So last Sunday in the midst of a second wave of blockades of tech company buses in San Francisco and Oakland, a bus window was broken by some anarchist activists and the action immediately sailed to the top of countless news sites. Activists had been trying to draw attention to how the buses (collectively termed…

In the wake of the Duck Dynasty controversy, Tom Woods recently made a post connecting the matter to his grievances surrounding “thick libertarianism.” Woods defines the distinction between “thin” and “thick” libertarians as follows: Some libertarians say the traditional libertarian principle of nonaggression is insufficient. That is merely “thin” libertarianism, they say. We also need…

Pope Francis wrote in his recent apostolic exhortation, “Just as the commandment ‘Thou shalt not kill’ sets a clear limit in order to safeguard the value of human life, today we also have to say ‘thou shalt not’ to an economy of exclusion and inequality.” He’s right — but not in the way he intends. Before…

On his blog, libertarian bestselling author and Ron Paul homeschooling curriculum writer Tom Woods has written some thoughts about thin and thick libertarianism and how they apply to the Duck Dynasty controversy. If you’ve been living in a cave, the star of reality television show Duck Dynasty said some unfortunate things about gay people and…

There were two radical, anti-authoritarian movements of the 1960s which developed in very different ways yet compliment each other in ways which remain unappreciated. One is the newly formed Libertarian movement headed by people like Murray Rothbard and Leonard Read, both experts in economics who spent much of their time at the blackboard or the…

For a very long time, Miley Cyrus embodied everything I hated about contemporary pop music. Meticulously groomed as a picture-perfect Disney sponsored pop starlet she seemed indistinguishable from the legions of similar cookie-cutter manufactured singers who came before her except for being the daughter of one-hit wonder Billy Rae Cyrus, which added bizarreness and nepotism…

I am now prepared to state without reservation that the ongoing NSA/surveillance story ranks among the more momentous and nauseating charades perpetrated on a frighteningly gullible public. Any remaining doubt I had on this question — and, in truth, no substantial doubt remained in my own mind — has been obliterated by this story concerning the remarks…

Let’s briefly review several critical facts. If there is a single general theme to Glenn Greenwald’s career as a journalist, it is that he constantly confronts and challenges power and those who exercise power, primarily in the political sphere. Greenwald himself has often proclaimed this to be his major concern, and he repeated this conviction in…

The most revolutionary and significant aspect of the promise that WikiLeaks offered the world was its radical method of disseminating information. Beginning in very early childhood, all of us are taught to rely on authority figures for everything: for personal and professional advancement and fulfillment, for opportunities of all kinds, for survival itself. Most damningly,…

Glenn Greenwald opens his latest column for The Guardian with this: “Like many people, I’ve spent years writing and speaking about the lethal power-subservient pathologies plaguing establishment journalism in the west.” He goes on to discuss an article by Chris Blackhurst, a career journalist who had been the editor of The Independent until a few months ago. Greenwald sets forth the…

I suppose we will forever be subjected to incomplete accounts of the life of Nelson Mandela and the evil he struggled against. Both the Right and the Left (as conventionally defined in America) are too busy pushing agendas to provide the full story. On the establishment Right (with some honorable exceptions) apartheid was deemed unimportant…

I had not intended to write anything on the death of Nelson Mandela. Partly because I am exhausted, but mainly because I wish to demonstrate my right not to mark his passing in any way — notwithstanding any affection I might bear the man. I feel that it is a right that needs to be…

They don’t create oppression; they just make it possible What I’m about to say may surprise you, but I assure you it’s the honest truth: in my personal experience, cops are overwhelmingly decent folks. They almost always conduct themselves “professionally” and have generally treated me with respect. I’m not saying stories of law enforcement abuse haven’t…

In Commonwealth, Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri observe that, because of network communications and radically cheapening production technology, capital accumulation is becoming “increasingly external to the production process.” But rather than working with this trend and exploiting the opportunities it offers, they argue, the Social Democratic approach is “to reintegrate the working class within capital.”…

I declare myself to be a capitalist and anti-capitalist, a socialist and anti-socialist, all at once. No, this is not my resignation of all use of politically descriptive terminology, and I am not declaring myself a moderate between two polar opposite camps. So how may I hold to each of these positions simultaneously? It is…

Criminality, Counter Economics and the Silk Road, or We’re All Illegalists Now! At this point in time, it seems of little doubt to most that Ross Ulbricht was none other than a Dread Pirate Roberts (DPR). According to files obtained by the feds off of Ulbricht’s computer, it also appears that he is the first…

The JFK administration’s public image has often been compared to that of Camelot, a mythical royal court. What’s more disturbing is that the people who apply such terms to this 20th century gang are almost always applying it in a positive sense. “What could be better,” say these waxing nostalgic imperialists, “than an administration which commands…

When I was a young, I remember reading about the difference between cooperative and coercive exchanges. It was a mind-blowing thought, that all interactions could be lumped into one of two categories. And that the implications of the nature of those interactions could be so incredibly powerful and meaningful. While libertarianism certainly encompasses many thoughts…

Anarchists who intend to act as though we didn’t live in a dystopic world must find themselves perplexed at every moment. With the ecosystems of civil society so atrophied and virtually every surviving institution of value captured and beaten into participating in the bloody circus of statism, who do you call? What do you do…

The most controversial and celebrated artist this year is, without a doubt, Miley Cyrus. Miley has quickly and flawlessly altered her image from 2000’s bubblegum sensation to corporate-sponsored rebel. Miley has captivated audiences with what many consider to be shocking performances that embrace hedonism and the mocking of puritan values. While many might consider her…