Not in My Name, by Matthew Sims

THE LIBERTARIAN ENTERPRISE
Number 578, July 11, 2010
"It's all about oil"

Contents

Not in My Name
by Matthew Sims
[email protected]

Special to The Libertarian Enterprise

[This was a blog post in reference to "Letter from Matt Simms" in the previous issue—Editor]

Dustin, that is exactly what you are saying. If those people over there are acting in your behalf as your proxies you are exactly saying that you want to kill innocent people to effect some kind of outcome. You won't define the outcome as anything other than "win the war and come home." I asked the question on my blog what do people mean when they say that.

Dirk. Sounds like for the Taliban the ROI on that ROE is not too bad. And the same for our guys.

What is the ROI if we put down all our guns and come home? Well, don't put them down. That would be a little silly to just give them away. But, what has the past, oh, I don't know, 3500 years at least of history shown us about going to somebody else's place and killing everyone we can kill? Has it stopped wars?

I am by no means a pacifist. I will fight to the death to defend what's mine from an attacker. Who is doing the attacking here? How long do you think it will take for none of them to want to defend what's theirs? Forever is a pretty damn long time.

I stated what it means to win the war in the aggressive stance we have taken with bin Laden and his declaration of war in my blog. But he was not speaking as the representative of any country. And, isn't he an Arabian? If you are not a "truther" and you believe the USofA government's conspiracy story/cover up then you have to know that those who attacked us were Arabian, not Iraqi and not Afghan. And, those who attacked us in that scenario outfoxed us mightily. They all died in the attack. So, who does that leave us to attack to get our revenge? We have been made to look like fools. (I don't include myself in that collective we, none of them are acting as my proxy.)

In bin Laden's letter to the American's he says this:

(3) You may then dispute that all the above does not justify aggression against civilians, for crimes they did not commit and offenses in which they did not partake:
(a) This argument contradicts your continuous repetition that America is the land of freedom, and its leaders in this world. Therefore, the American people are the ones who choose their government by way of their own free will; a choice which stems from their agreement to its policies. Thus the American people have chosen, consented to, and affirmed their support for the Israeli oppression of the Palestinians, the occupation and usurpation of their land, and its continuous killing, torture, punishment and expulsion of the Palestinians. The American people have the ability and choice to refuse the policies of their Government and even to change it if they want.
(b) The American people are the ones who pay the taxes which fund the planes that bomb us in Afghanistan, the tanks that strike and destroy our homes in Palestine, the armies which occupy our lands in the Arabian Gulf, and the fleets which ensure the blockade of Iraq. These tax dollars are given to Israel for it to continue to attack us and penetrate our lands. So the American people are the ones who fund the attacks against us, and they are the ones who oversee the expenditure of these monies in the way they wish, through their elected candidates.
(c) Also the American army is part of the American people. It is this very same people who are shamelessly helping the Jews fight against us.
(d) The American people are the ones who employ both their men and their women in the American Forces which attack us.
(e) This is why the American people cannot be not innocent of all the crimes committed by the Americans and Jews against us.

Can you dispute that with facts and not wishes? I can't. I think he is right on the money in that assessment. The "citizens" of the USofA are not free. I don't want to get into that argument here, I'll save that for another time and place.

But I digress.

He is not speaking of me when he says those things about why Americans are responsible. I publicly declare I do not support those actions. Any taxes taken from me are taken by force, which fact I can prove beyond a shadow of a doubt. I would not willingly pay one cent nor give one minute of my time to attack people in another country and kill their women and children through embargoes of food and medical supplies.

He calls us to an awful lot of things, pretty much all of which are no better than our own country telling us what to do. All in the name of his version of the Abrahamic religious trio. He has no more right to tell me to do those things than anyone else. But he's over there. He can't tell me what I can and can't do. But do you know what he can do? He can get the people who claim they somehow have jurisdiction over me because of where I choose to live to make me do those things. Look what he has accomplished turning the power of our own government against us.

How do we know what will be the cost in dollars and lives if we just brought everyone home from everywhere?

What do you think is the best way to set an example of what a free country would be like?

I see only 2 choices:

To act like a free country. And convince your neighbors by their observation of what a free country is.
or
To call yourself a free country and act worse than most other countries in trying to convince your neighbors by killing them. "We must make the world safe for democracy."

Do you think, if this truly was a "free country" there would be any lack of people willing to defend it from aggressors?

Do you think there would be many aggressors if we weren't going around the world telling other people what they can and can't do and killing a lot of them if they don't do as we say?

How do you know? We've never tried it. Not even with our own "citizens". We can try to calculate the cost in dollars and lives of continuing to do what we do, but we are lied to about those costs so there is no way to calculate. And they won't say what it means to win or commit to bringing everyone home and selling off all the bases when we do win. So, we really can't predict that cost, but we know it is astronomical. Would you think the cost in dollars and lives of not doing things that way would be about the same? More? Less? I know we have nothing to base that calculation on because we have never tried it so we have no history to go on. But we certainly have a history to go on when trying to forecast the cost of trying to win an argument by killing your opponent.

My bet is, the cost in lives would be much lower. The cost in dollars would be much lower. The cost in liberties lost would be much lower. The cost in reputation would be much lower.

I guess it's obvious I don't support what is allegedly being done in my name.

And I can't change it through the system. I'm tired of hearing that. If you come remotely close to understanding my definition of the situation as it is you will plainly see the only option I have is to keep saying what I am saying until one more person understands. And that person can see how frustrating it is to want to live in a society where no one gets to take other people's stuff and tell them what they can and can't do. No one. Not even if they call themselves a government.

It is logically impossible to claim that you support preventing theft and coercion and you will use theft and coercion to prevent theft and coercion. How many suicide bombers do you think bin Laden could recruit only on religious grounds? I know he says he wants all of us to come to Allah. But No one is going to tell me who I have to worship or if I have to worship. And I don't think he can find very many people willing to give their lives simply to help him proselytize. Add in the fact that we are killing their women and children, and recruitment becomes a little easier. You can scoff and smirk at that statement if you want, but you are not able to draw logical conclusions if you actually deny it.

So, how about we end all the civilian casualties in Afghanistan as well as the military casualties and the casualties to our national reputation?

I certainly don't want to make any sort of hero out of Obama. I despise the man. When he speaks my skin shivers with a feeling of "disingenuousness".

However, he could win the war by apologizing and bringing home all the troops and selling off the bases and letting them decide on their own fate. I say win it because to me if we were not to lose one more life or one more dollar to this empire building world ruling mess that calls itself a government I would put that one up as one for the win column.

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