Logging this so I can find it later: a favorite parable of private-sector conservation is that of William Beck’s Ravenna Park in Seattle.
2006: that link has gone bad, but here’s another.
Ever notice that, when socialists want to illustrate the inadequacy of the private sector, their favorite example of (current) market failure is the most regulated and subsidized industry of all?
In 1994, I was (so they tell me who follow such things) the first Libertarian in California to be endorsed for partisan office by a major daily newspaper. Now I have a chance at a second footnote in the history books!
There’s a new group (or maybe one guy) proposing an Amendment to recognize the right of secession:
The sovereign authority of any State to withdraw by law from the United States shall not be questioned, and the United States shall recognize it as a sovereign and independent country.
I’m chortling because the first clause was my suggestion (except that I wrote the People of any State), in response to this earlier draft:
If any state should, either through a referendum or a majority vote of that state’s legislature, choose to secede from the United States of America, Congress shall let it secede in peace, and recognize it as a sovereign and independent State.
My objection to this was that it overrode any provision that a State constitution might have for supermajority or popular ratification. Many of us, I imagine, would want some major reforms before allowing the gang of thieves in the State capitol to declare itself sovereign by simple majority!
Looking up the Constitution of the State of California for a discussion on secession, I noticed this doubly odd provision (article 3 section 2):
The boundaries of the State are those stated in the Constitution of 1849 as modified pursuant to statute. Sacramento is the capital of California.
Why incorporate a superseded law by reference rather than explicitly? And why put in the constitution something that is subject to alteration by ordinary statute?
wouldn’t want to give anyone ideas
Justice Department Censors Supreme Court Quote
The mind reels at such a blatant abuse of power (and at the sheer chutzpah of using national security as an excuse to censor a quotation [from a Supreme Court decision] about using national security as an excuse to stifle dissent).
Alan K. Henderson sells shirts and a bumpersticker with the slogan
McCain/Feingold ’04
SILENCE THE VOTE!