfortunately, if you pay property taxes, then you do not own your property to the degree that you thought you did.

It may surprise many of you to learn that the federal government claims ownership of much of the land in each of the states, especially in the western states. Much of the rest is claimed by the states themselves. This is clearly an important topic, unfortunately not one that I have time to explore rigorously here.

You probably don’t own your car the way you think you do. If I give you a “gift certificate,” do you have the gift, or just a piece of paper that represents that gift? When you finish making payments on your auto loan, does the bank send you the “title” to the car, or simply a “certificate of title”? The certificate of title is a piece of paper that only represents the title of the car. Each car that is manufactured has an MCO, or “manufacturer’s certificate of origin,” that is the true title for the car. Because most cars are purchased on a payment plan, the dealer sends the MCO to the state agency that controls the registration of vehicles. The MCO is microfilmed and then shredded to make it much more difficult for you to obtain the actual title. If you are able to pay cash for your car and you know enough to demand the MCO as part of the purchase agreement, it is possible for you to purchase an automobile and own it the way you currently believe that you own it. The figure on next page shows a copy of an MCO obtained by a patriot friend of mine. He is not required to register his car with the state, and he travels in it without license plates. All of this is perfectly legal—although you may admittedly have some difficulty convincing the police officer who has detained you for what appears to be a traffic violation.

Property may be an adequate source of rights for land, but what is the source of your right to life? Many will argue that your right to life comes from God, however that debate is outside the scope of this book. Whether divinely created or scientifically evolved, one thing that is indisputable is the fact that your body exists. It is also widely assumed, at least in the contemporary United States, that you own your own body. If someone else owns your body, then you are a slave. The institution of slavery was based on the premise that other humans were considered to be property, and thus could be bought and sold like any other commodity. That idea is loath to many of us now, however the Thirteenth Amendment prohibiting slavery and involuntary servitude was not passed until December of 1865. You cannot successfully claim your right to life until those around you respect your body as property that you alone control. Even today the women in Middle-Eastern countries are treated as the property of men, and children are still sold into slavery around the world.

The second corollary on the subject of rights is the fact that every right implies a responsibility. Rights and responsibilities are as inseparable as the heads and tails of the same coin. You cannot have one without the other. I have a right to wear a gun on my hip, but I also have the responsibility to make sure that no one is injured by it. Furthermore, carrying a gun does not give me a right to your property. I only have a right to my property, not to yours. It is a widely held position that a six-year-old child has the right to life. I have never personally met anyone who has argued otherwise, but do not assume that this is a universal proposition. Does a six-year-old child also have the right to keep and bear arms? Very few of us—not even I—would allow a child to walk around with a loaded firearm. That’s because a child does not have the mental capacity to grasp the possible consequences and implicit responsibilities of using a gun. To a child, everyone is immortal just like Wile E. Coyote in the Road Runner cartoons. A child thinks that if you fall off a cliff, there is a brief puff of dust and a few seconds later you’re zipping along on rocket roller skates. Unfortunately, that type of rapid recovery isn’t possible in the real world.

Americans have grown weary of their responsibilities, and our government has been only too eager to relieve us of those burdens. When two people have a child, they have a responsibility to determine what the child will learn and what values it should adopt. Over the years parents have become complacent about that responsibility, turning it over to government schools that offer “one size fits all” education. Then parents have the audacity to wonder why their children haven’t adopted the values they would like them to have. Instead of planning for their future, our parents and grandparents allowed the Socialist Insecurity Administration (sic) to take money from their paycheck to create their retirement program. Today, everyone is concerned that Social Security doesn’t return enough money for basic subsistence, much less the money people need to enjoy their golden years. If people had retained that responsibility for themselves, placing their money in a simple savings account with 5 percent interest, they would easily have more money than they currently get from the government. By allowing the government to assume our responsibilities, we have gradually given away many of our rights.

My third corollary on the subject is that the only limitation on your rights is the equal rights of others. To put it another way, you only have the right to your property. You do not have the right to anyone else’s property. Many people believe that they have a right to health care. There is even a presidential candidate who recently suggested a constitutional amendment guaranteeing that right. A right to health care suggests that you should be able to walk into a doctor’s office and insist that she or he correct your illness for free, or for a significantly reduced cost. Would you be willing to do your job for free for anyone who steps in off the sidewalk? I sincerely doubt it. You’d be very busy—and very, very poor. Why should your doctor provide services for free after spending all the time and money required to graduate from medical school? “Don’t worry!” people tell me, “the government will pay the doctor’s salary.” Oh, really? And where does the government get the money to pay the doctor’s salary? From taxes, of course. But for every $100 the government takes from my wallet, they keep $50, the HMO keeps $25, and the doctor gets what’s left. Wouldn’t it be easier and far more efficient for you to walk into my house to take $100 out of my wallet yourself? You’d be able to pay for even better treatment than you’re getting right now. There is, of course, one small problem with that plan. I am a strong Second Amendment supporter. If you come into my house in an attempt to take money from my wallet, you will soon be going to the doctor for something far more serious than whatever you were suffering from in the first place.

You should have learned this in grade school, but just in case you missed it, you do not have a right to other people’s property, not even when the government takes it away from them and gives it to you. That is the basis for socialism, and that is exactly what the Constitution is intended to prevent.

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Friday, November 2, 2007

Rogue State Medeland


The Netherlands have now openly and fully qualified for the title of 'schurkenstaat' (rogue state). What's a rogue state? Traditionally, a rogue state is a state that abuses its own citizens. These days, other properties that are considered are support of terrorism, violation of human rights and dodging of (international) law. However, a listing of properties holds a limitation. Far better is a more general definition. A state can be considered a rogue state when it violates basic rational moral values.

The Dutchman does not exist, according to beloved import-bride to the heir to the throne Maxima. When taking into account the number of imported, mainly Islamic, people that 'enriched' our country ('Medelanders') it might indeed be better to call the State of The Netherlands 'Medeland'. Because there's no doubt about the existence of the 'Medelanders'. Whomever views Medeland with a critical eye only has to look at the month of October to inevitably conclude that Medeland indeed has become a rogue state.

PM J.P. Balkenende (residing under would-be queen Beatrix) threatens to conduct a coup should his gang approve a concept-law that would require a referendum on the sale of Medeland to Eurabia. Beatrix has the State Council, also residing under her, present an obvious lie about the European Constitution ("the new treaty has no constitutional aspects") and parliament absorbs it as were it the word of God himself. Coup avoided, mission accomplished. The voter is put offside, only the useful idiot during election time, when most corrupt Dutch party, PvdA (Labour Party, Party of the Ayatollahs), swore that they would insist on a referendum should the 'new' treaty look anything like the original one. Well, it did, and they didn't.

The already criminally high tax burden is increased even more, and public health care is being revised again: anyone that does not abuse the system is going to pay more for those who do. And as a rule, there's less money available to Dutch citizens, while trainloads of taxpayer's money disappear to distant horizons: 4.5 billion euro is spent annually on 'development' countries, while a 'normal' amount, in perspective to what other European countries spend, would be 1.2 billion. Mind you: these 1.2 billion are wasted as well, and would better be returned to the taxpayer, for the majority of the money ends up in the wrong pockets, while the remaining bits that do end up in the intended spots do not make any structural difference. 4.7 Billion euro has gone 'missing' with Bertje Koenders' department (as is habitual with the PvdA, the Portemonnaie van de Ander, Other People's Wallet), and nobody gives a toss. Much of that money goes to terrorist outfits like Hamas and Fatah, and the 'benefactors' have no say in that. The Development Ministry could be closed tomorrow; none of the beneficiaries would be the worse for it, but the Dutch taxpayer would benefit quite a bit. Leaves a buch of civil servants that need to find a real job, but hey, they might learn something.

According to the CDA, the Christian Democratic party, the produce-price of gasoline could be 12 eurocents lower, ignoring the fact that the consumer price consists for more than 65% of taxes. In the past, we had gradual tax increases with two real jumps, one ten cents (4,54 eurocents) and one 'temporarily' 25 cents (11.33 eurocents) that were never returned to the taxpayer. But parliament blames big oil. Motorbike riders will not be exempt from the intended mileage-taxing, as it "would be imcomprehensible that they could use the roads for free". The amount of bikers compared to motorists is neglectible, and most bikers pay double already anyway as they also own a car, and cannot drive both vehicles simultaneously. Combined, bikers and motorists put up a whopping 18 billion in taxes annually, of which only close to two billion are being returned to them in infrastructure, the blood vessels of the economy. What do you mean, "use the roads for free"? We're being screwed for 16 billion euro; the State is an expensive whore.

A man tries to kill two police officers and gets killed in the process. The would-be killer is depicted in the MSM as a victim (also see this article), and we hardly hear anything of the fate of the police officers, other than that they were saved in hospital. Day after day the MSM reports how the state failed at helping the 'schizophrenic' 'victim', up to and including theories on possible relationships between inbreading and schizophrenia. We still have no news on the police officers, whether or not they're out of hospital yet, but the lady that shot the guy will face an investigation: couldn't she have shot him in the legs?

That the state failed is beyond argument, but not for the reasons claimed by the PC media. The overwhelmingly Moroccan neighborhood burns non-Moroccan owned cars every night, à la Paris; news about it suppressed in the MSM, because they're 'offended' by the killing of one of their's. What does the state do? While Islamsterdam is burning, the police picks up football hooligans a few blocks on, and raids partygoers in order to search them for possession of drugs. Stops pushbikes to fine riders who do not carry proper lighting. Job Cohen, mayor and self-Islamiser of Amsterdam, drinks more tea with the Moroccans. The 'hard approach' is undesired, says dhimmy Cohen, but apparently that only goes for the voters for his Party of the Automobilefires.

A child molester, caught in the act (!) while sexually molesting a 9-year old, and admitting to six more cases of child molest, was set free by a judge because the molests 'were not severe enough'. Only to be picked up again for sexually molesting an 18-year old. But as the that case was already known by the justice department, who refused to investigate it, the case was thrown out and the guy was set free once again. This is akin to a rape license! Is the judge connected to Dutch boss-of-justice-department Joris Demmink (Demmink is known to be guilty of child-rape but it cannot be proven as he, covered by a series of Justice Ministers, remains in function and thus obstructs any investigations)? Or maybe the perp has details on Demmink? Why does the Justice Department refuse to investigate serious crimes like (child) rape? I just read it failed to investigate 200 child-porn cases, a quarter of the cases carried over from 2006!

Our fake monarchy visits India, one of the few, and possibly the only country in the world where the rise of capitalism leads to more childlabour, instead of less, which is the rule in other upcoming countries. This is due to the criminal Indian 'kaste'system, which abuses the lower 'kastes'. But our fake queen won't utter a word on the subject. No inconvenient questions, please.
The Dutch heir to the throne, Wim Alex, nicknamed Prince Pils (Pils is short for pilsener, beer) follows his imported wife into politics, a field thus far avoided by the 'Royal' Family, as it is full of mines. After inquiring with the Indian authorities whether they subsidise their farmers in order to not use valuable water in raising their food crops (!) he goes on to visit neighboring totalitarian state Bhutan to 'help' the dictators there with advice on how to convert their monarchy into a democracy like the Dutch, i.e. how to convert their dictatorship into another one. Whomever might think Wim Alex would use the occasion to inquire about all the Nepalese that were chased out of the country and now reside in UN fugitive camps would draw the short straw: no such luck. Same thing for the Christians, who are being persecuted; no inconvenient questions here.

Gross indignation and a courtcase by the fake Royalty were the result of the publication of pictures of the Dutch infant princesses on a pedophile website, Martijn. You won't hear Wim Alex about all those other kids posted there, who are equally unroyal but not related to these imposters, and even now, nobody cares about those unknown kids. Selective indignation, therefore, and thus, class justice. The reports on the event are inconsistent, as usual: "After the pictures were removed from the public part of the site, they still appeared on the member pages. Martijn claims that after the summons these were also removed, but the state information service claims they cannot verify that". Question: How does this relate to the claim the pictures were there in the first place?

In the mean time, highschool classes are split into discussion groups where half a class has to defend Al Gore's Global Warming propaganda and the other half the debukers, with the 'Swindle' as base material. Accompanying material are IPCC materials and MSM articles that still uphold the hockeystick graph (debunked in 2003) and 1998 as the hottest year in 10 centuries (debunked in August 2007). The midieval warming period is also left out of the handouts. This is criminal misinformation, if anything, as part of the public schooling system. Pupils are trained to defend what's already recognised as outright lies, a perfect training for politicians and, as such, a great example of Frankfort School tactics.

A not yet sworn-in judge, apparently too stupid too realise she could not serve as first judge yet, ruled to hold six suspects in custody, among them a confessed rapist and a confessed murderer. Because she was not sworn-in, her judgement (with two 'real' co-judges) was deemed illegal and the suspects were set free. Yes, free; unfortunately I'm not joking here. Form before content, "the constitutional state demands it", the safety of society is of no concern here. If the constitutional state demands the release of confessed heavy criminals, I know of some more people that should not be in prison, because chances are they are innocent, and only convicted willfully on false and manipulated evidence. The list of such cases grows by the day. Why would our justice department go to great lengths to get innocent people convicted? Why do judges insist on releasing suspects who confessed to their crimes?

There are several (Dutch) websites that clearly illustrate the many things that are wrong with Dutch 'justice', like the sites of Paul Ruys, Stan de Jong and Klokkenluider Online. Medeland deceives and lies to its citizens. The Dutch are extorted and sucked dry in order to pay for all Medelanders, but are themselves treated as second-rate citizens. Crime pays and therefore rules; as long as one has a loud mouth and threatens to use violence when 'offended', politicians crawl to be be of service. Any notion of morality and decency has been destroyed by the state. Medeland absolutely qualifies as a rogue state.

How can this situation be resolved? A cabinet crisis is highly improbable: the ones currently in power have sunk so low in the polls that they'll compromise on just about everything, in their own interest. New elections would wipe them out. On HVV Michiel Mans calls for a protest on the Dam in Amsterdam, to voice our frustration. I'm not such a protester myself, but I just might consider to join the band, even while chances are that it won't matter a bit. The one thing you can be certain of is that the Kafka and AFA fascists will show up to stir a riot, unbothered by the police and Cohen.

What does help? The 'method Pinochet'? Elimination of Balkenende, his gang and his extreme left-wing cronies? Although prosperity advocates (I've read that Pinochet received advise from Milton Friedman) historically made very small amounts of victims when repairing economies compared to their leftist opponents when ruining them, the prosperity-bringer's victims are always brought to attention in order to stress how evil these people were. All this while those victims without exception are the socialist do-gooders who feel the unsuppressible need to tell others how to live their lives, violently if necessary. Socialist victims are preferably never mentioned. Exception to this rule are genocides and the Holocaust but, oh irony, only to serve yet another socialist agenda. I'm not in favor of these methods, however, sometimes you have no choice. It's not as if Pinochet would have reached his goals if he'd let the Che Guevaras and Fidel Castros have their way.

How do we stop Balkenende's gang (intranslatable word game: de Balkenbende)? How do we get rid of Cohen? How to dismiss the monarchy? For preventative elimination, as was done with Pim Fortuyn by the extreme-left, it's too late; the damage already has been done. Elimination now is useless as well: while Pim was unique and irreplaceable (whatever opinions you may have on the man) for every socialist a clone sits waiting to take the vacant position. The main disadvantage of Libertarianism (in this respect, in others it's a huge advantage) is that Libertarians do not feel the urge to tell other people how to live their lives. The only thing a libertarian wants is to be left in peace, and to leave the other one in peace as well. Thus, a libertarian does not long for power, and therefore has no incentive to conspire with others on how to obtain that power. Socialists always abuse this lack of organisation among libertarians.

On closing, I'd like to refer the reader to the excellent (Dutch) post on Communism by André, based on a video brought to our attention by Seneca, featuring Michael Badnarik. From it, you will see that Medeland is indeed a rogue state, heading for oblivion, like all socialist/communist states before her.