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Open Source Molecules
manganese4 writes "They've been discussed before in relation to Google, but the American Chemical Society has launched a new effort against perceived competitors. They are attempting to limit the government's ability to freely publish the results of scientific work paid for by tax dollars. The British journal Nature and the Univeristy of California reports on efforts by the ACS in attempting to shutdown a free database, PubChem, of molecular structures because it competes head to head with the fee-for-service Chemical Abstract Service. Their rationale is that the government should not spend taxpayer dollars on something private business is already doing. Luckily the government has not backed down."
Ummm, yeah, you obviously have no fucking idea what you're talking about. Libertarians absolutely believe in the sovereign rights of the individual.
From the LP Platform:
As Libertarians, we seek a world of liberty; a world in which all individuals are sovereign over their own lives, and no one is forced to sacrifice his or her values for the benefit of others.
We believe that respect for individual rights is the essential precondition for a free and prosperous world, that force and fraud must be banished from human relationships, and that only through freedom can peace and prosperity be realized.
Consequently, we defend each person's right to engage in any activity that is peaceful and honest, and welcome the diversity that freedom brings. The world we seek to build is one where individuals are free to follow their own dreams in their own ways, without interference from government or any authoritarian power.
And part of what it means to be sovereign is to, in essense, "own" yourself. There is no contradiction between supporting freedom of capital, and property rights, and supporting the rights of individuals.
They are just angry failed small businessmen that don't like paying taxes.
I suppose you have a source for this assertion and can back it up with some hard facts? No? I didn't think so...
"Information wants to be free" - That is not property.
The whole "information wants to be free" mantra has almost nothing to do with the American LP. Many Libertarians are actually divided over the idea of "intellectual property" and ideas such as patents and copyrights. For you to make this statement in this context only illustrates, again, that you really are uniformed and clueless.
The fake american "libertarians" want us to be the slaves of property.
Utter bollocks. That statement doesn't even mean anything. Sounds like a "sound bite" you heard on a street corner and decided to parrot.
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How are taxes illegal?
A better question would be "how are taxes legal?" Theft is when someone take something from you by use of fraud or force or some coercive threat. In the case of taxes, the government takes a portion of your income, under threat of imprisonment (or death if you decide to defend yourself).
The government has no intrinsic rights and it has no dominion over me (or anybody else) as a sovereign individual. My property, the fruits of my labor, are mine to decide what to do with. If someone threatens me and takes that property, they are a thief. That they call themselves "government" and claim to represent "the majority" and wear fancy uniforms, changes nothing.
Also, if we removed taxes and government funding, how would people stay secure from theft (thinking especially disabled people and the poor)?
First let me correct a mis-perception that you have. No one is secure from theft now, because of the government. Governments and police do NOT prevent crime. Well, they may have a mild deterrent effect, but they don't actually prevent anything or protect anybody. The police forces are mostly reactive, responding after a crime has already taken place, and don't typically accomplish a whole lot, especially in the case of simple theft.
Also, I'm not saying that we have to remove taxes and government. I just want involuntary taxation under threat of death or imprisonment, removed. As far as I'm concerned, if a group of people, from as small as 2 or 3, up to all 280 some million people in the US, want to form an organization, call it "government" and make voluntary contributions to support it's goals, that is fine and dandy. As long as I have the option to opt out and as long as their "government" doesn't presume any dominion over me, I have no problem with it.
As for the answer to your question, going on the assumption that we did in fact eliminate *all* taxes and government:
They would defend themselves, with assistance from their friends, families and neighbors. The same way people have been defending themselves since there were people. The poor and disabled would clearly be even more dependent on the good will of others, of course, but that is the nature of things. Perhaps they would form neighborhood watch groups or citizens patrol groups to help protect each other.
Now would this eliminate all crime? No, I'm sure it wouldn't. But what we're doing now hasn't eliminated all crime either. And sad as it may be, life simply isn't guaranteed to be fair. Some people would still get hurt. Nobody is happy about that, but that's life. And in the end, we're all dead anyway.
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