Reader Mail #7a - Screwed Over by the State

In Student Tasered at John Kerry Speech, two anonymous readers said:

It was shocking the way they treated that kid.

I'm sure the student was shocked that those cops would do that to him.

That's enough puns for now. Twice in one post is sufficient.

In Reader Mail #7, redpillguy writes:

On "I was just following orders", in the book "The Science of Good and Evil", author Michael Shermer tries to explain the human psychology of how individuals can do things that are morally repugnant. The "I was just following orders" reasoning moves the individual 1 step away from the act; the exact same psychology is at play when the SS officer commanded soldiers to turn the gas on in the gas chamber. They feel removed from the act.

Here is the psychology in action: You are standing on a train platform. You see a runaway train that is about to kill 20 people. You can save them, by throwing a switch, but 1 person will be sacrificed. Most people will say "yes" to throwing the switch. Now, if instead of the switch, you have to PUSH the 1 person onto the tracks, to save the 20. Suddenly the act is much more difficult. You are far less removed from the action of killing that 1 person.

I touched on this book in my post The Pie is as Big as We Want It To Be.

I haven't read that book. Lately, I've only been reading things that are available for free on the Internet. I think that amateur authors tend to have better stuff than "professional" writers. Someone who is writing for a paycheck has to pander to the least common denominator, to insure sufficient sales. I'm interested in reading what the people in the top 0.01%-1% are writing, and they aren't able to profitably write for a mass audience.

The current economic and political system ensures that the details are fully abstracted away from the people who do bad things. Consider the example of someone who refuses to pay income taxes. Politicians pass laws requiring people to pay taxes. A person working at the IRS notices a problem. An attorney prosecutes the person for paying taxes. A judge supervises the trial. The policemen are just following the judge's orders. The jury usually does what the judge and prosecutor tell them. Prison guards manage the person while he is in prison. The responsibility is diluted among so many people that bad things happen without anyone feeling accountable. The weakest link in the chain is policemen. If they refused to obey the judge's illegal orders, the red market would have no power. Unfortunately, policemen are trained to blindly follow orders without questioning them. About 95% of the time, this is good advice for the policemen. That makes it easier for them to do bad things once in a while.

Consider The Subprime Mortgage Lending Scam. The people who work for the Federal Reserve aren't responsible for The Compound Interest Paradox. The people who work at the Federal Reserve aren't aware of the corrupt nature of the monetary system. They are doing the best they can, given the constraint of working under a corrupt monetary system. If someone was smart enough to understand The Compound Interest Paradox, they wouldn't be selected to work at the Federal Reserve. The banks are doing the best they can to earn a profit. If they didn't issue mortgages, one of their competitors would. The banks need to foreclose, because they have to look after their own balance sheet. The judges and policemen who confiscate your house are just doing their jobs. They aren't aware of the unjust nature of the monetary system and The Compound Interest Paradox. They don't understand that a certain number of bankruptcies are a statistical necessity built into the economic system.

The principle of the current economic and political system is one where nobody specific gets blamed whenever something bad happens. The responsibility is diluted, and no single person is every fully accountable. For serious red market offenses, someone specific is blamed but the underlying problem is ignored or exacerbated.

In the agorist economy, most businesses will be relatively small. Without limited liability corporations, there's a natural limit to the size of a business. Whenever something bad happens, a specific person will almost always be clearly responsible. Losses due to natural disasters, such as hurricanes, can always be insured for the right price. Losses due to incompetence or theft would not be insurable. In the current economic and political system, the red market provides insurance in cases of incompetence or theft.

In Reader Mail #6a - Media Bias and Anarchy, an anonymous reader says:

The Christian teaching of human depravity is actually an argument against centralized power.

That isn't exactly true.

Christianity teaches that people are intrinsically evil, BUT priests have a special property that they are not evil. At a minimum, priests are far less evil than the average person.

This is the second side to the main lie of Christianity. This is the reason Christianity is such a great religion for slaves. Christianity also teaches that "People in positions of authority are far less evil than the average person." This doesn't just apply to priests. It also applies to politicians, policemen, lawyers, judges, CEOs, and teachers. According to Christianity, the person in the position of authority is there because he is less evil than average.

In practice, the opposite happens. The most evil people are attracted to positions of authority. Positions of authority allow the most evil people to do the most damage. Positions of authority allow the most evil people to steal, while lying to everyone else that they are actually good.

I suspect that an average honest person, put into a position of authority, would become corrupted by the position.

On the Ron Paul Forum, someone said:

In "The Stare Decisis Scam", FSK says that the Supreme Court has ruled that defense attorneys may not remind jurors of their jury nullification privilege. What is the history of this and the reason?

You could have asked me directly.

The big decision is "Sparf vs U.S.".

Originally, the ruling said that judges are not required to remind juries of their jury nullification privilege. That decision was later interpreted to mean that defense attorneys are BARRED from reminding juries of their jury nullification privilege. I believe this decision was made by lower courts, but the Supreme Court never reviewed or reversed this practice.

I'm not sure if this ruling applies to someone representing themselves. An attorney has to obey the judge's orders, under threat of disbarment. An individual can present this argument with less fear of retribution. The judge could declare a mistrial, but the individual could just make the jury nullification argument again at his next trial.

Overall, the reason for repealing jury nullification is that judges, lawyers, and politicians want to control everyone else. If juries start thinking for themselves about the difference between right and wrong, that could be a serious problem for the bad guys. Jury nullification is a potentially serious problem, because the red market cannot completely eliminate trial by jury without admitting that the USA is now a dictatorship. Biased jury selection methods and the dumbing-down of the population have gone a long way towards repealing jury nullification.

There have been many types of cases where preventing jury nullification is useful:

• In cases where it was a corporation suing an individual, juries were almost always ruling in favor of the individual.
• In the era of prohibition, jury nullification prevented many convictions for possession or sale of alcohol.
• In the civil rights era, juries were nullifying trials where white people were accused of murdering or injuring black people.
• Medical marijuana and possession of marijuana are places where jury nullification could be used.
• Possession of a gun is another place where jury nullification could be used.
• When Dr. Kevorkian was being tried for assisted suicide, jury nullification was an issue in his trials.
  

Of course, there are two big ones that the red market never wants to see:

• Jury nullification in taxation cases.
• Jury nullification in cases where a bank is confiscating someone's home for failing to pay their mortgage.

I believe jury nullification is justified in BOTH instances. Arguing against taxes, especially the income tax, should be obvious. Only slaves pay taxes/tribute.

When a bank writes a mortgage, it is borrowing at the Fed Funds Rate, currently 4.75%, and lending at the mortgage rate, currently 6.5%. The bank does NOTHING to earn its spread of 1.75%, other than its role as a middleman. In order for a loan to be a binding contract, something of TANGIBLE value must be provided. Since Federal Reserve Points are intrinsically worthless, mortgage contracts aren't really binding. Something of tangible value is held as collateral, a house, but nothing of tangible value is provided in exchange. Zero-interest contracts aren't valid. A zero-interest contract is a contract where one party doesn't provide anything tangible to the counter-party.

However, I say that voting or trial by jury have no legitimacy whatsoever. Why do 12 people, chosen using biased methods, have a right to deny me freedom or take my property, even if I haven't injured anyone?

In Did the USA Declare Bankruptcy, an anonymous reader writes:

It's "martial" law, not "marshal". Keep your blogs coming. I wish more people had your understanding.

I looked around, and the "marshal law" typo is reproduced elsewhere.

It could be more accurately described as "'whatever the judge feels like it' law" or "'whoever has the most guns' law".

I've been considering ways to spread my message to more people. I've been thinking of creating a standup comedy act based on my blog.

On the Ron Paul Forum, someone asked:

What is the purpose of government?

Superficially, the purpose of government is to maintain the power and wealth of the upper class. The purpose of government is to enslave the poor and middle class with an unfair monetary system, an unfair taxation system, an unfair political system, and excessive government regulations.

Government was designed to keep people from destroying themselves and their planet, until a certain level of sophistication is reached. Now, it's time to take off the training wheels and get rid of government. The UFO conspiracy theorists are partially wrong. There isn't a government conspiracy to hide aliens from the general public. Government itself is an alien conspiracy! Fnord!