A free people do not need an army to protect them.

[Austrian Econ Disciple]

I agree with much of what you write. I'm also against permanent standing armies.

I support Ron Paul, and his goals are my goals.

Ron Paul is no anarchist or open borders supporter. He said we what we have now is not immigration, but an invasion.

My state is being turned into a province of Mexico. Mass immigration has not reduced the size of the state here. It has only increased the demand for social services, caused more taxation and increased the size of police departments as neighborhoods break down. It's only a matter of time until the cops are patrolling strip malls carrying M-16s, like they do down there.

Property rights around here are violated every day by Sureno taggers. Homes are shot up if some punk thinks a school kid disrespected him by entering his turf wearing the wrong color t-shirt.

Mass immigration has not increased my freedom or lowered my tax bill, although some like to exploit cheap labor just like the slave holders did.

In my opinion, the open borders folks are playing into the hands of the CFR and their NAU goals -- which Ron Paul opposes.

Bring the troops home. Protect the borders. End the income tax. Kill the Fed.

While I may disagree with your positions with regard to immigration, and property rights (I don't believe that anyone has the right to tell you, who you can, or cannot hire, or who you can or cannot let on your property), I certainly see a lot of room to work with. In the proper setting those who wanted to protect their property could band with their community and form local militias for that purpose.

To rely on a politician to protect your property, is, to me laughable since the job of the politician is to violate it.

I'm just curious. Would you advocate the deportation of everyone currently on welfare, because there are plenty of Americans breeding welfare families, and it is no different a burden, than Mexicans coming over and leeching. The problem you have then, isn't with immigration, but with the Welfare State. Stop attacking people looking for work, and start attacking the people stealing from you. Just my advice.

Anyways, lets work to kill the Fed

 

[tremendoustie]

Then why do you argue for anarchism on a Ron Paul site? Ron Paul is no anarchist.

I'm not an anarchist either, I'm a voluntaryist. As I say, I support order, and the enforcement of rules against harming persons or property.

I'm also practical enough to realize a man who I agree with on 95% of issues or more, and who continually wakes people up, to work for more liberty, deserves my support.

Perhaps you would find a more accurate representation of your views on an Emma Goldman forum.

I don't support violence, and I do support property rights, so her views are pretty much the antithesis of mine.

Writing condescendingly about U.S. military personnel is counterproductive to the Liberty Movement.

I don't intend to sound condescending at all. I think most Americans have been duped into blind, unthinking obedience to the state -- and those among that number who happen to be military personnel have been most abused.

I do not think the U.S. military at this time is a force which acts in the interests of freedom. That does not mean I have a lower opinion of individual military personnel than other men, or that I do not think there are liberty minded military individuals in the military.

Most people don't act in the interests of freedom these days, after all ...

Ron Paul served in the U.S. Air Force. There are plenty of Liberty-minded people in the U.S. military, which was one of Ron's biggest sources of support.

That's true.

We should continue to make our case for a non-interventionist foreign policy, for closing our foreign bases, and for bringing our troops home, not alienating them from us.

I agree.

We have the high ground and a popular message, and anarchists muddle that message with talk of a utopian world without governments, police or military power -- a world that will never exist as long as there is a human species.

Well, assuming you're referring to my views as "anarchist" here, I'd like to point out that I do support police services (we need protection from criminals), and military/militia (we need protection from attack). I also support orderly systems of justice, which could be considered government.

I just don't think a single monopoly is the best, most accountable way to provide these services, and I don't think extortion is the best way to fund them.

I'd also like to point out that significant reform is possible. Before slavery ended, many thought and argued that it was an essential component of any human society -- but we learned that we can do quite well without it, after all.

Maybe your heart is in the right place. I don't know. But anarchists have traditionally been used by globalists to subvert populist movements and increase the power of banksters and central governments.

I assure you, that's the last thing I want -- and people like me are the last thing they want.

I doubt the bankers are keen on efforts to move to silver barter or underground trade, and I doubt the central governments are keen on civil disobedience or jury/state nullification.

Anarchism, like Communism, is a philosophy for fools and tyrants -- and 16-year-old skaters.

I think this question warrants more consideration than you've had the opportunity to give it.

I was a mainstream republican four years ago, and a constitutionalist two years ago (I still do absolutely believe restoring the constitution is a worthy goal). It takes some time, to really think through, and study these issues.

I think our brains are oriented towards considering a central state the only solution to these problems, because that's all we've known -- but it's actually a really poor approach.

Also, open borders are a goal of the globalists, not Ron Paul. Our mass immigration policy was put in place by them, and it is only serving to increase the power of the state over our lives while making us less prosperous and less free.

I can see that big government types abuse immigration for their own ends. I just don't see more tyranny as a path to less tyranny. I think we need to strike at the root -- the warfare/welfare state -- not give more power to the government to control who may live and work.

This is the 5% where I disagree with Ron. I can't think of any other significant issue I disagree with him on ...

 

[tremendoustie]

I agree with much of what you write. I'm also against permanent standing armies.

I support Ron Paul, and his goals are my goals.

Ron Paul is no anarchist or open borders supporter. He said we what we have now is not immigration, but an invasion.

My state is being turned into a province of Mexico. Mass immigration has not reduced the size of the state here. It has only increased the demand for social services, caused more taxation and increased the size of police departments as neighborhoods break down. It's only a matter of time until the cops are patrolling strip malls carrying M-16s, like they do down there.

Property rights around here are violated every day by Sureno taggers. Homes are shot up if some punk thinks a school kid disrespected him by entering his turf wearing the wrong color t-shirt.

Mass immigration has not increased my freedom or lowered my tax bill, although some like to exploit cheap labor just like the slave holders did.

In my opinion, the open borders folks are playing into the hands of the CFR and their NAU goals -- which Ron Paul opposes.

Bring the troops home. Protect the borders. End the income tax. Kill the Fed.

Like AED said, I think we agree on most things .

I disagree on immigration -- I think an individual property or business owner should be able to hire, or admit, whomever he chooses. I think it's right to go after individual immigrants who harm others, or their property -- I just don't want to paint them all with that brush.

I absolutely consider you an ally for liberty, however -- I should make that clear. The fact is, you want to make me far more free than I am now, and that makes you a friend in my book.

It's useful to discuss theory, and principle, but I think all constitutionalists, minarchists, and voluntaryists, should recognize that at the end of the day, we're on the same team. Something Mr. Franklin said comes to mind ... to roll back the state to any extent whatsoever, we will all need to pull and hang together.

 

[qwerty]

I like the Swiss type!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_of_Switzerland

Under the country's militia system, professional soldiers constitute only about 5 percent of military personnel

That makes MUCH sense!

 

[Bucjason]

/sigh

Because Standing Armies are able to protect themselves against Nuclear Weapons, right? You bypass the point of Standing Armies. They aren't there to protect you!!!!!

You just defined socialism, and I wholeheartidly reject it, and so should every capitalist. Military is no different than any other socialized institution. If you cherish liberty, you must be against Standing Armies.

A government who's sole purpose is protection of rights , life , and property is not socialist, you idiot , it's minarchist.

This isn't 1750 .... we all can't just pick up our hunting rifle and a pitchfork and fight off an invader. This is why a standing army is now a requirement - technology has advanced a little to far for that to be an effective means of defense.

 

[Austrian Econ Disciple]

A government who's sole purpose is protection of rights , life , and property is not socialist, you idiot , it's minarchist.

This isn't 1750 .... we all can't just pick up our hunting rifle and a pitchfork and fight off an invader. This is why a standing army is now a requirement - technology has advanced a little to far for that to be an effective means of defense.

Tell that to the Afghanis, the Swiss, the Vietnamese, the Japanese (Why do you think we dropped A-Bombs on Japan, instead of invading the mainland?), etc.

You are well aware that Militia during the times of the Revolutionary War, and the Civil War had artillery batallions, and armories, right? Educate yourself!

Also, the US Military does not protect your rights, it squashes and obliterates them. You might want to talk to some Japanese Americans from the 1940s, or to the Native Americans, or to the descendants of the Reconstruction, or to those around in Waco, or to anyone who has lived through a war America has fought in. Are you aware America has been at war almost every single year since 1940? WAR IS THE HEALTH OF THE STATE. Why do you give people the power to go trotting the globe in pursuit of their egomaniacle dreams of power. I value life far too great to put my sons, or your sons, or anyone sons on the line for the whims of our dutiful overlords.

Do you believe Patrick Henry, Thomas Jefferson (who by the way disbanded the standing army during his Presidency), or George Mason, were anarchists? Really?

 

[Number19]

...Anyone who supports a Standing Army supports a socialist institution. Thats just the fact. ...

I'm going to nit-pick on your choice/use of words. Standing armies existed long, long before Socialism evolved as a concept. A much better choice of word is "statist". Like I said, it's nit-picking but probably is a more appropriate and accurate choice of terminology.

 

[Number19]

...Also, open borders are a goal of the globalists, not Ron Paul. Our mass immigration policy was put in place by them, and it is only serving to increase the power of the state over our lives while making us less prosperous and less free.

Explain this. IMO, this is not true. In a free society, open borders do not make a society less prosperous and less free. A controlled border is ONLY relevant to a "statist" society. I believe I'm not incorrect in saying that libertarians support open borders and I wouldn't say that libertarians are "globalists".

 

[Jace]

Explain this. IMO, this is not true. In a free society, open borders do not make a society less prosperous and less free. A controlled border is ONLY relevant to a "statist" society. I believe I'm not incorrect in saying that libertarians support open borders and I wouldn't say that libertarians are "globalists".

Ron Paul is not for open borders. He happens to be for reinterpreting the 14th Amendment so that birthright citizenship does not apply to children of illegal immigrants, or anchor babies. Giving citizenship to anchor babies was never the intention of the 14th Amendment, as any honest person can see.

I lived in Korea for a while. Women over there would fly to LA when they were seven months pregnant. They would give birth in the US, get a birth certificate and then fly home. Their child, a US citizen, would grow up and then vote in US elections while living in Seoul or Pusan, never having lived here, or even having any kind of benevolent feelings toward this country.

The CFR has been pushing open borders on us since the days of "Colonel" Edward Mandell House. The CFR sees mass immigration as a tool to overwhelm the American middle class with a foreign born proletariat, and further break down American sovereignty to ease the way to a North American Union.

Their aim is to ease us into a giant borderless economic bloc, like the EU, with a unified fiat currency ruled by a central bank. We are to become Balkanized enclaves in ethnic conflict with each other with no common culture, other than consumerism.

It is one thing to have a little bit of immigration into a country. We are the most compassionate nation in human history when it comes to welcoming immigrants. But our hospitality has been abused. What we have now is an unprecendented flood of people coming in -- greater than our birth rate -- which is increasing the size of the police and welfare state. We are not becoming more free as a result of this deluge of foreigners coming in. We are beginning to take on the characteristics of the Third World places these people are coming from.

California is American because people who were culturally American demographically overwhelmed the Spanish and Indians that were here first. Now American culture is being demographically overwhelmed by people from Latin America and Asia -- good, hard working people, oftentimes. There is no reason to believe that the US Constitution and our values of freedom, rule of law and property rights will dominate when cultures with entirely different values become dominant. The numbers are too high and there is no time for assimilation into our culture and our values. We are the ones now being assimiliated -- in the nation of our birth. Children born into American culture are being taught in our own schools that they are oppressors of immigrants, even though these immigrants are coming here for a standard of living higher than where they came from.

This immigration deluge can be traced to the 1965 Immigration Act put in place by Edward Kennedy and Communist banksters.

A peaceful republic has armies to defend its borders. An empire sends armies abroad. We have lost our way.

We must bring our troops home, defend our borders and kill the Fed before it's too late.

 

[Number19]

Ron Paul is not for open borders. He happens to be for reinterpreting the 14th Amendment so that birthright citizenship does not apply to children of illegal immigrants, or anchor babies. Giving citizenship to anchor babies was never the intention of the 14th Amendment, as any honest person can see.

I lived in Korea for a while. Women over there would fly to LA when they were seven months pregnant. They would give birth in the US, get a birth certificate and then fly home. Their child, a US citizen, would grow up and then vote in US elections while living in Seoul or Pusan, never having lived here, or even having any kind of benevolent feelings toward this country.

The CFR has been pushing open borders on us since the days of "Colonel" Edward Mandell House. The CFR sees mass immigration as a tool to overwhelm the American middle class with a foreign born proletariat, and further break down American sovereignty to ease the way to a North American Union.

Their aim is to ease us into a giant borderless economic bloc, like the EU, with a unified fiat currency ruled by a central bank. We are to become Balkanized enclaves in ethnic conflict with each other with no common culture, other than consumerism.

It is one thing to have a little bit of immigration into a country. We are the most compassionate nation in human history when it comes to welcoming immigrants. But our hospitality has been abused. What we have now is an unprecendented flood of people coming in -- greater than our birth rate -- which is increasing the size of the police and welfare state. We are not becoming more free as a result of this deluge of foreigners coming in. We are beginning to take on the characteristics of the Third World places these people are coming from.

California is American because people who were culturally American demographically overwhelmed the Spanish and Indians that were here first. Now American culture is being demographically overwhelmed by people from Latin America and Asia -- good, hard working people, oftentimes. There is no reason to believe that the US Constitution and our values of freedom, rule of law and property rights will dominate when cultures with entirely different values become dominant. The numbers are too high and there is no time for assimilation into our culture and our values. We are the ones now being assimiliated -- in the nation of our birth. Children born into American culture are being taught in our own schools that they are oppressors of immigrants, even though these immigrants are coming here for a standard of living higher than where they came from.

This immigration deluge can be traced to the 1965 Immigration Act put in place by Edward Kennedy and Communist banksters.

A peaceful republic has armies to defend its borders. An empire sends armies abroad. We have lost our way.

We must bring our troops home, defend our borders and kill the Fed before it's too late.

Everything you write is from the perspective of a "statist". And everything you say is correct - for a statist society, controlled borders are essential. What you did not address is : why would open borders be detrimental in a free society?

 

[Kojac]

Y'all think you're advocating a free society, but a free society that defends itself minimally or not at all is easy pickings. Yes, that includes border issues. Citizenship, when not hereditary, ought to be awarded only to those that demonstrate a capacity to maintain residence in the country.

 

[constituent]

In my opinion, the open borders folks are playing into the hands of the CFR and their NAU goals -- which Ron Paul opposes.

Funny, that's how I feel about the border-dupes...

Bring the troops home. Protect the borders. End the income tax. Kill the Fed.

Don't get me wrong, love the empty platitudes--really, I do--but you do realize that protecting the states' borders is the duty of the various states, correct?

What happened to following the constitution? Why would you support anti-constitutional policies that grant extra-constitutional authorities to the federal government?

Why does Ron Paul?

...talk about playing (or being played) into someone else's hands.

Never mind that your entire post sounds like it was gleaned and spit-shined from a story at infowars.

Really, that should say it all.

 

[constituent]

Y'all think you're advocating a free society, but a free society that defends itself minimally or not at all is easy pickings. Yes, that includes border issues. Citizenship, when not hereditary, ought to be awarded only to those that demonstrate a capacity to maintain residence in the country.

You're conflating immigration with naturalization. No surprise... common mistake. Hell, even dear leader has a tendency to do the same.

 

[fisharmor]

Y'all think you're advocating a free society, but a free society that defends itself minimally or not at all is easy pickings. Yes, that includes border issues. Citizenship, when not hereditary, ought to be awarded only to those that demonstrate a capacity to maintain residence in the country.

The difference between you and me (and some others here) is that I'm willing to listen to reason and take other arguments into consideration.

Watch Patriot's uberfail on page 2 - the Stateless Ireland video. Then watch part 2.

Part 2 describes how stateless Ireland went unconquered for a thousand years.
It also describes the various attempts at conquest - several viking attempts, a couple Norman attempts, and the one that stuck - Cromwell's policy, which was to eliminate 14% of the population in the process.

He also points out that this is a higher percentage dead than occurred in Germany during WWII - where you had three major industrial powers attacking at once, using high-altitude bombers.

It was pure fail because the fact that a stateless society enjoyed 1000 years of relatively peaceful existence and was finally conquered after several other failed attempts, and then only by the commission of an atrocity at the end of centuries of attrition, isn't exactly a condemnation of that model.

I can't think of a formal state that lasted longer than Byzantium, which lasted for 1000 years, had periodic wars (i.e., was less peaceful than Ireland), and ultimately was conquered through attrition. That means the stateless model and the statist model have equal longetivity records, and both ended the same way.


YouTube - Stateless Ireland
YouTube - Stateless Ireland 2


The burden of proof is on you: prove that a stateless society is more prone to foreign threat.
Actually, if you watch the stateless Iceland video from the same youtube user, you'll find out that as soon as Iceland formed a state, the island began to experience periodic power-struggle wars; something which was unknown in Iceland before the state existed there.

 

[tremendoustie]

Y'all think you're advocating a free society, but a free society that defends itself minimally or not at all is easy pickings.

Since when are well organized and funded militias with many tens of millions of members combined "minimal" defense?

Yes, that includes border issues. Citizenship, when not hereditary, ought to be awarded only to those that demonstrate a capacity to maintain residence in the country.

You can decide who you will and will not allow on your land. Who I allow on mine, or who I hire, is none of your business. You need to stop trying to run other people's businesses and property.

 

[libertarian4321]

A militia or guerrilla army can harass and annoy an invading army, it is not going to stop it.

Using Iraq or Afghanistan as an example of guerrillas "successfully defending" a nation is ludicrous- while those armies have the ability to inflict casualties, they have ZERO ability to stop the US (standing army) from doing nearly anything it pleases- should the US military choose to rape and pillage, there is little the militia/guerrilla army can do to stop it.

If your goal is to have an army that can harass and annoy and invader and hope the invader someday decides to go away, the militia/guerrilla army might do the trick.

But if you want to keep your people from being raped, your economy from being destroyed, or your lands from being plundered, that sort of army is not adequate.

So a standing army is necessary. One can argue over the size needed - what balance of standing army to reserves/militia are necessary, but to claim that no regular military is needed is fool hardy.

I feel the US military is far too large- but the idea of eliminating it and relying on a citizen rabble armed with rifles to defend the nation is absurd.

 

[Pericles]

I reject this premise in entirety.

And as further evidence of professional incompetence,
[url]http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=248043[/URL]

This nation, and free people DO NOT need a Standing Army.
The Founders warned of it and their warnings have been proven true.

If I may restate what I think is your point-

Being paid to do it all day is not what makes a professional - it is competence. Being paid to do it full time, increases the probability of competence, but does not guarantee it.

The founders considered standing military establishments a danger to the country because of the possibility of use by the federal government to impose tyranny, but the other danger is the increased chance of foreign entanglements not in the best interest of the country.

The geographical considerations of the 18th Century made this policy practical, and we need to have some military force that is capable of dealing with threats that may arise before the "nation in arms" can be assembled.

 

[tremendoustie]

A militia or guerrilla army can harass and annoy an invading army, it is not going to stop it.

Using Iraq or Afghanistan as an example of guerrillas "successfully defending" a nation is ludicrous- while those armies have the ability to inflict casualties, they have ZERO ability to stop the US (standing army) from doing nearly anything it pleases- should the US military choose to rape and pillage, there is little the militia/guerrilla army can do to stop it.

That's because the standing army has a budget many thousands of times larger than the militia/guerrilla army for equipment, as well as vastly greater personnel resources. If they were anywhere close to equal, the standing army would be demolished. Even move a little closer towards equilibrium, and the militia is capable of winning -- look at what the Afghans did to the Russians.

Standing armies are the modern equivalent of lining up in neat little rows with red jackets on.

I feel the US military is far too large- but the idea of eliminating it and relying on a citizen rabble armed with rifles to defend the nation is absurd.

You clearly don't understand what is being proposed.

Here, let me repeat myself:

With just a fourth* of the $300 billion dollars Americans spent on charity last year alone, you could buy approximately an AK47 for every two or three adults, RPG-7s for every ten or so, and more than a million stinger SAMs.

*Forgot to take out kids and the elderly with the earlier calculation.

Then there's the fact that there's more guns than people in the US already, finance for militias would likely be much higher, and continue year after year. Oh, and add in the fact that everyone's vastly richer because they don't have to finance the military industrial complex and the rest of the federal government BS.


Look, hire a standing army if you want, but count me out of it. I think it's dangerous, and a waste of resources.

 

[Pericles]

................. Thomas Jefferson (who by the way disbanded the standing army during his Presidency)...................

Fact check on aisle 3 ............ While Thomas Jefferson was President:

Lewis and Clark expedition (Regular Army)
West Point founded
Regular Army reduced to just over 3000, but not eliminated

 

[Kojac]

We'll put it this way, then. To those of you that promote a stateless, voluntary society without a government and certainly without a government's military, what do you do when the hyper-wealthy emerge, and some (or even just one) of them purchases his own military, his own power, and begins to bend people to his will?

A scenario for this could be the hyper-wealthy head of a biotech firm. This biotech firm engineers a deadly, slow acting virus, and the cure for this virus. They control distribution via a private military that they've purchased, and clandestinely begin to infect certain strategic regions, basically gaining private rule over them with the leverage of the cure they own.

There are no courts or governmental forces they MUST contend with, and no one is powerful enough to stand in their way once they get the ball rolling.