Michael Jarrell

Sunni: How do you think things are going to shake out in November? I don't imagine all the recent libertarian in-fighting is going to help the cause of liberty ...

Michael: Come November it will just be more of the same, regardless of who gains control. I just don't see any hope of libertarian candidates getting elected anytime soon and we can't afford to wait another 35 years, as some libertarians are suggesting. We don't have 35 years to wait for a solution that is unlikley to come. The dominant Boot on Your Neck Party has no interest in liberating us from their grasp, as we have seen they are much more interested in enslaving us even further. Political libertarianism is failing spectacularly as it stands.

Sunni: It seems to me that a nontrivial part of that dynamic is that electoral politics overall is failing spectacularly in this country. The number of nonvoters keeps swelling, no matter how easy the politicrats make it to register and vote; no matter how many rock stars they get to shill for the process. I wish I knew of a way to capitalize on that apathy ... I think a lot of people might need just a bit of focused conversation or reading to understand that their dissatisfaction is with the fundamental process, not the current personalities or issues. Maybe I'm a little more optimistic—or naïve, take your pick—than you. I think that if increasing numbers of individuals just drop out in some way—civil disobedience as Gandhi advocated, or just quietly rejecting the state and doing things themselves, and among themselves in groups—we'd accomplish a mostly bloodless revolution. Forget trying to wield the state's tools of concentrated power, and focus on maximizing one's own sovereign power, and the problem mostly withers from neglect. [sighs] Okay, I'm dreaming too much, aren't I?

Michael: One may never dream too much, Sunni. Perhaps I and others are just pessimistic, but I don't believe the government will leave people alone who try to live free. Especially if they manage to garner widespread support and reach a critical mass. Folks who wish to be left alone to pursue their own destinies rarely are; we can look at Waco as a prime example of what happens in those circumstances. I hope it does go down the way you see it—it would be vastly more preferable to the horrors of internal warfare.