LPM OnlineMarch 9, 1999 |
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Hey everyone, the long awaited smoker's outreach matches are in! Please contact the distributor nearest you and make arrangements to pick some up and get them out SOON! Thanks! Stacy Distributors: Bob Black Upper Peninsula bblack@up.net Jim Anderson Traverse City User999186@aol.com Dick Whitelock Ionia (616)527-9263 Bill Gelineau Grand Rapids gelineau@iserv.net Tim O'Brien Allen Park TObrien321@aol.com
What an enlightened age we live in! Gone are the days of fumbling in the dark, following our individual desires and tastes, making mistakes and indulging in self-destructive hedonism. Now we always know what’s the right thing to do. And if we don’t, there’s always some busybody control freak ready and eager to tell us. Listen! You can probably hear the chorus right now. “Buckle up! Don’t smoke! Don’t drink! Just say no -- no matter what it is.“ Isn’t it nice to know that, whenever you face a choice, there’ll always be someone there to make sure you do what’s best for you? Sure it is. It’s real nice. And we get more of it every year. Every time you turn around there’s some thin, nervous, “public interest advocate” or some other kind of pest, hovering over you, smiling with his mouth and frowning with his eyes. “Get up now, exercise!” he says. “Have some fiber! Are you wearing your condom? Did you get your smog certificate? What’s your cholesterol count? Put down that beer!” And you know the nicest thing of all? If you follow all that good advice, you’ll probably live ten or twenty years longer. Now that’s really nice, isn’t it? Twenty more years of having some sanctimonious asshole nagging your ears off. “Live a healthy life,” they tell you, “and you’ll make it to eighty.” Great. But what do you do at eighty, anyway? Sit around and reminisce, that’s what. But you won’t have a hell of a lot to reminisce about, will you? Mountains of fiber. A lifetime of smug self-denial. Night after sober night of pricing kiddie car seats and rowing machines. An unending parade of restaurants where everybody does exactly what you do. Look, no matter how you cut the deck, you’re going to end up with the same hand in the end. The zealot who worshipped at the altar of the Nautilus and took communion on bran cereal, the video guilt monger who thought she could reform the world by making everybody follow her dictates, the white-lipped office manager passing out the little cups at the rest-room door .... they’re all going to ride into the crematorium right behind the guy with the beer gut and the yellow-stained teeth and the milky-white blood who thought a prophylactic was one of those baby formulas they pitch during game shows. So what you’ve got to ask yourselves is: “What do I want flashing before my eyes when I hear the death rattle welling up in my throat? A kaleidoscope of red-eyed dawns, blue smoke and peroxide blondes? Or a gray blob of aversion therapy, politically correct consumer decisions, and sphygnamometers?” They say you can kiss high blood pressure and addiction and sexually transmitted diseases goodbye if you just let them tell you how to live. What they don’t tell you is that you can kiss a few rights goodbye while you’re at it. No, not just life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, but the most inalienable right of all. The one Tom Jefferson didn’t think even had to be written down. The god-given right to fuck ourselves up royally. The usual types of governmental tyranny are so common we don’t even notice anymore. This is different. People have always been told how to vote, how to work, what to say in public. But the fascist eye usually turned blind once you got into Charlie Rich country -- behind closed doors. Not now. Now the pamphlets and the signs and the laws and the TV spots have burrowed into even our collective unconscious. We don't trust a friend unless he won’t let us do something we want to do. We don’t have sex unless it’s as safe--and as much fun--as doing it alone. We don’t eat anything unless it’s been recommended by at least three diet doctors. Even then, we can’t take a bite without being made to feel guilty about something. Maybe we need a Twenty-seventh Amendment: “Congress shall not abridge the right of the people to mess themselves up good and not feel guilty about it.” Screw heart-healthy cooking. Screw second-hand smoke. Screw speed limits. Screw diversity. Screw the environment. Screw political correctness. These are our souls we’re fighting for. If we have to take this fight to the barricades, if we have to take it to our graves, we will. Just don’t forget the beer and cigs. Meanwhile, grab yourself a big, greasy burger for lunch. With fries. Use a copy of Executive Fitness for a placemat. Bury ‘em in salt. And when the parrots start to squawk, “Hypertension, hypertension,” just tell ‘em to get off your damn back! ---Adapted by Al Dolega from National Lampoon, “The Periodical of the American Spirit”, October 1987
The following article is the latest in a series of Op-ed articles written by LPM Chair Tim O'Brien and submitted to news outlets across the state for publication. This current article was published on March 4, 1999 in the Detroit News. On September 8, 1925 Dr. Ossian Sweet moved his family into their new two- story, brick home on the corner of Garland and Charlevoix on Detroit's east side. A prominent and successful gynecologist, the ambitious, hard-working Ossian Sweet was a graduate of Howard University medical school in Washington DC, having paid his tuition by firing furnaces, shoveling snow and waiting tables. He also spent time studying and working in Europe -- including a stint with nobel prize winner Madame Curie in Paris -- before settling in Detroit and starting both a family and a private practice. One might expect that Dr. Sweet would be out of place in the poor, working class neighborhood. And he definitely was. However, it was not so much because of his noticeably greater wealth and education than his mostly poor and illiterate neighbors, but rather because he was black and they were white. A mob of hundreds that had gathered in the schoolyard across the street grew increasingly ugly. The Waterworks Park Improvement Association, as they called themselves, had driven another black doctor, a surgeon by the name of Turner, out of his home on Spokane Avenue some weeks before. Anticipating trouble, a dozen police officers cordoned off the area for three blocks around and walked up and down the street between the mob and the Sweet residence. In the midst of the growing tension the Sweet family did their best to maintain an air of normalcy. Mrs. Sweet was in the kitchen preparing dinner and several family and friends were helping unpack, when the crowd started howling and stones began pelting the house. Dr. Sweet grabbed a gun and dashed to an upstairs window to get a better -- and safer -- view of what was going on outside his new home. Just as he saw a car with his dentist brother, Henry, and a family friend named Davis pull up to the curb a rock smashed through the window showering him in shards. The now terrified doctor ran back downstairs to let his brother and their friend into the house as the crowd was screaming: "Here's niggers! Get them! Get them!" That's when the first shot rang out. In the ensuing pandemonium no one is exactly certain how or in what order events then unfolded. It is certain that six of the 11 people inside the house fired their weapons, as did at least one police officer outside who in fact emptied his revolver. Two people in the mob were struck -- one fatally. The police, who until gunfire erupted had been little more than spectators, stormed the house and arrested everyone inside charging them all with murder. The sensational case polarized the city, but as chance would have it, ended up assigned to a judge whose integrity and personal courage would one day make him a Michigan legend. "This is the opportunity of a lifetime to demonstrate sincere liberalism," remarked the unflappable presiding Judge Frank Murphy, who immediately released Mrs. Sweet on bail. Nor were the defendants wanting for high-powered legal representation. Irrepressible champion of society's downtrodden, Clarence Darrow, came into Detroit to handle the case. Darrow's legendary eloquence and craft were very much in evidence in his impassioned defense of the Sweets. This pioneer in the cause of "equal protection before the law" spent three weeks on jury selection alone -- most of it in a painstakingly detailed recounting of the history of the black man in America. A Detroit Free Press reporter said at the time: "When I was assigned to cover the trial I had the average prejudice against Negroes. I give Clarence Darrow credit for destroying my race hatred." Following a seven week trial and three days of often acrimonious deliberations by the all white jury, Judge Murphy ruled that a verdict could not be reached and declared a mistrial. Prosecutors decided to retry only Ossian's brother, Henry, who had freely admitted firing his gun. At this second trial, attorney Darrow, not only didn't deny the fact that his sole remaining client may indeed have fired the fatal shot, but argued that the defendant was fully justified and acting in self-defense. The second jury (also all white) took barely three hours to return a "Not Guilty" verdict. As a consequence of all of this the Ku Klux Klan -- which operated much more openly in those days -- lobbied for and got the first round of restrictive gun legislation in Michigan. The Public Acts of 1927 included the requirement that citizens obtain government issued "purchase permits" following mandatory "safety inspections," and even then that the opportunity to legally carry the weapon be granted only at the whim of (unaccountable) county "gun boards." Following racial unrest in major American cities across the country in the early to mid 60's -- culminating in "the long, hot summer" of 1967 -- the next round of restrictions came out the federal government in the form of the Gun Control Act of 1968. This legislation was actually modeled on the German Weapons Law of 1938 enacted by the Nazi government. A revealing feature of the contemporary gun control movement has been the persistent drive to ban inexpensive handguns often disparagingly called "Saturday Night Specials" -- an epithet based on an old racist line that any kind of riotous going-on was a "Niggertown Saturday Night." And, indeed it is pretty obvious that, if not strictly minorities, it is at the very least, poor people who are being targeted by a ban on inexpensive weapons. Of course, none of this has proven effective in stemming violent crime because criminals, by definition, do not respect the law, whatever it might say. Nevertheless, those whose sacred cause is to finally and fully disarm the law-abiding in the deluded belief that this will somehow impact the criminal population have discovered a new tactic. Since courts have been unwilling and legislatures unable to accomplish their goal, several major cities have decided that perhaps the marketplace itself can be choked off by civil litigation holding manufacturers responsible for the misuse of their products. An announcement that the hometown of Dr. Ossian Sweet is following suit is expected soon. Had it come a couple of weeks ago it would have provided a tragically ironic end to Black History Month. For, as Jews have already discovered, disarming a people is only the first phase in attempting to end their history entirely.
For those of you who missed John Stossel's remarkably libertarian special "Greed," an uncompromising documentary defense of self-interest, this is your lucky week. ABC has scheduled to air it a second time, on Thursday 3/11 at 10:00PM PST (check local listings for other time zones). I urge everyone to watch. It's pure undiluted libertarianism. It's also a show you can recommend to anyone. Stossel is enormously persuasive and has a knack for making even the most extreme libertarian positions seem uncontroversial. There are just a few times a year when something to be aired on TV is absolutely essential to watch, record on your VCR, and advertise to your friends and co-workers. This is one of them.
Greed is a much deprecated motivation. It is discouraged at its first manifestation in young children. It is blamed for untold evil in fiction and in real life. The very word greedy is a pejorative. However, as ABC's John Stossel demonstrates in this solidly libertarian documentary, greed doesn't deserve its bad rap. Yes, says Stossel, greed may motivate some people to steal and cheat, but (government aside) these are exceptions. Greed motivates most of us to work harder, to innovate, and to cooperate with each other. More importantly it motivates those few creative geniuses among us on whom everything else depends to bring to life the new ideas that move the whole world forward. Why then is greed so vilified? Stossel invites Objectivist philosopher David Kelly to answer that one. Kelly says that because greedy people get rich, it makes some feel that since the greedy are getting a bigger piece of the pie, everyone else must be getting a smaller one. What that perception misses, continues Kelly, is that greedy people make whole new pies--including products which never even existed before, like high-speed computers and lifesaving medical treatments. All this is important to libertarians because government force, to which libertarians are opposed, is often justified as a necessary counter to the effects of greed. If greed isn't so bad after all, then maybe that force can't be justified. And even apart from that issue, if greed is a driver of human progress in a voluntary society, everyone should be concerned about the effects of making it a moral crime. Of course, the observation that self-interest is beneficial isn't new. Adam Smith noted that people intending their own gain tend to promote the public interest as though "led by an invisible hand." And Ayn Rand even wrote a book on the "Virtue of Selfishness." But this may be the first time that this point has been made in such a concentrated form in a documentary. And in a day and age when people are many times more likely to watch a film than read a book, that makes this something of a milestone. Stossel has done his usual outstanding job of making his points in an evenhanded manner and with crystal clarity, employing a variety of colorful examples. Even more importantly, he has done so without pulling any punches, at one point favorably comparing the good done by junk bond king Michael Milken to that of Mother Theresa! I think this is Stossel's best work so far. Yes, as long as theft is illegal, greed is good.
Needless to say, libertarian positions are not terribly popular among the people running TV land, so it's vitally important to support John Stossel. Typically after these specials, the words "send comments to," with an email address will appear at the bottom of the screen. Please send a quick email, anything, just thanking ABC for airing Stossel's excellent work.
If you wish to receive Miss Liberty's Film & TV Update, send an email message to requests@missliberty.com with the words 'subscribe update' in the body or header. Put 'unsubscribe update' in the body or header to discontinue. All other correspondence should be sent to jon@missliberty.com. For more information on this newsletter and libertarian film and video generally, see http://www.missliberty.com.
Information about the upcoming 1999 Libertarian Party of Michigan Convention has been posted on our web site at www.mi.lp.org/99conv/ There is information on the hotel (Ramada Southfield) including a map, prices and a phone number to make reservations. There is also a schedule, info about the various events and a printable registration form that you can use to register. There is also an early registration/membership contest with a prize of a free jacuzzi suite at the hotel for the weekend of the convention. Anyone who registers for the convention before April 10 will get one entry into the drawing. If you renew your membership at the same time you get another entry in the drawing. You can also recruit other new members by April 10, 1999 and recieve a drawing entry for each recruited member! Make copies of the membership form from your latest newsletter or ask me at markfheil@worldnet.att.net and I'll send you some. Then when you have your friend use the form to join the party, just put "Attn: Recruitment Contest" on the back of the form along with your name and address to get credit. Don't forget to sign up your spouse and other family members for extra drawing entries! |
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