Last year, I had a simple, and seemingly achievable, goal as C4SS’s media coordinator: To reach a total of 1,000 “mainstream media” pickups and citations of the Center’s op-ed material (since we started identifying such pickups and citations in mid-2010).

We didn’t make it in 2013. We made it today.

Which pickup is “the 1,000th?” That’s impossible to say — sometimes a piece will appear on the web and then not show up on my search protocols for some time.  Once I find them, I might enter several from or on the same day without regard to when they actually posted at the other site. And sometimes I miss them for a looong time until the author notices one and lets me know. For example, the 1,000th pickup I entered was actually from back in October — Nathan Goodman came across it and dropped me a line about it today.

But, however we got here, here we are. Hooray for us!

One of the bigger media stories coming into 2014 is over whether Patch, AOL’s so-called hyperlocal news organization, will survive or bite the dust. While rumors of the controversial network’s demise were greatly exaggerated, it does appear that the future of the service is in flux – and what that means for hyperlocal.

For y’all keeping track at home, hyperlocal news means exactly what it sounds like: basically, a person or group of persons are covering events in a town, sometimes down to the individual street level, and publishing it for their friends and neighbors – and audiences beyond either – to see. (Sounds awfully like blogging.)

Almost every city in America has a website devoted to something along the lines of hyperlocalism, whether or not they call it that. Some consist of independent reporters covering things they’re passionate about. Others, like Journatic, are in the business of outsourcing hyperlocal, which has made for some interesting and sometimes cringeworthy times.

AOL wanted their network to be the largest in the country, which is not in itself a deplorable goal. Where they went wrong? Trying to flood out their smaller competitors and gouge advertisers for more than they could afford – natural, if you model yourself off your predecessors.

Media critic Jeff Jarvis wrote (“The Almost Post-Mortem for Patch”), “Hyperlocal works in town after town. What doesn’t work is trying to instantly scale it by trying to own every town in sight. That was Patch’s fatal error: acting like an old-media company.”

Instead of trying to own everything from the top down, new, hyperlocal media needs to be built from the bottom up. Stigmergic, decentralized outlets have already been proven to thrive and be as effective – if not more so – than old media sites.

A recent emailing of Roderick Long’s, “An Open Letter to the Peace Movement,” precipitated some criticisms from a non-libertarian and non-anarchist friend. This post will be a response to those criticisms. The author’s name will be withheld. If he so chooses, he can reveal himself in the comments section. The original text of the piece is in italics, and my friend’s criticisms are in bold.

“Dear Peace Activists:

All honour to you. In your opposition to the United States’ impending war on Iraq, you represent a welcome voice for sanity and civilisation, lifted up against the incessant baying of the dogs of war.

But I want to urge you to follow the logic of your position just a bit further.

Much has been said, and eloquently so, about the need, in dealings between nation and nation, to choose persuasion over violence whenever possible. Hear, hear!

But why this qualification: between nation and nation?

If persuasion is preferable to violence between nations, must it not also be preferable to violence within nations?

Here comes the shift from macro-level (nation) to micro-level (persons). Is it really useful to extend this metaphor? Hard to tell. Nations can cause a lot more damage than individuals when they get roused to action, mainly from the collective ability to dish out pain wholesale.

True enough, but the underlying principle of violence over persuasion remains. Nations or other macro collectivities may do more damage, but that doesn’t change the basic principle involved.

Suppose my neighbour runs a business out of his home, and I’d rather he didn’t. If I call the zoning board and ask them to shut his business down by force, am I acting like a peace activist? Or am I acting like George Bush?

So if someone wants to open a pig farm next door or an opium den, I just have to sit by in a non-mobile “investment” or house that now has diminished value. So someone with property can impose expenses on others by using his property with no regard for others (this is why people think of libertarians as selfish assholes, if you didn’t figure that by now.)

You’re more concerned with property values than human freedom. What’s truly destructively selfish is your willingness to use initiatory force to uphold your property values. Freedom matters more.

That’s all for now, but I will address the rest in a future blog post.

Enjoy review 11!

Sam Kierstead discusses Hamid Karzai’s role in determing the future of Afghanistan.

Charlie Hinton discusses the ten steps to dictatorship in Haiti.

Pepe Escobar discusses a provocative incident related to China.

Tanya Golash-Boza discusses Obama’s deportation record.

Julie Mastrine discusses why libertarians shouldn’t slut shame.

Sheldon Richman discusses the Pope’s take on the free market and capitalism.

Dave Lindorff discusses the outing of three CIA Pakistani chiefs.

Jonathan Cook discusses the planned Gazaification of the West Bank.

Tom McNarma discusses the terror of bombing and saying no to war crimes.

John Laforge discusses the treatment of Gitmo detainees.

Tom Engelhardt discusses the bombing of wedding parties.

Mitchell Plitnick discusses Max Blumenthal’s book, Goliath: Life and Loathing in Greater Israel.

Aaron Rubin reviews the new film, My Afghanistan: Life in the Forbidden Zone.

Semuas Milne discusses the war in Afghanistan.

Shamus Cooke discusses the potential for peace in Syria.

Norman Solomon discusses Moveon.org’s indifference to the atrioticies of Obama.

Lynn Fitz-Hugh discusses police estatism.

Jonathan Carp discusses Christmas.

Peter Beinart discusses the absence of an anti-war left on Iran.

Josh Marsfeder discusses Miley Cyrus and socail entropy.

Ryan Calhoun discusses libertarians and thre 60’s counterculture.

Noam Chomsky and Stefan Molyneux discuss a range of issues.

Conor Friederdorf discusses why secret operations and self-government don’t mix.

Robert Taylor discusses 10 most libertarian moments of 2013.

Sheldon Richman discusses the Federal Reserve.

Nathan Goodman discusses thick libertarianism.

Dr. Cesar Chelala discusses the application of the Nuremberg precedent to the Iraq War.

Laurence M. Vance reviews, The Moral Case for a Free Economy.

Review of the new algrebaic editon of Winning Chess. Both Irving Chernev and Fred Reinfield wrote this book. Two very prolific chess writers. This is a book on tactics. As the master level player, Teichmann, put it: “Chess is 99 percent tactics”. I own the descriptive notation edition of this book, and can attest to its usefulness.

John Watson reviews Eplus #107 and an e-book version of Chess Praxis. The latter is by the famous Russian player, Aron Nimzowitsch. He was famous for writing My System. Chess Praxis was the follow up game collection to the aforementioned theoretical work.

This was quite the year for left-liberty. Others have already examined the year from different ideological perspectives. This has ranged from Lew Rockwell’s Ron Paul filled piece to Medea Benjamin’s take. It’s time for a retrospective that addresses 2013 from a left-libertarian perspective. There are 4 things worth focusing on.

1) The Canadian Supreme Court’s striking down of the anti-prostitution laws. This was an important step in the direction of sex worker liberation. Not the only step that needs to be taken, but a meaingful one nonetheless.

2) Chelsea Manning’s continued heroic stand against the warfare state. It landed her in jail, but she has many supporters on the outside. Those of us who oppose American warfare statism have much to thank her for.

3) Radley Balko’s book on police militarization earns a spot in this piece, because those police powers are often used against the marginalized and oppressed. The War on Drugs is a notable example, because it predominantly targets African-Americans.

4) Edward Snowden’s revelations about the surveillance state. Glenn Greenwald has been instrumental in helping us find out about the spyng of the NSA. He deserves accolades for this principled behavior. It goes to show that he is one of the more reasonable left-liberals or centre-leftists out there.

I spent a couple of hours this morning scouring the search engines for C4SS “mainstream media pickups” in December.

The good news: Usually December is a month that kind of trails off for us in terms of pickups — newspapers tend to run cheery holiday stuff instead of anarchist polemic at this time of year. But THIS December was an exception! I’ve identified 35 pickups of C4SS material in “mainstream media” — well above our normal expectation of 20 or so.

The better news: All our authors had successes this month, but two standouts are Jonathan Carp, whose “So This is Christmas and What Have We Done?” broke us into Pakistani media for the first time ever and Trevor Hultner, who had pieces published from coast to coast in the US and abroad as well.

The not quite so good news: I had really hoped to break 1,000 total pickups in 2013. We fell short of that — as of today, the count stands at 976. But if January is as good a month as December was, we’ll hit 1,000 this month. Thanks, as always, for your continuing support!

Best regards,
Tom Knapp
Media Coordinator
Center for a Stateless Society

We’re happy to announce the creation of another regular column here at Stigmergy: the C4SS Blog, devoted to the analysis and criticism of mainstream and independent media. Regret the Error will publish every Tuesday.

Every entry-level journalism and media writing textbook will stress objectivity as one of the central standards and practices of the craft. Objectivity is usually defined (with some variations) as “the closest possible version of the truth,” which is a well-meaning sentiment. In practice, however, it usually means, “Talk to two people with opposing views and include equal numbers of quotes in your article, and voila! You’re a paragon of objective journalism.” This is the view from nowhere.

The dangers of glibly playing with moral relativism aside, this is a lazy approach to writing and an even lazier approach to truth-telling. However, I’ve noticed that in some independent media outlets’ dash to be more “hard-hitting” or radical with their coverage than mainstream news, they sometimes take the polar opposite approach to what I described above. Namely, “let’s only publish stuff by people we agree with, because they’re always right/the mainstream media is always wrong!”

This is, I would argue, how sites like Breitbart and The Blaze formulated their mission, at least in the first months of their inception (now you are just as likely to find a well-written story at The Blaze as you are anywhere else). This is also why independent media faces such a huge struggle to become accepted by more people.

Let’s face facts: what independent media needs is not to be diametrically opposed to Big News’ stated values. Independent media needs to be the one to do the jobs no major news org wants to, to do the shoeleather reporting. To offer the context those big, old legacy publications and radio stations and television networks don’t feel like offering. The thing I love about independent media is that we don’t feel the need to play into the trope that all ideas are right, either ethically or factually. We can give our readers, listeners and viewers the tools to figure out their own paths that the major media won’t give.

This is especially important for anarchist media. I think C4SS and other, similar sites have done an excellent job at this so far with op-eds and commentaries, but I don’t think we should shy away from hard newsgathering, either.

One of the best examples of this, I believe, is Nathan Goodman’s reporting for C4SS on Jane Marquardt, a Salt Lake City activist for the Democratic Party and one of the United States’s biggest prison profiteers. William Gillis, our resident Transhumanist and Bay Area correspondent, managed to masterfully explain the context of the recent Google Bus window-smashings without shying away from facts OR going easy on commentary.

This kind of writing needs to be encouraged. To quote Kevin Carson, (who, on an unrelated note, I firmly believe to actually be a cadre of agorists acting collectively as one man):

The way to arrive at truth is to apply logic to the facts and make the best case for reality, as you see it, that you can. Any bias in your case will be ruthlessly cross-examined by others using logic and evidence to make their own case.

When a blogger presents a one-sided version of reality, guess what happens? They’re hyperlinked by an opposing blogger, who then puts their one-sided account into perspective by linking to the information they left out.

It’s only through such an adversarial process, with all the entry barriers removed from the marketplace of ideas, that the whole truth can emerge. This way is certainly better than a deliberate pose of obtuseness, pretending not to see what’s staring you right in the face, for fear the facts might show that reality itself is biased.

C4SS Senior Fellow Gary Chartier talks to right libertarian John Stossel about Markets Not Capitalism and why advocates of freed markets should oppose capitalism.

http://youtu.be/INfSOUgLHG8

Enjoy review 10!

William Pfaff discusses how history will remember Obama

Elizabeth Goiten discusses “good guys” and “bad guys” in the War on Terror.

Bruce A. Dixon discusses how Obama won a court case to keep sentencing disparities intact.

Chris Floyd discusses the murderous character of the American system.

Chris Floyd discusses the NSA spying scandal.

Scott Anderson reviews America’s Great Game.

Chris Floyd discusses the chemical weapons attack in Syria.

Robert Fatina discusses the status of forces agreement with Afghanistan.

Jacob Hornberger argues for a lifting of the Cuban embargo.

Nitin Rao discusses the criminalization of gay sex in India.

Dmitry Minin discusses the Jihadi warriors of Syria.

Arthur Silber discusses problems with Glenn Greenwald on whistleblowing.

Corey Robin defends campus activism and BDS.

Logan Yershov discusses the problems with assassination markets.

Arthur Silber discusses leaking.

Arthur Silber discusses the doctrine of exceptionalism.

Trevor Huitner discusses school shootings and thought crimes.

Christy Thornton discusses NYU grad student unionization.

Patrick Cockburn discusses the bankruptcy of the West’s Syrian policy.

Ann Jones discusses ROTC and child soldiers.

Hayes Brown discusses 5 surprising places that the U.S. military operates.

David Swanson discusses fighting for peace.

Tony Newman discusses the top ten Drug War stories of 2013.

Joshua Holland discusses the massive U.S. prison population.

Sheldon Richman asks whether Obama really wants an agreement with Iran or not.

Dr. Cesar Chelala discusses stopping Iran’s human rights abuses.

Patrick Cockburn discusses the humanitarian emergency in Syria.

Lucy Steigerwald discusses this year’s bad cops.

John Watson reviews My System and Blockade. Both of which are by the famous Russian player, Aron Nimzowitsch.

Chess Cafe offers its annual “year in review” for 2013.

An article at C4SS has had to be corrected due to factual inaccuracies that came out after publication. I regret the error I made in the commentary, “Music Piracy as Market Correction,” and have made the necessary changes to reflect the new information. At the top of that post you’ll find a shorter version of this statement.

One of the great things about working at an anarchist think tank like C4SS is that everyone I write with is also my editor, proofreader and ombudsman. I thank my colleague Jonathan Carp for alerting me to the developments in the commentary’s news hook – mainly that the source of the original Iron Maiden story, Citeworld journalist Andy Patrizio, reported incorrectly on information obtained by analytics company MusicMetric. Citeworld has posted a correction of their own, saying:

Update and correction: Due to writer error, an original version of this article stated that Iron Maiden used MusicMetric’s analysis to plan its South American tours. MusicMetric did not work directly with Iron Maiden. The analysis described in this article was carried out without the band’s participation or knowledge, and we have no confirmation that the band ever saw or used it. CITEworld deeply regrets this error, and we apologize to our readers.

Luckily, the phenomenon described in the commentary – that artists are taking advantage of the tools that brought the recording industry to its knees – is occurring with enough frequency to make this a relevant topic of discussion, with or without an Iron Maiden hook.

At C4SS, news commentary is the main source of content, with feature articles and other work interspersed throughout. This means that we rely somewhat heavily on what is essentially secondhand information – news reports or blog posts about events and issues that display relevance to our mission statement – to form the basis of our work. Every article we publish is discussed, edited and fact-checked to the best of our ability, but sometimes it isn’t enough. To quote a colleague, getting things wrong sometimes is “hard to avoid if you’re trying to be topical.”

Personally, it stings to see an article have to undergo surgery because an element of it doesn’t ring true. And personally, I feel like I got lazy in relying on the Citeworld article to provide my hook. So I do apologize for the error, and I will work to eliminate future such errors before you even read my work as much as possible.

Walter Block recently penned a piece arguing that libertarianism is neither left nor right. In it he argues that libertarians share an anti-unionist bias with the right. It may be true that many libertarians possess an anti-union bias, but that says nothing about the normative compatibility of unions with libertarian principles. It also ignores those left-libertarians who embrace labor unionism like Kevin Carson. His Labor Struggle: A Free Market Model comes to mind.

Walter Block presumably identifies unionism with state or government coercion. This ahistorical take ignores the fact that labor unions have often had an adversarial relationship with the state or government. It wasn’t until the National Labor Relations Act of 1935 that unions received any government or state protection/recognition. Not to mention that government or the state has frequently suppressed unions throughout American history. Some notable examples are the Homestead Strike of 1892, Pullman Strike of 1894, and the Colorado Labor Wars of 1903.

In addition to the above, the courts interpreted labor unionism as a violation of anti-trust law until the Clayton Antitrust Act of 1914. Other legal restraints are contained in the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947. Not to mention that the National Labor Relations Act or Wagner Act itself had issues. As Kevin Carson explains:

“This attitude was at the root of the Taylorist/Fordist system, in which the labor bureaucrats agreed to let management manage, so long as labor got an adequate share of the pie. (25) Such a social contract was most emphatically in the interests of large corporations. The sitdown movement in the auto industry and the organizing strikes among West coast longshoremen were virtual revolutions among rank and file workers on the shop floor. In many cases, they were turning into regional general strikes. The Wagner Act domesticated this revolution and brought it under the control of professional labor bureaucrats.”

Block never mentions any of this history.

The final aspect to be discussed is whether unionism is compatible with the normative philosophical principles of libertarianism. An emphatic yes is the answer. Left-libertarian market anarchist unionism involves a voluntary association of free and equal workers working together for their freedom from arbitrary employer power. Voluntary association and freedom are core libertarian principles. They most emphatically apply to the working class.

The Canadian Supreme Court recently struck down the anti-prostitution laws of the country. This sound legal decision provides an occasion for a deeper discussion of the dynamics of sex worker politics. In particular, it allows for a dialectical or contextual left-libertaian analysis. Chris Matthew Sciabarra ably describes dialectics as:

“Dialectics is the art of context-keeping. It is a thinking style that emphasizes the centrality of context in the analysis of systems across time. As applied to libertarian social theory, it counsels us not to disconnect politics from economics, culture, social psychology, ethics, epistemology, and other factors. It views these seemingly disparate aspects as interrelated within a wider totality. Hence, any attempt to understand–or change–society must entail an analysis of its interrelations from the vantage point of any single aspect. This brings forth an enriched portrait of society, and underscores the indivisible connection between theory and practice.”

This brief exploration follows in his footsteps.

Contextually speaking, political legality is important, but it doesn’t exhaust all the factors necessary for sex worker liberation. There is still the necessity of addressing the economic and cultural levels of analysis. Both of which help to provide us with a broader more systemic view of the issue at hand. Without this broader context we risk losing sight of the total picture. This comprehensive picture allows us to grasp the interconnections spoken of by Sciabarra above.

Economically speaking, the mere political legality of sex work matters not without assurances that property owners will not discriminate against sex workers. It also matters not without sex workers receiving a comfortable share of the economic pie. It’s certainly true that the absence of coercive political penalties by the government assists in this, but it isn’t the end of relevant analysis. Private property owners could still use control of economic resources to deny access to sex workers. This is still true with formal legality.

Our final level of analysis is the cultural. In the absence of a sex worker friendly culture, formal legality could be rendered irrelevant by the restrictions of oppressive social mores. This would lead to the economic discrimination mentioned above and induce agitation to restore the laws on the political level. All the more reason to wage an interrelated struggle for sex worker liberation. These three levels of analysis are preferably dealt with simultaneously.

Christmas is full of exhortations to work towards a more peaceful world. But when you get right down to it, what can we actually do, today, to help usher in that world? While there’s no magic button that can be pressed or perfect argument that can be made to bring about peace on Earth, there are a few things we can do to work for peace.

The first thing I’ll mention is something I have some experience with- counter-recruiting. Counter-recruiting is just what it sounds like- counterprogramming the messaging from military recruiters particularly and from our entire culture generally. Young people can go their entire lives without hearing anything bad about the military, and when the recruiter comes calling and they are faced with the choice between mountains of student debt, immediately entering an uncertain work force, or a full-time job with generous benefits that offers to pay for college later, the choice, for far too many, is easy. It’s easy because, as those of us with military experience know, they don’t have all the facts. This work will come naturally to anti-war veterans- just go in there and tell them why the military sucks!- but the venerable American Friends Service Committee offers resources and guides for those, veteran or no, who want to pursue this very rewarding line of work. Convincing even one young person that she has better choices than state servitude is immensely gratifying and makes a tiny but real and material dent in the war machine.

Another great option is Iraq Veterans Against the War’s ongoing Operation Recovery, a project to stop the re-deployment of traumatized troops. What makes Operation Recovery so effective is that it is something even the most bloodthirsty hawks have a hard time arguing with, and yet every step towards the goal puts a little more grit in the military’s gears. At Ft. Hood Operation Recovery, led by the great folks at the Under the Hood Cafe, has made great strides, forcing the commanding general to issue policy guidance to the entire post directing that soldiers not be impeded in their efforts to seek mental health care and that commanders respect physicians’ orders regarding soldiers’ mental and physical health.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, just be a consistent voice for peace. When the hawks start beating the drums of war and the compliant news media start baying for blood, it can feel awfully lonely to be a dove, but you almost certainly are not alone. As we recently during calls for American bombing in Syria and as polling has consistently shown over recent years, war is unpopular and the people are sick to death of it. Rather than letting ourselves be cowed by the talking heads on TV and the screeches of the bloodthirsty maniacs in government, let’s educate ourselves on the crisis du jour and make consistent, persistent arguments against war. It’s a little scary being the first voice at the office or the holiday table to speak out against a war, but I can tell you from experience that once you open the door, others will join you.

In my Christmas op-ed I wrote about some of the Psalms and other scriptures I remember from my church-going youth, but the hymn I remember most clearly is somewhat sappy ditty written by a husband and wife in 1955. The organist would announce it most often as the recessional, and we’d all stand, open our hymnbooks, and tunelessly drone in that inimitable Catholic way these words: “Let there be peace on Earth, and let it begin with me.” It’s a long, hard, and uncertain road to peace, but it starts with us, today.

From Boing Boing:

The ACLU has spent years in court trying to get a look at a top-secret FBI interrogation manual that referred to the CIA’s notorious KUBARK torture manual. The FBI released a heavily redacted version at one point — so redacted as to be useless for determining whether its recommendations were constitutional.

However, it turns out that the FBI agent who wrote the manual sent a copy to the Library of Congress in order to register a copyright in it — in his name! (Government documents are not copyrightable, but even if they were, the copyright would vest with the agent’s employer, not the agent himself). A Mother Jones reporter discovered the unredacted manual at the Library of Congress last week, and tipped off the ACLU about it.

Anyone can inspect the manual on request. Go see for yourself!

There’s really nothing to add to this. It’s beautiful all by itself.

Sad news today of the death of Mikhail Kalashnikov, designer of the iconic AK-47. Designed by then-sergeant Kalashnikov, a wounded Red Army conscript, in response to what he saw as the inadequate weapons he was issued, the AK-47 has become the most popular rifle in the world, seeing use in virtually every armed conflict since.

While the rifle was designed for a government and mass produced by governments, it’s hard to dislike the design itself. In many ways the Avtomat Kalashnikova, to give the weapon its full, Russian name, prefigures the open source, distributed production ideals we hold so dear today. Designed to be manufactured cheaply anywhere out of simple stamped sheet metal and with high tolerances that not only made manufacturing a snap but also made the rifle legendarily reliable, the AK-47 rapidly became the favorite weapon of insurgents and resistance movements everywhere, aided by the Soviet government’s admittedly self-serving policy of distributing the design for free.

And what an incredible design. The standard issue American rifle of the Second World War, the M1 Garand, could fire around 40 rounds a minute, if the person wielding it managed to avoid getting his thumb caught in the action while reloading. The AK-47 can sustain one hundred rounds per minute of automatic fire; in other words, the Kalashnikov puts into an individual’s hands the firepower of an entire company of Napoleonic soldiers. Furthermore, unlike many more elaborate designs, the AK-47 can fire under virtually any conditions with very little maintenance. US Army colonel David Hackworth, fed up with the finicky American M16s his men were issued, once famously buried an AK-47 in mud, dredged it up, loaded a magazine and fired it on full auto until it was empty without a single malfunction- truly a people’s rifle.

Mikhail Kalashnikov designed his great weapon while working for one of the most vicious governments ever to blight the Earth, but let that not blind us to the brilliance of his design, and to what it represents. The Avtomat Kalashnikova was the earliest forerunner of the great work of Defense Distributed today, and presaged a future when power will truly be open source and fully distributed.

The annual digests continue. Let’s get moving on number 9!

Stephen Masty has a quiz to decide whether you’re an imaginative conservative or not.

Matthew Feeney discusses 5 hot foreign policy subjects of 2013.

Gene Healy discusses the myth of isolationism surrounding a foreign policy of non-intervention.

Laura Carlsen discusses the setbacks for women’s rights in Honduras.

Sheldon Richman discusses why 2016 will be a good year for the corporate state.

Justin Raimondo discusses Max Blumenthal’s new book about Israel titiled Goliath.

David Swanson discusses the continued U.S. occupation of Afghanistan.

Rev. William E. Alberts discusses the reactionary position of th United Methodist Church on homosexuality.

Jeffrey St. Clair and Alexander Cockburn pontificate on police killings.

Ron Jacobs discusses the lies of the powerful about war.

William D. Hartung asks whether the Pentagon needs another 20 billion dollars.

Biony Kampmark discusses the prospect of a digital bill of rights.

Mark O’ Brien discusses seeing a sex surrogate.

James Peron discusses the death of Barbara Branden.

Grant Mincy discusses police violence.

Thomas L. Knapp discusses government spending.

Dawie Coetzee discusses the Mandela administration.

Never Gordon discusses the possibility of a nuclear free zone in the Middle East.

Kevin Carson reviews Sean Gabb’s book titled Cultural Revolution, Culture War: How Conservatives Lost England, and How to Get It Back.

Kevin Carson reviews The End of Politics: New Labour and the folly of managerialism.

Chris Hedges discusses the business of mass incaracertion.

Barbara Branden discusses Ayn Rand’s inner life.

Ronald Bailey argues for the abolition of software patents.

Uri Avnery discusses the lack of attendance by major Israeli leaders at Mandela’s funeral.

Alyssa Figueroa discusses a recent civilian killing drone strike.

Arturo Lopez-Levy discusses how the embargo on Cuba makes diplomacy impossible.

Jeremy Brecher discusses a non-violent insurgent approach to climate activism.

Jeremy Brecher discusses climate activism.

A review of the second volume of Garry Kasparov’s series on himself. Garry Kasparov is one of the world’s best chessplayers. He is a former world champion with a rating peak of 2851. He was surpassed by Magnus Carlsen’s achievement of an 2872 rating. One of his most grueling matches was the first 1984-1985 World Championship match with Karpov. It lasted 48 games before being canceled.

Our second chess pick of the week also comes from Chesscafe.com. The book reviewed raises the question of whether chess is preferably treated as a fun game or serious work. The author comes down on the side of serious work. My own view is that chess can be both serious work and fun. It’s sheer joy to study and play chess better. The fun increases as you become better at the game.

“To be governed is to be watched over, inspected, spied on, directed, legislated at, regulated, docketed, indoctrinated, preached at, controlled, assessed, weighed, censored, ordered about, by men who have neither the right, nor the knowledge, nor the virtue. … To be governed is to be at every operation, at every transaction, noted, registered, enrolled, taxed, stamped, measured, numbered, assessed, licensed, authorized, admonished, forbidden, reformed, corrected, punished. It is, under the pretext of public utility, and in the name of the general interest, to be placed under contribution, trained, ransomed, exploited, monopolized, extorted, squeezed, mystified, robbed; then, at the slightest resistance, the first word of complaint, to be repressed, fined, despised, harassed, tracked, abused, clubbed, disarmed, choked, imprisoned, judged, condemned, shot, deported, sacrificed, sold, betrayed; and, to crown all, mocked, ridiculed, outraged, dishonoured. That is government; that is its justice; that is its morality.” 

~ Pierre-Joseph Proudhon

The GOP ironically seeks control in rendering the country ungovernable through obstructionism. They are upset that the Democratic Party wing of the ruling class blocks their ability to exert total control and governance. This is borne out by the ironic fact that even the government shutdown involved giving orders to government agents to prevent people from visiting memorials or national parks. A further examination reveals the GOP establishment’s support for criminalization of abortion and persecution of undocumented immigrants. These are hardly people who truly despise government in any principled manner.

The above mentioned type of obstructionism needs to be clearly distinguished from the genuine desire of the anarchist to render things ungovernable for the structurally privileged ruling class. A humane anarchist would seek to obstruct the functioning of government in a manner conducive to the well-being of those still dependent upon government for survival. An example would be prioritizing the rendering of the DEA dysfunctional over the food stamps program. The abolition of food stamps preferably follows freed market forces creating a radically more equal distribution of wealth. This will allow for the organization of egalitarian working class mutual aid societies.

C4SS Senior Fellow and Chair Sheldon Richman “explores the critical distinction between capitalism and free markets; discusses corporation socialism, the challenges facing publicly funded schools, and much more.“

After a week of seeing stories of YouTube’s “ContentID” system wreaking havoc on independent content producers in the name of protecting intellectual property, I finally felt ready to sit down and bang out a commentary on this new, “legitimate” form of IP trollery.

As it turns out, Jim Sterling, the reviews editor for video game website The Escapist Magazine, beat me to it with this episode of his long-running “Jimquisition” series (NSFW language).

For a little context, ContentID is a way for major players in the entertainment industry to automatically scour YouTube for any instance of copyright infringement – real or perceived. According to YouTube:

Copyright holders use Content ID to easily identify and manage their content on YouTube. Videos uploaded to YouTube are scanned against a database of files that have been submitted to us by content owners. When Content ID identifies a match between your video and a file in this database, it applies the policy chosen by the content owner. Content owners may choose the following policies:

Monetize: If ads that you did not enable appear on or before your video, the content owner has applied a Monetize policy.

Block: If the content owner has chosen a Block policy, your video will either not be viewable on YouTube, or its audio will be muted. The owner may choose to allow content within your video to play in some countries while blocking it in others. While you may not be able to see your video, or hear its audio, people in other regions may still be able to view and interact with it as usual. You will still be able to view, moderate, and respond to comments on the video from the Comments page in My Messages.

Track: If the content owner has chosen a Track policy, your video will be unaffected. However, its viewership statistics will appear in the content owner’s YouTube Analytics account.

In other words, if you record yourself playing a video game and providing voiceover color commentary, or reviewing a movie using edited clips from the trailer, or anything else involving content derived from other content, companies can either forcibly place ads on your video to make them money, steal your viewers or eliminate your video altogether. Good times, right?

Review 8 time is here! Let’s get started.

James Bovard discusses the glut of police shootings.

Sheldon Richman explains why government is the problem.

Pepe Escobar discusses Erik Prince’s new book.

Binoy Kampark discusses the creeping fascism in Europe.

Uri Avnery discusses land theft in the Jordan Valley.

Patrick Cockburn discusses the complicity of Saudi donors in funding terror.

Kevin Carson discusses the sellout of Mandela to capitalism.

Mohammed Al Qawli asks why the U.S. and Yemeni governments killed his brother with a drone strike.

Eric Margolis discusses the faux pullout from Afghanistan.

Andrew J. Bacevich discusses how Obama can turn away from a warmongering path in the Middle East.

Chase Madar discusses the increasing criminalization of everyday life.

Tom W. Bell discusses how writers coped without copyright protection.

Aaron Ross Powell and Trevor Burns answer common questions about libertarianism.

Wendy McElroy has some advice on how to diminish your ties to the state or government.

Jacob Sullum discusses the faux drug reform policy of the Obama admin.

Patrick Coffey discuses drone war.

David Gordon reviews Lew Rockwell’s new book, Fascism vs Capitalism.

Sheldon Richman advocates for a non-punishment oriented legal system.

Sufyan bin Uzayr discusses Yemeni politics.

Sheldon Richman explains why Mandela wasn’t radical enough.

Moncia Lucas discuses her Progressive Libertarian vision.

James Bamford discusses Al-Qaeda’s magazine, Inspire.

Juan Cole discusses 5 women right’s activists who are shaking up the Middle East.

Franklin C. Spinney discusses the new Seymour Hersh take on Syria.

Kelly B. Vlahos discusses Ann Jone’s new book.

Ivan Eland discusses the pending security agreement with Afghanistan and Hamid Karzai.

Marie Arana discusses a book about the coup against Salvador Allende.

Kevin Carson discusses a libertarian theory on the use of ideology.

We end this review with the final two games of the recently concluded World Chess Championship:

Game 9 was a short win by Magnus Carlsen. Anand allows him to queen a pawn on move 27. The only explanation I can provide for my readers is that Rf4 was designed to result in Rh4 with mate on h7. Anand must have overlooked 28…Qe1. This move allows for 29…Qh4 with material advantage to black.

Game 10 was a fairly lengthy draw. 3. Bb5 took me by surprise. The subsequent exchange of the bishop contradicts the dogma of the advantage of the two bishops. White gets a nice Maroczy bind with 7. c4 and a centralized Queen on d4 in return. Otherwise; a fairly uneventul draw.