But who will take care of the poor [in the absence of government]?!

Such questions are often posted by those who haven’t through through a reality without a top-down, centralized bureaucracy that can only give to some what it takes from others. I don’t berate those who have such a knee-jerk reaction when they hear someone advocate for a world without institutions based on violence, after all, most people are exposed only to the religion of the State in gun-run schools and via the lamestream media. But think about it for a moment – how frugal or cost-effective would your expenditures be if you had unlimited access to everyone’s money (or could just print money out of thin air)? Not very. Or how likely would you be to learn from bad purchases? Not very.

Yesterday I joined a number of other individuals to distribute Thanksgiving meals to those less-fortunate. Rather than pander for an assistance program to receive more funding we chose to act on our own volition. After all, it’s not charity if done at the barrel of a gun (which is exactly how underlies every government anti-poverty program).

Stealing is wrong, whether done by a stranger on the street or someone who has an extension at the IRS office. Whatever is done by government employees is either immoral or done inefficiently.

Major props to Amanda Bouldin for spearheading a damn successful Basket Brigade here in the ‘shire. Be sure to listen to Amanda’s suggestions at the end of the video on how to get a Basket Brigade off the ground in your area if you’re so interested. Or, if you engage in your own civil society activities that you think others may be interested in leave them as a comment so we can achieve liberty in our lifetime!

More:
Basket Brigade of NH website
Voluntaryism
Free State Project
From Mutual Aid to the Welfare State edited by David Beito, Peter Gordon & Alexander Tabarrok
The Voluntary City by David Beito
Liberty On Tour’s First Time Here? page
Liberty On Tour’s Resources page
David Beito on the Voluntary City and Civil Rights on MotorhomeDiaries.com
Capital Access interview of Amanda Bouldin and Kate Muller about the Basket Brigade

The segment is about 40min long.

Jim heads-up DownSizeDC and was covering the first hour of Jerry Hughes’ “Straight Talk” on the Accent Radio Network.

Ian is involved with Free Talk Live, Free Keene, The Civil Disobedience Evolution Fund, and more.

Last week, we engaged in a two-hour dialogue with others in the second Agora I/O in back-to-back sessions on “Brainstorm with Cop Block: Your Feedback, Ideas & Involvement Wanted!” and “Police Interaction and Accountability: Q&A with Cop Block.”

The conversation itself was a bit more freewheeling on topics related to Copblocking, voluntaryism, private defense agencies, tactics and more.

Thoughts, ideas or feedback on the talk? Let us know: http://www.copblock.org/contact/ Thanks to everyone who joined us and contributed to the convo and to George Donnelly for spearheading this information-sharing event.

You may recall our “Effective Activism” session back in March at the first Agora I/O unconference:

Occupy Wall Street: Strike The Root
CURRENT POT: $400 (as of Sat. Oct 3rd)

There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root.
- Henry David Thoreau

Striking the root is a concept advocated by abolitionist, individualist anarchist and trancendetalist Henry David Thoreau. He believed that striking the cause (the “root”) was preferable to hacking at the effects (the “branches”).

The effects of corporatism and subsequent gaps in wealth that exist between the haves and have nots are obvious. Those active with Occupy Wall know this better than most. However, to not recognize that these are only things that stem from a root cause is to unfortunately miss the matter.

What is that root? It is the state, that group of individuals who claim a monopoly on the use of “legitimate” violence within a geographic location. Is it not the state that “permits” corporate class plunder? One must focus on the state and not just its allied corporate class.

OccupyWallSt.com describes Occupy Wall Street as a:

leaderless resistance movement with people of many colors, genders and political persuasions. The one thing we all have in common is that We Are The 99% that will no longer tolerate the greed and corruption of the 1%.

Occupy Wall Street: Strike The Root! aims to speak to these people. They are already disillusioned with the Statist Quo. They know things are messed-up. But many (- not all!) focus their attention on berating corporations and banks. Do people operating corporations and banks do fucked up shit? Yes. But that’s only due to the existence of the great fiction of the State. It’s just classic rent-seeking.

Can YOU make a video that communicates the ideas of
complete liberty to those at the Occupy Wall Street protests? Do it!

Criteria:

• The names of sponsors (listed below) must be included in the video for a minimum of ten seconds (all the organizational names can be put on the same screen)
• Save for YouTube’s 15min-max, there are no other constraints, so be creative!

Prizes:

• Best video – 2/3 the total raised for the Occupy Wall Street: Strike The Root! video contest
• Runner-up video – 1/3 the total raised for the Occupy Wall Street: Strike The Root! video contest

Judges:

• Pete Eyre of Cop Block & Liberty On Tour
• judge list will be expanded shortly
  

Deadline:

• 11:55PM EST on Sunday, Oct. 16th
• Post your video on your own outlet & email us a link with “Occupy Wall Street: Strike The Root” in the subject line
• Questions? We’re here: OperationStrikeTheRoot [at] gmail.com (replace the “[at]” with “@”)

Money:

CURRENT POT: $300

• Each of the sponsors below have already contributed $100 toward the Occupy Wall Street: Strike The Root! video contest (CopBlock & LibertyOnTour donated $100 together)
• If YOU think this is a worthwhile investment, a good bang-for-your-buck, please considering donating as well. All funds will go to the winners. Think of this as an X Prize or crowdsourcing at its finest – we’re a community after all!

Video Posting:

• Winners will be announced by 3PM EST on Tuesday, Oct. 18th
• The videos chosen as “best” or “runner-up” will be posted on the respective YouTube channels of all the sponsors
• Attribution will be given in each video description and the announcement post (if your video is selected we’ll contact you – you can choose to share whatever you like – remain anonymous, provide your full name and a paragraph overview about yourself, your aims, your projects, or anything in-between

Resources:

• Resources by Liberty On Tour
• Market Anarchism FAQ by Center For a Stateless Society
• Occupy Wall Street on Cop Block
• Anonymous – Occupy Wall Street, Sep 17th video shared by guarf78

More resources:

• Economics in One Lesson by Henry Hazlitt as PDF, via FEE.org, on Google Books, via Mises.org, via Amazon
• I Must Speak Out: The Best of the Voluntaryist by Carl Watner as .PDF, on Google Books, on Amazon
• Justice Without the State with Bruce Benson as VIDEO, based on the book The Enterprise of Law from Mises.org, on Amazon
• The Most Dangerous Superstition by Larken Rose book for sale

Sponsors:

• Cop Block
  Cop Block is a decentralized project supported by a diverse group of individuals united by their shared goals of police accountability, education of individual rights and the dissemination of effective tactics to utilize while filming police. We seek to highlight the double standard that some grant to those with badges. By documenting police actions whether they are illegal, immoral or just a waste of time and resources then calling the police stations involved (ideally while recording and then later sharing your conversation), we can work together to bring about transparency and have a real impact.

• Freedom’s Phoenix
  Freedoms Phoenix is the premier Freedom, Liberty, Peace and Love R3volution website in the world. Our network is re-igniting the flames of freedom one mind at a time. Today’s governmental structure is imploding under its own weight, and its death rattles aren’t going to be pretty. At Freedom’s Phoenix we observe, comment and try to stay out of the way. We know Freedom will rise from the ashes, and we want to make sure that everyone’s Freedom is never signed away again by those who believe they have the power to do so.

• Liberty On Tour
  Liberty on Tour couples on-the-road activism with new media to advance the voluntary society. Through in-person interactions, online networking and constantly-varying content, LOT advocates for self-government, personal responsibility and consensual interactions.
• Strike The Root
  Strike The Root is a daily journal of current events and commentary from a libertarian/market anarchist perspective. The mission of STR is to advance the cause of liberty, primarily by de-mystifying and de-legitimizing the State. STR seeks a world where people are free to live their lives as they see fit, as long as they don’t use force or fraud against peaceful people.

Want to get on-board as a supporter?
Email us at: OperationStrikeTheRoot [at] gmail.com (replace the “[at]” with “@”)

They scream self-ownership! You can put what you want in your body (coffee) and have the right to defend it (guns). And a portion of sales will be donated to Liberty On Tour!

From: http://www.ronpaulbuttons.com/Guns-and-Coffee-T-Shirt-TS-GunsandCoffee.htm

Guns and Coffee ~ T-Shirt

Open carry? How about in your favorite coffee shop? Starbucks doesn’t discriminate, neither do we!  See Starbuck’s policy statement regarding their gun-toting customers here!

Wear this special edition T-shirt and show your support for sound public policy, the 2nd amendment, and coffee. Our “Guns and Coffee” T-shirt is one of a kind. Wear it with pride and get the Button too.****

****A portion of the proceeds for the sale of this special edition T-Shirt will benefit our friends at Liberty on Tour! 

 

I actually got my Guns and Coffee t-shirt last Sept. when on the road with LOT: 2010. I traded a LOT shirt straight-up:) That shirt was our first edition, with the LOT logo on the front and the URL on the back. Now on our Support page we have “This Is What a Voluntaryist Looks Like” t-shirts with the URL on the back.

Looking for other badass gear? Check out the revamped CopBlock.org/Support

That’s the problem we found while trying to film several of the activities this year, it was hard to pick between Bob Murphy and Dan D’Amico or Round Tables and Football (I choose football and was the MVP – just ask anyone). We did our best to get as many as speakers/events on video as we could, it just wasn’t possible – especially after the Manchester PD took two of our cameras.  So here’s a video of the speakers, events and activities that we caught this year at Porcfest. If you don’t see something in here that interest you to come next year, you’re a statist and need to head to LibertyOnTour.com’s Resources page immediately.

When traveling the country we’re constantly asked, “What is Porcfest?” And the answer, “That the Porcupine Freedom Festival (or PorcFest) is the Free State Project’s summer event” doesn’t do it justice. To fully understand the magnitude of Porcfest you have to experience it. Over 1,000 people – nearly all of which subscribe to ideals of less government, no desire to control others and prefer to be left alone - camping in the White Mountains of New Hampshire peacefully and without the government’s hand on their shoulder.

Even my words can’t describe it, so we (props to Pete Eyre for filtering though the mountain of Porcfest footage and editing this) chopped up this video. Here’s what you missed at Porcfest 2011, loser.

This year was my first time attending the Porcupine Freedom Festival and I had such an awesome time, I wanted to share my experience with all of you.

We arrived Monday and parked MARV conveniently close to the showers as well as agora alley around the corner.  Just about anything we could need was available at the venders at PorcFest from several different types foods to hand-rolled cigarettes to special brownies.  I didn’t get to as many events as I would have liked to, but I had a lot of fun nonetheless.  As cliche as it may sound, my favorite of PorcFest was the people and just as valuable were the many conversations on alternative currencies, off-the-grid living, agorism in action and the benefits of a voluntary society.  With the beautiful scenery and, besides the occasional shower, the beautiful weather of Northern New Hampshire, I couldn’t have asked for a better way to spend a week whilst my hometown was practically boiling down South in the Summer heat.

I thought I’d see how some of the other first-timers were doing, so I put together this video to show all those who didn’t attend it this year what they missed.  You won’t want to miss PorcFest 2012.

I am now in Des Moines, Iowa, after my 4th day of the 10 day caravan (I have completed 3 days of eastward travel out of 8 planned).

I have been updating my website, www.libertycaravan.org, every day but forgot to post the links on here.

Day 1 pictures, a few:

Day 1 pictures – all are on my flickr account here.

Day 2 report: Denver sightseeing and shopping on Sep 8.

Day 3 report: Denver to Kearney, Nebraska on Sep 9.

Day 4 report: Kearney to Des Moines, Iowa on Sep 10. Two meetups planned but no one came.

I am uploading Day 2 pictures now onto the flickr account, which is a lot quicker than any of the other sites I have tried, and then days 3 and 4 should be quick as there were a lot less pictures the last couple of days. Most of the Day 2 pictures are from the Denver Zoo and then a site I visited in Fort Collins, Colorado. Maybe I’ll make those separate lists so everyone doesn’t have to look through them all to find the other, more interesting pictures.

Today I leave for Chicago, about 5 1/2 hours of driving, and no sightseeing planned so I expect, finally, to get to the hotel quite early and have lots of time for catching up on stuff I haven’t been able to do every day. That will be my halfway point so I will write a special piece on here about that as well.