Friday, May 27, 2016

Does John McAfee Really Understand the Non-Aggression Principle?

I have seen a couple of comments relating to my John McAfee interview where the argument is made "Well at least McAffe understands the non-aggression principle."

I am not so sure about that. When I asked him about the non-aggression principle, he simply zeroed in on the word aggression and said he was against aggression and talked about how aggression was bad when humans and countries aggressive . That doesn't suggest to me a familiarity with NAP. Listen to the interview again.

For a libertarian, NAP has a very specific meaning and McAfee didn't come close to touching on it. (See Walter Block on NAP here).

Indeed, since he told me he hasn't read any books since he finished college and was unfamiliar with Murray Rothbard, it would be hard to think that McAfee would have an understanding of NAP as a libertarian concept.

As I said during the interview, he seems to have an instinctual hands off perspective with regard to government but he has no philosophical underpinning to his view.

He is only attractive as a libertarian candidate because the other prominent candidates are even worse. In other words, to quote Ocean Man, the Libertarian Party has gone to shit.

  -RW

7 comments:

  1. "For a libertarian, NAP has a very specific meaning..." You're joking, right RW?

    If there's one thing libertarians don't agree on more, it's the NAP which ranges from basing ALL of libertarianism on some idea of the NAP to rejecting the NAP altogether. Holy shit! :P

    My understanding of the NAP I suspect is quite different from RW or WB... I still consider them and me to be libertarians. Libertarianism is simply still a work-in-progress is all I can conclude.

    But for someone to proclaim as McAfee does, "I'm a libertarian!" having not read a single book on it... And enough of one to run for POTUS on the LP ticket? Really!?! Wow.

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  2. "...the Libertarian Party has gone to shit."

    Well, the party has had quite a smell for some time. People with better philosophical understanding don't feel inclined to throw their hat into the ring. A shame, too. Such a person could probably get, what, 1.5% of the popular vote.

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  3. "I am not so sure about that."

    Fair enough, it's subjective at this point.

    "He is only attractive as a libertarian candidate because the other prominent candidates are even worse. In other words, to quote Ocean Man, the Libertarian Party has gone to shit."

    Oh yes, I agree completely.

    Just to be clear, even if McAfee has a rudimentary understanding of the NAP, that doesn't mean I was "endorsing" him in a way, shape, or form.

    It's sad that the Libertarian party can't field people that are at least familiar with the history of libertarianism in general and have more than a cursory understanding of the NAP.

    That's why I mentioned the Gary Johnson quote(linked) about the NAP going over his head- and in that context, at least McAfee is headed in the right direction, unlike Gary Johnson.

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  4. People already understand and practice the NAP in their real lives in their suburban neighborhoods. My yard, my house, my car, my dog, my bank account. People could establish private neighborhoods RIGHT NOW with the abolition of lawsuits for refusing to engage someone in contractual relations. The rules of the those neighborhoods could/would be made by the folks who live there. There is no reason for libertarians to fret about that for the next 100 years.

    I can see neighborhood lifestyle BRAND NAMES so you would know exactly what you are getting in terms of neighbors, schools, dispute resolution procedures etc... The neighborhoods could be designed by Trump and sold by the Property Twins, Fanty and Mingo. To the ladies. On cable TV.

    If you engage in some sort of disgusting but non-criminal behavior, the rest of society may just never deal with you, leaving you sad, lonely and in poverty. Libertarians always fail to see and explain that there will be and can be sanctions other than the initiation of violence for disgusting non-criminal behavior.

    Further, private neighborhoods solve the crime problem, the drug problem, the gun problem, the uninvited party guest problem, the "living next door to meth cookers and their kids" problem and the zoning problem. So let's never explain it and instead propose what amounts to legalization of all drugs where nothing else changes. Pursuant to the usual libertarian vision, average people could and would be living next door to meth cookers and their kids would go to your kids' school.

    Some people have a problem with "the vision thing".

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    1. "Libertarians always fail to see and explain that there will be and can be sanctions other than the initiation of violence for disgusting non-criminal behavior."

      Sounds like you're stereotyping. Which libertarians are you referring to? Boycott is a favorite alternative of many libertarians as an alternative to govt. sanctions for non-criminal behavior.

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  5. The reason the LP can't come up with good candidates that understand and can explain libertarianism, is because the good ones hate the state and want nothing to do with its politics.

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  6. John Lennon didn't read music.

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