Timmy's Lost It: [Was Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice]

[jim bell]

At 11:15 AM 1/3/97 -0800, Timothy C. May wrote:
>As for my "elitism," I've never presented myself in any other fashion. I've
>discussed this issue many times. Get used to it, or ignore it, or just keep
>foaming at the mouth and ranting about how I need to take "yellow pills" to
>avoid being an ally of "Bubba."

I don't fault you for being "elitist."  However, Rich Graves was right: I 
think that  cryptoanarchy, while obviously eliminating taxation and income 
redistribution sounds cozy for economic elites, actually also eliminates the 
basis for those elites to be formed in the first place.  To cite just one 
example that will hit close to home for you, without copyrights or patents (which 
are, obviously, monopolies enforced by governments) it would be far harder 
for companies such as Intel to maintain a near-monopoly on the 
DOS-compatible microprocessor market.

And it has long been observed in libertarian discussion circles that far 
from hating regulation, most large (American; and others) corporations 
actually receive a net benefit from it as compared with smaller companies:  
The cost of complying with regulations doesn't increase linearly with the 
size of company, which means that those same regulations are a way of 
fighting competition if they are played right.  Bring in crypto-anarchy and 
this effect is no longer operating.

Despite all this, I still see nothing inconsistent in even an "elitist" 
pushing for crypto-anarchy:  The current political system has become so 
dramatically inefficient and keeps so many people (through welfare, 
Socialist Insecurity, and government employment) well-fed through income 
redistribution, that I think finally even an "elitist" would be happy to 
chuck the whole system and adopt a crypto-anarchy-equalized system.



Jim Bell
jimbell at pacifier.com