The auction is now over.

The winning bids were 1.75 BTC. The first person who made this bid will be the winner. I will be contacting them within the next 24 hours.

He name his son after Ayn Rand, an absolute atheist.

Yet people are concerned he's going to shove religion down people's throats? If anything, they should be concerned about his objectivist values. Now that would be legitimate.

Now, let's see here... Apparently Rand thought racism was irrational.  

Well, fuck.

I think giving every US citizen a pony is the more effective than the welfare system we have today. Foodstamps, medicare, etc? 90% waste, 10% efficiency.

The pony program? Money goes to the farms, ponies come out. Poop comes out of the ponies, poop goes into local community farms and food comes out.

I can't complain. It's one of the most efficient welfare programs I've seen.

*shakes hand*

It's useless, Rassah. Apparently shooting a potential rapist is not establishing a right to yourself. It's just violence.

When the state does it, it's an established right.

The state calls its own violence law, but that of the individual, crime.

-Max Stirner

I wanted to vote for Vermin Supreme. : \

We have various governmenst with missiles and guns. We would prefer them to only use them to protect themselves. They don't. 99% of the world's military power is with the United States. The US is held accountable to nobody. Actions can be taken against those below it with little recourse.

What do I advocate? Decentralizing this power through its benefactors (aka the taxpayers) and make people accountable to the states or forces of their choosing.

The system you have now is failing, Hawker. It's time to choose something sustainable. It's time to do something more local.

If we can only do things this way, we're doomed.

I couldn't of said it any better.

To me the laws are equivalent to the Bible.

Like the Bible, the law may say homosexuality and sodomy is unlawful and against human nature but it doesn't make it so.

That's how it is now with the state. If somebody with more firepower and force than the current government comes along, then I am just as screwed.

There is nothing sacred or special about the government. They are just regular people like you and I who happen to be the highest power or the biggest gun, if you will. They are not wise, incorruptible nor virtuous. They are not God.

The point is there will be always a bigger gun. You might as well arm everybody and make local communities the biggest guns around.

Alright, I am going to hang a "No Trespassing" sign right here, saying the governmnet recognizes this as my property.

Moments later I am shot, my wife gets raped and all of my stuff is stolen.

What now?

The state tries to find the perpetrators and say it's illegal but I am fucking dead.

Hawker, the laws are worthless when it comes to sustaining my "rights". My rights are not even guaranteed nor do they truly exist with a state.

Law books are just bounded pieces of paper in the end.

Private property and "laws" only exist when they are fully enforceable. Otherwise, you just have pure religious dogma.

A law or right that cannot be enforced is nothing to me or anybody who wishes to disobey them.

In Texas, if somebody tries to trespass on my property or steal from me, I can shoot them. Castle Doctrine.

Is this not private property without a state?

If I try to steal a farmer's cattle, I will be likely shot before I can get away. Again, is this not private property without using a state?

If an armed woman is about to be raped but she shoots the rapist, was it only her that protected her right to herself?

The state isn't here to personally protect our persons. We can only take action towards that. The only thing enforcing our right to ourselves is our own means. Easily, people can come in hurt us through their own freewill. The state guarantees nothing against that except after the damage has been done.

It seems only the individual and their own private means can sustain the right to themselves and guarantee it.

The fact is the technology exists today for the individual to sufficiently protect their own property and themselves without a monopoly on force. We don't need governments to protect us.

The incentive for people to overpower many security-enabled citizens is absurdly low. Even today, most households are far from fortresses, police hardly monitor them constantly and they are still safe. They can only be better off with an alternative system that competes to meet their desires.

For instance, insurance coverage alone can easily provide enough incentive to keep criminals off the streets. Sure, you have freeriders that won't buy insurance but their property won't be covered from loss and damage.

Again, the state is irrelevant in this day and age.

How often do you think stolen property is recovered? Do you see the police constantly guarding your property?

Who do you we usually rely on for such things? Private security. Private investigation. Our own security cameras and security measures.

The state does very little for us when it comes to these things. Private insurance is the only thing we can sufficiently use to cover loss and the contracts are enforced on the basis that the parties involved will be out of business and worse off otherwise.

The state plays a very small role in all of this and when we need them most, they pool up cases of abuse and outright war against innocent people.

The good things we have such as an increased lifespan and a lower crime rate are mostly due to individuals voluntarily improving things through their own businesses and desires aka capitalism.

Also: http://www.reddit.com/r/Bad_Cop_No_Donut/

The state does not paint an alternate reality. It only fools its subjects into thinking so. The state fails at upholding ownership everyday.

Ownership and possession is the same according to you because the state will be just as poor as me defending my own property, at least in the US.

The courts are overpriced and bureaucratic. The police here have no obligation to serve according to the supreme court.

My firearms and my defenses can only be more powerful and of higher quality than what the state has to offer.

Hawker, if it is in my possession, it is my right. If I can commit the act, it is my right to do so. If I can sustain the possession, the ability or whatever it may be, it is my right. If I can do all of the former without a state, they are still my rights.

I do not need a state to maintain my rights as long as I have the might to do so myself and through my own virtue. Remember, might is what entails rights. It is my strength and my abilities that entail my rights. There is nothing more to this. A state guarantee is mere happenstance and could be argued as a ability of my own virtue: the rights are given to me out of my value to the institution.

To say otherwise is purely religious.

For instance, if a state won't care for you, if you can't feed yourself, clothe yourself or shelter yourself, none of these things are your rights. The UN can declare you are entitled to such things but that means nothing, for you have nothing but whatever strength and virtue you currently possess.

As the primitive men before you, you will only be able to attain these things through your own might.

But let the individual man lay claim to ever so many rights because Man or the concept man ‘entitles’ him to them, because his being man does it: what do I care for his right and his claim? If he has his right only from Man and does not have it from me, then for me he has no right. His life, for example, counts to me only for what it is worth to me. I respect neither a so-called right of property (or his claim to tangible goods) nor yet his right to the ‘sanctuary of his inner nature’ (or his right to have the spiritual goods and divinities, his gods, remain un-aggrieved). His goods, the sensuous as well as the spiritual, are mine, and I dispose of them as proprietor, in the measure of my — might.

- Max Stirner

Only when a powerful man such as Eric Schmidt and his company notices the innovation that is Bitcoin but avoids it because of legal pedantry, do you know that this is the future.

This should be setting a positive precedent going forward. I am predicting steady gains over the long-term and gains in the short-term.

...and that's enough internet for today.

Yep, I've gone off the deep end. I just dated a single mom with two children. Women that aren't 10 years older than me seem like children to me.

I'm not going back aren't I?

The president can appoint whoever they want to the fed. That can affect the world. That can affect currency policy everywhere.