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From: KFL%MX.LCS.MIT.EDU@MC.LCS.MIT.EDU.UUCP
Newsgroups: mod.politics
Subject: Defense
Message-ID: <12264922592.22.MCGREW@RED.RUTGERS.EDU>
Date: Mon, 22-Dec-86 18:12:01 EST
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Posted: Mon Dec 22 18:12:01 1986
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    From: WRITIMM%YALEVMX.BITNET@WISCVM.WISC.EDU
    Subject: Defense

    >  Do you really think that Qadaffi and
    > Khomenei are more trustworthy than ANY INDIVIDUAL in the US?

    I can think of several people whom I trust less than Khomenei or
    Gadhafi. What makes Americans so damn trustworthy, anyway?

  What I mean was, do you believe that for every individual American,
Qadaffi is more trustworthy than that individual?  Since you seem to
think that Qadaffi should be allowed to have nuclear weapons but that
no individual American should, I guess you do.
  My point is that it is easy to find flaws in libertarian thought.
These always take the form "If you give a person freedom X, he might
abuse that freedom".  This is true.  But it is debating in a vacuum.
We are comparing a libertarian system to the present system, not to
some hypothetical ideal world in which everyone is peaceful and sits
around in white robes doing whatever people do to pass the time in
utopia.
  In particular, according to currently accepted international norms,
it is ok for any national government to have nuclear weapons, even if
that government is a single individual.  It is not, however, ok for
individuals who are not kings or emperors to have nuclear weapons.
  Don't get me wrong.  I don't like nuclear weapons.  I wish they
didn't exist.  But they do.  As long as anyone has them, I think
everyone should be allowed to have them.  I would support an
international agreement that nobody is to have them, if it applied to
everyone everywhere, if it had no conditions attached, and if we had
some way to verify compliance.  But as long as one person or
government anywhere has one, I think you or I should be allowed to
have one too.

    >    Any country whose inhabitants won't defend it except when 
    >  coerced is not worthy of being defended.

    Strange. If you don't need to defend your country (you are not at
    war), a strong case can be made for not having a draft. You seem
    to be advocating a mandatory draft, ...

  If you had read my messages you would know that I totally oppose a
draft even during wartime.

    ...  How is a nuclear war, fought with 19,000 strategic and
    possibly 31,000 tactical nuclear weapons "painless". It might be
    short, but its effects would certainly last a long time.

  Another straw man.  I do not advocate nuclear war.  Or any war,
unless we are actually invaded.
                                                              ...Keith
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