Sorry about the hiatus, folks. Blogger suffered a security breach, and after disabling the FTP account used to upload to Liberty4me, I procrastinated in setting access back up.

posted by John Hoffman at 11:22 AM

More on stamps... In the near future, if you want to mail a letter, you'll have to present your ID.

Stamps will be serialized and matched with the sender (or at least the person who bought the stamps) when they are scanned in the post office. A lot of the infrastructure for this sort of system is already in place.

posted by John Hoffman at 9:15 PM

It looks like, if you don't like stamps with American flags on them, you may be investigated as a subversive.

I personally like the American flag. I don't see it as a statist symbol; I feel it is a symbol of freedom. (And I think the Statue of Liberty is, if anything, more broken as a symbol than the flag.) But symbol's meaning contrasts sharply with the incident, and clearly shows what's happening to our liberty.

In other news -- are you still worried about the National ID card? The one that's already being tried out inside the US military? Well, now it's time to fear the International ID card too...

posted by John Hoffman at 10:36 PM

Astroturfing.

Astroturfing is the term used when someone counterfeits a grassroots effort. Instead of being forwarded by people, it's being propped up by outside interests.

Very recently the largest ever discovery of astroturfing took place. According to the Wall Street Journal Online, the people behind NannyCulture.com ordered a multitude of documents from the IRS using the Freedom of Information Act, detailing the finances and management beind various tax-exempt organizations and pieced together the links. The evidence is available at ActivistCash.com.

Or should I say, WAS available. As of this time, both the ActivistCash and NannyCulture web sites are down. Overloaded? System crash? Or were they hacked?

UPDATE: The site is back up. Go take a peek.

posted by John Hoffman at 10:33 AM

Unattributed story, found on an email list...

I was going to bed the other night when my wife told me that I had left the light on in the shed. She could see from the bedroom window. As I looked for myself, I saw that there were people in the shed taking things.

I phoned the police, but they told me that no one was in this area to help at this time, but they would send someone over as soon as they were available. I said OK, hung up, and waited one minute, then phoned the police back.

"Hello. I just called you a minute ago because there were people in my shed. Well, you don't have to worry about them now 'cause I've shot them all."

Within five minutes there were half a dozen police cars in the area, an Armed Response unit, the works. Of course, they caught the burglars red-handed. One of the officers said: "I thought you said that you'd shot them!"

I replied with "I thought you said there was nobody available!"

posted by John Hoffman at 7:47 PM

Thanks to Neal Boortz for the link -- the Massachusetts Libertarian Party has turned in a petition with 75,000 signatures calling for the repeal of the state income tax. Neal opined that the state's legislature will be doing anything it can to scuttle the ballot, including having it declared unconstitutional ex-post-facto. I tend to agree with him.

posted by John Hoffman at 10:34 AM

Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee responded to calls for increasing state income taxes by creating a new charity -- the "Tax Me More Fund". Arkansasans who wish to pay more to their government may do so by contributing. Huckabee said that he will reduce spending rather than raising taxes. Not exactly a libertarian elimination of taxation, but still noteworthy.

posted by John Hoffman at 10:05 AM