Attribute to L. Neil Smith’s The Libertarian Enterprise

In this issue Our Mr. Smith propounds the thesis that Socialism is just Communism with a new label. I, myself, would say that Communism is just Socialism with a new label. Communism and Socialism are basically the same, though, and are a subset of Collectivism.

Collectivism is the pernicious and evil doctrine that says only people in groups matter, and the individual is of no account at all. At all!

We here at The Enterprise, of course, adhere to the Truthful Doctrine of Individualism, the doctrine that says only individual people matter, and people in groups are either secondary or irrelevant.

Aristotle gave a good illustration of this when he wrote his great work which we might call “On Human Action,” which consists of Volume 1: “Ethics,” and Volume 2: “Politics.” Fist you consider individuals and their actions, later you consider individuals in groups. (We might include as Appendix A to “Politics” the work “Rhetoric”, which deals with people who are not able to be reasoned with (there seem to be rather a lot of those these days, probably in his day too)). As Aristotle says:

…in dealing with certain persons, even if we possessed the most accurate scientific knowledge, we should not find it easy to persuade them by the employment of such knowledge. For scientific discourse is concerned with instruction, but in the case of such persons instruction is impossible…

These books were formerly part of every educated person's … education. Alas, in these benighted times most people have never studied them, even people who think of themselves as educated. So, as a service to our readers here we present a freeware collection:

Ethics: Project Gutenberg, Everyman's Library, 1911.

Politics: Project Gutenberg, Everyman's Library, 1912

(Rhetoric: Kindle format, or ePub format.

No, not light reading, but very educational.

 

Jamie Hyneman has been busy:

The Tank That's Tougher Than Wildfire: How Jamie Hyneman Turned an Armored Personnel Carrier Into the Future of Firefighting

Wow!

 

A big Thank You! to all the “Get Well” emails from you readers. I finally did! (Mostly)

And also time for a big Thank You! to those of you who provide a bit of financial support by either donating cash or using our links to Amazon.com and other places that may pay us a small amount of money if you buy something using those links. It is not much, but every little bit helps, right?

While I have been sick, I have been reading Walter Scott's Lay of the Last Minstrel, and include in this issue the most famous part for your poetical reading pleasure.

And next issue is Issue Number 1,000. One Thousand! How did we do that, anyway?

I do not have anything planned for that issue, not been up to productive thinking during the cough- and sniffle-fest of these last weeks. Nor yet still. So we will see what happens.

As for me, I think it is time for yet another nap.