ow embarrassing it is for most Americans today blindly celebrating the Declaration of Independence while also joyfully supporting a huge police state that far surpasses any crimes engaged in by King George III. It’s hard to imagine what people like Thomas Jefferson, Sam Adams, and Thomas Paine would think of our police state today and the so-called “Americans” who support it.

We mourn the passing of our good friend Butler Shaffer, who died yesterday afternoon at the age of 84. Butler was a libertarian at a time when there were very few libertarians in the world. Like many supporters of the free market, he was first attracted to the Republican Party. He supported Barry Goldwater for President in 1964, but he soon came to realize that limited government was a chimera and that the State was by nature opposed to liberty.