theophiles.org - Meet the Sovereigns

Written by laika

Wednesday, 16 January 2013 21:40

At The Daily Beast:

His name is Craig Douglas Fleshman, though he won’t answer to that, just as he no longer carries a driver’s license or pays taxes. Pastor Paul Revere doesn’t recognize the authority of the State of Oregon, the United States of America, or anyone else that presumes to have some command over him. He answers only to God.

Comments

whitemice - The IT Correlation

|2013-01-17 06:48:13

"... the former computer systems analyst..."

How did I know that was coming? It work in IT, in the domain of hackers, software developers, for-profit-privacy-invaders-who-are-beloved-by-the ir-customers, system administrators, etc...

What is the deal with the correlation between I.T. and Libertarians (of various stripes)? In those forums there are far more of these anti-government anti-authority types than I meet in other circles. I mean far-and-away more.

It has baffled me for years. These are people clearly capable of conceptualizing complex concurrent systems; and there answer to any sociological problem is the same hammer: "get rid of the rules".

emperorbma - KISS principle

|2013-01-18 21:50:07

AnCaps and Libertarians in IT tend to derive their views on this from the freedom of information principles that pervade the field. I should know, I am one...

The basic issue is NOT getting rid of the rules as you claim. It is recognizing the fact that law is, in fact, merely another kind of code. It must be compiled, interpreted and parsed just like computer code. The most elegant code is the code which is simple and efficient.

A libertarian's perpective is just that... the most simple and elegant approach to a state. Don't regulate anything unless it is absolutely necessary.

In a nutshell, "Keep It Simple, Stupid."

laika - re: HAL 9000 principle

|2013-02-05 23:25:50

emperorbma wrote:

The basic issue is NOT getting rid of the rules as you claim. It is recognizing the fact that law is, in fact, merely another kind of code. It must be compiled, interpreted and parsed just like computer code.

But law must be "compiled, interpreted and parsed" by humans, yes? And not by machines?

Would a computer approach the U.S. constitution as variously as humans? What would a machine make of sola scriptura? Or do I, not being an IT person, miss your point entirely? Perhaps you're suggesting government by computer as the optimal libertarian arrangement?

emperorbma - Lawrence Lessig, rather

|2013-02-08 20:23:56

I was referencing Lawrence Lessig's e-text Code is Law. Civil law operates very analogously to computer code but I will concede that its parser is not strictly logical as you point out.

Wikipedia wrote:

The primary idea, as expressed in the title, is the notion that computer code (or "West Coast Code", referring to Silicon Valley) may regulate conduct in much the same way that legal code (or "East Coast Code", referring to Washington, D.C.) does. More generally, Lessig argues that there are actually four major regulators -- Law, Norms, Market, Architecture -- each of which has a profound impact on society and whose implications must be considered. (ref)

also

Wikipedia wrote:

"Code is law"

In computer science, "code" typically refers to the text of a computer program (the source code). In law, "code" can refer to the texts that constitute statutory law. In his book Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace, Lessig explores the ways in which code in both senses can be instruments for social control, leading to his dictum that "Code is law." Lessig later updated his work in order to keep up with the prevailing views of the time and released the book as Code: Version 2.0 in December 2006. (ref)

My reason for this reference is making clear that we can derive useful analogies for the flaws of governments by considering the flaws in coding behaviors. Furthermore, my argument also implicitly admits the key libertarian principle (although Lessig disavows libertarianism in favor of constitutionalism) that not all value is economic or labor-centric.

The basic analogy with code is that simpler code tends to work more efficiently with fewer problems. More complex code tends to work inefficiently with problems that are harder to discover and resolve over time. Similarly, simple governments tend to work more efficiently but highly bureaucratic governments tend to draw excess resources for futile projects and become gradually more corrupt. Thus the KISS principle...

There are real and necessary complexities which exist, but most legislation doesn't actually address these sorts of things. Many of these can be better addressed by assigning the task to the correct domain of behavior: Church, State, Market or Family. (For Lessig, these were the Law, Norms, Market, Architecture...) Instead, most legislation today is simply made to cover up flaws, glitches, cheats and to provide opportunities for corruption.

Our politicians should be like our coders: interested in fixing problems rather than simply shills for those who want to create problems. A bad politician is like the malicious hacker who funnels the roundoff error into his own bank account. A good politician will code the program correctly...

whitemice - The principle fib

|2013-01-17 06:51:36

And there in lies the principal fib underlying anarchism / libertarianism:

".... to stop selling people “church-based insurance,” which... What she did have was a 'Certificate of Self-Insurance', issued by Revere’s church, identifying her "

If you reject "government", you'll just be governed by an organization with a different name. But, hey, at least it won't be "the government". And you probably won't get representation in that non-governmental government; you won't need it, it isn't a government. And round and round and round and round they go.

SteveGus

|2013-01-17 12:05:15

Pseudolibertarianism defines itself around the ideas of 'property' and 'contract'. Government exists only to protect rights arising out of property and contract.

The problem is that these are both legal constructs, and as such meaningless without a lawmaker. The lawmaker gets to decide what rights are included in property, and which agreements will be dignified as contracts and which won't.

Pseudolibertarianism therefore turns to every tyrant's favorite argument: the idea that some legal ideas are irreformable by mere humans, existing independent of human societies and somehow encoded in the structure of the universe, and as such simply must be: our only choice is to enforce them. The problem with irreformable, inhuman laws is that we still have to rely on human beings to tell us what they are. So that really doesn't solve the problem.

whitemice

|2013-01-18 06:02:48

I don't know what "Pseudolibertarianism" is, that implies there is a 'true' cannon Libertarianism. But what protects us most from standing-on-head Libertarian ideas is that if you put five 'libertarians' in a room you will have seven different Libertarianisms.

If you go with:
QUOTE
According to the U.S. Libertarian Party, libertarianism is the advocacy of a government that is funded voluntarily and limited to protecting individuals from coercion and violence.
UNQUOTE
- then you get the same issue. The government decides what is "coercion" and whether or not a violent action is actionable. It won't be "coercive" if something arises from a "free" market, that will just be natural. That will be a dream come true for industrial barons, who will be the ones primarily funding the voluntary government through their donations. Ah, right, that is called feudalism.

emperorbma

|2013-01-18 21:41:04

whitemice wrote:

I don't know what "Pseudolibertarianism" is, that implies there is a 'true' cannon Libertarianism.

It's not like it's "whatever you say goes" philosophy. There is a common body of philosophical concepts which libertarians and anarcho-capitalists share from. I have described some of these in my other posts in this thread. It's true to admit that the interpretation of these concepts is highly individual, though.

I do believe that SteveGus takes a *VERY* narrow subset of these concepts based on his posts, though...

SteveGus

|2013-01-20 02:02:07

By 'pseudolibertarianism', I mean to describe any of several political theories that make a 'marketplace' the key political institution, and the mechanism that decides the rules you are made to live by. Pseudolibertarianism typically states that the only legitimate role of law and government is to protect 'property' and 'contracts', which somehow are imagined to precede the existence of law.

I have a number of problems with this. One big one is that such an arrangement tends to sharply constrict rather than enhance individual autonomy. It simply denigrates forms of social control imposed by the government, while privileging forms of social control imposed by economics, and proclaiming them immune to reform by governments.

Which tyrant do you think most Americans fear more? President Obama? Your state governor? Or your boss?

emperorbma

|2013-01-20 04:03:33

SteveGus wrote:

I mean to describe any of several political theories that make a 'marketplace' the key political institution

The libertarian "market" is just a synonym for what Christian theology calls "the world." The Libertarian free market is directly related to the libertarian conception of "value." For a Libertarian, "value" is entirely subjective. This is a concept that is shared with Austrian Economics, which formed the nucleus of Libertarian economic philosophy. Non-tangible things like ideas and beliefs are also "value" and they can be shared and traded in the "free market."

For example, a firefighter finds a non-tangible value in helping save people from a burning building. The cost may well be his or her life.

Unlike most economic philosophy, Libertarianism is not bound to this silly notion that value and goods are "things we did physical work to attain" or "intrinsic commodities." Everything that people find worth in is a "value" and everything that has value can be shared and traded in the "market."

Furthermore, even the most repressive regime doesn't remove "free market" according to libertarian philosophy. It merely slows and hinders its proper operation. The flow and exchange will continue regardless of the government's blockage. It's like a river. If I throw a stone in the river, the river just goes around it. The free market routes around a blockage with "black markets" and other forms of political dissent against government overreach...

SteveGus wrote:

Pseudolibertarianism typically states that the only legitimate role of law and government is to protect 'property' and 'contracts', which somehow are imagined to precede the existence of law.

An emphasis on protection of property is merely the emphasis on ensuring that someone cannot burst into your home and take away your food, your books, your bed or anything else you are using without your consent. Is a government required to make thievery wrong or is thievery wrong because it hurts others?

emperorbma - NAP, natural rights, desert island, social extensi

|2013-01-18 21:34:34

Libertarian philosophy is centered upon a principle known as the Non Aggression Principle: a person cannot initiate aggression upon other people, but they are permitted to defend themselves. The NAP applies to natural rights and a libertarian government exists to defend a person's natural rights from infringement by other people.

Inalienable natural rights can be deduced with a simple test: whatever I can do on a desert island without anybody else is a natural right. Suppose that I find myself on a desert island. I can pick up and carry rocks and coconuts on that desert island. Therefore, it is clear to see that property is, in fact, a natural right.

A contract is a social extension of this natural right which is pursuant to the objective of the state to defend the natural rights of life, liberty and property from being infringed upon by others. The contract is a means of defining what does and does not constitute infringement upon one's natural rights by another party. It is an agreement and consensus between one or more parties which the state serves to witness and enforce.

In a nutshell, I disagree that these are contrary to libertarian ethical principles. Contracts and property are within the legitimate purpose of a night-watchman state.

SteveGus

|2013-01-20 01:51:34

A person living alone on an island is necessarily cut off from human society. Law, in the conventional sense (i.e. civil and criminal law) is meaningless without a society for it to govern, though. I don't see how the ability to grab coconuts proves that property is somehow necessary; law would only come into play if someone were there to contest the right to take them, and there isn't.

No doubt a fellow on a desert island is still a sinner, but that's a different matter. At least, the stranded person will find it as difficult to steal as they will to fornicate. But human law judges only acts, and not the heart.

But all of the laws that are enforced by courts and govern human societies are the work of humans. Some may be convenient and others may be impractical. Some may be wise and some foolish. They remain entirely ours to make and unmake.

emperorbma

|2013-01-20 03:14:55

SteveGus wrote:

I don't see how the ability to grab coconuts proves that property is somehow necessary; law would only come into play if someone were there to contest the right to take them, and there isn't.

The mere fact of taking, using and storing coconuts provides the basic framework of what most libertarians consider to be "property." It is the ability of humans to take and use resources to their own perceived benefit. The libertarian ethical approach to this is to let people do so with as much freedom as possible without hurting other people.

The problem is, in fact, a social one. Once we take our castaway off the island we have to figure out whether he alone can use his coconuts or whether someone else can have the coconuts too. The basic model then is that of negotiating how much it is fair for other people to be able to take something that someone else is using.

The libertarian approach generally favors one of protecting people's ability to have things that are clearly ascribed to their personal stewardship which shouldn't be meddled in by others unless there is a good reason to. Hence contracts and laws regarding property. You are entirely fair in pointing out that this is something that society establishes laws to govern. Furthermore, it is also very true that these laws are mostly human constructs. There are, however, aspects of the laws that are not human constructs which can be, in fact, discovered. For example, "do unto others as you would have done unto you" is a rather basic principle that has been discovered and rediscovered and, most famously, emphasized by our Lord. The continual reinforcement of this principle is not a fluke. It is, in fact, derived from a simple natural law of social behavior: People tend to respond in kind to others' activities, if you don't want to be harmed don't give anyone cause for harming you.

Because of this fact, even if we can revise the laws of society as you point out, there are some basic underlying principles of reality itself that must be respected by any society for it to thrive and flourish. Another one of these is some kind of natural principle that protects individual's ability to secure a protection on objects that they are using, which is strongly related to the "desert island coconuts". Still another aspect of this same principle is the principle of household and hospitality. The Bible strongly emphasizes the concept of goods in a household and the responsibility of a household owner to protect his or her guests from harm when in their home. This is, in fact, the same natural principle being extended into a social dimension. It's a principle acknowledged from Crowley (i.e. "dominion") to Confucious.

Therefore, while it is clear that much of the constraint on property might be social law, a large part of it is also natural law examined with respect to a social dimension.

laika - re: NAP, natural rights, desert island, social ext

|2013-02-28 23:14:48

emperorbma wrote:

Suppose that I find myself on a desert island.

I've been intending for months to ask if there was a community, state, nation where your ideas have been put to work. Other than your desert island, would you say that something like this community of Soveriegns is a good example of what you'd like to see?

emperorbma

|2013-03-08 03:40:41

Overall, there have been a few historic approximations of what I would consider desirable. I might cite the Icelandic Commonwealth as a functional anarchy. Similarly, the early American Republic (Articles of Confederation better than The Constitution which was better than Lincon's Federalism... etc) was a particularly good example of what I think we should return towards.

With that said, I must make absolutely clear that the similarity between the Sovereigns and libertarians is superficial. There is a common cynicism about the government, but the intended goals differ greatly.

The primary difference is this: What is the legitimate role of a State? For the Sovereigns, they do not believe the State has a legitimate role. Speaking from a philosophical perspective, they are anarchists not libertarians. For a libertarian, we believe that the State is, technically speaking, a social construct which exists to limit the use of force to appropriate times. To wit, I don't believe anarchy is a pejorative. Rather, it is merely a more extreme perspective which denies the State's legitimacy entirely and seeks to replace it with something like theology, socialism or capitalism. In this case, the Sovereigns believe that God does not give authority to the State and I disagree with this perspective.

Thus, to be clear, libertarians do not reject that the State serves a legitimate purpose. Yes, the State is an artificial construct and it doesn't "exist" like a man does. (more on this later...) However, it does have a legitimate purpose. The primary concern in libertarian philosophy is that a State should not overreach its authority with excessive regulations. The basic core principle of a libertarian state is that a state exists to defend its citizens from aggression and provide citizens a peaceful means to redress grievances by other citizens. Doing anything beyond this purpose is regulatory overreach. A basic premise of a libertarian government is that it is nothing other than an organization of the principle of self-defense which is inherent in all people. A state which regulates excessively steps beyond the legitimate intended purpose because it necessarily initiates aggression.

From a Biblical perspective, this is very much consistent with what Romans 13 reveals as God's intention for establishing rulers: to ensure that people can live peaceable and Godly lives. It specifically gives as the instrument of that authority "the sword" which recognizes that the State's primary instrument is force of arms. Furthermore, it gives as the State's primary objective "to be a terror to evildoers" which means that it must not to be a terror to decent people who have committed no crime.

Consequently, a libertarian state must not itself be an aggressor. If a citizen commits a crime, then the citizen may be justly punished. However, a citizen who commits no crime may not be penalized in any way. (Consequently, all laws should be reasonable and not criminalize things that are harmless to others) Likewise, a proper government must always act with the consent of those whom it governs. This means, for example, that a libertarian state cannot take away one citizen's wealth to give it to another. That would be an act of aggression against the citizen from whom they are taking wealth.

Thus we come to taxation. It is a specific plank of libertarian philosophy that taxation is a moral evil. It is necessary to unpack why the libertarian believes this is the case. It is clear that the Bible itself legitimizes taxation. However, it does so for one specific reason: the authority is performing a service. In light of libertarian ethics, the government has a contract with society. The government is providing a service to society and the people are funding it. For the libertarian, the primary concern is that a tax is coercive since it provides no opportunity for opting out. It is fine if one accepts the government's service to pay a tax for that service as a transactional compensation. However, to make this transactional compensation mandatory regardless of consent undermines the principle of legitimacy created by non-aggression. The State itself becomes an aggressor which means that its services become a threat. This is exacerbated because of regulatory overreach in modern governments.

We are not allowed to dissent from their services nor are we allowed to reject how the services are allocated. It is a package deal and we are expected to pay for services, even those which harm us and are contrary to our desires. This is one of the fundamental travesties of modern governance.

Pursuant to this travesty, the government uses taxation to redistribute wealth as it sees fit without the consent of those whose wealth it distributes. Charity and social programs are good things, but if they are funded with thuggery then they are no better than criminals giving to the Church. The Bible specifically says that a thief should give up his crimes and do honest labor. (Ephesians 4:28) When Caesar is a thief, the model is nothing less than organized thuggery being justified by the corrupted legal system that was designed to prevent crimes. The crimes are being masked, however, because the State is associated with the instruments of civil justice. This is why such corrupt schemes are all the more to be scorned by anyone who is aware of them. If the Mafia were doing this, (and it did), it would not justify the crimes. Yet, because it is the State, we give them carte blanche to rob us without consent. Hence, it is clear that involuntary taxation itself is a form of aggression.

Therefore, we find that we have two thugs who rotate office during the elections: On the one hand we have Scrooge and on the other we have Robin Hood. Both criminals move the government on a fast track toward totalitarianism and corruption to further protect themselves from public scrutiny. Thus we find the fundamental problem with our American government. It has become an entity that serves to benefit few at the expense of everyone else.

The fundamental libertarian ethic is one thing only: The goverment is an instrument to curb evils not to promote them. Because this role has been inverted, it is necessary for we the citizens to protest and to raise our voice in dissent. The libertarian goal is not the goal of elimination of good government, but its restoration and the purging of the corruption which has undermined it.

Note: Continuing on the "doesn't exist like people," I note that the government considers corporations people. These are not people either. Both the government and corporations are constructs which serve a purpose. They must be treated as useful tools not like people. The notion of corporate personhood is yet another aspect of the corruption that has infested our government...

holmegm - re: The principle fib

|2013-01-21 14:20:37

whitemice wrote:

Hmm; two things come to mind:

1. In a free society, you will have a variety of structures around within which you have rights and responsibilities: governments, family, church, clubs, etc. There won't just be one.

2. I'm smelling the fallacy of the false alternative here. It's not as though Medicaid or Social Security are actuarial-ly sound. But we have to privilege them with legitimacy.

whitemice

|2013-03-10 20:27:25

> 2. I'm smelling the fallacy of the false alternative here.

No, no fallacy at all. I'm deliberately specifically clearly and openly saying - there is no alternative, thus no false alternative.

The proposition of Liberatians, or the Soveriegns, is a completely totally utterly false alternative. I can be under the thumb of "the government" or under the thumb of the local militia (aka "the government", just, you know, not).

> It's not as though Medicaid or Social Security are actuarial-ly sound.

Eh? Which has nothing to do with anything. And I do not believe anyone in the thread up till now mentioned them.

>But we have to privilege them with legitimacy.

How are the illegitimate? They were created by a [mostly] freely elected government. You may not like them, or agree with the math, but that doesn't make them in any substantive way "illegitimate". Why do I have to privilege spending billions of dollars on a totally useless, unnecessary, and absurd to the point of ridiculous military and "intelligence" establishment? Because that's life in the 21st century. The planet is crowded, expensive, and complicated; nobody gets everything they want. But I'll take stumbling bureaucracy over the single only alternative; every day of the week.

PineHall - God is sovereign

|2013-01-18 22:57:22

Quote:

“We believe there’s only one sovereign,” Revere told The Daily Beast. “And it isn’t us. Jesus said to render to Caesar that which is Caesar’s and render to God that which is God’s.”

His logic says God is sovereign therefore the government is not. But the passage says we need to render to the government its due. And more importantly he is ignoring Romans 13:1.

Quote:

Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.

So the government was instituted by God and God is still sovereign over the government. Though they say the government is not valid.

Quote:

The most prevailing sovereign theory is this, Potok explained: The U.S. Government effectively dissolved, in either the Civil War or 1933, when it went off the gold standard.

There sure seems to be a government running things today, evil or not, it is still a government that we need to be subject to as long as we don't disobey God. I guess I don't get it.

emperorbma

|2013-03-08 21:20:30

If it helps, I think this is an accurate depiction of the main thrust of the "Sovereigns'" perspective.

whitemice - re:

|2013-03-13 07:05:27

SteveGus wrote:

Which tyrant do you think most Americans fear more? President Obama? Your state governor? Or your boss?

My boss.

Also my health insurance provider.

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Our valuable member laika has been with us since Thursday, 03 April 2008.

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