In my branding concerns about a new Objectivist direction I will be going in (positive and commercial), I want something on record to point to later when future customers ask questions. This crap was recently posted on Solo Passion by Perigo:


This is one dude who does not understand checks and balances and limited terms of office, nor does he understand the mechanisms of how freedom is protected by and from the government.

Our Founding Fathers were wise. That's why they made checks and balances. I believe the American people will not allow a certain line to be crossed, no matter what.

I do not support Obama, but he is an American presidential candidate freely chosen by Americans. I do not believe he will cross the line of dictatorship (although he may dream about it one day). I even believe he will make a humongous mess to clean up should he win, but it will not go beyond a certain point. Too many Americans cherish freedom to let that happen.

Preaching the murder of Barack Obama is vile and evil. It is just one step removed from actually murdering him.

God! How I hate this oversimplified malicious crap!

This has no place in my kind of world and I totally repudiate it.

Here's a question for you. Who really has the soul of a dictator? Obama the bonehead, or Perigo the preacher of murder?

Michael

Nothing Perigo does surprises me. He does continue to disgust me.

Perigo may find he has problems getting into this country the next time he wants to come here.

Michael, Perigo added:

"Obama is a special brand of evil. He is Pol Pot in benevolent guise. I hope he meets the fate of his soulmate Mussolini, only before he ever wins power."

And one person on Solo -- only one -- protested Perigo's call for a lynching.

Good God! We have supposed Objectivists -- Craig Biddle et. al. -- recommending that we bomb mosques and schools in Iran, and now a self-styled Objectivist hoping for the murder of a presidential candidate. We have supposed intellectual allies -- at ARI -- editing out of Ayn Rand's work what they prefer she had not written; we have excommunications worthy of a religious inquisition; we have Objectivists rewriting the history of the movement and the life of Ayn Rand; we have a self-anointed intellectual leader denying the reality of human error and substituting "evil" for "error"; we have a cult of personality and its membership of fanatical true believers .... the list goes on and on. It is profoundly depressing.

Barbara

Is there a link or a thread regarding this that someone can point me to? Thanks.

The man has come terribly close to committing a US Federal felony. He had better get good legal advice before visiting here again. In NZ he may not even be able to board a flight to the US now. You can be sure what he said has already been nailed down by computer surveillance. Obama = Hitler? Sorry. No. One had a moral right to kill Hitler once his Brown Shirts started physically attacking his political opponents before he became Chancellor. The way our government is set up, 1/3 of the vote won't make you President. You can't set up a government the way you do under a parliamentary system and just pass any law you like and make it stick just by virtue of making it law; there's a higher law under our Constitution. One big danger, among many, with Obama, is the Democrats will get 60 votes in the Senate and nothing can be blocked legislatively. However, even if that happens, the Democrats are likely to fracture and fight each other. A wet-behind-the-ears US Senator is now President!? Can't you see the envy, jealousy and surpressed rage bubbling to the surface?

--Brant

Ted,

See this thread for starters:

Air brushed Objectivist publications and materials

Michael

Heavens! Anyway, I only saw this now...and then posted accordingly on Solo.

Reason is so simple yet why is it that so few people have it??? Maybe it is a male thing, in which they would rather fight and kill, than figure it out? God!

Great post Brant.

I also want this screenshot on record just in case it ever gets deleted on Solo Passion:



We have our share of deranged individuals in the Objectivist subculture and preaching for the murder of a USA presidential candidate is more than disturbing. Someone with some screws loose might try to act on it.

Michael

> now a self-styled Objectivist hoping for the murder of a presidential candidate.

Lindsay Perigo represents a new low.

First time I've ever heard of anyone who had the slightest comprehension of -any- of Ayn Rand's ideas issue a 'fatwa'.

In all the years since Oists first began writing, studying the ideas, all the presidential campaigns over the years, I've never hear someone so stupid, so twisted, so sick --- so ignorant of the idea that you change the world by appealing to men's reason and convincing them --- as to advocate -killing- political opponents.

He finally stands alone: Lindsay Perigo, Advocate of Murder.

No one should associate with this man. He should be shunned. He should be viewed as a pariah. He should be condemned on every Oist website, lest someone in the future should look this up on the internet.

One can only -hope- that he is a drunk...and had been under the influence when he wrote this. Did not mean it literally. And will retract it and apologize.

Even the most extreme right-wing nutjobs (or their left-wing equivalents), the conspiracy theorists who see black helicopters everywhere, who believe we never landed on the moon or that George Bush instigated 9-11 would probably not sink to this level. The only creatures on this level are the muslim islamo-fascists who issue fatwas against their political and ideological foes.

Here is the latest installment:


Now the idea is armed revolution.

(I presume his view of "violent revolt" includes arms.)

With some people, you can take the man out of communism, but you can't take the communist revolutionary out of the man...

Che Perigo.

It has a proper-sounding ring to it...

Michael

EDIT: Here is the screenshot in case it is ever deleted.



I don't care how you spin it. One does not publicly preach for the murder of a USA presidential candidate and call that a personal opinion. I wonder what part of "No, I'm not joking" is now up for subjective interpretation.

Thanks for the info and posts. I keep experienced non-surprise.

Perigo has now retracted his statement:

Well, going to SOLO I see that Perigo has been in the United States all this time. If I were him I'd go home by way of Mexico after getting a Visa from Mexico and walk across the US/Mexican border. I don't think you have to ID yourself to US authorities when you do, but am not sure. Not Canada. The Canadian computers are completely up to date with US data. They'll know if you have any US misdemeanor convictions, for example, even a very old one.

--Brant

This no way diminishes my contempt for Perigo and his thug mentality.

Michael

I think he's a little scared after reading me. He ought to be. I think it unlikely that the US Secret Service would bother with him, but you never know with those guys. I also think it very unlikely they don't already have him flagged for some kind of investigation. Deleting all the relevant posts here and at SOLO wouldn't make a lick of difference. If they did grab him they'd probably thoroughly grill him and then kick him out of the country. I assume they'd be too busy with everything else to do more, which would require a Federal prosecutor, also too busy with everything else to deal with a harmless man and a grey, ambiguous application of a law.

It's unbelievable what Federal police agencies can do to even innocent people in this country if they decide to target you. They'll freeze your bank and brokerage accounts and credit cards and that's just for starters. Obama may turn out to be just as dangerous as Perigo fears though I doubt it. If elected he'll have to be a whore to a broader constituency than his Chicago base or the country will simply neutralize him and drive him out of office. He's much too smart to let that happen. However, he'll still do a lot of damage before he's gone.

--Brant

> My Mussolini/Obama thing was reckless, thoughtless and wrong. [Linz]

Retraction accepted. Linz sometimes says really dumb things and sticks by them. But, unllkely many others, sometimes he says really dumb, emotional things, 'shooting from the hip' and retracts them.

I appreciate benevolence, but I am coming to the conclusion that there is a side of some Objectivists that simply likes thugs. It has to be a question of taste.

When I see the same evil repeated over and over, the same loony hate speech that would make John Birch proud return time after time, but the same preacher for thugs forgiven over and over, with Objectivists I respect turning the other cheek time after time against his malicious words, I can only conclude that they like thugs.

Don't talk to me about appeasing evil anymore. The people now saying that Perigo acted in a "rational" manner is pure appeasement of evil.

I would not feel this way if I were not certain that the hate speech will repeat over and over and over and never get any better. I base my conclusion on the past.

But here's what really galls me with the present appeasement of evil by Objectivists. Despite Perigo backpedaling on preaching the murder of Obama, he did not retract his preaching the armed overthrow of the USA government. (I emphasized the part this time, since so many people missed it.)


Just so there is no mistake, this means that it is time to take up arms against the USA government. No. It is worse. The time to take up arms against the USA government, according to Perigo, "has long past."

And just who should engage in this "violent revolt"? Americans, of course. My comment about some deranged soul out there taking this to heart and acting on it still stands. Doesn't anyone remember Timothy McVeigh?

When Perigo recanted his crap against Obama, but did not recant this part of his crap, I thought he would not take too long to pop out with more of the same. This is the way he acts. I did not expect it to be today, but there it is. Here is the screenshot:



Let's make sure nobody misses it this time. Here is the statement and I emphasized the pertinent part:


That is softer, but it is still preaching the armed overthrow of the USA government. Now Perigo wants "freedom-lovers" to fight the USA government with guns. I wonder... would such armed overthrow include the murder of the USA President?

I take issue with this. I can't express how strongly I despise it.

I took 32 years to come back to the USA and I will be damned if I will remain silent before this crap.

Michael

"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."

Thomas Jefferson


"America is at that awkward stage; it's too late to work within the system, but too early to shoot the bastards."

Claire Wolfe


It's rather amusing that Mr. Perigo would come out supporting Americans taking up arms against the US government in a violent revolution. The chances of such a revolution succeeding at the present time are infinitesimal, and the mayhem, death, and destruction that would result are inestimable. Besides, since Mr. Perigo is such a vehement advocate of American empire and imperial projects such as the Iraq war, how does he imagine that the American empire of which he is such a huge supporter could be sustained after the US government had been overthrown in a second American revolution?

Martin

Oh Jesus, another "empire" hater. Well, where the hell are my dividend checks from this empire? Where is my coolie slave? Where is my tribute of gold and spice? Where are my free barrels of oil? A funny empire when you let the subjects keep their own belongings, make there own laws, and you leave when they ask you to do so.

Words have meaninings. Empire is a word, and so is fool.

The closest thing the United States had to an empire was the Caribean hegemony from the Spanish American War to the de-colonization of the Phillipenes following WW2. As imperialists go, the U.S. was second rate. It was limited and we never got sucked into the trap that killed Rome where we had to expand our direct rule or die. In short, we NEVER EVER had an Empire like the Romans or like Britain. The sun did set on U.S. territory at least once a day.

How did America make her mark. Like the Romans who built roads and water systems, we built canals, railroadz and cleaned up swamps. Where the Romans conquered with the Sword, we sprayed with DDT. Where the Romans left the Imperial Cult we left a vocabulary of rights and liberty. That was our kind of "Empire". Where the Romans slaughtered Carthage and Gaul we instituted the Marshall Plan and we prospered because of it. To paraphrase Julius Caesar -- we saw, we came, we played boogie and sold blue jeans.

What the U.S. -did- achieve was a kind of cultural domination. We left our mark on many lands and peoples, but our domination was manifested in styles, aspirations and outlook. Many peoples of the world wanted to be like us (too bad we have lost our virtuous role model standing). In many parts of the world American tropes exist.

Ba'al Chatzaf

I think the USA made a bad mistake at the Bretton Woods meeting after WWII when it dollarized the world for inter-country transactions, but made it look like something else. (Previous currency for this had been basically the English pound and French franc.)

Global dollarization looks like an enormous benefit, but it actually comes with a stiff price. Once you have it, you have to protect it to keep it. This leads to sticking your nose where you otherwise would not and allowing a small group of multinational corporations have way too much influence in government policies, especially foreign policies. You have to back all that up with the military to make it stick.

I believe this is part of what modern libertarians mean when they say "empire."

One thing is for sure. You fix this situation with ideas, not guns.

Michael

So you thought that the US empire was going to make you rich? Sorry, but it won't, not unless you happen to be Halliburton, Blackwater, Lockheed, Raytheon, or another esteemed member of the military industrial complex. Your name accidently got left off the list of beneficiaries, as did mine and pretty much everyone else around here.

But for a consolation prize, you get to pay in taxes and in inflation, for the rest of your life, to support the hundreds of US military bases around the world that you don't see fit to call an empire, along with the multiple wars and military occupations that are planned for our glorious future of national greatness. After all, there's no such thing as a free lunch, you can't consume more than you have produced, and someone's got to pay for all of that national greatness.

Thank you for playing "If we're an empire, how come I'm not getting rich?"!

Martin

Funny, Martin.

Robert (Ba'al) has admitted difficulty understanding irony ("Where's my coolie slave?" Indeed!) , but at least he understands what the word empire means.

What's your excuse?

The US has over 700 military bases around the world, has engaged in over one hundred military actions since the end of WW2, and spends over $500 billion annually on the defense budget, more than the combined total spent on defense by the entire rest of the world. It is presently engaged in fighting at least three different wars, in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Somalia. It is also launching across border military attacks into Syria and Pakistan. It has a declared foreign policy of "preemptive war", claiming the right to attack any country that it considers to be even the slightest threat.

But I guess you think that this is all just fine. I obviously just don't know the meaning of the word "empire".

Martin


http://www.alternet.org/story/47998

The following is excerpted from Chalmers Johnson's new book, "Nemesis: The Last Days of the American Republic" (Metropolitan Books).

Once upon a time, you could trace the spread of imperialism by counting up colonies. America's version of the colony is the military base; and by following the changing politics of global basing, one can learn much about our ever more all-encompassing imperial "footprint" and the militarism that grows with it.

It is not easy, however, to assess the size or exact value of our empire of bases. Official records available to the public on these subjects are misleading, although instructive. According to the Defense Department's annual inventories from 2002 to 2005 of real property it owns around the world, the Base Structure Report, there has been an immense churning in the numbers of installations.

The total of America's military bases in other people's countries in 2005, according to official sources, was 737. Reflecting massive deployments to Iraq and the pursuit of President Bush's strategy of preemptive war, the trend line for numbers of overseas bases continues to go up.

Interestingly enough, the thirty-eight large and medium-sized American facilities spread around the globe in 2005 -- mostly air and naval bases for our bombers and fleets -- almost exactly equals Britain's thirty-six naval bases and army garrisons at its imperial zenith in 1898. The Roman Empire at its height in 117 AD required thirty-seven major bases to police its realm from Britannia to Egypt, from Hispania to Armenia. Perhaps the optimum number of major citadels and fortresses for an imperialist aspiring to dominate the world is somewhere between thirty-five and forty.

Using data from fiscal year 2005, the Pentagon bureaucrats calculated that its overseas bases were worth at least $127 billion -- surely far too low a figure but still larger than the gross domestic products of most countries -- and an estimated $658.1 billion for all of them, foreign and domestic (a base's "worth" is based on a Department of Defense estimate of what it would cost to replace it). During fiscal 2005, the military high command deployed to our overseas bases some 196,975 uniformed personnel as well as an equal number of dependents and Department of Defense civilian officials, and employed an additional 81,425 locally hired foreigners.

The worldwide total of U.S. military personnel in 2005, including those based domestically, was 1,840,062 supported by an additional 473,306 Defense Department civil service employees and 203,328 local hires. Its overseas bases, according to the Pentagon, contained 32,327 barracks, hangars, hospitals, and other buildings, which it owns, and 16,527 more that it leased. The size of these holdings was recorded in the inventory as covering 687,347 acres overseas and 29,819,492 acres worldwide, making the Pentagon easily one of the world's largest landlords.

These numbers, although staggeringly big, do not begin to cover all the actual bases we occupy globally. The 2005 Base Structure Report fails, for instance, to mention any garrisons in Kosovo (or Serbia, of which Kosovo is still officially a province) -- even though it is the site of the huge Camp Bondsteel built in 1999 and maintained ever since by the KBR corporation (formerly known as Kellogg Brown & Root), a subsidiary of the Halliburton Corporation of Houston.

The report similarly omits bases in Afghanistan, Iraq (106 garrisons as of May 2005), Israel, Kyrgyzstan, Qatar, and Uzbekistan, even though the U.S. military has established colossal base structures in the Persian Gulf and Central Asian areas since 9/11. By way of excuse, a note in the preface says that "facilities provided by other nations at foreign locations" are not included, although this is not strictly true. The report does include twenty sites in Turkey, all owned by the Turkish government and used jointly with the Americans. The Pentagon continues to omit from its accounts most of the $5 billion worth of military and espionage installations in Britain, which have long been conveniently disguised as Royal Air Force bases. If there were an honest count, the actual size of our military empire would probably top 1,000 different bases overseas, but no one -- possibly not even the Pentagon -- knows the exact number for sure.



The below link contains a list of all military events that have occurred throughout the history of the United States.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Unite..._history_events

When in England at a fairly large conference, Colin Powell was asked by the Archbishop of Canterbury if our plans for Iraq were just an
example of 'empire building' by George Bush. He answered by saying,"Over the years, the United States has sent many of its fine young
men and women into great peril to fight for freedom beyond our borders. The only amount of land we have ever asked for in return is
enough to bury those that did not return."

Barbara

They went to Iraq to fight for oil by George Bush. They thought they were fighting for freedom. Bush didn't have the slightest idea about that except for some propagandistic rhetorical flourishes. If he did he wouldn't have been screwing over Americans with his left hand while screwing over Hussein with his right. I do admit that this was a step up from LBJ who sent Americans to die in Vietnam to give the Vietnamese the right to vote themselves into communism--a right abrogated by Eisenhower, btw, in the 1950s.

--Brant

Mmm hmmm. That's why the price of gas went over $4 per gallon this summer. All that Iraqi oil we fought for.

Judith

"They went to Iraq to fight for oil by George Bush"? This sentence (well, the whole post) makes no sense. Kind of like the whole imperialism/Bush Lied-People died-Fish Fried/Blood for Oil nonsense.

What is "oil by George Bush"? If we fought for Oil, to whom did we lose it? Who is this they that thought they were fighting for freedom? The US military objective was to overthrow Saddam Hussein and install a popular government. unfortunately, Saddam is still in power, and all we have for our effort is all that oil we seized. (That's irony, Bob. )

This arbitrarily stated, unspecified, and undefined nonsense is so convoluted and meaningless it makes even those who spout it incoherent.

Ted,

One day you should look into the concept of broker chain and oil.

It's an eye-opener.

Michael

I'm comfortable letting my post stand on its own two feet without further elaboration.

People qua politicians are too stupid to run a country as big as the United States. Dissolve the Union into its constituent States (and Texas by 5). The terrorists will never figure out who to terrorize. If one state gets too statist just move to another. Let France save the world. Not such a hard job if the United States isn't screwing it up.

--Brant

Thank you, Martin. Anyone with an interest in free market economic theory from an Austrian perspective might want to read a short book called Imperialism by Joseph Schumpeter. Schumpeter explains that imperialism originates not with businesses, but with masses of people who expect their governments to go overseas and loot other people for their benefit and then distribute the largess at home. Of course, it does not work that way, has not historically, and -- from the Austrian a priori assumptions -- cannot work that way.

For a clear picture we all have seen, I offer Spain's looting of the Americas. Why was Spain not the capital of a glorious renaissance? All that silver, all that gold, free (nearly) for the taking, mines in Bolivia and Mexico run on slave labor at the lowest possible costs. Why, instead, did all that loot go to finance the Northern Renaissance of the Netherlands and England? Why was Spain poorer and poorer with each shipload of silver and gold? -- and by "Spain" of course we mean the actual living suffering persons -- individuals -- of that place over those long centuries... from 1492 to 1821, when Spain's colonies broke away. Over three hundred years -- five, eight, ten generations -- of grinding poverty as a reward for silver and gold at the lowest possible cost.

Anyone who has studied physics ought to be able to figure that out.

I am trying to fit your example to a system with lots of Gibbs Free Energy. It is the system with lower entropy that is capable of doing mechanical work. I am not quite sure what you had in mind, so could you clarify your remark? Thank you.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Ideas do matter, but the salient question is: Which ideas? We all have had the experience of getting along alot better with people who are liberals, post-modernists, religous, unintellectual, and a hundred other et ceteras. Rand called it "sense of life." It is ironic that Lindsay Perigo launched Sense of Life Objectivists (SOLO) and that Barbara Branden was the angel on his highly ornamented Christmas tree. What changed? I believe that neither Lindsay nor Barbara changed. In fact, I wonder to what extent anyone ever "changes" -- and what we mean by that. Rather than changing, each revealed herself and himself. We all do this in interaction, communication, intercourse, trade, conflict. We begin with signs and calls -- among humans the complex semata of spoken or written abstractions. How we dress and address speak volumes that do not need to be written as metaphysics or politics. By "dress" I mean more than the mere clothing styles -- although there can be that -- but the adjectives and adverbs with which we adorn our speech.

"Address" gets closer to the problem, perhaps. Very seldom do two Objectivists disagree by asking questions. Nuances are deployed and arrayed as ordances. When you see the enemys' bayonet above the trench, you do not need to know the name of the manufacturer -- or the name of the man who carries it -- or why he is there. Even if her uniform is the same color as yours, you can still spot the insignia far enough away to sight in on it. Neo-con... imperialist ... empire-hater ... anarchist ... I always like using the pun "govern-mentality." ... collectivist ... mixed premise range of the moment context dropping muscle mystic ... It's almost poetry.

The worst part is that if you are not wrong, then I must be. A or non-A. Either-Or. To compromise is to surrender your values. So, to avoid being wrong -- at least in my own mind, if not in public -- I must defeat your arguments ... even if you are not arguing.

Michael,

The ideas ARI is trying to edit out of Objectivist history are documented elsewhere on the airbrushing threads.

I agree with you about the all-or-nothing form of arguing that surrounds us on all sides. It's silly, it's irritating and it's dangerous at times, but it exists.

I don't think the problem is ideas alone or even context. I see ideas wedded to vanity and ideas used to nurture personality cults as a source of real nasty actions by otherwise good people.

Obviously, for these folks, vanity and personality cult take priority when they clash with the ideas, so in that case they simply change the ideas and rewrite them or airbrush them to fit their self-image and projections on others.

Part of Rand's genius lays in the fact that, even though she was not totally successful in escaping the effects of this, she laid such a solid foundation for sticking to ideas over vanity and tribalism that real egoism—the fact that a person can morally claim the right to his own thinking without bowing to intimidation and peer pressure—keeps popping up within this really weird subcommunity of ours based on her work. (Incidentally, these independent thinkers are the sparks I look for and identify with.)

Her strong defense of selfishness appeals to vain people and attracts them like flies on a sugarloaf, but it also appeals to genuinely independent individuals. The history of the Objectivist movement is practically a nonstop clash between these two types, with some great ideas thrown in to confuse the issue.

Michael

And, since Russia will absorb Alaska first, and only slowly work her way down to the 5,000 communes of California, and over to The Former People's Republic of Massachusets, the idiot anarchists will have plenty of time to agitate against self defense - and then flee for such evul dictatorships as maybe Britain (although it will be Britaniyya) which still believe in their own right to exist.

And people expect Americans to vote Libertarian!

Why not, while you're at it, tell your bodies cells that "Organism is Statism," and disband?

This is just a think piece by me. I'm not actually advocating it--not right now, immediately. Someday in a somewhat different world there may be a change from the United States to a confederation. As for Russia, it will have a hard time holding on to Siberia. And as for terrorists, they are usually state-sponsored and the states that sponsor them should be summarily dealt with.

--Brant

No problem. Let's hope you're right about Siberia - but the only problem I see therte is China taking it, not the Nivkh, Chukchi, Yukaghir, etc. declaring a free state.

Brant: "People qua politicians are too stupid to run a country as big as the United States."

This may be true but I don't think it's the problem. The real problem is not the size of the country but the size of government -- that is, the nature and complexity and variety of the activities and areas in which the government now makes decisions. I've often thought that no one man can possibly be an effective president -- that no one man, however brilliant and dedicated he may be and however many and accomplished his advisors, can possibly hold in his head all the elements necessary to make all the decisions he must make. It's very like the problem von Mises pointed out with regard to economic calculation, and why no economic calculation is possible under socialism: the complexity involved in deciding what millions of people will need and be willing and able to buy, and how to organize an entire economy so that the goods and services necessary are available when and where they are needed, makes centralized calculation and prediction impossible, Similarly, to decide what is the best system of government health care and how to sneak a Supreme Court appointment past Congress and what to do about Medical's huge deficits and how to balance the budget and whether to send more military equipment to Afghanistan and how the most recent bailout money should he apportioned and who will he best able to head the equally complex Federal Reserve, and so on ad infinitum, is an impossible task. The greatest genius on earth could not handle it. And the same is true of Congress. We are electing people to do jobs that no one man and no group of men can conceivably do with any hope of a successful outcome.

Barbara

Great post, Barbara. But the bureaucrats would disagree with you. They think they are up to it if only they get more money and more power.

--Brant