If the government passed a law tomorrow that declared that rape was now "legal" (besides for TSA agents, that is), how many of us would immediately go out to commit one? Zero libertarians would, because it is against our principle. The Zero Aggression Principle to be precise.
Authoritarian types, though, seem only to care about what is "legal"; not what is right. Torture, secret trials, gun "laws", drug "laws", militarized police, "taxation", property codes; all these things may be "legal", but they are still evil and wrong. No amount of "law" or enforcement will ever make wrong "right".
The IRS claims that the income tax is "legal" because they arrest and convict people for defying it. And get away with it. That is the silliest justification I have ever heard.
If I pass a "law" that says I can enter your house and take what I want, and then use the fact that I will shoot anyone who objects as my justification, does that make my actions legal or right? Of course not. It doesn't work when The State tries it either.
Government can't be allowed to make up its own rules out of thin air, then judge whether its rules are OK, just as I can't. An act that is wrong can not be made "not wrong" by edict.
One small step in fixing this perverted state of affairs is in completely re-thinking courts.
Judges, as long as courts are still operated by The State, should only be paid when they rule against the government- if the abuses of the past couple hundred years are to be reversed. You cannot have the "impartial judge" working for only one side as they are now. This is a serious conflict of interest, and is generally understood to be completely wrong.
The only times the government's courts rule against the government and its wrong acts are when they are making a show of being "fair", not when they could actually make a difference. It's a case of "lose a small one that makes no real difference, so that we can later win the ones that matter". They will never strike a crippling blow to the US police state. This must change if America is to survive and if right and wrong are to have any place in courts.
For justice to occur there needs to be a separation of court and State. And then, The State needs to be eliminated. It's the right thing to do.
(Updated from my archives- OCTOBER 20, 2006)
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Governmentalists are arduous in their pursuit of the idea that one can indeed create silk purses out of sows' ears.
ReplyDeleteSam
Government is the monopoly on "legitimate" coercion. That monopoly is expressed through the ability to simply declare that anything they want is "legitimate".
ReplyDeleteThat's why murder is "legal" if it's an agent of the state that does it, and it's done in such a way that it isn't a complete embarrassment to their handlers.
Just because a thing is legal does not make it lawful.
ReplyDeleteSam
But it can make it awful.
ReplyDelete