Hans-Herman Hoppe and The Property and Freedom Society

Distinguished Fellow at the Mises Institute Hans-Herman Hoppe created a new intellectual society in 2006.  He named it The Property and Freedom Society, and its fifth annual meeting was held this past week in Bodrum, Turkey.

As a member of the Mont Pelerin Society and John Randolph Club, Hoppe observed the potential failings of such groups and has crafted an astutely devised intellectually radical organization.

In his 2010 address, Hoppe describes the two goals of the Society:

On the one hand, positively, it was to explain and elucidate the legal, economic, cognitive and cultural requirements and features of a free, state-less natural order.

On the other hand, negatively, it was to unmask the State and showcase it for what it really is: an institution run by gangs of murderers, plunderers and thieves, surrounded by willing executioners, propagandists, sycophants, crooks, liars, clowns, charlatans, dupes and useful idiots—an institution that dirties and taints everything it touches.

Hoppe first presented his idea for an international "Austro-libertarian" society during an informal meeting with Thomas DiLorenzo, Guido Hülsmann, and Ralph Raico at the 2005 Mises Institute Summer University in Auburn, Alabama.

Robert Taft Fights Back: The Old Right "Whips" the New Deal

Arm yourself in the battle of ideas against Obama's New New Deal (see the end of this post).

Robert Taft (1888-1953) was a prominent member of what is now known as the "Old Right" and an ardent anti-New Dealer. He is well-known for his non-interventionist foreign policy which he described in his book A Foreign Policy for Americans (available as a pdf from the Mises Institue). He opposed the New Deal and World War II, took a principled stand against the Nuremberg Trials as victor's justice, balanced the scales of labor and management that the New Dealers had tipped to the unions, and was named one of the five greatest senators in American history by John F. Kennedy in his Profiles in Courage.

Re: Olympics

For moral as well as economic reasons, the Olympics should be funded wholly privately.  I also despise how this event is used to promote crazed nationalism by a state-worshipping media. Why must we root for an athlete just because he is ruled by the same political hacks as we? The emphasis should be on the talent of the athletes, not the glory of the nation-states they purportedly represent.

That being said, I do enjoy the games. It's an unparalled opportunity to admire the special talent of some very special athletes. This is a welcome break from the anti-human "we're-all-the-same" propaganda the establishment usually shoves in our face.

"Unless you're free, the machine will be prevented from working at all"

Those words were spoken by Mario Savio in a speech that helped start the protest movement of the Sixties.  Compiled with video from the protest in Tiananmen Square, this video inspires those of us who believe in individual liberty.

There's a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart that you can't take part! You can't even passively take part! And you've got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus -- and you've got to make it stop! And you've got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it -- that unless you're free the machine will be prevented from working at all! - Marco Savio