Instead of Fighting, Libertarians and Communists Should Be Working Together

Table of Contents

1. Introduction
2. Misconceptions
     I. Markets and Monopolies

     II. The State and Centralism

     III. Economics

     IV. Politics
     V. Environment and Borders

     VI. Self-Regulation of Firms

3. Conclusion

Content

1. Introduction

     Why are libertarians and communists fighting each other instead of working together?

     Karl Marx said that "the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all". These are not words which you might expect would come out of the mouth of a communist. The quote seems to imply that the collective has a duty to satisfy the individual's needs, and perhaps even his wants. But Marx did say it (in Chapter 2 of The Communist Manifesto).
     It's easy to imagine why individualist anarchist Max Stirner might have agreed with this sentiment. After all, Stirner said "If it is said socialistically, society gives me what I require - then the egoist says, I take what I require."
     Despite Stirner's association with the mostly left-wing Young Hegelians, he has become somewhat of a hero to anarcho-capitalists (possibly owing somewhat to his financially disastrous ownership of a milk shop).
     Marx's pro-individualist statement, and Stirner's popularity among right-libertarians, should cause us to wonder whether libertarians and communists can get along after all, and whether their relationship can be salvaged, and their differences resolved.
     I believe that they can. But first, students of these schools of thought must continue their education, increase their level of discourse with rival schools, and resolve and clarify long-standing misconceptions about the supposed irreconcilability of libertarian and communist thinking on economic and political matters.

2. Misconceptions

     Among those misconceptions are the following.

I. Markets and Monopolies

     Communists shouldn't worry about truly free markets.

     Free markets don't have to result in super-profits or monopolies. The rewards of competition are only permanent when there is a monopoly on the recognition of legitimate property claims (i.e., a state). When the state registers property claims, it promises the legitimate use of force against people who contest other people's property claims. Otherwise, the rewards for competition are permanent and markets are free, all resources would be capable of being competed for, and contested.

     Unnatural monopolies cannot be sustained without willingness to use violence. Without the use of the state as a violent tool of repression, the private sector would have to protect itself, and work to support itself and maintain its own properties. Instead, the private sector colludes with the state to subtly deprive and impoverish people into being "willing" to perform that labor for reduced wages.

     But this "will" is not truly voluntary; it is acceding and begrudging acceptance, when enthusiastic consent should be the standard. Make no mistake, libertarians: wage-theft and wage-slavery are real, and the augmentation of the economic pressure felt by the poor is undeniably coercive - and therefore in violation of the Non-Aggression Principle - because it is being done with the help of the state.

     But not all private-sector entities reap profits. The non-profit sector, and workers' cooperatives, do not reap profits, are largely outside the realms of both the public state sector and the for-profit private sector. Non-profits and workers' cooperatives are thus "private" in the sense that they are not state actors, but they could also be described as not private, but only to the extent that "private" implies being in business for profit (which it does not necessarily imply).



II. The State and Centralism

     Lenin clarified in The State and Revolution that Engels was more consistent than Marx about wanting community control rather than state control. Marxists do oppose the state, at least as we now know it (i.e., the bourgeois-controlled ultra-nationalist state). The "state" which the Marxists and Leninists support - and want to replace the current state, and then gradually wither away after revolution - is arguably not a state at all, since it would be comprised of the masses of people acting in voluntary cooperation with one another. This "proletarian state" - a state of affairs in which the people have the power and proliferate freely without fear that their children will become slaves - could hardly be described as either a state, or as any sort of monopoly.

     So communists and libertarians both oppose the state, and centralization, and fascism. Moreover, Lenin also let people trade in markets temporarily during economic crises (i.e., Lenin's New Economic Policy of 1922). Libertarians and communists both support decentralization, as well as geographical political autonomy. The voluntary building of intentional communities, and their secession from larger units of government, therefore furthers both libertarian and communist goals.

III. Economics

     Redistribution doesn't have to be done by the state, and it doesn't have to harm workers or the poor. Redistribution can and should be done through the community, whether it expresses itself as a public sector entity or market entity. But only the ill-gotten wealth of government contractors and artificial monopolies - and what has been legally or illegally stolen from the public or the commons - should be redistributed back to the people.

     Both the communist and libertarian schools of thought are equally tolerant of libertarian Marxism, Murray Bookchin's libertarian communalism, Georgism, geo-libertarianism, Mutualism, voluntary syndicalism, physiocracy, left-wing market-anarchism, platformist anarchism, free-market anti-capitalism, and post-scarcity economics. The Alliance of the Libertarian Left, must take shape, but also heed criticism coming from the libertarian right; while the right heeds the criticism of the Left.

IV. Politics

     Austrian economics and Austromarxism should be taught side by side, because total freedom of choice includes political and economic freedom. Also, market-anarchists like Molinari and Marxist Otto Bauer both promoted panarchism, the freedom to choose your political association without changing your location.

     Libertarians and far-leftists should talk about how the Constitution can be amended. If that doesn't happen, then leftists will scream demands to vote away everyone's right to have guns and private health insurance, without caring whether it's even legal to "force the vote" on a given topic in the first place. Until leftists receive constitutional education from the libertarian right, permanent national reform on health, retirement, education, environment, land management, housing, and energy will be all but impossible.

V. Environment and Borders

     Once libertarians and communists educate one another, they should support the abolition of states and the U.S. Senate, and their replacement with bioregionalist states (such as Cascadia). This will reduce competition over water resources and water regulation, and reduce the need for (and expense involved in maintaining) artificial borders.

     This will in turn reduce interruptions in the flow of commerce, making goods less expensive. A Georgist or Mutualist economy will also drastically reduce taxes on income and sales, decreasing prices even further. Automation, overproduction, and cessation of government hoarding of land and resources, will accelerate this process. Carl Menger’s writing on how abundance results in low prices, makes him essential reading for both left-libertarians and students of Austrian economics.

VI. Self-Regulation of Firms

     “Free market” does not have to mean “not regulated at all”. Consumers are not being allowed to do their part to help keep the markets free, because consumers are not fully free to boycott without government permission.
     Markets regulated through consumers' freedom to refuse to buy a product, would regulate monopolies out of existence, especially in the absence of a state. We currently don't have the freedom to refuse to buy some products, though (namely, identification, and everything that the government bails out and subsidizes, like health insurance).
     This means that our right to boycott is being inhibited unfairly, through the threat of violent enforcement of the law (i.e., of the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947), and through the process of taxation and subsidization (i.e., extorting working people for money, and handing their income over to companies they might wish to withhold their money from).
     This must end; Taft-Hartley must be repealed, and subsidies to all for-profit agencies (and possibly some non-profit agencies as well) should cease as soon as possible.
     Self-regulation exists as well; for example, in the form of voluntary recalls.

     The libertarians want society and the economy to be self-regulated, and they want firms to be self-regulating too, if possible. Is that so absurd, communists? When you believe workers' cooperatives can manage themselves just the same?

     Socializing workplaces without the help of the state, and organizing large numbers of individuals to unionize together into a union of private contractors - while demanding the repeal of the Taft-Hartley Act, and insisting on the irrelevance of the National Labor Relations Board in permitting or denying strikes - would drastically increase union participation, and recognize the right to boycott again, but without empowering the state. Additionally, it would achieve mass ownership of the means of production which would be held by collectives and cooperatives, while at the same time, that ownership could also be described as "private" (in the sense that those means would not be state-owned).




3. Conclusion

     Without the state, markets would be free from monopolies, and the commons would not be eroded by the public sector inviting-in statism, monopoly, and hoarding of natural resources by "public" politicians and bureaucrats secretly serving private interests which are a mix of their own and their cronies and beneficiaries. Less state interference in society, the market, and the environment will result in a clearer separation of the public and private sectors, and in the growth of additional sectors of which most people are scarcely aware (i.e., the commons, the club sector, and the voluntary / charity / third sector).

     While the Georgists say "Tax land, not man" and "Tax bads, not goods", Lenin's advice is to regulate goods but not people. Although this may seem like the opposite of Georgism, it at least fulfills the libertarians' desire that society go unregulated by external means. And despite these little differences, at least now, we can all agree that something must be taxed and regulated less, but that the centralized state shouldn't do it. We just can't exactly agree on which things should be taxed and regulated less.

     Once society and economic production become uncontrolled by violent state monopolies, "external political governance" (as Lenin put it) will become unnecessary.

     This "withering away of the state" should be our long-term goal, after an era of political upheaval which can either be described as revolutionary, or at least drastic and radical in its degree of reform. Such reform must wholly abolish the monopolistic, territorial, and violent nature of the governing bodies, however, in order to be said to have truly achieved the abolition of the state (inasmuch as it is a local monopoly on the legitimate use of force).

     Disarming and demilitarizing the police (or at least empowering the people to defend themselves and police their own communities in some manner) - in addition to decentralizing political organization, ending unnatural and artificial borders, and ending or reforming illegitimate state governments - will do wonders to start us on the path of abolishing the most egregious abuses which are characteristic of the modern bourgeois nation-state.

     But all of this is only possible - according to the beliefs of both libertarians and communists - once the people become educated enough to regulate themselves and make wiser decisions. We need political, economic, social, and productive technical education. Free development of the individual and the community - and the free development and exchange of libertarian and communist thought - are impossible without them.

Written on April 27th, 2021

Originally posted to the Facebook group
"Communists vs. Libertarians Debate Group"
on April 27th, 2021

Edited and Expanded on April 28th and 30th, 2021

Strategy Going Forward Regarding the Presidency and the National Government

      The U.S. Capitol building has finally been breached by civilians. This comes after very disappointing showings for minor parties in the 2020 elections, as compared to previous elections.

     And after two consecutive presidential elections in which the two nominees of the major political parties could be described as the two most hated people in politics, maybe even in the entire country. And that all came after decades upon decades of abuse of the Constitution and the people, by the two major parties, and the president, and the Congress, while the Supreme Court lets it all fly.

     How did things get so bad? And where do we go from here? Perhaps most importantly, why aren't  more people calling for the abolition of the presidency, the two major parties, and/or the national government altogether?

     Think about Switzerland for a moment. Switzerland is currently headed by a Federal Council of seven members, one of whom has the title of President of Switzerland or President of the Swiss Confederation. However, that position is regarded as "first among equals", and has no powers over the other six members of the Federal Council.

     So why can't a country with such a strong anti-monarchy history as ours, and similar values to that of Switzerland (namely, limited government, and, before World War I, neutrality) manage to do something about the unlimited power of the unitary executive?

     One way is to elect a Congress that will stop handing over its authorities - and handing over the people's freedoms and property - to the executive branch, without cause. But this article will focus on another way; directly amending the constitutional processes regarding the way the president is elected, and the way the Congress is composed (that is, constituted).

     If there's any chance at getting a reasonable president – one who's not a tool of either of the major parties, and one who's neither a child molester nor a racist, nor someone who gasses protesters and immigrants – then that person will have to either be an independent, or else represent minor parties.

     Or, if not that, then they must appear to do both. [Note: As an example, Jesse Ventura was nominated by the Green Party of Alaska, while remaining more or less an independent, by refraining from actively campaigning.]

     Howie Hawkins controversially gained the Green Party's nomination after receiving the nomination of the Socialist Workers' Party. This was a problem for many Green Party supporters, especially supporters of Dario Hunter, because the Green Party's nomination of Howie Hawkins actually violated the Green Party's bylaws, because a person who has already been nominated by another party cannot run as a Green.

     This is why it is important to not only find a viable candidate, not representing either of the two major parties, to become president; but also to find a way for that person to be nominated by two or more minor parties. That can only be achieved through minor parties working together as much as the law will allow them to, and through working together to eliminate and reduce the barriers to ballot access.

     I believe that that is one of the few ways a minor party candidate could get enough public attention to win the White House.

     There are probably very few ways left, for a reasonable, stable, or even somewhat limited government – with limited powers of the executive branch – to replace the current state of tyranny. That is why I want to encourage minor parties (commonly referred to as “third parties”) to talk to each other, and to have an exchange of ideas.

     I believe that the Green Party and the Libertarian Party, for example, have a lot more in common than most of us have been led to believe. They both support non-violence and decentralization, and responsibility, and they both oppose unfunded wars.

     [Note: I have commented before, in greater detail, regarding what the Greens and Libertarians have in common. That information can be viewed in the infographic which I published in October 2020, which is available at the following link: http://aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2020/10/what-do-green-party-and-libertarian.html]

     That is a huge start right there, in addition to their mutual support of changes to election laws which would be helpful to parties which are struggling to grow.

     One electoral strategy in third party politics which may prove helpful, would be to urge members of one small party to visit the meetings of another, or maybe even multiple other parties (if there are that many parties active in your county, that is). Once small parties' members are visiting each other's meetings, they will begin to notice what they have in common.

     The most easily noticeable factors will, of course, be their mutual disdain of the Democratic and Republican parties, and of the laws which they have set up- especially the election laws – and the history of their attempts to exclude third parties from the ballot with or without just cause.

     Minor parties should work together as much as they legally can. This varies state by state, so each small party's state chapters should do whatever they can to make sure that their members know whether they will encounter legal barriers to collecting signatures for candidates running for the nominations of more than just a single party. Small parties should also continue to work with each other to file lawsuits challenging mutual obstacles to their ballot access.

     Another strategy which might be effective, would unfortunately require all but one small parties to be humble. This strategy consists of having each party in a coalition, change its bylaws to not only allow the nomination of a presidential candidate whom has already been nominated by another party in the same election, but to go further, and all nominate the same candidate. For example, the Green Party, the various socialist parties, and the other minor parties, would nominate Jo Jorgensen, the nominee of the Libertarian Party in 2020.

     If that were legal, and it happened, then most or all supporters of third parties, would vote for the third party presidential nominee who is either: 1) the most popular by sheer number of supporters; 2) the candidate capable of receiving the nomination from the highest number of minor parties; and/or 3) the third party presidential nominee who seems most determined to improve conditions for minor parties, their members, and independent and disenfranchised voters.

     This suggestion may seem unfair to all small parties except the most successful in a given election, but I will stress again that this should only be done after the parties' bylaws are changed via the properly prescribed processes. Additionally, I am only advocating that this coordination be done for the presidential and vice-presidential ticket. I would not expect state chapters of minor parties to nominate slates of candidates for state-level positions, only to urge their members to vote for the nominees of another party.

     What I am saying is that the minor parties should combine their efforts on the national level – and behave more like a single party, only on the national level – for the sake of efficiency. But at the same time, they should continue competing, as much as they please, for control over their respective states. I say this, in part, because the Constitution (i.e., the 10^th Amendment) is designed to allow states to be somewhat different from one another, while the national government is more likely to settle near the political middle. So it would not take too much fundamental change to the law for this strategy to work.

     I think of the Green Party as “radical progressives”; ones whom are less likely to disappoint us than factions of the corrupt Democratic Party, such as the Progressive Caucus, the Justice Democrats, and the Democratic Socialists of America (D.S.A.). That's why what the Greens and Libertarians have in common, should serve as a solid foundation, going forward, to build the “Progressive-Libertarian Alliance”, for which I and others have been calling for going on 14 years now.

     [Note: I have written about the Progressive-Libertarian Alliance previously; for example, in the following articles on social libertarianism, health insurance policy and free markets:

     http://aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2011/01/what-is-social-libertarianism.html

     http://aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2018/08/crafting-health-insurance-law.html

     http://aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2019/11/critique-of-idea-that-we-have-free.html]

     I believe that building this alliance, and increasing communication and collaboration between small parties, will do wonders to help achieve the type of alliance against fascism and endless unfunded war, which the people of the United States (whether on the left or on the right) so sorely need.

     Coordinated minor party strategy, going forward, should include information-sharing regarding which states will allow protest votes in the Electoral College in the next presidential election. This will help officials and delegates of the state chapters of minor parties be prepared to tell voters in the state that their electors are either bound or unbound. Few people seemed to notice that six electoral college votes were cast in 2016 for candidates other than Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. The fact that nearly half the states do not punish protest votes, could be a strategy to win the presidency. It would require an enormous level of coordination, however, and it would also face a lot of criticism by Democrats and other people supporting the principle of “one man, one vote”.

     Minor party strategy should also include additional proposals to make elections fairer and more inclusive while making it easier for a third party presidential nominee to win the Electoral College. Additionally, strategy should include changes to the national government; especially those which could affect or change the way presidential elections are run, in a way that benefits parties which have historically been excluded from the process.

     While Maine and Nebraska remain the only states which use proportional allocation of their electors, more than a dozen states still allow protest votes. Also, many majority-Democratic states have joined the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, joining which obligates a state legislature to pledge all of its electors to whomever won the popular vote for president in that state. So in a way, the states are drifting apart when it comes to whether the popular vote is what matters most in a presidential election.

     Fortunately, however, there is a way to resolve this: Add more states. In 2020, Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang published an infographic to his website which stated that his position on states' rights is to add more states. The reason why adding more states could help, is because it could reduce conflict between states who allocate their electors differently. If the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico became states, for example, then there would be four new U.S. Senators, most of them probably from the Democratic Party. But the addition of those states could potentially stand to benefit Republicans and right-wingers in a way, too; because more states would mean more state governors, and (potentially) more state sovereignty over issues not explicitly delegated to the national government.

     And, of course, any and all new states would be free to join, or not join, the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact. So the addition of more states, in principle, would not necessarily benefit one party or another (even though, as the facts of history stand right now, it would benefit the Democratic Party more than the Republicans, at least in the short term).

     Considering that the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, Guam, and the U.S. Virgin Islands, all have populations of more than 60,000 inhabitants, these commonwealths and territories should all remain free to hold referenda regarding whether they would like to become the 51^st, 52^nd states, etc..

     As per the Constitution's provisions, until the 2020 Census shows us whether American Samoa and/or the Northern Mariana Islands have surpassed 60,000 inhabitants, those aforementioned four territories are all free to join the Union, while the other territories with smaller populations are not. But even if those four places became states, that would still leave about a million Americans without representation in either the House, the Senate, or the Electoral College (although several territories do have primaries).

     This is why I believe that a constitutional amendment should be passed, which would allow special accommodations to be made in the Constitution, which will allow all Americans not represented by a state, to band together as a single state, for the purposes of representation in the Senate and House. Perhaps the “state” could be called “Outlying Territories” and abbreviated “O.L.”, and have its own star on the flag. Perhaps not.

     In all likelihood, creating five new states and achieving representation for the outlying territories, would most likely result in the two senators and one or two representatives from that jurisdiction, being ethnically Samoan or from the Northern Mariana Islands. It's also likely that, from time to time, one would be white, while the other are Micronesian.

     If you're asking “Who cares about American Samoa?”, then instead, you should be asking “Why do people in American Samoa pay taxes, but don't get represented in Congress? Isn't that taxation without representation? Didn't the Founders fight the American Revolution to get rid of taxation without representation?”

     This is not just about Samoa. This is about all Americans living outside the protection of states, of whom there are nearly five million. Americans living in all jurisdictions deserve congressional representation if they want it.

     And we should keep in mind that most proposed changes to the number of senators and representatives, would affect the size of the Electoral College. That is why reforms to the Congress and the presidential election process should be considered in tandem with one another.

     As I explained above, minor parties should talk to each other, and see what they have in common. Then, they should draft platforms together, based on what they agree upon.

     As many third parties as are willing, should draft a joint declaration – delivered to the media and to the various state and national Secretary of State's offices - saying that they intend to support reforms to the Congress, and to the presidential election process. Additionally, that they will support more ranked-choice voting; in local, state, and national races alike, and in primaries as well as general elections.

     Additionally, if enough parties can be convinced to support parliamentarism, they should declare that they intend to support changes to the government which will make it resemble a parliamentary system, featuring coalition-building and party-list systems. This would not necessarily require the abolition of the Senate, however; but the abolition of the Senate should remain on the table for consideration.

     If most minor parties agree that curtailing the representation of states to the national government, by abolishing the Senate, is what is necessary to increase the power of the people (as represented by their legislators in the House of Representatives), then they should pursue making the whole Congress into a single people's house, and announce their intention to do so, through legislation or lawsuits or whatever means.

     This is not to say, however, that one and two are the only acceptable numbers of chambers of the national legislature. Americans should consider adding a body of legislators, just as they consider removing the Senate.

     Adding a third house of legislators to the Congress, becomes an especially interesting prospect, when we consider that dual power and bioregionalism could be useful tools in dismantling the violence of the authoritarian and imperialist state.

     Dual power is the use of trustworthy alternative institutions of political representation, to challenge existing political structures while existing alongside them, and to inject competition for legitimacy into politics and law.

     The most famous example is the use of dual power by the Soviets, the workers' councils in the U.S.S.R.. Between February and October 1917, the soviets competed for legitimacy against the Duma, the lower house of the Russian parliament. The Duma, itself, was put together as a sort of dual power organization to try to challenge the absolute sovereignty of the Tsar. Of course, the Duma had little power, and was created with the Tsar's permission (under some pressure from advisors) and while recognizing his absolute power. But the fact that the Duma had little power was why it became necessary to create yet another organ of political representation, in the Soviets. These were councils primarily composed of workers, peasants, and veterans. After Lenin arrived in Russia from Switzerland, he yelled “All power to the Soviets”, and the workers' soviets' competition for legitimacy against the Duma grew ever fiercer. Eventually, the provisional government of Aleksandr Kerensky was overthrown, the Tsar and his family were executed, and and the soviet system took hold.

     Knowing this, it does not take much imagination to think about how a new body of legislators could be added to the national government. One would simply have to be added, without any other body losing its power or being replaced (as the Duma lost its power).

     So imagine, if you will, that both the House and Senate were to continue to exist, while a new chamber of lawmakers – a Chamber of Environmental Legislators - became the third body. I developed this idea after speaking to a farmer named Johnny whom I met in Oregon. Johnny told me that he believed that populations of people are overrepresented in Congress, in comparison to how much the land is being represented (which is not at all). The U.S. senators kind of represent the land, but really they represent the interests of the state's people, since they're popularly elected. Before the 17^th Amendment, senators more or less represented state legislatures more than they represented the states' people. But the point is, the land is unrepresented in Congress, either by the House or by the Senate.

     You might be thinking, “The land isn't represented in Congress because it isn't human.” That's true. But the land is alive. There are entire sections of land area covered by giant mushrooms. Every square inch of soil is covered in living organisms, which could not survive without the soil. Living things and their environments are not separable.

     So why shouldn't the Congress make sure that a body of environmental lawyers have some say in what laws are passed? In my opinion, a body of environmental lawyers - primarily concerned with our ability to live in harmony with nature and survive in good health, and giving less regard to the needs of consumers and industrial producers - should have the ability to vote against, and maybe even veto, any legislation proposed by Congress which could negatively affect our health or the health of the ecology (or both).

     That is why I support the use of dual power and bioregionalism in tandem with one another.

     Bioregionalism would involve the erasure of old borders, and the establishment of new political boundaries where mountain ranges already exist. This turns watersheds and river valleys – the largest natural geographical unit of human civilization – into the new “states”. This arrangement would give each river valley or watershed the ability to fine-tune its legal needs, and its environmental legislation needs, to the scientific facts of the ecology in the area which is unique to that area alone.

     To reject bioregionalism is to say that a central government should be free to trample upon locality's environmental laws without any special or expert knowledge about the physical needs of the people and land which are trying to thrive in that locality. Bioregionalism would give localities – but not the existing states, which are often tyrannical and support pollution – the power to protect the people and the environment, when the central government and the E.P.A. refuse to do so.

     Moreover, bioregionalism and dual power could be pursued at the same time, by saying that the states should be replaced by bioregional governments. Also, by saying that, as a consequence of bioregionalism, U.S. Senators should either be replaced by a body of environmental legislators, representing those bioregionalist “states”; or else that body should be created as a third chamber, while the Senate continues to represent the people who elected them.

     Either way, instituting bioregionalism would almost certainly have to entail fundamental change of the Senate. If each senator represented a new bioregion, for example, we would have to figure out whether it is fair that each watershed – which are different sizes, and have different populations – would have two U.S. Senators. Essentially, without major reform of the Senate, we would have the same electoral problems in the Congress and Electoral College as we do now, but with an extra body. That would make things more complicated, but it would also present an opportunity to sort things out and streamline government to make it simpler.

     [Note: Please click on the following links to learn more about my opinions on, and proposals for, bioregionalism:

     http://aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2014/02/cascadia-proposal.html

     http://aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2019/09/ten-reasons-to-consider-bioregionalism.html]

     Almost needless to say, eliminating unnecessary houses should never be taken off the table.

     But additionally, to compensate for problems that this might cause, a new body of legislators would probably require the reduction of the number of people currently serving as national legislators (535). Unless, of course, you're in the camp that believes that the constitutional provision that each representative have no more than 30,000 constituents, should never have been repealed.

     But that would only be affordable if legislators would agree to be paid a pittance; not just compared to how much congressmen are paid today, but also compared to the average worker. Since it is not likely that lawmakers would accept such a small amount of compensation, perhaps it is best that we (through the Congress) reduce congressional pay to zero, so that the only people left making the law, are the people who genuinely want to engage in public service and do not want to receive anything in return.

     Some argue that paying congressmen nothing could result in more demand for bribes, but that way of thinking just rationalizes and excuses corruption. Congressmen should be compensated based on how well they did; they should be paid according to performance. If they are paid at the beginning of their term, then there is no incentive for them to be on their best behavior, and no punishment for being derelict in their duties.

     The role of “representative” must also be reformed into the role of a delegate; one who votes the way the constituents order him to, as opposed to the way he personally thinks he should vote. In The State and Revolution, Vladimir Lenin promoted the delegate system, saying that all delegates should be subject to recall elections whenever the people demand it. I agree with Lenin on that point.

     Maybe there's a place for both! The House could be composed of delegates, while the Senate would be composed of people voting on their principles; or the other way around. But the crucial thing is that the House and Senate operate differently from one another, and operate independently (as they are now; they are allowed to make their own rules regarding how they will run and conduct their business).

     It is important that they are different, because without this difference, competition for legitimacy might exist, but the contrast between the competitors is not as stark. Where there is no real difference between the legislative bodies which are competing for legitimacy, real dual power is not being used or pursued.

     If the House is composed of delegates, and the Senate is not, then the people should be able to figure out pretty quickly which chamber is doing the right thing more often than the other. And that discernment will allow us to develop the organs of political control until society becomes more organized with minimal inconvenience to the freedom enjoyed by the people.

     If bioregionalism proves an ineffective strategy for achieving dual power – and competition against the existing legislature – then communal autonomy, or a confederation of communities, should be attempted as another dual power strategy.

     If you look at a county map of Virginia, you will see that most cities in the state are not part of the counties which surround them; the cities' metropolitan areas have their own counties. I would like to see more states allow and encourage urban and rural areas to separate, and allow the creation and splitting of counties. This, and increased county home rule status, will help increase the degree of autonomy over legislative affairs which is currently experienced by counties, cities, and towns. The more autonomous each locality is, the more the country begins to resemble a loosely confederated network of city-states (as it was in ancient Greece).

     If communities were to regain their autonomy, and band together, then they could do several interesting things.

     The communities could demand that a third house of Congress be created, with cities, towns, and/or counties being what's represented, as opposed to people (or land). This would create a political situation which is called “triple federalism”, in which the national government, the state governments, and the local governments, coordinate their efforts to some degree, but also have duly-delegated exclusive spheres of influence, in which the more and less central levels of government may not meddle.

     Another thing the cities and towns could do, would be to combine by territory, and secede from their existing states. Yet another would be to declare that only local governments are legitimately constituted, and that the states and the national government are not. If successful, this would allow the cities and towns to create entirely new states, or bioregions, in place of the old ones, whose legitimacy they would have invalidated.

     Bioregionalism could be a path to dual power, but it could also be a path to Land Value Taxation. The promotion of the creation of bioregions, should always be done alongside the study of Henry George's Single Tax on the non-improvement of land, as a way to achieve a greater focus on ecological affairs, and on the needs of the land and the people for each other.

     Before a reform as radical as bioregionalism can happen, however, it seems appropriate that we take a few “last shots” at reclaiming our republic.

     For one, the people should attempt to convene an Article V constitutional convention, as long as doing so will not risk the disappearance of any one, or all, of the first ten amendments to the Constitution.

     Additionally, if the people want national legislation on environment, energy, retirement, welfare, or health, then they should pursue constitutional amendments, to achieve these reforms as permanent changes that cannot easily be dismantled by presidents and governors, as opposed to their remaining more temporary programs.

     Also, I have proposed a seventeen-step set of instructions as to how I think it would be most appropriate, and constitutionally legitimate, to pursue the formal, legal abolition of the national government. That article can be read at the following link:

     http://aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2019/10/abolishing-federal-government-and.html

     Independents, disaffected people, and minor party supporters, should increase their communication and collaboration, study Georgism and Mutualism and post-scarcity economics, and promote bioregionalism and dual power alongside (or as) reforms to the presidential election process and the Congress. These are the areas of study, in which it will be necessary for minor party supporters and political independents to engage (and develop, and find areas of agreement), if policies palatable to all anti-authoritarian people and groups are to succeed, and the imperialist state is to be defeated.

     Once that occurs, and a voluntary society is achieved, the Alliance of the Libertarian Left must be built – to build a path from a libertarian society to an anarchist one – and fraternity and peace should be promoted among all people wishing to live without violence, hierarchy, and arbitrary authority.

     In my opinion, the only viable alternative to a free society, in a world running out of time and clean air and bees and fish, is sweeping, radical, transformative change; but one which occurs formally, in the context of the rule of law, and which keeps within the strictures outlined in the Constitution. If the Constitution cannot accommodate such swift changes (which, I believe, have not been tried hard enough), then it is only appropriate that the Constitution itself be repealed, or at least that the ban on ex-post facto laws be amended or repealed.

     But I do not believe that we are so far gone already, to the point that those are our only options. Amending the Constitution is still not being tried. Greater coordination and cooperation between minor parties can still be attempted. And it should. Or else our country might not be able to survive retaining its current form and style of government for much longer.

Based on a post published on December 27^th, 2020

Edited and expanded on January 8^th  and 17th, 2021

Originally published on January 8^th, 2021

Political Spectrum Illustrating Which Economic Systems Are on the Left, the Right, or in the Center

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To see more of the political spectra I have designed and published on this blog,

please visit the following link:

http://aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/search?q=political+spectrum

Created on September 8th, 2020

Published on September 8th, 2020

Speech to the Libertarian Party of Chicago on March 3rd, 2020

     The following text was written for a meeting of the Libertarian Party of Chicago, Illinois. It explains my platform and priorities for my fourth and current campaign for the U.S. House of Representatives, and also contains some comments on how World War II, and socialism and fascism, should be taught in schools. This speech was not delivered in full; instead, its first three sections were condensed into a two-minute speech.

     Thanks for having me. My name is Joe Kopsick, I'm running a campaign for the U.S. House of Representatives, up in the 10^th District, which includes Waukegan, where I live, most of Lake County, and parts of northern Cook County.

     I'd like to say a few things about unemployment and my campaign, and then I'd like to talk about a problem that's the primary concern of lovers of liberty: authoritarianism. Finally, I will address the issue of whether I am a communist and a Stalinist.

     We're being told that we've never had it so good; that the unemployment rate has never been lower. We're told that it's the lowest it's been since slavery! Well I guess we better bring back slavery, if our goal is full employment, right?

     It is not true that unemployment is at an all-time low. It was lower in the last quarter of 2019, and it was also lower in the late 1960s and early 1950s. Unemployment may be at its lowest in 50 years, but remember that there are six different ways of measuring unemployment (U1 through U6). Donald Trump loves to tout the unemployment rate as proof that he has helped the economy, but what he's neglected to mention is that he's stopped focusing on U6, which is the most comprehensive way of the six to measure general difficulty maintaining stable employment.

     But let's suppose that more people are working. So what? Most of the companies they're working for are companies that get handouts from government, like Wal-Mart, Amazon, Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Boeing, etc.. Do we really want more people employed by corporate arms of the corrupt government?

     Moreover, the decrease in unemployment started before Trump took office, statistics show his influence could lead to an upswing in unemployment, and his claims that black and Hispanic unemployment rates were at all-time lows, have been debunked as half-truths.

     But it's the same on the so-called “left”; we saw at a recent debate, that the mainstream media are letting candidates like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren have their own facts, rejecting objectivity in favor of neutrality. Over the past three years, not only have the Republicans and Democrats proven themselves completely untrustworthy, delusional, and cultish; each of them have sought illicit business and political dealings with both Russia and Ukraine.

     The time has come to stop believing our politicians.

     In the 10^th District, Congressman Brad Schneider is running for re-election. He has taken tens of thousands from the military-industrial complex, hundreds of thousands from companies that pollute our air and water, hundreds of thousands from big banks (including bailout recipients), and hundreds of thousands from the pro-Israel lobby.

     My platform stands in stark contrast to my opponent's. Unlike him, I promise to reduce the size and budget of the military, root-out corporate largesse and cronyism in government, fight the big banks by demanding an end to the Federal Reserve that gives them credit, and fight for the health of people in the 10^th District (without supporting the disastrous Obamacare or the unconstitutional E.P.A.).

     I want to usher-in a new era of race-relations through reviving the counter-culture. My top three issues are “POUND EMPATHIC SKA”. Which sounds like I want to just blare two-tone ska music until people of every race, color, and creed are jamming together and getting along. And I do. But “POUND EMPATHIC SKA” stands for my top three issues:

     1. (POUND): Pay Off the U.S. National Debt by 2047. We will drastically reduce spending, drastically increase taxes but only while making sure they're more efficient, or both; in order to run a trillion-dollar surplus budget for 25 years in a row until the national debt is fully paid off.
     2. (EMPATHIC): Eliminating Medical Patents to Achieve Human Technology for Immortality Cheaply. I want to shorten the “lifespan” of medical patents, in order to increase the lifespan of human beings. Stop protecting medical patents for so long, so that they become generics sooner; and tax the profits but not the sales of medical devices, so that they're less expensive and more accessible. As pharmaceuticals and medical devices become more abundant, their price will go down. As more machines do the work, and fewer people do the work, necessary to make them, their costs will go down.
     Research is being done on how to lengthen the human lifespan through genetic research on how the tips of our chromosomes (telomeres) work; bits of them fray each time our cells are reproduced; this is what leads to organ failure and eventually death. If we urge people to put more private funding into the research of telomeres, and implement the medical cost-reducing proposals I've outlined, then we can achieve human immortality through low medical prices. That is how we achieve free medicine without socialism: through mass production and automation; and through price competition (the freedom to offer lower prices).

     3. (SKA): The Safe Kids Act. We will keep kids safe, while preparing them for the future, by abolishing the Department of Education, or, failing that, threatening to withhold federal funds from all public schools that refuse to start teaching courses on the skilled trades. At the same time, high schools should be split in half, so that upperclassmen are the only ones exposed to the risk of harm from dangerous machines in such classes, and individual students may sign waivers to be around machines (thereby eliminating fear over potential lawsuits against schools). Splitting all high schools in half carries the added benefit of ending the practice of 14-year-olds and 18-year-olds going to school together. I also hope to propose needed reforms to end child marriage, and I believe that a constitutional amendment establishing a nationwide age of consent, will both help reduce child trafficking, and set up age - not just some vague definition of "maturity" - as a requirement necessary to consent to contract.

     But therein lies the problem; we cannot trust this current federal government to police child trafficking, because it does so much child trafficking. We are faced with the same problem Lenin faced; we want good government, but reforming the one we have now is impossible. Fixing child sex trafficking laws would be hiring the fox to guard the henhouse.

     In my recent research, I have identified more than twenty ways in which child trafficking is legal or government-supported. One of the first ones is obvious; the kidnapping of children by I.C.E. agents at the southern border. Others include both parties' complicity in the Jeffrey Epstein teen sex slavery ring case, and forms of government custody of children which could reasonably be called kidnapping or child trafficking. We must criminalize all of these legal forms of trafficking, in addition to prosecuting illegal child trafficking.

     There are “black sites”, or “concentration camps” at the border; it's true. Alexandria-Ocasio Cortez called them concentration camps, and got criticized for it, but before she called them that, she called them black sites. When A.O.C. called I.C.E. detention facilities “black sites”, I thought, “The only person I've ever heard use the term 'black sites' is Alex Jones.” In a way, the “far left” and the “far right” have more in common than they might think; for example, opposition to authoritarianism, monopolies, corporate power, big banks, harm to the environment, and incursions into civil liberties. The “far left” and “far right” aren't “extreme”; they're just the libertarian wings of their respective parties, who are fighting the establishments in each party. That applies a lot less to Alex Jones than to A.O.C., but let's talk about that.

     Until Trump showed up, the nationalist, conservative, main street, and libertarian wings of the Republican Party, were the elements that were fighting the mainstream of the party. But Trump united most of those elements and triumphed, preventing another Bush presidency under Jeb. So for the last five years, Alex Jones has been claiming, and frantically trying to prove, that he and Trump are libertarians. Even after Trump betrayed Alex on Syria and Alex admitted it, even after Trump showed his distaste for the 2^nd Amendment by banning bump stocks, even after James Mattis convinced Trump not to torture but Gina Haspel let him do it anyway. Alex Jones betrayed us.

     He deserves some thanks for exposing the deep state, and government's complicity in child trafficking, and many other things. But he has also used his show as a way to disseminate hate-filled tirades against liberals and leftists, going so far as to use textbook Nazi dehumanization rhetoric to compare them to helpless worms and maggots, etc.. Don't get me wrong; Marx, Lenin, and Mao all stooped to using this sort of logic; but nobody should talk this way about another human being. Our children should not grow up thinking it is OK to call people of different races “dirty”, nor “viruses”, nor call people of different religions or ideologies “cancers”, nor suspect all foreigners of carrying diseases. If we let ourselves talk like that, it's not long before we're treating each other like animals and diseases, even exterminating each other.

     We can no longer say that extermination is no longer possible in America, since we know about these I.C.E. “detention centers”, where people are being told to drink toilet water. Where people are having their religious jewelry taken away, like what happened to the Jews in the Holocaust. Where mothers are being told they'll get their children back after a quick bath, which is not dissimilar to the method employed to trick Jews into entering gas chambers thinking they were showers. As a matter of fact, America was using Zyklon-B on Mexicans, twenty years before the Nazis were using it to kill Jews. Have you ever heard of the Bath Riots? Immigrants entering America in El Paso were sprayed with harsher and harsher chemicals, to “disinfect them” from disease, until a teenage girl started a riot because pregnant women were being doused with toxic chemicals. This occurred years after the Mexican typhus scare ended.

     The Nazi-sympathetic German-American Bund, headed by Fritz Kuhn, held a rally thousands of people strong in Madison Square Garden in 1940. The German-American Bund was allowed to march in Grafton, Wisconsin around the same time. Nazis were allowed to march in Chicago, Illinois in 1980 after unsuccessful attempts to march in Skokie. F.D.R. advisor Henry Stimson, probably the most anti-Semitic public official America has ever had, not only advised F.D.R. to refuse to let the M.S. St. Louis (a ship full of 900 Holocaust refugees) allow people to disembark in America, he advised F.D.R. against approving a plan to bomb the train tracks leading to the Auschwitz death camp.

     America is deeply ultra-nationalist. If being a nationalist means loving your country or being proud of it, then there's nothing wrong with that. But if you're an ultra-nationalist who believes “My country above all others”, or, worse, “My country, right or wrong”, then you value patriotism more than you value knowing the difference between right and wrong, and acting as such. Too many Americans believe that, since America contributed to defeating the fascists in World War II, it should never have to worry about being accused of being fascist ever again.

     Well right now there are people in the Trump Administration who used to work for George W. Bush, and he and his father were fed on Nazi war profits, because Prescott Bush, while working for Brown Brothers Harriman, managed the American accounts of Fritz Thyssen, a German industrialist who financed hard labor camps and gave millions to Adolf Hitler. As George Carlin said, “Hitler lost World War II. Fascism won it.” America didn't defeat fascism; it helped defeat the Nazis, but then adopted fascism for itself, to make a new brand of uniquely American fascism.

     We are in complete denial about the grip the C.I.A. has on our information. Communists are just people – mostly industrial workers and farmers - who want to get compensated adequately for the work that they do. The fact that they sometimes commit violence, doesn't mean they're “fascist”, nor terrorists; it means that they've been cheated out of the fruits of their hard work, and they're willing to fight the people who cheated them, because their and their families' lives are on the line.

     Wage theft is real. There is no difference between a politician, a boss, a landlord, and a banker; each makes his living only by oppressing another. We must fight all relationships of domination if we are to ever get rid of the rule of one man over another.

     So... am I a communist? Hell yes, I am a communist. But a libertarian communist; a pure communist, who rejects the state, borders, classes, and money. You might say, “Sure, abolish the state, but why the others?” The state creates the money, creates the borders, and incentivizes the class system by creating a well-paid permanent political class that's subject to corporate capture! Isn't the professional licensing system, just another form of classism, to perpetuate the rule of the employed over the non-employed? So establish that stateless, classless, borderless, moneyless society.

     You might say “How can you be a libertarian communist if you support Stalin?” I believe that Stalin wasn't an authoritarian communist, because I don't buy the propaganda that the U.S.S.R. helped the Nazis; Stalin tricked the Nazis. But I will explain that fully in a moment.

     High schoolers are becoming increasingly attracted to “extremist” ideologies like ultra-nationalism and communism. We can either view that as a problem, or lean into it and see what good we can take from it. We could use memes to teach history; history meme pages exist by the hundreds on Instagram and other sites. We could take this opportunity to adequately teach the history of World War II.

     All today's high schoolers know about World War II is that Hitler and Stalin were bad, they killed a lot of people, and don't be a fascist or a communist. We ought to teach them things like whether they ever fought each other, who killed more people and what the debate is on that topic, which one attacked Poland first and which attacked the other first (because it does matter who threw the first punch; remember, we oppose aggression and initiatory violence, not self-defense), and whether and when each were allied with America.

     Holocaust denial is terrible, and it is becoming more prevalent. The easiest way to nip this problem in the bud is to teach kids that Hitler hasn't only been accused of killing six million Jewish people; he has also been accused of killing some 13 million other Germans and 27 million Russians. People will stop asking “Did Hitler kill six million, or zero?”, and they will start asking “Did Hitler kill 40 million, or 50 million?” That is how you stamp-out Holocaust denial promptly, before racist kids become adults, and come out in the world where we have to deal with them without their parents around to protect them.

     Stalin did bad things; for example, the gulag system of work camps. People were worked to the bone, yes, but these camps were spaced far apart, and thus suffered none of the overcrowding, and much less of the communicable disease and male-on-male rape, for which American prisons are known. Furthermore, Stalin saved the world from Hitler. Many Americans will brag that their country helped win World War II, but America simply came in at the last moment and made the war end more quickly than it would have. Additionally, few Americans know the grave cost the Soviet Union paid for “helping” to defeat Hitler; 27 million lives. That's 50 Soviet soldiers for every American soldier killed in World War II. Take a moment to reflect on that fact.

     This is stolen valor. The C.I.A.'s America is treating communists like fascists, when the communists have historically been more staunch and fierce enemies of fascists than liberals and libertarians have. What was the Molotov-Ribbentrop Treaty(commonly known as the Hitler-Stalin Pact) but a treaty of non-aggression and mutually-beneficial trade? Any libertarian regime would have fallen for that.

     Stalin at least had the idea to use the materials that the Nazis traded to him – in this last opportunity to trade, when they knew war would come only in a matter of time - to feed the Soviet war machine, to eventually fend off the Nazi invasion. Stalin tricked Hitler by using against him, the extra resources he was willing to trade away. Stalin used Hitler's capitalism against him. Not to say that Hitler was fully capitalist; fascism has its own distinct economic ideology, which is called dirigism (referring to the direction of the economy by the government).

     We should not teach high schoolers that Hitler and Stalin were evil, unless we also teach them about the violence committed by Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill in the name of imperialism, capitalism, and “making the world safe for democracy” (such as interning 110,000 innocent Japanese-Americans).

     Alex Jones has discredited himself as a liberty lover, by using his show to urge his listeners to show up to protests with weapons, when they believe that Antifa members are likely to show up. I am making it a plank of my platform to oppose declaring Antifa a terrorist group, for the following two reasons.

     1) Have you ever noticed that Antifa usually have shields, instead of weapons? It's a stupid decision, true. But if they showed up with weapons – like the guns that nationalist protesters have been known to bring to protests – then the right would call Antifa “armed terrorists”. Nationalists bring weapons to protests to incite violence; Antifa bring shields because they expect that they will have to defend themselves from such people.

     2) Antifa was not founded two weeks ago by some loser in his mom's basement; it was founded in Germany in 1932, the year before Hitler took power.

     If you're anti-fascist, then you're Antifa. If you support declaring Antifa a terrorist group because you're anti-fascist and you think they're fascists, then logically you would have to support declaring yourself a terrorist (because you're anti-fascist, and therefore Antifa, which is an unincorporated movement that has no leaders and is directed by nobody).

     George Soros is not a Nazi, he was forced to join Nazi Youth as a teenager. Communists are not Nazis; Communists fought Nazis to the death and invaded the German capital. Communists with the Ukrainian brigades helped stop trains headed for death camps, and helped fully liberate Auschwitz after the Jewish prisoners partially liberated themselves in January 1945. Communists are not Nazis; Hitler banned Marxism in 1933, purged the Nazi Party of socialists, and faked being a socialist in order to avoid real socialism in addition to communism. The Nazis had quotas to confiscate Jewish wealth; not wealth in general. Nazism was not real socialism because it did not consider Jews part of that society, and the Nazis were not trying to do socialism.

     If you support taking people's money on their way out of the country - or requiring people to have permits and licenses in order to work, travel, or carry a weapon – then you're a fascist. Plain and simple. If not, then you might want to vote for me. Because there are real concentration camps in America, just like the ones funded by associates of the Bushes 80 years ago. And any day your driver's license could stop being accepted outside your state lines, and any day your school could “lose track” of your kid.

     Any day you could get swindled into thinking there are lots of jobs in the East, as the Jews were made to believe. And there were jobs; in hard-labor camps that eventually became death camps (as more and more people died from being overworked, and disease, and the Nazis resorted to extreme measures to prevent the spread of disease, which they knew would only make their prisoners sicker). After all, people from Honduras and El Salvador have been tricked into thinking there are jobs in America that you can easily leave, only to get stuck in I.C.E. facilities (when undocumented), or trapped in America at the end of harvest season (when documented).

     We are trapping Hispanics at the border and we are trapping black people in the jails. We are hunting human beings. America has made war and policing – killing and hunting human beings – into its national pastime and one of its most popular jobs. We have legalized treating people like animals, in our words and in our actions.

     It should be no surprise, then, that our teenagers are so prone to violence, with these murderers as their heroes. We blame violence on video games, but I blame school shootings, in part, on high taxes. Think about it: When our income is taxed, what we fairly earned through working for wages is taken away, and confiscated, and for the most part wasted. When our housing value is taxed, we lose all impetus to improve our property, because when our property value increases, our property taxes go up as well. There is no way to get ahead through producing something; the only way to make money is to destroy and invest in weapons, and the only way to save money and save on taxes is to produce less and own less. Kids are being taught that wasting and destroying things, gets you more money than producing and improving things. And it does! But this teaches them that they'll never be rich, because of high taxes (and barriers to employment, like lack of skilled trades classes), and so if they can't be rich, they can still be famous without being rich, by killing large numbers of people.

     If they do learn violence from violent video games, then yes, school shootings happen because kids are obsessed with who has the most kills. But if they're obsessed with who has the most kills, then there's a simple way to let those thoughts, and their politically extremist feelings, out: by debating Hitler vs. Stalin death tolls in high school. Hitler's fifty million dead will not only distract students from how many people they want to kill; it will also reassure them that they'll never be able to kill more people than the Nazis did. So why should they even try?

     It may sound ridiculous, but is that really more dangerous than what we're currently doing? Rationalizing the idea that the C.I.A. adopted from Winston Churchill; that the West should have aligned with Hitler from the beginning, because the Soviet Union and communism were the real enemies the whole time? Well, guess what: America did try to align with Hitler before World War II. It resulted in the deportation of Holocaust refugees and American assistance in the construction of forced-labor camps.

     I would much rather “teach the controversy” about World War II in high schools, than let troubled kids who understand extremism well, go without being challenged in front of their peers, and risk ending up isolated loners who kill their classmates. Socialists, nationalists, libertarians, anarchists, and others, all need to be respected alongside Democrats and Republicans in our public schools, and given equal time, or else the federal support of public schools should end forever.

     There is hardly any reason left to keep funding public schools anyway. The proponents of gun control argue “Even if it will save only one child's life, it will be worth it to ban guns.” And they make a good point; one child is shot or killed every school day in America. But you never hear anybody say “Even if it will save only twenty-four children from being molested a day, we should ban the public schools where this molestation takes place, with the help of our taxpayer money to defend the teacher.” I will be the first candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives to ever say that.

     I will also aim to lower the likelihood of school shootings through three methods: 1) Allowing students to take gun safety training courses; 2) Depend on private security guards to protect schools instead of the police, and 3) Pursue lawsuits or legislation which will result in the overturning of the 1980s Supreme Court case Warren v. District of Columbia, which holds that the police have no duty to protect and serve, unless there is a private contract.

     In my mind, the outcome of Warren is that we do not have a police force in America; we have a for-profit mafia-style protection racket. And the last thing it wants is for vulnerable people and minorities to be armed, defend themselves, and make the cops look bad.

     As your candidate, I vow to fight this mafia protection racket until the day I die. If I am elected to the U.S. House, I will do whatever I can to curtail the power of sovereign immunity, and charge police officers with an actual duty to protect and serve the general public (and, in doing so, restore civic order). I suspect that Warren has something to do with why these cops stand around at protests, and refuse to do anything when Antifa members come up to them saying Nazi sympathizers punched them and they're getting away and you can stop them.

     I will stop letting Nazis get away with all of this. I will do whatever I can to end the taxation of your children into joblessness, homelessness, debt slavery, depression, and despair. I will do whatever I can to restore the American dream of equality of opportunity and equal protection of the law.

     Please join me tomorrow at the public library in Lake Bluff, the town where I grew up, for the first meet and greet of my campaign. I will be giving an hour-long presentation about my platform, followed by an hour of question-and-answer from the audience. Feel free to take some of my campaign literature with you. Thank you.

Written and Published on March 3rd, 2020

Introduction Added on March 5th, 2020