Libertarian activists are protesting restrictive New Hampshire state laws by staging unlicensed puppet shows.
The Boston Globe
“Spot”
A cynic's definition of a libertarian is a Republican who smokes pot, but that is a half-truth. A libertarian is someone whose tattooed ferret smokes pot. And owns a puppet. The libertarian, that is, not the ferret.
I came by my puppet, whom I call “Spot,” through the turbulence of creative destruction that free-market types welcome; Spot is the former star of Pets.com commercials, and when the dot-com boom ended, my wife picked him up as a present for me for a song.
Ever since, we've been working on a medley of Chet Baker tunes to which he lip-synchs, casting an eerie spell as he channels Baker's ethereal boppish voice.
Chet Baker: If you close your eyes, you can't tell them apart.
It was after a late-night rehearsal—actually, I guess one doesn't really rehearse lip synching—that Spot floated a crazy, off-the-wall idea.
“You know, lip-synching is fine,” he said, “but I feel it's limiting my career.”
“How so?” I asked.
He turned from his perch on the end of my finger and looked me straight in the eye. “I want to sing—for real,” he said.
I considered for a moment what that would entail. “If you want to sing,” I said as the unseasoned music business pro that I am, “you're going to have to work a lot harder.”
“No you're going to have to work a lot harder,” he shot back at me.
“Why me?”
“Because I'm just a puppet. You need to work on your ventriloquism.”
He was right about that. I've been fooling around with “throwing my voice” ever since Tommy Racunas used to take home a prize, year after year, in the Sacred Heart Grade School Spring Talent Show with his dummy “Charlie” back in the 60s. For weeks afterwards, he'd have Carolyn Stretz, Trudy Espinosa and Candace Mitzel eating out of the palm of his hand. Then he'd run out of sunflower seeds, and things would return to normal.
“You're right,” I said. “If we're going to take our show on the road, we need to get better, and start at the bottom.”
“Someplace like Hampton Beach, New Hampshire,” Spot opined.
“Did I ever tell you about the time I almost got to play with Matt ‘Guitar' Murphy of ‘Blues Brothers' fame in Hampton Beach when my roommate's bass player showed up a half-hour . . .”
“Only about a million times.”
Matt “Guitar” Murphy
“Right. I remember now.” I was humbled. No man is a hero to his sock puppet. “There's just one problem with your idea,” I said after I'd recovered my self-esteem.
“What's that?” Spot asked.
“Unlicensed puppet shows are illegal in New Hampshire.”
You could have knocked Spot over with a feather—if he hadn't been attached to my arm. “You're kidding,” he said. “The ‘Live Free or Die' state?”
“The same.”
“You make me feel so young—you make me feel that spring has sprung!”
He turned away, then angrily slammed his little paw against the wall.
“Ow,” I said.
“What are you crying about—it's my paw,” he snorted.
“You're an inanimate object,” I replied. “I'm the one who can feel pain.”
“Oh, right. Anyway, I still can't believe it. Doesn't anyone read John Milton anymore?” he asked.
John Milton—or Dan Fogelberg?
“No,” I replied. “And if they did, what difference would it make?”
He was fired up now. “Because if they did, they might have learned a thing or two from Areopagitica.“
“A Speech for the Liberty of Unlicenc'd Printing?”
“On the nosey. For my money, it's still one of the greatest defenses of free speech.”
“You don't have any money,” I reminded him. “What would people learn if they read it?” I asked, a bit skeptical.
He went to the bookshelf, pulled down his little thumbnail-sized edition of The Complete Poetry and Selected Prose of John Milton, and flipped to page 720.
“They would know that licensing—a requirement of prior approval—'is but weaknes and cowardise in the wars of Truth,'” he declaimed, warming to his topic. “We arrive at truth by permitting a diversity of ideas.”
“Except for Catholicism—right?”
“Talk to the hand.”
“Well, yeah. Milton did have a blind spot about that.”
We sat there in silence, thinking about the never-ending struggle to keep speech and puppet shows free.
“So are we gonna do something about it?” he asked after a moment.
“What can one man and one puppet do?” I asked.
He gave me a look of cold, pitiless contempt. “I can't believe you,” he said. “You sit there all day with your finger up my butt, while our precious freedoms are frittered away.”
“I didn't say I wouldn't help—I just have to know what I'm in for.”
He got right up in my face. “We're going to New Hampshire—tonight!”
“I'm kind of tired,” I said.
“I'll drive,” he snapped. “You can sleep 'til we get there. In the morning, we'll hit the streets, and put on the baddest unlicensed puppet show New Hampshire's ever seen!”
I had to admire his courage. “Okay—I'm in,” I said.
“All right!” He gave me a high five, or actually a high one, since he doesn't have reticulated digits on his paws.
“Just promise me one thing,” I said, slowing him down for a moment.
“What's that?”
”You'll give me plenty of warning if you have to pee.”
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Comments: 12
Does that put a damper on my libertarian credentials?
A cynic's definition of a libertarian is a Republican who smokes pot
Au contraire. I'm a cynic, and I know that "a Republican who smokes pot" is actually the definition of a yuppie.
Let me help you on this:
One definition of a sociopath is a person who thinks it's okay to shoot people in order to: foster healthy diets; dictate personal consumption and/or recreational habits; dictate who gets to offer what products or services to exchange with others; dictate the terms of otherwise mutually-voluntary (and inherently just and valid) contractual relationships of others; mandate the purchase of any given goods or services; build roads, build schools and fill them by means of compulsion and threats of kidnapping; and virtually everything and anything else that does not strictly and clearly involve the defense of persons and property against initiatory force or fraud.
The definition of a libertarian is just a person who recognizes the truth of the above definition.
I guess it's subtle little things that muddied the water, so to speak; the pejorative reference to "free-market types," the potshot at Milton, the (really not-so-subtle) association of libertarianism with Republicans.
So anyhow, just out of curiosity, what does a somewhat libertarian believe? We should be somewhat free?
I might have worded it better on the other post. But there it is...a net loss, unavoidable I'd say, not discounting some total nuts have done some amazing things, but guys like this, (assuming it's insanity, not just drugs)what do you do? They're human, they have rights, but they don't understand or extend them. I'm interested in your thoughts.
Sorry, I do remember seeing that question now; I must have put it on the backburner and then forgot it was there. Apologies...
Are you asking me how would society deal with the criminally insane in the absence of a state, or just how could we deal with them currently in a way that doesn't involve government overreach?
Either way, it's a very involved, complex subject; it's not something I think I could sufficiently give the kind of answer that the question commands and deserves right here in this thread; not without the rather high likelihood of agitating the owner of the page, at least.
I will take a look around and see if I can dig up some literature on the subject and send you some links very soon. Hopefully for now it might be helpful to point out that people are only ever deprived of their full rights of self-ownership under 2 conditions: One is they are forfeited only to the extent that their wrongdoing may be prevented or corrected (as much as humanly possible, given the facts of the situation and the inherently imperfect nature of reality) using the minimal amount of force necessary; or to the extent that they are dependent upon the responsibility of others for basic survival (e.g. children), and again, it is only to the limited degree commanded by the facts of the situation. The case of insane people contains elements of each of those conditions.
Good one, Con :-)