Garry Reed's Blog: Good Reed's Goodreads

In June 2010 I posted excerpts of Julian's Jailhouse Journal in Libertarian News Examiner after Julian was released from Rikers Island and made it available to all of his Tyranny Fighters. Here is that article:

Julian's Jailhouse Journal: Police State USA
June 17, 2010
10:43 AM MST

News from the liberterrain…

Seventy-eight year old veteran libertarian, Fully Informed Jury Association activist and indefatigable freedom campaigner Julian Heicklen released his jailhouse journal to his fellow Tyranny Fighters on Tuesday.

Heicklen was arrested on May 25 for committing the crime of standing on public property in front of the US District Courthouse in Manhattan while peacefully giving jury rights information to individuals, sent to jail for 18 Days in New York City's notorious Rikers Island, and then released "in the interest of justice."

Following are just a few outtakes from his journal. Anyone who finds these entries disturbing, disgusting, outrageous and inexcusable should read his entire journal.

"The handcuffs were removed. A number of capillaries had been broken in my wrists. My hands turned blue."

"I was physically and verbally abused during these drags. My upper arms were crushed in their hands, and blood vessels broken. This was painful. My upper arms turned blue. My sneakers had no shoelaces, so my toes kept smashing into the front of the sneakers breaking blood vessels in my toes. This was unpleasant to say the least. My toes turned blue, and did not return to normal for two weeks."

"The nurses and doctors pounded on my chest and pinched my fingers, which was quite painful, but I would not utter a sound. Then they sodomized me by shoving a needle up my rectum. Presumably they were looking for drugs (or bombs)."

"I objected vociferously, but the attendants pinned me to the floor while the doctor gave me an injection in my buttocks. Presumably this was a thorazine shot. I passed out."

"The toilet had overflowed, so there was urine and feces on the floor. I got very little sleep in these pens, because I did not have room to lie down and my old body would ache in the sitting position."

"The toilet did not flush, so feces and urine accumulated in the toilet."

"However the NY City police officer who had to drag me up and down stairs in the courthouse was more articulate. Every few minutes, he would say: 'You worthless piece of sh*t," apparently directed at me.

Heicklen, blessedly, is not without a sense of humor:

"On Sunday at 6:00 am some guy got a razor and cut up my face pretty severely. That guy was me. It was my first shave since I left home the previous Tuesday morning."

Now everyone can read JULIAN'S JAILHOUSE JOURNAL in Tyranny Fighters: The Julian Heicklen Chronicles where it's published in its entirety as a Special Bonus Chapter.
Tyranny Fighters: The Julian Heicklen Chronicles
Garry Reed

If you're not familiar with Julian Heicklen, the original "Tyranny Fighter," I've posted one of his earliest known video interviews on the Tyranny Fighters Blogspot. This was recorded by a supporter called "bile" on September 11, 2009 during Julian's fourth trip to the federal courthouse in Manhattan where he was once again illegally prevented from distributing Fully Informed Jury Association pamphlets to citizens on public property.

Find out more about Julian, the Tyranny Fighters, and the book that chronicles their story in over 70 "as-it-happened" news articles as their stories unfolded.

http://tyrannyfighters.blogspot.com/2...

Tyranny Fighters: The Julian Heicklen Chronicles

Garry Reed

Synopsis of my important new book:

From age 77 until he turned 80 veteran rights activist Julian Heicklen was confronted, harassed, attacked, arrested and jailed by the very law enforcers and justice officials charged with protecting his rights. On more than one occasion he was injected with dangerous antipsychotic drugs, all because he refused to be complicit in his own illegal arrests.

His "crime" was giving jury rights pamphlets to fellow American citizens who voluntarily chose to accept them while both were standing peacefully on public sidewalks in front of America's public courthouses.

Over the years he was joined by a thousand-strong group of supporters who came to be known as Tyranny Fighters, freedom-loving men and women who assisted him in whatever capacity they could; helping distribute brochures, video recording, photographing, witnessing, reporting, publicizing, interviewing, advocating and aiding in his legal battles.

Many of these Tyranny Fighters themselves became victims of the establishment's confrontations, threats, harassments, attacks, arrests and prosecutions.

In my own role as a Tyranny Fighter I served as a reporter, writer, opinionizer, publicist and advocate with my online column The Libertarian News Examiner. From the beginning of Julian's activism and the rise of the Tyranny Fighters I wrote and posted some 70 news and commentary articles in their support.

Now I've collected it all in a single volume under the title Tyranny Fighters: The Julian Heicklen Chronicles. All of the original articles are here, amplified with additional introductory notes and by never before published background material from activist emails, and further supplemented with reader comments, social media commentaries and mainstream news sources.

The book tells the story as it happened, from beginning to end, article by article, dateline by dateline, blow by blow, the setbacks and successes and even the infighting, the coming together of the libertarian community in overwhelming support of the jailed activists with demonstrations and protests and marches and call floods and freedom pages on social media sites.

More than just a riveting chronicle of real world conflict and confrontation in the name of freedom this book celebrates the courage and inspiration of Julian Heicklen and applauds the contributions of all those who proudly took up the mantle of Tyranny Fighter.
Tyranny Fighters: The Julian Heicklen Chronicles
Garry Reed

Doug Erlandson is a Top 50 Reviewer in Amazon's pantheon of Top 100 Customer Reviewers, a writer, and served as a philosophy professor at the University of Nebraska after earning his doctorate from Johns Hopkins University. He self-identifies as a former anarchosyndicalist and currently as a "radical decentralist."

When I first approached Doug Erlandson about taking a break from his normal heavy philosophizing to review my Selected Salvos 2 book he responded with "I am sympathetic to libertarianism, so I'm sure I'll find these essays interesting" and when I mentioned my first book he said, "I'm sure I'll also enjoy Selected Salvos 1."

That meant two reviews for the price of none!

For Selected Salvos 1, under the heading "Good primer on what libertarianism is" he begins with: "This is a fun book to read" and describes it as "lighthearted, humorous, occasionally self-deprecating, and now and then acerbic."

His Review of Salvos 2 is titled "Thoughtful libertarian fare" and makes the point that "If you have libertarian leanings you'll love what Mr. Reed has to say. If you don't, you probably won't read this book (even though you should)" and then concludes with "I highly recommend Volume 2 of 'Selected Salvos,' just as I did Volume 1."

Amazon Top 50 Reviewer, taught philosophy in my home state, is libertarian minded and gave me ten stars for two books. Thanks Doug Erlandson!

Get the latest greatest up-to-datest info about the book like all the places you can buy and/or download it and even watch a YouTube book trailer about it: http://tinyurl.com/mhsl9ve
Selected Salvos from the Loose Cannon LibertarianSelected Salvos 2 from the Loose Cannon Libertarian
Garry Reed

After my Selected Salvos 2 book and free excerpt was posted at, disappeared from, and reappeared on BookDaily the good folks there invited me to post up a free excerpt from my first book, Selected Salvos 1, as I'd already done for Selected Salvos 2.

So once again I've offered up the leadoff article, this one being "Scrooge McDuck Capitalism." Two things about this article:

1. Back when I wrote it in 2002 whenever I said "capitalism" I always had in mind "The Laissez-Faire Free Market" definition of that word. Since then I've discovered that in many people's minds "capitalism" means "Corporatism" or "Government-Corporatist-Bankster-Masonic-Bilderberger-Iluminatti-One World Space Alien Conspiracy" which as a libertarian I utterly reject. These days I eschew the term "capitalism" altogether and just say "free market."

2. In 2004 I received this email:

"I’m a high school economics teacher. Your essay [Scrooge McDuck Capitalism] will be both interesting and valuable to my students. I am printing a class set."

Here's a teaser for the article. Please visit BookDaily to read the entire excerpt:

"Scrooge McDuck Capitalism"

I learned about capitalism long before I'd ever heard of "the free market" or "libertarianism." I learned everything I ever needed to know in my youth, with my head burrowed deep under the bedcovers, reading Scrooge McDuck comic books by flashlight.

Read the entire "Sample Chapter" here: http://tinyurl.com/kyzc4qt

Selected Salvos from the Loose Cannon Libertarian
Garry Reed

An Amazon Customer Reviewer named "Fundamentalist" strikes again. Earlier this month I reported how I unexpectedly stumbled upon this reader's review of my first book, Selected Salvos from the Loose Cannon Libertarian. Following his link to his "Activity" page I found his entire write-up tucked in amongst reviews of a toaster oven, a heating pad and a video.

This time his review of the Kindle Edition of Salvos 2 ranks right up there with his Five Star Review of my first Salvos book.

Fundamentalist is, of course, a pseudonym for our anonymous reviewer. "I picked the name since I am a Christian and because it sounds funny," he confided once I was able to track him down. If he thought "Fundamentalist" was funny I offered to publish his real name along with my own funny description of Fundamentalist:

"How do you help an insolvent mind reader?" "Fund a mentalist."

He responded with "Puleeeeze do not use my name. Let’s just stick with Fundamentalist (or whatever permutation of it that sounds good)."

Or sounds like a horrible pun?

Okay, so here's his entire (very short) review: http://tinyurl.com/qegz9yq

Selected Salvos 2 from the Loose Cannon Libertarian
Garry Reed

I'm grateful for the fact that interviews, book reviews, excerpt postings and other promotional opportunities have been coming so fast lately that it's actually hard to keep up with them all, but that's a great complaint for any writer to have.

Here's another book review of Selected Salvos 2, this time from an economist's-eye view. His name is Robert McKeown and he writes The Blue Collar Economist website where he explains free market "Austrian Economics" for non-economists like me. A year ago Robert wrote a review for my first book in my nascent "Fun&Freedom" Book Series, Selected Salvos from the Loose Cannon Libertarian, and kindly agreed to take a second shot at my second entry in the collection.

Below is a quick promo I posted on my Selected Salvos Blog. It has a cool graphic, more links and additional book info: http://tinyurl.com/nswrasq

Blue Collar Economist reviews Playboynomics in Salvos 2

After reviewing Selected Salvos 1 a year ago Robert was kind enough to take a second shot at the second Salvo.

From his review: "One of my favorite articles is, 'Uncle Shazam and His Magical Logic' where the reader finds example after example where the rubber hits the road in the school of Playboynomics. What is Magical Logic, you might ask? It’s a mental impairment of the governmentally afflicted. I believe 'governmentally afflicted' ought to be the next viral term on social media."

Read the entire review from Robert on his Blue Collar Economist website: "Salvos 2: Get Ready for More Fun and Freedom" http://tinyurl.com/l525k4l

And then listen to Robert who recently appeared with Joe Cristiano on BlogTalk Radio at this link: http://tinyurl.com/k3pog6g

Selected Salvos 2 from the Loose Cannon Libertarian
Garry Reed

Curry B. Taylor, Vice-Chair of the Libertarian Party of Dallas County (Texas) and Editor-In-Chief Extraordinaire of the LPDC Newsletter cross-examined a suspicious character purporting to be some sort of sassy essayist.

Following a faux introduction in the April 2015 edition awash with insider snortles (snickers + chortles) Taylor introduced the Selected Salvos 2 author with an obvious attempt to either Curry favor or flavor with Curry: "Garry Reed does have a smashing new book out, and I picked his prolific brain about it in this interview."

Slim pickings.

It's a fairly longish Q&A – some of the questions are actually longer than the longish answers but here's a fun example exchange:

Taylor: Sex sells. Are your "Playboynomics"-themed chapters in the book a thinly-veiled attempt at appealing to the hedonist in all of us, or is there a much larger and deeper hidden agenda?

Reed: I'm compiling articles 20 per book and I realized I had these two Playboy themed articles written close to the same time so I decided to make "Playboynomics" the theme for this edition which also covers several of the other economically-themed articles. Besides, sex sells.

Curry puts out a beautifully sculpted newsletter with bright sharp graphics and both whimsical and thoughtful content. That makes this interview best read in its native state with photos and layout and other visuals.

Enjoy the entire give-and-take here in full PDF format:

CANON FROM A LOOSE LIBERTARIAN: AN INTERVIEW http://tinyurl.com/nqjrlwq

Selected Salvos 2 from the Loose Cannon Libertarian

Garry Reed

Susan Callaway, known to many libertarians as weblogger "The Price of Liberty" and affectionately to many others as "Mama Liberty" wrote a review and posted it several places on Amazon and on Barnes&Nobel, B&N Nook Books and her own website "The Price of Liberty." She not only reviewed the book but the author too!

Here's her full review from her own blog:

The Loose Cannon Libertarian
Posted on March 16, 2015 by Mama Liberty

MamaLiberty

Book Review: Selected Salvos 2
(http://www.thepriceofliberty.org/?p=7055)
By Garry Reed, The Loose Cannon Libertarian

Garry Reed has been a friend for many years. We’ve talked a lot about most aspects of freedom and politics, not always in agreement by a long shot, but I was always pleased to see that he would er on the side of individual sovereignty, even when he didn’t immediately embrace the full extent of the potential because pragmatism kept getting in the way.

Gradually, with interesting back and fill at times, he came to understand that electoral politics could not even be justified by any kind of pragmatism. Slavery, by any name, is still slavery. And theft is still theft, no matter how many people want to justify theft.

Garry has collected articles from the last fifteen years or so into two small volumes. They describe the journey from Libertarian political apologist, to the voluntarist he has become. Unlike so many, this journey is taken with wit, much terrific insight into humanity, and an unbelievable number of plain old belly laughs. And he paints even his sometimes painful transition with humor and good cheer.

If you have also made this journey, or are even wondering about it, these books will do you much good, and will serve as a springboard, perhaps, to conversation with friends who remain stuck in pragmatism, or actually still believe that there is some magic about electoral politics that can “restore” freedom in America.

Show them it just isn’t so.

Selected Salvos 2 is now on BookDaily and it includes One FREE Article from the book!

BookDaily encourages authors to post excerpts of their books for readers to read free. They suggest posting an entire chapter, but since my book is only 74 pages long and consists of 20 articles that average 750 words each that means every article is a chapter in itself. And since each article is so short you get to read one whole article gratis.

I've published the same excerpt/chapter/article here in my "Good Reed's Goodreads Blog" before – "Tax Dollars for Sex Scholars" – but if you're curious and would like to see it on BookDaily (maybe as a place to show off your own book) here's the link:

http://www.bookdaily.com/book/4991173...

Selected Salvos 2 from the Loose Cannon Libertarian

Garry Reed