In a free society, every individual has a right to their life, liberty and property. No one may initiate force (i.e., invade) the life, liberty or property of anyone else. This is the ideal that must perpetually be in our sights, despite the loud voices who relentlessly push for the opposite.
In a free society, every individual has a right to their life, liberty and property. No one may initiate force (i.e., invade) the life, liberty or property of anyone else. This is the ideal that must perpetually be in our sights, despite the loud voices who relentlessly push for the opposite.
In a free society, every individual has a right to their life, liberty and property. No one may initiate force (i.e., invade) the life, liberty or property of anyone else. This is the ideal that must perpetually be in our sights, despite the loud voices who relentlessly push for the opposite.
Hello everybody and thank you for tuning in to the Liberty Report.
With me today is Chris Rossini, the co-host.
Chris, welcome to the program.
Great to be with you, Dr. Paul.
Very good.
I would like to address the subject today of trying to better understand what rights are all about and privileges and demands and the whole situation that drives the politicians in Washington.
And I've always worked on the assumption that there is not a whole lot of respect for rights or an understanding of rights and where they come from.
It's always special interests demanding and they have a right to something.
They don't emphasize this whole thing that in a free society you have a right to your life, but you don't have a right to somebody else's life.
And I think this principle is pretty basic and we need more people understanding exactly the basis of a free society because you just can't assume that the government is there for divvying up the loot and everybody gets a little bit here.
So you get a little bit of liberty there, we get a little bit of lever here, and that misses the whole point.
And I think we'd like to talk today, you know, about the importance of where these rights might come from.
So what's your opinion about where these rights come from?
Well, I think we should look to the people that wrote the Declaration of Independence.
I mean, they were flawed people, but they were geniuses when it came to certain things, and rights was one of them.
And, you know, it says it right there in a declaration that rights were endowed by our Creator, whatever you want to call it, nature, whatever.
It precedes even the idea of forming a government.
You have a right to your life, your liberty, and your property.
But now we have a lot of socialists in our midst, and they are coming up with rights to health care, child care, education, free time.
These are not your property.
These are the labor and property of others.
You have the right to trade with them voluntarily.
But that's not what the politicians are proposing.
They're proposing the violation of people's rights, the violation of their life, liberty, and property.
And unfortunately, such an idea is catching on.
Yes, and I think what happens is they move over and they don't think it in terms of what rights are all about.
They think that people get stuffed because they justify their demands.
Demands become their rights.
A desire becomes their right, and they expect somebody else to provide it for them.
They just let the government do it.
They never accept the fact that the government is just another person.
Somebody else has to pay and has to accommodate.
And then they all use the issue of needs and the things that you mentioned.
People need health care and they need to eat and they need a house.
But they don't base it on the fact that, you know, people are individuals and they have a right to their life, but you don't have a right to somebody else's life.
And that's what property is all about because property is a consequence of free individuals producing things.
Governments produce nothing.
Matter of fact, they're more responsible for the destruction of production than anything else.
But there's always a demand.
It's endless.
And the politicians have been able to get away with this for a long time because that's how they get re-elected.
So the burden of accepting a system of liberty, and we see the wonderful benefits from it.
Others see, well, there are restraints.
We have too much responsibility.
How am I going to take care of my kids?
What am I going to do in my old age?
How am I going to get 12 weeks of sick leave?
And all these things that they want and demand and think they're entitled to.
Yet it's in the Declaration, as you mentioned, it recognizes individual rights and individual liberty.
But, you know, and you mentioned property, and I think that's a good term to use as well.
But I've, over the years, a lot of times would refrain from the pursuit of liberty, thinking, I don't know, like it's too vague or something.
But the more I think about it, it's a great phrase too.
Pursuing your liberty, pursuing your desires.
Get everybody else out of the way as long as you don't hurt people.
It would have been nice if they'd have been very explicit about the need for and the desire and the understanding of the non-aggression principle and what Bastiov talked about.
You know, individuals can't do certain things.
Why can the government do it?
We're not allowed to steal, but why does the government steal from us?
It goes on and on.
We're not allowed to shoot and kill, and yet the government does a lot of shooting and killing, getting involved in wars that are undeclared.
So it's a system that is not complicated.
And, you know, they often talk about, you know, all the different factions, Republicans and Democrats, conservatives and liberals and socialists and communists.
And, you know, I just divide it up into two groups, authoritarians and non-interventionists.
Authoritarians, they're not wanting their right to their life.
They want to use authority to run your life and divvy up the loop and have all this power and control.
And the non-interventionist is somebody who says, just leave me alone.
Let me keep what I earn.
I won't hurt anybody.
And then there's quite a bit different.
The magnificent thing is the many benefits that we got from the founders did a great job in the early history because the incentives were tremendous and we built our wealth.
Today, Chris, I think it's under threat because we're seeing the aggressiveness of those who want to change this whole thing that we're talking about.
And they're quite willing.
Yeah, we want socialist power.
People aren't able to and they can't take care of themselves.
And besides, there are some rich people today that we have to take the wealth from.
But never mentioning that maybe those super, super rich, maybe many of them got there because they have been permitted to live in a system that is authoritarian and they benefit by it, such as the benefits that the Federal Reserve bestows upon a certain group.
So I think, Chris, this is a very important issue, and people should not be so discouraged and intimidated and frightened about a free society.
That's right, Dr. Paul.
And speaking about our founders, you know, as flawed as our Constitution is, and obviously it is because look what happened.
The founders, they understood that they were not creating a democracy.
They did not want majority rule.
And they spoke one after another.
We're talking about, if you allow mob rule, it's over.
And today, that's what the left pushes.
Majority.
A majority want free health care.
A majority, well, of course, a majority is going to want.
That's human nature to want things and to want it right now with the least amount of effort.
But if you're using government to take from one to another, that will be, as Franklin warned, the end of the Republic and the end of civilization because everything is up for grabs.
If all you want is a majority rule and all you have to do is convince the majority that you're going to give them something for free.
So they've exploited that over the years and it's been like a slow drip.
How the Democratic socialists, Democratic, are now trying to capitalize on it for their own power.
And it can only lead to destruction.
And de Tocqueville in the 19th century wrote about this, the Frenchman that came here and studied our system.
And he talked about the dictatorship of the majority.
And that's what it is.
A majority rule is really very, very bad for liberty because liberty is supposed to protect the minority.
And who's championing this?
People who claim they're the ones who are for freedom and equity and all these wonderful things by using more authoritarian principles.
And of course, they gang up on the minority, the minority that might be promoting the cause of liberty, because you have this thing called identity politics now.
If you belong to a group, you qualify automatically.
If you happen to be an Indian, I guess some of our candidates think, oh, I'm special because I'm an Indian.
You know, it gets just terrible.
What we want to say is, leave me alone.
Dictatorship Of The Majority00:03:33
I'm important.
I should be able to keep the fruits of my labor because I am a sovereign individual and I promise not to hurt anybody.
And, you know, that is just so overwhelming today for so many people because we've drifted a long way from that.
But still, Chris, when I go about the country and talk to young people, there's still a lot of people out there that understand it because what they see on the horizon is, you know, a system that is not solvent.
And they're not saying, oh, yeah, they're not part of the crowd.
It says socialism is the answer.
And they understand personal liberties and hopefully they'll understand economics better.
But the young people I meet are very much aware of the nonsense of all these wars that we've been involved with.
And that is helpful.
The message is so powerful.
What we need are more messengers to get the message out there and counteract what we're listening to.
But the way I see it is that the powerful weapon of the demagogues and the propagandists and the mainstream media and the politicians and all the professors, they endorse authoritarianism.
And they do not like the whole idea of individualism, except they want to be individually left alone if they're in the elite group.
Then they can do what they want.
But no, I think that our job is overwhelming when we have to convert people.
But we should use all the tools that we can, one-on-one, writing, reading, doing whatever we can to promote these issues.
And the Internet, with all its flaws, has been helpful.
It's sort of like books can be very damaging.
A lot of people over the century wrote terribly ugly things and promoted fascism and communism.
But the Internet is just as precarious.
It can promote good things too.
And that is the reason that we do make use of the Internet.
And hopefully there'll be enough people to preserve the integrity of the Internet and do our very best.
But ultimately, it's all about ideas.
And, you know, when an idea's time has come, you know, it can't be stopped.
The armies can't stop it because they're very, very powerful.
And reaching the individual and convincing people that doesn't mean that what we want are very selfish, self-centered people who don't care about anything.
Quite frankly, if you had one that followed the rules of non-aggression, they're no big deal.
They have their own little personal problem.
But it's really so beneficial if people accept the non-aggression principle because that's where the prosperity is.
And if you have a system that you don't protect individuals and special interest groups and bail out the wrong kind of people, then all of a sudden there's more peace, more prosperity, and that should be our goal.
And if you think the collectivists have the answer, And that will take us in the wrong direction.
So it's a little discouraging to see the endorsement by the media of the few socialists in the Congress.
We have a few pretty good libertarian type people in the Congress, but they don't get on the hand and say, oh, the libertarians are coming.
Freedom is coming.
No, that's a threat to all these people.
So the socialists are coming.
They will solve our problem.
All of a sudden, they get the attention.
Serving Others, Not Taking00:02:56
Right, and that's really what it is.
I have hope for, I just know from my life and the people I interact with, I don't get a sense that socialism is on everyone's mind.
But the people in the media, like you said, the professors, the government, they're very loud about it and they push it very, very hard, and we need to counter it.
And that's the long and short of it.
And the last word that I wanted to tackle, Dr. Paul, is the word privileged, because that's been twisted as well.
Because it's said that rich people are privileged to be able to buy high-quality goods and services, and everyone else should have the same privilege.
Well, it's not a privilege.
You have to earn these things.
And most people do that.
Now, there are people that use the government to get their money and get rich.
And that itself is a privilege because you're taking, you're not providing, you're just taking and using the government.
And that's the difference between earning and real privilege, like a duke or a duchess or kings.
Those are professional people that are privileged.
They live at the expense of others.
So that's what privileged means, is to live at the expense of others instead of at the service of others.
And we promote the latter, serve others, and don't look to take their stuff for yourself.
Very, very good.
And I want to sort of have a closing statement on this because I think there are benefits that are not just a personal liberty issue.
You run your own life and just leave everybody else alone.
But I think personal happiness is achieved in a special way.
I think it comes from self-reliance and being able to take care of oneself and being able to produce.
It has nothing to do with the degree because I think people who feel good about themselves because they're responsible and take care of their family and all their needs, they have a satisfaction that is quite a bit different.
There is the productivity and that is great and that is part of it.
But I think the whole idea that we understand that our goal and the goal of the authoritarians are always not equal justice.
Their goal is equality.
Why can somebody have more than others and we have to redistribute the wealth?
And that's very, very, it can become very cumbersome and very annoying.
But what we should be aiming for is the equal justice under the law and that makes the difference.
And I do believe very sincerely that no matter what the level of income is, if people assume responsibility for themselves, even if they have to work and struggle, that they get satisfaction from that and true happiness can come from it.
And also, I think the fact that people who work harder and they see people successful, they shouldn't become envious and greedy about this whole thing.
Strive for Justice00:00:43
They should say, you know, that is good.
In a free society, we can continue to strive.
That's really what motivated so many in America.
And I think still a lot of people want to come to America believing that if they work hard, and I've seen some immigrants come in here, into this country, that didn't come just for the fact that they might get a handout or get to vote for a certain candidate.
There's a lot who just want a chance.
And what they're saying, give me a chance to have my liberty, and I will work hard.
And not only will they take care of themselves, they will take care of other people, and they will have a greater chance for having personal satisfaction and enjoyment.
Chris, I want to thank you for being with us today.