The american libertarian origins

[GatoVillano]

Right now, I'm in the middle of reading ''The libertarian mind'' and I just listened to ''the second treatise of government'' by John Locke and something struck me while I was reading this. It made me think of a video that Stefan did where he talked about migrants and how they live in a bubble of how their country of origin was before they left.

Why are Americans so different from the British? They both have common history, yet the Brits don't share the American need for freedom of speech; freedom of association; freedom to defend yourself and your family; to reject big governments, monopolies and oligarchy; and their love of the free market. What sparked this libertarian movement in the USA? It is interesting to observe that John Locke's work coincides with the same time period that the settlers moved to the new world. While the British were beaten back into the shackles of a big government, the settlers of the new world might have had this seed of freedom inside their minds, free from the tyranny of the British crown. This idea that everyone is equal in the eyes of the maker; That everyone must respect the laws of nature; that even a monarch must answer for his crime; that everyone is free as long as he doesn't coerce an other man; that every men has the right to seek justice when he is wronged. 

It is also interesting to notice that American culture thrives every time there is a separation with Europe due to a conflict. We can observe this during WW1 and WW2. While Americans rejected German music (because of the wars), you see the beginning of Jazz, the American dream, an industrial boom, the invention of disgusting cane meat. And with this, we see a boost of American pride.

If the EU globalist declare war on the USA, we might see a rebirth of american culture, american pride, libertarian thoughts and disgusting cane meat. =P

[smarterthanone]

Big government in Europe. Many groups felt oppressed and wanted to get away. So they moved to America. So people who directly knew the problems of big government would come here mostly. Imagine if Mars was terraformed and all the more libertarian conservative realm of people all started moving there to get away from REEE sjws? Wouldn't you expect Mars to then be very different in a few hundred years from now vs earth? Don't forget, these people leaving one area not only formed America but they removed themselves from Europe so it had a double effect.

[AraiBob]

GatoVillano,

In my own puzzles of history, I wondered at the differences, also. The people writing the constitution were mostly British, and some were minor royalty. Yet, they came up with ideas that we still find helpful, even if they have been mostly ignored.

First, we do NOT live in a democracy. They were very careful about that, and called it a 'republic'. That one word could mean a lot of things, but the emphasis was on individual rights. As the writers were a minority, they did NOT want the 'general population' telling them what they could or could not do.

Further, based on history, they decided they NEVER wanted Royalty to be in charge, and to never allow clergy to be in charge. Both of them have inherent faults that have to be overcome by extraordinary efforts by the leaders. Better to not give them the chance.

And yet, they allowed a LOT of diversity. How? By allowing the states to be almost completely free of a national government. As long as they honored the Constitution rules, They could try out a lot of ideas. If those ideas had merit, then other states would accept them. If enough states liked it, it might be time for an addition to the national constitution.

However, over time this method was bypassed. The Federal Reserve is one of those bypasses that caused a lot of troubles, of which we are living in. And the 'amendment' related to income taxes, was written, but was NEVER ratified by the states. It was implemented, but is an illegal 'enterprise' since it began.

So, the debate of the last few years? Socialism? The constitution allows individual states to explore this idea. However, like any 'ism' they demand that ALL participate. One of the most 'famous' in this regard is California. Not the only state, but the loudest. And they are demanding ideas and taxes that other nations have tried, and have failed. Most famous, today, is Venezuela.

Under the notions of those founders, if California wants to demonstrate why those ideas don't work, that is ok. But to demand the nation follow? Not so good. Worse, they expect the rest of the nation to pay for their ideas.

And that is exactly what happened with ObamaCare. An imposed system, unproven and unwieldy, and today we know it failed. And instead of going back to what worked (perhaps what was around in 1950?). those in congress are attempting to re-write what was a bad idea. So the mess continues.

I would like to say they are making a mistake. But they way they are doing things? makes me think of a deliberate action to force another thing that will fail upon the US.

[GatoVillano]

On 09/07/2017 at 9:03 AM, smarterthanone said:

Big government in Europe. Many groups felt oppressed and wanted to get away. So they moved to America. So people who directly knew the problems of big government would come here mostly. Imagine if Mars was terraformed and all the more libertarian conservative realm of people all started moving there to get away from REEE sjws? Wouldn't you expect Mars to then be very different in a few hundred years from now vs earth? Don't forget, these people leaving one area not only formed America but they removed themselves from Europe so it had a double effect.

Very true. You make a good point. It did have a double effect. If we were to apply this to the current year. The west is going to shit because of left indoctrination. In the end, we might have repeat history. If conservative libertarian want to avoid the fall of the west, they can migrate somewhere else and create a new country based on libertarian values. For example, we could buy land in Brazil and build a new civilisation. It is not outside of the realm of the possible.

[GatoVillano]

On 24/07/2017 at 4:31 AM, AraiBob said:

GatoVillano,

In my own puzzles of history, I wondered at the differences, also. The people writing the constitution were mostly British, and some were minor royalty. Yet, they came up with ideas that we still find helpful, even if they have been mostly ignored.

First, we do NOT live in a democracy. They were very careful about that, and called it a 'republic'. That one word could mean a lot of things, but the emphasis was on individual rights. As the writers were a minority, they did NOT want the 'general population' telling them what they could or could not do.

Further, based on history, they decided they NEVER wanted Royalty to be in charge, and to never allow clergy to be in charge. Both of them have inherent faults that have to be overcome by extraordinary efforts by the leaders. Better to not give them the chance.

And yet, they allowed a LOT of diversity. How? By allowing the states to be almost completely free of a national government. As long as they honored the Constitution rules, They could try out a lot of ideas. If those ideas had merit, then other states would accept them. If enough states liked it, it might be time for an addition to the national constitution.

However, over time this method was bypassed. The Federal Reserve is one of those bypasses that caused a lot of troubles, of which we are living in. And the 'amendment' related to income taxes, was written, but was NEVER ratified by the states. It was implemented, but is an illegal 'enterprise' since it began.

So, the debate of the last few years? Socialism? The constitution allows individual states to explore this idea. However, like any 'ism' they demand that ALL participate. One of the most 'famous' in this regard is California. Not the only state, but the loudest. And they are demanding ideas and taxes that other nations have tried, and have failed. Most famous, today, is Venezuela.

Under the notions of those founders, if California wants to demonstrate why those ideas don't work, that is ok. But to demand the nation follow? Not so good. Worse, they expect the rest of the nation to pay for their ideas.

And that is exactly what happened with ObamaCare. An imposed system, unproven and unwieldy, and today we know it failed. And instead of going back to what worked (perhaps what was around in 1950?). those in congress are attempting to re-write what was a bad idea. So the mess continues.

I would like to say they are making a mistake. But they way they are doing things? makes me think of a deliberate action to force another thing that will fail upon the US.

A complete democracy would never work. I cant remember who said this, but it sounded a bit like this: democracy works until people realise they can vote themselves subsidies. If you read John Locke, Frederic Bastiat and David Boaz, the state and religion are things that must always be feared. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. This is why the US government is fragmented. So that power can never be centralised.

The funding fathers followed John Locke's advice. Locke said that every men has natural rights. But if a state becomes so corrupt as to take away a man's natural right. Then it is his duty to alter the state or to replace it. Thus, the US declared their independence from a tyrannical monarchy.

Not all US presidents were good. Woodrow Wilson, Roosevelt, LBG, Lincoln, Clinton, Bush, Obama. These bastards used the power of the state has a force to coerce. This is  where everything went wrong. When the state grew in size, and took away more and more freedom by force. Sending men to die in wars that have nothing to do with america because the industrial military complex are mercenaries that companies can buy. Sending young men to die so companies can make a buck. The level of power and corruption has gotten out of hand. Thomas Jefferson must be turning in his grave. 

[ofd]

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Not all US presidents were good. Woodrow Wilson, Roosevelt, LBG, Lincoln, Clinton, Bush, Obama. These bastards used the power of the state has a force to coerce.

With that definition every single president, even Washington, was bad. See the Whisky rebellion for details.

[GatoVillano]

14 hours ago, ofd said:

With that definition every single president, even Washington, was bad. See the Whisky rebellion for details.

Washington could have stayed into office. He was even asked to become some sort of monarch of the US. But he knew that power corrupts, so he decided to step down voluntarily. He is the one that set the rule that a president can only do 2 terms.

If you ask me, my favourite president was Thomas Jefferson. He took the natural rights very seriously. The declaration of independence is an amazing document. This guy was a libertarian to the core. Imagion, a nation funded on the none aggression principal. Man... Just think how amazing that is and how we take it for granted. 

Sure, you can find dirt on every president. But those that I consider the worsts are the ones that increased the size of the government, striped away natural rights of the people and used coercion for their own self interests. 

[ofd]

Quote

If you ask me, my favourite president was Thomas Jefferson. He took the natural rights very seriously. The declaration of independence is an amazing document. This guy was a libertarian to the core. Imagion, a nation funded on the none aggression principal. Man... Just think how amazing that is and how we take it for granted. 

It's a great idea. But then again, it didn't happen. during Jefferson's reign, the Federalists took over the government and the judiciary. They were backed by merchants and slave holders. A few decades later, when industrialists became more important, the slave holders lost interest. Hence their idea of free trade to export cotton to the UK was given up in favour for tariffs to protect the North from cheaper imports.

 

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Sure, you can find dirt on every president. But those that I consider the worsts are the ones that increased the size of the government, striped away natural rights of the people and used coercion for their own self interests. 

Who makes it on that list? The criteria seem to fit only for Harding and Coolidge, who tried to shrink the government and increase individual liberty.

[smarterthanone]

On 7/29/2017 at 1:06 PM, GatoVillano said:

A complete democracy would never work.

The only way I see a government working would be a document that said like "No murder, murder is X" "no theft, theft is this y" like just spell out the NAP. Then say, if you break the rules, write in restitution or whatever specifically. LASTLY, if anyone tries to change such document to add or subtract even the most minor change, a forever kill order is places on them, free for all anyone can do it.

There are still many problems with this BUT we know every other type of government doesn't work very well, I do think this would work better, and I still have many issues with it.

[GatoVillano]

9 hours ago, smarterthanone said:

The only way I see a government working would be a document that said like "No murder, murder is X" "no theft, theft is this y" like just spell out the NAP. Then say, if you break the rules, write in restitution or whatever specifically. LASTLY, if anyone tries to change such document to add or subtract even the most minor change, a forever kill order is places on them, free for all anyone can do it.

There are still many problems with this BUT we know every other type of government doesn't work very well, I do think this would work better, and I still have many issues with it.

As you know, democracy works until the people that have less realise that they can vote to redistribute the wealth of those who have more. This is theft and inevitably leads to the collapse of the economy. However, you dont want an oligarchy either. We dont want a ruling class of elites that treat the poor as pawns. Therefore you want a system where rational people with an understanding of economy and who work and contributes to society to have the right to vote. You want this criteria to be accessible to all with a reasonable amount of work. This is why I believe that the system where only property owners had the right to vote, was the best system. This system does not discriminate on race or gender and it has the benefit of allowing only those who contribute financially to society to decide how it should be administrated. The funding fathers really got it right the first time. 

[GatoVillano]

19 hours ago, ofd said:

It's a great idea. But then again, it didn't happen. during Jefferson's reign, the Federalists took over the government and the judiciary. They were backed by merchants and slave holders. A few decades later, when industrialists became more important, the slave holders lost interest. Hence their idea of free trade to export cotton to the UK was given up in favour for tariffs to protect the North from cheaper imports.

 

Who makes it on that list? The criteria seem to fit only for Harding and Coolidge, who tried to shrink the government and increase individual liberty.

Well then, lets try to make some examples. Lets take JFK as an example. He tried to end the Vietnam war, he tried to audit the fed and he tried to dismantle the CIA. I believe that JFK was a good president. He tried to shrink the power of the government on the people and increase their freedoms. 

Obama dropped over 100 000 bombs on the middle east, he tippled the national dept, he gave up Icann to the UN, He sold weapons to our enemies all around the world, he created an internet spy grid to spy on everyone in the world, he forced people to have a single payer healthcare, he increased racial tensions in the country.... I could go on. He was a bad president. He took away countless freedoms to the people and trapped them in poverty. 

What I consider a good government is one that respects the natural rights of individuals. A president that doesnt impose its ideology on people. A government that doesnt create problems to later take away people's freedoms in order to ''fix the problem''. Technically, the only task a government should have is to protect people from coercion. If the government is the source of coercion, then it has failed. It should then be altered or replaced. 

[ofd]

Quote

He tried to end the Vietnam war

No, he started it. He sent advisors to Viet Nam which led to the war under LBJ.

Furthermore, Executive Order 11110 increased the power of the Fed, by planning to get rid off silver certificates altogether in the future.

 

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He tried to shrink the power of the government on the people and increase their freedoms. 

The civil rights legislation speaks a different language.

 

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he created an internet spy grid to spy on everyone in the world

That was well under way with Clinton and Bush 2.

 

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he forced people to have a single payer healthcare

Where do people have single payer healthcare?

[smarterthanone]

12 hours ago, GatoVillano said:

As you know, democracy works until the people that have less realise that they can vote to redistribute the wealth of those who have more. This is theft and inevitably leads to the collapse of the economy. However, you dont want an oligarchy either. We dont want a ruling class of elites that treat the poor as pawns. Therefore you want a system where rational people with an understanding of economy and who work and contributes to society to have the right to vote. You want this criteria to be accessible to all with a reasonable amount of work. This is why I believe that the system where only property owners had the right to vote, was the best system. This system does not discriminate on race or gender and it has the benefit of allowing only those who contribute financially to society to decide how it should be administrated. The funding fathers really got it right the first time. 

That works in the short term. Answer me this, if government does X is the correct moral best necessary thing to do.... why would it need to be voted on or changed? The fact that change is allowed, then allows for literally anything to later happen and always brings about the excessive governance we see today.

Even the damn roads. Say the government is going to build the roads. It could be accomplished like this:

A 1% tax will be collected to build and maintain roads. No other methods can be used to fund road building or maintenance. The final road plans will be approved by the road commissioner who is to be elected every two years by popular vote. ANY ATTEMPT TO CHANGE THIS PROVISION WILL RESULT IN A DEATH ORDER.

Now the roads are done. Nothing to do. No gas taxes, increase of taxes, tolls, car taxes... simple. Then when some wannabe senator type person says hey lets increase the taxes to 2% someone will just blast the dude.

I think this would be a much better system than one that can be changed or voted or whatever, both popular or via land owners, or any other method of segregating out people.

[GatoVillano]

On 01/08/2017 at 1:19 PM, smarterthanone said:

That works in the short term. Answer me this, if government does X is the correct moral best necessary thing to do.... why would it need to be voted on or changed? The fact that change is allowed, then allows for literally anything to later happen and always brings about the excessive governance we see today.

Even the damn roads. Say the government is going to build the roads. It could be accomplished like this:

A 1% tax will be collected to build and maintain roads. No other methods can be used to fund road building or maintenance. The final road plans will be approved by the road commissioner who is to be elected every two years by popular vote. ANY ATTEMPT TO CHANGE THIS PROVISION WILL RESULT IN A DEATH ORDER.

Now the roads are done. Nothing to do. No gas taxes, increase of taxes, tolls, car taxes... simple. Then when some wannabe senator type person says hey lets increase the taxes to 2% someone will just blast the dude.

I think this would be a much better system than one that can be changed or voted or whatever, both popular or via land owners, or any other method of segregating out people.

Why do you need a goddam government to build roads. Private companies do a better job building them and maintaining them. They just charge people a small tarif to use them. Also, when government build roads, there is often a huge amount of corruption, the road takes years to make, it cost like 10x the original estimate. And you realise down the road (no pun intended) that the government official received bribes by a company so that this company would obtain the contract.

If you want a good example of shit like this, look at the olympic stadium in Montreal. They could have build a simple stadium, it wouldnt have cost them much and would take little time to make it. No, they had to hire some super star architect, that made some crazy ass over complicated design. The construction was managed like fucking shit. employees went on strike. It cost a fortune and wasnt done on time. It was unfinished during the olympics and showed the world that the people of Quebec are a complete failure. It cost so much that 40 years later, they still havent made a profit on this dam project.  I'm sorry, but the government sucks at building stuff.

[smarterthanone]

17 hours ago, GatoVillano said:

Why do you need a goddam government to build roads. Private companies do a better job building them and maintaining them. They just charge people a small tarif to use them. Also, when government build roads, there is often a huge amount of corruption, the road takes years to make, it cost like 10x the original estimate. And you realise down the road (no pun intended) that the government official received bribes by a company so that this company would obtain the contract.

If you want a good example of shit like this, look at the olympic stadium in Montreal. They could have build a simple stadium, it wouldnt have cost them much and would take little time to make it. No, they had to hire some super star architect, that made some crazy ass over complicated design. The construction was managed like fucking shit. employees went on strike. It cost a fortune and wasnt done on time. It was unfinished during the olympics and showed the world that the people of Quebec are a complete failure. It cost so much that 40 years later, they still havent made a profit on this dam project.  I'm sorry, but the government sucks at building stuff.

I agree with you. I am working under the assumption that if we HAD to have a government, how would you fix the flaw of democracy such as the majority votes for the minorities money? What I posted was my proposed idea.

And to be honest, I have since thought about it and it would probably apply to anarchy.

Say some revolution happened and instead of a new government forms, the NAP is written out real clear and one security force announces "we will enforce the NAP according to this document, which on it says it may not change". And thus anarchy is formed.

[GatoVillano]

On 04/08/2017 at 6:54 PM, smarterthanone said:

I agree with you. I am working under the assumption that if we HAD to have a government, how would you fix the flaw of democracy such as the majority votes for the minorities money? What I posted was my proposed idea.

And to be honest, I have since thought about it and it would probably apply to anarchy.

Say some revolution happened and instead of a new government forms, the NAP is written out real clear and one security force announces "we will enforce the NAP according to this document, which on it says it may not change". And thus anarchy is formed.

This is interesting. I have been thinking more and more about how and if anarchy could actually work. Most of my life I had rejected the concept, thinking that there is no possible way it could work. I mean, who would honour their contracts if there is no courts to enforce them. But, I've been reading more and more about freedom, and the concept of some level of anarchy in a society could work. 

Lets say, for shits and giggles, that the economy would collapse and that we have to start fresh without a government to rule over us. Would it be possible to have a series of private entities that would provide the services needed to run a civil society? We know that we can trade for food and water. We can have private companies upkeep the roads for a small fee. We could have insurance companies provide a police for to protect private property. We could elect a judge and a jury to settle legal affairs. Of course, people can own guns for protection and every grown men is required to join and train in the militia. Poor people could receive voluntary donations and if we start living in communities, people could even find labour for them until they get back on their feet.   

I know, this looks like colonial USA. But it works. No where in this community was a government needed. Not even for currency, because we could go back to the gold standard. 

[smarterthanone]

21 hours ago, GatoVillano said:

...and every grown men is required to join and train in the militia.

Error. Everything else though. Nobody is required to do anything of the sort. Who would require them?

[GatoVillano]

It is true that you cannot force anyone to do anything. If you do force someone to join an army, to fight and to die and if by some chance you dont want to we'll kill you anyway. Yes this is coercion. You are right. But this is a good way to bring up the next subject I was thinking of this morning, which is culture, using Stefan's definition of culture.

[GatoVillano]

Ok I just wrote down some ideas I had this morning about culture: an individualist culture that is based on positive reinforcements and a collectivist culture based on negative reinforcements. You can go read it, the title is ''culture and migration''. And I do believe that what we were talking about is related.

As you know, white people are mostly individualist, well at lease those with an IQ 100 and up. This is our greatest strength and our greatest weakness. 

We all agree that we want to live in a free and peaceful society where people are free from coercion. But constant vigilance is the cost of freedom. If an other group invades your group, hangs the men, rapes the women and enslaves the kids... well, there goes your free society. So it is preferable for the group to be able to defend itself. There is the option of hiring an armed group to protect you, but then you are at the mercy of their good will. So lets agree that it is preferable for the protection of our liberties that every men in our society to be armed, proficient with that weapon and able to function in a group.

Now here is the problem. If you are in an individualistic culture, you will prefer positive reinforcement. This means that if the group is attacked by barbarians, can I could on Bob to back me up. If we do positive reinforcement, I will thank Bob for helping me out fighting back the barbarians. But if he refused to fight, then I must respect his freedom to refuse to fight.

If we are in a collective culture, Bob is required to step up and join the group to fight the barbarians. If he pussied out, he will be ostracised from the group and probably exiled or some shit. Yes, Bob's freedoms flew out the window when shit hit the fan and that it was time to fight. But at lease we aren't dead, raped and/or enslaved. 

This is basically the reasoning behind the army. We give up our freedom of movement, of speech for a while and maybe even give up our lives. But we do this to defend our free society. And this is why, in the anarcho-capitalist society I created, I said that we need to have a militia. 

[RichardY]

I'd be inclined to kill Bob if he refused to help against organised violent barbaric groups and society was in chaos. Especially if he wasn't packing, could be a spy or informer, tie up any loose ends. Would require(requisition) any assets of the deceased.

I remember Ayn Rand arguing against Anarcho-Capitalism and for a Nightwatchman state for the reason you highlighted @GatoVillano of armed groups strong arming individual communities. Nietzsche also mentioned in Will to Power somewhere of the issue of punishment (negative reinforcement) and how many individuals involve outsourcing responsibility to many individuals in the state. This is not to say that Anarcho-Capitalism is not the most consistent framework available, but that as well as a High IQ required to understand and work through various scenarios, it also requires full responsibility and to embrace aspects of a persons personality that are not comfortable to many people. Live by the Sword Die by the Sword.

Getting back to Bob instead of serving in a local militia a compromise could potentially be reached. If he did not wish to fight he could help in other ways, Medic or Engineer for example. If he didn't wish to help then it would still be important to eliminate him as a potential threat. If he occupied a strategic location to inform or defend this would have to be addressed. If Bob was just some gun nutt in the middle of nowhere then fine leave him alone, made his bed lie in it. Cost and benefit. If Bob is part of the community he is obligated to defend it, if he does not defend it then he isn't a free rider, but a traitor. 

[GatoVillano]

Sir Richard the V, your argument reminded me of a video I saw about WW1. To be more precise, the video talked about a mental illness we discovered during WW1 that is shell shock. WW1 was one of the most brutal war the world has ever know (if you want you can read about the conditions in the trenches from Churchill. He spent years in those trenches and you can read about it in ''the power of words''. These soldiers spend years being buried like rats, bombed by artillery, they even used chemical warfare. Some soldiers just lost it. They became incoherent. They laugh for no reason. They would leave everything and start walking away from the battlefield. and of course they were treated like deserters. 

To think that these young men were kidnapped by force by the state, forced to fight in a war that meant nothing for them. And when this hell broke them and drove them mad, the state decided that they had to be executed. Because we dont want any disobedient rats in this mouse utopea. We need to remember that we are nothing but cogs in this hellish machine we call the state. This thought turned my stomach. These men died for nothing. And it reminds me of something that Bill Whittle said in his show ''the right angle''. It was about this kid in Europe that was going to die of some disease. The only chance the kid had was an experimental treatment in america. The family raised 1 million dollars through a go fund me to treat the kid. But the courts in Europe decided that the kid couldnt go to america. That he was to stay in the hospital and die. The court didnt even allow the kid to die at home. Bill said that this is what he finds disgusting about statism. That when the state decides its your time to die, then it is your time to die. This is just like the soldier in WW1 that is shell shock. The state decided to grab this man. to take him away from his family and his life. And then to die running to the enemy lines or to die by an execution squad. The state decided that it was his time to die.

I swear, I'm becoming more and more anarcho-capitalist by the day. =P

[RichardY]

Not Sir, would have to bump probably 20 odd family members off(could be a State School teacher, less appealing) and not related to Rowan Atkinson aka Mr Bean.

Killing Bob or him helping in another way?

They weren't kidnapped many were professional volunteer soldiers(TA) part time had a Great Grandfather(50% German, massive guy)  who was a RSM, have the parade stick. Many men volunteered, I think another Great Grandfather of mine volunteered, but was rejected because he was a skilled whitesmith machinist. Large capital stock to maintain in the UK at the time and shortages of munitions at the beginning at Least on the British side. Heard my grandmother say once or twice that her father the RSM had suicide pills for her and her sisters in case the Germans invaded in WW2.

On the French side, wonder what they are playing at, I mean they invaded the German states twice, obsessed with looking good in their swanky fashion. Drugged on booze. "Never did I speak German, not even under the torture." There are a lot of WW1 cemeteries in France and they take it very seriously, though the migrants are probably crapping on their graves, christian crosses and all. So maybe not so serious.

There was another kid some time a go whose parents basically told the NHS to go fuck themselves and smuggled their child(later survived) out of the country to have proton beam therapy in the Czech Republic. That recent case was a baby with mitochondrial DNA problems or something.

[smarterthanone]

The trick is make enough money fast enough to hire and support your own private militia before someone comes and gets you. Make money, hire guards, make more money, hire more guards. If you decide not to make money and hire guards that is your decision and I won't come to your defense. Just like be a starving artist, no money for health care, or be a doctor and have both money and preferred access to health care, the choice is yours.

[Dylan Lawrence Moore]

Can't understand the philosophic founding of America without knowing your Thomas Paine:

Peace Revolution 086: Common Sense for the 21st Century

I also recommend reading Carroll Quigley's The Evolution of Civilizations, particularly to opening parts on his chapter about Western Civ, where he goes into possible reasons that the West was different right from the beginning.

The Evolution of Civilizations (Western Civ starts on Page 10)