How little government is small enough?

kilgore forelle: Government is disorder and unfair advantage. Government is oligarchy -- the accumulation of power and wealth to a few. The market can do order and fairness better.

How do you explain the fact that 99.44% of us can proceed daily without knowing any of the intricacies of government. But you say government protects us from the ill-intentioned ones? There are 1000s of incidents every day in which the ill-intentioned ones escape the notice of government altogether. You are protected only by the probability that no harm will come to you as a result of how you organize your own life.

Since the government can only protect you after the fact, we have a word for those protected by the government -- victim.


pangloss: kf, that implies that no one is discouraged from partaking in predatory commerce despite laws prohibiting. To take that idea to its logical conclusion we would say that no laws have a deterrent effect...no?

I would argue that without govt and without laws and law enforcement there would be more "victims" on the order of magnitudes.

kilgore forelle: Argue that if you like. Predators just get less scrupulous lawyers and prevaricating accountants.

If what I said about oligarchy were not true then government would be fine.

We'll probably never know who's right since we are more and more in the global clutches of oligarchists, but historical evidence of anarchy shows cooperation and fewer victims. Read the links.

An optimal number of laws will have an optimal effect. Nobody passed new laws faster than the bolsheviki, except perhaps the brits during their 4 century rape of ireland, or maybe paul bremer as emperor of the coalition provisional authority. (Tip -- if you're not gonna be an authoritarian, don't put 'authority' in your name!)

Deterrence sucks. See britney spears, lindsey lohan, paris hilton, nicole richie, michael "let's make a deal" vick, george bush, o j simpson, saddam hussein, bill clinton, osama bin ladin, larry craig, william jefferson, . . . ad nauseum.

• Peter T Leeson
  
• Wikipedia on the Social Ecological Model
  
• Amos H Hawley

Pavarotti -- RIP

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David Gilmour



Alfredo Kraus

I believe I hear him still.