From: Dale Thorn <dthorn@gte.net>
Date: Sun, 6 Oct 1996 03:53:56 +0800
To: attila <attila@primenet.com>
Subject: Re: [SARCASM] [RANT] Re: The Right to Keep and Bear Crypto
In-Reply-To: <199610051202.GAA04320@infowest.com>
Message-ID: <325695E7.1449@gte.net>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


attila wrote:
> In <v02130500ae79cef28e84@[10.0.2.15]>, on 10/03/96
>    at 09:02 PM, azur@netcom.com (Steve Schear) said:

[some text deleted]

> CAVEAT:  under no conditions could I ever condone Jim Bell's
> Assassination Politics --it may be anarchistic in and of itself, but
> it is a thinly disguised criminal amentality, not only from the
> extant of trying to 'moralize' murder, but a form of power politics
> (and shadow government) which actually exceeds the abuses of our
> supposedly democratic republic run amuk with abusive police powers.
> Not only is revenge politics immoral, but AP is a corruption of
> society by lawless and arbitrary behavior of a few players who can
> afford the price of entry (to the betting pools).

You seem to be missing or confusing some points:
AP, as I understand it, is not necessarily revenge, any more than any 
other type of business deal.  You don't stab the competitor primarily 
because you wanna get revenge, you just do it as a practical matter, to 
lessen the competition.  You fail to grasp the predatory reality of what 
humans really are, and in that failure of illumination, you succumb to 
the illusion that humans are something closer to divine spirits than, 
say, a hawk, an eagle, or a wildcat.

Your religious beliefs are fine, I'm sure, as far as they go, but if you 
can agree with the principle of "separation of church and state", then 
you should see that trying to apply one's own personal religious 
convictions in dealing with the people who run Mother Earth is a fool's 
game.  Go to church, worship God, then, when you're doing business, 
treat people with the same courtesy you'd want from them.  The original 
Golden Rule.

You already agree that police killings *may* be justified, i.e., are not 
necessarily murder, then, as though "the people" have no right to apply 
the same techniques themselves (they "must" surrender this option to the 
state etc.), you label what the people would do as murder.  Bottom line 
is not whether AP would be murder, but whether you think the people have 
an inherent obligation to always surrender the right to kill to govt. 
authorities, even in a state where the govt. authorities are far beyond 
the point of "trust".

The last point about only a few players being able to afford AP is also 
shortsighted, from what I understand.  The collective anonymous 
contributions of a lot of little people could help unseat a much larger 
tyrant, which should go a long way in helping the tyrant control 
him/herself.