Quotes by Robert Higgs

Robert Higgs

…History shows that … (people) can be deflected from their natural tendencies by artful propaganda, bogus crises, or other political trickery.

Peace

People

War

Abetted by misguided or co-opted intellectuals, the rulers weave a cloak of legitimacy to disguise their theft and hence to ease their extraction of wealth from the rightful owners.

Ease

Legitimacy

Wealth

All nonstate threats to life, liberty, and property appear to be relatively petty and therefore can be dealt with. Only states can pose truly massive threats, and sooner or later the horrors with which they menace mankind invariably come to pass.

Horror

Liberty

States

Any society that entails the strengthening of the state apparatus by giving it unchecked control over the economy, and re-unites the polity and the economy, is an historical regression. In it there is no more future for the public, or for the freedoms it supported, than there was under feudalism.

Giving

Historical

Regression

But politicians who talk about failed policies are just blowing smoke. Government policies succeed in doing exactly what they are supposed to do: channeling resources bilked from the general public to politically organized and influential interests groups.

Government

Groups

Succeed

By adopting programs to distribute substantial amounts of income, a nation guarantees that its government will become more powerful and invasive in other ways.

Government

Guarantees That

Powerful

For members of the political class, the crucial question is always: how can we push out the frontier, how can we augment the government’s dominion and plunder, with net gain to ourselves the exploiters who live not by honest production and voluntary exchange, but by fleecing those who do so?

Class

Government

Political

Government spending either is completely wasteful, merely transfers income, purchases an intermediate rather than a final good, or purchases valuable final services whose value cannot be ascertained because the transaction is not made by private parties exchanging their own resources in a market setting.

Finals

Government

Party

H. L. Mencken famously said that ‘every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under.’ By now, however, I am no longer ashamed, because I do not identify with the government under which I live. Rather, I view it as a criminal organization that without provocation has chosen to make war on my just rights-not only mine, of course, but everyone’s. Although this vile enterprise is my problem, because it robs and bullies me relentlessly and without mercy, it is not my responsibility: the nail is not the hammer.

Men

Responsibility

War

If anarchists are idealists, they may simply be likened to someone who finds himself swimming in a cesspool and, rather than paddling about looking for the area with the least amount of floating faeces, seeks to climb out of the pool completely.

Floating

Paddling

Swimming

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Acceptance

Agreement

Anarchy

Appreciation

Atmosphere

Attitude

Burden Of Proof

Character

Children

Class

Community

Compassion

Connections

Cost

Country

Debate

Despair

Done

Ease

Economy

Elements

Events

Exercise

Finals

Fire

Flames

Floating

Fossils

Four

Giving

Government

Groups

Guarantees That

Hands

Historical

Horror

House

Income

Leader

Legacy

Legitimacy

Liberty

Lines

Littles

Long

Loses

Lying

Mean

Men

Military

The Future Blueprint

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The Home Therapist: Anti Anxiety

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Quotes by Robert Higgs

Robert Higgs

…History shows that … (people) can be deflected from their natural tendencies by artful propaganda, bogus crises, or other political trickery.

Abetted by misguided or co-opted intellectuals, the rulers weave a cloak of legitimacy to disguise their theft and hence to ease their extraction of wealth from the rightful owners.

All nonstate threats to life, liberty, and property appear to be relatively petty and therefore can be dealt with. Only states can pose truly massive threats, and sooner or later the horrors with which they menace mankind invariably come to pass.

Any society that entails the strengthening of the state apparatus by giving it unchecked control over the economy, and re-unites the polity and the economy, is an historical regression. In it there is no more future for the public, or for the freedoms it supported, than there was under feudalism.

But politicians who talk about failed policies are just blowing smoke. Government policies succeed in doing exactly what they are supposed to do: channeling resources bilked from the general public to politically organized and influential interests groups.

By adopting programs to distribute substantial amounts of income, a nation guarantees that its government will become more powerful and invasive in other ways.

For members of the political class, the crucial question is always: how can we push out the frontier, how can we augment the government’s dominion and plunder, with net gain to ourselves the exploiters who live not by honest production and voluntary exchange, but by fleecing those who do so?

If anarchists are idealists, they may simply be likened to someone who finds himself swimming in a cesspool and, rather than paddling about looking for the area with the least amount of floating faeces, seeks to climb out of the pool completely.

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