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Actually, you might be surprised to learn that I once held your view regarding the law, but I applied it consistently in that I thought all immoral laws should be broken at every opportunity. I granted this right to everyone and not just illegal immigrants. Since that time, due to a very unfortunate personal situation I will not go into here, I had firsthand contact with the machinations of law and gained a greater understanding and appreciation for the process. On paper I would very quickly agree with your view, but I find that in practice, it is untenable. I would call it still just and objective, but far more nuanced and complicated than could be dealt with by a statement like Government ought only protect life, liberty, and property. The statement is certainly true but I find that it tells me very little about the machinations of state and law. So to answer your question directly, I did nothing. I now see that as a mistake in most cases.

I disagree. In most cases that I witnessed, it at least results in the defrauded individual being suddenly responsible for back taxes. That would just affect the percentages though. To look at that in principle, though, does that mean that if the government takes more money than I can reasonably afford and causes be undue hardship, then I would be justified in burglarizing someones home or place of business to make ends meet. Their lost goods would just be collateral damage caused by the governments immorality, then? I can see that in an emergency ethic where "a man shooting at me is holding a baby as a shield," in which case the babies safety is damaged by the shooter, not my self-defense, but outside of emergency situations, which illegal immigration clearly is.

Maybe the people who have to prove they are not responsible for any debt, fines, back taxes, etc. that have been associated to their identities. From personal experience I can tell you that this takes a lot of time and money. Years in some cases.

During my years in construction the many that I saw that had illegal ID's would claim 9 dependents. As a result very, very little would be withheld. When they ran in to difficulty they could get a new card within 30 minutes typically.

It's estimated that 75% of illegal aliens use fake Id's. :. 75% of those entering illegally have no respect for the rights of others. QED with a small part of the total relevant context.

Just as a clarification, I think you are missing that he implicitly distinguishes between individual, unalienable rights, and freedom in his statement. The absolute freedom of a man alone on an island is not the same as the individual liberty that is his moral right in a political context. His freedom to act is limited in the preservation of the rights of everyone else in the latter context. This misidentification could lead to a seeming contradiction with objectivist principles.

That's an interesting delineation. It sounds right on the surface, but still seems like a "I'm not touching you! I'm not touching you!" technicality. Generally, you need to work to exist and if you do then they take away what you worked for. In combination with reality you are forced to work for others. In actuality though, as long as there is still cradle to grave welfare, you still have a choice not to work. A sad, sad choice between becoming a moocher, looter, outlaw or martyr, but still a choice, I guess.

I realize that this occurs, but I don't believe it is justified in that the extent to which law, at large, is optional, is the extent to which society is not ruled by laws any longer.

I would just take the inability to use cars as a circumstantial fact like I do in business planning with regard to taxes. I don't think that we should obey laws out of a fear of anarchy, but as a matter of principle. I don't mean to convey that a single illegal act causes anarchy to come into existence. Even the illegal immigration on a grand scale does not cause it because the place that they are coming to is populated mostly by people who do follow the law. This is similar in scale and effect to stealing or ponzi schemes. When everyone is stealing and mooching(as in heavy socialism) eventually there is nothing to steal. Parasitism only works when most are not parasites. Likewise, a ponzi scheme only works when few are collecting and many are paying. On an individual level there is virtually no risk of catastrophe or descent into anarchy. When everyone or most everyone even views the law as something to be decided by themselves in each particular instance, then it is certain to be a state of anarchy. Or, like Sophia mentioned, if enforcement of laws is considered optional at the state level, then you have a "rule of men," de facto even if not de jure. I would hold that there is no difference in which should be followed. I live in Colorado, and in mountains the speeds change widely and routinely on blind curves and through towns, for example. Though the limit is open for some debate, there is usually some reason for each alteration and the nature of these things are that a limit must be set to preserve the safety of everyone else on the roads. Me deciding, or even feeling certain that I can take a curve at 45 miles an hour when it says 25 does not justify it, morally.

I see. I misunderstood. In fact, in that case I would not drive. I'd ride a bike or walk.(and spend a lot of time advocating against the law) Enough people would be driving at that speed +/- a mph, that driving much faster would be unrealistic and probably extremely dangerous for everyone else on the road. Pedestrians and other drivers expecting 1mph cars would not account for someone driving at 40mph. This really is a great metaphor, btw. An unreasonable law does put our interests into conflict, but it still does not justify some following their own rules because those 'some' are then directly responsible for the inadvertent rights violations of others. Putting them more at risk by way of their lack of common expectancy. Same happens now, If someone drives through a 15mph school zone at 45mph, he's putting many in danger, even though 45 isn't objectively dangerous. Not only that but it gives those, demographically speaking, who are more likely to break the law, for whatever (im)moral reason, an advantage over the moral law abiding types who you would wish to encourage to come here. A bad law, paired with poor enforcement, in this case could serve as a filter, punishing the good and benefiting the bad.

To the point of both statements, the government, having the proper authority to enforce laws is contingent, entirely, on a populace obeying them. This is why I disagree with your stance that only laws which are moral, which in political practice would mean, you have been correctly or incorrectly convinced are moral should be followed. To believe that you can have a government charged with writing and enforcing law but unable to enforce it since everyone believes they are under no obligation to follow laws which they perceive as unjust, strikes me as inherently contradictory.

You are making, what I would consider, a wrongful correlation between "rights violations" and "the law." There does not exist a 1:1 ration where that is the case. The law is the methodology of avoiding as many rights violations as possible. What should be legal, should definitely be based on what protects rights. Whether or not a law should be followed should not. Unless you are advocating that we are at the point that all immoral laws should be disobeyed. So, next April 15, you think I should not pay taxes and maybe shoot the guy who uses guns to force me to give up my hard earned money and bury him in my backyard, if I can get away with it in a rationally self-interested way, of course. I just want to be certain of your consistency. It is not just a civil issue, is my point...he would be criminally liable for injury as if he had hurt them himself. Even if there were no rules specifically saying he couldn't. Rights are nor a "vaporous abstraction" but they certainly are a wide reaching abstraction which, in practice, in considered on a case by case, context ridden fashion. I'm glad that see the borders as having some meaning. Who then, do you think, should be in charge of running that process of entry and setting the rules for it? The government or each individual?

I disagree that one would be justified in breaking an unreasonable law, even one as unreasonable as a 1/2mph speed limit. I think where I disagree is that it is gray at all. The law is very clear that below 1/2mph is acceptable, above is not. The greyness is in where it is reasonable to set it. That decision rests with the legislatures and their appointed bureaucrats. The number amount is somewhat arbitrary and should reasonably be discussed but a line has to be drawn at a point of enforcement. The same problem occurs with age of majority. Why 18? Why not 2 days before 18? Nothing is fundamentally different in so short a time. As a practical matter of government, some age limit must be set and to make it fair, it is applied consistently even if, objectively, at 17, you are more reasonable and qualified than someone else you know who is 19. The fact that it is imprecise does not mean it is arbitrary. Some elected officials sat down and made a particular decision at what limits to set. If we disagree with their reasoning and decisions we can vote against them or reason with them to change, but breaking the law is not our prerogative if we wish to live in a just society. The acceptable exception, as I noted earlier is, if you believe us to be in a dictatorship where there are no means of redress, except violence left to you. And in that case, there is nothing I see that is special about immigration and all immoral laws should be disregarded as often as you safely can. The fact that people still want to emigrate here, in part, leads me to the conclusion that we are not yet at that point.

I admire your idealism, but I think it is misplaced in this argument. I am quite certain that neither Agrippa, Maximus, Sophia nor I lack any necessary knowledge about rights theory from an objectivist perspective. The primary problem in the miscommunication between our two sides is that we are looking primarily at the application of law and not just the theory upon which it should be based. We aren't looking at immigration and saying to ourselves, "should people have rights to their life, liberty, and property and be able to move freely and act as they wish?" Our question, rather, is "Since people have rights to life liberty, and property, what laws, enforcement procedures and other methodologies of government are most conducive to those ends in our present context?" Sometimes minor infringements of rights are acceptable in application because human perception and reasoning will never be perfect. If I am doing nothing wrong, but a cop signals me to pull over, I still cooperate. By your arguments, since I know that I have violated no rights, he has no right to pull me over; I should just ignore him or try to get away and when he then escalates the use of force and rams me off the road or draws his gun, I should try to shoot him first before my rights get violated. In actuality, this absolute right of immigration devoid of the inconvenience of going through a proper immigration process doesn't exist and can never. No perfect objectivist society would allow you to yell fire in crowded theaters even though your freedom of speech seems to imply that you could. If nine people got trampled to death, you would properly be criminally liable. Not just civilly because you broke the terms of agreement that the owner posted. Rights are violated by limiting that speech, being pulled over for no reason, or even wrongful arrest and imprisonment. Objective courts try to sort that out later whether the use of force was reasonable in the given context sometimes unsuccessfully, but usually they do a decent, not perfect, job. To relate this to the current thread, we are not in disagreement about people being able to come here freely, in general. Just whether anyone should cross wilynily without any restriction, hindrance, or concern. The current context is that security threats do exist to the US and its citizens, so stopping entrants at the border for security checks etc, is a wise idea in the ultimate goal of protecting the rights of people inside of its jurisdiction, which is the proper charge of the US government.

Yes but only because you hate freedom. Is that some sort of racial epitaph?!?!? I really don't want to discuss this with you any longer because this statement makes it clear to me that you hate brown people. Especially Cherokees.

Wow...that's beyond horrid.

That's a little passive for my tastes. I would recommend a more direct conversation.

There's a third way. He could just be a total cheapskate.

Maybe that's the problem. We(men) as a group tend to be. I'd bet two to one that he has some weird explanation for it that only makes sense in his mind because he hasn't said it out loud. I'd just ask him.

Why do you exclude LLC from the second list? It seems to be drawing the false inference that a partnership could not also have limited liability.

Maybe this is too obvious, but have you asked him why he does not pay for anything? Some oddly strict dollar based application of not giving or receiving "unearned" wealth? Or for that matter, are you certain he is interested in you romantically, otherwise?

I am not familiar with the man or the books, but I would note that even Marx saw the value of capitalism...as step on the road from feudalism to communism.

I don't think that I'd go so far as to call it willful. More likely, it's just a confirmation bias at work. They wish to be right and do not notice when they are not or, at least, they don't attribute import to counterexamples they run into.

I love TED! Intellectual pornography. Good talk.

I think, strange as it may sound, a conspiracy theory can provide a sort of peace of mind when you consider that the alternative is that no one is making the grand decisions. It can seem preferable, in a sense, to think that some selfish, diabolical cabal of rich guys is making all the decisions because then you can assume that it will never be that bad. "They" would never destroy the world, for example, because they need to live here too. The idea that all of the big happenings in the world occur in a haphazard, unplanned way, is a little disturbing, when you think about it. Fuck, anything could happen! Also, it's important to keep in mind that conspiracies on smaller levels happen all the time. From LBJ having a river rerouted through his own property at the expense of the taxpayers to the S&L "crisis" where Clinton and a great many other politicians were complicit in the partial deregulation of the s&l banks that allowed them to steal untold billions of FDIC insured dollars, to bernie madoff. The relative success of these little conspiracies lend credence to the big ones. A third issue which makes them believable is that, like evolutionary psychology, they tend to work like "just so" stories. When looking backwards on events it is quite easy to form a consistent, meaningful, logically coherent story that explains all of the facts. Personally, I use this as an indication of dishonesty in dealing with other people. Some level of doubt or missing information is usually a part of any knowledge set that someone has of a story, so someone with absolute knowledge of every detail of some story, I usually find, is either being dishonest or is a narcissist if they are like that consistently.