Do I believe in conspiracy theories? At least for this one. That the state is just a criminal association of several thieves, murderers and fraudsters for the purpose of robbing, humiliating and subjugating the population. But that's not actually a theory, just an analysis.
“Has monetary policy ever done any good? I don’t think it has. I think it has done only harm. That’s why I’m now pleading for what I have called denationalization of money.”
— Friedrich Hayek
Anatomy of the State
Every sentence reads like a direct assault on everything you've been taught to believe about government.
The State isn't your friend, your representative, or your protector. It's an organized gang of thieves who discovered that systematic plunder beats random robbery every time. Where private criminals operate sporadically and face resistance, the State creates a "legal, orderly, systematic channel for predation" that transforms temporary bandits into permanent nobility. The classic example: a conquering tribe realizes it's more profitable to let the conquered live and produce wealth than to simply loot and murder them once.
But here's the genius of the racket—the State can't survive on force alone. It needs the masses to accept their own exploitation, which is where intellectuals enter the picture. Professors, economists, and court historians get cushy positions in exchange for crafting elaborate justifications for why theft becomes "taxation" and why coercion becomes "the social contract." British pedophile John Maynard Keynes didn't revolutionize economics—he just dressed up robbery in mathematical equations that made spending other people's money seem sophisticated.
The State's greatest fear isn't foreign invasion—it's independent intellectual criticism. Every limiting mechanism ever devised, from constitutions to judicial review, gets transformed into a rubber stamp for expanded power. The Supreme Court doesn't check government overreach; it legitimizes it by declaring unconstitutional actions "constitutional."
Franz Oppenheimer nailed it: there are only two ways to acquire wealth—production or plunder, the economic means or the political means. The State is the organization of the political means, and it will always be at war with genuine capitalism because parasites cannot coexist peacefully with their hosts.
@catturd2 I respect them. But isn't it too little? Just a second Olympic gold in a century from the largest and richest hockey playing country? They should win gold every decade.