Friday, February 25, 2011

The Conant Problem

When Taylor Conant debates statists on why he doesn't want to participate in coercive government activities, they often tell him, "If you don't like it here, leave."

His problem: In order to leave, he would have to subject himself to a coerced search of his body by the government (TSA).

5 comments:

  1. Wenzel,

    Oh I've got many more problems than that-- family, friends and enemies could tell you as much!

    But this is definitely one of the most mind-numbingly frustrating of them all. It'd be peachy if I made it into Wikipedia or a handbook of logical snafus like this, though.

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  2. And if he were to renounce the coercive U.S. government, in effect saying "I'll leave you alone and you leave me alone", he'd be subjecting himself to the coercive confiscation a large percentage of his wealth!

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expatriation_Tax

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  3. Yes. Recently one libertarian announced that American citizens who did NOT renounce their citizenship were as complicit in the government's crimes as actual government critters.

    Wow.

    In other words, because someone's not willing to get hit with an exit tax (if rich enough) or return to a third-world scamistan stealth-run by central banksters and their corporatist (and often western) enablers, they're now bonafide "collaborators"?

    Talk about specious reasoning.

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  4. And, Wenzel, shouldn't that heading be "A Conant-drum"?

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  5. If you look back to the days of the Iron Curtain, when people of Eastern Europe tried to escape from the Eastern Bloc of Soviet influence, there were border guards stationed to kill them. Entire countries were like prisons to prevent bleeding of population towards freer pastures. US's expatriation restrictions are less barbaric, but that doesn't mean that US doesn't exact a heavy toll on people trying to leave.

    And even after leaving, people have to find a better freer country to land their feet on. The lack of a freedom oasis is the other half of the problem. The small Asian tigers look appealing - especially the very very small ones.

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