Kevin Carson in CounterPunch.
Tag Archives | Conflation Debate
Way Long Gone, Part 2
Greetings from Lancaster NH, where I have wifi internet access but no cellphone signal. PorcFest is great fun so far – it’s like Woodstock for rational people. Seeing lots of old friends. Beautiful countryside also; nice to be in this neck of the woods again. There’s a C4SS/ALL table where the literature looks vaguely familiar. I’ve given a couple of talks already and have more coming up.
Free Talk Live, a Keene-based libertarian radio show, is broadcasting from PorcFest all week. They interviewed me last night; you can listen here. My bit starts around 23:24.
Are You Being Served?
Steven Cohen is terribly exercised over the “attack on public service.” At C4SS, David D’Amato and Kevin Carson respond.
Why Neither “Libertarian” Nor “Left” Values Can Be Achieved By Working Within the Political Establishment
Anna Morgenstern writes:
Let’s first examine the favorite whipping boy of many people, “libertarianism.” The problem, as some of the more clever leftoids have argued, is that the ruling class will look through this laundry list and throw their weight behind the parts of it that strengthen their position, and discard the rest, thus making libertarianism into a less aggressively socially conservative form of conservatism.
“Lower taxes?”
Sure, let’s lower taxes for the rich.“Less regulation?”
Well, let’s remove the regulations that counteract corporate power, but not the other ones (see: Enron).“Legalize drugs?”
No friggin’ way, chief.But what’s not clearly understood is that this is also true for “liberalism” and so-called “social democracy” or “democratic socialism” or what have you. Modern American “liberalism” is simply Mass Corporatism on steroids.
(Read the celý piroh.)
Laugh Line of the Week
“We are only inches away from ceasing to be a free-market economy.” – Mitt Romney
Well, There’s Spam, Egg, Sausage, and Spam; That’s Not Got MUCH Spam In It
Kevin Carson, in the new Freeman, on European “socialism” versus American “capitalism”:
[S]ocial democracy treats privilege as normal and leaves it intact – then regulates it to make it bearable to the subordinate classes without altering its fundamental nature as privilege. But most of the positive aspects of the European model simply duplicate what could be achieved by dismantling privilege altogether.
(Celý piroh.)
In the same issue, see John Blundell on the Grimké sisters and Stephan Kinsella on IP. There’s other good stuff too.