From: jkreznar@ininx.com (John E. Kreznar)
Date: Sat, 2 Apr 94 01:48:02 PST
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Left, Right, Up, Down--Libertarian Ideas
In-Reply-To: <199404020502.AA17875@panix.com>
Message-ID: <9404020947.AA05749@ininx>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


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> I responded the way I did to John Kreznar's post precisely because it
> looked identical to standard Republican-style leftist-baiting,

Actually, I _was_ deliberately baiting leftists, but I was doing so to
challenge their conceit that a liberal State is more congenial to
individual liberty than any other kind of State and therefore ought to
be less hostile to cryptography.  Remember Mike Schenk's original words:

> I have always thought that the Netherlands was a very liberal country.
> But now the government is proposing a law that totally outlaws the use
> of encryption methods.

Last I heard, the Netherlands is a State.  (So he's apparently talking
about ``liberal'' as a kind of Statism, not as a synonym for anarchism
as I would prefer.  Mike Schenk, are you there to clarify?)  A State is
a State.  The purpose of a State is to supplant personal choice with the
State's choice.  (To the extent that the State is a democracy, this
means supplanting personal choice with collective dictate.)  ``Liberal''
or not, a State is threatened by strong cryptography because it helps to
enable a person to choose for himself in spite of the State.

	John E. Kreznar		| Relations among people to be by
	jkreznar@ininx.com	| mutual consent, or not at all.

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