[Lnc-business] Veterans in service to the Libertarian Party; see the note at the bottom.

[David Demarest]

Hi Starchild,

 

Thank you for your thoughtful analysis and carefully-crafted response that
represents one of the few fresh voices of sanity in the predominately
anti-intellectual wilderness and troubling crescendo of mindless
emotionalism ranging from unethical pile-on venting to crass political
opportunism reminiscent of the mainstream political tactics and
intellectually-dishonest status quo of the discredited two-party system. 

 

Perhaps these recent LP internal intellectual-implosion, knee-jerk responses
will serve the useful purpose of exposing the work that the Libertarian
Party must do if we intend to provide a serious and thoughtful intellectual
alternative to the broken two-party system. I must say I find the opening
anti-intellectual salvos overwhelmingly disruptive, destructive and
characterized by disingenuous misinterpretations of the college education
military bribe moral dilemma as an insult to veterans. The logical fallacies
of such misinterpretations are patently obvious as are the attempts to use
these misinterpretations as a venue for acting-out emotional venting and
opportunistic political gain.

 

We humans and Libertarians are capable of using our brains for what they
were designed for, i.e., thoughtful analysis before emoting as you have done
superbly. My hope is that the silver lining of this painful incident will
incentivize empowered individual Libertarians to emerge from this
uninspiring swamp of reactionary groupthink to create a vanguard of leaders
and followers worthy on the original heroic efforts that created our former
bastion of freedom and free market prosperity and later the birth of the
Libertarian party and inspiring Statement of Principles. We Libertarians are
capable of far better responses to the challenging intellectual initiatives
that differentiate the Libertarian Party from the duopoly.

 

Starchild, I look forward to your forthcoming and equally thoughtful
analysis of Arvin's moral intent and attention-getting semantic approach. I
also hope that you will point us in a direction that leverages this incident
to create a positive outcome for the Libertarian Party.

 

Thoughts?

 

~David

 

Dec 28-Jan 1 Omaha Roads to Liberty Un-Convention

 

~David Pratt Demarest

LNC Region 6 Representative (IA, IL, MN, MO, ND, NE, WI)

Secretary, LPNE State Central Committee

Cell:      402-981-6469

Home: 402-493-0873

 

From: Lnc-business [mailto:lnc-business-bounces at hq.lp.org] On Behalf Of
Starchild
Sent: Sunday, May 14, 2017 5:03 AM
To: Michael H. Wilson <evergreenlibertarian at gmail.com>
Cc: Libertarian National Committee list <lnc-business at hq.lp.org>; ALLEN
ACOSTA <islandal72 at yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: [Lnc-business] Veterans in service to the Libertarian Party;
see the note at the bottom.

 

 

Hi Michael,

 

            Thank you for your message to members of the Libertarian
National Committee, and for your activism! That's great to hear that
yourself and other former soldiers in the Seattle area are organizing to
support the Libertarian Party. I like the Washington Libertarians' "Support
The Bill of Rights" banner - simple, blunt, and to the point.

 

            Regarding the "questionable comments" to which you refer, I'm
guessing that you mean some of the recent comments posted by LP vice chair
Arvin Vohra on Facebook, since LNC members were also sent another message
about the topic criticizing him by name over these remarks, and there has
been some debate over his statements about the U.S. government's military
forces and personnel on the LNC list, as well as coverage on IPR (
http://independentpoliticalreport.com/2017/05/shane-trejo-libertarian-party-
vice-chair-releases-controversial-anti-military-manifesto/ - the comments
section is worth checking out).

 

            Without yet getting into my thoughts on what Arvin has written -
I may say more on that later when I reply to the other message mentioned
above, from (former?) LP member Michael Sanchez - I would like to ask your
opinion as a longtime libertarian who opposes U.S. government military
aggression (and if I'm not mistaken, a member of the Grassroots Libertarians
Caucus who shares many of my views about the party!), on some questions that
I think get to the heart of this controversy.

 

            I assume you agree that individuals are morally responsible for
their own actions, and that working as a government soldier doesn't change
that. But to what extent should people who voluntarily work for an
aggression-based government in exchange for a paycheck be called out for
doing so, or held morally responsible for immoral actions committed by other
individuals who are part of that institution, if they themselves play only a
relatively minor supporting role? 

 

            As I see it this is by no means an easy question, and not only
because I am also a former government soldier myself and conscious of my own
compromises with authoritarian power and others made by generally
freedom-loving people I respect (e.g. working a "respectable"
above-the-table job that provides a good income - and entails paying large
amounts of taxes that go toward funding evil). The challenge libertarians
face is this: How do we maintain moral clarity and integrity, speak truth to
power, and perhaps most crucially, work to de-legitimize the structures and
choices that support aggression, without alienating people who might side
with freedom against authoritarianism if push comes to shove, or making
sacrifices in our lives that - let's be honest - most of us are not prepared
to make? (Incidentally, I think we should do more to encourage such
sacrifices and support and honor those who choose to make them, but that is
a topic that deserves to be addressed at greater length than I want to take
space for in this response.)

 

            There are definitely some individuals whom I believe we should
not hesitate to call out and alienate, and I hope we can all agree on that.
Powerful statist politicians who are responsible for significant government
aggression, whether inside the United States or not, and individuals who
personally commit heinous actions such as unjustified murder and other
similarly unconscionable crimes, whether they work for government or not,
are to me the most obviously deserving of Libertarian condemnation. But
where should we draw the line when speaking as Libertarian Party leaders?
What level(s) of criticism, if any, of those who choose to work for the U.S.
government's military do you think yourself and your colleagues who are
former soldiers would be comfortable hearing from the LP, and why?

 

Love & Liberty,

                                    ((( starchild )))

At-Large Representative, Libertarian National Committee

                                 (415) 625-FREE

                                   @StarchildSF

 

P.S. - The photo you sent could be great for LP News, the LP website, or
some other party publication or communication. Do staff have your permission
to use it?

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A couple of LP Vice-Chair Arvin Vohra's Facebook posts (links copied from
the comments section of the IPR story referenced above):

During the last hours, I've seen many justifications for joining the
military. To avoid confusion, I'll address them in a single post.

1. I thought I would be fighting for freedom, or to defend the constitution.

If you were a soldier in recent history, you probably weren't. Instead, you
were a person who got tricked by propaganda. That doesn't make you a hero;
it makes you someone who got tricked.

That's happened to many people. I personally have been tricked by government
propaganda. I voted for Obama in 2008. When I learned that I had been
tricked, and had encouraged others to do the same foolish action, I decided
to work to make amends. I spent thousands of hours helping people see the
lie of the duopoly. 

If you were tricked by military recruiters, help prevent the same thing from
happening to others. Share your experiences, and speak out boldly.

2. Many people don't care about all that, they just want money for college.

That's a morally unacceptable position. That's saying, "I signed up for a
job where I might have to kill innocents because I wanted the money." It's
not new to say, "I idd violence because I wanted money." It's not moral
either. 

3. A soldier is like a gun. You don't blame guns when someone uses a gun for
mass shootings; blame only the president, not the soldiers who follow his
orders.

A soldier is not a gun. A soldier has thoughts, morals, and judgment. If a
gun had human level intelligence and then chose to be part of a school
shooting, I would blame the gun along with the wielder. When a soldier
chooses to follow an order to bomb a school or hospital, I similarly blame
the solider along with the politician ordering him.

I know the military makes a big propaganda show of calling soldiers military
property, but the fact is slavery was outlawed by the 13th amendment. You
are not an object. You are not a thing. You are a human being, with human
abilities, and human responsibilities.

4. I still think what the military is doing is right. I'm proud of the work
I did/am doing/will do.

In that case, I disagree. I don't think you are an immoral person, but I do
think you have been mislead. Sure, the American army in 1776 did great
things. But today's military is not fighting for our freedom. It's getting
involved in civil wars, and creating blowback. 

There are certain parts of the military that are purely defensive, at least
in theory. But that theory rarely pans out. My only moral opposition to
those is the tax funding, which applies to every government worker and
contractor, not just to military.

5. Come to my base and say it to me and my platoon, so I can kick your
[butt]

Fighting ideas you dislike with violence is exactly why the military is
failing at its current attempt to beat radical Islam with bombs. Ideas are
defeated with better ideas. Women's rights happened through ideas and
debates, not bombs. The same hold true of minority rights and even
democracy. Beating up individuals doesn't change minds any more than bombing
does.

In the next few days, I will be putting together a working group for Counter
Recruiting. The goal is to undue the lies and bluster military recruiters
use to dupe young men and women into misusing themselves in the pursuit of
immoral wars. All are welcome to join this group.

https://www.facebook.com/arvin.vohra.9/posts/1511726878858800

 

 

It seems that many members of the military have taken offense to the phrase
"accessory to murder" used to describe non-combat support staff of combat
soldiers, and the phrase "murder" to describe military combat used in
completely counterproductive wars that create enemies. If the issue here is
word choice, then I'm sure we can find a replacement. Replace murder with
"tricked into killing" or "counterproductive killing" or "violence in the
service of counterproductive military policy." Replace accessory with
"support staff to violence that makes America less safe by creating
predictable blowback." Replace enlist with "agree to follow orders from
people who have been giving immoral orders for the last 40 years." Replace
service with "squandering the desire for honor on the military industrial
complex." If the issue is word choice, then there are plenty of other
phrases. I'd be happy to immediately apologize for the word choice - if
those who claim to care only about the word choice will join on the new word
choice.

That leaves this question: do those of you who take issue with the word
choice believe military policy is good or bad? Do you think that the core
combat missions have been corrupted, by politicians and the military
industrial compex? Or do you believe that the current actions in the Middle
East, the hundreds of overseas bases, the word policing are good?

If you believe that those military actions are good, then I simply disagree.
Ending military overreach, shutting down foreign military bases, and using
the military for defense only will make us safer, save us blood and
treasure, and stop psychologically damaging people by forcing them to take
part in counterproductive violence and killing. 

If you believe that those military actions are bad, that the mission has
been corrupted, then will you say so to the young men and women considering
enlisting? Will you remind people who got tricked by the manipulation of
military recruiters that they have the Entry Level Separation option, and
can still leave within the first few months of joining? When you see
Hollywood movies jammed with military propaganda, will you say something to
those who look up to you and trust you? 

If you believe that current military actions are wrong, that the military
industrial complex and politicians have corrupted the mission, then will you
help starve the beast? Will you help encourage people not to enlist?

If some of the last day's responses were just about word choice, let me know
and I'll change it. If it's just that you support military overreach, then I
hope you will reconsider your position.

Respectfully,

Arvin Vohra <https://www.facebook.com/VohraEducation/> 

https://www.facebook.com/arvin.vohra.9/posts/1513441192020702

 

 

 

On May 11, 2017, at 8:58 PM, Michael H. Wilson wrote:





 
<https://scontent.fsnc1-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/18199339_1491688597519110_8
782152455506462635_n.jpg?oh=24ac2708f9bc81c63ae3344f5b9f0067&oe=59B99E6E>  


This is a local group of veterans working to promote the LP. There are six
of us out on this day, four Army vets from Iraq/Afghanistan, one Marine and
me, Coast Guard. I'm the old fart in the chair. At least four of these men
are seriously disabled. They understand the situation. It would help if the
LP put more emphasis on stopping the war and bringing all of the troops
home. Maybe a big banner across the top of the web page or some decent
literature with numbers of troops and dollars of costs written out.

I think we will continue our efforts. I just hope the LP can put a stop to
some of the questionable comments I and many others have heard recently

Thank you 

 

Michael H. Wilson; member since 1980

 

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