1 Young American Revolution 2 December 2009 Contents December 2009 / Issue 04
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1 Young American Revolution 2 December 2009 Contents December 2009 / Issue 04 4 Editorial Tear Down This Wall 5 Karl Marx’s America By George Hawley 27 Campus Spotlight Has The Communist Manifesto replaced the Constitution? Ron Paul Commencement, Ending the Fed in Cleveland, Pop Quiz, 8 Manifesto for Slavery By Robert Conquest Rave Against the Machine Marx’s ideas led to the persecution of the proletariat by a bureaucratic elite 29 Bullies and Chatterboxes By Jeff Fulcher How to handle distractions while you 12 Obama’s Bad Medicine By Dr. Rand Paul There’s no such thing as a free heart transplant recruit for your group 30 The Preble Problem 14 Beautiful Loser By Bill Kauffman Anti-Federalist Luther Martin didn’t stop the Constitution— By Jeremy Lott Should this man be Ron Paul’s but he made it better secretary of defense? 18 The Power of Fusionism By Donald Devine 33 Profiles in Liberty Libertarians and conservatives can curb the state, By Trent Hill if they work together The insights of Peter Boettke 22 Generation Gap 36 Free Radical By Rep. Michele Bachmann Washington is spending your money years before you earn it By David Gordon Property, Freedom, Society: Essays in Honor of Hans-Hermann Hoppe Edited by Jörg Guido Hülsmann 24 Blueprint for Revolution By Steve Bierfeldt and Stephan Kinsella Real politics is about precinct organizing, not just sign waves or YouTube clips 38 A Life in the Right By Karen De Coster Encounters: My Life with Nixon, Marcuse, 41 Hollywood at War By John W. Payne What we can learn from “Inglourious Basterds,” G.I. Joe,” and Other Friends and Teachers and “The Hurt Locker” by Paul Gottfried 3 Young American Revolution Tear Down This Wall .S. Eliot once thought that a little Tsaid there are deviation from the no lost causes be- Constitution might cause there are no be justified in the Publisher gained causes. That dangerous climate Jeff Frazee sentiment has been of the arms race a source of hope to with the Soviets. But Editorial Director constitutionalists, as events showed, Daniel McCarthy who rightly see that the deviations were for all the setbacks neither minor nor Deputy Editors we have suffered, our principles remain temporary. Every real or trumped-up crisis Edward King, true. Unfortunately, false principles can since the Berlin Wall fell, from the War on Nicole Gonzalez Knowlton also endure: they too are not lost causes. the Drugs to the War on Terror, has been Even the most extreme forms of statism turned by Washington into another Cold Art Director have not been permanently banished to War, requiring yet more sacrifices of blood Matthew Holdridge the ash heap of history. and treasure. Before 9/11, many neocon- Our lead story in this issue looks at servatives were even pushing for a new Illustration Shane Helm, how many points of Karl Marx’s Commu- Cold War with China. This mentality will Anthony Rousseau nist Manifesto have already become law in be familiar to anyone who has read George America—Marx, after all, was the father Orwell’s 1984. Contributing Editors not only of what came to be known as The Soviet Union was not very close to W. James Antle III, Dylan Hales, George communism but also of social democ- what Marx envisioned as communism. For Hawley, Trent Hill, racy, a creed that still prevails in most of one thing, he thought that communism Jack Hunter, Bonnie Kristian, Europe. It is the collectivist creed that must first come to the industrialized na- Kelse Moen, John W. Payne, Jeremy Lott Michael Moore, director of “Capitalism: tions as a natural progression from liberal- A Love Story,” and others on the power- ism. The USSR was not a workers’ state, hungry Left would like to impose upon it was a garrison state—it produced not Young American Revolution is the official publication of Young Americans for Liberty (www.YALiberty. America. Much of their work, as Hawley goods but tanks and ICBM’s. The military org). Subscriptions are $50 for one year (4 issues). shows, has already been accomplished. and the intelligence services were the heart Checks may be made out to Young Americans for When the Berlin Wall came down 20 of the nation, subordinate only to the Liberty and sent to PO Box 2751, Arlington, VA 22202. years ago, freedom triumphed over domi- closed political class. Communism in prac- Young American Revolution accepts letters to the nation—in Eastern Europe, at least. Here tice meant military power and little else. editor and freelance submissions. Letters should be between 50 and 300 words. Submissions should in the United States, however, very little That power proved to be ineffective— be between 700 and 2400 words. Letters and changed for the better. Uncle Sam, instead for this year is also the 20th anniversary of submissions may be edited for length and content. of playing chessmaster in a geostrategic the Russians’ retreat from Afghanistan. Write to us at [email protected] or PO Box 2751, Arlington, VA 22202. game against the Soviet Union, became And now another military superpower is policeman to the world: 1989 was also the Young Americans for Liberty is the continuation of entrenched around Kabul… Students for Ron Paul (SFP). In less than 8 months, year George H.W. Bush launched an inva- The cause of peace and liberty looked SFP established over 500 college and high school sion of Panama to oust dictator Manuel lost during the Cold War. But it prevailed chapters in all 50 states and over 26,000 students Noriega. Two years later the USSR would joined the Ron Paul 2008 campaign. in Eastern Europe thanks to a mostly non- implode, and Bush would take the U.S. to violent revolution. In the United States to- The mission of Young Americans for Liberty (YAL) war in the Middle East. America did not is to train, educate, and mobilize youth activists day, there is a revolution brewing against committed to “winning on principle”. Our goal is to come home victorious from the Cold statism. It can be won at the ballot box, if, cast the leaders of tomorrow and reclaim the policies, War—she did not come home at all. as Steve Bierfeldt argues in this issue, we candidates, and direction of our government. We never tore down our “Berlin Wall,” fight intelligently. But it can only be won We welcome limited government conservatives, our Cold War complex of espionage agen- if we remain focused on tearing down classical liberals, and libertarians who trust in the cies and defense contractors. And without creed we set forth. not only the wall of social democracy that having to guard the Fulda Gap or Khyber Opinions expressed in Young American Revolution Pass against Russkies anymore, presidents Barack Obama and his allies are building are not necessarily the views of Young Americans at home, but also the ramparts of empire for Liberty. were now free to meddle everywhere in the world. None of the wars of the Cold that should have come down with the end Copyright 2009 Young Americans for Liberty War had been constitutionally declared— of the Cold War. not Korea, not Vietnam. Many Americans — The Editors 4 December 2009 Karl Marx’s America Has The Communist Manifesto replaced the Constitution? George Hawley hen the Berlin Wall fell and the The world remembers Marx’s sharp- WSoviet Union imploded two years est phrases, as well as the mountain of later, Americans sighed a breath of relief. corpses his disciples constructed in the Seemingly overnight, our debilitating fear subsequent 140 years. More frequently that a horde of T-72’s would blitz through forgotten, however, are the specific poli- the Fulda Gap evaporated; the world real- cies Marx promoted in his seminal work. ized a nuclear holocaust would not be the Section II of the Manifesto explicitly de- Cold War’s coup de grace. What’s more, clared what the Communists sought to the Cold War’s conclusion freed millions achieve. Even a cursory examination of of souls from Soviet oppression. We were the United States today refutes the no- right to be relieved. American conserva- tion that Marxism is an exhausted intel- tives, who were eager to take credit for lectual force. USSR’s demise, were feeling particularly The ten program points from The triumphant at that time. We had finally Communist Manifesto: reached the “end of history,” and “demo- cratic capitalism” reigned supreme. It re- 1. Abolition of property in land and mains to be seen, however, whether post- application of all rents of land to pub- Cold War conservative chest thumping lic purposes. was truly justified. Although Americans still enjoy basic Although all freedom lovers should Bolshevik propaganda poster of Trotsky, property rights, the state’s power of emi- celebrate the downfall of the dictatorship represented as St. George, slaying the counter- nent domain (reinforced in 2005 by the of the proletariat, the peaceful death of revolutionary dragon, 1918. Supreme Court case Kelo v. City of New the Soviet Empire did not necessarily in- London) ensures that our right to our own dicate the demise of Marxism as a force in the world. In fact, a property is subject to the state’s whims. Zoning laws determine strong case can be made that the United States is more Marx- how property may be used. Heavy property taxes require you to ist now than ever before. It is true that a socialist revolution did pay what amounts to an annual rent on land you ostensibly own. not occur, as Marx predicted, via an apocalyptic struggle between Yes, you may own property, but only if the state does not think workers and the bourgeoisie, but a socialist revolution of sorts your property can put it to better use and only if you can afford to nonetheless took place.