The Transportation Security Administration has demonstrated over and over again that they cannot be trusted with neither your personal liberty nor with your health. This infographic gives an excellent description of why and how they fail. (Cross-posted at StopAustinScanners.org.)

Created by: OnlineCriminalJusticeDegree.com

Every year, I like to construct a list of some of the best books released in the past year and a few a others that are worth recommending at any time. Of course, this is my opinion, but if you’re looking for a gift for your libertarian loved one this Christmas season then perhaps you’ll give one of these books a go. So without further adieu, the Top 10 Libertarian Books for Christmas 2011!

1. It is Dangerous to Be Right When the Government is Wrong by Andrew Napolitano – The Judge, host of FreedomWatch on Fox Business, has put together an amazing book that analyzes a host of topics from the standpoint of natural law. I will be reviewing this book on my personal website soon but I’m going to say it now – you need to read this book. The data and stories he presents in the book make it easily worth every penny, and it deserves a prominent place on your (or anyone else’s) bookshelf.

2. Libertarianism Today by Jacob Huebert – This book was on the list last year, but it warrants another mention because you can get it at a significantly reduced price by purchasing directly from the publisher. Huebert’s book is definitely a must-read, and is one of the best recent books on hardcore libertarianism in the past few years. LRC writer Laurence Vance has called it, “The best introduction to libertarianism on the market.”

3. Bourbon for Breakfast and It’s a Jetsons World by Jeffrey Tucker – Check out this review of Bourbon for Breakfast, and you’ll see that it is a super read for anyone looking to circumvent statist restrictions upon their lives. Tucker’s followup work tells exciting stories of the little everyday miracles of the free market at work.

4. Liberty Defined by Ron Paul – Another gold standard in libertarian literature by one of liberty’s greatest defenders. See this review for the full story.

5. Rollback by Thomas Woods – I am a huge fan of Tom Woods and have known him for over 5 years now. His latest book makes an eloquent case for dismantling pretty much everything the government currently does today.

6. Great Wars and Great Leaders by Ralph Raico – Leaders who take a country to war are often heralded as “great,” but the libertarian perspective considers such notions to be folly. War is the health of the state and the enemy of liberty, and Raico’s historical work is great ammunition in the war of ideas that we fight daily.

7. Myth of a Guilty Nation by Albert Jay Nock – This is an old book newly reprinted by the Mises Institute, and I’m excited to see it available again (because I’m a big fan of Nock and haven’t ever read this one). From the Mises.org description: “Nock’s book reminds us of what most everyone has forgotten, namely, that this was sold as a war for freedom and self-determination over imperial ambition. Along with that came some of the most rabid war propaganda ever fabricated until that point in time, all designed to make Germany into a devil nation. Nock’s brave book took on that idea and demonstrated that there was fault enough to go around on all sides. All through the 1920s, a Nockian-style retelling of the facts behind the war led to a dramatic shift in public opinion against World War I.” Awesome!

8. The Bastiat Collection Pocket Edition by Frederic Bastiat – If you haven’t read Bastiat’s The Law, you need to get on that immediately! This book contains all the major works of Bastiat in a very small volume, and makes a great gift.

9. Economics in One Lesson by Henry Hazlitt – Need to learn a little more about economics? Start with the classic by Hazlitt, and never forget the first lesson again…

Last but not least, a special note for the Christian readers…

10. Christian Theology of Public Policy and Bible and Government by John Cobin – I absolutely love the excellent work of John Cobin. For Christian libertarians, these are must reads!

Have a happy holiday season!

I have been at the forefront of fighting the TSA’s “enhanced security” theater in Texas for some time. We have gained so much momentum in the last month that now even the Feds are taking notice.

Yesterday, the US Department of Justice waltzed into the Texas Capitol with a letter to the Lt. Governor, saying that if Texas passes the HB 1937 “patdown” bill, which bans government officials from legalized molestation as a condition for entering a public building or airplane (and which, by the way, I helped write), that they will respond by turning Texas into the TSA equivalent of a no-fly zone.

Unfortunately, the Senate may be caving. But you can help! The best thing you can do right now is encourage anyone and everyone you know, especially from Texas, to send phone calls and emails toward the Texas legislature telling them you support human dignity and HB 1937.

Click here to get more information, to use our 30 second contact-the-Senate form, and to find out how to call every Texas Senator. This is our “Come and Take It” moment and we have very little time, so get going!

Perhaps you have heard – the future has arrived. Tech-giant IBM recently pitted their super-computer/AI named “Watson” against the two best Jeopardy players on earth and Watson won.

I for one welcome our new computer overlords.

Check out this interesting video about this historic event. To me, these kinds of things are far more important in the long run than the stupid political movers and shakers that populate Washington and various other capital cities. The free market gets stuff done.

I am on the board of the Austin, Texas-based Foundation for a Free Society, and one of our objectives is to put out professional, artistic, catchy videos that communicate the philosophy of liberty in a succinct and fun manner. This video is one of our latest projects and was recently featured on LewRockwell.com. If you think this is a cool idea, why not become a donor to F4FS? Trust me, it’s a GREAT cause. F4FS has been a great supporter of the student group I am involved in, the Libertarian Longhorns, and I can heartily commend them to you.

Isn’t that fantastic? Share it with your friends, maybe you’ll be able to teach them about liberty soon…

Andy Greenberg has a fascinating interview with Wikileaks founder Julian Assange posted at Forbes.com. Assange states that he has been significantly influenced by “market libertarianism,” and though I disagree with the conclusions of his “expertise in politics and history” he is most assuredly a friend to the cause of liberty. Check out this excerpt from the interview.

Regulation: Is that what you’re after?

I’m not a big fan of regulation: anyone who likes freedom of the press can’t be. But there are some abuses that should be regulated, and this is one.

With regard to these corporate leaks, I should say: There’s an overlap between corporate and government leaks. When we released the Kroll report on three to four billion smuggled out by the former Kenyan president Daniel arap Moi and his cronies, where did the money go?  There’s no megacorruption–as they call it in Africa, it’s a bit sensational but you’re talking about billions–without support from Western banks and companies.

That money went into London properties, Swiss banks, property in New York, companies that had been set up to move this money.

We had another interesting one from the pharmaceutical industry: It was quite self-referential. The lobbyists had been getting leaks from the WHO. They were getting their own internal intelligence report affecting investment regulation. We were leaked a copy. It was a meta-leak. That was quite influential, though it was a relatively small leak–it was published in Nature and other pharma journals.

What do you think WikiLeaks mean for business? How do businesses need to adjust to a world where WikiLeaks exists?

WikiLeaks means it’s easier to run a good business and harder to run a bad business, and all CEOs should be encouraged by this. I think about the case in China where milk powder companies started cutting the protein in milk powder with plastics. That happened at a number of separate manufacturers.

Let’s say you want to run a good company. It’s nice to have an ethical workplace. Your employees are much less likely to screw you over if they’re not screwing other people over.

Then one company starts cutting their milk powder with melamine, and becomes more profitable. You can follow suit, or slowly go bankrupt and the one that’s cutting its milk powder will take you over. That’s the worst of all possible outcomes.

The other possibility is that the first one to cut its milk powder is exposed. Then you don’t have to cut your milk powder. There’s a threat of regulation that produces self-regulation.

It just means that it’s easier for honest CEOs to run an honest business, if the dishonest businesses are more effected negatively by leaks than honest businesses. That’s the whole idea. In the struggle between open and honest companies and dishonest and closed companies, we’re creating a tremendous reputational tax on the unethical companies.

No one wants to have their own things leaked. It pains us when we have internal leaks. But across any given industry, it is both good for the whole industry to have those leaks and it’s especially good for the good players.

But aside from the market as a whole, how should companies change their behavior understanding that leaks will increase?

Do things to encourage leaks from dishonest competitors. Be as open and honest as possible. Treat your employees well.

I think it’s extremely positive. You end up with a situation where honest companies producing quality products are more competitive than dishonest companies producing bad products. And companies that treat their employees well do better than those that treat them badly.

Would you call yourself a free market proponent?

Absolutely. I have mixed attitudes towards capitalism, but I love markets. Having lived and worked in many countries, I can see the tremendous vibrancy in, say, the Malaysian telecom sector compared to U.S. sector. In the U.S. everything is vertically integrated and sewn up, so you don’t have a free market. In Malaysia, you have a broad spectrum of players, and you can see the benefits for all as a result.

How do your leaks fit into that?

To put it simply, in order for there to be a market, there has to be information. A perfect market requires perfect information.

There’s the famous lemon example in the used car market. It’s hard for buyers to tell lemons from good cars, and sellers can’t get a good price, even when they have a good car.

By making it easier to see where the problems are inside of companies, we identify the lemons. That means there’s a better market for good companies. For a market to be free, people have to know who they’re dealing with.

You’ve developed a reputation as anti-establishment and anti-institution.

Not at all. Creating a well-run establishment is a difficult thing to do, and I’ve been in countries where institutions are in a state of collapse, so I understand the difficulty of running a company. Institutions don’t come from nowhere.

It’s not correct to put me in any one philosophical or economic camp, because I’ve learned from many. But one is American libertarianism, market libertarianism. So as far as markets are concerned I’m a libertarian, but I have enough expertise in politics and history to understand that a free market ends up as monopoly unless you force them to be free.

WikiLeaks is designed to make capitalism more free and ethical.

Last week, an AK-47-wielding student caused a major scare on the UT-Austin campus. He ultimately killed himself in the library. Fortunately, no one else was hurt. That same day, the Libertarian Longhorns and UT Students for Concealed Carry on Campus were scheduled to host John Lott, famed author of More Guns, Less Crime, to speak about his research showing that government restrictions upon firearms are counterproductive.

Thanks to Rob Love of Texans for Accountable Government, we have video of the event. It has officially been posted on Youtube, and we hope you will assist us in making this go viral. We need people to understand the gravity of this kind of restriction upon our individual property rights. It’s not just about students needing to protect themselves, it’s about grasping the limits of government power.

Here’s the Youtube playlist, I know it’s a long series (8 parts!) but at least try to catch some of it. Know the facts!

On the morning of Tuesday, September 28, the University of Texas community was alerted to the terrifying situation of a gunman on campus. Students, staff, and faculty were told via text messages, emails, sirens, and various forms of social media to shelter in place and await evacuation.

It was reported that the gunman, later identified as UT student Colton Tooley was armed and seen walking down 21^st street, shooting his weapon into the air and ground while yelling and screaming. He then entered into the Perry-Casteneda Library and proceeded up to the sixth floor where he ultimately took his own life. Fortunately, no one else was injured in the process, and it appears that the Tooley had no intention of hurting anyone but himself.

Coincidentally, the Libertarian Longhorns and UT Students for Concealed Carry on Campus had invited Dr. John Lott, famed writer of the book More Guns, Less Crime, to speak on campus that same day. The date had been set since early this past summer, but the campus shooting obviously put Dr. Lott’s talk in jeopardy. However, the organization’s student leaders decided that, out of respect for the speaker who had traveled all the way from Maryland and the importance of the issues at hand, the event should not be canceled.

The two student organizations quickly reorganized the event. Local bookstore Brave New Books generously agreed to host the talk and extended their normal business hours to accommodate. The Libertarian Party of Texas assisted students notifying media outlets and local groups that the event would continue at the new location.

The result was nothing short of phenomenal. At least 125 students and Austinites crammed into Brave New Books to hear John Lott speak about his research on the effects of gun control laws on violent crime. Television, radio, and newspaper outlets from Austin, San Antonio, and Dallas interviewed people and recorded footage of the event. Their response to the presentation was very positive.

UT students Jeff Shi, Kory Zipperer, Justo Montoya, Jose Nino, and Andy Fernandez were interviewed on Austin area news stations and quoted in newspapers across Texas. More news coverage will certainly be released in the coming days.

Despite the sensitive nature of the issue, the Libertarian Longhorns and UT Students for Concealed Carry on Campus acted in a professional manner and provided a solution in a difficult time for the UT campus and Austin community. Their actions are consistent with their firm belief that by educating the community these volatile situations may be reduced.

Media Coverage to date:

• The Austin-American Statesman
• KVUE Local ABC
• The Daily Texan
• KXAN Local NBC

Andy Fernandez is a leader of the Libertarian Longhorns at UT-Austin and an SFL Campus Coordinator. Originally posted on the Students for Liberty Blog.

On August 9, 2010 President Obama came to the University of Texas at Austin to give a talk on the future of higher education. But while he and his adoring public had their little state-worship service in Gregory Gym, protesters outside had quite a time trying to deal with the restrictions put upon their freedom of speech.

When I arrived to the scene (coming from the north end of campus), I was dumbfounded that I couldn’t see any demonstrators anywhere. What was going on? As I proceeded south, I finally discovered why: protesters were confined to their special “free speech zone” designated by none other than the Secret Service. Apparently, they get to decide now where people have rights and where they don’t. And since they get to decide, where do you think they would put us? How about as far away as they can? Indeed, the zone was effectively at the end of the entire line, at the fringes.

To get an idea of what this looked like, I created a map to help:
View Antiwar demonstration 08-09-10 in a larger map

Shortly after arriving, I saw a middle-aged woman being taken away in cuffs. I immediately pulled out my FlipCam and started recording. Turns out her name was Stacy and she was merely collecting signatures for an open letter/petition for TexasEnvironment.org. You may not agree with the group’s position, but for the police to arrest her for this is just stupid.

Just minutes later, I was recording a little video of the line and turned around to find Dan McCarthy interacting with a police officer, trying to move his poster closer to the corner and to the press vans. He was arrested as well, ultimately under the charge of "criminal trespassing" on what I believe was a "public sidewalk." Here’s the footage, although the sound did not come out well (if somebody wants to caption it, that would be awesome).

This was all KXAN had to say about these arrests:

The media finally paid attention to us, and I was even interviewed at one point (though I cannot find a video online right now). It was quite interesting to see the variety of people present at this demonstration. I met people from the Socialist Worker, from immigration groups, from the Tea Party, and more. And for the most part, we all got along peaceably so that we could protest Obama’s policies, especially the WARS, together.

It was now about 2 p.m. and people were quickly flowing into the building. The back of the line quickly moved past us and thus the free speech zone now held absolutely zero value for the protesters. As the demonstrators began to disperse, I asked them to stick around a little longer while I tried to convince the police officers to allow us to move the "free speech zone" closer to Gregory Gym. So, I found an officer and respectfully made my request. He immediately said no. I asked if there was someone with more authority we could talk to. He called his Sergeant, and the Sergeant said no as well. I asked if I could appeal this even higher. He said there was a Lieutenant on duty, and I asked if I could talk with him. Lieutenant Birdett (I think that was his name) came over and we had another chat, with no positive result. We couldn’t go anywhere else. However, the Lieutenant did reveal something I didn’t know: when the president is around, the Secret service has, quoting the Lieutenant, "total control".

"Really?" I asked him. "Can I get you to say that into the camera?" as I hastily reached into my pocket to pull out the FlipCam again. But no, he wouldn’t give me the satisfaction. Rats!

At this point, I ran into a guy with an insane sign, saying "The Obama Presidency is Christianity in Action!" Read my comments about this guy here.

I left after this because I needed to work more that afternoon, but the action didn’t stop there. Long after the line was gone, more demonstrators were arrested simply for exercising free speech. Antiwar activist Chanda Panda was arrested for asking “Who designates the free speech zone?” and she wasn’t even asked to leave:

Just minutes later, as I understand, John Bush of Texans for Accountable Government was arrested, even though he even had a press pass (which should have, in theory, afforded him even greater protection). His response to the police’s actions was above reproach and absolutely heroic:

Finally, I recorded a recap video once I got home, so you can see better some of the signs that Dan had brought to the campus and that I made for the demonstration.

Thankfully, all of those arrested were able to go home at midnight on $20 bail.

Photo credit: KXAN. Many thanks as well to all of those people who recorded the day’s events to put on display to the world.

Crossposted at LibertarianChristians.com.

Ever wondered what Christianity looks like in practice? Look no further than… President Obama!

I saw this on August 9 at a demonstration at UT-Austin in front of Gregory Gym and the library. Of all the ridiculous things I’ve seen in the past year, I think this takes the cake.

I asked the gentleman how Obama could be “Christianity in action” if it requires aggression against a neighbor to act. His response, I kid you not, was that back in the first century they had despots as leaders, and now we have representative government. After laughing hysterically, I then proceeded to ask how he justifies his task of blowing up the Middle East, I mean, they’re still his representatives of Christ, right? On the contrary: “Love for neighbor cannot be delegated” said Pope Benedict XVI.

I just can’t wait for Obama to go back to DC so he can put more Christianity into action!

Come back to TLS tomorrow for the full report on the demonstration. Thanks to Heather from LP-Texas for taking the picture. Heroic!

Crossposted at LibertarianChristians.com.