Well, not quite. But she has an interesting post on obscenity law and firearms:

If you consider a stash of obscene videos scarier than a stash of firearms then this is the country for you.  In America you have a constitutional right to own a gun, and you may traffic in firearms with legal impunity; but you risk being imprisoned for buying and selling arguably obscene pornography.

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It’s an odd notion of liberty that equates the dangers of legalizing pornography and the dangers of prohibiting gun ownership, but it’s not an uncommon one.  Consider the views of the Liberty Counsel: “(O)bscenity, pornography, and indecency debase our communities, harm our families, and undermine morality and respect,” according to the Counsel’s Declaration of American Values. “Therefore, we promote enactment and enforcement of laws to protect decency and traditional morality.”  But if “smut” poses demonstrable harm to “(m)en, women, children, families and larger society,” gun ownership (according to the Declaration of American Values) is “central to the preservation of peace and liberty.” The Second Amendment “stands as an impenetrable wall between tyranny and freedom,” Liberty Counsel founder Mathew D. Staver declared, lauding the Supreme Court’s recognition of a constitutional right to own a gun:  “Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition,” he chortled; cower when confronted with pornography.

If you had asked me about this two years ago, I probably would have described myself as a pro-gun, pro-porn maximalist. Upon further reflection, I’m now less sure about the porn. Regardless, I think Kaminer’s post is another argument in favor of radical political decentralization. People’s views on porn and guns vary so dramatically that I think it’s basically impossible to devise a one-size-fits-all firearm or obscenity policy. The irreconcilable nature of these disagreements also makes me doubt the existence of some universally acceptable middle ground between Second Amendment absolutists and the Brady Campaign (or between Larry Flint and the Family Research Council, for that matter).

So while national compromise is unlikely, hashing out obscenity guidelines or firearm controls at the local level strikes me as a plausible alternative. Kaminer can have her liberalized obscenity laws, the Liberty Counsel can continue to “praise the Lord and pass the ammunition,” and we’ll figure out what works and what doesn’t somewhere along the way.

After reading several accounts of the Ephemerisle Festival (for those interested, a more in-depth explanation of the event – and seasteading – can be found here), I’m more convinced than ever that I really need to attend one of these events. As I’ve said earlier, however, I don’t expect any floating cities to launch in my lifetime, and reports from Ephemerisle haven’t done much to change this assessment (The Irish Times‘ take on the conspicuous absence of nautical know-how isn’t exactly confidence-inspiring).

That said, the movement’s impressive groundwork suggests that enthusiasm for seasteading is more than a fad, and the idea of floating communities has, at the very least, provoked some incredibly interesting discussion. But I wonder if all of this enthusiasm is misplaced. My lack of engineering knowledge notwithstanding, the technical barriers to creating sustainable floating cities seem enormous. The political complications arising from seaborne secession also strike me as an important (and under-appreciated) hurdle to seasteading; if floating communities become as subversive as their boosters suggest, I think the likelihood of some two-bit dictator’s navy nipping the project in the bud increases dramatically.

The logic of seasteading, however, remains compelling. Creating a mechanism for persistent, non-theoretical political experimentation strikes me as a very worthy goal. So why not channel all of this energy into reclaiming the states as laboratories of democracy (or libertarianism)? The political barriers to a federalist revival are also immense, but they seem downright trivial compared to the challenges facing prospective seasteaders. I can’t help thinking that it would be easier for libertarians to claim Vermont as their own than to recreate Galt’s Gulch on an abandoned oil platform.

One possible objection is that experimenting within an American political context constrains the scope of potential experiments.* To be perfectly honest, I think this is a feature, not a bug. Whether through dumb luck or wise statesmanship, the West seems to have narrowed the spectrum of acceptable political systems down to variants of democratic capitalism. All that’s left, then, is to further refine the formula through more experimentation. A return to federalism strikes me as the best (and most feasible) way to accomplish this goal.

*One other possible objection is that libertarians have already tried – and failed – to jump-start a federalist revival.

One has to admire Murtha’s honesty. “If I’m corrupt, it’s because I take care of my district” might not represent the best of disinterested liberal governance, but it’s a refreshingly frank admission of his core political priorities. And whatever one thinks of Murtha’s methods, the sentiment behind them is certainly understandable. Murtha was elected to conduct the people’s business. In Western Pennsylvania, the people’s business is ensuring a modicum of stability in the midst of a disorienting economic transition. The impetus behind Murtha’s penchant for pork, at least, is actually quite noble.

So is Murtha wrong for shamelessly funneling government largess to his beleaguered district? Well, yes, I suppose he is. But for all his faults, Murtha is a creature of the system. He wants to help his district. In an earlier era, he may have been a particularly effective ward boss or a successful small town mayor. Now, however, congressional earmarks have replaced local patronage as the best way to keep his constituents fat and happy.

Had Murtha acquired a similar reputation for creative financial disbursement as town mayor or state representative, I doubt he’d be villified by anyone. Earmarks, special expenditures, patronage – these things grease the wheels of local democracy. Moreoever, their proximity to the people who originally supplied the funds and voted the relevant elected officials into office gives them a special kind of legitimacy that national earmarks sorely lack . At the state or regional level, the connection between government spending and citizen welfare isn’t tenuous. To those of us outside Western Pennsylvania, however, the supposed benefits of the John P. Murtha Technology Center are less apparent.

Too often, critics of earmarks obsess over the latest in asburd congressional spending without examining their larger context. Murtha’s prodigious earmarks are symptomatic of real social needs that deserve to be addressed by elected officials. That these officials are best-positioned to act effectively at the national level is an indictment of our top-heavy political infrastructure, not an indictment of public welfare spending per se.

*This headline brought to you by Slate Magazine.