Re: Information sheet thingie

Kevin Dempsey Peterson (kevin@cafe.berkeley.edu)
Thu, 18 Dec 1997 09:13:03 -0800 

Version 2.  Let's play find the newly introduced typos.

                   Cal Libertarians Information

This is a short information sheet about Cal Libertarians, a
libertarian student group at UC Berkeley.  It is posted regularly
to the ucb.org.cal-libertarians and ucb.politics.  If you received
this message through email, it's because, a) you requested it, b)
someone messed up, c) we thought you'd like to know about it or d)
we're desperate for members and are spamming you.

Contents:
    What is libertarianism?
    Activities
    Bureaucratic Stuff
    Online Stuff

What is libertarianism?
    Basically, libertarians want drastically less government in all
    areas.  Some argue that government doesn't work, some believe
    that government has no moral justification for it's power, but
    all agree that we have way to much of it right now.
    Libertarians are opposed to government taking money from the
    people in the form of taxes, because people can most often
    better decide how they want that money spent, and in any case,
    are the only ones entitled to make the decision Libertarians
    are also opposed to government limitations of freedoms,
    thinking that there is no reason that government, a group of
    people, has any moral jurisdiction to tell people how to live
    their lives.

    Libertarians do not fit on the conventional right/left
    political spectrum, but for issues, they will likely agree with
    the left on issues of personal freedom (abortion, free speech,
    deregulation of drugs), and with the right on economic issues
    (taxes, welfare, regulation of corporations)  It would probably
    help to understand the libertarian position by thinking of them
    as both more extreme and more consistent than either the right
    or the left.  For example, the right only want to end welfare
    to the poor; libertarians want to end welfare to corporations
    in the form of subsidies as well.  The left may want to allow
    doctors to prescribe marijuana for medicinal purposes;
    libertarians don't see where government gets the moral right to
    dictate what you are allowed to put in your body in the first
    place.  I couldn't (personally), tell you that if you smoke pot
    I'm going to lock you in a room for 3 years (at least not
    morally), but government does that every day.  On the other
    hand, I do have the right (and an obligation) to try to prevent
    you from killing someone.

    Libertarians draw a strong distinction between real crimes,
    which have a victim who was harmed (physically, financially or
    emotionally) like murder, fraud, reckless driving, and
    harassment;  and victimless crimes, where everyone involved
    consented to the "crime", like drug use, non-mainstream sexual
    activities (oral sex is illegal in some states) and gambling.
    Liberals want government to be your mother, conservatives want
    government to be your father, libertarians want government to
    mind its own business and not bother people who aren't
    bothering anyone else.

    The standard recommendations on where to learn more about
    libertarianism are _Libertarianism_in_One_Lesson_ by David
    Bergland and _Why_Government_Doesn't_Work_ by Harry Browne.
    You could also come to our meetings or ask questions on the
    newsgroup (see below)

Activities
    Dates and times for meetings and such next semester are not yet
    set.  This semester have had a table on Sproul two or three
    days a week, and meetings once a week.  We had a
    "anti-authoritarian movie night", which was intended to be a
    monthly thing, but it got started too late in the semester.
    Hopefully for spring.  The first thing to be done for next
    semester will be deciding on a good time for meetings and
    holding elections for officers.

    We're kicking around ideas for something to protest, and
    whether we should get an "Operation Politically Homeless" booth
    for next semester.  You might want to check out the newsgroup
    or the archives (see below).

    Some members of Cal Libertarians also go to Berkeley
    Libertarian Union (BLU) meetings.  BLU is a more discussion
    oriented group whereas Cal Libertarians is (or wants to be :-)
    an activist group.  BLU can be contacted through Jennie Dal
    Busco, minerva@autobahn.org.

Bureaucratic Stuff
    Mako Shuttleworth is going to be acting president until we have
    a chance to do elections (probably at the second meeting).  We
    will have to do another SAS (Student Activities & Services)
    form next semester, but it looks as if we have signatories
    lined up.  I'll add the officers here as soon as the elections
    are done.

Online Resources
    Cal Libertarians maintains a web page at
    http://www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~callib
    It provides some basic information on Libertarianism,
    information about the club, and links to other sites of
    interest.  Getting more information online is one of the goals
    for the near future.

    There is a newsgroup, ucb.org.cal-libertarians, which is probably
    where you are reading this message.  It has a charter:
        ucb.org.cal-libertarians is an unmoderated local newsgroup for
        the discussion of issues of interest to libertarians and 
        things related to the Cal Libertarians student group.
    The newsgroup is archived at
    http://www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~callib/archives/

    There is an announcement mailing list that currently runs off
    UCLink4.  We hope to move this list to the OCF eventually,
    which will enable us to make it possible to add yourself to the
    mailing list automatically.  For now, send mail to
    cal_libertarians-owner@uclink4.berkeley.edu to have yourself
    added.

Last Updated: 12/18/97, KDP

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