Hi Pax,
We were talking about the pendulum swinging between No Govt and All Govt.
I think what your question says is that without some formal govt the strong will govern the weak. This has happened too often in the past to be denied.
The context of my contention was that once you put two or more together you are going to have conflict, both within the group and from outside the group. That's where I see the need for governance. Since the fundamental power of govt is coercion, I don't think the biggest guy should have all the marbles. Sorry.
I contend that without minimum governance we will at best be individually reduced to defending our rights to the detriment of our other productive activities. At worst we will have to put up with what you stated in your question. Then again, maybe each of us can build an individual stockade and move into it and defend it from all comers? (A quick read about the Greek City-States and their incessant self-destructive warfare might be indicated here for budding libs).
Meanwhile, while we are all busy defending ourselves from our "friends" (fellow libs?) we can all be individually overcome by an organized "enemy" (non-libs).
H. L. Mencken made a similar quote to the one you posted:
We were talking about the pendulum swinging between No Govt and All Govt.
I think what your question says is that without some formal govt the strong will govern the weak. This has happened too often in the past to be denied.
The context of my contention was that once you put two or more together you are going to have conflict, both within the group and from outside the group. That's where I see the need for governance. Since the fundamental power of govt is coercion, I don't think the biggest guy should have all the marbles. Sorry.
I contend that without minimum governance we will at best be individually reduced to defending our rights to the detriment of our other productive activities. At worst we will have to put up with what you stated in your question. Then again, maybe each of us can build an individual stockade and move into it and defend it from all comers? (A quick read about the Greek City-States and their incessant self-destructive warfare might be indicated here for budding libs).
Meanwhile, while we are all busy defending ourselves from our "friends" (fellow libs?) we can all be individually overcome by an organized "enemy" (non-libs).
H. L. Mencken made a similar quote to the one you posted:
The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.