TGIF: Might You Be a Libertarian?

If you're like most people, you don't go around killing or assaulting others. You probably would never think of torturing, raping, kidnapping, or confining your fellow men and women. I doubt if you'd think that stealing or vandalizing their belongings would be a good thing. And I'm sure you'd never dream of stopping people from pursuing their chosen occupations.
Taking this a step further, I'll also assume you wouldn't think these actions would be fine as long as you had the endorsement of a bunch of other people, specifically, if more people expressed approval of such an actions than disapproval.

Now if all that is true, guess what: you are on your way to being a libertarian. Don't retreat from it. No, embrace your inner libertarian. It's a good thing to be. We often hear about the need to respect, tolerate, and even love humanity. That's nice but abstract. Humanity consists of individual human beings. So when you begin to make the admonition about loving humanity concrete, you can't help but start with: 1) don't murder individuals; 2) don't hit or otherwise abuse individuals, and 3) don't touch individuals' stuff without asking. You may want to go beyond those rules -- we have much to gain from peaceful cooperation, importantly including trade of all kinds -- but that is the starting point, the bare minimum. Don't tell me you love humankind if you can't endorse those rock-bottom don'ts.

Why do most of us live by those prohibitions? Most likely it's because we have a sense that this is simply the right way to be. We realize that other people are essentially like ourselves, and so we should let live because we want to live. We can take different paths to this conclusion, but most of us get there. It's not difficult to figure out. Kids do it, even if they occasionally need guidance.
Unfortunately, when the matter of the government arises, suddenly a disconnect occurs -- which is strange because the government is just a group of people. It's not an entity but an institution, a group of people who relate to one another and to a larger population in an ongoing and more-or-less formally defined way.

But if a government is just people, we ought to expect the don'ts set out above to apply, no? Many people, alas, don't see this. (Government education is largely to blame.) They exempt from those rules anyone thought to be acting in an "official capacity." But why? And shouldn't the burden of proof be on those who advocate a double standard of morality, one for the ruled and another for the rulers?

Don't reply that democracy makes it all right. We've already seen that you and I wouldn't abuse someone else if we could muster the support of a lot of people. Why would the situation differ if people formally voted?

You may be thinking that "officials" can do things to other people that you and I may not do because government exists to protect us. Fair enough. Let's talk about defense, self and otherwise.
You may properly use proportional force against someone if necessary to protect yourself or other innocents against aggression. Not only that: you may hire others to protect you or band together with others for mutual defense and aid of other kinds. Nothing wrong with that.

But note: those whom you engage for such a purpose are still subject to the rules the rest of us follow. They may not, under the rubric of defense, commit offenses against innocent people. If they do, they ought to be treated as any of the rest of us would and should be.

Obviously, the individuals who comprise the government are not held to this standard. They routinely use force against people without even the pretense of protection of innocents. Take taxation. If you, having threatened or hurt no one, don't surrender the money the people who comprise the government demand, they will not take no for an answer. If you decline, they will send armed agents to seize your belongings and maybe even lock you up in a cage. Should you resist those armed agents, they may kill you with impunity for "resisting a lawful arrest."

You and I can't treat other people that way. Wherefore the double standard? Needless to say, the power to tax is the root of all other government power, which some people then grab to gain wealth that would be impossible to obtain through voluntary exchange.

Once you explicitly grasp the implicit rules you already live by, you are a long way toward being a libertarian. All that's left is for you to realize that those rules apply to everyone, even those who shroud themselves in the mantle and mystique of the state.

TGIF -- The Goal Is Freedom -- appears occasionally on Fridays.

TGIF: The Nonintervention Principle

Anyone old enough to think about "America's" role in the world ought to be able to walk and chew gum at the same time. For example, one ought to be able to argue firmly against U.S. intervention in other countries without feeling obliged to downplay or deny the real crimes that the tyrant du jour has committed. Unfortunately, not everyone agrees.

I can see the temptation here. Many people believe that all one needs to do to establish a case for intervention is to portray the target as egregiously bad. Consequently, a noninterventionist may think that the easiest way to rebut the interventionist is to deny the claim that the target is as bad as "they say." But this is a lousy, shortsighted, and ultimately self-defeating move. For one thing, it implies that intervention would be acceptable if the target were that bad. Unsurprisingly, it's better to stick to principle.

The principle of foreign nonintervention has nothing to do with the record of the foreign government in question. It is perfectly coherent to identify Ruler X as a brutal dictator and to oppose a U.S. government action aimed at regime-change and nation-building. Thus the noninterventionist has no need to blunt the move toward intervention by misstating or obscuring facts to make the targeted ruler appear less bad than he really is. If someone is puzzled by the statement "The ruler is as horrible as you say, but that is no justification for intervention," it's the noninterventionist's job to straighten that person out because he clearly misunderstands the nature of noninterventionism.

The world is full of egregiously bad rulers -- as distinguished from merely garden-variety bad ones -- but when the matter turns to U.S. foreign and military policy, the appropriate question is, "So what?" As I say, the case for nonintervention doesn't rest on the target's record. So noninterventionists should have no trouble identifying Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro (among many others) as egregiously bad guys while also opposing U.S. government action against them.

Noninterventionists should also be able to state, assuming of course it is true, that a particular bad ruler is not as bad in every respect as the interventionists say without being smeared as an apologist for that ruler. For example, we can note that Assad, although a brutal dictator, has protected religious minorities, such as Christians, from the fanatical Sunni Muslims, such as al Qaeda and the late Islamic State. (Assad himself is a member of a religious minority, the Alawites, which is in the Shia branch of Islam.) Acknowledging Assad's record of protecting minorities does not make one a fan, much less a tool, of the Syrian ruler. Similarly, one ought to be able to point out that U.S. sanctions are partly responsible for Venezuela's problems without being accused of defending or overlooking Maduro's authoritarian state socialism, which by nature will always harm the very people it is perhaps intended to benefit.

Thus the case for nonintervention is independent of Assad's policy toward minorities and the consequences of U.S. sanctions against Venezuela. (Those sanctions should end.) Nonintervention stands on its own merits.

I find it necessary to discuss what ought to be obvious because recently I've seen people committing these fallacies: a few noninterventionists have appeared to suggest that a potential target of U.S. intervention, Maduro, isn't really so bad, while some interventionists have accused noninterventionists of being soft on some demonstrably horrible rulers.

Another fallacy I've encountered is the equation of noninterventionism with nationalism, specifically with a belief that national borders are sacrosanct. The fallacy here is in thinking that the libertarian case for nonintervention rests on a reverence for national boundaries. Nothing could be further from the truth. Noninterventionism and open (i.e., essentially abolished) borders go hand in hand.
So why the iron rule against nonintervention if borders are not sacrosanct? Albert Jay Nock and Murray Rothbard both answered this question: as long as we live in a world of states, to minimize the harm, we are obliged to keep the state we labor under on, as Nock put it, as short a leash as possible. This is true in domestic policy, but it is even more urgent in foreign affairs since presidents have frightening and acutely lethal autonomy in that realm. We should need no reminder that when the U.S. government intervenes in a foreign conflict, it makes things worse -- much worse -- especially for noncombatants. So nonintervention is motivated not only by a wish to keep the state as small as possible, but also to minimize bloodshed by abstaining from exacerbating other people's conflicts. Bluntly put, we must keep states from clashing. It's got nothing to do with a reverence for borders.

In the harsh light of 21st-century American foreign policy, we can see that the cause of nonintervention has never been more urgent. Let's not burden it with irrelevant considerations.

(For a statement of libertarian noninterventionism, see my "Libertarianism Means Noninterventionism.")

TGIF --The Goal Is Freedom -- appears occasionally on Fridays.

TGIF: Anti-BDS Laws Violate Our Freedom

Americans’ free-speech and other rights are being violated by state laws aimed at stifling the BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) Movement against Israel’s illegal rule of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, both conquered over half a century ago. Twenty-eight states have enacted anti-BDS laws or executive orders that prohibit state agencies and state-financed entities, such as colleges, from doing business with any person or firm that hasn’t pledged never to boycott Israeli goods.

Appropriately, these laws have come under fire as violations of both free speech and the right to engage in boycotts, which consist of peaceful decisions not to buy products of a particular origin.
The latest case to hit the news is concerns journalist and filmmaker Abby Martin and the state of Georgia. Martin explained the case in a January 11 tweet:

After I was scheduled to give keynote speech [about the media, not about BDS] at an upcoming @GeorgiaSouthern [University] conference, organizers said I must comply w/ Georgia’s anti-BDS law & sign a contractual pledge to not boycott Israel. I refused & my talk was canceled. The event fell apart after colleagues supported me.

This sounds unbelievable, but it’s true. To speak at a Georgia institution that gets state tax money (with a minimum honorarium), you must pledge never to boycott Israel. Here’s how the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights under Law, which supports such laws, described Georgia's situation:

Georgia’s State Senate passed an anti-BDS bill which states that “a company or individual seeking a procurement contract worth at least $1,000 with any state agency would have to certify playing no party in a boycott of Israel.” When making his claim for passage on the floor of the Senate, Senator Judson Hill cited companies like HP and Motorola as examples of companies that use Israeli technology, and stated that boycotting any products or companies that were developed in Israel goes hand in hand with discriminating against the people of Israel and the Jewish people as a whole. [Emphasis added.]

One would be hard-pressed to show that boycotting Israeli goods discriminates against all Jewish people. Many Jews support BDS and condemn Israel for its brutal mistreatment of the Palestinians. Sen. Hill merely repeated the pro-Israel smear that anti-Zionism equals anti-Semitism, which is patently absurd. As for BDS constituting discrimination against the people of Israel -- perhaps it does (except for Israelis who oppose the occupation of Palestinian territory and support efforts to end it). But why don’t Georgians and other Americans have a right to do that? It’s a peaceful decision to not buy certain products, and it violates no one’s rights.

Martin’s exclusion from Georgia Southern is under legal challenge by her, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), and the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund (PCJF).
At least one other legal challenge on this issue has succeeded on constitutional grounds, and similar laws are now in the courts. Regarding the successful case, MPN News reports,

In 2018, Bahia Amawi, a Houston-based children’s speech pathologist who worked with autistic, speech-impaired and other developmentally disabled children, lost her job after she refused to sign a similar document. Amawi had been at her job for nine years previously without a problem. CAIR took up Amawi’s case and managed to overturn every Texas boycott law on the grounds of their unconstitutionality and she is now free to return to work. They appear confident of a similar victory in Georgia.

Quoting a previous case, federal district Judge Robert Pitman ruled that the Texas anti-BDS law “threatens to suppress unpopular ideas” and “manipulate the public debate” on Israel and Palestine “through coercion rather than persuasion.” Judge Pitman added: “This the First Amendment does not allow.”

This issue ought to be a no-brainer. By what right does a state government require contractors, including speakers, to sign what is in effect a loyalty oath to Israel (or another other country)? That those laws have passed state legislatures and been signed by governors is more evidence of the influence -- dare I say power? -- the Israel lobby routinely wields in American politics. The lobby along with the Israeli government works overtime to destroy the BDS movement and discredit the activists who participate in it. (See my “The Art of the Smear -- The Israel Lobby Busted.”)

To address an objection (which I’ve already seen), anti-BDS laws are nothing like antidiscrimination laws that prohibit state agencies and state-funded entities from contracting with firms that practice racial, ethnic, religious, or sex discrimination. As long as states exist (hopefully for not too much longer) they will surely tax everyone without regard to race, ethnicity, religion, or sex. Therefore, it is wrong for the state -- or tax-financed entities -- to discriminate in hiring, contracting, etc., on the basis of those incidental characteristics. The liberal principle of equality before the law demands such nondiscrimination. But one cannot move from that reasonable principle to other kinds of conditions on contracting, particularly conditions that infringe the right to free speech (say, advocating BDS) or peaceful action (say, boycotting for any reason).

Finally, a word about BDS itself. The movement aptly models itself on the effort to boycott, divest from, and sanction South Africa during its apartheid days. Israel has deprived the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip of their rights since the war of 1967. Gaza is a prison camp under a long-standing Israeli blockade, punctuated ever few years by full-blow military assault. Peaceful protesters in Gaza have been shot by Israeli military snipers from outside the prison fence, killing hundreds and wounding tens of thousands. The Palestinians in the West Bank have no rights and are subject to military surveillance and Jewish-only settlements and roads, as well as separation wall that snakes through the territory. It is naked apartheid in that Jews have full rights while Palestinians are treated like nonpersons. Meanwhile, Israeli officials, encouraged by the Trump administration, have been moving toward formal annexation of key parts of the West Bank. Thus, no mystery surrounds the selection of Israel for boycott and divestment. (The Palestinians inside Israel, 20 percent of the population, are treated no better than second-class citizens, which is not surprising since Israel bills itself as the state of the Jewish people everywhere, not the state of all its citizens regardless of religion or ethnicity.)

I have no problem with the B and the D, and I applaud those who refuse to do business with companies and individuals associated with the oppression of the Palestinians and who liquidate investments in Israeli firms. That’s a proper and peaceful exercise of their rights. But we advocates of liberty should draw the line at S -- sanctions -- because we should on principle reject the state's power to impose sanctions on anyone. Sanctions punish people who don’t wish to boycott the targets. But the right to boycott logically entails the right not to boycott. Also, if the state has the sanction power, it will surely use it against targets we wouldn’t want targeted.

I propose a different S instead: Strip Israel of its $3.8 billion annual military appropriation.

TGIF -- The Goal Is Freedom -- appears occasionally on Fridays.

Scott Horton Interview

Scott Horton and I talked about Trump's Joke of the Century "vision" for Palestine. Listen here.