“By the Power Vested in Me” Kokesh 2020 Chooses Platform Over Property
“The entire concept of voting for someone to rule you...of imposing your choice of a leader on someone else, is unethical.”
~ Adam Kokesh
“...by the power invested in me by the American people through the American electoral process...”
~ Adam Kokesh
If the two quotes above seem to contradict one another well, that’s because they do.
What is the “the American people” to an individualist anarchist? And since when has the “American electoral process” been a legitimate means by which a voluntaryist can gain authority or claim ownership of property?
In this video I analyze some of Adam Kokesh’s confused ideas on voting, his “presidential platform,” and most importantly, point out the philosophically irreconcilable differences, and outright incompatibilities between his plan, and the foundational, logically sound voluntaryist/anarchist property ethic.
To the Kokesh fans out there (of which I very recently was one) I would encourage you to examine the content and arguments made in this video, objectively, carefully, and rationally, before raising counterpoints or slinging mud in the comments section.
Cheers!
~KafkA
Graham Smith is a Voluntaryist activist, creator, and peaceful parent residing in Niigata City, Japan. Graham runs the "Voluntary Japan" online initiative with a presence here on Steem, as well as DTube and Twitter. (Hit me up so I can stop talking about myself in the third person!)
My take on Kokesh is that he's in love with his own cult of personality. He's less concerned with understanding underlying principles of property than he is his "grand plan." As enticing as it sometimes is to imagine what we'd do as President to abolish the government, it would be a pretty fruitless endeavor even under the best circumstances.
Honestly, I think that's a large part of the problem I have with many libertarians, and even quite a few ancaps: either an (1) extremely shallow understanding of property rights, or (2) an almost complete lack of understanding of property rights.
Spot-on.
LOL This is primo!!!!
You made a great video and I agree with what is said.
The only thing useful I can see is maybe the publicity, just like Ron Paul got a lot of people to think.
Maybe it's an idea to make a separate post about property rights and the way of acquiering property, with the links to the books, in the post to make it easier for people to find.........it's just a suggestion you of course don't have to do that. :)
Peace :)
The probably is that the campaign is a dishonest one (whether intentional or not) as far as voluntaryism is concerned, and second, that the fellow that is running, and his team, have a history of questionable financial dealings and alleged lack of accounting for donations (see the Shield Mutual case) coupled with seemingly endless donation requests. Hate to see people honesty concerned with liberty fleeced (intentionally or otherwise) but if they need an “anarcho-christ” (many of them seem to), then so be it. They’ll have to learn on their own.
If a person was even going to consider the notion of inserting them self into the system to try to dismantle it from the inside you would think that a little leg work would be done up front. The president is the CEO of The UNITED STATES INC. The power of that position is granted and left checked by THE CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES INC. That is the shareholder board like in any other company. SO let's say you become CEO through running in an "election", you step up and decree "We are abolishing this thing called the UNITED STATES "government" (Which would include THE CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES). Congress would deem you not fit and impeach you that second. Game over.
Just a small detail I think that he has overlooked.
=)
Gotta say I re-evaluate what I think whenever I see your work. Good stuff!
To be honest, even if he did get in he would not be allowed (one way or another) to make changes to the status quo anyway.
Its an interesting experiment nonetheless, with its inherent faults as you point out.
If there were new, uninhabited land to colonise and start again as free people on the land I believe we would have an interesting new adventure. At least till the bombs started falling :-P
The only other way I see a real change is through revolution. Maybe it is this and not a war they want, to reduce the population. We are being pushed until we snap to 'weed out' the troublemakers.
Interesting times.
It's a nice post!
Thank you as always!
well there went the last few shreds of respect I had left for kokesh.
re-steemed for Anarchy! Not the violence of the vote!
What exactly are you objecting to? Assuming the ridiculous long-shot odds of 34% of Americans voting to have Mr. AK become the executor of this "bankruptcy" account, I ask: where is the downside (morally) for him to split up the assets and send them back to the states, respectfully? What else should be done with all this stolen property? The taking of WDC is no different than assuming control of a pirate ship. Is force not justified in that endeavor?
As for the debt to the banksters? Sorry, their counterfeit currency operation never legitimately loaned "money" ... it loaned promissory notes for pre-existing promissory notes, compounded in effect by "fractional reserve" lending. Those "debts" are right to be erased, instantaneously... and frankly, the Kokesh regime, before disbanding, should place every one of them in Guantanamo Bay prison for Treason, Theft, Fraud, Conspiracy and Counterfeiting. But I understand dealing with anarchos and the "justice system"......... What justice system?
I stated exactly what I object to in the video. His plan violates natural law and libertarian property ethic. I don't know how to state it in a clearer manner. Let me give an example. Let's say you live next to a national park and hunt there, fish there, hike there.
According to libertarian property norms, if this land were "unowned" as it technically is already, and definitely would be in the case of the erasure of the "debts," you and your fellow locals who have already mixed their labor with the land, and have the closest objective, intersubjectively ascertainable link to the land, are the one's to whom it should rightfully go, allowing your community of individual property owners to decide what should be done with it.
Now imagine I show up and say. "See all these national parks? I own them. But just for a second. Me and my friends...ahem..."custodians" will decide how they will be used." Clearly this is no different than voting to leverage political force to get one's way, which Kokesh has explicitly stated, several times over, vocally and in writing, that he is opposed to.
The error in your analogy involving the pirate ship is the same one Kokesh makes when he describes what he is planning to do as coming across a stolen motorcycle on the highway, and returning it. These are both one-to-one, concrete situations. A pirate ship is a single thing belonging to some individual(s). So is a motorcycle. Vast swathes of land, people, and resources are not a single thing to be comandeered. "America" is an abstraction, as is "government." Claiming ownership over this abstraction, and in effect, everyone and everything within the geo-social-political boundaries, even for a short time, and then issuing an executive order (which by definition depends on force to be enacted) is NOT A LIBERTARIAN PLAN.
This is basic, kids' stuff, really, but sadly the wide-eyed Kokesh-ites appear to have found their god. That's great. Just stop calling it voluntaryism. It's not. That's not even debatable.
Any system that puts us together sharing space, resources and a society is bound to have some contradictions woven into it. Deciding on a particular way to live together is always a give and take process and there is no perfect solution. We should be cognisant of all contradictions, but it might be a bit naive to expect there aren't going to be any.
Voluntaryism is not a utopian philosophy, so the fact that things will never be “perfect” is totally fine. All this video is pointing out is that Adam is posing as a Voluntaryist while supporting a plan that isn’t Voluntaryist in nature (intentionally or otherwise). This is the same as me claiming an apple is an orange. It’s not about some idea of perfection, but facts. He shouldn’t be selling his plan as a Voluntaryist one and taking donations from new anarchists/voluntaryists, when it decidedly isn’t one.
Mass is stupid. That's the reason you need a leader.
Who or what is “Mass” in this declaration?
Ah, Catholic mass? Nothing to do with the content in the vid beyond a silly graphic.