Tag Archives | Bureaucrash

Mock the Vote, but not This One

by Agent on June 10, 2009 in Orgs | Comments { 0 }

Hundreds of suggestions have been made for the name of the new, successor group to Bureaucrash.  Now is the time to vote on the short list of suggested names.

Finally an election I am not morally opposed to participating in.  Head on over to ABC Action and make your voice heard!

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Post-Bureaucrash Name Game

by Agent on June 8, 2009 in Orgs | Comments { 1 }

Many of us, dissatisfied with the direction that Bureaucrash has taken, are busily working behind-the-scenes to build the kind of organization that Bureaucrash should be.

As the Neo-Bureaucrashers photocopy thousands of form letters to send to their congresspersons; this new organization will be a voice for effective, principled activism.

What’s the name of Bureaucrash’s successor?  You decide.  Head on over to After Bureaucrash Action and suggest a name. Name suggestions will be taken through midnight (EST) Tuesday. Once the submissions are in a vote will be held and the new organization will be off and running.

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Crasher No More

by Agent on June 6, 2009 in Freedom of Movement, Natural Rights, Orgs | Comments { 6 }

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

You know the rest.  The events of the last few days, especially tonight’s chat session, impel me to separate myself from Bureaucrash.  The organization behind Bureaucrash has chosen to pursue a path that is not my own.

I have made plenty of fine friends at Bureaucrash and many of those will outlast my departure.

To current Crashers.  Keep up the good fight; but make sure it’s the right fight.  Mine will be.

che

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More Social Networking Options

by Agent on June 5, 2009 in Orgs | Comments { 2 }

The chaos over at Bureaucrash Social has many in the freedom movement considering other social networking options.  I’ll be honest, the move by CEI to install a conservative as Crasher-In-Chief has given me a lot of laughs over the last few days.  I don’t want to seem insensitive to Jason, Pete, Xaq and others who have given a lot of effort to Bureaucrash over the years but anyone who has been watching the discussions over there has to be at least a little bit amused by some of the antics.

I do not think that the conservative hordes had any idea what they were getting themselves into or just how much energy and dedication our side has.  The heroes and heroines are simply to numerous to acknowledge individually but they are many.

Some new social networking options are appearing and, as Mike Lowry pointed out in the comments section of that post, I neglected to mention Anarch.Me previously.

I enjoy Anarch.Me and have actually been a member there since before I found Bureaucrash Social.  The site has suffered from lack of discussion until very recently but has really been coming into its own over the last few days.  I did not cover Anarch.Me in that earlier post because I am not convinced that it can serve the same role that Bureaucrash Social did as the name (Anarch.Me), while very appealling to me, could turn off the Ron Paul Republicans and Libertarians.  So, while I do not believe that it will ever be a great site for educating statists, I do think it can be a fine hangout for discussing our activities, exchanging knowledge, etc…

Another option, this one not even a day old, is a mirrored copy of Bureaucrash Social created by Dan Patrick whose wife gave Jason and Pete their tattoos at the beginning of their cross-country Motorhome Diaries journey.  Dan says that he began the new site to enable people unhappy with what the original site has become “to be able to almost seamlessly transition” to the new site.  Dan has been one of the most vocal (well, figuratively…) opponents to the takeover of the original Bureaucrash Social.

The final social networking site that I will cover here has not even officially opened for business yet.  BlackVanguard.net is a project of the Center for a Stateless Society.

BlackVanguard.Net is being built by the folks from C4SS.org. It will be a consolidated community platform for market anarchist social networking, activism and fundraising.

We’re building the site with Drupal, assorted social networking modules for Drupal and the CiviCRM constituent relationship management system. Because CiviCRM has a particularly wide scope of features, the expectation is that “development” will in some ways continue long after the official launch of the site as we gradually build the skillbase to put it to progressively more effective use.

I was able to score a special invitation (thanks Noor!) to poke around and there is not much to see yet with Beta testing ongoing.  The name is wicked and I am sure that the site will be as well, as several good people are involved in it.

UPDATE:  Kevin Dean (Man, do we ALL live in motor homes or what?) has been making a lot of improvements to Fr33agents.net and it is really come together very nicely.  That site seems to be fully-functional now.  Great work, Kevin!

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Wherefore art Thou, FR33agents.net?

by Agent on May 31, 2009 in Orgs | Comments { 7 }

It seems that the new Crasher-In-Chief at Bureaucrash.com is not Xaq Fixx, the person that most of us wanted for the job based on his familiarity to Crashers and principled stance.  They have gone with Lee Doren, who seems to be more of a conservative type.

Bureaucrash Social had really been dying since Pete Eyre left and Xaq was sorely needed, in my view, to keep it going and revitalize the site.

Agorists, while in the minority at Bureaucrash Social, were easily the group with the most active discussions.  So let’s start the mass migration to FR33agents.net.  Some kinks still need to be worked out but it seems the most likely successor to Bureaucrash.  I’ll likely be spending more time at Forums of the Libertarian Left, as well.

Any other suggestions?

Note that I am out of town this weekend (like most weekends) and am basing much of my characterization of Mr. Doren on the opinions of principled people I trust like Jason Talley, Chase Camuzzi and Mike Lowry as I have had, and will have, very little internet time until later this evening.

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Xaq Fixx for President!

by Agent on April 20, 2009 in Orgs | Comments { 7 }

Well, not exactly president but Executive Director/Crasher-in-Chief of Bureaucrash.

As some of y’all may know, both Jason and I formerly worked at Bureaucrash in this capacity. Since my departure on April 1st to pursue Motorhome Diaries a number of friends and movement acquaintances have contacted me asking my thoughts about them applying for the position.

I’ve been straight-up with these folks, both about the nature of the job and in sharing my opinion on whether they’d be a good fit. And though I don’t claim to know of all of those that’ve applied for the gig, I believe that I have a good idea of some of the front-runners — one of whom is Xaq Fixx, whom both Jason and I are throwing our support behind for the following reasons:

  • Xaq is an activist. I have no question that he’ll be a lifelong advocate for liberty ’til the day he dies and this position can’t just be a job.
  • Xaq has the most institutional knowledge of Bureaucrash. He has developed personal relationships with crashers, knows what tactics have worked well and not-so-well, and has a solid grasp of the purpose of Bureaucrash.
  • Xaq has the passion, drive and entrepreneurial mindset needed to head an organization that has very limited resources.
  • Xaq is a networker and is well-liked by those active at Bureaucrash and those in the larger movement, many of whom he’s interacted with due to his role as host of the Podcrash.
  • Xaq is hardcore. Bureaucrash isn’t your run-of-the-mill beltway organization that works to better govenment, but instead it aims to strike the root.

I’m not sure if this post will have any influence on those at the Competitive Enterprise Institute (of which Bureaucrash became a project of a few years ago) as they review applications, but I wanted to voice my support for Xaq as he is my friend and because I believe that he has the skill-set necessary to head Bureaucrash.

If you too agree, then why not let those at CEI know by emailing Cord Blomquist, who is overseeing the application-review process: cblomquist[at]cei[dot]org.

Best of luck buddy!

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