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Introducing the Ten-Minute Libertarian

I was browsing at Borders last night and found, among lots and lots of other things, a little book called The Ten Minute Activist, which upon examination didn't convince me to buy, but did make me want to steal the concept.

The idea is that working toward whatever your social vision happens to be does not have to start with life-changing involvement. You don't have to give away your possessions, spend Christmas in Iowa bothering people for the candidate of your choice, or load the kids in the van for a family trip to PC World.

You can start to make some difference ten minutes at a time.

So I'm going to run some of these ideas as I find them, and hope some of you will offer some additional suggestions.

Here's the first one:

Libertarians are big on personal privacy, and the government--90% of the time--is not. But the Federal Trade Commission has finally gotten around to extending its "Do Not Call" registry to cell phones, and to setting up a user-friendly website that allows you to register up to three phone numbers at a time. Enter the numbers and you'll get an email with a link to click; that's it.

I'm sure some Libertarians have mixed feelings about this, wondering about the principle of restricting a business's ability to make "cold calls" for new customers. And there is some merit in this reservation, but I personally believe my right NOT to be bothered should trump theirs to troll for new business.

Moreover, the government doesn't get to use coercive force against them unless and until somebody actually complains.

So given that the rest of the State wants to redefine my privacy out of existence, at least the FTC provides a reasonable service to American citizens.

Comments

Brian Shields said…
So, you're saying add random phone numbers to the registry as some form of vigilante justice?
One thing worth mentioning is that form time to time you have to re-up with the no call list- a little accomodation to the "call you during dinner industry."
Now that you mention it, not a bad idea
The Last Ephor said…
Again the main issue here is cost. It costs me nothing to get junk mail. It costs me money to get a cell phone call.

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