Well, he endorses an anarchist novel, anyway.
"Austro" as in Rothbard and Wittgenstein, "Athenian" as in Aristotle and smashing-the-plutocracy.
About Roderick T. Long
The Empirical Me
I’m Roderick T. Long, Professor of Philosophy at Auburn University. I’m an Aristotelean/Wittgensteinian in philosophy and a left-libertarian market anarchist in social theory. (More about me here.) This blog, Austro-Athenian Empire, is a continuation of my earlier blog, archived here.
I saw that back when you posted about the novel, but I wasn’t sure if anyone here would be interested. I’m telling you, I wouldn’t be surprised if Ron Paul admits to being an anarchist when he retires. (Of course, I wouldn’t be surprised if he doesn’t do that, either.)
I’d seen the page, but hadn’t noticed the Paul quote until today.
One of his chief arguments for immigration controls has been “you have to have them unless you’re an anarchist,” so I dunno ….
Coming from Ron Paul, that could be seen as a nod to libertarian anarchists. He’s done that kind of thing before (e.g., he’s pointed out that some anarchists went to his rallies), as opposed to a typical politician who just uses “anarchist” as an insult.
BTW, on the topic of immigration, I mentioned that Ron Paul would support a much more open immigration policy in this comments thread. I should say that state immigration policies are of course not libertarian, but Paul’s position doesn’t sound quite as bad as some of us have said…
Okay, but how do you explain this soundbite? –
It’s not clear to me if this fictional Ron Paul has considered the possibility that all kittens are anarchists!
Since cats have nine lives, even if all kittens are anarchists, once you kill all the anarchists you’d still have to kill the kittens eight more times.
Those comments were attributed to an overly tight necktie.
“Starting with the anarchists, next the kittens, and so on in that fashion…”
I’m glad Futurama is coming back
“Since cats have nine lives, even if all kittens are anarchists, once you kill all the anarchists you’d still have to kill the kittens eight more times.”
That implies that one begins with kittens who are all in their first life, which is statistically unlikely.
It goes without saying that all kittens are anarchists. All kittens are cats, and if you’ve ever tried to tell a cat what to do you know that cats reject all systems of authority and assert their total freedom in all things, including their sovereign right to torture their prey for fun. OK, so it’s a somewhat Sadean anarchism….
I love cats.
It only counts as a true kitten if it’s in its first life. Otherwise its true age is too old for it to be a kitten.
A kitten could fall off the bed and break its neck, get eaten by a vacuum cleaner, and munch on rat poison, all within the first week of its existence. It would therefore be on its fourth life, but indisputably still a kitten.
But not a very smart kitten.
You’re forgetting the thousand years between cat incarnations.
Well probably kittens could be seen as Stirnerite “anarchists”, that’s why Mirror Ron Paul made the distinction. He was pointing out that you have to get rid of the deontological anarchists first, because they’re the bigger threat.
Please cite precedent
Please cite precedent
Consult the Sacred Scroll of Mi-Yao.
http://www.google.com/#hl=en&q=%22Scroll+of+Mi-Yao%22&aq=f&oq=&aqi=&fp=Qmi82AtOO98
Of course you are right. To suggest otherwise would be to seek to win a frivolous argument, an my intuition of the aesthetic logos suggests this is against the Rules.
An Anarchist novel sure, but a silly agorist novel whose belief in the superiority of agorist methods over the State stretches disbelief to its utmost.
Damn, that is exactly what I was afraid of, see http://aaeblog.com/2009/06/15/maybe-tanstaafl-but-tisataafb/comment-page-1/#comment-351885
stretches disbelief to its utmost
I think you mean “stretches belief”?
In any case, what did you object to specifically?
He doesn’t need a target of objection, he’s Franc.
Bingo.
Did you create the kitten picture yourself?
Come out as an anarchist?? I doubt it. At least not as an advocate of so-called State’s Rights.
We know he reads Rothbard.
Francois – “silly”? perhaps so, but it inspired me and who knows how many others to move beyond the (relatively) safe politics of libertarianism into the wilds of anarchism and agorist theory.
I certainly think it’s not the worst introduction a young person can get.
(I was in my early 20s when I read it)
I’ve been watching Ron’s career since 1980 and what I think it all comes down to is that he’s all about economics and monetary policy, from an Austrian perspective, seeing this as foundational to civilization. Everything he has done has pointed towards a goal of being able to return the United States to a gold standard.
That means if he can get elected to Congress, he does that. If he has to play footsie with racists and Know-Nothings, he does that. (I think his anti-abortion position is genuine, but that’s a useful coincidence which helps him get elected in South Texas.) If he thinks that endorsing an agorist novel, which promotes not just anarcho-capitalism but ATBC, he’ll do that.
Which makes me wonder if I can get him to endorse ESCAPE FROM TERRA.
Dang, that last post wasn’t very coherent.
What I meant to say is, if Paul thinks endorsing an agorist, pro ATBC (or ABCT or whatever) adventure novel will win some more converts to the theory at the margin, he’ll provide an endorsement.