Does ‘Joe Six-Pack’ care about the Federal Reserve System?

Over the course of the past two days, I have been in online discussions with our fearless leader, ElfNinosMom, and LFV newcomer, Jeff Wartman, about whether “Joe Six-Pack” — alias John Q. Taxpayer, etc. — cares about the Federal Reserve. Well, as luck would have it, CNN.com took a break from its riveting coverage of female bathroom habits and ran a story about a recent survey concerning the Fed.

Americans skeptical of Fed

Poll shows that majority of respondents are unsure about the central bank’s ability to improve the economy.

The findings:

• 17% of Americans are “not confident at all” that the Fed can stimulate the nation’s “shaky economy”
• 34% “not very confident”
• only 8% were “very confident” in the Fed’s abilities

Of course, it is the 8% that are most likely correct — the Fed almost certainly can “stimulate” the economy, just as a shot of heroin can stimulate a junkie. But, to me, these numbers show the nation does not have confidence in the cabal of central economic planners running the money system, and they’re starting to catch on to the scam.

Thanks to government intervention, Joe Six-Pack’s six packs now cost what a case did a few years ago, and he’s mad as hell about it. Now is the time for Libertarians to champion honest money and economic liberty — not to cower from these “complicated” issues that “don’t matter to regular people.” People are being robbed on a daily basis, and they care plenty.

What counts as a legitimate ‘news’ story in the MSM

I guess I probably shouldn’t be surprised at the anti-intellectualism, unseriousness, and crassness of the mainstream media. But I really thought this article, highlighted on the front page of CNN.com, took the cake:

Beware of ‘The Tinkler’

I mosey into the ladies’ room, glance at the mirror, remind myself that fluorescent lights make everyone look as if they’re in the final stages of tuberculosis, and head for a stall. And then I see it: The seat, even the floor, is covered in little yellow droplets. The Tinkler strikes again.

Even worse are the Story “highlights”:

Women’s bathroom is defiled by The Tinkler

Columnist tries to figure out who’s guilty of peeing on seat

Decides she is “aggressively mean-spirited, mole-like cavewoman”

Writer yearns for modicum of civility, a touch of class, or supply of Lysol

As if this is an actual, legitimate news story! For example, the Story Highlights for a Myanmar cyclone piece were as follows:

U.N. has started getting food aid but so far it is only the first step of huge job

NEW: Survivor tells how wall of water left bodies in trees, bushes and streams

More than 22,000 killed and 41,000 missing, Myanmar radio reports

U.S. President Bush says Navy is ready to help if asked

There you go: The state of an individual women’s bathroom and a barely literate “journalist’s” opinion thereof is the given the same treatment as a humanitarian disaster in which more than 22,000 people have died. I should interject here that this wonderful story was brought to us by that benevolent Obama sponsor / former crack smoker, Oprah Winfrey, and her hubristically eponymous magazine.

We have an illegal, unjustified, and undeclared war that’s been raging for longer than WWII, in which innocents are being murdered on a daily basis, hundreds of billions of dollars are being destroyed, and wealth is being redistributed from American taxpayers to military-industrial complex barons, international bankers, and foreign governments — but we give a higher priority to office “tinklers” than any of that. I really do understand why Reverend Jeremiah Wright said “God Damn America!” Has there ever been an Empire quite so decadent?

I tried reading Susan Jacoby’s The Age of American Unreason and found it to be unpalatable liberal-statist garbage. But the general thesis that Americans are dumbed down by the government and its propagandists in the media and public school system (though Jacoby would balk at the latter of these being characterized as such) is right on the money. I find it harder to live among my peers with each day that goes by.

A review of Ron Paul’s The Revolution: A Manifesto

Dr. Ron Paul’s The Revolution: A Manifesto is a concise (167 pages) and convincing argument for a return to America’s libertarian principles. During his campaign for president, Dr. Paul established a very diverse following: Republicans, Democrats, Greens, and “even some anarchists,” he would joke. In truth, many people were drawn to him due his obvious sincerity — a breath of fresh air! — even if they did not fully agree with or understand his ideology. Now they will understand and become Austro-Jeffersonians, one and all!

The first chapter, “The False Choices of American Politics,” demonstrates why those Ron Paul supporters who do understand his message cannot bring themselves to vote for either McCain or Hillary/Obama, or even to really care who among them wins: There is very little (if any) substantive difference between them. They may disagree about when and where to use foreign intervention, but never over whether it should be used at all. They may disagree over how fast interest rates should be cut by the Fed, but never over whether the Fed should exist. You get the idea.

Chapters 2 and 3 are titled “The Foreign Policy of the Founding Fathers” and “The Constitution,” respectively. Here Dr. Paul challenges his neocon and liberal opponents to openly condemn the wisdom of the founding fathers, which they do with their actions, or else follow it. The framers of the Constitution were far from unanimous — there were bitter disputes among so-called “Federalists” (Hamiltonian nationalists) and “republicans” (Jeffersonian decentralists) — but today’s neocon/liberals reject the wisdom of both parties, taking an expansive view of their powers that even Hamilton himself would have seen as excessive.

Chapter 4, “Economic Freedom,” may be an eye-opening one for many readers. First, there are the liberals who were attracted to Dr. Paul’s campaign, who may for the first time be presented with a contrast between the true Austro-Jeffersonian libertarian brand of capitalism and the inflationist, Kudlow & Company / Forbes magazine variety. Secondly there are many “paleoconservatives” I met who supported Dr. Paul but were under the mistaken impression that he was against free trade — nothing could be further from the truth! In fact, as Dr. Paul points out here, he is 100% in favor of unilateral, unconditional free trade and 100% against quotas, sanctions, embargoes, duties, and protective tariffs. He does oppose phony “free-trade” deals like NAFTA and the WTO (joining many liberal Democrats in doing so, but for different reasons) not because they “steal American jobs” (they don’t), but because they limit trade too greatly. Furthermore, they erode constitutional sovereignty and work for the benefit of politically connected elites, something with which libertarians, paleocons, and liberals can all agree.

All three constituencies will also cheer Chapter 5, “Civil Liberties and Personal Freedom.” Here the contrast between Jeffersonian libertarianism (once considered “liberalism” before that philosophy was given a bad name in the early twentieth century) and the so-called “conservatism” of the neocons and post-WWII New Rightists is perhaps at its greatest. Ron Paul supports the Constitution and the limits it places on government — which makes him a “blame America” leftist among the neocon punditry, all apologists for the liberal Wilson/FDR/Truman/LBJ foreign policy, by the way.

But the best and most important chapter, without a doubt, is Chapter 6, “Money: The Forbidden Issue in American Politics.” Here Dr. Paul expertly details the operations of the Federal Reserve System in stunning clarity — no conspiracy theories or half-truths that often further obfuscate discussion of the secretive monetary authority. The Austrian (and true) perspective on the Fed is not to be horrified that the Fed isn’t a government agency (it is, even if indirectly), but to be outraged that all banks are essentially arms of the government. We don’t need the government to have even more control over the money supply, we need it to have no control whatsoever (the exact opposite of what sources like Freedom 2 Fascism seem to suggest). What’s more, Dr. Paul doesn’t spread the myth that the Fed somehow profits as an entity when it creates money (its profits go to the Treasury), but instead, politically connected individuals and businesses profit at the expense of working-class and poor families. You see, the effects of inflation are not uniform — the Fed System works as a wealth redistribution system from poor and middle-class to the rich and politically connected. How so? Buy this book and find out!

Finally, the book ends with the self-titled seventh chapter in which Dr. Paul lays out a moderate and realistic course that could be accomplished over one or two presidential terms. I’m tempted to share this blueprint for you here but I don’t want to discourage anyone from buying the book. Instead, I’ll use the last few words of this review to lament the fact that this blueprint will certainly not be implemented by the next president. Perhaps a young man or woman who volunteered for Ron Paul’s campaign in 2008 will work his or her way up through the political establishment and be swept into office, with a like-minded Paulian Congress, sixteen years from now (just as Reagan followed sixteen years after Goldwater — not that either of these two are to be looked at as heroes. . .). We can only hope that the Republic can endure that long!

P.S. If you like my review, please go to Amazon and give it a “helpful” ranking. It is currently one of the featured reviews.

The shamelessness of the neocon business press

Investor’s Business Daily is a great paper for monitoring the financial markets. It’s also great for monitoring the deranged hysteria of the right-most Fascist fringe of the neoconservative movement.

Wednesday’s editorial page featured an absolutely shameless hit-piece against the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Although I do not agree with Rev. Wright’s racially collectivist views, his foreign-policy outlook seems right on the money, at least from what I’ve read and heard. But IBD characterizes Wright’s politically incorrect truth telling as “lying.” Apparently, anything said against the Regime qualifies as a “lie” — regardless of whether it is factually accurate or not. Ignorance really is strength!

From the article:

It’s a lie that the U.S. government pumps drugs into the black community to entice black men into prison. . .

Really? So agents of the U.S. government, i.e. the FBI, don’t sell drugs as part of undercover operations? Is that what IBD is alleging here? With a straight face? Come on! But of course, the federal government’s “pumping” operations go much deeper than that. Even if widely documented accounts of the CIA drug trafficking can be denied, it cannot be disputed that the U.S. government’s unconstitutional prohibition of illicit drugs results in reduced supply, higher prices, greater profits, and stimulated demand.

I guess one could quibble over what the definition of “pumping” is. But can you believe that IBD actually had the audacity to go here?

Wright added another lie — that if we wanted to know if Saddam Hussein was using chemical and biological weapons, all we had to do is check our sales records: “We sold him those biological weapons that he was using against his own people.”

I know plenty of neocons who don’t even deny this fact — even neighborhood fascists who still claim Saddam had WMDs buried in the desert! One has to truly be oblivious to reality to characterize the above as a “lie.”

Now how about this one:

“We have troops all over the world, just like Rome had troops stationed all over the world. That notion of imperialism is not the message of the gospel of the prince of peace, nor of God, who loves the world.”

What is IBD saying when they say the above is a lie?

• We don’t have troops stationed all over the world?
• Rome didn’t have troops stationed all over the world?
• Imperialism is the message of the gospel of the prince of peace and of God?
• God does not love the world, but in fact hates it?

I know; it’s all of the above.

But if you think it couldn’t get worse, just read how IBD actually portrays U.S. military presence in the Middle East. This is no joke, they really wrote this:

We prefer to think of Marines engaged in Operation Iraqi Freedom and its aftermath not as imperialist murderers but as heroes laying down their lives for their friends. Greater love has no man.

I’m sorry. I should have warned you to have a barf bag at hand before reading the above. I hope you didn’t sully anything precious.

It’s one thing to disagree with the traditional American foreign policy — the non-interventionism of Washington, Jefferson, the Old RIght, and (apparently) Jeremiah Wright. But to label politically inconvenient truths as lies just because they don’t support the neocon agenda is beyond the pale — even for the bloodthirsty chickenhawks at IBD.

It seems as though neoconservatism is legitimately a mental illness (Thomas Szaz be damned). The only question is whether or not these clearly deranged individuals even have any conception of what the truth is anymore. To neocons, the “truth” is merely the opposite of whatever the Goldstein of the day says. We were always at war with Eurasia.

Another blow to the ‘Paul Congress’ - Terbolizard arrested for DUI

Theodore Terbolizard (not his Christian name) was among the first and most vociferous of “Ron Paul Republicans” running for Congress. Well, here is what we get for taking the guy seriously:

Theodore Terbolizard, a little known GOP congressional candidate, is facing possible charges of driving under the influence after Grass Valley police pulled him over for speeding.

Terbolizard was stopped at 1:43 a.m. Sunday for what officers described as excessive speed as he was on his way home from a bar in Nevada City, according to police records.

Police Capt. Rex Marks told The Associated Press that officers arrested Terbolizard on suspicion of a DUI after administering a breathalyzer test. They are waiting for results of a blood-alcohol test, Marks said.

Terbolizard, from Cedar Ridge, is running for the seat being vacated by Republican Rep. John Doolittle, who has announced he will not seek another term.

The candidate told The Union newspaper that is arrest will not affect his campaign — other than to give him publicity.

If you want to take the Ron Paul mantle, you shouldn’t even be coming home from a bar at 1:45 A.M., let alone be drunk driving. And how did Terbolizard respond? By acting as if this would be a publicity boost to his campaign. Disgusting.

Murray Sabrin - Worthy of support?

Of the numerous individuals running for Congress as “Ron Paul Republicans,” only one has earned the Good Doctor’s official endorsement. Murray Sabrin, who as a Libertarian candidate for New Jersey governor achieved 5% of the vote (and accepted “matching funds”), is that one lucky candidate. And now Trevor Lyman, organizer of the first Ron Paul money bomb; and Larry Lepard, who paid for the full-page USA Today ad; have gotten behind Dr. Sabrin. In fact, there is an effort to have a money bomb for Sabrin’s senatorial campaign, and with the Paul campaign winding down, those inclined toward “Ron Paul Republicanism” should take a closer look at Sabrin.

A closer look, indeed. I was at first excited to hear about Sabrin running for U.S. Senate, but troubled by his lack of an “on the issues” section to his Web site. Other than being for the gold standard and Ron Paul, it was unclear what Dr. Sabrin stood for. Now the “on the issues” page is up at his site, and there are some troubling anti-libertarian and even anti-Paulian positions Sabrin champions.

First, Sabrin says he supports the Ninth and Tenth Amendments, “rolling back federal government,” and implicitly abolishing the Department of Education. But later, he advocates big-government, unconstitutional programs such as “education savings accounts” and, worse yet, vouchers. Where in the Constitution are these things authorized?

Disregard for the Constitution extends into Sabrin’s anti-abortion stances. Instead of merely stating a personal opposition to abortion and advocating decentralism, Sabrin supports the unconstitutional federal partial-birth abortion ban and chides his opponent for not cheering on this exercise in federal power-mongering. Then he goes further by advocating a federal law to “criminalize” harming an “unborn fetus during the commission of a crime.” Again, where in the Constitution are these powers delegated to Congress?

And of course, Sabrin takes the Know-Nothing approach to immigration, greatly outdoing Ron Paul here. Unlike Paul, he advocates using confiscated tax dollars and eminent domain to build a socialist wall keeping Mexicans out and Americans in. And worse yet, his cultural protectionism extends to a demand for English as a “national language.” Libertarians aren’t, or at least shouldn’t be, for national anything.

In fact, out of thirteen issues Sabrin chooses to focus on, at least nine are anti-libertarian, wishy-washy, or contradicted by his other issue stances. For example, what the heck does “paying down debt by rating programs’ effectiveness mean”? Should we only eliminate socialist schemes that are “ineffective”? And do we really need a Balanced-Budget Amendment to the Constitution? If we were to summon the political will to achieve that, wouldn’t it be better to pass an amendment abolishing the income tax and/or Federal Reserve? A little debt is not the worst thing in the world — the means by which debt is monetized and what the government does with the money it borrows are far bigger concerns.

If he were elected, I’m sure Murray Sabrin would be the most libertarian member of the Senate. But before deciding to support his candidacy, one must take his anti-libertarian positions into account. In contrast to Ron Paul’s presidential bid, the only real good of a Sabrin candidacy would come from actual electoral victory. From a “movement” perspective, nothing is to be gained by a candidate who not only fails the purity test, but seems to be ignorant of the Constitution’s limits on government and hostile to the notions of cultural freedom and free-market pluralism.

Ron Paul could use a bump in this poll

A friend sent me this presidential selector. You’ve seen things like this before. However, this is the best one I’ve ever seen, as almost all of the questions had answers with which I could disagree. In the past, I’ve seen selectors wherein the two possible choices on Iraq are

• (a) More bombs, more killing!, and
• (b) No more bombs! Spend our money on socialism at home instead!

What I’m surprised and frankly disappointed by, however, is the fact that Ron Paul is the top match of only 4% of people who’ve taken the test. Xenophobic Border Nazi, Tom Tancredo, is tied with “World’s Most Boring Man,” Chris Dodd, for #1. The Communist triumvirate of Obama, Kucinich, and Edwards are tied for third. Since this test is accurate, it’s clear that the test-takers thus far are fans of mass-scale interventionism. That’s bad. But then again, it is a poll sponsored by Amerikkan Pravda, aka NPR, so the results probably shouldn’t be too surprising.

Take the test and see if Ron Paul is your #1. If not, you probably have problems. I scored a 26.0 for Ron Paul, with a tie for second among Dennis Kucinich and Rudy Giuliani with 13.0, both of whom I detest. Let’s see if we can get Ron Paul up to double digits and ahead of his neo-fascist competitors.

The Club For Fascism releases its white paper on Ron Paul

The Club For Growth — a ravenous band of Fed-loving, big-government centralists — clearly does not know a truly pro-growth / pro-capitalist candidate when it sees one. Their white paper on Dr. Paul proves once and for all that supply-side GOP hacks like Stephen Moore and Larry Kudlow are nothing but industrial socialists posing as free marketeers.

CFG on Ron Paul on trade:

Unlike protectionists who deny the economic benefits of free-trade policies, Ron Paul embraces the importance of free trade, but lives in a dream world if he thinks free trade will be realized absent agreements like NAFTA and CAFTA. Paul himself argues that “tariffs are simply taxes on consumers,” but by opposing these trade agreements, he is actively opposing a decrease in those taxes. While Paul’s rhetoric is soundly pro-free trade, his voting record mirrors those of Congress’s worst protectionists.

CFG on Ron Paul on entitlements:

But the recurring theme of Paul’s career is his frequent willingness to let unattainable ideals obstruct attainable progress towards those ideals. Just as in trade, this tendency leaves Paul opposing pro-growth reforms of Social Security. He opposes allowing workers to divert some Social Security payroll taxes into private retirement accounts, arguing instead for cutting payroll taxes and leaving it up to workers to do what they will with the savings. While the ideal is admirable, it is not a sufficient reason to oppose the pro-growth, expansion of freedom that personally-owned retirement accounts represent.

CFG on Ron Paul on “school choice”:

Ron Paul’s opposition to school choice (as if!) stems from his opposition to the government’s role in education, arguing that federal voucher programs are “little more than another tax-funded welfare program establishing an entitlement to a private school education.” He consistently voted against voucher programs, including a 1998 school voucher program for D.C. public school students, and a 2003 bill for a DC voucher program.

CFG on Ron Paul on tort reform:

Instead of traditional federal tort reform, he proposes “private contractual agreements between physicians and patients” that “enables patients to protect themselves with ‘negative outcomes’ insurance purchased before medical treatment.” In theory, Paul’s solution may help alleviate the situation, but it is politically untenable. While Paul’s idealism is laudable, he has not offered a viable alternative for dealing with a problem that is hurting American consumers and businesses, while diminishing our international competitiveness.

In summation, the Club For Growth wants its members to oppose Ron Paul because:

1. He believes in unilateral free trade, instead of unconstitutional and sovereignty-reducing faux-trade agreements that grant thousands of special privileges and introduce thousands of barriers to free trade. . . The CFG knows that these “free trade” agreements must be good because idiotic protectionist Democrats oppose them. Logical!
2. He thinks payroll taxes should be cut to allow individuals to invest their money as they see fit, rather than forcing people, at gunpoint, to invest in “privatized” funds that are administered by politically connected corporations who would make billions in non-market-based account fees.
3. He recognizes the fact that the federal government is not authorized to meddle in the educational affairs of its citizens, and would, instead, allow individual states to determine how to administer and fund their public schools — or privatize them altogether! The CFG members send their kids to private schools, and they want their share of welfare. Hey, central planning never hurt anyone, did it?
4. He admits that, under the Constitution, the federal government has no place dictating to “tort reform” to the states, and that individual states should be free to establish their own tort-based justice systems. Just imagine if the CFG really did their homework and found out that Ron Paul wants to deregulate everything and have more tort-based justice! That’s really “anti-growth” because the CFG members would no longer be able to bribe Congress for legal permission to violate the property rights of regular Americans.

The Club For Growth and others of their ilk give capitalism a bad name. Or perhaps the “growth” the Club is after is merely growth of government?

The real ‘green’ candidate for president: Dr. Ron Paul

What we call “environmentalists” aren’t environmentalists at all. They are communists. They hate private property and want to effectively abolish it so that all lands may be collectively governed according to “green” principles.

The real environmentalists are libertarians, and this in-depth interview on the environment with Ron Paul proves it. The interviewer, Amanda Griscom Little, did a great job in asking questions that allowed Dr. Paul to articulate free-market environmentalist principles. Here are some highlights.

On energy policy:

I would say that the reliance on the government to devise a policy is a fallacy. I would advocate that the free market take care of that. The government shouldn’t be directing research and development because they are bound and determined to always misdirect money to political cronies. The government ends up subsidizing things like the corn industry to develop ethanol and it turns out that it’s not economically feasible. So, my answer to energy is to let the market work. Let supply and demand make the decision. Let prices make the decision.

On environmental protection:

Governments don’t have a good reputation for doing a good job protecting the environment. If you look at the extreme of socialism or communism, they were very poor environmentalists. Private property owners have a much better record of taking care of the environment. If you look at the common ownership of the lands in the West, they’re much more poorly treated than those that are privately owned. In a free-market system, nobody is permitted to pollute their neighbor’s private property — water, air, or land. It is very strict.

On abolishing the EPA:

Environmental protection in the U.S. should function according to the same premise as “prior restraint” in a newspaper. Newspapers can’t print anything that’s a lie. There has to be recourse. But you don’t invite the government in to review every single thing that the print media does with the assumption they might do something wrong. The EPA assumes you might do something wrong; it’s a bureaucratic, intrusive approach and it favors those who have political connections.

On the threat posed by global warming:

I think war and financial crises and big governments marching into our homes and elimination of habeas corpus — those are immediate threats. We’re about to lose our whole country and whole republic! If we can be declared an enemy combatant and put away without a trial, then that’s going to affect a lot of us a lot sooner than the temperature going up.

There’s much more, but I don’t want to quote the entire interview. The interviewer comes from a more typical leftist “environmentalist” perspective, and she is clearly taken aback by Ron Paul’s answers. But she can’t help but offer him at least some faint praise for his free-market ideas — which were clearly foreign to her. Read the entire interview.

Ron Paul’s most thoughtful and candid interview yet

The best thing about this interview is actually the interviewer — the first I’ve seen who actually knows what he’s talking about, and treats Ron Paul not only with the respect that he deserves, but with a mild degree of reverence. The content of this video is largely about monetary policy, banking, and the Fed, etc. It is fascinating, and the most in-depth Dr. Paul has ever gone (as far as I know).

Confessions of a former Fiat-Money/Inflation Enthusiast

Dr. Ron Paul helped me see the light.

Here is a letter I’m sending to my local newspapers:

During last night’s Republican debate on Fox News, a typically clueless media inquisitor had the audacity to ask Texas Congressman and Republican presidential hopeful, Dr. Ron Paul, how he was different from Hillary Clinton. The question stems from the fact that, unlike his “Republican” colleagues, Ron Paul holds traditional conservative Republican positions against interventionism at home and abroad. Hillary, of course, is much closer to any of the other Republicans than Dr. Paul on virtually every issue. A better question would have been, “How are any of the other Republicans different from Hillary?”

Unfortunately, Dr. Paul only had enough time to outline his foreign-policy disagreements with Mrs. Clinton. It would have been nice if he had been given a chance to point out that while she wants to raise taxes, he wants to abolish the income tax and the IRS altogether. Hillary wants to expand socialized medicine, while he wants to gradually abolish Medicare and Medicaid. Hillary would extend the federal government’s sphere of influence on issues like abortion and gay marriage, while Dr. Paul would leave these and most other issues to the states, as per the 10th amendment. But most of all, Hillary, her Democratic colleagues, and all of the other so-called “Republicans,” would leave the immoral and unsustainable fiat-money system of the Federal Reserve in place, while Dr. Ron Paul would legalize monetary competition and restore gold and silver to their rightful and constitutional status of legal tender.

Anyone who advocates for a continued fiat currency cannot rightly be called a fiscal conservative. Fiat money allows politicians to simply print more whenever there’s a shortfall, and there is no hope for restoration of small-government principles so long as Helicopter Ben’s printing presses keep churning out essentially worthless bills.

Supporters of the War in Iraq on the right, and opponents on the left, are virtually in agreement (or willful ignorance) on the issue of fiat money. But fiat money, the War in Iraq, and socialized Hillary/Romney-care all go together. One cannot support one without giving his support to all. Fiat money not only makes them possible, it makes them inevitable. If you are pro-fiat money, you are pro-war and pro-socialism. There is only one candidate from either party who is against all of the above: Dr. Ron Paul.

The government’s War on Corpses

My mom called me today with the following dilemma: A friend’s father had died. Prior to his death, he had arranged for his corpse to be donated to science. He had MS, and he felt, rationally, that his corpse would do him no good after his own earthly demise, so why not enjoy to psychic satisfaction, in the present, of potentially helping others, in the future? A rational choice.

However, where my mom’s friend’s dad went wrong was in assuming that the state wouldn’t have any obstructions against his posthumous wishes. Surely the state-funded institution of higher learning to which the cadaver was to be donated would have notified him of any potential obstacles, right? Wrong. We’re dealing with the government here. It’s always parasitic, feeding off the fruits of your labor, even in corpse form. Or, failing that, it will allow a favored group from among the populace to do the feeding, with the backing of the government’s guns.

My mom’s friend’s dad’s “crime”: He lived in Michigan. He had arranged for his body to be taken by the University of Toledo, which if you don’t know, is in Ohio. State or federal law prohibits the transfer of a dead body across state lines — unless you have a license to do so. After all, someone could get hurt! The funeral home, of course, has paid the necessary bribe to the state. Their charge for the sixty-mile round trip: Two thousand dollars, payable in Federal Reserve Notes.

So my mom wants to call her state representative and urge him to sponsor a bill barring “price gouging” by funeral homes. I tried to tell her that the price gouging wasn’t the problem, the problem was the favored status these “professionals” have been granted by the state, which distorts the free market by decreasing the supply of potential service providers. If the licensure requirements did not exist, someone would certainly be willing to perform this task, unpleasant as it may be, for 1/10 of the price.

But she didn’t get it. And it’s not because my mom is dumb. I understand her inability to grasp free-market solutions to problems when we’re all taught from an early age that government is the solution — that the government exists to regulate markets.

Breaking the statist paradigm is difficult, and that’s why I’m so excited about the Ron Paul campaign. I am much more of a libertarian now than I was when his campaign began, and I’m not the only one. That’s why I’m hopeful, and fairly confident, that his campaign will continue through Election Day, regardless of whether he wins the GOP nomination.