Dear “Libertarians”,

I notice a lot of you like to say that brown people in third world countries accept low-wage, hard-labor jobs because that’s better than the alternative (namely: subsistence farming). You argue that this is how the invisible hand of the “free market” works.

No, it’s fucking not.

The only reason they are condemned to these choices is because they had the misfortune of being born in some banana republic, some petty dictatorship, or some ass-backward third-world country. Viz., some place you ‘libertarians’ would never — ever — want to find yourselves; you would kick, punch, claw, gouge and shoot your way out. You would climb mountains, cross deserts, or navigate shark-infested oceans in order to find something better.

But when I bring up immigration, I’m not talking about you. I’m talking about them. You’re worried that if people emigrate, you might not pull down $18/hour plus benefits to be a high school custodian — as if being compelled by the forces of supply and demand to accept a $13/hour gig instead is a degradation even remotely similar to being locked in some craphole third-world country making $100 shoes for 8 cents a day.

You’re saying, “I’m all for the free market as long as I get to play by a different set of rules [than immigrants and residents of LDCs]“. But that’s not how a “free market” works.

You do not get to exempt yourself from the workings of the free market and still call it a “free market”. The same forces which might compel a migrant worker to pick cherries in Traverse City, or to work ‘illegally’ doing midnight shifts at the gas station, may also compel you to sacrifice that vacation home, or the third flat-screen TV, or the brand-new car for your daughter’s sweet sixteen, or your microbrews, or your Marlboros or your expensive tennis shoes and video games — so that those oppressed and disenfrachised can feed their fucking families.

Take a good, long, hard look in the mirror. You are not an advocate of the ‘invisible hand’.
You are an apologist for the ‘invisible fist’, punching all of humanity in the throat, forever.

Sincerely,

David Zemens

Possibly related posts:

1. An Open Letter to Mark Brewer
2. Fake Anarchists Oppose Immigration

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At one point, someone else must’ve asked him how he can possibly sleep at night. The guy says he turns off “cop mode” when he goes home, and sleeps soundly every night. Apparently, he thinks “cop mode” is a lightswitch. Turn it on or turn it off, at will.

Thing is, his words indicated otherwise—that he was completely incapable of flipping that switch to the “off” position. You know, like, everyone who’s ever smoked pot is a “thug” or a “worthless hippy” and they’re ruining ‘Merica and they all deserve to go to jail and when he goes to work tonight he’s just itching to bust someone for “possession of marijuana”. That’s how irate, how flat-out vindictive he gets when people challenge the legitimacy of a law—he wants to bust some kid merely because some other people on the internet disagree with him.

Too bad his “dickhead mode” didn’t come with an on/off switch. But I digress.

This lightswitch mentality is a huge part of the problem. It’s compartementalization, it’s what sociopaths do. It is what leads people down the path of “I was just following orders,” or “I was just doing my job,” or “I don’t make the rules, I just enforce them,” and so on.

The idea that you become something other than a belligerent with a gun and a club the moment you punch out at shift’s-end is how people rationalize, how they convince themselves that what they’re doing isn’t wrong at all. When they leave work, they’re just a “regular guy” like you and me; they have families and feelings and they like baseball and apple pie.

No, you’re fucking not a “regular guy”. A “regular guy” isn’t vindictive and belligerent. A “regular guy” doesn’t make thinly-veiled threats on internet forums (he actually said he was going to report the thread to local law enforcement—as if talking about legalization is a crime!). A “regular guy” doesn’t get a hard-on every time someone says that just maybe the war on drugs is a stupid idea and just maybe responsible adults should be allowed to be responsible on their own time.  A “regular guy” doesn’t think it’s OK for people to be shot to death for smoking a joint.

No. You’re pretty fucking far from “regular”.

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I want some water.

I can’t put water in my mug, because after you’ve tainted a stainless steel mug with coffee, everything tastes like coffee.

I could walk to the drinking fountain every few minutes, but that’s not terribly productive. Or I could walk to the vending machine and purchase a bottle of water. But that means I’m wasting money, and to be honest, a plastic bottle is about as recyclable as a styro-foam cup, isn’t it?

This was ushered in under an “environmentally friendly” memo. I suspect it’s really a “cost-cutting” policy.

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Begin rant

Today is a special day here at my place of employment; there is a man here, a supervisor (let’s just call him Bob), who is retiring after 42 years at the SAME JOB.  In this day in age especially with our Gen X crowd moving jobs every other year to find the mythical brass ring.  A ring filled with fame and fortune beyond all comprehension.  This is an accomplishment that most of us will never know of.  Loyalty like this used to be rewarded with such cheesy luxuries like a watch, a clock or plaque something that took thought and a little more than a memo to a secretary to make sure it got done.  It was followed by a hand shake full of meaning and praise and appreciation for a man who had dedicated his life to company.  What does he get here at the wonderful company I work for……..Pizza and Cake for lunch!

This, ladies and gentlemen, is the current state of business today.  A market with so little regard for the working men and women of our country that they don’t even take an employee’s personal life into consideration when wishing him well onto the next stage of his life.

Pizza and Cake?

Bob is a healthy guy; he eats healthy lunches, exercises regularly and is an avid outdoorsman who takes pride in his appearance and has no time for cheesy shit like Pizza and Cake.  In our grandfathers time companies knew their people and appreciated the pride they took in their job and how well they performed everyday.  The plant manager knew their kids and wife had them over for dinner and what do I hear this morning?

“Oh yeah Bob was a good guy, but you know what.  He’s replaceable”

It’s that kind of shit that should piss us all off.

He may be “replaced” but he isn’t replaceable, not by any root of the meaning replace which as we all know is: To put something new in the place of; and implies a filling of a place once occupied by something lost, destroyed or no longer usable.  Is that how management views this great man, no longer usable?  This man of 62 years gets more done in a day than 85% of the people I know.  His work ethic is unstoppable.  Even today on his last day of work for the rest of his life he is getting shit done and getting it done right. He has the care and attention to detail the likes of which hasn’t been seen since, I don’t know, Van Gogh.  Is this how you would reward Van Gogh with a shitty lunch of fatty foods and sugars for the younger slovenly generation to gorge themselves on?  I think not.

So, today, we should all raise up our glasses to Bob.   A man who is a member of a work force the likes of which we may never see again.  Not because we do not have the motivation but because of the society we live in.  A society that has no honor, no loyalty and no chivalry whatsoever.  Sure there are those of us who recognize these failings and do our best to represent our elders and be the men and woman who they are or were.  We are the ones who refuse to honor excess and greed, celebutants and the fat pigs who hang out on MTV and VH1 reality shows fighting for their 15 minutes.

Today lets honor people like Bob.  People, who work for their money; who get up everyday and make the trek to a job that gets them by and lets them live their life the way they want to, with no excuses.  Here’s to you; we should all be so lucky.

/End rant.

Pizza and cake? That’s the same thing they serve when they celebrate all the February birthdays on the first Tuesday of the month.  Pizza and fucking cake! Christ…. – dz

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I sold it so I could buy another one. If you’re curious, I’m replacing the X8 with a brand-spaking-new Ride Machete, which should be sized more appropriately for me. Shipped yesterday from Washington state, via USPS. Seller told me that they charged him $30 for shipping standard ground. Tracking number is useless via USPS. No updates at all during the 16 hours the board has been in their possession. I’ve experienced this before with USPS—there won’t be any updates until after I receive the board, which defeats the purpose of tracking updates in the first place.

/Rant

Disclaimer: All monopolies suck. But I’m currently affected by the postal monopoly and it’s pissing me off.

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And so on. You get the drift. I agree that it’s very disingenuous for millionaire celebrities to come on TV or radio and starting pimping for donations when they’re not doing a damn thing themselves (some of them are, some of them aren’t) and I’ll be the first person to take the side of complaints raised against the government doling out taxpayer money (isn’t it all taxpayer money?) for foreign aid*. Every time there is some major calamity in the world, like the tsunami in 2004 or the hurricanes in 2005 or earthquakes or whatever, Americans give in spades. And celebrity marketing, give me a freaking break.

Could we give more? Probably. In my estimation, the biggest impediment to charitable giving in the U.S. is the already onerous tax rates, which the government uses ostensibly to provide the citizens with things they would otherwise provide for themselves. Like health care. Insurance. Food. Housing. Education. The list is endless.  If we don’t give “enough” it’s clearly not because we’re greedy and selfish.

I don’t want “my” government donating to the rest of the world. I don’t want “my” government spending money on anything. Truth. But that’s not the argument they were making.

What I really took issue with on this fine radio program was the spirit of their argument. The douche-nozzles were seriously equating a “poor” American (who probably has cable TV and air conditioning and eats fast food, etc.) with third-world Haitians who have lived their entire lives under brutal political regimes and civil war and who have now suffered the wrath of nature, and suggesting that as Americans, we have no business giving money to destitute brown people in third world countries as long as there are Americans who can’t buy luxury items.

No matter how shitty you think life is in America, it’s way f*cking worse for a pretty substantial proportion of the rest of the world.

*The U.S. government probably spends more money on foreign aid already than does the entire rest of the world combined. And on top of all that, Americans pay more than $1 Trillion to charitable organizations every year — more than the US government collects in income taxes.

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