DOWN TO THE DOCTORS: Pirates (Again), Protests, Property Rights and the President

An irreverent look at some of the past week’s headlines by Libertarianz leader Dr Richard McGrath

1. Kiwis Safe After Cruise Ship Fights Off Pirates – That Israeli security team dealt swiftly and effectively to a boatload of Somalis attempting to board a cruise liner in the Indian ocean, thereby saving the lives and property of 990 passengers. Good on them! The owners of other luxury liners would do well to follow the example of the MSC Melody by arming themselves appropriately, and employing people capable of utilising this weaponry to maximum effect.
I would love to see Somali pirates blown into small pieces by cannon fire, torpedoes, rockets or other appropriate tools of self-defence. Piracy is a serious matter, and those contemplating it as a career option need to persuaded otherwise.
More importantly, Somalia urgently needs restoration of the rule of law, so that a government can be formed and action taken to intercept and detain potential pirates before they become seaborne.

2. Marchers Casting Net Wide – A hikoi is planned to protest against the government’s decision not to provide special  seats on the proposed Super City council for indigenous brown-skinned people. The ‘Super City’ concept sucks, and the spectre of race-based seats is an insult to the people it is meant to help. I would hate to be stripped of my individuality, lumped in with others who had similar skin colour, eye colour or ancestral origin, and essentially told that I was so useless and incapable of fending for myself that I could never be elected to a council seat on my own merits. The whole concept of herding people into a group and then telling them they are useless and thus in need of special reserved places for them at the table is insulting and degrading.
This planned hikoi is a disgrace, and its supporters nothing but apologists for apartheid.

3. City’s Tree Lovers To Press MPs For Rethink On Controversial Law Changes – Let’s get this clear from the get-go: anyone who loves trees more than people is a truly twisted sick piece of work. That includes Nick Smith, who likes to hug trees with his tongue.
Anyone who thinks trees have rights -- especially those who think trees have more rights than the people who own them and the land on which they stand -- has a distorted sense of value and a rather dim view of the worth of humanity.
Forget the Local Government and Environment Select Committee bullshit about ‘tweaking’ rules so that people will be ‘allowed’ to prune, cut down or burn down trees they own. Look at the bigger picture. All around New Zealand, people own land on which sit trees, some of them old, some of them native to these shores, some of which would make good firewood or furniture, and many of which are blocking human enjoyment of life.
The important thing is that the land is owned by somebody. The owners have a right enshrined in common law to do what they like with this land provided they don’t cause objective harm to others in the process. If you feel that because someone has cut down a tree that somehow makes you a victim, then seek redress by proving you have been harmed. Otherwise shut the fuck up and mind your own god-damned business.

4. CEO Sacking Hallmark Of A Hands-On Presidency – That’s what the headline says.  I would phrase it another way: Obama is an interfering Big Government statist control freak with an agenda of nationalization and micromanagement that will make Helen Clark look like a libertarian. Rick Wagoner, CEO of General Motors, is told that the President would like him to resign. Rick Wagoner falls on his sword (as should any CEO after losing billions of taxpayer dollars). But he didn’t fall, he was pushed – by a busybody, micro-managing President.  (No wonder GM is now being called Government Motors.)
The mainstream media see this gross disregard for property rights as “symbolic of US having crossed from an era of laissez-faire capitalism to a new kind of managed economy.”  Sadly, the truth is that the US hasn’t had anything remotely approaching a laissez-faire capitalist economy since the early twentieth century. This “new kind of managed economy” is just the same as the old kind, and with the same consequences: a slide in living standards and loss of essential liberties and rights for all who choose to remain part of it.
Rescue packages, stimuli – whatever you want to call them – they are simply socialism with a fancy name. And socialism not only doesn’t work, it kills.

See y’all next week!
Doc McGrath