[Joe Liberty]

Oh I'm sorry. I apologise. I made it all up:

Find some logic to replace your "guilt by association" nonsense and that will be sufficient, you can keep your attempts at sarcasm.

"I used to know a guy named Rich who was a complete dickhole. Therefore, you're a complete dickhole." I see the appeal in that kind of thinking (meaning, there isn't much there so it's really easy), but it fails as an actual argument.

Isn't there a contradiction in using conscription whilst decrying slavery?

There sure is.

[SolarCross]

It seems to me that for an american libertarian looking for a precedent for secession one can look at the unsuccessful attempt to secede by the south from the north in the civil war period which is closely interwoven with the villainous practice of slavery or one can look at the successful attempt to secede by the american colonists from the British Empire in the war of independence which has only positive associations for Americans.

Wouldn't the war of independence make a better example of secession to cite?

[Technology]

I suppose you're right actually. Both the British and the colonists at that time were slavers, so it kind of evens out.

[quetzalcoatl]

...the ludicrous notion of (absolute) self ownership must be thrown along with the whole Libertarian (absolute) property nonsense.

What aspects of self-ownership (or self-determination, personal autonomy, whatever) would you consider valid?

[Eran]

Are you saying that abolitionists should be skeptical about using war to pursue their agenda? That leaders should perform cost-benefit analyses prior to wars and surrender/ withdraw if a certain threshold is exceeded?

Historically, it wasn't abolitionists that decided to start the Civil War, not was abolition the goal of the War.

However, to you point, of course people should perform cost-benefit analyses prior to wars and surrender/withdraw if a certain threshold is exceeded. To suggest otherwise is to claim that certain goals are worth any price in life and human suffering.