Always Loved PJ O'Rourke, as a 19 year old he autographed my book 'To Emer who was allowed to read my books far too young' 😊 While I'm no longer young, he's still brilliant
"Humor is the denial of metaphysical importance to that which you laugh at. The classic example: you see a very snooty, very well dressed dowager walking down the street, and then she slips on a banana peel . . . . What’s funny about it? It’s the contrast of the woman’s pretensions to reality. She acted very grand, but reality undercut it with a plain banana peel. That’s the denial of the metaphysical validity or importance of the pretensions of that woman. Therefore, humor is a destructive element - which is quite all right, but its value and its morality depend on what it is that you are laughing at. If what you are laughing at is the evil in the world (provided that you take it seriously, but occasionally you permit yourself to laugh at it), that’s fine. [To] laugh at that which is good, at heroes, at values, and above all at yourself [is] monstrous . . . . The worst evil that you can do, psychologically, is to laugh at yourself. That means spitting in your own face." ~ Leonard Peikoff, The Philosophy of Objectivism lecture series, Lecture 11
@@DavidLee-vi8ds Isn't Piekoff a higher up in Objectivist circles? And I disagree, because the easy definitions of "that which is good" and "heroes" and "values" is often something that could USE a little ridicule. It is also not monstrous to laugh at oneself. It is good to have more humility than the average Ayn Rand hero.
PJ is our last Mark Twain and Tom Wolfe combined. He lives 14 miles from me up here in NH. I'm 58 and grew up with NatLamp in the 70s... anyone else here too? Best wishes from a NH Free State Porcupine
The interviewer did a great job. PJ has so much more depth than when he wrote his best book “Holidays in Hell”, but living in the D.C. area has turned into a “Deplorable want-a-be”. I think I’ll have to read his book about Baby-boomers.
Loved Holidays In Hell. It was an indictment of the human race, top to bottom. But then, Parliament of Whores was such a brutal take down of our government...gave that one to my kids for a civics lesson.
It is NOT the responsibility of Boomers to 'push that cash back down'. Boomers were taxed at 15.2% of their income for Social Security. In addition they paid income tax and Medicare tax. IF they had been allowed to save for themselves maybe they would be able to forego some benefits. Maybe PJ is wealthy enough to quitclaim his benefits but the vast majority of his cohort are not.
I've seen a lot in my 66 years, PJ has seen many times as much in his 73. My memories make it hard to stay sane sometimes. I don't know how he stands it.
Gillespie at 19:30: "What...um, so Trump...How much is he grating on you?" Shorter Nick: 'I think Politician X is a sh!thead. PJ, are you surprised by how much of a sh!thead Politician X is?' Seriously, that's the kind of facile questioning we expect from mainstream media. When did Reason TV start trying to become just like mainstream media?" (See, I can do it, too)
I completed my masters in 2012. That information somehow got into my browser. Suddenly, I was inundated with ads for online masters courses. As if I wanted to do another one!
One time, I had the thought, "Maybe, if we're constantly on the verge of chaos, it's a sign we're alive, and not yet enslaved." Oh yeah, that time was right now.
Are you kidding? I have fresh food, coffee, electric bikes, shoes, shirts, earplugs, cell phones, dog bones, tennis gear, car electrical parts, engine oil, beds, makeup delivered to my house. Being "Prime" members, its all delivered free and we get free streaming music and original TV series streamed. There is nothing on there that I have not been able to find (except a car and a motorcycle) . I rarely shop elsewhere and thereby save hundreds of precious hours each year. Time is money/freedom/choice... not to mention the avoidance of crowds, parking, stress involved in shopping among the sweaty mass.
They have no serious selection of musical instruments, and food is comically overpriced. They sell TVs, but do not have enough selection for people who seriously research them before buying them. Any Macy's has much better makeup offerings. The "free" shipping for Prime members is a ruse, at least for books. The price of books is dramatically higher from Amazon than from third party sellers, who are able to sell books at much lower rates, including the $3.99 standard shipping fee. You're actually paying for fast shipping twice - once in your "membership" fee and once again at checkout! Clothes and shoe shopping online is a matter of preference - it's easier to me to just drive somewhere and try stuff on rather than ship things to and from my house, for others it's the opposite. Amazon is good with popular or standardized brand electronics, like cables or Bose headphones. They're not bad for a lot of other things, too, but I've found that the moment you want something more than just the "whatever brand" that they carry, you often need to go elsewhere.
*_While liberty is never utopian, it is always melioristic._* ~ Me, I say this *_Liberty is always dangerous, but it is the safest thing we have._* ~ Harry Emerson Fosdick *_Liberty is the only thing you cannot have unless you are willing to give it to others._* ~ William Allen White *_The love of liberty is the love of others; the love of power is the love of ourselves._* ~ William Hazlitt *_Liberty is always unfinished business._* ~ American Civil Liberties Union *_Liberty is to the collective body, what health is to every individual body. Without health no pleasure can be tasted by man; without liberty, no happiness can be enjoyed by society._* ~ Thomas Jefferson *_Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law,' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual._* ~ Thomas Jefferson *_The boisterous sea of liberty is never without a wave._* ~ Thomas Jefferson *_Where liberty is, there is my country._* ~ Benjamin Franklin *_Liberty is one of the choicest gifts that heaven hath bestowed upon man, and exceeds in value all the treasures which the earth contains within its bosom, or the sea covers. Liberty, as well as honor, man ought to preserve at the hazard of his life, for without it life is insupportable._* ~ Cervantes *_It is important to remember, as has well been said, 'the essential characteristic of true liberty is that under its shelter many different types of life and character and opinion and belief can develop unmolested and unobstructed.'_* ~ Charles Evans Hughes *_Liberty is not merely a privilege to be conferred; it is a habit to be acquired._* ~ David Lloyd George *_The true character of liberty is independence, maintained by force._* ~ Voltaire *_The inescapable price of liberty is an ability to preserve it from destruction._* ~ Douglas MacArthur *_Liberty is not a right but a duty._* ~ Ezra Pound *_Liberty is meaningless where the right to utter one's thoughts and opinions has ceased to exist. That, of all rights, is the dread of tyrants. It is the right which they first of all strike down._* ~ Frederick Douglass *_The saddest epitaph which can be carved in memory of a vanished liberty is that it was lost because its possessors failed to stretch forth a saving hand while yet there was time._* ~ George Sutherland *_The true test of liberty is the right to test it, the right to question it, the right to speak to my neighbors, to grab them by the shoulders and look into their eyes and ask, 'Are we free?' I have thought that if we are free, the answer cannot hurt us. And if we are not free, must we not hear the answer?_* ~ Gerry Spence *_The fact is that the average man's love of liberty is nine-tenths imaginary, exactly like his love of sense, justice and truth._* ~ H.L. Mencken *_[The average man] is not actually happy when free; he is uncomfortable, a bit alarmed, and intolerably lonely. Liberty is not a thing for the great masses of men. It is the exclusive possession of a small and disreputable minority, like knowledge, courage and honor. It takes a special sort of man to understand and enjoy liberty,... and he is usually an outlaw in democratic societies._* ~ H.L. Mencken *_I believe that liberty is the only genuinely valuable thing that men have invented, at least in the field of government, in a thousand years. I believe that it is better to be free than to be not free, even when the former is dangerous and the latter safe. I believe that the finest qualities of man can flourish only in free air ~ that progress made under the shadow of the policeman's club is false progress, and of no permanent value. I believe that any man who takes the liberty of another into his keeping is bound to become a tyrant, and that any man who yields up his liberty, in however slight the measure, is bound to become a slave._* ~ H.L. Mencken *_One of the qualities of liberty is that, as long as it is being striven after, it goes on expanding. Therefore, the man who stands in the midst of the struggle and says, 'I have it,' merely shows by doing so that he has just lost it._* ~ Henrik Ibsen *_Liberty is to the collective body what health is to every individual body. Without health no pleasure can be tasted by man; without liberty, no happiness can be enjoyed by society._* ~ Henry St. John *_Liberty is the soul's right to breathe and, when it cannot take a long breath, laws are girdled too tight._* ~ Henry Ward Beecher *_Liberty is the possibility of doubting, the possibility of making a mistake, the possibility of searching and experimenting, the possibility of saying “No” to any authority -- literary, artistic, philosophic, religious, social and even political._* ~ Ignazio Silone *_The first step in saving our liberty is to realize how much we have already lost, how we lost it, and how we will continue to lose it unless fundamental political changes occur._* ~ James Bovard *_A day, an hour, of virtuous liberty Is worth a whole eternity in bondage._* ~ Joseph Addison *_Liberty is the solution of all social and economic questions._* ~ Joseph Labadie *_Life without liberty is like a body without spirit._* ~ Kahlil Gibran *_Liberty is not a cruise ship full of pampered passengers. Liberty is a man-of-war, and we are all crew._* ~ Kenneth W. Royce *_Political liberty is nothing else but the diffusion of power._* ~ Lord Hailsham *_Liberty is rendered even more precious by the recollection of servitude._* ~ Marcus Tullius Cicero *_Americans have the mistaken viewpoint that Lady Liberty is only a peacetime luxury who is ill-equipped to fight the nasties. Therefore, they reason, we need an equally nasty Big Brother. Americans have forgotten that Lady Liberty is one ferocious mother when protecting her children._* ~ Mary Ruwart *_Liberty is one of the most precious gifts which heaven has bestowed on man; with it we cannot compare the treasures which the earth contains or the sea conceals; for liberty, as for honor, we can and ought to risk our lives; and, on for the other hand, captivity is the greatest evil that can befall man._* ~ Miguel de Cervantes *_Liberty is a slow fruit._* ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson *_What light is to the eyes - what air is to the lungs - what love is to the heart, liberty is to the soul of man._* ~ Robert G. Ingersoll *_Where men cannot freely convey their thoughts to one another, no other liberty is secure._* ~ William E. Hocking *_The spirit of liberty is not merely, as multitudes imagine, a jealousy of our own particular rights, but a respect for the rights of others, and an unwillingness that any man, whether high or low, should be wronged and trampled under foot._* ~ William Ellery Channing *_It is true that liberty is precious; so precious that it must be carefully rationed._* ~ Vladimir Ilich Lenin
Google is a monopoly because they made such a vastly superior search engine. The search you use doesn't affect the search engine I use, that's not the same as social media. I actually use Bing now because the search and presentation are better now IMO. I also use duckduckgo on occasion to support an underdog. The solution to these monopolies is being developed in Blockchain. Blockchain is as big an innovation ad the internet or the transistor and it will have just as big of an effect. No ONE person will be in control. It's a network of networks that fixes the digital double spending problem and allows strangers to "trust" each other in online transactions (not just monetary transactions)
Let's say we don't know, Mr O'Rourke. Yes great terrors were wrought in the last century but a century is an abstract concept and we're yet only eighteen short years into a new abstract concept call the twenty first. I feel we have yet time to create unknown horrors to mark the decades to come. After all take a good damn long look at the time line our prior generations lived through. Consider the change in that short ten decade span. We've yet time to make another mess and I don't think a feeling of enlightenment will hold out if hindsight shows otherwise.
I don't think you can argue that amazon, google and facebook operate on the level. The extent to how convenient it is to use some of these platforms limits other platforms from growing. Yeah sure it doesn't seem that way when one service supplants another in the same industry but I think given the size of the industries we're talking about now the only thing that compete is a larger already established company in the space taking another's users. And then there's your monopoly.
Facebook is an entertainment platform designed to deliver advertising. If you don't like some aspect of trade, that is what you discuss and negotiate, not add tariffs that harm consumers and producers at the expense of a special interest. Growth over profits is the natural progression for winner-take-all competitive capitalism. It's a shame because it does seem to reduce actual competition, actual progress in ideas, and building entrepreneurial businesses versus only those that have the pedigree/cronyism to receive funding from the already wealthy. An encrypted channel solves nothing (per his snapchat bit) because in the end, communications must be in the clear for the sender and recipient, and so either party can make copies and subsequently release it to others.
how would pj go about "free trade"? talk about not knowing what you're talking about. pj offers no solution or plan but criticizes the one guy who is effecting actual change in trade.
Human nature and free for all system is a sure fire way to hell. Society only can only exist on the basis of cooperation, empathy and compassion for all its members. Government is (should be) the embodiment of such self sustaining and enlightened endeavor and not be allowed to stray from the progressive path of evolving civilization in a finely tuned efficient manner towards the future.
Do you mean; "being" or do you mean, "is". Nuance is the mother of miscommunication and is essential in the debate to find common ground, that intelligent discussion, to find solid unity and solidarity on core issues facing all humanity, as well as, the local and community level. I have been refining my grammar and thanx to spell check, progressing, so has my communication skills. I hope. ShakeUp
Please clarify. I am into the refining and moving on phase. I am feeling, "what is, and what should never be" but divergence of logic on your statement, Liberty, equality, benchmark of on the shelf, for human consumption, carrot so to speak, is just the beginning for an immature, evolving Species that has a serious Melatonin and egocentric mish mash of thought and control.
Man, I've never been a fan of O'Rourke and now I know why; he fails to correctly identify problems and when he does manage to identify something close to the real problem he presents no solutions.
Every time I hear the word Statist or Statism I throw up a little in the back of my throat. Stttoooppp. You're never going to sell the notion on getting rid government entirely because that would also mean no borders and no border patrol and other ideas that people aren't going to let go of.
I love how the first person to jump in defense of government is beobachter, one of the more disgusting and immoral people to regularly grace the reason TV commentariat. You're in good company, Darrin. Hah! By the way, I know you love borders (doubtless because of cultural and economic insecurities, i.e. emotional reasons), but border control is yet another example of how government is incompetent, inept, and fundamentally incapable of improving virtually anything. Not exactly a rousing success story. This doesn't bother _me_ much insofar as I don't care about borders or government, but it amuses me the way these pseudo-libertarians invariably jump to border control as their first example of the necessity of government - an objective that no government anywhere ever has managed to carry out successfully. Did you know that in the UK (an island nation, for God's sake), people are successfully and routinely smuggling drugs and guns across the border in _inflatable rafts?_ Meanwhile in the US, the cartels have long switched to using diesel submarines (complete with radar and radar jamming), meanwhile all these ignorant fools are still pretending that a border wall could have any relevence to drug interdiction. LOL! It's a good thing borders really aren't that important, because if they were it's pretty much inarguable that civilization would have collapsed long, long ago.
@@marshaul What civilized modern society has thrived let alone survived without a national government? There's a reason why tribes evolved into city states and then into nation states.
@Beobachter anarchism is not the absence of laws. Even by strict etymological deconstruction, it simply means the absence of _rulers._ The best way I like to clarify this distinction is that anarchism is, strictly understood, nothing more than the _absence of legislative monopoly._ With this understanding you can see that a common law, which is very democratic in a fundamental sense, is not incompatible with anarchism. I might further add that under voluntaryist philosophy, anarcho-communism is every bit as acceptable as anarcho-capitalism, assuming both are voluntary. Anarchism is, by definition, lacking any coercive entity to declare what is the "true" form of anarchism, and your rigid differentiation of the two types is nothing more than tribalist nonsense.
@@darrininmesa9750 As presented, the formulation of your question is rhetorically invalid. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, so to speak. Try again without elementary fallacies and I'll be willing to engage. By the way, strictly speaking, what you committed is called the _argument from ignorance._ It's an elementary fallacy, and if you think that passes for an argument, then I can't help you.
he says the number of people living on 1 dollar a day has been cut by half, thats progress. does he realize tha on dollar is not what it used to be? he lost me there.
Always Loved PJ O'Rourke, as a 19 year old he autographed my book 'To Emer who was allowed to read my books far too young' 😊 While I'm no longer young, he's still brilliant
I liked him when he wrote for NatLamp. HIlarious. Him, Doug Kinney and Henry Beard, that was quite a crew they had for a while.
My favorite O'Rourke-ism-"Giving money and power to politicians is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys."
I had them print that quote on my yearbook page my senior year in high school.
federalist46 or #MeToo to a leftist feminist.
"When the legislature controls what is bought and sold the first thing bought and sold is the legislature"
24:25 "If it moves - regulate it. If it profits - tax it" (the government mantra). Brilliant.
Time for your reminder that socialism always ends in starvation and genocide.
Beobachter: Get lost, you Kraut Commie. If not for the USA, you'd either be in a gulag or goose stepping your way to the Gobi Desert.
If you wasted resources, prices would be higher. It does the exact opposite, but you know that.
Beobachter
If resources were wasted then they’d be scarce and prices would rise, not fall and be relatively cheap. Try again.
Beobachter
Ever notice how how readily available (non wasted) items are cheap (eggs, milk, etc.)...
democide
His entire career was worth it for the quote 'Earnestness is just stupidity sent to college'.
Some people just want to watch the world burn
alfred
It's not so bad. Look on the bright side, we can roast some marshmallows.
He should go on Rogan it would be great to see this interview in long form
why is the first picture of O'Rourke terrifying
"Humor is the denial of metaphysical importance to that which you laugh at. The classic example: you see a very snooty, very well dressed dowager walking down the street, and then she slips on a banana peel . . . . What’s funny about it? It’s the contrast of the woman’s pretensions to reality. She acted very grand, but reality undercut it with a plain banana peel. That’s the denial of the metaphysical validity or importance of the pretensions of that woman. Therefore, humor is a destructive element - which is quite all right, but its value and its morality depend on what it is that you are laughing at. If what you are laughing at is the evil in the world (provided that you take it seriously, but occasionally you permit yourself to laugh at it), that’s fine. [To] laugh at that which is good, at heroes, at values, and above all at yourself [is] monstrous . . . . The worst evil that you can do, psychologically, is to laugh at yourself. That means spitting in your own face." ~ Leonard Peikoff, The Philosophy of Objectivism lecture series, Lecture 11
@@DavidLee-vi8ds Isn't Piekoff a higher up in Objectivist circles? And I disagree, because the easy definitions of "that which is good" and "heroes" and "values" is often something that could USE a little ridicule.
It is also not monstrous to laugh at oneself. It is good to have more humility than the average Ayn Rand hero.
PJ is our last Mark Twain and Tom Wolfe combined. He lives 14 miles from me up here in NH. I'm 58 and grew up with NatLamp in the 70s... anyone else here too? Best wishes from a NH Free State Porcupine
No, but I was a college kid in the 70's and bought National Lampoon too. I have P.J.'s new book - it's on my Amazon Kindle.
Great interview and really enjoyed hearing PJ's thoughts and experience. Thank you!
Always excited when a new conversation with or speech by P.J. pops up in my subs.
The interviewer did a great job. PJ has so much more depth than when he wrote his best book “Holidays in Hell”, but living in the D.C. area has turned into a “Deplorable want-a-be”. I think I’ll have to read his book about Baby-boomers.
Loved Holidays In Hell. It was an indictment of the human race, top to bottom.
But then, Parliament of Whores was such a brutal take down of our government...gave that one to my kids for a civics lesson.
smell the alcohol thru my monitor. lighten up on the liquid breakfast, pj
Not your call. Go to war torn countries first then see how u live
It is NOT the responsibility of Boomers to 'push that cash back down'. Boomers were taxed at 15.2% of their income for Social Security. In addition they paid income tax and Medicare tax.
IF they had been allowed to save for themselves maybe they would be able to forego some benefits.
Maybe PJ is wealthy enough to quitclaim his benefits but the vast majority of his cohort are not.
Excellent.
I've seen a lot in my 66 years, PJ has seen many times as much in his 73. My memories make it hard to stay sane sometimes. I don't know how he stands it.
I don't worry about my own sanity I worry about other's and when I will become helpless before them. My memories help me to get through the day.
Alcohol
Great talk, and reat insights from PJ.
Gillespie at 19:30: "What...um, so Trump...How much is he grating on you?"
Shorter Nick: 'I think Politician X is a sh!thead. PJ, are you surprised by how much of a sh!thead Politician X is?'
Seriously, that's the kind of facile questioning we expect from mainstream media. When did Reason TV start trying to become just like mainstream media?" (See, I can do it, too)
PJ shows his age. He has a vague grasp of the concepts. The good part: he does not want the government to regulate things out.
Game theory ages as swiftly as the climate.
Love PJO
I completed my masters in 2012. That information somehow got into my browser. Suddenly, I was inundated with ads for online masters courses. As if I wanted to do another one!
One time I heard the thought:
Maybe, if were constantly on the verge of chaos, we deserve it
One time, I had the thought, "Maybe, if we're constantly on the verge of chaos, it's a sign we're alive, and not yet enslaved."
Oh yeah, that time was right now.
Amazon seems like they sell everything based on their home page, but once you venture past books, their offerings are actually pretty sparse.
Are you kidding? I have fresh food, coffee, electric bikes, shoes, shirts, earplugs, cell phones, dog bones, tennis gear, car electrical parts, engine oil, beds, makeup delivered to my house. Being "Prime" members, its all delivered free and we get free streaming music and original TV series streamed. There is nothing on there that I have not been able to find (except a car and a motorcycle) . I rarely shop elsewhere and thereby save hundreds of precious hours each year. Time is money/freedom/choice... not to mention the avoidance of crowds, parking, stress involved in shopping among the sweaty mass.
Variety is weak.
They have no serious selection of musical instruments, and food is comically overpriced. They sell TVs, but do not have enough selection for people who seriously research them before buying them. Any Macy's has much better makeup offerings. The "free" shipping for Prime members is a ruse, at least for books. The price of books is dramatically higher from Amazon than from third party sellers, who are able to sell books at much lower rates, including the $3.99 standard shipping fee. You're actually paying for fast shipping twice - once in your "membership" fee and once again at checkout!
Clothes and shoe shopping online is a matter of preference - it's easier to me to just drive somewhere and try stuff on rather than ship things to and from my house, for others it's the opposite.
Amazon is good with popular or standardized brand electronics, like cables or Bose headphones. They're not bad for a lot of other things, too, but I've found that the moment you want something more than just the "whatever brand" that they carry, you often need to go elsewhere.
I never thought PJ would outlive his relevance
He ceased being relevant over a several decades ago. Nothing novel or interesting to say.
@@stopper90004 What are you saying?
*_While liberty is never utopian, it is always melioristic._*
~ Me, I say this
*_Liberty is always dangerous, but it is the safest thing we have._*
~ Harry Emerson Fosdick
*_Liberty is the only thing you cannot have unless you are willing to give it to others._*
~ William Allen White
*_The love of liberty is the love of others; the love of power is the love of ourselves._*
~ William Hazlitt
*_Liberty is always unfinished business._*
~ American Civil Liberties Union
*_Liberty is to the collective body, what health is to every individual body. Without health no pleasure can be tasted by man; without liberty, no happiness can be enjoyed by society._*
~ Thomas Jefferson
*_Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law,' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual._*
~ Thomas Jefferson
*_The boisterous sea of liberty is never without a wave._*
~ Thomas Jefferson
*_Where liberty is, there is my country._*
~ Benjamin Franklin
*_Liberty is one of the choicest gifts that heaven hath bestowed upon man, and exceeds in value all the treasures which the earth contains within its bosom, or the sea covers. Liberty, as well as honor, man ought to preserve at the hazard of his life, for without it life is insupportable._*
~ Cervantes
*_It is important to remember, as has well been said, 'the essential characteristic of true liberty is that under its shelter many different types of life and character and opinion and belief can develop unmolested and unobstructed.'_*
~ Charles Evans Hughes
*_Liberty is not merely a privilege to be conferred; it is a habit to be acquired._*
~ David Lloyd George
*_The true character of liberty is independence, maintained by force._*
~ Voltaire
*_The inescapable price of liberty is an ability to preserve it from destruction._*
~ Douglas MacArthur
*_Liberty is not a right but a duty._*
~ Ezra Pound
*_Liberty is meaningless where the right to utter one's thoughts and opinions has ceased to exist. That, of all rights, is the dread of tyrants. It is the right which they first of all strike down._*
~ Frederick Douglass
*_The saddest epitaph which can be carved in memory of a vanished liberty is that it was lost because its possessors failed to stretch forth a saving hand while yet there was time._*
~ George Sutherland
*_The true test of liberty is the right to test it, the right to question it, the right to speak to my neighbors, to grab them by the shoulders and look into their eyes and ask, 'Are we free?' I have thought that if we are free, the answer cannot hurt us. And if we are not free, must we not hear the answer?_*
~ Gerry Spence
*_The fact is that the average man's love of liberty is nine-tenths imaginary, exactly like his love of sense, justice and truth._*
~ H.L. Mencken
*_[The average man] is not actually happy when free; he is uncomfortable, a bit alarmed, and intolerably lonely. Liberty is not a thing for the great masses of men. It is the exclusive possession of a small and disreputable minority, like knowledge, courage and honor. It takes a special sort of man to understand and enjoy liberty,... and he is usually an outlaw in democratic societies._*
~ H.L. Mencken
*_I believe that liberty is the only genuinely valuable thing that men have invented, at least in the field of government, in a thousand years. I believe that it is better to be free than to be not free, even when the former is dangerous and the latter safe. I believe that the finest qualities of man can flourish only in free air ~ that progress made under the shadow of the policeman's club is false progress, and of no permanent value. I believe that any man who takes the liberty of another into his keeping is bound to become a tyrant, and that any man who yields up his liberty, in however slight the measure, is bound to become a slave._*
~ H.L. Mencken
*_One of the qualities of liberty is that, as long as it is being striven after, it goes on expanding. Therefore, the man who stands in the midst of the struggle and says, 'I have it,' merely shows by doing so that he has just lost it._*
~ Henrik Ibsen
*_Liberty is to the collective body what health is to every individual body. Without health no pleasure can be tasted by man; without liberty, no happiness can be enjoyed by society._*
~ Henry St. John
*_Liberty is the soul's right to breathe and, when it cannot take a long breath, laws are girdled too tight._*
~ Henry Ward Beecher
*_Liberty is the possibility of doubting, the possibility of making a mistake, the possibility of searching and experimenting, the possibility of saying “No” to any authority -- literary, artistic, philosophic, religious, social and even political._*
~ Ignazio Silone
*_The first step in saving our liberty is to realize how much we have already lost, how we lost it, and how we will continue to lose it unless fundamental political changes occur._*
~ James Bovard
*_A day, an hour, of virtuous liberty Is worth a whole eternity in bondage._*
~ Joseph Addison
*_Liberty is the solution of all social and economic questions._*
~ Joseph Labadie
*_Life without liberty is like a body without spirit._*
~ Kahlil Gibran
*_Liberty is not a cruise ship full of pampered passengers. Liberty is a man-of-war, and we are all crew._*
~ Kenneth W. Royce
*_Political liberty is nothing else but the diffusion of power._*
~ Lord Hailsham
*_Liberty is rendered even more precious by the recollection of servitude._*
~ Marcus Tullius Cicero
*_Americans have the mistaken viewpoint that Lady Liberty is only a peacetime luxury who is ill-equipped to fight the nasties. Therefore, they reason, we need an equally nasty Big Brother. Americans have forgotten that Lady Liberty is one ferocious mother when protecting her children._*
~ Mary Ruwart
*_Liberty is one of the most precious gifts which heaven has bestowed on man; with it we cannot compare the treasures which the earth contains or the sea conceals; for liberty, as for honor, we can and ought to risk our lives; and, on for the other hand, captivity is the greatest evil that can befall man._*
~ Miguel de Cervantes
*_Liberty is a slow fruit._*
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
*_What light is to the eyes - what air is to the lungs - what love is to the heart, liberty is to the soul of man._*
~ Robert G. Ingersoll
*_Where men cannot freely convey their thoughts to one another, no other liberty is secure._*
~ William E. Hocking
*_The spirit of liberty is not merely, as multitudes imagine, a jealousy of our own particular rights, but a respect for the rights of others, and an unwillingness that any man, whether high or low, should be wronged and trampled under foot._*
~ William Ellery Channing
*_It is true that liberty is precious; so precious that it must be carefully rationed._*
~ Vladimir Ilich Lenin
His analysis of Trump is petty and peevish. Never Trumpers have huge egos and it shows.
Everyone with a brain hates you.
Google is a monopoly because they made such a vastly superior search engine. The search you use doesn't affect the search engine I use, that's not the same as social media.
I actually use Bing now because the search and presentation are better now IMO.
I also use duckduckgo on occasion to support an underdog.
The solution to these monopolies is being developed in Blockchain. Blockchain is as big an innovation ad the internet or the transistor and it will have just as big of an effect. No ONE person will be in control. It's a network of networks that fixes the digital double spending problem and allows strangers to "trust" each other in online transactions (not just monetary transactions)
Nice
Let's say we don't know, Mr O'Rourke. Yes great terrors were wrought in the last century but a century is an abstract concept and we're yet only eighteen short years into a new abstract concept call the twenty first. I feel we have yet time to create unknown horrors to mark the decades to come. After all take a good damn long look at the time line our prior generations lived through. Consider the change in that short ten decade span. We've yet time to make another mess and I don't think a feeling of enlightenment will hold out if hindsight shows otherwise.
I don't think you can argue that amazon, google and facebook operate on the level. The extent to how convenient it is to use some of these platforms limits other platforms from growing. Yeah sure it doesn't seem that way when one service supplants another in the same industry but I think given the size of the industries we're talking about now the only thing that compete is a larger already established company in the space taking another's users. And then there's your monopoly.
I don’t think CZcams makes a profit. I read that Google subsidizes it.
Frau Katze #KILLGOOGLEBAMN
What is the difference between Sati and nuclear fusion?
Facebook is an entertainment platform designed to deliver advertising.
If you don't like some aspect of trade, that is what you discuss and negotiate, not add tariffs that harm consumers and producers at the expense of a special interest.
Growth over profits is the natural progression for winner-take-all competitive capitalism. It's a shame because it does seem to reduce actual competition, actual progress in ideas, and building entrepreneurial businesses versus only those that have the pedigree/cronyism to receive funding from the already wealthy.
An encrypted channel solves nothing (per his snapchat bit) because in the end, communications must be in the clear for the sender and recipient, and so either party can make copies and subsequently release it to others.
how would pj go about "free trade"? talk about not knowing what you're talking about. pj offers no solution or plan but criticizes the one guy who is effecting actual change in trade.
Human nature and free for all system is a sure fire way to hell. Society only can only exist on the basis of cooperation, empathy and compassion for all its members. Government is (should be) the embodiment of such self sustaining and enlightened endeavor and not be allowed to stray from the progressive path of evolving civilization in a finely tuned efficient manner towards the future.
Liberty and equal protection under the law preclude any "free for all" and being subject to nature.
Do you mean; "being" or do you mean, "is". Nuance is the mother of miscommunication and is essential in the debate to find common ground, that intelligent discussion, to find solid unity and solidarity on core issues facing all humanity, as well as, the local and community level. I have been refining my grammar and thanx to spell check, progressing, so has my communication skills. I hope. ShakeUp
Please clarify. I am into the refining and moving on phase. I am feeling, "what is, and what should never be" but divergence of logic on your statement, Liberty, equality, benchmark of on the shelf, for human consumption, carrot so to speak, is just the beginning for an immature, evolving Species that has a serious Melatonin and egocentric mish mash of thought and control.
13:40 the product of facebook is the us.
Man, I've never been a fan of O'Rourke and now I know why; he fails to correctly identify problems and when he does manage to identify something close to the real problem he presents no solutions.
I'm guessing Trump understands more about trade than PJ gives him credit for.
You guessed wrong.
Every time I hear the word Statist or Statism I throw up a little in the back of my throat. Stttoooppp.
You're never going to sell the notion on getting rid government entirely because that would also mean no borders and no border patrol and other ideas that people aren't going to let go of.
Sorry to hear you feel that way.
Consider taking a look at this video:
czcams.com/video/r3qRm3sXVRU/video.html
I love how the first person to jump in defense of government is beobachter, one of the more disgusting and immoral people to regularly grace the reason TV commentariat. You're in good company, Darrin. Hah!
By the way, I know you love borders (doubtless because of cultural and economic insecurities, i.e. emotional reasons), but border control is yet another example of how government is incompetent, inept, and fundamentally incapable of improving virtually anything.
Not exactly a rousing success story.
This doesn't bother _me_ much insofar as I don't care about borders or government, but it amuses me the way these pseudo-libertarians invariably jump to border control as their first example of the necessity of government - an objective that no government anywhere ever has managed to carry out successfully. Did you know that in the UK (an island nation, for God's sake), people are successfully and routinely smuggling drugs and guns across the border in _inflatable rafts?_ Meanwhile in the US, the cartels have long switched to using diesel submarines (complete with radar and radar jamming), meanwhile all these ignorant fools are still pretending that a border wall could have any relevence to drug interdiction. LOL!
It's a good thing borders really aren't that important, because if they were it's pretty much inarguable that civilization would have collapsed long, long ago.
@@marshaul
What civilized modern society has thrived let alone survived without a national government?
There's a reason why tribes evolved into city states and then into nation states.
@Beobachter anarchism is not the absence of laws. Even by strict etymological deconstruction, it simply means the absence of _rulers._ The best way I like to clarify this distinction is that anarchism is, strictly understood, nothing more than the _absence of legislative monopoly._ With this understanding you can see that a common law, which is very democratic in a fundamental sense, is not incompatible with anarchism.
I might further add that under voluntaryist philosophy, anarcho-communism is every bit as acceptable as anarcho-capitalism, assuming both are voluntary. Anarchism is, by definition, lacking any coercive entity to declare what is the "true" form of anarchism, and your rigid differentiation of the two types is nothing more than tribalist nonsense.
@@darrininmesa9750 As presented, the formulation of your question is rhetorically invalid. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, so to speak. Try again without elementary fallacies and I'll be willing to engage.
By the way, strictly speaking, what you committed is called the _argument from ignorance._ It's an elementary fallacy, and if you think that passes for an argument, then I can't help you.
he says the number of people living on 1 dollar a day has been cut by half, thats progress. does he realize tha on dollar is not what it used to be? he lost me there.
Jorge Gomez fridge cost a lot more in the 70s so did a television
So boring!!