Yes, my political beliefs are radical. That does not make them wrong, illegal, or abhorrent.
I knew better, but a few days ago I made the mistake of participating in an online “discussion” where I had been criticized for promoting anarchism. It came from one of my posts which had been shared by a good friend. As most political discussions do, it quickly devolved into a hot mess of childish accusations, ad hominem attacks, and even indirect threats of violence. After I’d had enough, I simply left the discussion. There’s really no point in trying to debate anyone who doesn’t understand the concept of civil discourse. I knew this, but sometimes I still fall victim to taking the bait.
I didn’t arrive at my current political views until much later in life. I’ll soon be 67 years old and my journey was a long and tortured one. I thought it might be worth sharing that journey, if for no other reason than to get it off my chest. I say it’s been torturous for good reason. Why? Because I had to let go of of my previous political ideology, one’s I held with certainty and defended fiercely through each of those political phases. It’s not an easy thing to admit you’ve been wrong. But through each of those phases, many of which were radical changes, I did just that. These changes have left me with a sympathetic view of those who hold the same views I once held because I understand why they believe them. This is why I hold no animosity toward their views. I do however hold them accountable for vicious attacks to others who hold different views.
My phases of political views fall into the following categories, in the order I held them:
PHASE I 1971-1979 (age 16-24), Leftist Liberal.
I use the term liberal here not in the classical sense, but as it’s understood in modern American parlance. I was a hippy wannabe in my teens and rebellious by nature. I was very much into the drugs, rock and roll, peace, love, and beads scene. I read nothing about politics and relied simply on my gut instincts to guide my political views. My life goal was to be a commercial artist. In 1975 I enlisted in the Air Force for the simple reason that there were no jobs available anywhere else. This illustrates that while I claimed to be a liberal democrat that I had little commitment toward any ideology, given that the Vietnam War was essentially over and during that time, committed liberals hated the military. I voted for Jimmy Carter in my first act of voting in 1976. I distinctly remember watching Gerald Ford’s emotional concession speech and thought to myself, “Oh no. I voted for the wrong guy.” It was the last time I voted for a Democrat. It was only then that I began to take an interest in politics.
PHASE II: 1980-2000 (age 25-45), Rock Ribbed Republican.
In the early 1980s, still in the Air Force, I began taking college courses at night. My goal was to get a degree so I could obtain a commission in the Air Force through a commissioning program for enlisted airmen. The requirement for entry into that program was to commit to an engineering or computer science discipline. I chose computer science.
There were however many general education requirements to accompany my major. Several of those, primarily basic economics courses, were pivotal in my transformation from Democrat to Republican. Unlike most of my peers, I found economics fascinating, even to the point of taking other economics courses as electives. At about the same time, I discovered a PBS series called Free to Choose, hosted by Milton Friedman. This show, combined with my basic understanding of economics, led to a drastic change in my political views. While Friedman was a well known, Nobel Prize winning economist, he was also a libertarian. Interestingly, at that time I didn’t associate him with libertarianism, I just liked that everything he said made perfect sense. The concept of free markets entered my brain forever. Unfortunately, I didn’t even know that libertarians were a thing. I wish I had explored that further.
In 1984 I received my commission and spent the rest of my career in the Air Force as a software engineer. I swore and oath to the Constitution again, albeit a slightly different one than the ones given to enlisted folk. I voted for Reagan, loved him, and thought he was the best president ever. I had yet to do any kind of deep dive into what was really going on the political world. George Bush came along and I sided with everything he did, even the wars.
Keep in mind, I was still in the military and bought into the whole concept of the Constitution being as sacred as the Bible. And yes, I was a war hawk. In 1986, I got married for the second time. Like me, my wife was also a junior officer and was a committed conservative. Bill Clinton entered the scene and I despised him, believing him to the beginning of the end of our country. I retired from the Air Force in 1994. At this time, I was still a hard-core, Constitution worshiping Republican believing that all things evil were Democrat and all things good were Republican. There was no nuance and no gray areas. Binary thinking was the extent of my intellectual pursuits. I was a voracious reader, but the only non-fiction I entertained was written by Bush acolytes and their like.
PHASE III: 2001-2014 (age 46-62), Repubican to Minarchist Libertarian.
George W. Bush came along and so did 9-11. Still the loyal Repubican I was supportive of anything Bush did, even with the war in Iraq. It never occurred to me to question my beliefs. After all, I was right and all the “libs” were delusional. I still hadn’t discovered the libertarian movement., but I was beginning to question my beliefs. I was frustrated that every time Republicans gained national power, they never set things right. The budgets exploded and they didn’t even attempt to repeal the measures that Democrats brought to us, those dangerous slides into hell our country was enduring. Looking back, this was the seed that planted my move to libertarian philosophy. That wouldn’t take hold right then, but it was there.
When Obama got elected, I was outraged at his desire to “fundamentally change America,” as if that hadn’t already been happening since the early 1960s. About this time I discovered a true intellectual giant of an author. He wasn’t like those other intellectuals–not the snooty, big word, chart wielding economist, but one who could communicate to the masses like Milton Friedman did. This man was Thomas Sowell. I mention him not because he’s a libertarian scholar. I’m not sure if he claims to be libertarian, but he did introduce the concept of nuance and gray areas to me. Suddenly, some of my previously held views were being challenged. I still admire this man immensely.
By the time Obama got elected the second time, I was actively searching out ways to sort out my disconnect with the Republican party. I finally discovered the liberty movement. It began with reading Reason Magazine and watching Youtube videos of other libertarians. Let’s call them the Cato wing of libertarians. They were the stuffed shirt variety, mixing it up in Washington, D.C. with the other parties, desperately trying to earn the respect of the Washington elite. I occasionally ran across the Mises folks, but always dismissed them because they believed the unthinkable: that government shouldn’t exist. “What a bunch of nutjobs,” I thought.
PHASE IV: 2015-Present (age 46-67), Anarcho-Capitalist.
By the time Donald Trump exploded into the world of politics, I had finally discovered people like Tom Woods, Dave Smith, and Michael Malice. This exposure was almost exclusively from podcasts. In turn, they introduced me to some of the giants of pure libertarianism. People like Ron Paul (who I laughed at during his presidential campaigns), Lysander Spooner, Murray Rothbard and Ludwig von Mises. That was followed by a deep dive into their writings. I distinctly recall thinking Ron Paul was an idiot for claiming that 9/11 was in part caused by U.S. military intervention in the Middle East. I now wish I’d been more open-minded back then because now I know he was right. Unfortunately, at that time I was still holding on to the idea that my simple, binary thinking was bullet-proof and I couldn’t possibly be wrong. I remained a lower-case libertarian for quite some time because I didn’t want to be associated with any political party, believing that all parties are subject to corruption and eventually succumb to it.
By 2016 I embraced anarcho-capitalism in full, believing that all government was inherently evil. I still believe that. In 2020, I joined the Libertarian Party because I was convinced the LP would be taken over by the Mises Caucus. This was necessary because the party had been overtaken with other caucuses that weren’t true to libertarian philosophy, like the libertarian communist wing, an abomination if there ever was one. Incidentally, that takeover has finally taken place.
CONCLUSION
I have to point out that embracing anarcho-capitalism came with some serious grieving and some regrets. I took an oath twice in the military to support and defend the Constitution. At the time I took those oaths, I meant it with every ounce of my soul. It has been quite difficult for me at times, renouncing something I spent so much time and effort supporting. I spent much of my military career overseeing huge, highly classified war planning software development projects during the cold war. This mortifies me now, given my intense hatred of war. While I don’t deny war may be required and inevitable in certain circumstances, I’m convinced now that in nearly all cases it can be avoided. My regrets are only that I wish I had been smarter and more inquisitive during those times in my life. This is also why I don’t believe that most people who support other ideas necessarily have evil intent. They, like I was, are just ignorant and unwilling to expend the energy to explore other ideas. This doesn’t mean that the results of their work is not evil though. It is.
All of the above explains how I made the journey from liberal Democrat, to conservative Republican, to minarchist libertarian, to anarcho-capitalist libertarian. I won’t use this article to defend anarchism. That would be an exercise in futility and only anger those who resent the concept of a governmentless society, i.e., those who are unwilling to explore other ideas of organizing how we live as human beings.
I now believe the U.S. Constitution is a failed document and that it should no longer be treated like a religious document, never to be criticized. The Declaration of Independence is one of the most beautiful documents ever written. It’s intent was noble, but alas, the Constitution that followed it was destined for failure. The failures began as early as the John Adams administration’s unconstitutional Aliens and Sedition Acts of 1798.
Thus began the twisting of words and meanings of the Constitution itself to the will of the governing classes. Each administration following that one continued to add to those perversions of the Constitution. The decline has been constant. The decline has become steeper and steeper as time goes on with just enough minor adjustments to convince the electorate that it is salvageable. Two steps forward, one step back. Government, in all its forms is subject to corruption and it nearly always takes place. I could cite hundreds of examples of how our government behaves in unconstitutional ways, but I’ll just mention two here. Foremost among those is the complete and utter violation of the Tenth Amendment. That alone contributes to the defiling of our Constitution in a way that makes it impossible to correct. But if there is any single event that should remind us all that our government does not and will not protect our civil liberties. It began in 2020 and continues in part now, when our government assailed the population and disregarded the rights “enshrined” in our Constitution, by issuing mandates and lockdowns that stripped us of nearly all of our civil rights. That was the most egregious act perpetrated by our government since it’s inception. If you can’t see that, then your vision is clearly clogged by your failed ideology. One can offer all the justifications needed for removing those rights from us, but no one can deny that they happened. That those rights can be removed at the whim of presidents, governors, mayors, commissioners and countless un-elected bureaucrats says all you need to know about the strength of the Constitution itself. I care not that some believe it was done “for our own good.” Those are the words of tyrants immemorial. And they are the words of the tyrants who perpetrated this upon us in the last two years. And that the majority of the U.S. population supported this is evidence that this “democracy” we have will lead us further in the wrong direction.
I will finish with one quote that fairly represents why I’m an anarchist:
“But whether the Constitution really be one thing, or another, this much is certain – that it has either authorized such a government as we have had, or has been powerless to prevent it. In either case, it is unfit to exist.” Lysander Spooner.
Fellow ancaps might wonder why it took me so long to come around. My only response is that I’m a slow learner. But at least I’m a learner, which is more than I can say about the vast population of adults.
NOTE: Anarcho-Capitalism is now also known as Voluntaryism. This recent renaming of the philosophy came about as a result of the misunderstanding of the word anarchy and to differentiate previously developed forms of anarchism from anarcho-capitalism. Incidentally, the original form of anarchism was a movement by certain factions of the communist movement, and then misappropriated by the libertarians of the time.