Barter!

The excerpt of Adam Smith's 'Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations' focused on two things:

A. The way in which production/manufacture of goods becomes faster when it is departmentalised

B. That if man had no propensity to trade goods of his production for the goods of another's production, man would have no reason to try to make more/better.

When man lives in society, he finds that no longer can he do all that he needs to survive. He has 'almost constant occasion for the help of his brethren' and must show that 'it is for their own advantage to do for him what he requires of them.' And so a barter system develops in which goods are traded for goods. [best quote ever: 'Nobody ever saw a dog make a fair and deliberate exchange of one bone for another with another dog.']

And now a segue to The Fed! See, the Federal Reserve Bank has a series of educational comic book-style publications which can be found at http://www.newyorkfed.org/publications/result.cfm?comics=1 couple deal with the history of money, the more entertaining of which is entitled 'Once Upon A Dime'. On an island nation, there's a fisherman who wants to marry a doctor. They discover that to get flowers for the wedding, they have to trade fish for spears, spears for coconuts, coconuts for a net, and the net for some flowers. That's when they decide that barter is too much work and invent money. All through the second chapter of the excerpt, I'm reminded of the [poorly drawn, badly scripted] comic explanation of barter, and money, and thought I'd put this resource out there.

Imperiaist Tendancies

So, both the imperialists and anti-imperialists of the turn of the century compare America unfavorably to Spain. [This is when I decide I need to brush up on my world history] And then there's the issue of the Philippines, where there is violence and for some reason America decided to step in. [This is when I go off to wikipedia for a while] ... Okay, so after Spain lost the Spanish-American War, she ceded the Philippines, which were already in revolt, to America, along with Cuba, Puerto Rico, and Guam. The Filipino revolutionists were no more happy under America's banner, and continued to fight until 1913, with a final death toll of over one million Filipinos. [In 1946 we gave them Independence, after they'd been occupied by the Japanese for ten years]

So why did we keep the Philippines for 48 years? Especially when our gov't obviously wasn't working for them, anathema to our very premise of gov't [as set out in the first pph of the League's argument]. According to Sen. Beveridge, 'it is ours to save that soil for liberty and civilization.' He believes we have a duty to 'free' everyone. Wait, I thought we freed them from Spain... Where'd the logic go? Oh, the Filipinos are uncivilized, so we should govern them anyway, even though they've been trying to gain their freedom and govern themselves for twenty years and a million people are willing to die for that. Okay then. Perfect sense. His other arguments are equally untenable, one being that we 'need' the land to be able to export all the produce our country, which is 'perpetually revitalized by the virile, manproducing workingfolk of all the earth' [immigrants apparently procreate with more vigour than the rest of us] creates; that we must not be 'misers of liberty'; that God will favour us, as one parable in the Bible can be stretched to mean.

I ken our darling anti-imperialists much better than I do the aforementioned Beveridge. Dude, until we can sort the mess that we've made for ourselves on our home territory, we should stay the hell out of other people's business. 'The United States have always protested against the doctrine of international law which permits the subjugation of the weak by the strong.' The League argues that no ruler in the spirit of improvement may do something to break the social contract, as Abraham Lincoln stated that 'no man is good enough to govern another man without that other's consent'. And then, the League proposes that, if you agree, you oust those criminals from office by Voting! Brilliant!

If you believe in [representative] democracy, protect it! Vote! As for subjugated countries, if they deserve liberty, they will make it happen. [We did, France did, Britain did; it's not our duty to give it to people who can't govern themselves. That'd be like giving a chipmunk a grenade] As for imperial countries, well, congratulations, you have military power and your colonies don't. Kinda like running into a large person, us wee ones just bounce off and get mowed down. Perhaps this connection comes simply because I have the '33000 calorie day', a History Channel special about the super morbidly obese, going in the background, but imperialism now aligns itself with glutton in my mind. Ooh, tasty country, let me gobble it up! Like canolli! And then you end up being confined to bed for years, living off other peoples' kindness, until your overworked organs explode and twenty firemen cannot get you out of your apartment. Congratulations! I'm glad you were such a model country. We all want to pave a road directly to doom!

[Imperialism is bad]

Black Humor

Frederick Douglas' speech, and the way he treats upon delicate, especially to today's ears, subjects, have got to be the precursor to current stand up comics. Here he is, a fugitive slave, addressing the President of the white men who condone his misery, cracking subtle jokes at the irony of circumstance. 'Such a declaration of agreement on my part would not be worth much to anybody. It would, certainly, prove nothing, as to what part I might have taken, had I lived during the great controversy of 1776.' Hell, it's great for him to agree, but he's seventy-six years too late, and black to boot. Black meaning that no one would bother listening to him; black meaning that had he been alive and of fighting age seventy-six years previous, he should still have been a slave, ergo would have had to take the part of whomever owned him, be his master Torrie or Rebel. Douglas later plays up his ignorance, having taken his audience through the causes of the Revolution, then saying that they should instruct him in regard to those causes. Ah, but they have instructed the 'crushed and bleeding slave'. And I bet they instructed him quite well. Imagine an energetic Will Smith, charming, funny, blatantly pointing out that to a slave, 4 July does but mock exactly what it celebrates so voraciously. Perhaps it's still too soon to be giggling at that.

The Harm Principle

I could have underlined the entirety of the excerpt of John Stewart Mill's 'On Liberty'. Except then I'd be back where I started. Instead, here's a distillation with quotes in Italics and my comments in periwinkle. (I actually follow the chronology as presented, so if you desire to know the context in which the quotes come, it shouldn't be too hard.)

The sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number is self-protection. That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant.
If you make a move to kill me, I can protect myself by either killing you or calling the law, who will keep you from killing me even if that means that you are imprisoned for the rest of your life. However, if you make a move to kill yourself, I mayn't stop you unless you plan to do so by driving a bus into a nursery school.


Over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign.
Can this be more explicit?

Those who are still in a state to require being taken care of by others, must be protected against their own actions as well as against external injury.
Thou must prevent those who would take advantage of children or fools. And ensure that said innocents don't harm themselves. Beware grandmothers who set their wards on kitchen counters; when they melt their shoe onto the stove, you are liable and shall be punished for said sinful act.

A ruler full of the spirit of improvement is warranted in the use of any expedients that will attain an end, perhaps otherwise unattainable.
Um, wait a minute. How does said ruler know that these things will benefit me? And how does said ruler classify people as barbarians in the need of improvement? So long as I have become capable of being improved by free and equal discussion, a ruler may do nothing more than facilitate the exercise of that capability. And if I'm disallowed to participate in free and equal discussion, well, there will be a small scale rebellion. And by small, I do of course mean a total coup, wherein those who tried to silence me will be permanently silenced in a gruesome and educational manner. Wait a minute. I just used any expedients that will attain my improvements. . . Oh yeah, I am justified because I enabled free and equal discussion. At least there was no circular reasoning involved. . .

I regard utility as the ultimate appeal on all ethical questions.
Not to tread on questionable ethics or Bill Clinton, but that depends on how you define utility. I mean, look at the miasma around Terry Schiavo. In that case, what was grounded on the permanent interests of man as a progressive being? Man being mankind? Or the individual in question? And how can anyone outside of that person judge?

But there is a sphere of action in which society, as distinguished from the individual, has, if any, only an indirect interest; comprehending all that portion of a person's life and conduct that affects only himself, or if it also affects others, only with their free, voluntary, and undeceived consent and participation. [...] It comprises, first, the inward domain of consciousness; [...] secondly, [...] liberty of tastes and pursuits; [...] Thirdly, from this liberty of each individual, follows the liberty, within the same limits, of combination among individuals; freedom to unite.
Herein find an arguement for the legality of all currently illegal substances for human consumption. By making them legal, crime associated with said substances will neccessarily decrease. If one chooses to ravage one's own body, what business is it of even the family members near to that person? They may simply choose not to participate in interaction with said individual, and seek aid should that person choose to force his company upon the family. As for affected children, the state may protect them from physical harm, as the state already does.

No one pretends that actions should be as free as opinions. Then follows that opinions aren't exempt either if they instigate a mischievious act. Just because an opinion instigates doesn't mean that other thinking human beings will act. And if they do, so long as the person whose opinion informed their actions does not participate in said actions, so what? A person is responsible only for his own actions, not for the actions of fellow humans. Remember the sovereignty principle?

The liberty of the individual must be thus far limited; he must not make himself a nuisance to other people. I define nuisance as repeated badgering. Painting those of us who wear fur coats red, thereby ruining our beloved fur, and calling us murderers classifies. Wearing a fur coat does not. Protesting gatherings by shouting at participants as they try to enter peacefully classifies. Attending a controversial gathering does not so long as one does not attack the protesters.

Human nature is not a machine to be built after a model, and set to do exactly the work prescribed for it, but a tree, which requires to grow and develop itself on all sides, according to the tendency of the inward forces which make it a living thing. Brave New World? Anyone?

allo.