NEW MEXICO LIBERTY

“Let Freedom Ring”

The Official Newsletter of the Libertarian Party of New Mexico

August 2010 http://lpnm.us V.2.2 N.25

Table of Contents Notes from the Editor

by Mike Blessing
Page 1 Libertarian Media from New Mexico [ mikewb1971@gmail.com /
mikewb1971.xanga.com ]
Notes from the Editor by Mike Blessing
The Unanimous Consent Challenge
Page 2 Events at a Glance Do-Or-Die Time for the LPNM

The LPNM's Candidates OK, folks, this is it. Due to extenuating circumstances, the LPNM
is at a point where we have to choose between the
Other Groups to Network With, and Their organization's continued existence, and going on our merry
Events ways.
Page 3 Success for N.M. Minority Students Lies If we choose to continue the LPNM's existence as the LPNM, we
With Adults need substantial donations, and we need them immediately.
by Paul Gessing, Rio Grande Foundation Please send whatever you can to the LPNM mailing address
listed on page 8 of this issue [ LPNM c/o Ron Bjornstad, 918
Page 4 Glenn Beck’s Lincoln Contradictions Ivory Rd SE, Rio Rancho NM 87124 ].
by Thomas J. DiLorenzo
Page 6 Contacts / Internet Resources THE UNANIMOUS CONSENT CHALLENGE
CASH Ø10,000 PRIZE
Page 7 Administrivia
To the first person to write a logical and documented essay
The Unanimous Consent Challenge showing one of the following to be compatible with the
Page 8 Enrollment / Renewal Form Declaration of Independence:
Page 9 A Modest Solution Sherman Anti-Trust Act of 1890
by Butler Shaffer Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906
Federal Communications Act of 1934
National Firearms Act of 1934
Libertarian Media from New Mexico Banking Act of 1935
(not necessarily endorsed by LPNM) The Internal Revenue Code
Controlled Substances Act of 1970
The Weekly Sedition – Thursdays at 8 PM RICO Act of 1970
(July – August – September 2010) Federal Elections Act of 1970
kcufmedia.xanga.com Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974
Plumbing Products Efficiency Act of 1992
Adam vs. The Man Anti-Money Laundering Act of 1992
Monday – Friday, 3-4 PM on 1550 KIVA-AM USA PATRIOT Act of 2001
adamvstheman.com / 1550kiva.com Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002
Hemp TV – Tuesdays at 7PM This challenge is also on the web at tinyurl.com/hn982
myspace.com/nmhemptv To claim your prize, contact
The One Party State – Wednesdays at 11PM Mike Blessing at 505-515-7015 or
Contact Lance Klafeta [ lklafeta@yahoo.com ] for details send an email to mikewb1971@gmail.com

Reeferhead – Saturdays at 6PM The Law by Frederic Bastiat

myspace.com/reeferheadtv
See these pages –
The Fringe Element
thefringeelement.net / postpubco.com bastiat.org/en/the_law.html
jpfo.org/articles-assd/bastiat-the-law.htm
If a message is not compatible with an individual's values, he
always has the power to reject it. Parents obviously have a role, Also in PDF form –
through implicit and explicit moral instruction, in shaping those jpfo.org/pdf02/bastiat-thelaw-2008.pdf
values. If they do their job right, their children will learn to be
skeptical about what they see and hear – including alarmist
claims about their own vulnerability to bad influences.
– Jacob Sullum

New Mexico Liberty – August 2010 – Page 1

 Events at a Glance Other Groups to Network With
Bernalillo County – The BCLP stages one no-host dinner Wednesday, 18 August, 5-7 PM: The Rio Grande Foundation
meeting per month, on Thursday, 5 August, 6:00 to 8:00 PM at hosts Liberty on the Rocks in Santa Fe at the Rio Chama
Fiesta's Restaurant & Lounge (Carlisle & Montogomery NE). Steakhouse. See this page for details – tinyurl.com/2cmf4gb.
Contact Mike Blessing for details [ mikewb1971@gmail.com / Wednesday, 18 August, 5-7 PM: The Rio Grande Foundation
505-515-7015 ], or see the BCLP website – lpnm.us/bernalillo. hosts Liberty on the Rocks in Farmington at the St. Clair Winery
Mike Blessing and Bill Koehler host The Weekly Sedition on – 5150 East Main Street – in the San Juan Room. See this page
Thursdays at 8 PM on Albuquerque Comcast Channel 27. For for details – tinyurl.com/29gmw9o.
those not subscribed to ABQ Comcast, the show can be viewed Thursday, 19 August, 5-7 PM: The Rio Grande Foundation hosts
live at the Channel 27 website (NOTE – this requires MS Liberty on the Rocks in Albuquerque at the Chama River
Windows Media Player!) [ quote-unquote.org ]. Brewing Company. For details, see this page –
Dona Ana County – The next scheduled Central Committee tinyurl.com/2esszae.
meeting is Saturday, 14 August 2010, time and place to be Tuesday, 31 August, 5-7 PM: The Rio Grande Foundation hosts
annnounced. Any county Libertarian wanting support in running Liberty on the Rocks in Las Cruces at the Cattle Baron Steak &
for political office or having party or political issues that they wish Seafood Restaurant on the 4th Tuesday of every month. The
the county party to address prior to then can call a meeting of Cattle Baron will offer happy hour prices and a full menu for food
the County Central Committee by gaining the approval of at least selection. For details, see this page – tinyurl.com/2b4oy8w.
half of the Committee members via email or phone request.
The New Mexico Patriot Alliance 2010 Fall Summit
Please contact the chair or check the LPDAC website for more
The New Mexico Patriot Alliance's mission is to support Patriot
information –
Preparedness, Education and Action, and Patriot group
lpdacnm@lpnm.us / 575-571-6881 / lpnm.us/dona-ana. interaction throughout New Mexico in order to restore
Constitutional governance to New Mexico and the United States.
If you live in a county with an inactive affiliate and want to
get involved, contact the county chair. See Page 7 for a list Fall Summit Schedule
of county chairs, campus contacts and Central Committee
Friday Evening, 15 October – Speech by Michael Badnarik, free
members.
and open to the public – donations gratefully accepted.
Special Events Saturday, 16 October – Michael Badnarik's famous Constitution
Special Convention – Sunday, 12 September 2010 Class. See tinyurl.com/28j9qlt for registration details, including
costs.
Lunch at 12:00 PM, Business Session from 1:00 to 4:00 PM. All
Caucus members are requested to attend. County Chairs Facebook page – tinyurl.com/2fref7k
and Contacts and candidates are encouraged to attend! Myspace pages – tinyurl.com/2ac6hto / tinyurl.com/25u6ekn
Location – Quarters BBQ at 3700 Ellison NW in Albuquerque –
see tinyurl.com/27rhyrn for map and directions. New Mexico Liberty page – tinyurl.com/2b6wo7z
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The LPNM's Candidates
State Legislature
State Representative, District 16
Mike Blessing – mike4nmh16-2010.blogspot.com
State Representative, District 19
Mark Curtis – macurtis@webtv.net
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
“I have sometimes been asked what I consider to be the prime
attribute of a gentleman. One may not pick singly, but certainly
one of the more important elements is that of an adventurous
mind. Adventure is an important part of life, even though, as
Bilbo put it, it sometimes makes you late for dinner. Not
everyone has the luxury of indulging in adventures, but without
an adventurous mind it does not matter whether he has the
opportunity or not. I think one acquires an adventurous mind
from reading. I have not read as broadly as I might have, but I
got a good dose of adventure from the works of G.A. Henty, Sir
Walter Scott, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Sir Percy Fitzpatrick, Zane "The prestige of government has undoubtedly been lowered
Grey, and Edgar Rice Burroughs. Of course few people read for considerably by the prohibition law. For nothing is more
recreation anymore, so we find that adventurous minds are destructive of respect for the government and the law of the land
increasingly rare. than passing laws which cannot be enforced."
– Jeff Cooper – Albert Einstein
“What about GATT and NAFTA? If an agreement is more than a
paragraph long – and it's between two governments – then it
ain't about free trade!”
– L. Neil Smith, Tactical Reflections
[ lneilsmith.com/tactical.html ]
New Mexico Liberty – August 2010 – Page 2
 Liberty, Opportunity, Prosperity
Success for N.M. Minority
Students Lies With Adults
by Paul Gessing
[ pgessing@riograndefoundation.org ]
19 July 2010 – tinyurl.com/2dvylew
Is demography destiny?
If so, say some experts, states with growing Hispanic
populations seem doomed to fail, weighed down with ineffective
school systems and abysmal test scores.
One academic recently predicted states like New Mexico will
become the "Appalachia of the 21st Century." He based his
prediction on well-known statistics concerning the dropout and
low achievement scores of Hispanic students. Nationwide,
Hispanics drop out of high school at appalling rates. When they
do graduate, they have achievement test scores roughly
equivalent on average to eighth grade Anglo students.
How about it New Mexico: Are you going to accept this fate for
your children and your state?
States can overcome this challenge. How do we know? Florida.
Startling statistics show that with abundant school choice and
systemic education reform, Florida's Hispanic students already
eclipse the average academic performance of many states.
Tackling education reform in Florida is a tougher nut to crack
than in Massachusetts or New Hampshire. Low-income students
make up almost half of the K-12 student body, with a "majority
minority" ethnic mix. Florida spends below the national average
on per student funding.
Former Gov. Jeb Bush pushed through an education reform
strategy of accountability from both the top down (state testing)
and bottom up (parental choice) in 1999. Bush's A+ Plan
emphasized standards for the schools and transparency for
parents.
Florida grades the performance of schools A, B, C, D or F and
rewards success and creates consequences for prolonged
failure. Once provided truth in advertising, communities rallied to
the aid of their students, donating thousands of hours of
volunteer tutoring for students. Failing schools faced
consequences for prolonged failure, including school vouchers
for their students.
Bush's parental choice in schooling plan also included the
creation of the nation's largest school voucher program – the
McKay Scholarship Program – for students with disabilities and
the Step Up for Students tax credit for economically
disadvantaged children.
Today, more than 820 Florida private schools educate almost
19,000 children with disabilities through the McKay program. A
similar number of low-income children are benefiting from Step
Up for Students. Florida also has a vigorous and growing charter
school program, with more than 375 charter schools educating
more than 100,000 students.
So what does Florida have to show for this tough mixture of
high-stakes testing and parental choice? The best source of data
to answer this question comes from the National Assessment of
Education Progress. The NAEP tests representative samples of
students in every state on a variety of subjects and is the
nation's most reliable and respected source of K-12 testing data.
Researchers focus heavily on fourth-grade reading scores as a
bellwether for future academic performance. Children who do not
learn to read in the early grades almost never recover
academically.
In 1998, a stunning 47 percent of Florida fourth-graders scored
"below basic" on the NAEP reading test, meaning they were
functionally illiterate. By 2009, 73 percent of Florida's fourth-
graders scored basic or above – a remarkable improvement in a
short period.
Best of all, improvements among Hispanic and African-American
students helped to drive the overall results. Florida's Hispanic
students now have the second-highest reading scores in the
nation; and African-Americans score fourth highest when
compared to their peers. Both groups have a great deal of
momentum on their side.
The average Florida Hispanic student score on NAEP reading
tests (conducted in English mind you) is now higher than or ties
the overall average scores of all students in 31 different states –
including predominantly Anglo states such as Iowa, Minnesota
and Washington. Florida's African Americans outscored or tied
eight statewide averages for all students.
Florida's reforms have been so successful that the Miami-Dade
County Public School District, 91 percent of whose students are
either Hispanic or African American, outscores the statewide
reading average for Oregon – a highly Anglo and relatively
wealthy state. What worked in Miami can work in Albuquerque.
Demography need not become destiny in New Mexico or
anywhere else. Education improvement is not about the kids.
The kids, even the poor and minority kids, can learn. The
roadblocks to improvement are with us adults, not with the kids.
If New Mexicans decide that they want something better for their
children, they can achieve it. If they reject the fate of becoming
an educational and economic backwater, others already have
departed from this path.
Fortune favors the bold, and New Mexicans can secure a
brighter future if their adults have the wisdom and courage to
embrace it.
Paul Gessing is the President of New Mexico’s Rio Grande
Foundation. The Rio Grande Foundation is an independent, non-
partisan, tax-exempt research and educational organization
dedicated to promoting prosperity for New Mexico based on
principles of limited government, economic freedom and
individual responsibility.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
New Mexico Liberty – August 2010 – Page 3

Glenn Beck’s Lincoln
Contradictions
by Thomas J. DiLorenzo [ tdilo@aol.com ]
17 July 2010
lewrockwell.com/dilorenzo/dilorenzo190.html
I’ve been occasionally watching Glenn Beck on the Fox News
Channel and think he has done an admirable job of smoking out
and identifying the shockingly hardcore, radical socialists who
dominate the Obama administration. He has also done a
generally good job talking about the libertarian founding
principles of America, how they have been lost, and our duty to
regain them. But he has been absolutely abysmal when
discussing the subject of Lincoln, the War to Prevent Southern
Independence, and its legacy. I suspect that the reason for this
disconnect with historical reality is that:
1. The Fox News Channel is essentially a propaganda arm of
the neoconservative political cabal that has captured the
Republican Party;
2. One of the cornerstones of neocon ideology is Lincoln
idolatry and hatred of the South and Southerners.
(Professor Paul Gottfried, for one, has written extensively
about this.)
3. Therefore, if Glenn wants to keep his gig at Fox, he must
toe the party line on Lincoln. Being otherwise libertarian –
while the Democrats are in power – serves the purposes of
the neocon cabal nicely.
To the neocons, Lincoln idolatry serves the purpose of helping to
prop up the centralized, bureaucratic, liberty-destroying, military-
industrial complex that defines their existence. As William F.
Buckley, Jr., the original neocon, declared in 1952, fighting the
Cold War meant that "we have got to accept Big Government for
the duration," including "a totalitarian bureaucracy within our own
shores" with its "large armies, atomic energy, central intelligence,
war production boards, and the attendant centralization of power
in Washington." In case you haven’t noticed, for quite some time
now the Republican Party has stood for war, war, and more war,
and little else. How on earth genuine conservatives who favor
limited constitutional government came to embrace Buckley as
one of their leading spokesmen is a bizarre mystery.
When I debated one of the gurus of neocon Lincoln idolatry –
Harry Jaffa – shortly after The Real Lincoln was published in
2002, he bellowed at one point that "9/11 proves more than ever
that we need a strong central government." (In reality, it proved
the failure and incapability of "the central government" to protect
even its own D.C. headquarters from a few nuts armed with box
cutters.) "We need big, totalitarian government to fight all the
new Hitlers and potential Hitlers in the world" is the neocon
mantra, in a nutshell.
To neocons, Lincoln is the poster boy of militaristic big
government that runs roughshod over civil liberties while
bankrupting the country with taxes and debt and murdering
thousands of innocent foreigners (not that Southerners during
the 1861–1865 war were foreigners; they were fellow American
citizens). Doesn’t this sound like the Republican Party of today,
as embodied in the recently dethroned Bush administration?
Despite his admirable performances discussing the founding
fathers, socialism, progressivism, and other topics, Glenn Beck
has been absolutely awful and sometimes untruthful when
discussing Lincoln and his legacy. During one show he claimed
to have read the actual original copy of The Confederate
Constitution. I assume he made this assertion to show that he
must really be quite the expert on the document.
I didn’t believe him when he said this, and his next sentence
proved to me that he did not read the document. The next
sentence was the statement that the formal title of the document
was "The Slaveholders’ Constitution . . ." Anyone can look the
document up at Yale University’s online Avalon Project, which
warehouses all the American founding documents,
commentaries, and more, to see for yourself that Beck was
wrong about this.
Beck’s next false statement was that "I read it" (the Confederate
Constitution) and "it wasn’t about states’ rights, it was all about
slavery." Read it yourself online. It is a virtual carbon copy of the
U.S. Constitution, with a few exceptions: The Confederate
president had a line-item veto; served for one six-year term;
protectionist tariffs are outlawed; government subsidies for
corporations are outlawed; and the "General Welfare Clause" of
the U.S. Constitution was deleted.
The act of secession was the very essence of states’ rights,
contrary to Beck’s proclamation, for the basic assumption was
that the states were sovereign. They delegated certain defined
powers to the central government for their own mutual benefit,
but all other powers remained in the hands of the people and the
states, as stated in the Tenth Amendment. As sovereigns, they
had a right to secede for whatever reason. If a state needed the
permission of others to secede, as Lincoln argued, then it was
not really sovereign.
The U.S. Constitution adopted a federal, not a national system of
government. That is another way of saying a states’ rights
system of government. The Confederate Constitution was nearly
identical.
As for slavery, the Confederate Constitution was not essentially
different from the U.S. Constitution as it existed at the time. Beck
was grossly deceiving when he told his audience that the
Confederate Constitution protected slavery while saying not one
word about how the U.S. Constitution did the exact same thing.
Slavery had been protected by the U.S. Constitution since 1789.
That’s seventy-two years of slavery protection under the U.S.
Constitution. A Fugitive Slave Clause was written into the
original U.S. Constitution, and the 1850 Fugitive Slave Act
passed by Congress was never challenged constitutionally. That
in fact is why the great libertarian abolitionist Lysander Spooner
launched so many vitriolic attacks on the Lincoln administration.
As a trained lawyer, he had laid out the constitutional case
against slavery, but the Lincoln administration and the
Republican Party wanted nothing to do with him or his peaceful
route to emancipation – the same route all other countries of the
world (and the Northern states) took during the nineteenth
century to end slavery.
Moreover, Beck’s hero, Lincoln, orchestrated passage through
the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives of the
Corwin Amendment to the Constitution, which would have
formally and explicitly enshrined slavery in the U.S. Constitution
by prohibiting the government from ever interfering with
Southern slavery. This amendment passed the Senate and the
House just days before Lincoln was inaugurated. In his first
inaugural address he said he believed slavery was already
constitutional and then, alluding to the Corwin Amendment, said:
"I have no objection to it [slavery protection] being made express
and irrevocable" in the Constitution. This was by far the
strongest defense of slavery ever made by an American
politician, coming from the president himself. Beck and the
wacky preacher posing as an intellectual made no mention of
this.
[ Continued on Page 5 ]
New Mexico Liberty – August 2010 – Page 4
[ Continued from Page 4 ] America was founded with the George Washington/Thomas
Jefferson foreign policy of commercial relationships with all
More recently, Beck has admirably attacked the idea of
nations, entangling alliances with none. The neocon
"collective salvation" that Obama himself espouses, and which is
establishment, which is influential in both major political parties,
apparently as much a part of the ideology of the American Left
believes in just the opposite: "entangling alliances" and endless
today as militarism fueled by Lincoln idolatry is of the Right.
military interventionism with as many nations as possible, all in
According to the doctrine of "collective salvation," a Christian
the name of some undefinable Great Moral Cause, in the
cannot be saved and go to Heaven unless one first embarks on
tradition of Dishonest Abe.
a crusade to have government "save" the "oppressed" of society
by expanding the welfare state, raising taxes, making taxation Of course, all of this high-handed talk about the Republican
more "progressive," adopting more racial hiring quotas, and Party supposedly being "the party of great moral ideas" is also a
regulating and nationalizing as much of private industry as convenient smokescreen for the economic greed that is its real
possible. It is a variant of "liberation theology" which, according motivation, and has been ever since the party first gained power.
to Pope John Paul, II, is essentially Marxism masquerading as As Rothbard further explained: "On the economic level, the
Christianity. Republicans [in 1860] adopted the Whig program of statism and
big government: protective tariffs, subsidies to big business,
What Beck and his wacky preacher/faux Lincoln expert do not
strong central government, large-scale public works, and cheap
know is that the main supporters of the Lincoln regime believed
credit spurred by government." It hasn’t changed much since.
in the exact same quasi-religious ideas. Indeed, it defined their
very existence. As explained by Murray Rothbard in "America’s Thomas J. DiLorenzo is professor of economics at Loyola
Two Just Wars: 1775 and 1861" (in John Denson, ed., The College in Maryland and the author of The Real Lincoln; Lincoln
Costs of War, Transaction Publishers, 1997, p. 128): Unmasked: What You’re Not Supposed To Know about
Dishonest Abe and How Capitalism Saved America. His latest
The North, in particular the North’s driving force, the
book is Hamilton’s Curse: How Jefferson’s Archenemy Betrayed
"Yankees" – that ethnocultural group who either lived in
the American Revolution – And What It Means for America
New England or migrated from there to upstate New
Today.
York, northern and eastern Ohio, northern Indiana, and
northern Illinois – had been swept by a new form of
Protestantism. This was a fanatical and emotional neo-
Puritanism driven by a fervent "postmillennialism" which
held that, as a precondition for the Second Advent of
Jesus Christ, man must set up a thousand-year Kingdom
of God on Earth.
To the Yankees, their "kingdom" was to be a "perfect society"
cleansed of sin, the principal causes of which were slavery,
alcohol, and Catholicism. Furthermore, "government is God’s
major instrument of salvation," Rothbard wrote. This is why the
Yankees never seriously considered ending Southern slavery
how THEY had ended it in their own states – peacefully through
some kind of compensated emancipation. They were not so
concerned about the welfare of the poor slaves. Indeed, even
Tocqueville noticed that "the problem of race," as he phrased it,
was worse in the North than it was in the South. Instead, as
Rothbard continues:
The Northern war against slavery partook of fanatical
millennialist fervor, of a cheerful willingness to uproot
institutions, to commit mayhem and mass murder, to
plunder and loot and destroy, all in the name of high
moral principle and the birth of a perfect world. The
Yankee fanatics were veritable Pattersonian
humanitarians with the guillotine: the Anabaptists, the
Jacobins, the Bolsheviks, of their era.
"Collective salvation," as opposed to the individualistic salvation
that the Bible teaches, was what motivated the Yankees and
their war on the South. This of course is exactly what Glenn
Beck has been ranting and raving about recently when it is
practiced by opponents of the neocon establishment – the exact
same establishment that embraces the Lincolnite, Yankee
millennialist fervor as one of its defining characteristics. That’s
why the neocons constantly invoke Lincoln’s "all men are
created equal" words from the Gettysburg Address (via
Jefferson’s Declaration of Secession) to "justify" their endless
military meddling in over 100 countries of the world. ALL men
deserve "equal" liberty, they tell us, and it is OUR job to invade,
conquer, and occupy any nation on earth where there is a lack of
such liberty.

New Mexico Liberty – August 2010 – Page 5

 Administrivia Subscriptions and Correspondence
by Mike Blessing, Editor For a print subscription, contact Ron Bjornstad for details. New
If you have news, interesting stories, op-ed pieces, a letter to the Mexico Liberty will be posted to the web, in PDF format, to the
editor, or timely information that you think belongs in the Files section of the Google group I’ve set up for it –
newsletter, groups.google.com/group/nmliberty
please send it along. I can be contacted at 505-515-7015, or just
send it to email address mikewb1971@gmail.com. If you are moving or change your mailing address, please use
keep us in the loop so we can keep your New Mexico Liberty
When sending your submission as an MS Word (or Open Office coming to you – contact Ron Bjornstad [
Text) file, send it single-spaced in 9-pt Arial – like this is. Margins rbjornstad@earthlink.net ] if you're a print version subscriber.
should be quarter-inch (0.25”) around, with no headers or Otherwise, contact the editor.
footers. If you send it in a text-only format, make it clear to me if
you want anything in bold type, underlined, in italics, struck- Advertising in New Mexico Liberty
through, different colors, etc. I’m not telepathic here, so help me Current rates for year-long spots
out. And NO Wordperfect files – I can't open those.
Business card Ø 8.00
Graphics (pictures, cartoons, etc.) – send the highest quality
graphics you can – email them to me at the address above, and Rates are subject to change at the discretion of the editor. The
I’ll do what I can to get them in the next issue. In particular, what editor will do his best to make any such changes only when
I want are pictures of YOU the LPNM members, either at LPNM- absolutely necessary.
sponsored events or at other peoples' events. Submission
Inserts – For an insert into the PDF version that goes out over
deadline for each issue – midnight, third Tuesday of the month.
the internet, contact the editor at email address . For an insert
Articles into the print edition, contact Ron Bjornstad at email address
rbjornstad@earthlink.net or phone number 505-288-4228.
As for writing your article, It should be concise (no longer than a
full Ø – The symbol for Federal Reserve Note(s), as used by Boston
page) and topical. A bit of humor helps, especially for op-ed T. Party in his books. In plain-text message traffic (such as
pieces. email), the acronym “FRN” will be used by the editor. See
What I'm really looking for in the way of articles is what's going javelinpress.com for more information. Also see the Wikipedia
on in the LPNM – what YOU the membership are up to in page for “Federal Reserve Note” –
spreading the message. For example, an article about the en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Reserve_Note.
stupidity, insanity and evil of the UN might get put in, depending
on available space and the quality of the article. A group of THE LPNM OFFICIAL WEBSITE – lpnm.us
LPNM members counter-protesting the raising of a UN flag by
LPNM OFFICIAL MAILING ADDRESS
the city council WILL get put in, and probably will get first priority.
AND PHONE NUMBER
Editorial Viewpoint
918 Ivory Road SE
The basis for libertarian thought is the Zero Aggression Principle Rio Rancho, NM 87124
[ZAP] – 505-288-4228
A libertarian is someone who believes that no human
being has the right – under any circumstances – to initiate
force against another human being, nor to threaten, incite
or delegate its initiation.
New Mexico Liberty holds that Libertarian candidates,
officeholders or appointed spokespersons at all levels of
government or the Party
should refrain from advocating new or more restrictive laws, new
or more expensive spending programs, or new or higher taxes.
To paraphrase from the medical profession, “First, do no harm.”
Submissions Policy
The editor reserves the right to refuse service to anyone for any
reason. The editor will most often be willing to explain any such
reasons. Appeals of the editor's refusal to post an advertisement,
article, letter to editor, or anything else can be made to the
LPNM's State Chair, Central Committee and/or Judicial Council.
Copyright
Copyright © 2003 – Present, Libertarian Party of New Mexico. All
rights reserved. Permission is explicitly granted for subscribers to
"When a place gets crowded enough to require ID's, social
recopy New Mexico Liberty for non-commercial purposes,
collapse is not far away. It is time to go elsewhere. The best
specifically as use as an outreach tool, provided that New
thing about space travel is that it made it possible to go else
Mexico Liberty is copied in its entirety. Use your imagination
where.”
here.
– Robert A. Heinlein, Time Enough For Love (1973)
The Notebooks of Lazarus Long

New Mexico Liberty – August 2010 – Page 6

 LPNM Central Committee County Contacts
Chair
Bernalillo – lpnm.us/bernalillo
Jay Vandersloot – 505-362-1733 / jayvandersloot@yahoo.com
Mike Blessing – 505-515-7015 / mikewb1971@gmail.com
Vice Chair
Colfax
Elisheva Levin – 505-286-1387 / elisheva@elishevalevin.com
Richard Moore – 575-377-6849 / myliberty@mail.com
Secretary
Siebert Ickler – 575-541-9079 / lpdac@peoplepc.com Dona Ana – lpnm.us/dona-ana
John Ennis – 575-571-6881 / johnennis2@gmail.com
Treasurer
Michael Simpson – 505-999-9954 / Lea
michael.p.simpson@gmail.com Christina Groth – 575-397-9366

District 1 Representative Lincoln

Bob Finch – 765-412-2374 / nmlibertarian@gmail.com Richard Obergfell – 575-378-8025 / lplcnm@valornet.com

District 2 Representative Los Alamos

VACANT Allen Cogbill – 505-662-7833 / acogbill@geopotential.com

District 3 Representative Luna

Mike Moss – 505-564-4905 / mmoss@plumbersoft.com Marilyn Steffen – 575-936-6843 / b_lamont5@hotmail.com

At-Large Representative, Seat A Otero – lpnm.us/otero

Allen Cogbill – 505-662-7833 / acogbill@geopotential.com Gilberto Heredia – 575-439-8234 / thrill@zianet.com
At-Large Representative, Seat B Roosevelt
VACANT Ken Sanders – 505-749-2085
At-Large Representative, Seat C San Juan – sjclp.org
Mike Blessing – 505-515-7015 / mikewb1971@gmail.com Gary Wood – zang5775@msn.com
At-Large Representative, Seat D Sandoval
Ron Bjornstad – 505-891-4541 / rbjornstad@earthlink.net Ron Bjornstad – 505-288-4228 / rbjornstad@earthlink.net
At-Large Representative, Seat E
VACANT LPNM Vacancies
Membership Coordinator Central Committee (2)
Ron Bjornstad – 505-288-4228 / rbjornstad@earthlink.net District 2 Representative
Press Secretary At-Large Representative, Seat E
Bill Koehler – 505-264-0835 / bkoehler8@comcast.net County Contacts (22)
Media Director Catron / Chaves / Cibola / Curry / De Baca
Bob Finch – 765-412-2374 / nmlibertarian@gmail.com Eddy / Grant / Guadalupe / Harding / Hidalgo
McKinley / Mora / Quay / Rio Arriba / San Miguel / Santa Fe
Campus Contacts Sierra / Socorro / Taos / Torrance / Union / Valencia
Central New Mexico Community College [CNM] College Contacts (3)
groups.myspace.com/cnmlibertarians
Mike Blessing – 505-515-7015 / mikewb1971@gmail.com Eastern New Mexico University (Portales)
New Mexico State University (Las Cruces)
New Mexico Tech (Socorro)
Internet Resources University of New Mexico (Various Campuses)
Official Website – lpnm.us Western New Mexico University (Silver City)
LPNM Discussion – groups.yahoo.com/lpnm-discuss Contact the state chair if you're interested in filling a slot.
If you don't, who will?
Blog – lpofnm.blogspot.com
Facebook group – facebook.com/group.php?gid=20233114967
Myspace group – groups.myspace.com/lpnm

Libertarian National Committee

For the full list, see this page – lp.org/leadership

Region 4 Representative
Norman Olsen – 303-277-9967 / Norman.Olsen@lp.org
Region 4 Alternate
Don Willis – Don.Wills@lp.org

New Mexico Liberty – August 2010 – Page 7

 Libertarian Party of New Mexico
Enrollment / Renewal / Donation Coupon
(Please print in all areas)

Name ___________________________________ Address ____________________________________

City ___________________________ State ________ Zip ______________ Phone _______________

Email _______________________ Employer ____________________ Occupation _________________

[ ] I am registered to vote as “Libertarian” in the State of New Mexico and wish to [ ] join or [ ] renew as a
caucus member. I am paying $25 annual dues. I will receive a one year (12 issues) subscription to the LPNM
state newsletter “New Mexico Liberty” (the national “LP NEWS” IS NOT included) and I will have delegate
status at state
conventions. I certify that I do not advocate the initiation of force to achieve political or social goals.

Signed _____________________________________________

[ ] I am not registered to vote as “Libertarian” in the State of New Mexico and/or [ ] I do not wish to sign the
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[ ] I am making a DONATION to the LPNM in the amount of $ ________ to be applied as follows:

$_____ General Fund $_____ Chairman's Fund $_____ Major Player Fund $_____ Win One Fund

TOTAL of DUES or SUBSCRIPTION plus DONATION $_________ to be paid as follows:

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Signature: _____________________________________________

Government mandated notices:

● The US Postal Service requires us to notify you that the annual New Mexico Liberty subscription
cost is included in your LPNM membership dues of $25.00.
● The Internal Revenue Service requires us to print “political contributions are not tax deductible” on
all fundraising appeals.
● The Federal Election Commission requires us to ask for the employer and occupation of each
individual whose contributions aggregate in excess of $200 in a calendar year.

The preceding notices alone should be enough reason to join the Libertarian Party, the only political party
working to increase your freedom.

COPY OR PRINT, FILL OUT, AND SEND TO:

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New Mexico Liberty – August 2010 – Page 8


A Modest Solution
by Butler Shaffer [ bshaffer@swlaw.edu ]
13 July 2010
lewrockwell.com/shaffer/shaffer220.html
"We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking
we used when we created them."
~ Albert Einstein
Governments in America – at both the state and federal level –
are in an escalating state of bankruptcy. Politicians, media
hacks, and academicians propose the kinds of responses
reminiscent of the classic definition of insanity: to keep repeating
the same actions expecting a different result. Increase income
taxes, cut spending, enact a federal sales tax, tax "junk food"
and tanning salons, are just a few of the suggestions being
made by those intent on recycling political solutions to politically-
generated problems.
At the center of all this is a national debt that has arisen from a
basic truth that statists prefer to ignore: human beings are much
less thrifty in spending other people’s money than they are with
their own. Let me control your checkbook, and I will come up
with a much different pattern of expenditures than you would
have. We are much more generous with the lives and property of
others, a state of mind upon which political systems depend for
their existence.
We need to step outside the circle of our conditioned thinking
and consider alternatives to our dilemmas. I have a modest
proposal to offer to resolve the national debt: repudiate it! The
reality is that, even after more extended wars and the
formalization of slave-state efforts to avoid it, defaulting on this
debt will become the ultimate solution. Leviathan, and its
institutional keepers, will not curb its appetites, particularly when
all that stands in its way are the always-expendable people.
I find support for my proposal in the thinking of the Keynesians,
whose ideas most of us accepted, helping to produce our current
state of affairs. My undergraduate introduction to the study of
economics was firmly rooted in Keynesianism, whose tenets
expressed what I assumed Thomas Carlyle meant in regarding
this field of study as the "dismal science." One of the frequently
stated defenses of government debt was "we only owe it to
ourselves." It was only years later that I was to discover who the
"ourselves" were to whom we were indebted. Such creditors
proved to be the same gang who comprised "we, the people" in
the creation of government in our country: the institutional
interests who comprise the ruling political establishment.
If the idea that we "only owe [the debt] to ourselves" was
sufficient to help generate popular acceptance of Keynesian
doctrines, should not the repudiation of this debt be seen as a
reasonable solution? After all, if I "owe" myself $100, would it
make sense for me to contrive all kinds of mechanisms and
schedules for repaying it? It is comparable to the kind of
nonsense thinking one sees in advertising: "you owe it to
yourself to" purchase a retailer’s product or services. If I failed to
make this purchase, would I have a cause of action against
myself grounded in negligence or breach of contract? Could I go
to court and get a judgment against myself for my misfeasance?
The proposition is so absurd that it could only be taken seriously
in a law school!
To suggest that the national debt be repudiated will strike
politically-conditioned minds as irresponsible. "Responsibility" is
a word which, when divorced from individual conduct and the
concept of property, can become little more than a duty one has
to satisfy obligations others have created for him or her. By
contrast, I am responsible for the consequences of my actions,
or from what my property has done to another, because – and
only because – as a self-owning person I am in control of my
energies and other resources. Political action, on the other hand,
is the very essence of irresponsible behavior, for it allows those
who desire a particular end to shift the costs of providing it to
those who do not want it.
The myth of "representative government" is invoked, at this
point, to inform us that politicians and other state officials are our
"agents"; that we – you and I – are the "principals" in this
arrangement who are responsible for what our "agents" do in our
behalf. Thus, if we have directed our agents to run up enormous
debts, we are obliged to satisfy such liabilities. I trust that such
delusional thinking – grounded as it is on the "social contract"
theory of the state – will not require much refutation here. But in
case a reader has not thought this through, let me observe that –
apart from a few isolated examples of voluntarily constituted
communal societies – I am unaware of any political system that
has arisen by way of a consensus [i.e., universal agreement]
among those to be collectively bound. Governments – including
the American varieties – have arisen through and been
maintained by conquest; by violent force. The idea that one who
has not sanctioned the state that insists upon controlling him can
be considered a "principal" who is vicariously responsible for the
acts of his phantom "agents," is nothing more than the imposition
of duties upon those who have not undertaken them. Along with
the myth of "democracy" – which I have defined as the illusion
that my wife and I, combined, have twice the political influence of
David Rockefeller – such ideas are part of the corruption of
thought upon which state systems depend.
Even the politicians who have been voted into office cannot
reasonably claim to be the agents of anyone. Voting takes place
anonymously, in the privacy of a polling booth, with no public
expression of one’s choices. Unlike the sales representative of
the United Updike Company – who has been provided, by his
employer, with an office, business cards, telephone, and other
indicia of his status as an agent – politicians are unable to clearly
identify anyone for whom he or she acts. Furthermore, those
who do not vote – such as myself – could never be accused of
selecting any politician as his or her elected agent. The man who
claims to represent the congressional district in which I live
almost always votes contrary to my personal values: in what
twisted way could he be said to be my representative in
Washington?
The following example might serve as an effective means of
getting the state to formally acknowledge that it is not the agent
of any ordinary people. One might identify a given candidate –
perhaps for the House of Representatives – and send them a
certified letter [for evidentiary purposes] telling that person as
follows: "I intend to vote for you, in the general election, to be my
duly selected representative in Congress. If you are elected, I
hereby direct you to never vote for any measure that would,
whether directly or indirectly, increase my tax obligations."
[ Continued on Page 12 ]
New Mexico Liberty – August 2010 – Page 9
[ Continued from Page 11 ] You may recall the "financial crisis" that had hit New York City,
represented as some vague "threat" to all residents of Gotham.
Should that person be elected, a follow-up letter should at once
be written stating: "Congratulations on your being elected as my I recall the anguish of a fellow faculty member at a university
representative to Congress. I voted for you in yesterday’s where I was teaching at the time. He literally cried – real tears –
election. You will recall my letter of [previous date] in which I at the prospects facing New York City, as he begged our support
directed you, as my agent, to never vote for any bill that would for a rescue from Congress. "My wife and I (sob!) spent our
increase my tax obligations." After taking his or her seat in honeymoon in (sob!) New York, and the thought that Central
Congress, should the representative vote in favor of any such Park (sob!) and the theaters (sob!) should disappear is (sob!) too
tax-increasing measure, the alleged "principal" would painful to bear." "Where do you think all of this is going?", I
immediately file an action against the so-called "agent" for asked. "Do you think Middle-Eastern bankers are going to attach
breach of contract. The courts would then have to confront the a rope to Manhattan and pull it to Saudi Arabia?" He just gave
issue of whether an elected official is or is not such an "agent" of me the same kind of empty stare we are likely to see on the face
those who so select them. I suspect the judiciary would hold that of Boobus, as he embraces his "responsibility" for seeing to it
such officials are not the agents of anyone other than that the current gang of special interests receive their promised
themselves. spoils.
The fallacy of the state as an agent further unravels in the face The political establishment and its media toadies will condemn
of the routine practice of government officials keeping their any sentiment that suggests that you and I approach the solution
actions secret from their alleged principals. In what marketplace to the national debt crisis with the same self-interest motivation
setting would an employer be legally prohibited from knowing the that led the institutional order to create it. We will once again be
details of its employee’s course of employment conduct? The admonished to put aside our "selfishness" for the "greater good,"
most recent example of this practice was seen in the House of an appeal that will bring us face-to-face with Stendhal’s
Representatives voting down a measure that would have observation that "the shepherd always tries to persuade the
provided for an audit of the Federal Reserve policies and sheep that their interests and his own are the same."
practices. By a 229-198 margin, Republican and Democrat
Butler Shaffer teaches at the Southwestern University School of
agency pretenders decided that it was not the business of their
Law. He is the author of the newly-released In Restraint of
alleged "principals" to be privy to the knowledge these elected
Trade: The Business Campaign Against Competition, 1918–
officials share with one another.
1938 and of Calculated Chaos: Institutional Threats to Peace
In the face of an indebtedness generated by those who make a and Human Survival. His latest book is Boundaries of Order.
pretense of representing us – even though we might not have so
chosen them; who keep secret the purposes and interests of the
real beneficiaries of their actions; who stand by, without
objection, as trillions of dollars are shoveled from the Treasury
into the coffers of the corporate owners of the political system;
with what principled and reasoned intelligence can it be said that
we – you and I – are responsible for the ensuing disaster, and
have an obligation to restore solvency to the system?
There is no better time than the present for Boobus Americanus
to finally get around to do what he has long resisted doing:
questioning the nature of the state. While the Constitution and
those who officiate on behalf of the state speak to the promotion
of the "general welfare" as the underlying purpose of the
arrangement, the reality is that all political systems – in whatever
time or region of the world – exist for the sole purpose of
benefiting a few at the expense of the many. Our liberty, our
wealth, even our very lives, are at the disposal of self-anointed
masters who have conditioned us to believe in the legitimacy of
their rule. As the system intensifies threats of its violence against
us to keep us in a line that can lead only to our individual and
collective bankruptcy, intelligent minds would do well to ask the
whyness of our supposed obligations.
We might begin by identifying the real parties in interest in all of
this. Such an inquiry would be yet another invocation of the "cui
bono?" question: who has benefited from the destructive mess
that has been created? How should moral and causal
responsibility be allocated in defining who should bear the costs?
If my neighbor loses his job and later goes bankrupt, should I be
considered "responsible" for his losses, as well as obligated to
his creditors?
This is but a revisitation of an earlier financial "crisis" that
American taxpayers were called upon to resolve. In the early
1970s, New York City was unable to meet its obligations to
bondholders who had underwritten various governmental
projects – including the construction of the World Trade Center.
The corporations and others whose special interests had been
served by such endeavors, were not receiving their promised
bond payments. The politicians and the mainstream media were
quick to the rescue.
New Mexico Liberty – August 2010 – Page 10