Ari Armstrong's Free Colorado

Why We Don’t Need Avengers

By Ari Armstrong on May 25, 2012

The following article by Linn and Ari Armstrong originally was published May 25 by Grand Junction Free Press.

There’s a great scene in the Avengers film where the villain demands that a group of people kneel before him. One elderly gentleman refuses, saying he remembers what happened last time a dictator demanded the people kneel. Just as the villain prepares to kill the man, Captain America intervenes with his protective shield. The symbolism is moving.

But in the real world we don’t need magical shields and hammers, super strength born in a laboratory, or super-powered suits of armor to protect us from those who would do us harm. For we have the firearm.

Because we remain largely free, our society has the wealth to outfit our military with the best tanks, airplanes, rockets, and other machinery to protect us from foreign aggressors. Still, the basic tool of the soldier remains the rifle. The men and women in uniform serve as our real-life “avengers,” not in the sense of taking revenge, but of protecting the innocent from aggression. And they do an amazing job; the real Captain America walks among us. (Indeed, our military’s biggest obstacle is not the enemy but Washington’s policies and rules of engagement that often prevent soldiers from acting in America’s self-defense.)

Domestically, firearms allow civilians to defend themselves against burglars, rapists, and would-be murderers. Guns are the great equalizer, empowering the smallest women and those with disabilities to successfully defend themselves against the strongest criminals.

Even if superheroes existed, they could respond only to a small fraction of crimes in progress, as is the case with the police. Those at risk of attack don’t need Thor’s hammer if they have a reliable Glock 9 mm or Colt .45 and know how to use it. Notably, the mere possibility that a potential victim might carry a gun deters many criminals. And, once a criminal realizes his intended victim carries a gun, usually the criminal flees without a shot fired.

If we were to plan our own movie featuring these tools of self-defense, we might include a couple scenes based on real-life events.

Picture a lonely agricultural road on a beautiful spring day. Our heroine enjoys a lovely walk. But as she rounds a street corner, two large pit bulls come within feet of her. Just that morning she had seen the news that a pit bull had mauled a woman to death in a neighboring city. The dogs become aggressive. Our heroine draws her pistol and aims it toward the dogs.

Later she recounts, “I don’t know if they smelled the gun oil or could smell that I was fearful but determined to defeat them, but they backed off. I was shook up, and I don’t know how I would have reacted if I hadn’t had the pistol. I knew that if I had tried to run the dogs likely would have pursued me.”

Next picture a dark moonless night in the Colorado mountains. A couple pulls their car into a lonely restroom at the top of Vail Pass. As the husband walks out of the restroom, he encounters three terrified young women. They say young men in another car had been harassing them as they drove along the interstate, and they had stopped seeking help. The husband tells the women to go into the women’s restroom and come out with his wife. While they are in the restroom, three hot-headed men park at the facility and storm out of their car.

The husband later recalls, “The three men eyeballed me up and down, but I just stood there against the wall calmly. I had my pistol safely concealed, so I knew I had the ability to protect myself and the others if I needed to. My wife and the three young women came out of the restroom. My wife and I never so much as mentioned that we were armed. We escorted the young ladies to the next town, and that was that.”

If our movie were a documentary, we might interview John Lott, author of the book More Guns, Less Crime. His findings suggest that the high rates of gun purchases in recent years is nothing to fear but rather something to welcome, as armed civilians deter crime. Moreover, he finds that minorities and women tend to benefit the most when legally allowed to own guns for self-defense.

We also might interview Alan Gottlieb, author of Politically Correct Guns. He reports a variety of interesting facts. For example, gun-banner Dianne Feinstein got her own permit to carry a .38-caliber revolver. Nancy Reagan sometimes slept with a .25-caliber handgun on her bedside table. Other famous Americans to have obtained gun permits include Bill Cosby, Donald Trump, Howard Stern, and Joan Rivers.

Thankfully, civil arms are not fantasy but reality. Guns are not restricted to an elite few with special powers; rather, any peaceful citizen may obtain one (though some American cities continue to make that extraordinarily difficult). So go and enjoy the movies, but then appreciate the real-life tools of self-defense.

This entry is filed under Grand Junction Free Press, Guns and Self-Defense.

Beating the Monty Hall Problem

By Ari Armstrong on May 13, 2012

A couple friends of mine described the so-called “Monty Hall Problem” to me a few weeks ago. (I’d probably heard about this long ago, but if so I’d forgotten about it.) The problem, named after “Let’s Make a Deal” host Monty Hall (pictured here), is a puzzle of logic and statistics.

Here’s the problem (in my own terms): Imagine a game show where you’re trying to win a car. The game works as follows. There are three doors on stage. Behind one door is the car. Behind the other two doors are goats. (Or you can imagine whatever other prize and booby prize you like.) You get to make an initial selection of one of the doors, but you can’t see what’s behind it. Then the host shows you which of the other two doors opens to the goat. Then you get to stay with your initial choice or switch to the other unopened door. What should you do?

When my friends suggested to me that the correct move is to always change your selection to the other door, I thought they were nuts. I thought they had fallen for a logical trick. After all, once we know that one of the doors opens to a goat, we’re left with only two choices: our original choice or the other unopened door. There’s a fifty-fifty chance of guessing correctly.

I couldn’t quite put my finger on the error that I thought was behind the advice to always switch, but I thought it had something do to with confusing the two time sequences (the initial versus the final choice of doors).

But then I was reading through Sam Harris’s The Moral Landscape, and he uses the Monty Hall Problem to illustrate the dangers of always going with our “gut” reaction. How, I wondered, could an intelligent neuroscientist fall for this same trick?

So I decided that, by God, I was going to figure out what was wrong with the standard Monty Hall analysis. What better way to do that, I thought, than by running my own trials? (The Wikipedia entry on the matter suggests that others have run simulations and even let pigeons have a go. Apparently the pigeons tend to switch to the third door.)

I rolled a die to determine which door hid the car and which door I initially selected. Then it’s easy to figure out if, by switching, you get the car or the goat. By always switching, I ended up selecting the car 17 times out of 30 trials, which was not very helpful given it’s about halfway between 15 (fifty-fifty odds) and 20 (two-thirds odds).

But running the trial quickly gave me the idea of what’s going on. In my first trial, I selected Door 1, while the car was behind Door 2. That means that “Monty” reveals a goat behind Door 3. By switching from Door 1 to Door 2, I get the car.

In my third trial, I selected Door 1, and the car was behind Door 1 as well. Thus, when “Monty” reveals a goat behind Door 2 (or Door 3), I switch to the other door and end up with the other goat.

Here’s the general idea. Every time you initially select the door that happens to hide the car, you switch to another door and get a goat. Every time you initially select a door that hides a goat, you switch to the door that reveals the car.

Or, in other words, by switching, one-third of the time you’ll end up with a goat, and two-thirds of the time you’ll end up with the car. (If this is not now obvious to you, I suggest you run your own trials to get the hang of how it works. In rolling the die, I assigned sides 1 and 2 to Door 1, sides 3 and 4 to Door 2, and sides 5 and 6 to Door 3. Or you could set up actual doors if you want to get fancier and more concrete.)

So what’s going on here? When “Monty” reveals one of the remaining doors to contain a goat, he is introducing new information into the process.

To make this more obvious, we can imagine a game with more doors. (Wikipedia suggests this.) What you’re really doing in making your initial selection is forcing “Monty” to reveal additional information about the remaining doors. So let’s say there are more doors, and “Monty” has to reveal the rest of the doors except for one.

Let’s say there are six doors, and you initially select Door 1. Let’s say “Monty” reveals goats behind Doors 2 through 5. The car, then, is behind either Door 1 or Door 6. What do you do?

Your three basic choices are these. Always stick with your initial selection, which, in this case, gives you a one-in-six chance of getting the car. Or you can choose randomly between the remaining two doors, which gives you a fifty-fifty chance of getting the car. Or you can always switch to the remaining door, which is the prudent move.

I actually ran a new trial with six doors (using a six-sided die to determine the door with the car and the initial selection). Out of 18 trials, I got the car 17 times by always switching (which is even better than the statistical prediction). (I didn’t really need to run the trials at this point, but I figured I’d follow through with it.)

Or you can imagine 100 doors. If you want to run trials for this, you might use the real random number generator. The outcome follows the same pattern. If you always stick with your initial selection, you’ll end up with the car about one out of a hundred times. If you always pick randomly between the final two doors, you’ll increase your odds to fifty-fifty. If you always switch to the other door, you’ll increase your odds to 99-in-100. The only time you’ll lose out is if by luck you happen to pick the door with the car in your initial selection, then switch.

Realizing that you can increase your odds by moving away from the strategy of always sticking with your initial selection, to picking randomly between the final two doors, to always switching, should disrupt your initial “intuition” (if you had it) that the odds are always fifty-fifty.

Of course, I’m pretty sure the game shows have figured this sort of thing out by now.

This entry is filed under Mind Tech. | 5 Comments

What Skeptics and Conservatives Can Learn from Each Other

By Ari Armstrong on May 11, 2012

The following article by Linn and Ari Armstrong originally was published May 11 by Grand Junction Free Press.

What do skeptics from Denver and conservatives from the Heritage Foundation have in common? More than you might initially guess.

We suppose Ari is one of the few people to have attended both a Heritage event and a Skepticamp (a day filled with talks critical of mysticism and the paranormal). He may be the only one to have done so on back-to-back weekends.

During the last weekend of April, Heritage sponsored a two-day event in Colorado Springs for free-market activists. On May 5, Denver-area skeptics organized a Skepticamp in Parker. Ari attended both events, and the juxtaposition of ideas merits some discussion.

Of course the huge disagreement between the conservatives and the skeptics concerns the reasonableness of believing in a supernatural entity. Most of those who attended the Heritage event believe in the Christian God. Probably everyone at Skepticamp, on the other hand, believes that no god exists, and that neither the evidence nor any rational argument supports a belief in God’s existence.

That is a huge debate, and one’s beliefs on the matter impact one’s entire worldview. By the time people reach adulthood, they usually settle their beliefs on the matter; we doubt that anyone who attended either event will seriously consider changing positions.

While we cannot understate the importance of the debate over God’s existence, nevertheless beyond that issue many conservatives share much in common with many skeptics. And we think the similarities are just as interesting.

We hope the skeptics would have been impressed by much of what Heritage historian Matthew Spalding had to say. Spalding sees America’s founding as rooted in the Enlightenment, a movement that recognized the power of human reason to advance science and governments. Spalding described the core principles of America—equality under the law, a recognition of the facts of human nature, and government rooted in the consent of the governed—and argued that everyone, whether pagan or Christian, can discover these truths through reason.

True, skeptics would disagree with Spalding’s view that “reason and revelation agree” about such things. Nevertheless, Spalding resisted the views of some that American principles flow only from the Christian tradition. Spalding pointed out that the Constitution is not a sectarian document, and that Jefferson and other Founders drew on the ideas of Aristotle, Cicero, and other pre-Christian thinkers.

Spalding also spoke about the profound importance of religious liberty and freedom of conscience, ideals many skeptics also support. For example, Spalding praised George Washington’s “Letter to the Jews of Newport,” written early in the great man’s term as president.

Washington wrote, “The citizens of the United States of America have a right to applaud themselves for having given to mankind examples of an enlarged and liberal policy—a policy worthy of imitation. All possess alike liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship.”

We are proud to call ourselves liberals in this Washingtonian tradition. And both conservatives and skeptics who follow Washington in supporting freedom of conscience are to that degree liberals in the truest sense.

Many skeptics could learn a thing or two from Spalding about the profound importance of economic liberty. While skeptics claim to be critical thinkers, some unthinkingly embrace leftist political goals emanating from the disturbed mind of Karl Marx and the so-called “Progressive” movement that he inspired. To take but one example, some skeptics seemed to support censorship of political speech by individuals interacting voluntarily in groups (“corporations”).

Spalding spoke eloquently of the Founders’ respect for property rights, economic liberty, and the rule of law that protects equality under the law, not “equality” of resources that others produce. As Spalding argued, such liberties flow from natural facts about people and the use of reason to recognize those facts and their proper political implementation.

Unfortunately, sometimes skeptics and American Christians make a comparable error. Some skeptics see the cause of economic liberty as bound up with the religious right and reject both. Some Christians think that the problem with Communism was its atheism, rather than its reliance on a secularized version of religion that treats the collective as a mystical superentity. Capitalism—the system of individual rights (including economic liberty)—finds its defense in reason based on the evidence of the natural world.

But many skeptics do indeed endorse economic liberty. Last year Barry Fagin, a free-market writer for the Independence Institute, spoke at Skepticamp. This year, Robert Zubrin spoke about his new book, “Merchants of Despair: Radical Environmentalists, Criminal Pseudo-Scientists, and the Fatal Cult of Antihumanism.” Strikingly, while some of the conservatives made disparaging remarks about Charles Darwin, the greatest biologist of human history, Zubrin explained how leftists misapplied Darwin’s ideas to promote programs involving eugenics and population control.

If every conservative would attend a Skepticamp, and every skeptic would attend a lecture by the likes of Spalding, the world would be a much more interesting place—and we think a much better one.

Linn Armstrong is a local political activist and firearms instructor with the Grand Valley Training Club. His son, Ari blogs at AriArmstrong.com in the Denver area.

Note: Heritage paid most of Ari’s expenses for the event in question (not that that made any difference to the contents of this article); see Ari Armtrong’s Disclosures Unjustly Compelled by the FTC.

Image of Matthew Spalding from the Heritage Institute

This entry is filed under Government, Grand Junction Free Press, Religion.

Hayek and the Tea Party

By Ari Armstrong on May 10, 2012

On April 2, I participated in a panel organized by Matt Kibbe of FreedomWorks for the Association of Private Enterprise Education. (FreedomWorks paid my way to the event.) I filmed the talks, and now I release them with Kibbe’s permission.

First, Matt Kibbe discussed the decentralized nature of the Tea Party movement:

Second, Trey Fleisher, an economist at Metro State, offered a somewhat pessimistic take on the Tea Party, noting that individuals often lack the incentive to take up political causes:

Third, Wayne Brough, an economist with FreedomWorks, argued that new technologies make it increasingly easier for individuals to participate in politics:

Finally, I reviewed Hayek’s 1949 essay, “The Intellectuals and Socialism,” talking about how ideas spread through a culture generally and how they spread to and throughout the modern Tea Party:

This entry is filed under Activism, Tea Party.

My April 2012 TOS Blog Posts

By Ari Armstrong on May 9, 2012

Following are links to all of my Objective Standard blog posts for April of this year. I’ve put an asterisk by my personal favorites. Henceforth, I plan to publish updates every week or two. See my TOS category for a complete listing.

April 2, 2012
Reason Ralliers Need the “How” of Reason-Based Rights

April 5, 2012
Freedom-Loving Americans Must Condemn DOJ’s Bullying of Book Sellers

April 6, 2012
Court Tosses Colorado’s “Amazon Tax,” Injustice Remains

April 6, 2012
Penn & Teller Merge Entertainment with Big Ideas

April 7, 2012
* President Obama: The Preeminent “Social Darwinist”

April 9, 2012
New Jersey Government Begins Outright Theft of Gift Cards

April 10, 2012
The Evolution of the Tea Party

April 11, 2012
Freedom Rises in Guatemala

April 12, 2012
* States Join Extortion Racket Against Book Publishers

April 13, 2012
Kibbe: Tea Party Aims for “Hostile Takeover”

April 14, 2012
Henderson Shows “How Property Rights Solve Problems”

April 15, 2012
Soviet Mass Murder for Fun and Games?

April 16, 2012
Pull Peddling Intensifies in Washington

April 18, 2012
Stop the Fracking Controls

April 21, 2012
Week in Review for April 21, 2012
The Antritrust Assault on Apple
Colombian Hookers, Las Vegas Clowns, and Your Tax Dollars
The Intensifying Assault on Free Speech
Food Stamp Program Stomps Harder on Rights
A Feckless Effort to Strip Stripper Welfare
A Call to Lift the Prohibition on Drugs
Increasingly Ominous Tax Day

April 22, 2012
* Marxism “Begins with Theft and Ends with Murder,” Shows C. Bradley Thompson

April 23, 2012
Reflections on “Earth Day” 2012: Americans Begin to Wake Up

April 25, 2012
* Is the Next Era of “Big Stuff” Upon Us?

April 26, 2012
“Crucify” Energy Producers: EPA Administrator Confesses Agency’s Goal

April 28, 2012
Washington’s Spending Problem and Other Matters: TOS’s Week in Review for April 28
Washington’s Spending Problem
America Deploys its Most Advanced Fighter Jets Near Iran
Obama’s Hit List
Judges Should Actively Uphold the Constitution
Marxist Surprisingly Surprised by Marxist Evil
So Long, Hotel California

April 30, 2012
Will Bork Convince Romney to Select Anti-Liberty Judges?

This entry is filed under TOS.

My March 2012 TOS Blog Posts

By Ari Armstrong on May 7, 2012

Following are links to all of my Objective Standard blog posts for March of this year. I’ve put an asterisk by my personal favorites. Once I catch up, I plan to publish updates every week or two. See my TOS category for a complete listing.

March 1, 2012
Judge Tosses Rights-Violating Cigarette Labels

March 1, 2012
Geithner and “Progressives” Favor Expanded Involuntary Servitude

March 2, 2012
Happy Birthday, Dr. Seuss—And Thanks for My Love of Reading

March 2, 2012
Limbaugh’s “Slut” Comment Typifies the Wrongs of the Right

March 4, 2012
Oscar-Winning Hugo Celebrates Creative Genius of Méliès

March 4, 2012
In Fight for Property Rights, Institute for Justice Tops “Pyramid of Moral Endurance”

March 5, 2012
Why the Outrage Over Welfare for Strip Clubs?

March 6, 2012
Judge Nixes Maryland’s Rights-Violating Handgun Restrictions

March 7, 2012
Write Us a Song, and That’s Lucky Too

March 8, 2012
Absurd Bill Sought to Ban “Discrimination” Against Raunchy Biker Attire

March 9, 2012
Temple Grandin, Justly Awarded and Profoundly Inspiring

March 10, 2012
Hope and Help for Africa Rests with Embrace and Example of Rights

March 11, 2012
Justice Department Unjustly Attacks Apple

March 11, 2012
Kudos to the Colorado Supreme Court for Upholding Concealed Carry On “Public” Campuses

March 12, 2012
Obama Administration Cuts Illegitimate Program, Conservatives Complain

March 13, 2012
* Anticapitalist Lorax Succeeds . . . Thanks to Capitalism

March 14, 2012
* Fonda’s Call to Censor Limbaugh Stems from Government Control of Airwaves

March 15, 2012
Encyclopaedia Britannica Ceases Printing, Marks Advance

March 16, 2012
What do Rick Santorum and Jane Fonda Have in Common?

March 18, 2012
African Slavery Highlights Evil of Involuntary Servitude

March 19, 2012
Scientists Need Not “Study” Psychic Nonsense to Reject It

March 20, 2012
Amazon’s Robots: “Raising the Productivity of Your Time”

March 22, 2012
Supreme Court Properly Slaps Down EPA’s Assault on Property Owners, But . . .

March 23, 2012
* Bernanke Defends Fed Policy that Turned Dollar Into Four Cents

March 24, 2012
“Best Friends” Ban in UK Schools Mirrors Ayn Rand’s Anthem

March 25, 2012
* Hunger Games a Worthy Addition to Dystopian Corpus

March 27, 2012
* From Morning Brew to Space Exploration, Good News Is All Around

March 29, 2012
* Force Begets Force Under Health Mandates

March 29, 2012
Proposed Ban on Words Assaults Reason and Life

March 30, 2012
* Memo to Justice Kagan: Taxes Are Coercive

This entry is filed under TOS.

My February 2012 TOS Blog Posts

By Ari Armstrong on May 2, 2012

Following are links to all of my Objective Standard blog posts for February of this year. I’ve put an asterisk by my personal favorites. Once I catch up, I plan to publish updates every week or two. See my TOS category for a complete listing.

February 1, 2012
There is No ‘Right to Work’ Against an Employer’s Consent

February 8, 2012
Liability Reform Shouldn’t Be Limited to Space Industry

February 8, 2012
End Tax Favoritism for Wind Energy

February 8, 2012
* Not Only Catholics Should be Angered by Birth Control Mandates

February 11, 2012
In Birth-Control Insurance Fight, Planned Parenthood is Anti-Choice

February 12, 2012
As Kodak Exits Camera Business, Remember the Genius of George Eastman

February 13, 2012
* Oil Shale Politics Points to Problems of Federal Land Ownership

February 13, 2012
* Modern Greeks Destroy ‘Foundations of Justice’

February 14, 2012
Facebook Provides an Enormous Value

February 14, 2012
* Ignore Santorum’s Depraved Prescription: Have Sex for Pleasure this Valentine’s Day

February 15, 2012
‘Keep Your Eyelids Up,’ Dr. Seuss Implores

February 16, 2012
Government School Steams Parents Over Lunch Controls

February 17, 2012
* The Problem of Gary Johnson’s Libertarian Affiliation

February 19, 2012
Mysticism Claims More Victims

February 20, 2012
Washington Guided the Constitutional Convention

Februrary 21, 2012
Education “Stimulus” Thwarts Education

February 22, 2012
Fear Not “Satan” but Santorum

February 23, 2012
Moral Justice Requires not Shuffling but Eliminating Corporate Taxes

February 24, 2012
Happy Birthday, Steve Jobs—and Thank You

February 24, 2012
Why Greece’s and America’s Economies Stink

February 26, 2012
Pope Immorally Condemns “Artificial Fertility”

February 26, 2012
Afghan Riots Indicate Deadly Consequences of Loving Our Enemies

February 27, 2012
Independent Reasoning, Not Prayer or Groupthink, Guides Fight Against Ravages of MS

February 28, 2012
* “Zombie Mohammed” Case Shows Western Capitulation to Islamist Barbarism

February 29, 2012
* Santorum “Throws Up” on Separation of Church and State

This entry is filed under TOS.

In Appreciation of Diana Hsieh

By Ari Armstrong on April 29, 2012

As Diana Hsieh turns the primary leadership of Front Range Objectivism (a group devoted to studying and applying the ideas of Ayn Rand) over to the capable hands of Santiago Valenzuela, it is a great time to pause to appreciate all the great things Diana has accomplished in recent years.

• After undergoing the rigors of graduate school at the University of Colorado, Boulder, Diana completed her dissertation on the problem of “moral luck.” Essentially, she demonstrated that people are responsible for their own choices, luck notwithstanding.

• Diana has become an accomplished public speaker, and she has helped others in the area (including me) improve their speaking skills. As an example of her efforts, earlier this month Diana spoke to over 50 people at Liberty On the Rocks in Denver. Drawing from her dissertation, she argued that people deserve what they earn, contrary to John Rawls’s claims that people get what they have through luck. And last month Diana gave a “Think!” talk at CU about Rand’s conception of moral perfection.

• Diana helped create several Atlas Shrugged reading groups in the Denver area, groups that have have developed into regular monthly reading groups.

• Diana developed the “Explore Atlas Shrugged” podcast series, an excellent companion to the novel.

• In other ways, Diana has helped to expand Front Range Objectivism, as by developing its web page and running the “Snowcon” conference for the past two years.

• Diana formulated the most rigorous case for abortion rights ever written from an Objectivist perspective. She also put substantial effort into defeating the so-called “personhood” anti-abortion ballot measures in Colorado. Diana and I coauthored papers on the subject for the Coalition for Secular Government and for The Objective Standard.

• Diana created the “OLists” to promote Objectivist activism and community.

• Amidst all this other work, Diana developed her “Philosophy In Action” weekly webcast, which focuses on applying philosophy to the challenges of daily living. She plans to focus her efforts on expanding this.

Diana has done far more than most to promote important ideas over the past few years, and she deserves our gratitude and appreciation.

This entry is filed under Ayn Rand. | 1 Comment

Progress Means Respecting People’s Rights

By Ari Armstrong on April 27, 2012

The following article by Linn and Ari Armstrong originally was published April 27 by Grand Junction Free Press.

Last week self-proclaimed “progressives” rallied at the state capitol for higher taxes. But there’s nothing progressive about forcibly confiscating other people’s wealth. Real progress comes from respecting people’s rights and banning coercion—the initiation of force—from social relationships.

The tax-hikers build their case on obfuscation. Consider an email distributed on Tax Day by the absurdly named ProgressNow Colorado, more accurately identified as CoercionNow. This group led a “proud to pay” taxes campaign, claiming that taxes produce “smart, educated kids,” fix “potholes and shaky bridges,” leave the state better than we found it, and affirm that “we’re all in this together.”

Somehow CoercionNow failed to mention that its members are “proud to pay” taxes to finance corporate welfare, bail out banks and auto unions, finance “nation building” exercises around the world at fantastic cost to U.S. life and productivity, incarcerate fellow citizens for actions that violate nobody’s rights, persecute ebook publishers, enforce wage controls that devastate employment opportunities for the poor, stop grocery stores from selling regular-strength beer (and enforce thousands of similarly absurd “regulations”), and create widespread dependency.

But let us focus on the more positive tax expenditures that CoercionNow cherry picks. The idea that government-run schools produce especially “smart, educated kids” is laughable, especially in relation to the enormous cost. What we’re really producing are rich, politically powerful “public” unions that back the “progressive” agenda.

True, some teachers in government schools are excellent, and some classes help students learn what they need. But U.S. schools regularly lag behind those of other nations, and often they utterly fail the poorest students. If we want to see education thrive and effectively serve the needs of students, we must introduce free markets in education. Then parents, who normally will finance their own children’s education (rather than pay a lifetime of taxes to educate other people’s children), will have both the ability and incentive to ensure their children end up in great schools. And individuals can contribute to voluntary charity programs to expand the opportunities available to the poor.

As for roads, the gasoline tax is supposed to link use of the roads with their financing. Insofar as the government operates various services (and the matter of whether it should operate roads lies outside the scope of today’s column), it should finance them through use taxes. Those are far different from the redistributionist schemes of the “progressives.” CoercionNow’s reference to roads is merely a bait-and-switch: the group advertises the paving of roads for the purpose of expanding the welfare state.

Beyond education and roads, CoercionNow turns to bromides and vague generalities. “I want to leave Colorado better than I found it.” Who doesn’t? The best way to do that is to expand liberty. “We’re all in this together.” Does the “this” refer to a free republic or to the Greek-style socialist hellhole the “progressives” wish to create?

Notice CoercionNow’s biggest lie: they claim to be “proud” to pay their own taxes, but what they’re really after is to force others to pay more taxes. After all, nothing is stopping members of CoercionNow from paying as much of their own money as they want to the government. Nor is anything stopping them from financing any private charity.

Let us return to fundamentals. The source of all significant human progress has been the growing recognition of the rights of the individual, however sporadic that has been. Unfortunately, no government anywhere on earth has ever fully protected individual rights—though the United States, grounded on the individual’s “unalienable rights” of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” has come the closest. It is time for us to complete the task our Founders started.

The protection of individual rights and the banishment of coercion are flip sides of the same coin. In order to protect individual rights, we must keep the individual safe from the initiatory force of others. In a proper society, no one may murder another, rob from another, claim the property of another through fraud or broken contract, bind or restrict anyone except to lawfully protect others’ rights, or damage another’s property.

When government protects individual rights, prosperous civil society can thrive. Individuals can live their own lives by their own judgment. They can remain alone when they want and join others when they want. They can work and produce as they deem best, using their own resources and those others grant them through voluntary contract. They can keep the fruits of their labor to spend, save, invest, or give away as they deem best. The only legal restriction is that no individual may initiate force against another.

We’ll know we’ve made real progress when no one dares express “pride” in calling for the initiation of force against others. True champions of progress, prosperity, and peaceful human relations proudly advocate the abolition of coercion and the consistent protection of individual rights.

This entry is filed under Grand Junction Free Press, Taxation.

My January 2012 TOS Blog Posts

By Ari Armstrong on April 25, 2012

Following are links to all of my Objective Standard blog posts for January of this year. Once I catch up, I plan to publish updates every week or two. See my TOS category for a complete listing.

January 4, 2012
Santorum Stands for Big Government because He Stands for Collectivism

January 9, 2012
Who Deserves Credit for Tebow’s 316 Yards?

January 9, 2012
Even with Gary Johnson, the Libertarian Party Undermines Liberty

January 15, 2012
Did God Help the Patriots Beat the Broncos?

January 24, 2012
Romney Should Call for Property Rights and Lower Taxes for Everyone

January 25, 2012
To Give Americans a “Fair Shot,” Obama Should Stop Violating Our Rights

January 25, 2012
Double-Taxation Means Double Injustice for Romney

January 26, 2012
Great Producers Deserve Our Gratitude, Not Obama’s Tax Hikes

January 27, 2012
Warren Buffett Immorally Calls for Tax Hikes on Top Producers

January 28, 2012
Obama Should Help End All Energy Subsidies, Not Play Favorites

January 30, 2012
Gingrich Seeks to Violate Rights of Women and Doctors to Engage in Fertility Care

January 31, 2012
Texas Anti-Abortion Law Violates Rights to Liberty and Freedom of Speech

This entry is filed under TOS.

My 2011 TOS Blog Posts

By Ari Armstrong on April 20, 2012

Following are all my Objective Standard blog posts for 2011. I’ve put an asterisk by my personal favorites. See also my TOS print articles (so far). My plan is to post this year’s posts in monthly batches until I catch up, then include each week’s new posts in regular updates. See my TOS category for the complete list.

“Fair Tax” Looks Ugly in the Details
October 1, 2011

Fuel Controls Violate Rights and Stifle Markets
October 7, 2011

* How to Actually “Separate Government from the Corporations”
October 11, 2011

“Fair Tax Offers Neither Fairness Nor Simplicity
October 12, 2011

* The Justice of Income Inequality Under Capitalism
October 19, 2011

Yes, President Obama, We Can’t Wait…
October 25, 2011

Student Loan Scheme Just Another Rights-Violating Bailout
October 28, 2011

Call It Exuberant Friday, Not “Black Friday”
November 23, 2011

* Contra Occupiers, Profits Embody Justice
December 2, 2011

* To Protect Rights, Phase Out Payroll Tax Completely
December 9, 2011

Obama’s Osawatomie Shakedown: Critics’ Roundup
December 15, 2011

Newt Sides with Anti-Abortion Zealots
December 22, 2011

This entry is filed under TOS.

My TOS Articles (So Far)

By Ari Armstrong on April 17, 2012

No doubt many of my readers have noticed that I’ve been writing for the blog of The Objective Standard. A lot.

It occurred to me that I should be tracking my work for that publication here at my own web page. So I just created a “TOS” category specifically for that purpose.

Eventually, I want to include a weekly update of all my new posts, in addition to a summary of each new print article. But I’m behind, so I plan to spend the next few days catching up. I begin with my print articles to date:

The Assault on Abortion Rights Undermines All Our Liberties
This article, coauthored with Diana Hsieh, offers a robust argument as to why rights begin at birth, and not before.

Lest We Be Doomed to Repeat It
Subtitled “A Survey of Amity Shlaes’s History of the Great Depression,” this article reviews Shlaes’s book The Forgotten Man and highlights its major themes.

Capitalist Solutions: A Philosophy of American Moral Dilemmas by Andrew Bernstein
I review Bernstein’s book, which covers a variety of issues ranging from environmentalism to gun rights.

Capitalism Unbound: The Incontestable Moral Case for Individual Rights by Andrew Bernstein
I also reviewed Bernstein’s earlier book. Note that I also selected this book for Liberty In the Books, and everybody in that group really enjoyed reading and discussing it.

This entry is filed under TOS.

The Renaissance of Liberty Begins in Colorado

By Ari Armstrong on April 13, 2012

The following article by Linn and Ari Armstrong originally was published April 13 by Grand Junction Free Press.

Over the last century the federal government has claimed sweeping powers over our lives. It has spent the nation into debt that races past yearly productive output, continued its decades-long march to nationalize health care, and seized control of our economic and personal lives far beyond the powers enumerated in the Constitution.

Unfortunately, the typical individual can exercise little if any meaningful control over national politics. Sure, we can try to elect better people to Congress and then hold them accountable. But congressional districts are large, the District of Columbia is far away, and national politics is dominated by special-interest groups seeking political favors. What, then, is the alternative?

Citizens of the original states created the federal government to handle national defense, prevent the states from imposing economically damaging protectionism, and handle a few other jobs beyond the capabilities of the state governments. The federal government was never supposed to turn into the monolithic power it has become. Indeed, the Tenth Amendment explicitly reserves “powers not delegated” to the federal government “to the states respectively, or to the people.”

Every school child learns that the Founders separated powers among the branches of the federal government, but, just as importantly, they separated powers among levels of government. Federalism—the separation of state and federal powers—is a central doctrine of American government. It is high time we fought to restore American federalism, not as an end in itself, but as an important means to protecting individual rights. We in Colorado can and should play a pivotal role in that fight.

A good indicator of the loss of federalism is the role of federal spending in state budgets. Colorado’s Joint Budget Committee reports that, for fiscal year 2011-12, federal funding accounts for over $5 billion of the total $19.6 billion budget, or 26 percent. Over half of that federal spending goes for health care.

But why should we in Colorado have to beg the federal government to hand over a portion of our own money to our state government? Such federal spending turns federalism on its head. Every year we witness the grotesque spectacle of Colorado’s elected officials dancing like marionettes to the demands of federal politicians who hold the purse strings.

Imagine a league of independent state governments that stood up to such federal tyranny. Imagine state legislators who grew a spine and said enough is enough. We look forward to the day when state legislatures routinely pass resolutions condemning federal abuses, then start passing laws to the reaches of their authority to stop those abuses.

To take one possible strategy, Colorado could pass a law saying that we will turn down all federal funding in our state, once a certain number of other states have passed a comparable law.* Then we can demand that the federal government reduce its tax burdens and simply let citizens keep their own money.

Of course, the goal is not to replace federal tyranny with state-level tyranny, but rather to turn all governmental entities into protectors of individual rights rather than the biggest threat to our rights. The same state governments that would stand up against federal abuses of individual rights would also be more amenable to protecting rights themselves. So how do we achieve that?

We must continue to develop a culture of liberty in Colorado. We must stand up for individual rights to life, liberty, property, and voluntary contract and association. We must unflinchingly defend freedom of speech, freedom of conscience and religious worship, and freedom to use the fruits of our labor as each individual decides. We must demand that government act to protect individuals from the coercion of others, from murder, theft, assault, fraud, and every form of force that one person might initiate against another. At the same time, government must cease acting as the primary instigator of coercion, stripping us of our wealth and our liberties.

Many of the seeds of our future liberty renaissance have already been sown. Many new liberty-oriented groups have arisen in the last few years, and older groups have gained a new vitality. As a single illustration, last week over fifty people gathered at Denver Liberty On the Rocks to listen to philosopher Diana Hsieh explain why, yes, people deserve what they earn, contrary to the nonsense of John Rawls. We are starting to return to the tavern-style, take-it-to-the-streets, energetic and principled activism that marked the work of such American legends as Sam Adams, Patrick Henry, and Thomas Paine.

We must make the principle of individual rights a living force in the minds of our countrymen. We must make coercion—the initiation of force—something that the people denounce, despise, and reject. Then we must elect pro-liberty state legislatures that protect our rights and stand up to federal abuses.

As F. A. Hayek wrote, “We must make the building of a free society once more an intellectual adventure, a deed of courage.”

Linn Armstrong is a local political activist and firearms instructor with the Grand Valley Training Club. His son, Ari blogs at AriArmstrong.com in the Denver area.

* Obviously we’re talking about federal funding funneled through state legislatures, not federal funding for legitimate federal programs that happen to have a presence in Colorado. Here is a related tidbit I came across: “[F]or every $1.00 the feds send to the states, states increase their own future taxes between $0.33 and $0.42.” —AA

This entry is filed under Activism, Government, Grand Junction Free Press. | 1 Comment

Amazon Considering Renewal of Colorado Associates Program

By Ari Armstrong on April 6, 2012

I was furious when Colorado’s idiot legislators imposed the so-called “Amazon tax” in 2010, forcing the company to drop the Associates program for all Colorado residents. The basic problem is that the Associates program, which incentivizes people to link to Amazon products by paying out a percentage of the resulting sales, arguably created a “nexus” that expanded the state’s power to impose tax-collection obligations on out-of-state companies.

Now that a district court has tossed Colorado’s “Amazon Tax,” what does that mean for the Associates program? I just received the following correspondence from Amazon: “Thank you for contacting us regarding rejoining the Associates program. At this point, we’re evaluating the decision from the United States District Court for the District of Colorado. We’d welcome the opportunity to re-open our Associates Program to Colorado residents. We’ll contact you if we are able to re-open the program in the future.”

Hopefully, the Associates program will again become available. Now will the legislature kindly leave us the hell alone to earn money?

This entry is filed under Taxation. | 1 Comment

Drug Reform Bill Favors Treatment Over Felonies

By Ari Armstrong on March 31, 2012

The following article by Linn and Ari Armstrong originally was published March 30 by Grand Junction Free Press.

Politicians trying to save people from the consequences of their own stupidity is itself stupid. The effort breeds invasive, Nanny State laws that undermine individual responsibility. The ultimate effect is to encourage stupidity rather than curb it.

Whether we care about personal health, responsible living, or responsible governance, what we need above all is a people capable of thinking for themselves and taking responsibility for their own actions. A government that attempts to do people’s thinking for them undermines responsible action.

Politicians trying to save people from the consequences of their own stupidity by threatening to destroy their lives with felony convictions is outright insanity. Yet that is precisely how Colorado law currently treats low-level drug offenders.

Thankfully, Senate Bill 163 would bring a touch of sanity to Colorado’s drug laws. Fox31 reports that the bill would “reduce the crime of possession of 4 grams or less of a schedule I or II controlled substance or 2 grams or less of methamphetamine from a felony to a misdemeanor.” The bill pertains to possession only, not distribution.

Christie Donner, executive director of the Colorado Criminal Justice Reform Coalition (CCJRC) and a supporter of the bill, explained the measure would alter criminal penalties for “everything from heroin and cocaine to methamphetamines,” drugs whose abuse often involves serious addictions. The bill would not impact marijuana, she added.

Those tempted to think of this as a weepy leftist “soft on crime” bill should consider that two of the bill’s sponsors, Shawn Mitchell and Don Beezley, are perhaps the legislature’s two most stalwart defenders of economic liberty.

In a remarkably personal moment, Mitchell said during a media conference (as reported by Fox31): “My younger brother has been a meth addict for nearly a decade. He’s has been in jail in more than one state, he has a felony conviction. He got a treatment program in a county jail in Utah that helped him see things differently and my family is filled with love and hope for his turnaround.”

Representative Claire Levy, a Boulder Democrat (if we may repeat ourselves), also talked sense: “Going to prison does not help someone with a drug problem. They don’t get treatment in prison, and it’s a tremendous waste of taxpayer resources. This bill is not only about being smarter on crime, but it’s about saving taxpayer money and devoting those resources to better purposes.”

In an email alert, CCJRC added, “A felony conviction is a lifetime punishment, resulting in significantly reduced ability to obtain housing and employment, the basics of productive life. Low-level drug possession does not warrant a lifetime of diminished opportunity.”

To be sure, the bill is not perfect. While the bill would pay for drug treatment out of savings from reduced incarceration, we’re not convinced the government should be in the business of financing drug treatment with dollars forcibly taken from taxpayers. We’d rather see voluntary efforts to fund drug treatment. But the bill wouldn’t spend any additional taxes, and its positive effects far outweighs our concern here.

Of course, the bill will do nothing directly to reduce the problems of criminal violence, toxically tainted drugs, and property damage associated with the criminal distribution of drugs. The simple fact is that all the worst problems associated with drugs result directly from the prohibition of those drugs, not the drugs themselves.

The largest and most obvious problem is all the gang violence surrounding the drug trade. As during the prohibition of alcohol, drug prohibition confers enormous wealth to violent criminal gangsters.

Moreover, we think it’s very likely that the nasty methamphetamines of today never even would have been invented but for the prohibition of milder amphetamines that pharmacists sold over the counter until a few decades ago.

But we don’t expect the legislature to embrace our radical views for at least a few more years. As a matter of practical politics, Bill 163 represents a good-faith effort by the bill’s sponsors to bring incremental but meaningful reform to the state’s drug laws.

We should not confuse a reduction in criminal penalties for possessing these drugs with any sort of sanction of the drugs’ abuse. Obviously these drugs can be extremely harmful to those abusing them. We personally know people who have seriously harmed their lives by abusing these drugs. Chances are good that you do, too.

But we’re not doing people with drug problems any favors by locking them up with hardened criminals or slapping them with a felony record. As Mitchell said, “If we’re trying to stop people from ruining their life with poison, it doesn’t make sense to ruin their life legally with the permanent consequences of a felony conviction.”

Those with drug problems deserve the chance to straighten out their lives, get on a good career path, and move on. For many, Bill 163 would give them that chance.

This entry is filed under Drug War, Grand Junction Free Press.

Voice of the Musical Saw: Interview with Natalia Paruz

By Ari Armstrong on March 27, 2012

My favorite scene from the film Another Earth involves the two main characters in a music hall; the composer plays the musical saw for his friend. The director skillfully weaves in scenes of space flight, and the friend (played by Brit Marling, who also cowrote the script) offers a moving response to the music. (I appreciated and enjoyed the quirky film overall despite its problems.)

After I posted my initial remarks, Natalia Paruz—the “Saw Lady”—mentioned to me via Twitter that she played the music of that scene. I’d already seen her perform the “Star Trek” theme on a YouTube video. And, when I was younger, a friend of mine played musical saw. So I figured I’d ask Paruz for an interview. She agreed, and the exchange follows. My questions are in italics.

How did you come to participate in the film Another Earth?

Director Mike Cahill saw me performing in the NYC subway and that gave him the idea to incorporate a musical saw into the film. He asked me if I would help choose music for the saw to play, and then record it for the soundtrack. He also asked me if I would coach William Mapother, the actor who was to act as if playing a saw, to do that.

Did you record the piece specifically for this film? How long of a process was it?

The piece was composed for the film by composer Scott Munson, who is probably the most prolific composer for the musical saw, inspired by the way Mike (the director) described the movie and the feel of the scene in an e-mail. I recorded what was to be a demo of the piece for Mike to hear—I was basically sight-reading the piece. We were certain we would re-record it properly later (if the piece met with Mike’s approval). It turned out that Mike loved the piece so much that he wanted to keep it exactly as is—so we never re-recorded it—what you hear in the movie is the demo! I later recorded the piece again, for my second album.

What was it like working with an actor to teach him to look like he’s playing the saw? Did he end up actually being able to play it a bit?

Working with William was a lot of fun for me because it was different from what I usually do, which is teach people how to actually play. It was challenging to come up with a system of signs that would map out the moves the music requires, for a person who doesn’t read music.

At the shoot I stood in front of William and mimed directions for him while he was “playing.” In the scene it looks as if William is looking as Brit Marling watching him play, but in actuality she wasn’t even there when we shot William “playing.” He was looking at my miming. Later, we shot Brit sitting in the audience. William wasn’t there for that—the director had me play on stage, so that the sound would inspire emotions on Brit’s face.

There is an instant when all one sees is the saw (a shot from behind)—that shot was done with me actually holding the blade. William did an excellent job pretending to play a saw—he never made a sound (he didn’t learn how to actually play) but he looks very convincing. During the shoot I had to give marks to each take, letting the director know which part of which take looked realistic and which didn’t. Editing that scene is a masterpiece of its own—it couldn’t have been easy to assemble all this separate footage, and Mike did such an amazing job!

Can you actually “tune” a saw, as the actor suggests in the film, or was that just made up for the performance?

In actuality one doesn’t “tune” the saw but rather “warms it up” before playing. That is done by bending the blade repeatedly up and down. If the air is cold (say, because of strong AC in an auditorium)—the saw wouldn’t sound good on the first try, and bending it up and down warms the metal to a temperature where it would vibrate more readily. That is what the “tuning” bit is based on.

How big of a deal was the film in terms of advancing your career?

Having a Fox Searchlight film on my bio certainly looks nice next to the other films I played for (Dummy with actor Adrien Brody, American Carny, I Sell the Dead, etc.). Also, the majority of the “Likes” on my Facebook Page are from people who saw Another Earth, so I would say the film certainly helped spread word about musical saw playing in general and myself as well.

As I watched the scene from Another Earth, I was struck by how much the musical saw sounds like a human voice. Usually the violin is described as close to the human voice; is the musical saw the closest to it?

It is amazing how a piece of steel can sound so human. So many times when people hear me playing before seeing me play, they come looking for a singer . . . and when they realize the sound is coming from the saw they find it hard to believe. They put their ears close to the blade to verify the sound is actually coming from there!

The saw’s sound is so much like that of a soprano voice that it was used in a recording of some choir, to do the high notes their sopranos couldn’t reach. I perform with opera singers often. Audience members often remark on how sometimes they cannot tell what sound is coming from the singer and what sound is coming from the saw! I recorded track #13 of my second album especially in order to show the similarity of a soprano voice to that of the saw’s.

I assume one can buy specialty “saws” for music that can’t actually saw anything. What’s the business of producing musical saws like?

About 100 years ago there were many manufacturers of saws made especially for music (see my detailed list of them). Today there are only three manufacturers of musical saws in the USA and some overseas, led by Mussehl & Westphal, which is the only manufacturer who lasted over the years. They have been selling musical saws since 1921. For a few years during the 1920s, sales averaged approximately 25,000 per year! However sales dropped significantly during the late 1930s as the art of playing music on a saw almost disappeared, especially after WWII.

So how did you get involved in this unusual pursuit? How long did it take you to become proficient?

I was introduced to the art of playing music on a saw by chance (or fate). I had mapped out my life as a dancer (I was a trainee with the Martha Graham Dance Company, and I performed with many smaller companies, in musicals, taught dance, etc.) but being run over by a car put an end to that. I searched for an alternate career, but nothing I tried filled the void the lack of dance left in my spirit. To cheer me up, my parents took me to Europe. We went to a show for tourists and part of it was a guy playing a saw, and for the first time since the accident I felt excited about something. It was as if providence pointed its finger to tell me what I was meant to do in life.

Since there was no musical saw teacher to be found, I taught myself, through trial & error (no internet tutorials back then either) how to play. At first I only thought of it as a hobby, but an invitation from a local Salvation Army Center (which heard about my playing from a neighbor of mine who could hear me practicing) changed that. When my phone kept ringing with invitations to perform, I realized that I could turn this into a career.

Anything else?

About 10 years ago I founded the NYC Musical Saw Festival which aims to promote the art form of playing music with a saw. When I started there were only five other saw players, but our numbers grew and we even established a new Guinness World Record for the “Largest Musical Saw Ensemble,” with 53 people playing saws together!

Thank you for the great questions, Ari!

Readers are invited to visit my website, where people can download my music, and my Facebook Page, where people may ask me questions about the musical saw or the movie.

Thank you very much,

all the best,
Natalia

This entry is filed under Music.

Ideas of the Tea Party Survey

By Ari Armstrong on March 26, 2012

I distributed this survey earlier this year; its goal is to better understand where Tea Partiers get their ideas. Replies follow the questions. (Obviously, I do not necessarily agree with all the replies.)

1. What is your name?

2. What city and state do you live in? [Answers omitted.]

3. What is your primary occupation?

4. If you have a Bachelor’s degree or higher, please list your major(s) and degree(s).

5. Did you become politically active through the Tea Party movement? How long have you been active in politics?

6. Besides the Tea Party label, how do you usually describe yourself in terms of your political commitments? If any of the following apply, please list them: conservative, Republican, independent, Christian conservative, fiscal conservative, free-market activist, libertarian, classical liberal, Objectivist.

7. Through what channels do you share your ideas with others? If you use any of the following means, please briefly explain how: social media (Facebook, Twitter, etc.), electronic email list, radio show, podcast, blog, regular newspaper column, occasional letters to newspapers, organize or participate in politically-oriented meetings or discussion groups.

8. What (if any) ideological or political organizations do you contribute to financially or volunteer to support?

9. Were you exposed to free-market ideas in college? If so, please briefly explain how.

10. What are your main, regular sources of politically-related ideas and information? Please list the most significant radio shows, TV shows, publications, blogs, organizations, or writers that you turn to on a regular basis.

11. Have you read any books since the rise of the modern Tea Party movement that have strongly influenced your political ideas? If so, which ones?

12. For each of the following figures, please briefly explain whether you have heard of the figure, whether he or she has influenced you, and, if so, how:
a) Milton Friedman
b) Friedrich Hayek
c) Ayn Rand
d) Henry Hazlitt
e) Ludwig von Mises
f) Thomas Sowell

13. Besides the figures already listed, have any scholars, intellectuals, or religious leaders strongly influenced your political ideas? If so, please name them and briefly explain how they influenced you.

Keith Peterson

3. RF Engineer (part-time)/All things computer the rest of the time

4. NA

5. No. 20 years

6. Conservative (Social and fiscal). However, I am becoming more Libertarian with each passing second.

7. Organize meetings (Legislative reviews with state Senators/Reps, Tea Party gatherings, guest speakers on issues). Facebook, Google+, website, assisting with radio program (not a host).

8. individual campaigns/candidates. Have in the past been a contributing member of Heritage and similar organizations.

9. No

10. Talk radio/podcasts (Glenn Beck, CATO, Coffee and Markets, Reason Magazine podcast, and others). Imprimis, Reason Magazine, PPC, I2I, Complete Colorado, Gasden Society of Colorado, Big Government, Daily KOS, MoveOn, Occupy sites. Too many to list all. Mostly Right leaning and Libertarian sites and publications, with a healthy sprinkling from the Left as well.

11. No

12. Ayn Rand, Hayek, and Mises. Mises mostly in helping me better understand how an economy should, and can, function.

13. The person who has maybe influenced me the most since the Tea Party came along is not well known outside of Colorado (so far as I know he isn’t), that would likely be David K. Williams. Ravi Zacharias, even though he rarely touches on the political in an in depth way, has influenced me politically for well over a decade now.

Anonymous

3. Software Development

4. Almost. I got a job in my field while still in school, and have enough major specific credits in Computer Science to graduate, but I make more than average for people with my degree already and don’t have all of the general education credits I need to graduate.

5. Tea party movement, I’m not terribly active in it, though I agree with its original intent and still talk to people about it. I’ve been voting since I could (2000) and have discussed politics with my friends since about 1992. My ideas didn’t really solidify until 2002 to 2003.

6. Libertarian primarily. Republican secondary. (It used to be reversed.) Classical Liberal, Fiscal conservative, and Objectivist are all things that I agree with at least partially.

7. Twitter, Tumblr, and my own blog (socia.arkaic.com), I comment on Facebook and Google+ posts by others, but rarely start those myself. I comment regularly on the blogs of others as well. I used to use Google Reader to share, discuss, and read articles, but Google neutered it, so now I use Newsblur with Tumblr and Disqus to do the same thing.

8. I have contributed to Freedomworks and the Fairtax foundation before.

9. To an extent, though the professor didn’t directly espouse it. Macroeconomics class had the building blocks for free market ideas, but I had to put them together myself. Microeconomics wasn’t very useful for free market ideas.

10. Reason.com, BigGovernment, John Stossel, Penn Jillette, South Park, The Blaze, The Jerry Doyle show, The Neal Boortz program and Free Colorado, to name a few. I have friends that cull interesting articles from sites like The Huffington Post and others, so I get a subset of those as well.

11. Actually very few, given my job I haven’t had as much time to read political books since the Tea party was founded.

12. A. Definitely, the sense of optimism combined with concrete examples of how the market works was very helpful in solidifying my ideas.
b. Indirectly, I’ve read a number of things from people who cite Hayek and I find these second hand bits to be quite insightful, but haven’t yet gone to read his stuff directly.
c. Yes, though not always in the direction she intends. Still good fodder to bring up new directions of thinking to problems I’m already looking at.
d. Sadly, no.
e. Another person I’ve read things indirectly from.
f. Some stuff here and there. Mostly articles rather than books. I’ve shared a number of them to better explain to others why I take the positions I do.

13. Walter E Williams’ writing has helped me with some of the concepts of free markets.

Earl Allen

3. Flight Instructor

4. M.A. English Literature

5. No. Since 1993, when I moved to CO.

6. libertarian/Libertarian/free-market activist/classical liberal in that order.

7. Twitter, Facebook, various email lists, blog http://flypro.blogspot.com , LTE’s, Boulder Libertarians.

8. Cato, downsizedc.org , Libertarian Party, theadvocates.org , ij.org

9. Yes. But not by teachers or classes. Read Milton Friedman’s “Free To Choose” when I was a college teacher.

10. wattsupwiththat.com , sppiblog.org , joannenova.com.au , news.google.com , Drudge Report , peoplespresscollective.org

11. “The Most Dangerous Superstition” http://larkenrose.com/store.html

12. a) Milton Friedman read “Free To Choose”
b) Friedrich Hayek read “Road To Serfdom”
c) Ayn Rand read “everything I could get my hands on” and own three copies of “Atlas Shrugged”, one of which is falling apart at the seams due to overuse.
d) Henry Hazlitt read “Economics in One Lesson”
e) Ludwig von Mises have read parts of “Human Action” and many of his essays
f) Thomas Sowell read “Inside American Education” and “The Vision of the Anointed”

13. Ari Armstrong for his untiring efforts to promote liberty in my home State. David Kopel for his articulate defense of self-defense rights. Jon Caldara for his articulation of liberty and free markets everywhere. Ron Paul for having the guts to stand up to the Repellicant status quo. Harry Browne for his gentlemanly articulation of free-market politics. Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il for being the perfect illustrations of what happens when authoritarians are in control. Trey Parker and Matt Stone for their Galt’s Gulch of humor at Comedy Central and for “The Book of Mormon”, which has a chance to change history (away from a Mormon Prez candidate).

Howard Towt

3. Internet Service Provider.

4. Engineering: BS, MS; Business Administration: MBA.

5. No; Since 2004.

6. Republican.

7. Blog: http://anti-republicanculture.com.

8. None.

9. Yes; Courses in political science and economics.

10. Radio: Rush Limbaugh; Blogs: Instapundit, Power Line, The Other McCain, Ricochet, Urgent Agenda, Black Five.

11. Breitbart’s “Righteous Indignation;” Bolton’s “Surrender is not an Option.”

12. a) Milton Friedman – Monetary policy vs. fiscal policy.
b) Friedrich Hayek – The role of intellectuals.
c) Ayn Rand – “The Fountainhead” is the best novel written.
d) Henry Hazlitt – (Don’t know.)
e) Ludwig von Mises – I need to know more about the Austrian economists…
f) Thomas Sowell – Great respect for his economic pragmatism and courage.

13. Ron Radosh, Victor Davis Hanson, Sarah Palin: people with the courage to promote the U.S. Constitution as a unique and important philosophical document.

Anonymous

3. Computer programmer

4. BSEE

5. No. 30 years.

6. Libertarian

7. Electronic email list
Blog
Occasional LTE’s
Organize and participate in meetings and discussion groups.

8. Libertarian Party

9. Once in 1972 when a Libertarian Party sympathizer came to speak. I was also heavily involved with free market economists at Columbia University and the University of Chicago

10. Ari and Linn Armstrong, John Stossel

11. No

12. a) Milton Friedman – Free to choose
c) Ayn Rand – Yes. I thought she was prescient when I first read her in high school.
d) Yes.
e) Yes.
f) Yes. I read his articles in Townhall

13. James Heckman, Nobel Laureate. I worked for him for 5 years before he got his Nobel.

Anonymous

3. Computer Modeler for Smart Grid and Direct Marketing applications

4. Bachelor in Chemistry, Bachelor in Physics

5. Not explicitly through the Tea party movement. I have been active since returning to the US from Thailand, though my disillusionment of late had caused me to be less active then initially on my
return. The gestation and birth of the Tea Party may change that.

6. Libertarian, with Nationalist tendencies.

7. Email and discussions

8. I have helped the Libertarian party in the past.

9. not really– but that was the 1970s

10. Fox news, KCOL600, Glenn Beck, CNN (yuck), 760 radio in Boulder (yuck, keep your enemies closer), Mark Steyn, National Review

11. A great many… Mark Steyn– America Alone, After America
Glenn Beck — Common Sense, Broke, Arguing with Idiots
Politically incorrect guide to Socialism,
Politically incorrect guide to Islam and the Crusades

12. a) Milton Friedman — Yes, blessed be his name– Rational economic
analysis
b) Friedrich Hayek — Yes, blessed be his name — argued Keynes into a
corner
c) Ayn Rand — Yes, Blessed be her name (though she wouldn’t appreciate it) A great deal of VERY good writing about our world and how it might get corrected and/or go wrong…. In defense of Selfishness is GREAT
d) Henry Hazlitt — no?
e) Ludwig von Mises — Yes, blessed be his name — I get stuff from the institute every day…
f) Thomas Sowell — I’ve read a number of his pieces and enjoy them immensely… solid…

13. Mark Steyn, how much fun is that? GREAT writing about important subjects
“How Civilizations Die” — I don’t’ know author–treatise on impact of demographics on society and civilization actually
“Guns, Germs and Steel” — jared Diamond– rational explanations and a clarity of analysis of history everyone could use
“Clash of Civilizations” — Huntington? — Another necessary read in this world.
“Wisdom of Crowds” — again, forget author — about how bodies of people are proven to make better decision then individual “experts”
Jonah Goldberg — Liberal Fascism… MUST READ

3. Unemployed

4. BSBA Business; MBA Business

5. NO. How long have you been active in politics? 25 years

7. Active in Republican organizations, occasional letters to newspapers, organize and participate in politically-oriented meetings, lobby state legislature.

8. Colorado Union of Taxpayers, Republican Party

9. NO

10.

11. Read Atlas Shrugged for the fourth time.

12. a) Milton Friedman yes, yes
b) Friedrich Hayek yes, yes
c) Ayn Rand yes, yes
d) Henry Hazlitt yes, yes
e) Ludwig von Mises yes, yes
f) Thomas Sowell yes, yes

13.

Kyle Haight

3. I am a software engineer.

4. I hold a BS in Cognitive Science from the University of California, San Diego. I took a year and a half of graduate study in philosophy from San Jose State but left the program without obtaining a degree.

5. It depends on what you mean by ‘politically active’. I have been politically aware since I was a teenager in the mid-to-late 1980′s, in the sense of paying attention to political developments, voting regularly and discussing political issues with friends and co-workers. The Tea Party movement was the first time I have moved beyond that to such actions as attending public rallies, holding sign-making events and the like.

6. I am an Objectivist and will describe myself as such when appropriate. In contexts where “Objectivist” would be uninformative I usually describe myself as a “secular pro-freedom advocate” or “pro-free market”.

7. I’m a regular participant in the Objectivism Seminar, an on-line book discussion forum which explores books by Objectivists. I have blogged in the past but have not done so actively for a few years. I make political posts to Facebook occasionally.

8. I support the Ayn Rand Institute and the Anthem Foundation. I also make targeted contributions to specific political campaigns, e.g. I made a contribution to Scott Brown’s campaign in early 2010 and contributed to the Wisconsin Club for Growth in support of Justice David Prosser’s reelection campaign. I will probably make a similar donation in support of Governor Walker to help him fight the recall campaign the left has pushed him into.

9. I was an active member of the UCSD Objectivist club for two years; I also read a variety of pro-free-market books from the university library. This activity was largely self-motivated, not something I encountered in the classroom.

10. I get a lot of information from blogs: Instapundit, Dailypundit, Power Line, RedState, Vodkapundit and the PJ Tatler are the main ones. I also read other PJ Media more broadly. I don’t listen to talk radio or watch TV news. Too bombastic, and anything they push hard will work its way into the blogosphere fairly quickly.

I also read the Objective Standard for longer-form analysis.

11. Influenced in the sense of changing my political ideas? Not particularly; I’ve been an Objectivist for over two decades. I did find Angelo Codevilla’s essay on the ruling class to be insightful and I’ve used the categories he set up to help with my analysis of shorter-term political trends and conflicts particularly within the Republican party.

12. a) Milton Friedman

Yes, I’ve heard of him, but I haven’t read any of his major works. (I did go to an ‘anarchist party’ thrown by his son David back in the 1990′s.) I wouldn’t consider him influential on my thinking.

b) Friedrich Hayek

I’ve heard of him. I tried reading his book “The Constitution of Liberty” when I was in college but bounced off. I’ve made use of his insights regarding the so-called ‘knowledge problem’.

c) Ayn Rand

Obviously a major influence.

d) Henry Hazlitt

I read Hazlitt’s “Economics in One Lesson” when I was in high school and it provided a very useful foundation for my understanding of how to analyze the operations of a mixed economy.

e) Ludwig von Mises

I read a large chunk of Mises’ “Human Action” in high school while researching a term paper for an economic class. I was very impressed, but too young to really understand it. I consider Mises’ ‘Calculation Argument’ to be the definitive economic refutation of socialism. Rand shows why socialism is immoral; Mises shows why it can’t work in practice.

f) Thomas Sowell

I read Sowell’s “Race and Culture” and “The Vision of the Anointed” in the 1990′s. I found them flawed but insightful; the former provides great ammunition for arguments over discrimination, race relations and affirmative action while the latter provides excellent insights into the liberal and conservative worldviews.

His short essays are also very much worth reading in my opinion, not so much for their theoretical content (which his often flawed by his conservatism) but for the facts and the way he ties them together.

13. I’m defining ‘political ideas’ somewhat broadly here.

Other Objectivist intellectuals, obviously: Leonard Peikoff and Tara Smith stand out for special notice.

I learned a lot of useful economics from George Reisman and Murray Rothbard (pity the latter is such a nutcase on other issues).

Angelo Codevilla on foreign policy.

Strauss and Howe’s “Generations” and “The Fourth Turning” have influenced my view of history and the nature of the crisis in which the country is currently embroiled.

Yochelson and Samenow’s “The Criminal Personality” has been a major influence on my view of criminal psychology and how the government should deal with criminals.

David Horowitz’s “The Politics of Bad Faith” has significantly shaped my understanding of the psychology and goals of the left.

I also have to give a nod to Bill Whittle. While he isn’t an intellectual he’s probably about as good a cultural commentator as you can find these days who isn’t an Objectivist.

Martin Buchanan

3. Software engineer and technical writer.

4. Four years of college with no degree. Many computer science and electrical engineering courses along with physics, math, medical laboratory courses, and a variety of other subjects. Attended MIT and George Washington University and have credits from four other institutions as well.

5. No.

In a major way from 1980 through the early 1990s in Oregon, including a 1988 run for Secretary of State as the LP candidate, creating the first major school choice organization in Oregon, writing the 1990 school choice initiative and heading the campaign, and writing other initiatives for tax limits and term limits (where others did the vast majority of the real work on those other initiative; the term limits were enacted by voters and are in the Oregon constitution). Occasionally active in Colorado, including a 2008 run in the First Congressional District, though mainly active by writing letters to the editor and giving money. Wrote and published a book in 2007 that anticipated our current federal budget crisis and provided appropriate solutions (cut spending and entitlements). Have set aside another book project, about the sovereign default of the United States, as I’m working two jobs.

6. Have identified as a libertarian since 1970, am a life member of the LP, was very active in the Oregon LP, and am somewhat active in the Colorado LP. First read Ayn Rand in 1967 and am still reading her works today. I share all of her major premises while disagreeing with some specific interpretations or applications of Objectivist ideas by Ms. Rand or by those in the movement. As a libertarian I avoid the “Objectivist” label, though I could fairly be described as an Objectivist sympathizer/someone who often finds value in the Objectivist movement. “Fiscal conservative” is another fair label. I abhor deficit and debts as government policy and strongly support a balanced budget amendment. Free market activist: yes. Classical liberal: yes.

7. Occasional letters to the editors, posting to email lists, or runs for office. When my book came out, did some radio and TV appearances for it. Once I really retire I may want to run initiative campaigns again. Can imagine blogging but do not want to Facebook nor tweet, nor podcast.

8. Ayn Rand Institute, Libertarian Party national and state and candidates, Cato Institute, ISIL, and occasionally other organizations as well.

9. At MIT was active in the Radicals for Capitalism and was a reporter for Ergo, an Objectivist student newspaper. A fellow worker at Ergo was Dan Karlan who introduced me to many other libertarian writers and thinkers including Murray Rothbard, Lysander Spooner, Roy Childs, Morris and Linda Tannehill, and David Friedman. I personally accept the argument for limited government put forth by Robert Nozick in Anarchy, State, and Utopia, but found and still find considerable value in the writings of the anarchocapitalists.

10. Internet each day check the Washington Post, NY Times, Wall Street Journal, CNN, Drudge, Wired, New Scientist, and Slashdot. Listen to PBS, Fox, ABC, and CNN on TV.

11. None with a strong influence, though I liked the Dirty Dozen that Ari Armstrong gave me about Supreme Court cases. The last book I read was Handbook of Floating-Point Arithmetic.

12. a) Milton Friedman – middling, read Free to Choose
b) Friedrich Hayek – minor, nas been on my “ought to read” list
c) Ayn Rand – strong influence, power and clarity of her writing and philosophy
d) Henry Hazlitt – strong influence via Economics in One Lesson and other books including Thinking as a Science and Time Will Run Back
e) Ludwig von Mises – middling, read some of his books years ago but never finished Human Action
f) Thomas Sowell – minor

13. Was moved by the power of C.S. Lewis’s writing and reasoning as well when I was a young man, and pondered the interesting problem of reconciling Lewis and Rand. That may be part of the reason I’ve generally been a deist for decades, putting me at odds with both thinkers. Was raised in the Presbyterian church as the grandson and great grandson of Presbyterian ministers by parents who valued parts of the Bible, reasoned about religion, and oscillated between liberal Christianity and agnosticism. My family background and my parents influenced me strongly and still do. As noted above, read and still value the work of several anarchocapitalist writers.

Jim McKindles

3. Retired Lucent Technologies installer/ Residential Builder

4. School of hard knocks!

5. Politically active since 1996, the year of my discovery of Dr Paul and Lew Rockwell.

6. Libertarian

7. My own email list.

8. Ron Paul and other Liberty minded candidates locally.

9. No college, just riding home with my Uncle from the construction jobsite listening to him carry on about Roosevelt and how crooked he and the unions were back in the mid sixties as a 20 year old.

10) Lew Rockwell, “Freedom Watch” on FBN

11-13) I have read each of these authors and all have influenced my way of living up here in [Michigan].

John Zaugg

3. Construction

4. Architecture-Bachelor Degree

5. No I’m not active in politics.

6. Objectivist

7. [Rarely write letters to papers; no on everything else.]

8. None

9. No

10. News commentary and books. Link TV, Democracy Now, Broadcast news commentary is shallow and bias.

11. No

12. a) Milton Friedman I have read some of his works
b) Friedrich Hayek I have read some of his works
c) Ayn Rand I have read all her works and I met Ayn Rand at a presentation in New York
d) Henry Hazlitt I have read some of his works
e) Ludwig von Mises I have read some of his works
f) Thomas Sowell I have read some of his works

Mary Lee Harsha

3. Retired IT professional

4. Theatre major

5. Three years

7. Letters to the Editor – occasionally
Facebook – post to Agenda 21 sites as well as my own. It is linked to a one year World Wide Amplified show about Objectivism that I led.
Twitter – only comments on political events, debates, etc.
The Objectivist Living blog – occassional
Electronic e-mail list: to friends in the Tea Party and 912 movements about everything I think is important to our politics and economics as well as a list of members of the Des Moines Objectivists about all things related to Objectivism.

8. 912, Tea Party, support through subscriptions The Objective Standard and The New Individualist at the Atlas Society.

9. No. I discovered them through Ayn Rand’s writings which led me to the Austrian economists.

10. Ayn Rand Institute, Objectivist presentations, Tara Smith, Glenn Beck TV (GBTV), Stossel, Freedom Watch, Varney and Company, general Fox Business news all day long, The Objectivist Standard, The New Individualist, Pajama T.V., Dianne Hsieh’s blog, George Reisman’s Blog, Facebook Agenda 21 groups, www.mises.org, WSJ Online, Reuters, American Thinker, and what ever comes up when I Google a particular subject.

11. Helpful Books:
Amity Shlaes – The Forgotten Man
Tara Smith – Moral Rights and Political Freedom
Ayn Rand – Atlas Shrugged – again and again
Ayn Rand – Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology again
Ayn Rand – Philosophy – Who Needs it again
Nathaniel Branden’s lectures – The Vision of Ayn Rand – Intro to Objectivist Philosophy
Barbara Branden’s audio book – The Principles of Efficient Thinking
Leonard Peikoff – Objectivism:The Philosophy of Ayn Rand
Leonard Peikoff – The Ominous Parallels
Andrew Bernstein – The Capitalist Manifesto
David Harriman – The Logical Leap: Induction in Physics
Ludwig von Mises – Human Nature and Epistemological Problems of Economics
Murray Rothbard – read in Man, Economy and State and Conceived in Liberty
Frederic Bastiat – Law, Unintended Consequences and selections from the complete works of
Saul Alinsky – Rules for Radicals
Karl Marx – The Communist Manifesto
Eugen von Bohm Bawerk – Karl Marx and the Close of his System
Glenn Beck – The Overton Window, How to Talk to Idiots, Broke
Jonah Goldberg – Liberal Fascism
Charles Beard – read in History of the United States
Stephen R.C. Hicks – Explaining Post-Modernism
Alexander Hamilton, James Madison – The Federalist Papers

Helpful for understanding Communitarianism and Agenda 21
Rosa Koire – Behind the Green Mask: U.N. Agenda 21
Amitai Etzioni – The Communitarian Reader
Amitai Etzioni – New Common Ground
Jay Walljasper – All That We Share

Helpful for Understanding the somewhat poor thinking of Conservatives:
Mark Levin – Liberty and Tyranny
Newt Gingrich – To Save the Country
Sarah Palin – Going Rogue

Helpful for Understanding Islam and Sharia Law
Barry Rubin – The Muslim Brotherhood
Brigiette Gabriel – Because They Hate
Brigiette Gabriel – They Must be Stopped

12. a) Milton Friedman – Yes, somewhat of an influence, though not as much as the Austrians (because his philosophy is not slid all the way down).
b) Friedrich Hayek – Yes, helped with understanding politcs and economics with his Road to Serfdom
c) Ayn Rand – Yes. Probably the most influential public figure in my life.
d) Henry Hazlitt – Yes – haven’t read him yet, but he’s on my list
e) Ludwig von Mises – Yes – big influence on understanding Austrian economics
f) Thomas Sowell – Yes – like to read his articles on the Atlas Society web site, have him on my book list.

13. Tara Smith – her philosophical articles in a variety of journals have taught me how to think about issues like judicial activism, how the U.S. Constitution has been interpreted, Objective and non-objective law, Zero Sum thinking in Environmentalism and the welfare state.
Yaron Brook – his excellent arguments for Objectivism at debates and on P.J. T.V. and other lectures have been a source of good cheer in the face of insane politics.
Jacob Bronowski – author of the Ascent of Man – did a beautiful job of making sense of the history of science. Led me to pursue more education in that field.
Richard Dawkins – his “The Greatest Show on Earth” and “The Magic of Reality” have helped clarify my thinking on Evolution and the nature of reality.

Todd Walton

3. System Administrator

4. N/A

5. Yes, I became politically active through the Tea Party movement. I was not before. I got involved in second half of 2010.

6. Objectivist.

7. Google+, Meetup group, Tea Party meetings, mailing lists, Republican Party committee meetings, I used to have a radio show, occasional letters to newspapers.

8. Local tea party activities, Ron Paul campaign, ARI.

9. No. Wasn’t really the point of my education.

10. Cato, Reason, ARI of course.

11. No.

12. I’ve heard of them all. Mises and Ayn Rand have influenced me. Mises
a little, Rand a lot.

13. No. I have other ideas, but my political philosophy is pretty much Ayn Rand 90% and then 10% from this and that and what I’ve cooked up myself.

Gladys Woynowskie

My primary occupation was “mother.”

4. BA in Humanities, AS in Early Childhood Education, I hold an Elementary Teacher’s license (in the state of CO).

5. I’m not sure I’m active yet. I have always had some interest as I see it as a citizen’s responsibility. In April of 2008 I went to Lincoln Park. I was motivated by the incredible disregard for the law and for political procedure (as set forth in the constitution) which was being demonstrated by the executive branch and the democratically controlled congress.

7. On facebook, I promote unity and mutual respect with all my communications. There is one group: Free Agent Diaz within which I freely communicate because we all recognize the failure of the judicial system to protect this man and we recognize the near futility of finding justice for him.
I also make occasional comments on blogs, etc. I write to my congressmen about once every two months. Mostly I talk with my friends.

I do not see myself as an activist and I resist activist techniques. I guess I am looking for a better definition and a more productive method of participation.

8. Parental Rights.org, NRA, Freedom Center (Horowitz), Judicial Watch, United American Patriots, Wounded Warriors Project.org

9. 2 classes: Economics, Retail Marketing

10. Local: blog.ariarmstrong.com/ gjresult.com junctiondailyblog.com livingthegrandlife.blogspot.com/ waronwrong.blogspot.com coloradoindependent.com/
completecolorado.com
National: Drudge Report, The Blaze, Huffington Post, Reuters, Politico, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck

11. The Coming Insurrection by unknown, You Don’t Need a Weatherman. . . by Ayers, A Point in Time by Horowitz, Chaplins and Clergy of the Revolution by JT Headley.

12. a) Milton Friedman : recognize as free market economist-never read
b) Friedrich Hayek: recognize as support of capitalism-never read
c) Ayn Rand: first read Atlas Shrugged in 1969 (give or take a year) Have re-read it at least 3 times since, have read all of her books. Her promotion of personal rights and responsibilities was irresistible.
d) Henry Hazlitt : no idea
e) Ludwig von Mises: no idea
f) Thomas Sowell: I know this name, seems linked to economics

13. The greatest influence on my political thought is the Bible. When I can understand how God wants me to interact with my fellowman, then I will know how act as a political entity. When I understand the constitution and the environment in which it developed, then I know how to act as an American. I am a self-educated historian with focus on ancient history and early American history
I have read most of Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations . I have read both of Thomas Paine’s books (Rights of Man and Common Sense). Both of these men have been read more than once. This effort helped to build my understanding of the context from which our country came to be. Along with this would be the writings of Bradford and the Mayflower compact, and the biographies and writings of the founding fathers. Of the latter, my knowledge is not exhaustive but is varied. I seem to be lacking great scholars and intellectuals (living) who have influenced me. I find no suitable explanation for that.

Bill Setser

3. Director at Damon Runyon Repertory Theater

5. No. 32 years

6. I am an individualist with a mix of the following: conservative, Republican, fiscal conservative, free-market activist, libertarian, classical liberal.

7. I talk politics with friends and family, and read and comment frequently on libertarian and
conservative blogs, and occasionally write letters to the Pueblo Chieftain.

8. RNC, Colorado Republican Party, NRA, and ISP through Outdoors Unlimited

9. No

10. Pueblo Chieftain, Mike Rosen, Limbaugh, Mark Levin, Cafe Hayek, Ludwig von Mises Institute, Don
Surber blog, Rossputin, Black and Right blog, National Review Online.

11. a) The Discovery of Freedom, by Rose Wilder Lane
b) Our Enemy The State, by Albert Jay Nock

12. All of these people have greatly influenced my individualist philosophy. Hazlitt the least so,
simply because I’ve not seen enough of his work.

13. Walter E Williams, Don Boudreaux, and Russ Roberts have all helped give an economic foundation
to my individualist philosophies.

H.L. Mencken, Robert A Heinlein, and Mark Twain help reinforce a distrust of government (no matter
who is running the show)

Karl Schwols

3. Own my own small retail business in Boulder CO

4. Double Major BS in Engineering Science and BA in Social Science

5. 2 years, yes Tea Party Inspired

6. Libertarian leaning conservative.

7. Facebook mostly

8. not much yet

9. Always have been somewhat conservative, but I have been inspired and have read a great deal lately

10. Mike Rosen, America’s Morning News, Laura Ingram, The 5000 Year Leap by Skousen, CK Prahalad, ICECAP.US

11. The 5000 Year Leap by Skousen, CK Prahalad, The Federalist Papers, the Anti-Federalist papers

12. a) Milton Friedman…Heard of, read some of his books, watched many of his videos, agree with
b) Friedrich Hayek….Heard of, tried to read but a bit cumbersome
c) Ayn Rand….Heard of, read some, agree with some, disagree with some
d) Henry Hazlitt …not familiar enough with
e) Ludwig von Mises…not super familiar with, but I believe he inspired Hayek and is a strict libertarian.
f) Thomas Sowell …great writer, makes things very clear. agree with.

13. William F Buckly, Mark Levin,

Anonymous

3. IT.

4. No. Currently attending Front Range for A.A.S. in Comp Sci.

5. I have been “active” to some degree since age 16 or so. I am 22 at present so this predates the Tea Party.

6. Fiscal Conservative but social centrist.

7. Facebook, occasional letters to public officials. Caucuses every 2 years.

8. I have volunteered to help candidates for a state house campaign, a school board race, and as a county assembly delegate.

9. I am in college and no, college is not the source of my views.

10. Mike Rosen’s radio show on 850 KOA, the Denver Post Spot Blog, and Devil’s Advocate on PBS. I periodically watch news and political talk TV shows and track a substantial number of political websites and think tanks via RSS feeds.

11. Few that would have been influenced by the Tea Party per se. A Monetary History of the United States and Free To Choose, both by Milton Friedman influence me. A Conflict Of Visions by Thomas Sowell was also influential. I am presently reading through Bush’s memoirs and a book on political campaigning. I am also reading Machiavelli’s “The Prince”.

12. I’ve heard of all of them except Hazlitt but I only care for the ideas of Sowell and Friedman.

13. I also sort of like Krauthammer to some extent, though I often disagree with him.

Kathy Peterson

3. Sales/Activism/Social Media

4. BS in Business Administration (dual majors: Marketing/Organizational Management)

5. Mike Rosen/Rush Limbaugh listener since 1991, County Election Judge since 1998, attended first caucus in 2008, became truly active in politics as of 2/19/09 when Rick Santelli went “Tea Party” on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange’s trading floor in a righteous rant against President Obama’s proposal to help foreclosure “occupiers” refinance their mortgages.

6. I am a pro-choice, agnostic, strong national defense, fiscal conservative, and registered Republican. I also identify myself as a conservative, and free-market activist.

7. I communicate in person, through social media (Facebook: personal profile, non-profit org page, candidates pages, public and private groups, fan pages, private messages; Twitter: tweets; LinkedIn: private messages, status updates), emails incoming/outgoing, call-ins to radio shows, suggesting guests for radio programs, listening to and recommending podcasts, reading and recommending/sharing blogs and websites, attending/organizing/teaching at politically oriented events and activities.

8. R Block Party, Independence Institute, Colorado Christian University, Act! For America, Leadership Program of the Rockies, American Majority, Americans For Prosperity, various local candidate campaigns

9. I took both Macro and Micro Economics in High School, but do not recall taking these courses in college for my Business Degree.

10. Grassroots Radio Colorado (radio program on 560KLZ), Mike Rosen, Rush Limbaugh, Jon Caldara, Michael Brown (radio programs on 850KOA), various FOX News clips seen on Facebook, blogs: ColoradoPeakPolitics, PeoplesPressCollective, Michelle Malkin, Andrew Breitbart, Pamela Geller, etc., organizations: Centennial Institute, Independence Institute, PJTV (Pajamas Media), among others

11. Atlas Shrugged, Economics in One Lesson, The Law by Frederic Bastiat, Basic Economics by Thomas Sowell, America Alone by Mark Steyn, The Political Zoo by Michael Savage, Culture of Corruption: Obama and His Team of Tax Cheats, Crooks, and Cronies by Michelle Malkin, etc.

On a related topic, various movies have also strongly influenced my political ideas:
Waiting For Superman, Agenda: Driving America Down, Obsession, The Cartel, Kids Aren’t Cars, spOILed, Runaway Slave, I Want Your Money, America at Risk, Fitna, Commanding Heights (pbs), Atlas Shrugged the Movie, Iranium

12. a) Milton Friedman – Free to Choose video seen at his birthday party at the Independence Institute, great video on Greed during a 1979 interview with lefty Phil Donahue
b) Friedrich Hayek – Road to Serfdom (on my bedside table)
c) Ayn Rand – attended Diana Hsieh’s Atlas Shrugged discussion group, promoted Atlas Shrugged The Movie Part 1 premiere
d) Henry Hazlitt – Economics in One Lesson (Broken Window concept, Spread the Work scam, reality of unions)
e) Ludwig von Mises – Austrian School of Economic Thought
f) Thomas Sowell – Basic Economics (textbook of Penn Pfiffner’s Free People, Free Markets: Principles of Liberty class in which I am currently attending)

13. Columnist and Radio Talk Show Host Mike Rosen is the best economics and political science professor I have ever had, and I have been his grateful student since 1991.
Congressman Bob Schaffer is the most articulate, rational, prepared, and persuasive debater I have supported as a political candidate.
Colorado Senator Shawn Mitchell is a radiating mentor of liberty principles, social media mastery, and commitment to conservative ideals of smaller government, less regulation, lower tax rates, and individual responsibility.
Centennial Institute and Independence Institute founder John Andrews has a photographic memory of names and faces, is an uber-networker, and whose quick wit is the most effective un-ruffler of heated feathers.
Ayn Rand Institute’s Yaron Brook is a personable, thoughtful, and well-versed advocate for oftentimes disregarded non-religous conservatives.
Brigitte Gabriel and John Guandolo are brave, compelling, and informative educators on the realities of the threat of Shariah vs. our Constitution.
Governor Jan Brewer has exhibited strength, courage, and persistence in her fight to protect her Arizona constituents, as well as all Americans from our dangerously porous southern border.
On a local level, a personal hero, dedicated volunteer, and committed school board member Laura Boggs alerted, inspired, and recruited me to the current state of our non-tran$parent, top heavy, corrupt education system.

Anonymous

3. Retired airline pilot

4. BA, Colgate, English lit

Naval Postgraduate School Monterey, Aviation Safety Officer

5. Yes, my political activity began with the Tea Party. I’ve been active in Tea Party and Republican Party over 2 years.

6. Fiscal conservative, free-market activist, objectivist.

7. Leader of the Evergreen Tea Party. We have a website, Facebook, Twitter.

8. Evergreen Tea Party, Republican Party, Independence Institute, Leadership of the Rockies

9. Yes, senior level core course in American values.

10. Victor Davis Hansen blogs, National Review Uncommon Knowledge video interviews, Thomas Sowell editorials, Dr Hurd Daily Dose of Reason

Rosen, Limbaugh, etc on radio

FOX Business News and to a lesser extent, Fox News

11. The 1000 Year Leap, The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Constitution, Bastiat’s The Law, Rob Natelson’s The Original Constitution: What it Said and Meant, John Bolton’s Surrender is Not an Option, Daniel Hannan’s The New Road to Serfdom, Adam Ferguson’s When Money Dies

12. a) Milton Friedman – know him, have read various articles by him.
b) Friedrich Hayek – know him, have read various articles by him.
c) Ayn Rand – a fan, though I learned of her late in life. Have read Atlas Shrugged and various essays.
d) Henry Hazlitt – know him, have read various articles by him.
e) Ludwig von Mises – know him, have read various articles by him. Regular reader of the Mises Daily.
f) Thomas Sowell – a fan. I try to read every editorial he publishes. I’ve read Basic Economics and the recently published Thomas Sowell Reader. Consider him a NATIONAL TREASURE.

13. Ayn Rand for her individualistic philosophy and sense of life.

Victor Davis Hansen for his observations to today world and his ability to relate it to ancient times.

Also, David McAlvany’s Weekly Commentary podcast is great on economics and financial topics from a big picture point of view.

I also enjoy Tammy Bruce and Michelle Malkin. And I read The Objective Standard and The Intellectual Activist Daily.

This entry is filed under Politics.

Birth Control Mandate Violates Individual Rights, Muell Argues

By Ari Armstrong on March 25, 2012

At a recent talk at Liberty On the Rocks in Denver, Amanda Muell argued that the birth control insurance mandate violates individual rights. She compared it to a law forcing restaurants to offer more extravagant and more expensive meals that customers wish to buy. The mandate does not merely violate religious liberty, she said, but individual rights.

This entry is filed under Economic Controls, Health Care.

Why Presidential Politics Shouldn’t Matter to You (Much)

By Ari Armstrong on March 23, 2012

Recently at Snowcon I offered a short talk on why people shouldn’t spend many resources on presidential politics, at least this year. There are plenty of other worthy causes to spend your time promoting!

This entry is filed under Activism.

How the Left Paints the Right as Anti-Woman

By Ari Armstrong on March 22, 2012

The following article originally was published March 16 by Grand Junction Free Press.

The birth-control mandate that forces insurance companies to provide “free” birth control is an extensive forced wealth transfer scheme, compelling everyone who doesn’t use birth control to pay for others to use it. It is blatantly unjust, violating the rights of women and men as consumers as well as the rights of religious organizations that condemn the use of birth control. So how is it that Republicans are losing the issue so spectacularly? How is it that the left so successfully paints the right as “anti-woman?”

Some have suggested that the Obama administration shoved the birth-control mandate down the throats of religious institutions specifically to get a rise out of Republicans. It was a conscious political strategy, in this view. Whether or not Democrats intended that result, they achieved it. The Democrats left the animal skins and clubs lying about, and many Republicans gleefully dressed the part of troglodyte.

Rather than clearly and consistently answer, “Women have every right to purchase and use birth control, but they don’t have the right to force others to pay for it,” Republicans managed to come up with a rather different set of claims. Consider:

• Rick Santorum said that birth control is “harmful to women” and “harmful to society.” Birth control is “not okay,” he added; it is “counter to how things are supposed to be” because sex should be “for purposes of procreation” and not “simply [for] pleasure.”

• When law student Sandra Fluke publicly endorsed the birth-control mandate, conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh called her a “slut” and a “prostitute” and suggested that she make sex tapes available. (He later apologized.)

• Newt Gingrich condemned “post conception birth control”—which notably can include the standard birth control pill—and endorsed banning it.

• Gingrich, Santorum, and Ron Paul all have supported the so-called “personhood” movement, which would totally ban all abortions from the moment of conception, ban the birth control pill, and ban standard types of in vitro fertility treatments.

The reason the left is able to paint the right as “anti-woman” is that there is more than a grain of truth to the claim.

The left successfully used the “anti-woman” tag in 2010 against Ken Buck, who lost the U.S. Senate race in Colorado. After Buck endorsed a “personhood” measure in Colorado (before backpedalling), Planned Parenthood ran ads proclaiming, “Colorado women can’t trust Ken Buck.”

Given the background debates, many voters found it easier to interpret even Buck’s innocuous comments in a sinister light. In response to the blatant gender-based attacks by his opponent Jane Norton, Buck joked that people should vote for him he doesn’t “wear high heals.” Attacking Buck over that comment was a cheap shot, but it was also a shot that Buck himself invited by entertaining the “personhood” agenda.

Now the Democrats are trying to beat the Republicans by “Ken Bucking” the lot of them. Democrats think that by winning the votes of independent women, they can win. And they’re probably right. As Rachel Maddow writes for the Washington Post, “Today’s Republican candidates are all Ken Buck now.” If Democrats can make the charge stick—and Republicans are making that all too easy—the Democrats win.

Unfortunately, rather than focus on individual rights, distracted Republicans allow the left to get away with various absurd lies about the mandate. One lie is that birth control paid through insurance is “free.” It is certainly not free for those forced to pay higher insurance premiums.

Another lie is that declining to force people who don’t use birth control to pay for others to use it somehow limits “access to birth control.” We think red wine is good for our hearts, but that doesn’t mean we should be able to force others to stock our wine cellars or that our “access” to red wine is limited if they don’t. There is a huge difference between having the freedom to buy something and having the “freedom” to help yourself to somebody else’s cash.

Yet another creative lie is that not forcing religious institutions to provide birth control would somehow impose “theocracy.” Every person, including those who join religious groups, properly has the freedom to voluntarily enter into contracts. Theocracy means imposing religious doctrines by force of law; the birth-control mandate imposes the comparable injustice of forcibly interfering with religious groups. (Of course, much of the controversy regarding religious groups arises from the phenomenon of employer-paid insurance, a relic of inane tax policies. But that is a separate discussion.)

The unfortunate fact is that neither the left nor the right defends the rights of individuals to control their own resources and bodies and contract by mutual consent. Where is the political leader who will take a pro-choice, pro-individual rights stand across the board?

Linn Armstrong is a local political activist and firearms instructor with the Grand Valley Training Club. His son, Ari blogs at AriArmstrong.com in the Denver area.

This entry is filed under Abortion, Sex, and Reproduction, Grand Junction Free Press.

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