Blogodidact

The State of the Ruin Speech

2012-01-24T23:15:00.001-06:00

Streams of light break through the clouds...?

A couple brief comments before bed, on the President's State of the Union speech. The first is that I've got to give President Obama credit for one thing, he has made great strides towards living up to two of his campaign promises:

"I just think we ought to spread the wealth around" and his promise to begin "... fundamentally transforming the United States of America."

I was surprised to hear one of the pundits say that 'there were no big proposals in this speech'... I don't think they listened too clearly. For instance, I didn't hear the pundits mention this part,

"We should start with our tax code. Right now, companies get tax breaks for moving jobs and profits overseas. Meanwhile, companies that choose to stay in America get hit with one of the highest tax rates in the world. It makes no sense, and everyone knows it.

So let’s change it. First, if you’re a business that wants to outsource jobs, you shouldn’t get a tax deduction for doing it. That money should be used to cover moving expenses for companies like Master Lock that decide to bring jobs home.

Second, no American company should be able to avoid paying its fair share of taxes by moving jobs and profits overseas. From now on, every multinational company should have to pay a basic minimum tax. And every penny should go towards lowering taxes for companies that choose to stay here and hire here."

Leaving aside the issue that if he believes the first part, then he ought to talk to his Jobs Czar, Jeffrey Immelt of G.E. who recently outsourced factories to China, or his Justice Dept telling Gibson guitar that if they want to continue doing business, they should outsource their jobs to Madagascar, but that pales in comparison to the rest of it. This is a huge suggestion, intimation, threat... or maybe a 'Nudge' is the better word for it, towards govt actively 'spreading the wealth around', and an assurance for even more of the mess we currently find ourselves in. Govt using its power to take from those it dislikes, and using it to favor and reward those it has warm feelings for... and amassing power to itself through the process.

And then there was this transformational little horror,

"We also know that when students aren’t allowed to walk away from their education, more of them walk the stage to get their diploma. So tonight, I call on every State to require that all students stay in high school until they graduate or turn eighteen."

Good lord, police state doesn't begin to cover it, but it was an incredibly appropriate bookend for the soft nationalization of American industry which his previous 'tax cuts' comments proposed. In case you missed it, following up on his earlier Youth Corps and TFA proposals, what this proposal amounts to, is nationalizing your children, America. But then since most parents seem to be just fine with govt monitoring of their kids 24/7, I guess that's a big yawn, right?

Talk about fundamental transformation. OMG.

And in ComPLETEly unrelated news, D.C. 'lawmakers' want mandatory 'college' for all students:

"Lawmakers in the nation's capital have floated a plan to require high school students to apply to college or trade school -- even if the students have no interest in attending."

Lawmakers in the nation's capital have floated a plan to require high school students to apply to college or trade school -- even if the students have no interest in attending ‎... I mean, after all, who cares what the student wants to do with their life, pshaw! Everyone knows that legislators know what's best for all, and the rest of us simply must, as Rousseau put it, be 'forced to be free'.

No cause for concern there. Nope. Moving on....

Perhaps most disturbing of all, was this:

"Some of what’s broken has to do with the way Congress does its business these days. A simple majority is no longer enough to get anything – even routine business – passed through the Senate. Neither party has been blameless in these tactics. Now both parties should put an end to it. For starters, I ask the Senate to pass a rule that all judicial and public service nominations receive a simple up or down vote within 90 days.

The executive branch also needs to change. Too often, it’s inefficient, outdated and remote.

That’s why I’ve asked this Congress to grant me the authority to consolidate the federal bureaucracy so that our Government is leaner, quicker, and more responsive to the needs of the American people."

He could have simply said "I've asked this Congress to grant me the authority to..." and left it there, because that is what he means by it. No big proposals? Maybe not in explicit plans, but the overall tone of this speech was overwhelmingly ominous. IMHO.

And finally a last couple visual observations.

One, maybe it's just me, but did anyone else notice how the camera repeatedly came back to the the flood lights streaming down before Obama, and how remarkably they looked like sunlight streaming through the clouds. Has anyone noticed that overt an effect being conveyed time and again in a State of the Union speech?

And two, did anyone notice that as Obama was making his way through the crowd and approached the seats of the Supreme Court Justices, that he turned his back to, and sidled around, Chief Justice Roberts, a conservative, and then he immediately and warmly shook hands or embraced the leftie justices Breyer, Kagan and Ginsburg?

It's late and I've got to get to bed, but if I had to give one impression (without substantiation for the moment) for this State of the Union speech, it would be that it is a fundamentally anti-American message, sure to bring the American state to even further ruin.

The Real Educational Trojan Horse: Deleting Western Civilization 101

2012-01-19T14:40:00.002-06:00

The Real Educational Trojan Horse: Deleting Western Civilization 101

My daughter brought home an assignment for her 7th grade social studies class 'Ancient Civilizations'; I wish I had been able to make a copy of it. The worksheet was several pages long, with four or five parts which summarized legend of the Trojan War, and did so remarkably similar to how Wikipedia does (which came first, the wiki, or the rotten egg?)... with one, very notable exception.

The assignment was really an exercise in the typical sort of pap our schools passes off as 'preparation for success!', feeding the kids two or three sentences, then asking a few fill in the blank questions following the paragraph, you know the sort of stuff I mean, the stuff that ensures improved test scores!, such as this:

"The Ancient Greeks believed in many Gods. Zeus was the king of the Gods and was believed to have ruled the world from their home on Mt. Olympus.

Review questions:
1. The king of the Gods was ____ and he lived on ______________."

What a challenge, eh? Can you say building Excellence?! - but at least it was long, right? (sigh), Four or five parts & pages worth, that was sure to fill homework quotas.

Anyway, I don't know how familiar you are with Homer's The Iliad, but I've read it a few times, I've read the surrounding myths and histories often and have generally thought about it... more than a little, and I was curious how they would choose to present the topic - as myth? as murky history? Both?, but I was at least assuming that they would present it.

You know what they say about assuming.

It started off well enough, going into the back story with the goddess Discord discovering that she hadn't been invited to the big wedding, and then doing her thing by rolling a golden apple into the party that was inscribed with 'For the most beautiful', which of course soon pitted several of the Goddesses against each other and sent them looking for someone foolish enough to judge who was most beautiful. Zeus was too smart to step into that one, and directed them to a shepard boy, Paris, a judgment which would eventually lead to the Trojan War.

It went into the Greek kings competing to marry the beautiful Helen, talked about Helen deserting her husband to go to Troy with Paris, and how the Greeks went to war with the Trojans over the 'abduction'. It noted that the war dragged on for 10 long years, that Achilles was the Greeks greatest warrior - it doesn't mention that Achilles was the child born of that earlier wedding, or how important that was to other myths and later plays, but hey, what can you expect of such excellence, right? - and then it mentioned that Achilles was distraught when Patroclus was killed an...

sssSCREEEECHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!! What?!!! What the... really?! It jumps from the war's 10th year, to Patroclus being killed.

WTF.

For three thousand years, the heart and soul of Western Civilization began, and in many cases ended, with Homer's telling of this brief episode of the Trojan War. In the epic of 'The Iliad', its first famous line of

"Sing, O goddess, the anger of Achilles ...."

is amongst the most famous first lines in all of Western literature. The Iliad, which was essentially the equivalent of The Bible to the Greeks, was Homer's telling of the conflict which resulted when the high King Agamemnon, upset at having to return his captive to her father, a priest of Apollo, turns and demands that Achilles give up his reward, the captive Briseis, whom Achilles loved, that Achilles give her to Agamemnon because Agamemnon was the king, and as king, he had the authority to take her, and so he could and would.

The anger of Achilles at this unjust action, and how he deals with it IS the Iliad. How he turned away from his just rage and listened to the Goddess Athena, goddess of Reason, that he should not kill Agamemnon, but instead should listen to Reason and bide his time, is a vital core of Western Civilization. As is his defying his king by refusing to fight any further in Agamemnon's war against the Trojans, his refusing all entreaties and bribes to return. Achilles instead goes about preparing to abandon 'the unjust king', choosing to turn away from the undying fame and glory which prophecy said was his if he were to fight in the war, though at the cost of an early death; Achilles instead chose to return to a calm, happy and long life.

But then his dearest friend Patroclus is killed while fighting in his stead, fighting because the Greeks were so in need of Achilles that they would perish without him, and so partially yielding, he allows Patroclus to wear his own armor and go into turn the tide of battle as if he were Achilles... if he would promise to return then and there. Patroclus does this, and he turns the tide of battle... but then he forgets his promise and pursues glory and is killed by the Trojan Prince, Hector, and with that, in anguish and rage, Achilles returns to the war, kills Hector and continues to burn in near madness, until Hector's father, King Priam, comes to him alone, and begs for his son's body. Achilles anger is put out, he allows Priam to take his son's body and promises him sufficient time for a proper funeral rights, and that is the end of the Iliad.

There is no significant trait of what has become known as The West, that does not find its origin in The Iliad. Our tendency to rebel at authority, the inventiveness and effectiveness at, and disgust over, war; our striving for excellence and our wariness at achieving what seems to be success, our wiliness... and so much more - it is our tie to the Greeks, to Philosophy, to our most famous plays, it connects us to Rome... the source and form of our culture, all traces back to The Iliad.

And all of that, except for Achilles killing Hector in revenge, which becomes trivial, a mere tit for tat reaction without the rest of the story to give it form... they left it all completely out.

That story, that passage IS the Iliad, it IS what makes the Trojan War worth recounting, That IS the only reason why any of the other myths and histories they did include, have endured over the last three millennium.This, the oldest tale in Western Civilization (bite me Gilgamesh), whose study was once considered the means, material and mark of Education even up through our Founding Father's time and beyond, this was deleted from their recounting of the Trojan War. They deleted it without even a hint of its existence, deleted it from the worksheet, and as I'm sure they hope, deleted it from your child's mind.

Why would anyone even bother with telling any of the other myths, without telling that portion? They are nothing but meaningless trivia without that key....

And that is more likely than not, exactly why it was deleted.

This was no accident. You could not possibly include what they did write about, without knowing about the conflict between Agamemnon and Achilles - absolutely Could Not. The deletion was deliberate, on purpose, intentional. There is not even the uber-feeble excuse of political correctness, for that part of the story contains no dicey PC issues, no non-multi-culti scenario, no further violence, no uncomfortable topic, which wasn't similarly included through the other parts as well... all that the Iliadic portions contain... is what gives them meaning, and it was simply and entirely omitted from the lesson.

Much Ado About Nothing?
Maybe you think I'm making a big deal out of nothing. Maybe there aren't many people who are left who'd know or care about this as I do, but... there is a reason for that as well - Western Civilization has been progressively bred out of Western Civilization for over a century, by those we entrusted our education to and the process is now nearly complete.

Gretchen Logue told me how she had just been talking with neighbors who recently put their kids in another school district, who told her that their child’s teachers were teaching them how another hero of the Iliad and the Odyssey, Odysseus, was being portrayed as a nasty, hater of women, the poor and of other cultures, as were the Greeks in general.

What a surprise.

Ladies and Gentleman, have a look around at the rest of the world... cast an admiring eye upon the ~~cesspools~~... civilizations of the middle east, Africa, Cambodia, etc., drink it all in and familiarize yourselves with it, meet and greet their deep wells of decadence, poverty, hatred and above all, ignorance. You might as well do it now, their examples are soon to become your realities, because their world is all that will remain after the West has past beyond memory.

Your schools, your so called 'educational systems' have nearly succeeded in deleting what it is that makes the West, the West... and you really think that the most important issue of the day is whether we'll have Newt Gingrich or Mitt Romney or Barack Obama as our President?

You really wonder why these are the only choices you have to choose from?

You goddamn idiots.

What kind of an education you get, is more important than getting a lot of education
You are being made into a people of Esau, eagerly disavowing their heritage for a bowl of pottage, which our Educational Czar, Arne Duncan, today calls 'life skills', and in so doing, you are becoming a people who are no longer descendants of the Greeks, but of the Trojans, and like the Trojans of Ilium, you have fallen for the ruse of the Trojan Horse, you have welcomed it in into your gates, disassembling them for the privilege, just as your spiritual ancestors did all those millenia ago.

But this time when we've all finally gone to sleep, while it won't be Greeks who crawl out of the bowels of this Trojan Horse, I garaundamntee you, they will bring you fire and sword and complete destruction. Had our education included more of the patrimony of the West, that which formed the education of our Founding Fathers, and was still significant even to my grand parents day, and for my parents education as well, treasures such as the Iliad, you might have guessed that.

But don't worry, I'm sure your kids will all get straight A's.

Pissing away our priorities

2012-01-16T22:34:00.002-06:00

No doubt you're all aware of the video that surfaced of Marines taking an ungentlemanly piss on some dead taliban terrorists, recently room temperature'd after a life or death battle with the same newly relieved Marines.

Some of our high-minded fellows were piously pissed off at said pissing.

Some weren't.

Dana Loesh mentioned on her radio show that the outrage was bizarre and that given the situation, she'd be more inclined to 'drop trou' and join them, which thoroughly pissed off the pious of the left and the right. A blog I'd not seen before this, SooperMexican, gives a good account of it, Dana said,

“Can someone explain to me if there’s supposed to be a scandal that someone pees on the corpse of a Taliban fighter? Someone who, as part of an organization, murdered over 3,000 Americans? I’d drop trou and do it too. That’s me though. I want a million cool points for these guys. Is that harsh to say? Come on people, this is a war. What do people think this is?”

And please, do be sure to scroll down to the bottom of that post where he's provided a selection of the righteously pissed off's own commentary. If you believe that they give a fig for simple human decency, congratulations, you are virtually the most deluded fool I've had the misfortune to meet. Today.

The first I heard of the marines waterworks incident was on Adam Sharp's page (Adam, always eloquent, expressed a very correct political viewpoint "Oh, I'm sorry am I supposed to give a sh*t?"), that there was an investigation being called for, and my reaction, doing somewhat of a disservice to the marines, and more service than is due to the taliban, was that the investigation should be over why they didn't bring a kegger with them.

Do I feel bad about that?

No, no I don't. Do I understand how important it is to have respect for your fellow man? Yes I do. Do I think it is important that our military have the highest standards of professionalism? Yes I do. Do I feel bad about what I said or what the marines did?

Nope.

And before you get too riled up at that, here's another question - do you think this was a casual, thoroughly well discussed and deliberated action upon the part of the marines involved? Do you think that if they were approached in normal circumstances, and asked if they thought that pissing upon dead taliban would be a proper and acceptable everyday behavior for someone to engage in, that they would think it would be?

I do not think that they'd answer yes to that.

Do I think they should have done what they did? I really don't think that's a serious question, but I'll go ahead and put my response this way: if I were to hire someone to build a fence for me, and they talked filth in front of my kids, I'd have a few well chosen words to say to them before escorting them off the property. But if I was confident that I'd hired competent professionals, and we heard them when they happened to swear after smashing their finger... I would probably not make too much of a deal out of it.

Multiply the circumstances involved there by several orders of magnitude, being sure to factor in the difference between a hammer striking your thumb, and an IED shredding your closest friends to jagged chunks of flesh thrown into your face and into the dirt along the side of the road, and magnify everything else by several similar orders of magnitude, and then I think that you should begin to see a feeble, though reasonable, comparison.

Now. If you are one of the people all a-flutter over this, let me ask you another question. Are you unable to see how a significant measure of courtesy and understanding should be extended to people, mostly twenty year olds, who are half way around the world, involved in actual war, defending your life by risking theirs; kids who are seeing their friends wounded and killed, seeing women & children slaughtered and maimed by these taliban they are fighting - and who they are there fighting because the taliban brutally slaughtered several thousand of your countrymen who were simply peacefully going about their lives... are you really unwilling to cut some slack to these Marines who are tasked with the horrifying job of having to kill those who'd like to kill you?

If so, I not only question your priorities, but whether or not you have any. If you can't understand that, then I suppose it's also highly unlikely that you'd understand that others would quickly step up to defend them; it's unlikely that you'd see the importance of people quickly stepping up and supporting those which our nation has sent into violent conflict, and so now I question more than your priorities.

A friend drew my attention the other day to this bit in the Daily Caller which sums the flap up well

"Let this be a lesson to everyone: If you want to pee on a dead terrorist, first wrap him in an American flag. Then Keith Olbermann, Eric Boehlert, and other leading lights of liberalism will cheer you on."

For those on the left, it is despicable, but expected - for those on the right, particularly those settling personal scores on the backs of the Marines caught up in this 'urinationgate', it is doubly despicable.

Oh, and if you did serve in the military, maybe even did see combat yourself - sorry, that buys you no pass in this matter with me... in fact it reflects even worse upon you, IMHO. Once upon a time you apparently had actual priorities, and now you've allowed others, of little or no significance, to take their place. Shame on you.

Priorities
Perhaps you can catch a whiff of what those lost priorities should be, in the actions of those who clearly did understand their priorities... and who, amazingly enough, once expressed themselves in a manner similar to these maligned Marines.

Those of you who know anything about Gen. George S. Patton, or even saw the movie, you might recall that Patton, who often stepped out of line with the sentiments of the time, expressed himself in a similar manner, was even photographed in the act, and surprisingly (to the righteously pious & pissed off), did not receive his usual heaping helping of controversy over the incident of his pissing in the Rhine, which was in fact symbolically pissing on an entire people.

"I drove to the Rhine River and went across on the pontoon bridge. I stopped in the middle to take a piss and then picked up some dirt on the far side in emulation of William the Conqueror."

A curmudgeonly fellow over at RedState put it well,

"George Patton knew damned well that, when he urinated in the Rhine River, that the very image (a once-iconic image, by the way, which was snapped by enterprising Army photographers, and that has hung in years gone by in innumerable VFW halls throughout the land) he was sending, indeed, a message to Greater Germany: I’m pissing on you. And you deserve it, for the horrific slaughter you’ve unleashed on mankind.

In short, he was pissed off. And I’m still pissed off at the “Taliban”."

Seems that Patton felt that since the the enemy was the reason for his being there, and the reason why his troops were being killed in battles they'd prefer not to have to bother having to fight, that that enemy wasn't worth any respect at all, and the people of the United States agree with him.

As far as the dead taliban go, another friend had this to say about the moistened mujaheddin:

"Piss be upon them"

Personally - I like that a lot.

But I'll give the last word (almost) to Rep. Allen West (R-Fla.), a former Army lieutenant colonel, who emailed a comment on this issue,

“I have sat back and assessed the incident with the video of our Marines urinating on Taliban corpses. I do not recall any self-righteous indignation when our Delta snipers Shugart and Gordon had their bodies dragged through Mogadishu. Neither do I recall media outrage and condemnation of our Blackwater security contractors being killed, their bodies burned, and hung from a bridge in Fallujah.

“All these over-emotional pundits and armchair quarterbacks need to chill. Does anyone remember the two Soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division who were beheaded and gutted in Iraq?

“The Marines were wrong. Give them a maximum punishment under field grade level Article 15 (non-judicial punishment), place a General Officer level letter of reprimand in their personnel file, and have them in full dress uniform stand before their Battalion, each personally apologize to God, Country, and Corps videotaped and conclude by singing the full US Marine Corps Hymn without a teleprompter.

“As for everyone else, unless you have been shot at by the Taliban, shut your mouth, war is hell.”

That, to me, seems much more like an example of someone who has their priorities in order.

IMHO, a person's priorities in matters such as this should reflect an understanding that our soldiers swear their lives to uphold and protect the Constitution of the United States of America, which provides for the laws which protect the lives, liberties, property and freedom of speech of us all, their priorities should reflect an understanding that those in our military not only put their lives in jeopardy to do that, but they risk enduring hell on earth in order to defend the Constitution, the nation and the lives of us all.

It seems to me that a persons priorities in matters such as this should allow for cutting some slack to those who might not behave as if they were in a corporate boardroom or public classroom, while fighting for their lives with brutal barbarians in an actual war.

To allow those priorities to take a back seat to a concern for politically correct sensibilities, to let those priorities take a back seat to scoring political points, to let those priorities take a back seat to settling personal issues with a person, such as Dana Loesch, who spoke up in defense of those who are defending us… is to piss away your true priorities, and I find it to be despicable.

The Pied Piper comes to collect your children-lab rats

2012-01-04T20:05:00.001-06:00

On the heels of my last post on the issue of Education taking a back seat to pushing a political agenda, the article which this post from the Missouri Education Watchdog links to asks “When is the linecrossed between better health and surveillance?”, and it asks it regardingthis:

“In early 2012, wristwatch-like devices calledPolar active monitors will be used by older students in PE classes at all 18Parkway elementary schools… focus of the monitors' use will change gradually,so that by the end of the year students will continually wear the monitors for a full week at a time [24/7] to assessactivity levels.
"We want to be able to look at both physical activity and sleep patterns,"Ramspott said. "We also want to see how various activity levels correlateto student achievement and behavior."

They want to monitor, track, record, the activity levels of your children, examine their sleep patterns, they want to have your children way an electronic monitoring device not just at school, but at home, at play... around the clock.

These areelementary schools. They are supposedly for Educating your children... ok, not even I believe that... but they are at least supposed to teach your child to read, write, calculate and have some semblance of a scientific and historical perspective. They are not research labs for testing the performance quality ofhuman resource units - your children, my children, are not being sent to school to function as lab rats so that government 'education professionals' can tweak their performance.

I’m sorry, but if you can’t see that this doesn’t even deserve the question ofwhen a line might be crossed, and instead leaps directly to inquisition modewith

“Who the hell conceived of this and why do they still have a job aroundour children?!”

, then… I find it very difficult to see how the name ‘American’applies to you in any way other than as a geographical reference. If you don't think that this, and worse, so very much worse, is coming to a school near you - soon... you are insane. That much ignorance of the progression of proregressive education is not excusable by ignorance or negligence, you are insane, and perhaps criminally so.

I don’t know how to string together enough four letter words to adequately express myoutrage on this properly, so I won’t bother trying, but as Sam Adams said

"... May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget thatyou were our countrymen!"

UPDATE: With Sam Adams quote firmly in mind, a person anonymously commented at Mo Education Watchdog's site, that

“Nobody can force kids to wear these things at home…”

You can look at this and seriously identify that as the key issue? Good lord, I hope I don’t know you.

What part of Reading, R’iting and ‘Rithmatic do you see monitoring a child’s activity levels and sleep patterns as falling under? Do you not grasp what assumptions this makes about not only the role of the School System, but its role in your life? Have you been so assiduous about not ‘over-reacting’, that you are willing to entertain any invasion of your life, any assumption of your child as a resource unit, as long as it isn’t ‘forced’ upon you?

Do you completely lack sufficient warmth of imagination to see what will follow once this is accepted as being the rational norm? Here, let me help you, this is from the article,

“… a pilot project started in April provided the monitors during physical education classes to students at Henry and Ross elementary schools. Shenandoah Valley Elementary School in Chesterfield joined the pilot in August.
At the district's Dec. 7 Board of Education meeting, the board approved expanding the project beyond the pilot phase.”

It began as providing monitors during phys ed classes, and is now expanding the project beyond the pilot phase… what do you suppose the ultimate purpose of the program is? This is every bit as much of a ‘pilot phase’ as wearing the monitors in phys ed class was, are you not able to see that?

“… but over-reacting isn't a rational way to deal with anything. “

How anyone can see this even being proposed, and not react with seething rational fury is beyond me. Personally, I’d be hard pressed to call anyone’s response to this, an over-reaction, and not reacting is just plain sick.

The proprietor of of "The 3Rs of Education: Respect, Reality, Reason" recently supplied this from Thorndike’s definition of the art of teaching, from his The Principles of Teaching based on Psychology (1906), that it,

"Stimulus and Response Using psychological terms the art of teaching may be defined as the art of giving and withholding stimuli with the result of producing or preventing certain responses In this definition the term stimulus is used widely for any event which influences a person for a word spoken to him a look a sentence which he reads the air he breathes etc etc The term response is used for any reaction made by him a new thought a feeling of interest a bodily act any mental or bodily condition resulting from the stimulus The aim of the teacher is to produce desirable and prevent undesirable changes in human beings by producing and preventing certain responses The means at the disposal of the teacher are the stimuli which can be brought to bear upon the pupil the teacher's words gestures and appearance the condition and appliances of the school room the books to be used and objects to be seen and so on through a long list of the things and events which the teacher can control The responses of the pupil are all the infinite variety of thoughts and feelings and bodily movements occurring in all their possible connections."

If that is accepted as the definition of Teaching, and it is in all of the Teaching Colleges which certify Teachers, you can be assured that what it is that is being taught is not compatible with Liberty... but it goes fabulously well with 24/7 electronic monitoring.

What Finland's schools can teach us about making political points

2012-01-02T23:20:00.001-06:00

Let me ask you something, if you discovered that another country was being hugely successful in educating their students, and doing so without either the endless classroom hours and brain busting homework loads of the Asian model, or the relentless testing and assessing barrages of the American model, wouldn’t you want to know what it was they were doing in their classrooms? If you were going to write an article to inform your nation of this great success story in Education – wouldn’t you discuss what it was they were doing?

I just read, what I’d hoped would be an interesting article on how successful Finland’s school system has been, called “What Americans Keep Ignoring About Finland's School Success”, but having read it, I find that it might have been better entitled “What American journalists can score political points with while Ignoring what’s made Finland's Schools Successful”.

What I found most interesting, is that the author of the article, and the Finn contact, relentlessly present the 'secret' of Finland’s success in Education, as having to do with issues which have nothing whatsoever to do with how they actually go about Educating their children.

Why would an article on educational success... not discuss what makes their system of education so successful? Interesting, isn't it?

The contact, Pasi Sahlberg, director of the Finnish Ministry of Education's Center for International Mobility, apparently taught mathematics and physics in a junior high school in Helsinki; but do we get to learn how he went about teaching those ‘notoriously difficult’ subjects to his students? Nyah. Apparently that’s just not pertinent to an article on another system of education.

What they did find to be pertinent, was going on and on about how there are no private schools in all of Finland,

“There are no private universities, either. This means that practically every person in Finland attends public school, whether for pre-K or a Ph.D.”,

Practically? I wonder what that means? Keep wondering, because they ain't gonna tell ya. And,

“None is allowed to charge tuition fees. ” and “In Finland parents can also choose. But the options are all the same.” And “More equity at home might just be what America needs to be more competitive abroad.”

All the options are all the same… say that sounds great, doesn’t it? And more ‘equity’ too! Btw, ‘equity’ in this context, probably means even more of that ‘spreading the wealth around’ that we Americans have found so swell lately, but why would a journalist who is interested in communicating truth and understanding bother with making sure that their readers understand what is truly going on?

Why do you suppose an article on education, would be so concerned about issues of politics?

Apparently this fine journalist, Anu Partanen, who btw is writing a book about "what America can learn from Nordic societies", along with her editors at Atlantic Monthly, could find no reason to point out that if no tuition fees are allowed to be charged, and all classes teach the very same thing throughout the nation, then that must mean that the Finnish government has apparently dictated that no one will be permitted, by law, to teach what they might see as being important for their children to learn… nope… no issue there, fuhgeddabout dat 'liberty' stuff, we've got 'equity' for you, nothing to see here dear reader, just move along. Now.

Instead, they find it much more useful to point out that their schools aren’t in competition with each other – hey would a journalist find it interesting to point out who it that set up the system of American schools and specifically sought to foster competition and rivalry between them, especially in high school? Oops, sorry, that could be dicey stuff for a leftie rag like the Atlantic to delve into. Instead, the article describes how the political delivery system of education is organized and publicly funded, and it also mentions, repeatedly, the lofty ideals that led them to that ‘equality for all’.

And that is nice and all, but strangely, for an article on a new and exciting educational system, it tells us very nearly nothing about what happens inside their classrooms… which is after all the ‘product’ being delivered.

Why do you suppose they neglected that? Hey, you don't suppose that one of the things that Anu thinks that we Americans can learn from Nordic societies, is socialism, do ya? Ya think?

When they do get around to mentioning issues which do have a direct relation to how the Finnish‘deliver’ Education in the classrooms, they are only mentioned because the Finnish Do Not engage in them: endless testing, assessments, teacher accountability, and they are mentioned almost in passing, humorously even, as a way to chide their American counterparts. Sahlberg says,

"Americans are consistently obsessed with certain questions: How can you keep track of students' performance if you don't test them constantly? How can you improve teaching if you have no accountability for bad teachers or merit pay for good teachers? How do you foster competition and engage the private sector? How do you provide school choice?"

The article doesn't bother to mention that those very features; testing, assessment, homework, production line like delivery and competition for grades, etc, were the signature innovations brought to our modern American 'system' of education by our founding proregressive leftists, such as John Dewey & Co. Nope, nothing useful in learning that, I suppose.

Amazingly the article gives barely a few sentences to what the Finnish actually do, do in their classrooms. One sentence tells us that,

" Finnish schools assign less homework and engage children in more creative play. "

Which is intriguing to me, how is it, do you suppose, that they so successfully engage their students, and in creative play at that? I for one would really like to know. But… apparently it’s just enough for us to know that they do, not how they do. And for what is probably the most significant issue of all, that the Teacher is the one who personally design's a test for each one of their individual students, they go all out and give us two sentences,

“Instead, the public school system's teachers are trained to assess children in classrooms using independent tests they create themselves. All children receive a report card at the end of each semester, but these reports are based on individualized grading by each teacher.”

THAT seems to indicate that the Teacher is in charge of teaching their own classes, rather than following a top down, turn by turn, compendium of policy instructions on exactly what to teach and how to teach it – which is an utter and absolute refutation of the entire formulation of the modern American educational model in general, and Obama & Arne Duncan’s model in particular!

I would love to know what sorts of materials they use in the classrooms to teach from, do they use textbooks? What type of content do they contain? How do the teachers utilize them? What sorts of ‘creative play’ do they engage in? How do the teachers go about putting together their lessons? Do they have particular academic goals for the semester? For the year? Do they even have semesters?

But alas, those questions were apparently not of any interest to the author of this article on the successes of the Finnish educational system. It really is a shame that this article on ‘education’ tells us so little about how the Finn’s actually go about educating their students… but, I guess when you’ve gotta choose between making a political statement, and stating the subject of your story, the choice is obvious – go with the political statement.

That certainly seems to be one of the lessons that journalists do manage to learn in their schools.

Two views on the long run: Keynes vs Isaiah

2011-12-29T22:22:00.003-06:00

Some Optimistic Pessimism
There's a blogpost that's making its way around the talk-show and email list circuit, by a lady named Jen Kuznicki, called "Ann Coulter Has Lost Faith"

"I read Ann’s latest column with a heavy heart. I came away with the unmistakable feeling that she has lost faith in the philosophy and movement she has been a firebrand for until now. And I think about how it happens that a person at the age of 50 becomes the very cheerleader for the status quo that she argued against these many years...."

Kuznicki is particularly upset that Coulter is de-emphasizing all of the key Tea Party, fiscally conservative, lower taxes and limited government hot button issues, in favor of what Coulter considers to be the two most important things for the next president to accomplish:

"... two things. Repealing Obamacare, and halting illegal immigration."

Pardon my shocked look of surprise, but seriously, during a time when Mitt Romney can be considered a conservative... do you really expect actual conservative candidates and issues to come to the fore?

Sorry, but I don't, and I'm not shocked by how this campaign is shaping up. A friend, former Mo. State Senator John Loudon, called this over a year ago, that Romney would be the establishment pick to run for President in 2012.

Now it hasn't happened yet, and maybe it won't (fingers crossed), but that that is even conceivable should tell you a lot about the so-called 'conservative' world we live in.

Seriously. We are talking about Mitt Romney, after all, who willingly, as Gov., helped craft a plan that is not only wrong on every principle of the Free Market and Individual Rights, but is actively antithetical to them.

Yes he was Gov of Massachusetts, yes the people wanted him to, yes that technically justified his helping them to get to what they wanted, but my ideal, actual Conservative, candidate would be someone who, if faced with the same situation, would not only have opposed and refused such a plan, but would have tirelessly worked to explain why state run health care was wrong and inevitably ruinous to the state’s economy and to the quality of health care available to all; someone who would have responded over and over again with different plans for how to address the actual problems with health care, which lay in how the state and federal govt's are already interfering in the markets, and dragging it down just as hard as it was forcing the prices of it up. But instead, he crafted RomneyCare, a plan which he still considers to be 'Conservative'.

Well... guess what folks... there's a reason why he's not being laughed out of every GOP primary state, and that is that every Republican primary state considers Romney to be able to pass the laugh test when calling himself a conservative. And his most serious opposition is Newt "Govt can do great things!" Gingrich!

Clue!

Not to be a Debbie Downer, but maybe I just have the advantage of never having expected a political solution to appear within the next few elections, and so the fact that some people fall along the wayside, the fact that candidates and pundits alike choose the expedient over the long term good,and the fact that the chaff is being sold as USDA Prime Grade "A" Wheat, is just no big surprise - I had never seriously expected anything else.

Hoped for something else, definitely. Worked for something else, yep. Expected something else? Nope.

What do you want in the long run?
My question to you is, what are you hoping to accomplish, something that'll endure and stand the test of time, or something that'll give you short term gratification?

Uber-Leftist economist Lord Keynes, when asked about what he'd do when in the long run his policies couldn't help but collapse the economic system and bring widespread ruin, famously quipped

"In the end, we're all dead"

,and you've gotta admit that he has a point there, right? I mean, if you are looking to get what you can, why worry about what happens in the end? Eat, drink and be merry at your grand kids expense, what are they gonna do, dig you up and collect?

That's one view of the long run, a very popular one at that, and it certainly puts a rosier face on the present moment, as taking the easy way out usually does. For the moment. But in the long run... you're doomed by it (actually, I think you doom and destroy yourself in the present as well, but that's something for another post).

Now, lower the fur on the ruff of your neck, pull your fangs back in, at least for the moment, and seriously consider this - in a world where Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney are seriously being put forward as the top two candidates for the 'conservative' GOP nomination... what do you suppose would be the result if a real conservative were to somehow be found, win the nomination and actually be elected President?

First off, they couldn't do it without trying to downplay their conservatism, just as RomneRich is trying to downplay their proregressive beliefs. Second, if a true conservative won, and then began trying to govern as a conservative - there would be riots in the streets.

What's that you say? Obama pulled off a bait and switch? Well of course he did, Obama could pull that off because he hasn't a principled bone in his body - and he ran as an unprincipled candidate who'd lean center-right, so naturally he has no problem with governing as an unprincipled candidate who, though not as centrist as he said he was... is still being consistent in showing that he has no principles.

And that'll work for an unprincipled person who runs as an unprincipled person, you can run as a liar and behave like a bigger one once you win.

But it doesn't work the other way around. You cannot run as an unprincipled middle of the roader, and then tear off the mask and say,

"Here I am to save the day! I'm going to stand on principle!"

, that doesn't work, cannot work, never has worked, and never will work.

If you want to run as a principled candidate, you'd better be able to count on at least a majority of the electorate who believes that you are principled, and wants to elect you because of that.

Now as mad as I'm sure that makes you, let me remind you again, Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney are the front runners for the 'conservative' GOP nomination for President of the United States of America.

And very few people are laughing at that.

That is not a portrait of the electorate who is looking for, and demanding, principled, conservative leaders. I'm sorry, it's just not.

Thinking that we could, would or should elect principled conservative leaders to lead this electorate... is... as much as it pains me to say, nuts. If they were elected, we'd sure enjoy the party after the election... but it'd be downhill in a hurry right afterwards, and in the long run, we'd be even further from a true conservative victory and presidency than had the leftie won.

I will not sacrifice the long run to a frivolous short term 'victory'.

Personally, I prefer a more practical, realistic view of the long run - aka Principled - and so I can point, optimistically, to a very pessimistic post from years gone by, which many of you are probably already familiar with, written by a fellow named Albert Jay Nock. He published an essay in 1936, which you'll recall would have been when FDR was heading into only his 2nd term as President, called "Isaiah's Job". Given the establishment party push that is obviously behind Romney, and the physical retching which that causes for myself and the Tea Party people I associate with, this is one essay that is well worth re-reading today.

"... In the year of Uzziah's death, the Lord commissioned the prophet to go out and warn the people of the wrath to come. "Tell them what a worthless lot they are." He said, "Tell them what is wrong, and why and what is going to happen unless they have a change of heart and straighten up. Don't mince matters. Make it clear that they are positively down to their last chance. Give it to them good and strong and keep on giving it to them. I suppose perhaps I ought to tell you," He added, "that it won't do any good. The official class and their intelligentsia will turn up their noses at you and the masses will not even listen. They will all keep on in their own ways until they carry everything down to destruction, and you will probably be lucky if you get out with your life."

Isaiah had been very willing to take on the job — in fact, he had asked for it — but the prospect put a new face on the situation. It raised the obvious question: Why, if all that were so — if the enterprise were to be a failure from the start — was there any sense in starting it? "Ah," the Lord said, "you do not get the point...."

The Lord's point was, while the people he was having Isaiah preach to could have listened and saved themselves, it was more likely that they would not, and so the real worthwhile nature of the job the Lord was giving Isaiah, was to arm the people who did listen, not only with the knowledge that they were right, but to help them understand why they were right, and if they would hold to what they knew was right, rather than what would be politically easy, they would win out - eventually.

None of us like to hear the word 'eventually', but apparently in regards to the Lord Isaiah was speaking for, History and indeed the Universe, that's the only game in town, and since it's their game we're playing - we'd best get used to it.

I’ll of course continue to do what I can in this and various other races, as should we all - that is one of the best ways possible to spread the word and to begin the process of educating people - but this nominee isn’t the point. The congressional elections may be closer to it, but they aren’t the point either. Personally, I’m focusing on decades down the line where the actual point is, by educating and spreading the word every chance I can get, about what the Constitution is, why it is important, and what it actually means and means to us. IMHO that is the most practical, worthwhile effort, that we can make at this point in time.

Why?

Because we will not have, cannot have, a ‘conservative’ candidate, a classical liberal of our Founders variety, who can run, win and govern as such, until we have a significant percentage of the populace who understands why it is necessary to have such a candidate, and a sizable percentage of the inattentive moderates who, on hearing the conservative platform, can nod and say ‘eh, I suppose that’s not too extreme’.

And we are a long way from that.

Yes I know the polls that say we are a majority conservative country, but if you look closer you'll find that we are a majority little 'r' republican electorate, and a sizable number of those who identify themselves as Conservative, also approve of such unconstitutional 'norms' as Social Security, Medicare, and unconstitutional regulatory agencies such as the SEC, EPA, FDA, eieio.

None of this should excuse anyone of us from doing their best to elect and/or pass the most conservative candidates and bills as we can here and now... but... these are and can only be, fleeting, stop gap efforts, they will accomplish little, in and of themselves, for the long run. As I was saying to a friend the other day, there's nothing to be gained by fooling yourself - we've got to reestablish a populace who has read and at least partially grasps the Constitution, before we'll ever have a Candidate who can hope to run on it, let alone be able to govern under it.

This shouldn't be that depressing to hear. We've got a huge advantage that Isaiah didn't have - he was just one person, we are hundreds, thousands... maybe even millions... there's plenty of reason for optimism - for the long run - especially when you realize that most of the media is geared towards ensuring that Nock’s & Isiaih’s Remnant don't discover that they are who they are and that they are not alone.

Isaiah's Job: It's not just for Isaiah anymore
Those of you who know the truth, you, each and everyone of you, are now charged with Isaiah's Job: Spread the word. And if you don't win this election or the next, well boo-hoo, but sorry, that's not the point and it never was, and if you thought it was, you wandered into the wrong game by mistake, if you want the easy job go become a proregressive leftist. It's the easiest game in town, requires little or no thought and pays off in immediate gratification, pays out obvious rewards and comes with the uber-easy satisfaction of having good intentions.

That's great and all... if you don't look at where the road of good intentions leads to - in the long run.
Remember, it is all about the long run. Whine about the problems of the moment if you must, I know I certainly will now and then, but you take those complaints seriously at your own peril.

The point is, to learn the truth, spread the word of what you know, talk to your friends and relatives about Why conservative ideas are better, and in the long run it'll be proregressivism and Keynesianism that'll be dead, and the Truth, Individual Rights and the Free Market that'll win out... but only, as a recent Isaiah, Winston Churchill, once said of us

"You can always count on Americans to do the right thing—after they’ve tried everything else."

And in the words of another Isaiah, Frederick Douglass, said in his speech "The Mission of the War,"

Then there is the danger arising from the impatience of the people on account of the prolongation of the war. I know the American people. They are an impulsive people, impatient of delay, clamorous for change, and often look for results out of all proportion to the means employed in attaining them.You and I know that the mission of this war is national regeneration. We know and consider that a nation is not born in a day. We know that large bodies move slowly—and often seem to move thus when, could we perceive their actual velocity, we should be astonished at its greatness. A great battle lost or won is easily described, understood and appreciated, but the moral growth of a great nation requires reflection, as well as observation, to appreciate it.

That is no less true today in our war of ideas, than it was during our actual Civil War back in 1863. Look to win in the long run, work for the long run, that's where the only worthwhile victory truly lies.

What gifts has Christmas brought you?

2011-12-24T17:03:00.002-06:00

What meaning is there to be found in Christmas, even by those who find no meaning in Christmas at all?

First off, grant that the false alternative of 'Not all Christians are good, therefore Christianity is bad', is in fact a false alternative, one that you should not burden your thoughts further with. Don't look at how Christians often misbehave as badly or worse than non-Christians, or that Christianity has failed to make heaven on earth, look instead at what is here in our lives as a result of the birth which Christmas commemorates.

Christianity has given us the ability to see that each person, peasant or prince, is as beloved of God as another, and that their choice is such a holy a thing that even God himself does not attempt to prevent it - not even with the choice of whether or not to accept God into their lives - Christianity declared that every man has the ability to accept God into their life - or to reject him - and that such godlike power is given to every man, the power to gainsay the will of All Mighty God - now there's a gift worth giving.

And every man, Christian or Gentile, has profited from it.

It has brought us the concept that the mistakes you make are of little value against what you eventually get right and true. Even if everyone of your choices were to reject God and what God wanted for you... your change of heart is enough to restore you to him... as if you who had persisted your whole life in adding two plus two and behaving as if the answer were three, or one, or any number of other numbers - the fact that you might finally see, and admit, that two plus two equals four, wipes your slate clean (note: it doesn't claim that the consequences of your errors will be wiped away, only that you would be accepted as finally whole and true).

Western Civilization is inextricably a Greco/Roman Judeo/Christian One

Through Christianity and the philosophy of the Greeks and Romans; the Good, the Beautiful and the True, are not just ideals, but principles of eternal Truths attainable by every person, birthrights, no matter their station in life. With this understanding comes the realization that every man, woman and child has the God given right to pursue them, and that the worldly power of government should be devoted to defending their choices in that pursuit. That is an ideal that would not exist, America would never, could never have been, without Christianity having come into the world first.

Phenomenal.

Has this realization made men better? Perhaps not entirely so. But it has made it possible for men to see that they can, and should, be better, and because of that the world is immensely better off than it was before the advent of Christianity.

Prior to the Judeo-Christian views, the world was ruled by power without rival. Even on those rare occasions where truth and wisdom was sought, and an effort to see the scales of justice balanced was made - Greece and Rome - nowhere did the desire to do good have value in and of itself, so much so that people would expend great amounts of time, effort, blood and treasure in an attempt to improve the lot of others, to bring them not just goods but Goodness, nowhere else did this occur upon the globe (and I do not mean do-gooders, a mirror image, and often a rejection of doing good).

Charities are something you will look in vain to see in pre or non-Christian cultures, and those few exceptions which you might find some semblance of them, simply prove the rule.

Even Art - not as decoration or garish depiction, but as an idealization of truth and goodness and a means of mending and lifting the soul - that is not found outside the Greco/Roman-Judeo/Christian, world view (and no, do not attempt to compare an oriental gong or pipe to Gregorian Chants or Bach, do not attempt to equate a golden Buddha with the Sistine Chapel - do not).

More than all of that, Christianity has brought with it the idea of 'you must be born again', or 'born from above' to a central position in every life; even to secular views this brought the conviction that your ideals and actions must come from and align with higher principles, rather than settling for greater quantities of measures and pleasures; that Quality is infinitely greater than Quantity. With the idea that God became Man, came the possibility of the idea that man could participate in the divine, and that even though you will never become perfect yourself (itself a monumental realization), you can strive to become more perfect through aligning your ideals with those of God - the meaning of progress itself is meaningless without that.

And that is Good.

And through this, there comes the possibility that men can, and should, strive for peace on earth and good will towards all. And whether or not you believe that Jesus was ever even born, let alone the Christ, the idea that he was, has opened the possibility of more meaningful lives for all in this world, than was ever possible before Christ.

Merry Christmas to all!

Wiener Roust for the National Defense Authorization Act

2011-12-16T19:47:00.007-06:00

Ok, well as far as illustrating absurdity by being absurd... this might take the cake... or the wiener, as the case may be.

You've probably heard about the fears of indefinite detention by the military in the new NDAA bill. Depending on who you talk to, it is clearly in there, not in there at all, or seems like it could be included in it through some language sprinkled throughout the clauses.

I don't know.

Tea Party favorite Rep. Alan West says it's ok. Tea Party favorite Sen. Mike Lee says it's uber-bad news. Do you have time to read a 600 page bill? I'm sad to say that I don't. I gave my effort on the TARP bills. And on the Obamacare Bill. And on the BBA bill. I'm tapped out at the moment. What does it matter anyway? As the boys in The Federalist Papers noted in #62,

"The internal effects of a mutable policy are still more calamitous. It poisons the blessing of liberty itself. It will be of little avail to the people, that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood; if they be repealed or revised before they are promulgated, or undergo such incessant changes that no man, who knows what the law is to-day, can guess what it will be to-morrow. Law is defined to be a rule of action; but how can that be a rule, which is little known, and less fixed?"

When the laws are too many, too long, and too frequently changed... no one can know what anything really means... even if you tried to. And past the beginning of this latest fiasco... I haven't. And that might be my undoing, since, by some of the interpretations of the term 'terrorist' by our very own DHS - I do after all have a copy of the Constitution and occasionally display the flag - I could find myself on that list. Hey, look on the bright side, maybe they'd send my oldest Son, or his best friend to pick me up.

So sure the wiener roust is funny.

But the law isn't.

Even if the language has been cleared up, as my Rep. Akin assures me it has,

"There has been a lot of confusion over what this provision will mean, and many people have been concerned that it will allow American citizens to be arrested and detained for indefinite periods of time, simply based on suspicion and no real evidence. I agree that this would be a serious violation of Constitutional rights and the due process of law. Earlier versions of the bill were unclear on this point; however, the conference report on H.R. 1540 was the final version that passed the House on December 14, and it renders all previous versions void."

, it's only language... and any set of legislators and justices who can interpret with a straight face, the wording of the single clearl line of the Commerce Clause, to mean that a farmer growing food for his own use could be considered to be violating laws based upon the constitution (oh yeah, I'll get to that in a minute), then... your confidence in your language might be... misplaced. For now I'm betting that no matter how satisfied 'common sense conservatives' are with this bill's 600+ pages of statements and exceptions, and retractions and restatements... if those in power want to read into it whatever powers they'd like to - they will.

When clear meaning is called a fancy... why bother questioning anything at all?
If you read this bill as plainly meaning what its language plainly states it should... you are living in the real world. Unfortunately, our government is not living in that same real world. Our government is living in a world where it can take language like this,

"To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;"

, even when the possibility that it could be used in any other way, would be understood by any responsible person as to make the entire structure of the Constitution pointless; as Justice Joseph Story put it in his commentaries on the Constitution,

"Neither is it disputed, that the laying of duties is, or may be an appropriate means of regulating commerce. But the question is a very different one, whether, under pretence of an exercise of the power to regulate commerce, congress may in fact impose duties for objects wholly distinct from commerce. The question comes to this, whether a power, exclusively for the regulation of commerce, is a power for the regulation of manufactures? The statement of such a question would seem to involve its own answer. Can a power, granted for one purpose, be transferred to another? If it can, where is the limitation in the constitution? Are not commerce and manufactures as distinct, as commerce and agriculture? If they are, how can a power to regulate one arise from a power to regulate the other? It is true, that commerce and manufactures are, or may be, intimately connected with each other. A regulation of one may injuriously or beneficially affect the other. But that is not the point in controversy. It is, whether congress has a right to regulate that, which is not committed to it, under a power, which is committed to it, simply because there is, or may be an intimate connexion between the powers. If this were admitted, the enumeration of the powers of congress would be wholly unnecessary and nugatory. Agriculture, colonies, capital, machinery, the wages of labour, the profits of stock, the rents of land, the punctual performance of contracts, and the diffusion of knowledge would all be within the scope of the power; for all of them bear an intimate relation to commerce. The result would be, that the powers of congress would embrace the widest extent of legislative functions, to the utter demolition of all constitutional boundaries between the state and national governments. "

Even given all that, our government was still able to take that, twist it, and do so in front of the Supreme Court court, and in a manner that is very much in line with the wildest dreams of our legislatures of the last couple years. They did that and still do so publicly, without causing any concern to many of our citizens, professors and media types beyond number. None of the smarter set even blink today at the notion of twisting the Commerce Clause into a statist tool of justification for jailing a small, family farmer, for the economic crime of growing his own crops, for his own use - not to sell, but to feed his own livestock. That was done with FDR's New Deal case, Wickard v. Filburn, and it is held up as a respectable precedent today - they simply said 'oh sure he's doing on his own land, for his own use, but hey, because he isn't buying it from someone else, that affects national markets and interstate commerce,

"...But even if appellee's activity be local and though it may not be regarded as commerce, it may still, whatever its nature, be reached by Congress if it exerts a substantial economic effect on interstate commerce and this irrespective of whether such effect is what might at some earlier time have been defined as 'direct' or 'indirect.'"

Sooo... because he didn't do something... that makes it legal cause for you to be fined, even jailed, because you didn't commit a crime that might have been a crime if you did... WTF?!. And that was in a time when the world still seemed sensible. What chance have you possibly got in a world like today, a legal world, mind you, such as that - it taxes the mind, so to speak, that you could possibly count on common sense understanding of anything.

Our government lives in a dream world of their own design, and they use their dreams of what they'd like the world to be like, as 'constitutional' excuses for doing anything and everything they want to do - if they even feel the need to cite anything at all. And of such dreams, my nightmares are made of.

So enjoy your hotdogs while you can. Before you're rousted that is.

Happy 220th Bill of Rights Birthday!

2011-12-15T13:52:00.030-06:00

220 years ago today the states ratified the first ten amendments to the Constitution of the United States of America!

Although it wasn't planned, I'm kinda pleased that the first two weren't ratified at the time (though one of them was ratified in the 1990's... do you know which one?)... Freedom of Speech just should be a 1st Amendment issue!

And while you're at it, pay especially close attention to the preamble that I've put in bold for you... just in case your eyes are getting as bad as mine (IOW They didn't trust govt with the Founding Fathers themselves... are you really going to trust the bunch we've got today? Pay Attention!).

Proposed Amendments and Ratification
1789 Elliot 1:338--40

Congress of the United States;

Begun and held at the City of New York, on Wednesday, the 4th of March, 1789.

The conventions of a number of the states having, at the time of their adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added; and as extending the ground of public confidence in the government will best insure the beneficent ends of its institution;--

Resolved, by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled, two thirds of both houses concurring, that the following articles be proposed to the legislatures of the several states, as amendments to the Constitution of the United States, all or any of which articles, when ratified by three fourths of the said legislatures, to be valid, to all intents and purposes, as part of the said Constitution, namely,--

Articles in Addition to, and Amendment of, the Constitution of the United States of America, proposed by Congress, and ratified by the Legislatures of the several States, pursuant to the Fifth Article of the original Constitution.

Art. I. [Not Ratified] After the first enumeration required by the first article of the Constitution, there shall be one representative for every thirty thousand, until the number shall amount to one hundred, after which the proportion shall be so regulated by Congress, that there shall not be less than one hundred representatives, nor less than one representative for every forty thousand persons, until the number of representatives shall amount to two hundred, after which the proportion shall be so regulated by Congress, that there shall not be less than two hundred representatives, nor more than one representative for every fifty thousand.

Art. II. [Not ratified... for two centuries] No law varying the compensation for services of the senators and representatives shall take effect, until an election of representatives shall have intervened.

Art. III. Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Art. IV. A well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

Art. V. No soldier shall, in time of peace, be quartered in any house without the consent of the owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner prescribed by law.

Art. VI. The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated; and no warrants shall issue, but upon principal cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Art. VII. No person shall be held to answer for a capital or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia when in actual service, in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject, for the same offence, to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled, in any criminal case, to be a witness against himself; nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use without just compensation.

Art. VIII. In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right of a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law; and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor; and to have the assistance of counsel for his defence.

Art. IX. In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury shall be otherwise reëxamined, in any court of the United States, than according to the rules in common law.

Art. X. Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

Art. XI. The enumeration, in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

Art. XII. The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states, respectively, or to the people.

FREDERICK AUGUSTUS MUHLENBERG,

Speaker of the House of Representatives.

JOHN ADAMS, Vice-President of the United States,

and President of the Senate.

Attest. John Beckley
Clerk of the House of Representatives.
Samuel A. Otis, Secretary of the Senate.
Which, being transmitted to the several state legislatures, were decided upon by them, according to the following returns:--

By the State of New Hampshire.--Agreed to the whole of the said amendments, except the 2d article.
By the State of New York.--Agreed to the whole of the said amendments, except the 2d article.
By the State of Pennsylvania.--Agreed to the 3d, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th, 11th, and 12th articles of the said amendments.
By the State of Delaware.--Agreed to the whole of the said amendments, except the 1st article.
By the State of Maryland.--Agreed to the whole of the said twelve amendments.
By the State of South Carolina.--Agreed to the whole said twelve amendments.
By the State of North Carolina.--Agreed to the whole of the said twelve amendments.
By the State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations.--Agreed to the whole of the said twelve articles.
By the State of New Jersey.--Agreed to the whole of the said amendments, except the second article.
By the State of Virginia.--Agreed to the whole of the said twelve articles.
No returns were made by the states of Massachusetts, Connecticut, Georgia, and Kentucky.

The amendments thus proposed became a part of the Constitution, the first and second of them excepted, which were not ratified by a sufficient number of the state legislatures.

The Founders' Constitution
Volume 5, Bill of Rights, Document 12
http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/bill_of_rightss12.html
The University of Chicago Press
Elliot, Jonathan, ed. The Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution as Recommended by the General Convention at Philadelphia in 1787. . . . 5 vols. 2d ed. 1888. Reprint. New York: Burt Franklin, n.d.

Presidents Obama & TR’s Nationalism vs Original Americanism

2011-12-14T16:48:00.327-06:00

Teddy Roosevelt made a speech a century ago, entitled “The New Nationalism”, which our current president, Obama, recently praised and reprised in his own speech. He noted, with a smile, how the press had then characterized TR’s speech as socialistic and even communistic,

"in 1910, Teddy Roosevelt came here to Osawatomie and he laid out his vision for what he called a New Nationalism. “Our country,” he said, “…means nothing unless it means the triumph of a real democracy…of an economic system under which each man shall be guaranteed the opportunity to show the best that there is in him.” (Applause.)

Now, for this, Roosevelt was called a radical. He was called a socialist -- (laughter) -- even a communist."

Does the word 'why?' pop into anyone else's mind but mine? Especially given the excuses that are usually shot back at any hint of someone being called a communist or a socialist - you know, McCarthyism! Reactionary! Racist! - whatever could have been their motivation here? This was, after all, a half century before Joe McCarthy… did conservatives knees really jerk before the eevile Joe McCarthy terrorized the nation? Before Stalin? Before even the USSR? Why?

Sorry if that got your curiosity up, I'm afraid that President Obama didn’t get into WHY they had said that about TR (surprise!) or why he thought they were silly to name him such, it’s enough, I guess, for the habitual smearer to sneer and move on, neatly avoiding contact with any real substance that might be lurking in the issue - that or it just didn't make it onto his teleprompter screen. Hard to tell which.

But there were reasons, very good reasons, for characterizing TR, and Obama, in that way, and those reasons hold as true today, as they did yesterday and yesteryear, and really it boils down to the proregressive's inherent antagonism towards key fundamentals of Americanism which Nationalist's have no choice but to oppose... but let's leave that for later.

It's enough, for now, to just observe the contradictions, misdirections, lies, inherent in promoting this new 'New Nationalism', and they are off the charts. It took me quite a while to get through this speech, I wasn't able to manage more than a page at a time before a knot of raging disgust welled up inside and I needed to get up and flush it from my mind. But even so, I've been able to glean a few points that I think are important to highlight... so... I'll try to quell the anger and nausea, and will see if I can get the point across without too much of my disgust spilling out into the html. Too much.

On the practical side, President Obama does seem to have learned a thing or two from his Regulatory Czar, Cass Sunstein, which is especially appropriate, given that this speech is on the signature speech of the father of the American Regulatory State, Theodore Roosevelt. The degree to which he skillfully splices together lies and facts with a fine weld of sympathetic misdirection for solder is really remarkable; and there are multiple instances where he comes out and says one thing, and then takes it back by saying its opposite shortly thereafter... it's stunning.

For instance, look at these two paragraphs where he begins with a very Luddite-ish moaning about the job killing nastiness of modern technology and the nastiness of the business cycle... and then just a bit further on, he takes that back with how he of course has no intention of complaining about modern technology or the business cycle!

... he giveth with one hand...

... and taketh away with the other

Factories where people thought they would retire suddenly picked up and went overseas, where workers were cheaper. Steel mills that needed 100 -- or 1,000 employees are now able to do the same work with 100 employees, so layoffs too often became permanent, not just a temporary part of the business cycle. And these changes didn’t just affect blue-collar workers. If you were a bank teller or a phone operator or a travel agent, you saw many in your profession replaced by ATMs and the Internet.

It’s not a view that we should somehow turn back technology or put up walls around America. It’s not a view that says we should punish profit or success or pretend that government knows how to fix all of society’s problems. It is a view that says in America we are greater together -- when everyone engages in fair play and everybody gets a fair shot and everybody does their fair share. (Applause.)

I could churn out 5,000 words on just these two paragraphs alone... especially the last part of the second paragraph... but as much as I'm sure your just itching to torture your eyes with that... I'll try and keep my keyboards Niagara Falls to a trickling faucet. I said try.

The President has made these comments about those dastardly ATM's giving people access to ATM's at all hours of the day and night... what is that about? Does he really think they left bank tellers forever out in the cold? They moved on to other jobs Barack! And with people having readier, 24hr access to their money, productivity and sales were boosted, jobs were created - how can he say these things without deep embarrassment? How can the snooty-tooty New York Times not call him on that?!

And on top of that he's lamenting about 'Madge' the AT&T Telephone operator whose technological replacement gave you the ability to make direct telephone connections across town and across the country, without having to ask an operator to connect you... that isn't something to lament! While 'One ringy dingy... two ringy dingy..." might have been a good gag, I mean, come one, what is this rubbish about? Just what sort of fears is he trying to stir up here?

And the poor Travel Agent who was kicked into poverty by your being able to find better and less expensive travel packages online, yourself? Those who could find no other way to make their services useful to you, were released from that unproductive position, you wasted less time having to wheel and deal with them, you had more money available to spend and invest elsewhere... wealth and prosperity was created and spread, not lost!

Oh the horrors. Mr. President, if the 21st century is too much for you, at least get with the 20th!

When people hear this, doesn't some part of their mind wonder what ever happened to the legions of blacksmiths who were displaced by the automobile? Or the candle makers who lost lost their jobs, and their manufacturers closed their door when the electric light bulb was introduced to the market? Have you asked yourself, was society really poorer as a result of their introduction? Does anyone, even bank tellers, really miss having to rush to the bank between 9:00 and 5:00 Mon-Fri in order to have money for the evening or weekend? Does anyone really miss having to ask an operator to connect them to a phone number across the state or nation? Does anyone really miss being able to turn the light on, or off, with a wave of the hand, rather than striking a match to light a candle... or stooping to blow one out, and making sure it actually goes out so your house doesn't burn down?

Isn't the truth of the matter more that while some few people had to find new ways of earning a living, millions of other people (and they themselves indirectly) benefited from these technological advances? Doesn't everyone implicitly realize that these advances have contributed enormously to making us a wealthier nation? A wealthier world?

Don't you then wonder to yourself "Just what in the heck is President Obama trying to accomplish by raising such silly issues? Repeatedly?

What is seen, and what is not seen
But... with the trickling faucet, rather than Niagara Falls, in mind, this post can't be about proregressive's economic ignorance and hidebound inability to see what is seen, and what is not seen. The real issue goes much further and deeper than Obama's Luddite streak.

Instead what he is attempting through mingling the thinnest of appearances and the deepest lies of omission... not to mention blatant bald faced lies, is to enable the Fox to blame the hens for the missing eggs in the hen-house. For instance,

"Factories where people thought they would retire suddenly picked up and went overseas, where workers were cheaper."

Seriously? 'Suddenly picked up'? Really? The American worker is famously more productive than any other nations worker's, still to this day,... and in comparison to some locations, are several times more productive; add to that the cash consuming difficulties of language, infrastructure, int'l laws, shipping... expectations of bribery and plain ol' criminal activities... just where is it that these companies are supposedly going to reap their supposedly vast, greed-worthy savings, from hiring cheap labor?

These workers would nearly have to be paying the companies twice over in order to make it an economic benefit to move overseas on the basis of cheap wages alone.

So there is something going on here, something more than simply going to where 'workers were cheaper' that makes the move overseas into a profitable and practical decision to make. What else do you suppose might have contributed to factories having 'suddenly picked up' and moved overseas?
Well... what was it that Obama says he is most proud of Teddy Roosevelt and America for?

"... an eight-hour work day and a minimum wage for women -- (applause) -- insurance for the unemployed and for the elderly, and those with disabilities; political reform and a progressive income tax."

Those are some of the ideas and realities which Theodore Roosevelt helped to bring to America, but before you get carried away with rapture over the 8hr work day, try and remember that he brought more than that to our shores, he, more than anyone else, brought us the intrusive Regulatory Agencies, beginning with what became the FDA, and then rapidly metastasizing into the likes of the FTC, FLRA, ED, SEC, EPA, OSHA, EEOC, DOL, DOE, DOT, DOI, HUD, HHS, USDA, and of course everyone's favorites, the FED and the IRS... and hundreds more at the Federal and State level.

Every single one of these agencies has thousands of pages of regulations and requirements which must be filed, approved, jumped through hoops for, resubmitted, updated... and worst of all met... even though they often contradict each other in what they require of a business. The administrative time, effort and cost of just meeting the regulations, to say nothing of what the regulations require businesses to construct, install, maintain, etc, the amount of wasted wealth is astronomical.

And do you know what locations such as Mexico & China do not have? Comparatively little or none of that. That is what makes it worthwhile to close down the factory here, the factory where management would otherwise have been easily able to oversee and keep first hand eyes on their operations, to leave behind them the homes where their own family and friends are, and ship it all over seas.

Factories did not 'suddenly pick up and leave', these factories which the proregressives routinely castigate for their greed and unpatriotic pursuit of a buck overseas, were instead practically thrown out by our own government! Uncle Sam has been not just outsourcing, but forcing out our productive abilities to other nations. If you don't believe me, ask Gibson Guitar, which has been nearly forced out of business by our DOJ... or better yet, ask President Obama's own Jobs Czar,

... Jeffrey Immelt, recently inked a deal for his corporation, G.E., to partner up with Communist Red China, in a deal which will require closing plants in America, and sending them, and their thousands of jobs, to China

... dontcha think that maybe his own Jobs Czar could tell the president why factories are picking up and moving overseas? If he cared? If?

Add to that the federal requirements that businesses appease unions, provide unsustainable pensions, meet minimum wages (based on nothing more than a politicians finger in the air guess at what will please the most inattentive of voters, and which reduces available jobs for teens, unskilled immigrants, minorities, etc), and of course the crown jewel, the Progressive Income Tax, and you have an engraved invitation for businesses to leave our shores for friendlier ones.

President Obama speaks with a twinkle in his eye about how Teddy Roosevelt's speech was greeted by the press at the time,

"Now, for this, Roosevelt was called a radical. He was called a socialist -- (laughter) -- even a communist. But today, we are a richer nation and a stronger democracy because of what he fought for"

Think about what has been done to us, by us - are we really a stronger nation because of policies which drive our own business people form our shores? Or are we instead a nation that has been weakened, more divided? Look around you... what do you see? And when they said of his speech that it sounded communistic or socialistic, do you really suppose they were just being pissy? Or is it instead maybe, possibly, that they had a reason for those evaluations? This is, after all, a half-century before the oh-so horrifying 'McCarthy Era', so why would they have such concerns about TR's speech? Maybe it is because they foresaw, having actually read what Karl Marx had to say, that TR's proposals match up very closely with the ideals of those of the Communist Party, especially on points such as #2 on Marx's Top Ten list for transforming a nation into a communist one:

"A heavy progressive or graduated income tax"

, and #10

"Free education for all children in public schools."

And no, of course I don't have a problem with all children becoming educated - believe me, that Is My Focus! - but that isn't what Marx wanted either, the reason why Marx wanted it, was for the State to do the educating, because he knew that if the state can control what children are taught... those children are going to grow up with some very state friendly thoughts in their heads, or at the very least they're going to come away from such a school with an inability to think too clearly about anything else.

And of course there's #1 on Marx's list, what he himself said his entire philosophy could be boiled down to, the

"Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes."

, and #7,

"Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the State"

, these and the other items in Marx's Top Ten Hit Parade, have already been effectively accomplished, or very nearly so, via regulatory agencies. Remember, the goal of communism is for the State to control all of the means of production - if the State controls what decisions can, and cannot, be made... then the State does control the means of production, in terms of what really matters.

That is why the people of 1910 were calling Teddy Roosevelt a communist and a socialist and a thug... and the realization of what this new nationalism held out to the would-be tyrant, would prove to be formative stuff for some scruffy community organizers around the world who would soon come to the fore in the 1920's and 1930's in Italy and Germany. Is there some reason why I should hesitate in seeing Barrack Obama in that same light? These newspapermen were people who still had knowledge of the founding of America, some even had grandparents who knew people of the Founder's Era, they saw the stark contrast and contradictions between the ideas America were founded upon, and what Teddy Roosevelt's 'New Nationalism' signified.

The Pro-Regress of Progressives
The more level headed people of 1910 knew that these steps being proposed by Teddy Roosevelt, were not steps forward, they were not progress, not in the least. For instance,

"William J. Barnes, Jr., the New York Republican committeeman against whom Roosevelt was contesting for leadership in the Empire state, announced that the speech "had startled all thoughtful men and impressed them with the frightful danger which lies in his political ascendancy."

, or as the papers said,

"The next day newspaper editors across the country reacted to the speech, while in the following weeks the mails were crammed with letters recording various sentiments about the Osawatomie address. The ideologically conservative New York Evening Post branded Roosevelt a "self-seeking, hypocritical, braggart," while its sister journal, the Sun, reported that "the third greatest crisis in the history of the nation has arrived, and warned every honest and patriotic citizen to prepare himself against this new Napoleon who deemed it his mission…to overthrow and destroy in the name of public opinion and…personal advancement." The New York Tribune called the speech "frankly socialistic...""

But this might be best summed up in a way that would make President Barack Obama, Sen. John McCain and Newt Gingrich feel proud,

"The Kansas City Star, Chicago Daily Tribune, Topeka Daily Capital, and a host of lesser progressive journals agreed that Roosevelt had left no doubt about where he stood. "T.R. has become a progressive Republican,"

What did (does) pro(re)gressivism mean? What distinguished them from their hotter communist and socialist brethren, was that they were not for revolutionary change, but for slow, incremental proregress, steps that would transform a nation so gradually - over a century say - that they wouldn't realize what they'd lost until it was long, long gone. President Obama says,

...there’s been a raging debate over the best way to restore growth and prosperity, restore balance, restore fairness. Throughout the country, it’s sparked protests and political movements -- from the tea party to the people who’ve been occupying the streets of New York and other cities. It’s left Washington in a near-constant state of gridlock. It’s been the topic of heated and sometimes colorful discussion among the men and women running for president. (Laughter.)

But, Osawatomie, this is not just another political debate. This is the defining issue of our time. This is a make-or-break moment for the middle class, and for all those who are fighting to get into the middle class. Because what’s at stake is whether this will be a country where working people can earn enough to raise a family, build a modest savings, own a home, secure their retirement.

He is correct about this much, that 'This is the defining issue of our time. ', the claim that it is progress to give up 'primitive freedoms', in favor of guaranteed privileges (to be doled out by bureaucrats), that it is progress to give up the risk of making your own decisions, in favor of the assured regularity of receiving known handouts, to not only settle, but to never even strive, not even once, for a distant goal worth accomplishing... in favor of a prepared place for you, for your child, in the 'middle class'.

Is that really progress?

The man who had to clean up after Teddy Roosevelt and his proregressive successor, Woodrow Wilson, the man who repealed much of their machinations and so gave us a prosperity so spectacular that it was called 'The Roaring Twenties', that man, President Calvin Coolidge, was not fooled into thinking such things were in any way progress. He was not fooled into thinking that such 'gifts of government' were anything other than chains with lace draped over them, nothing more than centralized power in the guise of administrators who want to 'help you' live as they dictate you should. As Coolidge said in his speech "The Inspiration of the Declaration of Independence',

"About the Declaration there is a finality that is exceedingly restful. It is often asserted that the world has made a great deal of progress since 1776, that we have had new thoughts and new experiences which have given us a great advance over the people of that day, and that we may therefore very well discard their conclusions for something more modern. But that reasoning can not be applied to this great charter. If all men are created equal, that is final. If they are endowed with inalienable rights, that is final. If governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, that is final. No advance, no progress can be made beyond these propositions. If anyone wishes to deny their truth or their soundness, the only direction in which he can proceed historically is not forward, but backward toward the time when there was no equality, no rights of the individual, no rule of the people. Those who wish to proceed in that direction can not lay claim to progress. They are reactionary. Their ideas are not more modern, but more ancient, than those of the Revolutionary fathers."

Think of that, think on that... and then make an effort to keep these three things in mind about the 'New Nationalism' of the proregressive left, and right, that:

President Obama is today praising Teddy Roosevelt.
That Newt Gingrich, like John McCain before him, admire Teddy Roosevelt.
That you might soon have to choose between Barack Obama or Newt Gingrich, in order to save us from proregressivism.

Freedom of choice... ain't it grand?

(Head. Banging. On. Table.)

Why ask why
As I said, there were reasons, very good reasons for characterizing TR, and Obama, as communistic and socialistic, and those reasons hold as true today, as they did yesterday and yesteryear, and a significant part of it boils down to their presumption that the Govt should have the power to take precedence over your choices, over your Individual Rights, in order to do what it thinks is right for you. The proregressive, whether of the left or right, has a fundamental antaganism to the Principle of Individual Rights.

See if you can catch the theme in this contrasting of some points from Obama's speech on the new old nationalism, and a letter which Thomas Jefferson wrote to a friend at the dawn of the original Americanism:

The New Nationalism

A Time To Choose

The Original Americanism

“Theodore Roosevelt... busted up monopolies, forcing those companies to compete for consumers with better services and better prices. And today, they still must....

There are also limits on the size of banks and new abilities for regulators to dismantle a firm that is going under. The new law bans banks from making risky bets with their customers’ deposits, and it takes away big bonuses and paydays from failed CEOs, while giving shareholders a say on executive salaries....

It will require parents to get more involved in their children’s education. It will require students to...

And in 1910, Teddy Roosevelt came here to Osawatomie and he laid out his vision for what he called a New Nationalism. “Our country,” he said, “…means nothing unless it means the triumph of a real democracy…of an economic system under which each man shall be guaranteed the opportunity to show the best that there is in him.” (Applause.)”

Our legislators are not sufficiently apprized of the rightful limits of their powers: that their true office is to declare and enforce only our natural rights and duties, and to take none of them from us.
No man has a natural right to commit aggression on the equal rights of another; and this is all from which the laws ought to restrain him: every man is under the natural duty of contributing to the necessities of the society; and this is all the laws should enforce on him: and, no man having a natural right to be the judge between himself and another, it is his natural duty to submit to the umpirage of an impartial third.

When the laws have declared and enforced all this, they have fulfilled their functions, and the idea is quite unfounded, that on entering into society we give up any natural right. The trial of every law by one of these texts, would lessen much the labors of our legislators, and lighten equally our municipal codes.
Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Francis W. Gilmer, 7 Jun 1816

TR and Obama both attempt to sound reluctant to have to exert Govt power, but that 'Gosh Darn it! Somebody's got to stand up for the little guy, and against the BIG moneyed interests!' But the funny thing is, the more they 'stand up for the little guy', the more power and wealth the politically well connected seem to accumulate. Ironic, eh? Well... no, not really, and when you come right down to it, the only protection the little guy truly has, as Jefferson alludes to above, is that of the Law, a law that is applied fairly, impartially, to all, regardless of their station in life. And that is something that cannot be maintained in a regulatory state.

Cannot. Regulatory law has to fundamentally assume that some people are prone to violating the rights of others and so must be presumed guilty, or it must presume to favor those the regulators must rely upon for their positions. What do I mean by that?

Back at the dawn of the Regulatory Age, when asked by the President of the Chicago, Burlington, and Quincy railroad, Charles E. Pickering, if he'd shutter the first prototype regulatory agency, the Interstate Commerce Commission, the Attorney General Richard Olney, replied that

"The Commission . . . is, or can be made, of great use to the railroads. It satisfies the popular clamor for a government supervision of the railroads, at the same time that that supervision is almost entirely nominal. Further, the older such a commission gets to be, the more inclined it will be found to take the business and railroad view of things. . . . The part of wisdom is not to destroy the Commission, but to utilize it."

IOW, the regulatory agencies found that if the railroads played ball with them, they could make each other's lives easier. Regulatory agencies have always, from the very beginning, been about making it possible for those in power to do things their way, and those who were rich enough and powerful enough to be of use and play ball, could benefit from their power to control others.

And that didn't change as the regulatory tide had swept the land and taken more solid shape. Liberal icon, famed attorney Clarence Darrow, of the Scopes Monkey Trial, was asked during the 1930's to investigate FDR's National Recovery Act, he found that,

"...In virtually all the codes we have examined, one condition has been present... In industry after industry, the larger units, sometimes through the agency of a trade association, sometimes by other means, have for their own advantage written the codes, and then, in effect and for their own advantage, assumed the administration of the code they have framed...."

Regulatory Law, is about gathering, controlling and exerting, power. Nothing more. And certainly it is not doing what it does for the benefit of the 'little guy'.

What position did, and does, the little guy have in that machinery of the regulatory state?

Grease.

For all their rhetoric about equality, the one area where their 'fairness' means unfairness, is the one area where the original understanding of American thought was most essential - equality before the law, without regard for race, class or wealth - and that doesn't mean equality for the person of modest means and less than equal status for the person of mucho means - or vice versa - it means, and must mean, equality before the law for all, regardless of their means.

Lose that... and you lose Justice, and then all is lost. Read the quote by Jefferson above and to the right - compare it to the snippets by Obama to the left - can you conceive of those sentiments co-existing in a legislative and judicial system? In a single person's heart and mind?

No, it isn't possible. As Jefferson put it in the letter above,

"Our legislators are not sufficiently apprized of the rightful limits of their powers: that their true office is to declare and enforce only our natural rights and duties, and to take none of them from us."

The Proregressive cannot exist without disregarding the natural rights of other men, to be a proregressive, is to be opposed to the fundamental ideals of Americanism - proregressivism requires favoritism, it can’t even pretend anything less... just as ‘the 99%’ - and I pity the po' fool who tries to tell himself he can be both.

A System with no place left
Part of the hostility that the proregressive mind has for the Free Market, which they derogatorily call ‘Capitalism’, and which the Capitalists cluelessly go along with referring to themselves as (rather than as members of the Free Market, which is what they are), is that the Free Market has no place for them, the Free Market is not a system, it has no System and it has no place for people to guide, correct or control it. The Free Market is made up of people who are free to make their own choices about their own lives and their own activities, free to take their own risks, support their own causes and charities, and there is no place in the Free Market for those who would seek after power over their fellow man, no place for those who would like to ‘force them to be free’ in a manner that they approve of (as the grand daddy of proregressivism, Rousseau, put it).

And that is the heart’s desire of the proregressive leftist – the desire to remake your life in a way that they think is smarter, and more pleasing to them.

In their minds, you have no place in your own life, or at the very least they do not see you in the driver's seat, you take a back seat to their need to make your choices for you, they do not see you as having a right to choose your own way if it in any way conflicts with their preferences for you, because they know full and well that their way is better, more efficient for you. It's for your own good. For the greater good. Really.

In the Proregressive's view of the world, you have no place in your own life.

We even have many on the ‘right’, even in the Tea Party, who unknowingly take the same position, that BIG is bad, that big moneyed interests should be prevented from using their free speech as they see fit, that they should take a knee to those lesser funded folk, ‘little people’, who have different opinions - why should the little guy's opinion prevail over the big people's opinion? Because they want it to and because they feel it would be best.

Sauron's Ring always looks attractive to those who see themselves as being able to wield it to do good.

The charge of elitism, though often true, is a very misleading guide to locating proregressives, look instead for those, rich or poor, who feel that - for whatever reason - they know better than another, how others should be made to live their own lives.

What all of these people should wake up and realize, quickly, is that both of these groups of ‘defenders’, if successful, will destroy the only defense which anyone has against the rich and powerful – the principle of property rights and the principle of free speech. As soon as it becomes ‘law’ that those in power can violate these sacred principles ‘for the greater good’, then it is only a matter of time before the rich and powerful figure out how to spin their intentions into sounding as if it is they who best support the ‘greater good’ – ask Wickard vs Filburn, ask Kelo, ask Gibson Guitar.

The only, ONLY, defense that the little guy has against the rich and powerful, is principle, and as soon as it is chipped away at enough, it is gone – the rich and powerful will sweep you aside like dirt in what they see as being the better path, the choices that you should make, would make, if you were as informed and smart as they, they are in fact doing you a kindness by, as Rousseau put it, going out of their own way in order to, for the greater good you understand, ‘force you to be free’.

If you don’t see that simple truth in the winning smile of Barrack Obama… you know longer have I’s to see.

Take a look at Obama’s speech, take a look at TR’s speech, and take a look at Thomas Jefferson’s speech above – TJ’s is the recipe for freedom, TR’s is the recipe for Nationalism:

“And in 1910, Teddy Roosevelt came here to Osawatomie and he laid out his vision for what he called a New Nationalism. “Our country,” he said, “…means nothing unless it means the triumph of a real democracy…of an economic system under which each man shall be guaranteed the opportunity to show the best that there is in him.” (Applause.)”

What meal does that recipe cook up?
The gathering idea of Nationalism which Teddy Roosevelt championed, was developed further by others around the world, and by the 1920's and 1930's, it took on very disturbing and world shaking form in Europe in particular. But even without those extremes, it can only lead to pretexts for exerting power to further the interests of those in power - especially at the expense of 'the little guy'.

Keep in mind, that whatever it is that these hucksters tell you they are cooking up for your benefit, it always comes down to decay, destruction and disaster in the end - ladies and gentlemen... look at Detroit!

Remember that the person who can, and will, say this:

"For the first time in history, the reforms that we passed put in place a consumer watchdog who is charged with protecting everyday Americans from being taken advantage of by mortgage lenders or payday lenders or debt collectors. "

, is the same person who, knowing full well that the legislation, which he championed as a community organizer, which he took an active part in bullying banks (yeah, bullying banks - remember, 'Elite' can lead you into a dangerous false comfort, look for those who are seeking power over others - that is where you find proregressives) into disregarding their time tested debt to ratio calculations when determining whether someone could afford a loan, and instead lenders were forced, by govt, to allow, encourage, and cajoled into seeking a loan which long experience showed the lenders that the applicants were likely to fail, and mandate that they give them a loan.

Fannie Mae Eases Credit To Aid Mortgage Lending
By STEVEN A. HOLMES
Published: September 30, 1999

"In a move that could help increase home ownership rates among minorities and low-income consumers, the Fannie Mae Corporation is easing the credit requirements on loans that it will purchase from banks and other lenders.

The action, which will begin as a pilot program involving 24 banks in 15 markets -- including the New York metropolitan region -- will encourage those banks to extend home mortgages to individuals whose credit is generally not good enough to qualify for conventional loans. Fannie Mae officials say they hope to make it a nationwide program by next spring. "

The ultimate result of this insanity, and quite a bit more, was the sub prime mortgage crisis, and yet Obama, Dodd, Frank, Schummer, Clinton, have the unmitigated gall to talk about taking advantage of people! It is they, and their socialistic, proregressive cronies, who want to abolish property rights in order to control all property; it is they who not only took advantage of people, but put their economic lives, and the well being of the entire nation, even the world as it turns out, at risk, in order to promote their proregressive agenda.

This man, and all like him, left or right, elitist or populist, are liars. Dissemblers. A person who is quite happy to go about deliberately misleading people, and twisting well known history, in order to score political points... is doing it for a reason... do you really think you are going to benefit from it?

What it comes down to, as President Obama said, is a choice between Nationalism... or Americanism - which will you choose?

A day that will live in infamy....

2011-12-07T08:19:00.001-06:00

Just a thought for those of us preoccupied by our various issues, primaries, elections, how breaking up is hard to do... they're real, they're important, sure - but they don't really amount to all that much, at least not in comparison to what happened seventy years ago today.

When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, it wasn't the sort of thing which the press today calls a crisis, every other day. This was a real clash of cultures. This was a day that truly will live in infamy, a day that saw two thousand four hundred and two people slaughtered, and which led us into four years of war and the loss of millions of lives worldwide.

Sometimes you need a bit of perspective... today is a fine day to get it.

Get a grip people.

Remember... it truly can get worse.

The Tea Pot Boils Over....

2011-12-06T22:18:00.005-06:00

By now it's likely that you heard of a schism in the St. Louis Tea Party.

People I know and trust on both sides of an issue have come to deep disagreement over events arising out of a primary, in my district btw, dividing (amongst those who have divided) roughly along the lines of the primary founders of the St. Louis Tea Party, several siding with Dana Loesch on one side, and several with Bill Hennessy on the other; aligning along differing inclinations over how best to apply their shared principles, each thinks the other has behaved inappropriately. I have no way of knowing the details , and so I won't venture a comment on them, but the situation has left the rest of us who haven't chosen sides - Adam Sharp of SharpElbows, Patch Adams of Po'ed Patriot, myself, and others, shaking our heads, blinking and looking at each other muttering

"WTF just happened?!"

I want to say that I believe the best of both sides and think each sides worst suspicions about the other are probably wide of the mark, misinterpretations or flat out wrong. If I'm a fool for thinking that... which part is the most foolish? And... if I'm a fool to believe one, why am I not a fool to believe the other? If it's foolish to deny the one, why isn't it foolish to deny the other?

I'm pretty sure that the others standing around with me in the aftermath are thinking much the same thing. I also couldn't help thinking of this, my first lunch with radicals (wish I had a picture of that afternoon!)

But whatever the facts actually are (and I'm not all that convinced that those involved actually know them either, but seriously, now that it's too late to matter, I'd just assume not hear the details), I suspect that the real issue is that an actual organization was formed where none should have been, and because it was, trouble followed.

At heart the Tea Party is fundamentally opposed to unconstitutional, expansive government and the abuse of power, and for the rule of law which preserves and upholds individual rights & property rights, through adherence to our Constitution.

Perhaps it should have been left there. Forming a political organization ultimately demands positions be taken for one candidate or another... and that has to, at some point, turn the organization, via the unavoidably differing opinions of it's members, against itself. IOW this was coming for some time, and if not on this issue, certainly another one would have presented itself.

There are other's, such as the proregressive conservative (said with a wink), Patrick Tuohey, of The Missouri Record who thinks,

"So why haven't they taken up his cause? If the Tea Party movement doesn't rally around candidates like Martin, what has been the point of the last three years? If the St. Louis activists staked a claim in party politics in New York's 23rd, why not in Missouri's 2nd?"

, leaving aside his question about the 23rd - action wasn't taken for what'shisname, but was directed against the proregressive rino 'republican' promoted by Newt Gingrich.

And that, off the top of my head, at this moment in time, is what I think the point is - the Tea Party, to the extent that it acts as a group, should be about drawing attention to problems, promoting relevant information, and educating people about our history and important ideas.

Campaigns and campaigning, should, IMHO, be left to individuals to promote those they feel strongly about, as individuals supporting Tea Party ideals, but NOT as members of 'THE Tea Party'.

Ok, enough.

So Now What?
Well... some pondering needs to take place. One starting point might be where we began, such as what I said back as the Tea Party was taking shape: don't waste time trying to plan and organize for a candidate, inform, publicize and where appropriate, criticize - loudly, far and wide - do that and those worthy of support, will gain support from those inclined to support them based upon what they've learned about them

When I was saying something similar to this:

"...maybe it’s best left in its natural decentralized structures as they are now, each ‘chapter’ communicating, debating, but putting their own public pressure on their local pol’s… kind of a new situation we need to give some thought to.

We shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that we have had many, many political parties, and presidents elected under them… Whigs, Federalists, Democratic-Republican, Know Nothings (!)… but in this current political climate, I just can’t see it being helpful or successful – better to have people who are united on principles, though not necessarily on their application (remember Madison & Hamilton agreed on principles, but violently disagreed on applying them), finding, screening and nailing or promoting, candidates through the existing parties..."

, and down in the comments, an idea I like a lot, but haven't had the time to develop,

"My current, though not thoroughly thought out sense is, that there needs to be something along the lines of a "Consumer Reports' organization, vocally educating and agitating for, particular measures - some activities and measures that cannot be tolerated - and some which must be enacted - and which will support or fight against any politician as they align for or against those measures."

.. though... obviously... that last turns out to be rather problematic.

If you've got any ideas on the subject... I'd love to hear them.

But Adam Sharp of SharpElbows had an interesting idea earlier today:

!'m starting my own Tea Party.
It's called "the If you mention a primary or primary candidate in my presence I'll punch you in the F**king face TEA PARTY"

Who's with me?

I think most of us are Adam.

;-)

Patch Adams of Po'ed Patriot has another:

Taking a long break...

Me? Got some reading to do. But I've been doing that here for about six years... so... more of the same, I guess.

One last thought for the night
Interestingly, I've been watching some other conservative oriented groups forming what each accuses the other of, 'forming a circular firing squad', and I couldn't help thinking of a couple lines from a Harry Potter movie (hey, sometimes you get Aeschylus from me, sometimes J.K. Rowling - deal with it), from a scene when Harry has been feeling wronged and was withdrawing from his friends:

Luna Lovegood: [about her father] We believe you, by the way. That He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named is back, and you fought him, and the Ministry and the Prophet are conspiring against you and Dumbledore.
Harry Potter: Thanks. Seems you're about the only ones that do.
Luna Lovegood: I don't think that's true. But I suppose that's how he wants you to feel.
Harry Potter: What do you mean?
Luna Lovegood: Well if I were You-Know-Who, I'd want you to feel cut off from everyone else. Because if it's just you alone you're not as much of a threat.

Take a short breather folks, reflect, but remember, in one form or another, we must regroup around the ideas that we are for, if for no other reason than for the fact that He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named doesn't want us to.

Indoctrinating You and Yours

2011-11-30T22:35:00.003-06:00

There's a new book out which just received a good write up on Big Government, which looks as if it will be very much worth your while to read. I haven't read the actual book myself, yet, but the blurbs and comments in the reviews of it are by turns shocking and entirely unsurprising to me. For instance, here's one about teachers indoctrinating their grammar students in leftist ideology,

"But more and more American K-12 teachers are bringing their politics into the classroom, brazenly acknowledging their effort to indoctrinate and recruit a new generation of radical, anti-American students.

“The long period of self-censorship among educators regarding class and labor issues may no longer hold,” wrote radical educator Rob Linne in his book “Organizing the Curriculum.”
“We cannot claim to be teaching for social justice if we ignore the class warfare being waged all around us. Bringing labor into the arena of K-12 education will undoubtedly meet political resistance, but an increasing number of educators are motivated to take up the challenge.”
That frightening approach to teaching is what motivated Education Action Group to publish a new book titled “Indoctrination: How ‘Useful Idiots’ are Using Our Schools to Subvert American Exceptionalism.”

Personally I don't find that at all surprising... do you? Really? Here's another,

"In his foreword for the book, FOX News contributor and former Clinton advisor Dick Morris bemoans the fact that educators are willing to brainwash young minds before they have the ability to fully understand and judge issues on their own.

“We have become accustomed to hearing American history and politics misinterpreted by leftist university professors,” Morris writes. “But (now) we see the insidious indoctrination at the elementary and secondary levels. At least university students can think for themselves. (The book) explains how 7- and 8-year-olds are taught to embrace an atheistic, leftist philosophy virtually from the time they enter school.”

And one more, just for fun,

"The book also discusses Chicago teacher Kati Gilson, who taught her preschoolers about her 2011 trip to Madison to protest the collective bargaining policies of Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker. She also taught them new words like “strike,” “collective bargaining,” and “negotiate.”

“My preschoolers understand what a protest march is and why it is important,” Gilson wrote.
“As we gear up for what looks like a big battle it is important for us to teach our children and families why we are taking a stand.”

Is this what we pay school taxes for?"

Isn't that special? But is it surprising?

No. Not in the least. Why do I say that?

You don't read this blog much, do you?

A post or two ago, I mentioned a fellow I was going back and forth with on facebook, who I called "FR", who described himself as an 'avowed socialist', and who proclaimed quite cooly that he did not believe in individual rights, and that he felt government using its power to create basic rights and minimum entitlements was just fine, and what it should do:

"You mistake rights without realizing that they are both means and ends.

More importantly, I think falling into this rights language lets us ignore the reality: that all of society is about coercion and force. You exercise force over people all the time. There isn't anything particularly more remote than a government doing it, compossed of people who pass rules made by people. Government is a body we've agreed represents a broader consensus than most personal interactions of force.

I also think there's a broad strawman about the government making decisions 'for you'. Yes, the government took your tax dollars. The government then provided health care for a 12 year old child who's family can't afford it but wanted it. In one sense, the government did make a decision for that family. On the other hand, that government also provided them with something that they needed but couldn't have. The reality is that when we talk about the government 'making decisions' for you, what really mean is that the government, as a collective action body for a society, benefits some over others and tries to control those benefits. Well, yes. It is force.

But it is only different in that it has legal force behind it. Society and living in one is about social coercion at all levels.

The federal government did have to intervene and make decisions for people in a wide array of circumstance that we certainly approve of now: forced integration of public facilities, protection of minority voters and their voting rights, etc. It's not always the federal government that does it best, but many times, the pure scale of the effort mandates a larger response.""

I mentioned at about that point in the post, that as I was reading his answers, a sick feeling overcame me and I clicked on his profile to discover that my sinking feeling was well founded - he was a teacher. Of World History. Not in a public school, but in what most people consider to be the more 'safe' sort, a Charter School.

What I didn't mention, was a very forthright equivalent of intellectual racism which he was proudly teaching to his students - this is from a comment on his facebook page, in thanks for a blog post of his that was picked up by Think Progress, In Teaching Cultural Literacy, Who Gets To Determine The Canon?, for which Ferny says:

"Thanks for the recognition! This journey I'm on with my students is going to continue and I plan on talking a lot more about the challenge of teaching students to enter a world of white cultural power, where their goal is to win and define their own cultural space for themselves and others.

I totally agree with the totalizing effect that Hirsch can have. Taken without criticism, the idea of cult...ural literacy just becomes a way to teach white trivia to our students.

I think, more importantly, this trivia needs to be taken as a reality of a culture of power and that we need to dismantle large parts of this privilege. Our goal is to empower our students so that they can do the hard work of expanding the canon for their generation and the next."[emphasis mine]

The post by Ferny Reyes, which was picked up by Think Progress, is here:

"Since I began the blog, I’ve switched locations and employment. Currently, I’m situated in Houston, TX, working at YES Prep SW, a high-performing charter school. When I say high-performing, I mean it: our test scores are among the highest in the state, we send 100% of our students to four-year colleges, and the selectivity of the colleges our students is only increasing. I recently showed a quiz I was giving my students for Islam to a couple of friends of mine who have attended college and taken classes on Islam.

The quiz covered material they would have covered in their college classes in 3-4 weeks of class. I did it in four classes, with a bit of homework. My students did well. I can confidently say that I have great students and that they work hard. Our goal here at SW is to prepare our students not just to be college-eligible, but to be college-ready."

Isn't that fantastic? His students were rigorously instructed about Islam, and their scores compared favorably with those of college students. Nice.

What do you suppose his enthusiasm level is for Western Culture? Yeah... good guess; in it he notes,

"To quickly summarize before continuing: power exists. As an educator who is training students to enter a culture of power that is not theirs, I have to make it explicit and I have to teach the cultural literacy behind the institutions of power they’ll have to navigate. I cannot, in good conscience, pretend that their cultural experiences will be valued for all that they are worth and that they won’t be judged for not having those markers of cultural knowledge. I forced myself to read the ‘classics’ of Western Civilization before attending school, but I constantly felt that the philosophers and ideas that were being dropped on a regular basis completely baffled me. I still can’t exactly tell the difference between the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin and other famous rock bands, though I at least know a phrase or two from popular songs."

His students scored fantastically on Islam, but if Ferny was 'completely baffled' by Western philosophers... those guys who came up with 'white cultural ideas' like the rule of law, freedom, liberty... what do you suppose his students 'picked up' from him on them?

The book he is referring to, is by Ed Hirsh, an intellectually filthy barbarian, IMHO, whose idea of 'cultural literacy' Ferny accurately describes as:

"...If each local school system imparts the traditional reference points of literate culture, then everybody is able to communicate with strangers. That is a good definition of literacy: the ability to communicate effectively with strangers. We help people in the underclass rise economically by teaching them how to communicate effectively beyond a narrow social sphere, and that can only be accomplished by teaching them shared, traditional literacy culture. We only make social and economic progress by teaching everybody to read and communicate, which means teaching myths and facts that are predominantly traditional...."[emphasis mine]

This is what... this the ALL you can expect for those who view the purpose of 'school' as being to 'teach' socially and economically useful 'skills'. Our Founders saw the purpose of Education as being making one self aware, able to understand your ideas and your place in the world, inclined towards being moral, virtuous and able to govern yourself, so as to be capable of living in liberty, and contributing to your life and that of your society as a result.

One of those who contributed to that idea of Education and 'literacy', was Aristotle, one of those 'baffling' old dead white guys, who said in his Nicomachean Ethics,

"...for it is the mark of an educated man to look for precision in each class of things just so far as the nature of the subject admits; it is evidently equally foolish to accept probable reasoning from a mathematician and to demand from a rhetorician scientific proofs..."

and from his "On Metaphysics(Book IV)"

"... for not to know of what things one should demand demonstration, and of what one should not, argues want of education. "

In the Western Cultural tradition, Eduction was to improve your ability to Reason, in order to pursue, discover, test and recognize the Truth; familiarity with the same stories your grandfather knew was a useful result, a side effect, not the purpose, of an Education. Montaigne put it as “A traditional liberal arts curriculum of history, language, and literature--the arts that liberate," of educating one to be worthy of Liberty.

Those... are the ideas which Ferny, a World History Teacher, refers to as 'baffling'.

Doesn't surprise me a bit.

Why?

Do you remember my post on an earlier Cassandra, from 1920? He'd tried to warn of anti-American, socialists, communists, who were taking over the schools and colleges 90 years ago. 90 years... do you realize what can be accomplished in 90 years? Look at what Obama has done in three. Couldn't have happened without our allowing the last ninety.

How about the post that showed that this 'early' Cassandra, was at the very least, 60 years late to the party? This hasn't been going on since only the 1960's, 50 years ago, not even 90 years ago, it's been creeping into our national soul, through our children, for over 150 years.

If you aren't deprogramming and correcting your kids, you'd better get them out of 'school' - if you don't, don't you dare come to me in a few years and tell me about how stunned you were to hear that your kids are full of anti-American, anti-Western ideas.

Don't. you. dare.

Occupy Yourself In Giving Thanks!

2011-11-23T18:56:00.000-06:00

Not to be forgotten, that even the best of men, sincerely seeking to do good, can mistake what they want to be good, for what actually is good.

From Gov. Bradford's recollections on the Pilgrims experiment with communism:

"...The experience that was had in this common course and condition, tried sundry years and that amongst godly and sober men, may well evince the vanity of that conceit of Plato's and other ancients applauded by some of later times; that the taking away of property and bringing in community into a commonwealth would make them happy and flourishing; as if they were wiser than God. For this community (so far as it was) was found to breed much confusion and discontent and retard much employment that would have been to their benefit and comfort. For the young men, that were most able and fit for labour and service, did repine that they should spend their time and strength to work for other men's wives and children without any recompense. The strong, or man of parts, had no more in division of victuals and clothes than he that was weak and not able to do a quarter the other could; this was thought injustice. The aged and graver men to be ranked and equalized in labours and victuals, clothes, etc., with the meaner and younger sort, thought it some indignity and disrespect unto them. And for men's wives to be commanded to do service for other men, as dressing their meat, washing their clothes, etc., they deemed it a kind of slavery, neither could many husbands well brook it. Upon the point all being to have alike, and all to do alike, they thought themselves in the like condition, and one as good as another; and so, if it did not cut off those relations that God hath set amongst men, yet it did at least much diminish and take off the mutual respects that should be preserved amongst them. And would have been worse if they had been men of another condition. Let none object this is men's corruption, and nothing to the course itself. I answer, seeing all men have this corruption in them, God in His wisdom saw another course fitter for them."

No matter the zeal and good intentions with which it is entered into, collectivism fails, yet those same moral people, can with liberty, quickly prosper.

There's one heck of a lesson in there for us.... Occupy yourself in giving thanks this Thanksgiving, for living in a nation where you have the liberty to learn this the easy way, rather than the hard way... so far.

Comments, Socialists, Schools and the Truest Meaning of Left vs. Right

2011-11-23T15:49:00.002-06:00

Commenting on Commentary on Current Events
A few... somewhat related comments from various sites. The first is from Steve Straub, who puts on the excellent "The Federalist Papers" page on facebook, and on the web as well. He recently posted a quote on his own page, by an economist who was celebrating the benefits of 'Income disparity',

Prominent economist Dennis Gartman said:
"We celebrate income disparity and we applaud the growing margins between the bottom 20% of American society and the upper 20% for it is evidence of what has made America a great country. It is the chance to have a huge income, to make something of one’s self; to begin a business and become a millionaire legally and on one’s own that separates the US from most other nations of the world."
Do you agree or disagree with this statement and why or why not?

Before going on, I’d be very curious as to your thoughts on that? I'll leave mine for the end of this post, because I want to run some other recent exchanges by you that I've had with some facebook friends, starting with Mytheos Holt. Mytheos is a real up and comer, who recently had an article on National Review online, which I recommend, entitled In Defense of Liberal Bias,

"This past weekend, I had the fortune of being able to attend a conference at Yale on the legacy of William F. Buckley Jr and his seminal work God and Man at Yale. Among those present were the publisher and editor-in-chief of this very magazine, as well as several luminari..."

Don't let the title fool you, Mytheos is no leftie, not by a long shot; what he is saying is that the Conservative movement is as strong as it is today, because those conservatives who've come through our schools and remained conservative, have been strengthened by the liberal bias arrayed against them - a mental 'that which does not kill you, makes you stronger'.

He notes that because there is a very obvious liberal bias on campus, the left's ideas have gone unchallenged, and for so long that they are becoming progressively more sloppy and weaker by the year, and as a result of imposing their inflationary wits upon their students, there are growing numbers of students, such as our Philip Christofanelli, who are not only bringing the nonsense taught in these biased classes to light, but who are speaking out about them, and are developing the mental skills and inclinations needed to shred the left's flabby ideas in every engagement with them.

Which is a beautiful thing.

What is usually Left unsaid
But, what with beauty being in the eye of the beholder, one fellow, I'll call FR, commented on Mytheos's Facebook page, that

"...when conservatives are talking about liberal bias, it's some bizarre parody of what I would construct as a joke."

I suggested that if he thought that, he should stop off in flyover country sometime, and have a look at classes such as this one which has liberal bias droppings splattered all over them, hard to make a move without stepping in it. To which he replied,

FR "That class sounds hilarious and really really stupid. That said, the guy that wrote the blog post is also absurd. I hate doing the both sides do it, but I can't imagine this person ever doing anything without an absurd slant."
Van ;-) you mean like this: / ;-)

Van (My post)

I let FR know that that was only one of several posts digging into the Communist Prof's Ancel's & Giljum's background, and that the manner in which the university systems reacted, or didn't, to their communist professors message, showed that their positions and their sympathy and toleration of them, were widespread throughout the two colleges in question.
Regarding my absurd slant, I told him that,

"...I don't come at politics from a political perspective, but from a philosophical point of view - heavy on volition (free will), rights and property rights - and that I tend to see anything that amounts to the 'abolition of property rights' as a direct assault upon not only my political rights, but my childrens lives and chance for happiness..."

, and also, that since the two professors, despite some statements of 'inappropriateness' and threatened dismissals, designed to shrug off bad-publicity, they are still gainfully employed at UMSL & UKC and are merrily professing the same foolishness as before, their ideas are probably prevalent not just in those two colleges, but throughout the system as a whole, and so with all of that in mind, and as opposed as they their messages are to what I expect my kids to be taught, I was actually being a bit understated in my post.

FR didn't back off, but he made some good natured and reasonable comments, obviously leftist, but not strident about it, which pricked my curiosity - the chance of questioning a leftist and actually getting answers, rather than put downs and diatribes, doesn't come along every day, and I was curious to hear more.
FR'd said of Prof's Ancel & Giljum, that "they're just standard commies." which is true, but I pointed out that they're not lonely ones, and as foolish as what they said was, I was more concerned about the acceptance of the ideas which their foolishness rests upon, and the degree to which it is accepted and widely endorsed. To which he replied,

FR Right. Like, look, I'm an avowed Socialist and I could trash these professors. I still think the rhetoric you were using about them getting fired is a bit hyperbolic.

An avowed Socialist. Well now, that goes way beyond stumbling upon an uncommonly lucid leftie, this put him into a whole new level of rarity... I just had to run some more questions by him. Obviously we'd need to 'agree to disagree' on most things, but while I didn't want to hijack Mytheos’s thread, I told him I was curious, and if he'd humor me a bit, I wouldn't snipe at his responses, and then asked the obvious,

"... for what reason are you an avowed Socialist? Or maybe for a shorter answer, do you put more value on providing people with a minimum of privileges and possessions, or on their having the Right to make their own choices (as well as their consequences)? Or do you see the issue from an entirely different perspective?

And a different perspective he did have.

FR Because I don't believe that a society where most people cannot access their rights due to lack of minimums is one where people are free. Simple as that. Public goods exist and should be provided by the government to ensure that the vast majority of population's state in life is not determined by the status of their parents. In the United States, a nation with the lowest income mobility in the OECD, this is definitely not the situation.
Yes. I am assaulting your rights from your definitions. That's fine. I care more about the vast majority. I think freedom is ultimately choosing a master. Oh well.
I could go into more details"

That's interesting, isn't it? "I care more" and "I think freedom is ultimately choosing a master", those are a couple of phrases that are just made for each other, aren't they? Freedom is just another word for slavery, and he has good intentions, after all, sooo... 'whatever' about the rest of it, rights and all, inconvenient live, truths and all the rest... whatever.

And here I'd said 'no sniping'. Ooh... so tough to bite my tongue and still my fingers from responding to that from every direction that came to mind... argh. Just 'keep to the questions', I told myself, just pry as many answers as you can from him.

"Van Ok, how do you define rights? Do you find their basis within the nature of a person, or in exterior needs? Or don't at all...?

And FR gave some very revealing answers.

FR To be fair, I don't actually believe in rights. I use that rhetoric because that's sort of the public space that's been created. Also because what I think is probably closer to that conception. I don't believe 'rights' exist in anything other than a definitional context created by societies. I don't believe in natural rights or absolute rights.
For a healthy society, there would be an obligations-orientation with a rights safety-net as a way to break coercive small relationships from completely overrunning people's ability to act.
I don't have a reflexive love of government. However, I think that government is a collective mechanism for the enforcement of certain things that I think all human beings should have at a certain point: food, shelter, health care, education.....

How's that for clarity? “To be fair, I don't actually believe in rights”. Can you believe that? I just shook my head and told him that it was refreshing that he had at least admitted the obvious truth that is always left out, that socialism and individual rights are incompatible, and that he didn't try to pretend otherwise. Very rare. Even rarer, I was actually agreeing with a socialist on something - go figure!
But how, I wanted to know, did he think that the govt/society was supposed to determine what people should have, or what the minimum was that they should have? How could a govt, removed from the realities of their life, possibly determine that? Did he think that the choices of an individual should even be taken into account in determining what they got or what they’d 'be allowed' to do in and for society? And... why?

I didn't really get an answer to those questions right off, but this one I did,

"...do you believe that people do have volition, that people have free will, or do think that people essentially pinball about within their environment?"

, and again, it was a surprising answer - this time because it didn't fit.

FR I do think people have free will, but I'm not too sure what that has to do it. There are certain physical and somewhat-physical things that you need, regardless of your volition or free will. Your free will doesn't suddenly determine if you need shelter - that's sort of a reality, given physical charectistics of human beings....

How can you believe in Free Will, and then deny people the ability to exercise their Free Will? How can you believe that people do make choices, but then prevent them from making them? What view does that express about the nature of being human, let alone the purpose and meaning of making choices, decisions, and why? Too many questions... he continued,

"...I think the way you determine what is necessary is largely through negotiation and definitely seeing what things we can figure out are primary qualifications to be able to exercise a wide array of freedoms. No one needs tents for camping. No one needs nice cars, televisions, ipods, etc. The government should not be in the business of providing this. Again, this goes back to the point that wealth inequality doesn't bother me per se; it's the realities of the people at the bottom. If they are well fed, have health care coverage, are able to access a decent education and have material needs met, I don't care if they only have that. I also particularly care if children have this.
Now, we can start talking about the role of government in a broader array of cultural and social issues, but that becomes a values fight very quickly.

How does a person come to such ideas? How does one person have the hubris, to choose to believe, that what another person has chosen for their own life, doesn't meet your approval, and so should be disallowed? How does a person ever become able to have such a thought without deep feelings of shame? School? Family? Circumstances?

... As for how it evolved, I'd say it came bit by bit. I think the core of it is from the fact that I grew up in a situation where I didn't have many of these things. It's important that people receive those things. A common response is to say that I made it, why can't others? You shouldn't need to be exceptionally brilliant (I like to think I am), hard working, etc. to be able to simply thrive in a way that isn't really that much above average. You shouldn't have to be in the 90th percentile in abilities to succeed. For many people that have those material necessities from the beginning, they can be in the 50th and be fine.

Which, as far as sources go, wasn't all that surprising, I think most people come to their positions out of what they consider to be generosity and basic human kindness, rather than through philosophical or political convictions. Doesn't make them any more ok, or lessen the damaging, even horrible consequences that follow from their positions, but going down that road didn't seem like it'd get us anywhere.
Instead I just told him that was a bit surprised at his honesty, and that,

Van My surprise comes because just as Socialism is not compatible with Rights, a denial of rights is not very compatible with affirming free will - socialism requires a deterministic view, which is why it has been the stated, or implied, position of most of the left's thinkers from Rousseau on down to today.
What Free Will has to do with the issue, is that it is the root of Individual Rights, and Rights (especially Property Rights) are a logical development once free will is acknowledged.
"A common response is to say that I made it, why can't others?" Well, while that's true, it's also true that many people who, though they may have a deep desire for financial success, just don't have what it takes, maybe lacking in brains, character, energy, will, skills, conflicting obligations or just plain bad luck. Bad things do often happen to good people - but I don't think that qualifies as a basis for government, anymore than I think any of the 'social contracts' do (not even Locke's)... but that again hinges on Rights, which is off the table at the moment.
My question is, why should remedying those situations be handled by the institution that exercises force over people and maintains the law in society, government; rather than by that of the members of society themselves?
Why should government make choices for you, rather than allowing you to make them for yourself - who does, after all, have the free will to make your own choices and be responsible for them - why is Govt, and the highly removed federal govt especially, the best and proper source for making basic decisions about your life?

He replied,

FR It seems silly to talk about free will though. If the idea is that you are capable of committing any action you want at any particular point in time, I'm convinced you are capable of it. But the realm of actions you'll think about are basically bound by the environment you grew up in...
I reject your philosophical premise that we can talk about rights as endowed or given by anyone. Even more important, however, is that given the rhetoric of rights nowadays, I can still use them and affirm that from your principles and given the context of today's society, most people can't utilize the full extent of their rights.
Freedom isn't having to stick in one job because it is impossible to get health care benefits; freedom isn't being unable to move to a potentially new location to find a good job due to economic benefits; freedom isn't being in a terrible community for education, simply by the narrative of birth.
You mistake rights without realizing that they are both means and ends.
More importantly, I think falling into this rights language lets us ignore the reality: that all of society is about coercion and force. You exercise force over people all the time. There isn't anything particularly more remote than a government doing it, compossed of people who pass rules made by people. Government is a body we've agreed represents a broader consensus than most personal interactions of force.
I also think there's a broad strawman about the government making decisions 'for you'. Yes, the government took your tax dollars. The government then provided health care for a 12 year old child who's family can't afford it but wanted it. In one sense, the government did make a decision for that family. On the other hand, that government also provided them with something that they needed but couldn't have. The reality is that when we talk about the government 'making decisions' for you, what really mean is that the government, as a collective action body for a society, benefits some over others and tries to control those benefits. Well, yes. It is force.
But it is only different in that it has legal force behind it. Society and living in one is about social coercion at all levels.
The federal government did have to intervene and make decisions for people in a wide array of circumstance that we certainly approve of now: forced integration of public facilities, protection of minority voters and their voting rights, etc. It's not always the federal government that does it best, but many times, the pure scale of the effort mandates a larger response.

If you know me at all, you know that at that point we'd passed the 'no sniping' zone, I started in on reply after reply, but then I did something that I usually do at the beginning... and I did it because as I was thinking about what he'd been saying, and the particular post-modernist way of saying it... it occurred to me that it smacked of a particular, distinctive dialect, that of educationese... oh... no... yep. It was true.

Not only is FR a teacher, but he is a World History teacher.... and not in just any school, but in one of those schools which seem to be seen as a veritable panacea of solutions, in the mind of most Conservatives, a Charter School.
Color me surprised.

Van Well. I started typing a reply, and by the time I glanced down I was up to nine pages... and still only half way through your comment. That isn't going to work in facebook. I've tried before. So. Brevity being the soul of agony, I did my best to write the least that I could manage.
But then I finally made it down to this: "that all of society is about coercion and force.

You exercise force over people all the time." This is jaw dropping. I read it and finally clicked over to your profile and realized my worst fear - you're a teacher. Gadzooks. Who do you know outside of govt that exercises force over people all the time?

An example from today's headlines of using similar means for distinctly different ends: The Occupy Wall Street demonstrations are examples of mobs of people using coercion and actual force to try and get their way, which is in direct opposition to the earlier Tea Party rallies, which were examples of people gathering together in an effort to persuade the public and legislators to their point of view.

What makes the one a mob, and the other a gathering, is the inability, or refusal, to see the difference between coercion and persuasion, perhaps as a result of being taught by folks such as yourself, that rights are non-existent, and that power can and should be seized if you have the numbers to force it.

"given the rhetoric of rights nowadays, I can still use them and affirm that from your principles and given the context of today's society, most people can't utilize the full extent of their rights." Lol, so let me get this straight, you will happily use what you do not think exists, in order to form principles you cannot believe in, in order to lay claim something you want to take from someone else. Wow.

"Freedom isn't having to stick in one job because it is impos..." Freedom isn't being free of any and all obstacles. Freedom isn't about being fed, clothed and cared for like a pet. Freedom isn't about not having to struggle to live, there IS a word for that though, it's called death... which I freely choose to avoid for as long as possible... by way of my right to make those choices and actions I see as being most worthwhile for me and my family.

Freedom and Liberty is about being able to make your own choices without either having to ask permission of, or being restrained by, the threat of physical force, and in recognizing your need for that, extending the same consideration to others.

"You mistake rights without realizing that they are both means and ends." On the contrary, you mistake Rights for being something other than a reasonable expectation of non-interference in making those choices and actions which a human being needs to be able to take in order to live their own life, and That is the real root of Rights – making the choices you choose to make in order to live your own life, and Free Will is central to it.

I'd be happy to go into greater depth on that (but... yes, this is an example of me being brief).

*Coerce - to restrain or dominate by force

*Persuade: to move by argument, entreaty, or expostulation to a belief, position, or course of action.
Do you really see no difference between the power of persuasion and the persuasion of power? To ignore the issue of actual force, to equivocate between choice and force... do you agree with the New York Times then, that "Reason Seen More as Weapon Than Path to Truth"?
I neither engage in coercion or force (leaving aside those unfortunate altercations with various drummers & drunks decades ago). In civil society the only avenue open to you to deal with your fellows is persuasion, and persuasion doesn't cease to be persuasion, unless you threaten or inflict actual physical force, in order to get your way.

No further reply from FR.

I'll have more to say about FR's comments, and what he said about what he feels is important that he teach to his students (it's pretty awful) and how it is that people come by these ideas as a result of our schools, and I'll even toss in a particularly offensive comment by a leading consultant to our own DESE in Missouri, but that'll have to wait for another post.

But have a look at this latest afront, from one school district away from my home,

"Fort Zumwalt high schools have placed an emphasis this school year on enforcing student ID regulations. Students are required to display identification at all times. Faculty at the five high schools have been instructed to increase enforcement on students violating the policy. Four times this year, the schools have done a spot check to track the number of students following the policy."

Students are required to display Identification on their persons at all times. In school. This is not the same situation as employees having to wear ID in a business, where you are on private property and are there by voluntary consent. This is government property, where students are required, to attend - that is bad enough - but on top of that they are to be required to 'Show your papers!' at all times, in order to not be penalized for being where they were ordered to be.

Well.

What can you say to that? My immediate reaction, was that if nothing else, this goes a long way to uphold that immortal principle of 'each person being presumed guilty unless proved innocent', not to mention the future benefits of implementing Lincoln's dictum that the philosophy of the schoolroom in one generation will be the philosophy of government in the next. And of course it is way more personable than having to wear a yellow star. Right? Hello? Is this thing on?

Is that too harsh? With the entire history of public education in America in mind, no, I don't think so. But even if you disagree... can you imagine the time, confusion and waste of time this requirement will result in, and take away from the little real education they have a chance of receiving in school?

Fortunately there is at least one member of the school board with sense, Laure Schmidt, who had the good sense (and which I know her to be chock full of) to note,

""All this time is being spent checking ID badges, and it has nothing to do with education," she said.
Schmidt said multiple teachers have expressed a dissatisfaction with the policy.
"I have teachers coming up to me and their exact words are, 'You've got to help us," Schmidt said. "

But it isn't entirely true that it has nothing to do with 'education', if by education you mean the education public schools were designed, from the beginning, to inculcate upon our students. And no, it didn't begin with the Dept. of Education under Carter. Not by a long shot. As I noted earlier this year,

"For those who think the Dept of Education is a recent creation, no, it's not, only it's cabinet level position, the original Department of Education was formed in 1867 to ... (whadaya think?)...as the Dept of Ed site puts it,

"...collect information on schools and teaching that would help the States establish effective school systems. While the agency's name and location within the Executive Branch have changed over the past 130 years, this early emphasis on getting information on what works in education to teachers and education policymakers continues down to the present day..."
It certainly does, and the Morrill Act in 1863, and the second Morrill Act of 1890 gave the"Office of Education" responsibility for administering support for the forbidden fruit of the Civil War, our system of land-grant colleges and universities."

But, as I also mentioned in that post (and many others), the problem goes even further back than that. At right about the same time that the fruits of True Education, as the Founder's era knew it, was bearing fruit - the Founding Fathers - some of those very founders were already looking to trash that system and replace it with the 'New! Modern!' ideas of (my favorite demon in human skin) Rousseau.

I've given a lot of grief to Noah Webster and his efforts to replace the well written, imaginative, time tested classics of the West (Homer, Cicero, etc), with disconnected, dry as dirt 'just the facts ma'am' essays, which were the forerunner of modern textbooks. But another Founder, who was important to the revolution and who was truly exceptional and remarkable in many ways, Benjamin Rush, was maybe just as bad, if not worse, for the future of education in this nation, than Webster was. I knew Rush was on the 'throw out the classics' bandwagon, but the extent to which he followed through on that I'd somehow missed.

See if you can recognize any of the ideas of FR, not the flowers, but the seeds, in what soon became not only the ideals of modern education, but the entire top down, anti-federalism oriented, all powerful State, in these snippets from Rush's "Thoughts Upon The Mode Of Education Proper In A Republic," Philadelphia, 1786:

"In the education of youth, let the authority of our masters be as absolute as possible. The government of schools like the government of private families should be arbitrary, that it may not be severe. By this mode of education, we prepare our youth for the subordination of laws and thereby qualify them for becoming good citizens of the republic."
"Let our pupil be taught that he does not belong to himself, but that he is public property"
"Our schools of learning, by producing one general and uniform system of education, will render the mass of the people more homogeneous and thereby fit them more easily for uniform and peaceable government."
"From the observations that have been made it is plain that I consider it as possible to convert men into republican machines. This must be done if we expect them to perform their parts properly in the great machine of the government of the state."

How did the bilge of Woodrow Wilson come to enjoy not just widespread public approval, but become nearly 'self-evident' on the parts of lawyers and judges who were undoubtedly 'well educated' enough to know just how incompatible such notions were with the original ideas of the constitution? Don't forget Abraham Lincoln's dictum, that -

"...the philosophy of the schoolroom in one generation will be the philosophy of government in the next..."

Which brings me back around to one final friend, an old flame who's living in New York, she's getting a degree from a school that is about as close to the original gates of philosophical hell as you can get, The New School (someday I'll finish my posts on Common Core Curriculum) and she's even helping to administer a foundation's grants, which extend into many an activity I'm sure I'd be appalled at.

At one point she'd mentioned giving the benefit of the doubt to the Occupy Wall Street ~~punks~~ people, that they were just idealistic, and maybe not so different from the Tea Party, which I'm afraid I went a bit off on (sorry Liz). She is definitely not a standard leftist, but she does get an earful of the standard leftists comments about the Tea Party - (ignorant, fearful of white culture being challenged, etc), and I suspect she's a bit baffled at how I can be so deeply involved with them.

But the fact that she has been getting a degree at "The New School" (whose history is at the very heart of the establishment of modern education, and she still retains an open mind, reaffirms my belief (bordering on desperately clutching at as if a life preserver), that though you may be aware of a central principle, that doesn't necessarily mean that there aren't other principles, perhaps just as, or more important, at work as well, which you might be blissfully unaware of.

Even so, after the mobbery the other day (November 17th), I had to send her a note,

What with your having front row seats, I was just wondering if you've had any other thoughts on the Occupy Wall Street'rs? Any further evaluation of the Tea Party?
Or on how the Rights of the few, the individuals, intersect with the demands of the many, the mob?
Our local OWS'rs talk the talk, but something in them (or at least in those they're trying to drive) keeps them from being able to walk it... they come up lame and ludicrous in the attempt - not like your guys, or Oakland's... thank goodness.
Stay safe,

Van

Back To The Beginning
And so now it's time to go back to the quote at the opening of this post, yes I agree with the gist of that statement. Show of hands for who was surprised at that? ;-)

You cannot live without making choices, and those choices require that you observe, consider - reason - making choices is a Requirement of human life. If you don't choose, you cannot make choices, you die. Rights and Life, go hand in hand, they are as inseparable, diminishing one, diminishes the other.

I believe each person has the Right to live their own life, and to do that you must have the ability to make your own choices and to retain the fruits of your efforts. In doing that you have to respect the Right, the necessity, of others being able to do the same... and that will inevitably mean cooperating and transacting with them - and benefiting from that.

The result of creating sizable amounts of wealth - inequalities of wealth - is that the cooperation and efforts of others must be involved, in order to accomplish it. You CANNOT produce wealth, without also, in one way or another, involving yourself with the enriching actions of others as well.

Adam Smith called that the "system of natural liberty", or the Free Market, and only America has (increasingly past tense 'had') a system of govt that was designed to enable that, by establishing a government that was primarily designed to uphold and defend the Individual Rights, Contracts, and so the Liberty, of its people.

Some people will make choices that will result in wealth that measures in the lower 20%, or less... others will make the choices, and the determined efforts, that will place them in the top 1%, and many others will make those choices which result in producing the wealth that measures out somewhere in between.

But ALL of them benefit, increasingly so, by their ability to freely associate and live their own lives, and even the bottom 1% will find themselves enjoying the effects of the wealth which those who succeeded in making better choices and more determined efforts, results in being created (paved streets, utilities, medicine, Arts, etc).

Every forceful action which requires some to NOT make the choices and efforts which they Rightfully (and respecting of rights) would have, diminishes the wealth and prosperity of all that society.

Another commenter on that thread, Dominic, responded that,

"Their philosophy is we are just not smart enough to make the choices that are right for us and our families."

Which is exactly so, and that is why those societies produce only poverty. The poverty which inevitably results from Socialism, in matter and spirit, has less to do with politics, than with the fact that when society is run decisions made at the top, and forced down, the number of additional decisions that are able to be made, is diminished - the more totalitarian the structure, the fewer are those making decisions. Such a process results in a society where the potential wealth that could be produced by the individual efforts of millions, is reduced to that which can be produced by only those few who are allowed to actively make (and who need to be very careful that they don't make decisions that anger those above them), which have to be distributed amongst millions.

It is literally throwing wealth - the productive decisions and efforts of millions of individuals - away.
A totalitarian state burdens itself with having to somehow distribute the wealth which those few who are partially allowed to think, and act, can produce, amongst a population many, many times its size.

Essentially what socialism does, is to select a quantity of 'Experts' equal to the population of a small village, and confine an entire state to having to live off the wealth which they might manage to produce. It doesn't matter how brilliant those experts are, the rest of the population is prevented from contributing their own productive decisions and efforts, and are prevented from making even the tiny corrections which the common sense of any knowledgeable person on the ground might make, and so the many can only consume what the few manage to produce.

The result is poverty. It's really not rocket science. Only wackademics.
Dominic replied that

"...Socialism leads to Totalitatianism, or are one in the same."

Yep. Behind their supposed differences, Socialism, Proregressivism, Marxism, Communism, Fascism... are little more than stylistic differences for varying degrees of depriving people of their Right to make their own choices and to retain the property resulting from them.

And just as an object falls at 32 feet per second, per second, the system which enters into any of these variants, will descend faster and faster towards hitting the pavement of Totalitarianism, in the (very messy) end.

Someone made a comment elsewhere the other day, about how the Left-Right political spectrum didn't seem to help much in describing the difference between Democrats and Republicans (or RINO's).... here's a suggestion to make what is being measured more meaningful.

On the left side of the spectrum, label its pole "Denial of Property Rights" and place this quote from Karl Marx, as an explanation for it:

" In this sense, the theory of the Communists may be summed up in the single sentence: Abolition of private property."

, and on the Right, the Protection of Property Rights, this quote by John Adams wherein he describes what the purpose of a Republic is,

"... . It signified a government, in which the property of the public, or people, and of every one of them, was secured and protected by law. This idea, indeed, implies liberty; because property cannot be secure unless the man be at liberty to acquire, use, or part with it, at his discretion, and unless he have his personal liberty of life and limb, motion and rest, for that purpose..."

For the very same reasons that Adams and many of the other Founders spoke so adamantly of the importance of Property Rights to all of our Individual Rights, Marx insisted upon their being abolished.
So there are your two poles, Left and Right.

There is of course some distance between them, but if you've got some notion that the distance is marked by a slippery slope, one that you can leisurely traverse, pause, change your mind on and reverse course upon, you might want to strike the word 'slope' and replace it with 'precipitous drop', for that is a much better description of the result of stepping to the left of "Preservation of Property Rights", and it equally describes the effort required to move from the left position, back towards the safety of the Right.

The last time we did it, it took a Revolution to accomplish.

Just sayin'.

And now for a few words from one of our Sponsors...

2011-11-21T12:26:00.002-06:00

Hey, when the opportunity comes along to match up Jon Stewart, and John Adams... who can resist? First enjoy a moment of honest & highly humorous insight from Jon Stewart on The Daily Show about the class warfare within 'Occupy Wall Street' at Zuccotti Park:

And then a couple words from one of our Republic's sponsors, John Adams; see if you can find some parallels between yesterday and today, in what he says in his Letters to John Taylor... ring any bells for ya?

"...Take the first hundred men you meet in the streets of a city, or on a turnpike road in the country, and constitute them a democratical republic. In my next, you may have some conjectures of what will appear in your new democracy.
V.

When your new democratical republic meets, you will find half a dozen men of independent fortunes; half a dozen, of more eloquence; half a dozen, with more learning; half a dozen, with eloquence, learning, and fortune.
Let me see. We have now four-and-twenty; to these we may add six more, who will have more art, cunning, and intrigue, than learning, eloquence, or fortune. These will infallibly soon unite with the twenty-four. Thus we make thirty. The remaining seventy are composed of farmers, shopkeepers, merchants, tradesmen, and laborers. Now, if each of these thirty can, by any means, influence one vote besides his own, the whole thirty can carry sixty votes,—a decided and uncontrolled majority of the hundred. These thirty I mean by aristocrats; and they will instantly convert your democracy of one hundred into an aristocracy of thirty.

Take at random, or select with your utmost prudence, one hundred of your most faithful and capable domestics from your own numerous plantations, and make them a democratical republic. You will immediately perceive the same inequalities, and the same democratical republic, in a very few of the first sessions, transformed into an aristocratical republic; as complete and perfect an aristocracy as the senate of Rome, and much more so. Some will be beloved and followed, others hated and avoided by their fellows.
It would be easy to quote Greek and Latin, to produce a hundred authorities to show the original signification of the word aristocracy and its infinite variations and application in the history of ages. But this would be all waste water. Once for all, I give you notice, that whenever I use the word aristocrat, I mean a citizen who can command or govern two votes or more in society, whether by his virtues, his talents, his learning, his loquacity, his taciturnity, his frankness, his reserve, his face, figure, eloquence, grace, air, attitude, movements, wealth, birth, art, address, intrigue, good fellowship, drunkenness, debauchery, fraud, perjury, violence, treachery, pyrrhonism, deism, or atheism; for by every one of these instruments have votes been obtained and will be obtained. You seem to think aristocracy consists altogether in artificial titles, tinsel decorations of stars, garters, ribbons, golden eagles and golden fleeces, crosses and roses and lilies, exclusive privileges, hereditary descents, established by kings or by positive laws of society. No such thing! Aristocracy was, from the beginning, now is, and ever will be, world without end, independent of all these artificial regulations, as really and as efficaciously as with them!

Let me say a word more. Your democratical republic picked in the streets, and your democratical African republic, or your domestic republic, call it which you will, in its first session, will become an aristocratical republic. In the second session it will become an oligarchical republic; because the seventy-four democrats and the twenty-six aristocrats will, by this time, discover that thirteen of the aristocrats can command four votes each; these thirteen will now command the majority, and, consequently, will be sovereign. The thirteen will then be an oligarchy. In the third session, it will be found that among these thirteen oligarchs there are seven, each of whom can command eight votes, equal in all to fifty-six, a decided majority. In the fourth session, it will be found that there are among these seven oligarchs four who can command thirteen votes apiece. The republic then becomes an oligarchy, whose sovereignty is in four individuals. In the fifth session, it will be discovered that two of the four can command six-and-twenty votes each. Then two will have the command of the sovereign oligarchy. In the sixth session, there will be a sharp contention between the two which shall have the command of the fifty-two votes. Here will commence the squabble of Danton and Robespierre, of Julius and Pompey, of Anthony and Augustus, of the white rose and the red rose, of Jefferson and Adams, of Burr and Jefferson, of Clinton and Madison, or, if you will, of Napoleon and Alexander.

This, my dear sir, is the history of mankind, past, present, and to come.

And one more summary, a bit more concise, particularly for Bill Gerling, a consultant for Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, who sees no problem creating 'Social Studies Standards for Missouri' which are teaching our children that we are a Democracy, or a “constitutional democracy” or a 'democratical republic' rather than what we are, a Constitutional, Representative Republic; perhaps he'll find a few moments of concern and caution from another of Adam's letters,

Who, btw, can be reached at:

Bill Gerling

Social Studies Consultant\Assistant Director of Assessment
Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education

573-751-0398
800-845-3545
573-526-0812 Fax
Bill.Gerling@dese.mo.gov

"...No simple Form of Government, can possibly secure Men against the Violences of Power. Simple Monarchy will soon mould itself into Despotism, Aristocracy will soon commence an Oligarchy, and Democracy, will soon degenerate into an Anarchy, such an Anarchy that every Man will do what is right in his own Eyes, and no Mans life or Property or Reputation or Liberty will be secure and every one of these will soon mould itself into a system of subordination of all the moral Virtues, and Intellectual Abilities, all the Powers of Wealth, Beauty, Wit, and Science, to the wanton Pleasures, the capricious Will, and the execrable Cruelty of one or a very few."

And finally for some incredibly correct words on politics, rather than political correctness, this from John Adams' Discourses on Davila,, for those who are oh so very impressed with our 'knowledge' and technology,

"First follow nature; and your judgment frame
By her just standard, which is still the same."
Alexander Pope
The world grows more enlightened. Knowledge is more equally diffused. Newspapers, magazines, and circulating libraries have made mankind wiser. Titles and distinctions, ranks and orders, parade and ceremony, are all going out of fashion. This is roundly and frequently asserted in the streets, and sometimes on theatres of higher rank.* Some truth there is in it; and if the opportunity were temperately improved, to the reformation of abuses, the rectification of errors, and the dissipation of pernicious prejudices, a great advantage it might be. But, on the other hand, false inferences may be drawn from it, which may make mankind wish for the age of dragons, giants, and fairies. If all decorum, discipline, and subordination are to be destroyed, and universal Pyrrhonism, anarchy, and insecurity of property are to be introduced, nations will soon wish their books in ashes, seek for darkness and ignorance, superstition and fanaticism, as blessings, and follow the standard of the first mad despot, who, with the enthusiasm of another Mahomet,† will endeavor to obtain them.

Are riches, honors, and beauty going out of fashion? Is not the rage for them, on the contrary, increased faster than improvement in knowledge? As long as either of these are in vogue, will there not be emulations and rivalries? Does not the increase of knowledge in any man increase his emulation; and the diffusion of knowledge among men multiply rivalries? Has the progress of science, arts, and letters yet discovered that there are no passions in human nature? no ambition, avarice, or desire of fame? Are these passions cooled, diminished, or extinguished? Is the rage for admiration less ardent in men or women? Have these propensities less a tendency to divisions, controversies, seditions, mutinies, and civil wars than formerly? On the contrary, the more knowledge is diffused, the more the passions are extended, and the more furious they grow. Had Cicero less vanity, or Cæsar less ambition, for their vast erudition? Had the King of Prussia less of one than the other? There is no connection in the mind between science and passion, by which the former can extinguish or diminish the latter. It, on the contrary, sometimes increases them, by giving them exercise. Were the passions of the Romans less vivid in the age of Pompey than in the time of Mummius. Are those of the Britons more moderate at this hour than in the reigns of the Tudors? Are the passions of monks the weaker for all their learning? Are not jealousy, envy, hatred, malice, and revenge, as well as emulation and ambition, as rancorous in the cells of Carmelites as in the courts of princes? Go to the Royal Society of London. Is there less emulation for the chair of Sir Isaac Newton than there was, and commonly will be, for all elective presidencies? Is there less animosity and rancor, arising from mutual emulations in that region of science, than there is among the most ignorant of mankind? Go to Paris. How do you find the men of letters? united, friendly, harmonious, meek, humble, modest, charitable? prompt to mutual forbearance? unassuming? ready to acknowledge superior merit? zealous to encourage the first symptoms of genius? Ask Voltaire and Rousseau, Marmontel and De Mably.

The increase and dissemination of knowledge, instead of rendering unnecessary the checks of emulation and the balances of rivalry in the orders of society and constitution of government, augment the necessity of both. It becomes the more indispensable that every man should know his place, and be made to keep it. Bad men increase in knowledge as fast as good men; and science, arts, taste, sense, and letters, are employed for the purposes of injustice and tyranny, as well as those of law and liberty; for corruption, as well as for virtue.

Frenchmen! Act and think like yourselves! confessing human nature, be magnanimous and wise. Acknowledging and boasting yourselves to be men, avow the feelings of men. The affectation of being exempted from passions is inhuman. The grave pretension to such singularity is solemn hypocrisy. Both are unworthy of your frank and generous natures. Consider that government is intended to set bounds to passions which nature has not limited; and to assist reason, conscience, justice, and truth, in controlling interests, which, without it, would be as unjust as uncontrollable.*
Americans! Rejoice, that from experience you have learned wisdom; and instead of whimsical and fantastical projects, you have adopted a promising essay towards a well-ordered government. Instead of following any foreign example, to return to the legislation of confusion, contemplate the means of restoring decency, honesty, and order in society, by preserving and completing, if any thing should be found necessary to complete the balance of your government. In a well-balanced government, reason, conscience, truth, and virtue, must be respected by all parties, and exerted for the public good.* Advert to the principles on which you commenced that glorious self-defence, which, if you behave with steadiness and consistency, may ultimately loosen the chains of all mankind. If you will take the trouble to read over the memorable proceedings of the town of Boston, on the twenty-eighth day of October, 1772, when the Committee of Correspondence of twenty-one persons was appointed to state the rights of the colonists as men, as Christians, and as subjects, and to publish them to the world, with the infringements and violations of them,† you will find the great principles of civil and religious liberty for which you have contended so successfully, and which the world is contending for after your example. I could transcribe with pleasure the whole of this immortal pamphlet, which is a real picture of the sun of liberty rising on the human race; but shall select only a few words more directly to the present purpose.

“The first fundamental, positive law of all commonwealths or states is the establishment of the legislative power.” Page 9.
“It is absolutely necessary in a mixed government like that of this province, that a due proportion or balance of power should be established among the several branches of the legislative. Our ancestors received from King William and Queen Mary a charter, by which it was understood by both parties in the contract, that such a proportion or balance was fixed; and, therefore, every thing which renders any one branch of the legislative more independent of the other two than it was originally designed, is an alteration of the constitution.”

Americans! in your Congress at Philadelphia, on Friday, the fourteenth day of October, 1774, you laid down the fundamental principles for which you were about to contend, and from which it is to be hoped you will never depart. For asserting and vindicating your rights and liberties, you declared, “That, by the immutable laws of nature, the principles of the English constitution and your several charters or compacts, you were entitled to life, liberty, and property; that your ancestors were entitled to all the rights, liberties, and immunities of free and natural born subjects in England; that you, their descendants, were entitled to the exercise and enjoyment of all such of them as your local and other circumstances enabled you to exercise and enjoy. That the foundation of English liberty and of all free governments, is a right in the people to participate in their legislative council. That you were entitled to the common law of England, and more especially to the great and inestimable privilege of being tried by your peers of the vicinage, according to the course of that law. That it is indispensably necessary to good government, and rendered essential by the English constitution, that the constituent branches of the legislature be independent of each other.”* These among others you then claimed, demanded, and insisted on, as your indubitable rights and liberties. These are the principles on which you first united and associated, and if you steadily and consistently maintain them, they will not only secure freedom and happiness to yourselves and your posterity, but your example will be imitated by all Europe, and in time, perhaps, by all mankind. The nations are in travail, and great events must have birth.

But... I'm sure that's all just 'old' stuff, outdated, and not relevant to our world today, right? I mean, obviously, having an iPod in your pocket is tantamount to the evolving of an entirely new species... right? Hey, do you suppose that means that new predators have evolved as well?

No need to worry though, really, there's nothing new under the sun, and so whatever the case, I'm sure that the old predators will suffice; and also true is that what was rare then, remains rare still, the race ultimately goes to those who seek after not what is new, but what is true.

Which are you? Where do you stand? Not fully clear on the question? Look at it this way, will you have the courage to live your own life? Or does allowing others to make your decisions for you, replacing the active part of you, within your own life, sound not all that bad? Does being a zombie sound just fine to you?

Really?

Do you really think that you can get by without making a choice?

The After Party #3 – Occupy your own world the old fashioned way – by living in it!

2011-11-20T21:58:00.002-06:00

Thanks to everyone who came out last Thursday evening for the third St. Louis Tea Party, After Party.

We had an easy 100+ people turn out, this time at The Sky Music Lounge. In addition to STLTP regulars Bill Hennessy, Dana Loesch, Michelle Moore, Adam Sharp, Jen E., Brian Bollmann, Darin M, Adam Bohn, we also had Frieda Keogh on hand to give a brief talk on the MOPP project, Missouri Precinct Project, which is working to mop up politics in Missouri, in general by, Signing up more voters Increasing voter turn out Educating people on their local government issues for – city, fire dist, school board, etc , and more specifically by rebuilding the GOP from the ground up, replacing political machinists with constitutionally minded conservatives. Through your efforts in the Precinct project, we can begin making our presence felt at the smallest division of local government, the Precinct captain. Most of these positions are unfilled, but they play an important part in deciding who is appointed for local, state and even federal offices… fill them with constitutional conservatives. Take a look at MOPP, and if you aren’t in Missouri, there are links that can help you with finding, or starting your own precinct project in your area... and you do want to do that, because I'm betting that your area doesn't look much different than our area, at least in this aspect: "Did you know in the 2010 election, which was supposed to be an important election, 1.8 million Missourians voted out of a total registered voting population of 4.1 million, or 44%. Don’t you think we can do better than that. We don’t know the percentage of registered voters that are Republicans but without a doubt we should be able to increase voter turnout by 10-15% from conservative voters that support conservative principals. One of the other goals of MOPP is to have conservative individuals running for Committemen and women in their respective Townships across the state. These are the individuals that form the party structure that determines the candidates for local and statewide offices. It is imperative that all of these positions are filled with constitutional conservatives to start turning our country back to a Jeffersonian Republic."
		Michelle Moore MC'ing
		Frieda Keogh MOPP'ing up

		The After Party after party munchies with Me, Rick T., Shadowy Burns, Bill Hennessy, Chris Loesch, Dana Loesch & Adam Bohn

Why Bother?
Look at the news, we’ve got anarchists, communists & thugs occupying parks and city centers around the nation.

Why? Because they’re idiots. Figuratively speaking.

They believe in central planning, using the force of government to force your compliance with their desires. The effect of that, is the exact opposite of the Free Market, instead of enabling millions of individuals to live their own lives, make their own decisions, produce their own wealth and take advantage of the productive decisions taken by every other person who is personally involved in their lives and businesses... they instead insist that the decisions of a select, bureaucratic few, be followed by all, effectively removing the intelligence of millions of individuals from the market, and forcing them all to live on the little wealth that can be produced by the distant and disconnected decisions of a few bureaucrats.

Like I said. Idiots.

Are you really going to let idiots occupy your world? Your neighborhood? Your life?

What is the ultimate message of the Tea Party and of MOPP?

Occupy your world. You can do that by occupying the political system which controls the world. Do that by occupying the means by which your neighborhood is represented within it, by meeting and involving your neighbors in your own neighborhood. Do that, so that you can again occupy your own life.

Isn't it worth it?

Trick or Treat doesn’t end with Halloween - It's the Stupidity Stupid pt.2

2011-11-13T20:55:00.005-06:00

I did a post not long ago about Robert B. Reich's advice to President Obama on putting together a Jobs Bill, which I'm continuing here, and later this week....why bother? I mean, Robert B. Reich...? Really? Why bother with what he says? Why does it matter what someone who no longer matters says or thinks? Well, along with the eye you should keep out for the upcoming super-committee budget meltdown later this week, again, you should keep another eye looking behind you towards Halloween and its Tricks & Treats. With that spooky night still fairly fresh in mind, I'll offer up an old treat by Niall Ferguson, historian & economist, who partly exposes the trick in his "History lesson for economists in thrall to Keynes", quipping off of Lord Keynes’s quip,

"It was Keynes who noted that “even the most practical man of affairs is usually in the thrall of the ideas of some long-dead economist”. Today the long-dead economist is Keynes, and it is professors of economics, not practical men, who are in thrall to his ideas."

But IMHO Ferguson only got that partly right, because the problem is that washed up economists like Reich, who are in thrall to long dead economists like Keynes, still have the ear of those many impractical men who are very much alive and holding the reins of power - see Obama's Jobs Bill and the budget super committee debacle at the end of this week - not only in America, but around the world; and the problem is that through them, the wealth & futures of practical men are being held in thrall, to the haunted cemeteries of these men’s minds.

And I for one am afraid of those ghosts.

Why? Because they are real. The problem with long dead economists, is that living ones still listen to them... and politicians, who can't make sense of modern economics themselves (because it is non-sensical), listen to them... even when there is no reason to believe that they were ever right, or ever cared about what would work... in the long run. That merry quipster Keynes had another quip for those sensible people who pointed out to Keynes himself that in the long run, his policies would exhaust the system, completely disintegrate and collapse the economy and that in the end his system, like a ponzi scheme, wouldn't work; he simply shrugged and said,

"In the end, we're all dead".

See what I mean? We're near the end, and he's dead... where does that leave you and me? Thinking which is that dis-integrated, which is so focused upon the here and now, tends to lead you into the sorts of dark times that are gathering around us now... meanwhile, those who led us to these ends are dead and gone. That's some scary stuff, and I for one am very much afraid of those ghosts, because that is what Keynesianism is all about, and we are being haunted, robbed and beaten up by it to this day.

But even that isn't the most frightening part of this - the really scary part is that Keynes entire corpus of non-sense was exposed and disarmed long ago - Henry Hazlitt demolished Keynesianism 50 years ago in " The Failure of the 'New Economics'", and yet we are still being beaten up and robbed by an unarmed dead man's ghost.

Now that's some serious Trick or Treating.

How? What it comes down to, is that the proregressive left (and 'right'), and those who can gain power over you through them, don’t care all that much about real reality, they aren't interested in what is right and true, but only in gaining power and winning; they care about how they can spin you into thinking that their trick is actually a treat - and Keynesianism is the very ticket for doing just that - it has an impressive argument (not a good one, but, like Kant's, it's one that is boring and very long ,just the sort of thing that people would rather put it into practice so you can find out what's in it, rather than bothering with reading it first - which seems to go well with our Pelosi-like times), and, best of all, it promises something for nothing, which is a demagogues dream, an elitist mask for a populist's pretext.

You might even say that it's something to Occupy the.001% (who think that they're the 99%) with.

On top of that, Keynes doesn't makes the mistake of coming out and saying what Marx did, that his system could be summed up in a single sentence "the abolition of property rights", Keynes only slyly implies and assumes it, without ever coming out and saying so directly, so Keynesianism can be used to accomplish the very same ends - the abolition of property rights - without having to use all those old scary words and names. Very ghost-like. And it is the perfect mask, that of a long dead economist, and a Lord no less, over that of an even longer dead economist, and one which gives the envious mob the blessings of the elites to take whatever they will, and feel justified in doing so.

Trick or Treat!

The Demons of Demand Don't Haunt Alone
But Keynes isn't the only ghost treating us with his tricks of course, there's Dewey & Rousseau, and of course Marx & Hegel & Kant... and Descartes too, the gangs all here, but Keynes is the one whose preachings, concocted from their ingreedients, makes their practical magic possible. It is his tricks that have succeeded so admirably in producing the money from our wallets to fund their schemes with, so that everyone willingly keeps up his pretenses.

Keynesianism doesn't make sense, it is important to realize that it doesn't actually work, but it can, with some distracting waving of the magicians arms, be made to appear to work and most people who do try and look closer at its workings simply assume that it is working and that it must be they who are missing something in understanding it. In fact it's Keynesianism that is missing something - a respectful grip on reality - but that is its trick, that it doesn't make sense, but people will assume that it does, so as not to appear to be unable to understand it - no one wants to say that the emperor has no clothes, and so everyone goes along with the trick.

We are being defeated by a whole lot of nothing. A ghost as a machine.

The American people's problem has been in recognizing that when these guys play trick or treat, they aren't playing games - in truth, most of those playing don't realize that they are, they mean well, and so assume things will turn out well, somehow, but the ruin they cause is real. The Wackademics, the Economists, the Politicians - look closely at their masks... they aren't masks... they don't come off... and though they don't mean to be, in practice their actions are those of spiritual vampires, economic ghosts and political Frankenstein monsters; everything they've been telling us about Political Correctness, managing the economy, and regulated rights. has been what has tricked us, themselves included, into playing along, on and on.

Most people spread Political Correctness because they think they are giving a tolerant benefit of the doubt to those who need a break, when in fact they are spreading falsehoods and enabling lies, and their good intentions sap our spirit. They push financial chicanery and sleight of hand because they really think their complexity can produce causes from effects, but their effects are produced through artificial demands and they produce only the destruction of wealth. Politicians push regulations thinking that they are aiding the little guy, when in fact they succeed only in centralizing power far away from the individual, empowering the most corrupt of corporations and decitful of politicians, over them.

Our perceptions are inflated by vast amounts of nothingness, and we mistake size for substance, keeping us blowing up one bubble after another, distracting ourselves with their continually popping about our heads.

There's a lot of talk and disagreement about what bubbles are, and even whether or not they are, but what bubbles are is more about what they are not: reality. Bubbles form when the information which people have and are making decisions based upon, doesn't reflect the reality that really exists beneath them. When real estate prices are soaring, based upon the idea that large numbers of people, have the actual wealth or a reasonable expectation of acquiring it, want to live in a particular area, then the market forces of supply & demand causes those real estate prices to soar.

But when it's discovered that most of those people couldn't really afford the property they were buying - they hadn't produced the wealth or had a reasonable expectation of producing it - that their debts could not be repaid because they could not produce the wealth to pay for what they'd consumed ... then the sharp end of reality pricks that bubble and as it pops, everyone who'd been floating up and along in it, falls to the ground... or at the very least they fall onto the next bubble rising on up beneath them.

The baseless real estate prices... fall upon the empty securities... which fall upon the unfunded pensions... which fall upon the extended loans which cannot be repaid... and the currencies which are discovered to have no wealth to prop them up... which fall upon the creditor nations who based their own credit upon the credit of those they loaned to....

*POP*

But know this - the encampments of Occupy Wall Street, are the very embodiement of their ideals, it is political correctness in practice, it is keynesianism in toto, it is the ideals of modern philosophy that have been 'educated' into the OWS'rs heads, on full display right before our eyes, is what those ideals mean in practice. This is also one of those rare instances when those who brought such a fearful diaplay about, will openly and admiringly admit it - see the press, see the professors, see the economists, see the politicians; they all look and praise what they are seeing with the Occupiers - will you look and see the refuse, the filth, the lice, the disease, the drug addiciton and overdoses, the theft, the violence, the arson, the rapes, the murders - will you have enough respect for the truth to see that those are the ends which the modernist monsters means will mean for everyone's lives?

Trick or Treat! Will you look? Will you call them on it? Probably not. Why? Because they say they don't mean for that to happen, right? they don't intend such bad things, only good, and so we continue on in your ever deepening indebtedness - you can thank Kant for that.

What those bad debts really are, is misinformation, a confusion between what some people wished was true, and what really was true. Many Cassandras have tried warning us of this for years, here is one from Nelson Hultberg in "Apocalypse This Way Comes", from back in 2003,

"But this time around our malaise is not caused by Fed engineered high interest rates. It is far deeper and more systemic. It stems from the great Keynesian theoretical flaw that will always manifest in the long run: central bank credit expansion leads to "debt saturation" and "malinvestment," which reverses the boom that the credit expansion was meant to perpetuate, but does not do so until the latter stages of the Kondratieff cycle."

Sadly for us, reality doesn't pull it's punches, and our society, indeed the world, is saturated with just this sort of Debt, and the debt collector is a coming. Hultberg goes on in one of the cheerier passages (really, don't read the article if your sanity is hanging by a thread... Boo!),

""Something ugly this way comes," writes brash and brainy Jim Willie in his Ass-Backwards Economics series. But the bovines in our establishment pasture are not cerebrally independent enough to grasp the horrific financial collapse of which he speaks. Lacking the contrarian attitude necessary to see truth coming down the pike, they drone out Pollyannish bunkum about the economy that pacifies the herd and reinforces the dogma to which they subscribe. What they should be stocking up for, however, is the devastating "mother of all bear markets" that is now beginning its attack upon our lives in the manner that bubonic plague begins its contagion by first striking isolated victims, then later explosively metastasizing throughout the whole of society with pervasive death and ruin."

The one thing they never tell us about all of the 'bubbles' we've had popping about us, is that they aren't confined to economics; while we have had plenty of real estate bubbles, and stock market bubbles, they are only the visible edge of the larger larger philosohical and educational bubble starting to be felt in the College bubble. What? You haven't heard about that one yet? Why? Where do they come from? A hint can be found in that all of the bubbles begin by promising to give us what we want, without our having to work for it.

Here, look closer, see if you can see the strings behind three of the biggest bubble blowers:

Public Education was ostensibly mandated to produce an educated populace for free, but it has nearly succeeded in removing even an understanding of what being educated means.
The FED was ostensibly established to do away with depressions, recessions and economic bubbles by letting experts handle things... but the reality is that we've had more of each since its establishment, than we ever experienced before it.
Regulatory Agencies were ostensibly created to help the little guy, but no one is so oppressed by them as the individual.

Whatever their original intentions might have been, and good intentions no doubt they were, they have in fact served as a trio of virtual bubble blowing machines, they inflate us with information that has less and less relation to reality, puffing us up ever higher and larger, until eventually one of their bubbles pop, distracting us from the next one in line. But what we miss with all the lesser bubbles, is that there is one massive great pumpkin of a bubble which we've all been standing upon, one that has made all the others possible, and its motto is that you can 'have your cake and eat it too', but we are all far too distracted by all the little ones floating & popping around our heads to take much notice, ar even really care... because, be honest, the cake tasts good... and while you know you don't still have it... everyone else is pretending right along with you, so what's the problem, right? You might get found out in the end, but... in the end... we'll all be dead, right?

Keynesianism is the leading edge of that bigger bubble... but it isn't the bubble itself, that belongs to Mssr's Descartes, Rousseau, Hume & Kant, but he is the leading method for implementing their emptiness and for blowing up all the other little bubbles with it.

But rest assured, at some point we are going to realize that there are no smaller bubbles left, and we'll all look down, and then, like Wylie E. Coyote, we'll look back at the camera, gulp, wave, and then 'Foop!' shoot down out of the screen towards the canyon bottom far below, dissappearing in a little puff of dust.

That real philosophical bubble, which has expanded to puff up very nearly the entire world, probably won't be acknowledged or recoginzed in our time, in time; nope, more likely it'll take historians looking back and remarking on how terribly wrong the rhyme was that ended with 'Words can never hurt you. "

Trick or Treat indeed.

Why am I being so cheery today?

Well, there have been several things which have occured recently, which lead me to think I may find myself with the horrid pleasure of saying "I told you so". Indicators such as this recent tid-bit from a governor of the Bank of England saying "OMG!"

"World facing worst financial crisis in history, Bank of England Governor says: The world is facing the worst financial crisis since at least the 1930s “if not ever”, the Governor of the Bank of England said last night."

And... also some indications that the last financial bubble standing, China, is getting scarily close to popping - oh yeah, it is. But before looking at the latest, lets look at a couple years ago, when a couple Keynseian's were happily expressing their views just before and after Obama’s 2008 election. Here one leftist economist is speaking glowingly of China's Keynesian policies,

"… a U.S. stimulus of the same size as the Chinese … would amount to $2.2 trillion. That's the kind of rocket-powered stimulus we need! … Obama's team is already ready to roll with similar plans."

And this one from just after Obama's election denouncing those who were foolish enough to oppose his plans,

"The Republicans want to put the brakes on, and just fall back on cutting taxes, and hoping that lower taxes is going to inspire big business …Many Americans, like me, just don't buy it… If big business cared about the people of the United States they would invest in the US and not ship jobs off to exploited workers in countries with low…."

Blah, blah, blah. That was two years ago. And last week. And tomorrow too, no doubt. But the fact is that their Treat is their Trick. Stimulous. Printing... digitizing money, spending, regulating, encouraging demand... Keynesianism... the offering up of a trick as a treat... with a bigger, nastier trick waiting in the wings to close out the show with. In the end. Hopefully, after you've left.

Not sure what I mean? China is the new economic super power, isn't it? Everyone from Glen Beck to Paul Krugman, and even Niall Ferguson, have been trumpeting how the Chinese are preparing to eat the West's lunch. While that's true, in a sense, what they aren't expecting, or rather what they have been expecting but will soon see is nowhere to be seen, is that the West will produce the coins to pay the bill and tip the waitress.

Come on... one more time... say it with me... Trick or Treat! From bad to worse, let's peek under the dragon's mask... first from Stratfor, the well respected global observer,

"One of the solutions the Chinese have tried to follow is urbanization: the idea that if they build it, people will come and if people move to the cities they will suddenly have jobs and in having jobs in the cities and living in a city, they’re going to become consumers. And certainly this is not for the entire billion of the population that’s not active, but maybe another hundred million, 200 million, 300 million. And that would help to better distribute wealth throughout China; it would also ease China off from their heavy dependence upon exports.

This boom in urbanization coincided with this government need to spend a lot more on domestic investment. It also fell right inside of what was already building as a speculative bubble in real estate investment. ...

So we have a China that’s facing a real estate bubble in an attempt to build a new urbanized society, but the individuals who would be moving into that urbanized society can’t afford to move in because of the price rise in housing. The government is trying to find ways to slow down that rise in price, but if they move too quickly it can undermine the collateral for the loans from state-owned enterprises, it can pull away the nest egg from their middle class and that can cause a very rapid backlash against the central government.

For China then, what this European crisis has done is it has brought something that they’ve known for a long time right up into the front. They no longer have the ability, it seems, to simply keep pushing back economic change and perhaps even not the ability push back political change in the country because the European crisis has ended their ability to count on this continuous rise in exports."

And then moving from Stratfor's cool detachment, to a more human reaction, here, from last week, have a closer look,

But what happens when the China bubble bursts? When it goes bang it will be worse than the US credit crisis and far worse than the EU sovereign debt crisis. For when China goes under the entire economy of the planet will sink into oblivion with it.

The only question remaining once China falls is when the bottom will be reached.

The day China's bubble bursts may be a lot closer than many think…at least The Daily Bell's market analysts think so, and they make a frighteningly good case.

For the past decade China has been riding the wave of the West's reckless spending and debt cycle. Becoming the biggest exporter in the world next to America (that's right, America—the US is still number one despite what you may have heard), China has pinned its currency, its hopes and its future on trade with the West.

And though Western economists, even some of the best, such as Fergusson, think that China has the advantage... who are you gonna believe, them or the Chinese? You see, we've been passing our IO‭U's to China... and China is beginning to realize that there is nothing behind them, the rich people in China are beginning to examine those IOU's, and they're beginning to realize that the reality they promise, just doesn't exist - IOW, they're false, unfounded financial information - bad debt. Forbes notes:

"China’s rich, primarily driven by a sense of insecurity, are taking money out of their country. Many are actually preparing to move elsewhere.

According to a new study, almost 60% of China’s “high net worth individuals,” defined as those possessing more than 10 million yuan in investable assets, are either considering emigration through investment programs or are completing the emigration process. The survey, conducted by China Merchants Bank and Bain & Co., also reports that 27% of those with more than 100 million yuan in investable assets have already emigrated and 47% of them are thinking about leaving the Motherland.

The stunning results correspond to reports that the U.S. Treasury unit monitoring illegal money flows has, since the beginning of last summer, detected a surge in hidden cash transfers out of China.."

What is the trick that these guys have all been treating us with? The answer is in the cards, which we'll start flipping over in the next posts, but what you should simply ask yourself, is does the free market work? Does communism fail? If you answer yes, then you've got to ask yourself, do you think that there is a reason beyond their names? Hopefully your answer is Yes again.

But if you answered no to the free market... then... ask yourself, what it is that happens when you forbid people from doing what they wish to do?

It makes no difference whether you are talking about forbidden ideas, intoxicants or economic practices, when people are forbidden from living their own lives as they'd like to out in the open, then you might have noticed that they begin doing so in the shadows, hidden from view, telling likely stories to mask the truth... can you guess what those allibi stories create when they are spun, told and followed?

That is precisely where bubbles come from.

The Free Market works for a reason, and Communism fails for a reason, and that reason is that it violates what the Free Market upholds - the right of the individual to live their own lives. Violate that, and sooner or later, your system will come crashing down... and ladies and gents, it is later... right now.

To be continued.

Occupying the Slippery Slope - Mayor Slay's Sleighride down into OWS

2011-11-07T12:55:00.001-06:00

Occupy your own life or THEY will Occupy your life for you
Who's they? That's a very good question, and one you really need to begin asking, because 'They' is made up of a lot of people, from a lot of walks of life - 'They' are anybody with enough friends who don't mind breaking the law 'for the people!', 'They' are anybody who has been filled with so much false self esteem that they think they know better than you do, how you should live your own life.

But don't make the mistake of thinking that 'They' are only the unkempt vagrants stinking up your public places, 'They' are all of those who are willing to use the persuasion of power to get what they want, including those who are actually in power, and are sympathetic to 'the cause' which they themselves see as 'progress', but who still feel restrained by the law and your respect for it, from openly violating the laws they were elected to uphold.

Mayor Slay's Sleighride down the slippery slope
Here in St. Louis, after enough people from the actual people, the actual 99% who don't like unwashed activists occupying their public places, complained about their doing so, and doing so on the people's electricity bill, Mayor Slay offered up a feeble response on his blog:

"The participants in the nation’s Occupy movements, including those in St. Louis, are saying some important things about the direction of the country. I support their right to say them."

I certainly support their right to say what they want to say also, but that isn't the issue, and the Mayor should know it. They can say all they want, what is at issue here is where they stay and what they do, while staying and saying it. Occupiers are substituting 'free camping' for 'free speech', without a shred of legitimacy to support their actions, they are simply occupying the law at the expense of the rule of law.
Anybody see the teensiest possiblity that "The Law" and "Equal protection under the Law" might suffer if such practices have a blind eye turned to them?
Mayor Slay doesn't see it that way:

"I emphatically disagree with those who say that allowing the encampment to remain during those national events showed St. Louis in a bad light. Instead, I think it showed us to be a reasonable and compassionate place to live and work. Moving the Occupy residents simply to deny them a chance to tell their story to a large audience would have been wrong-headed and wrong-hearted."

Who is buying this load of manure? No one wanted to deny them the 'chance to tell their story', they simply expected an unsightly and unlawful menace to be dealt with. Is it really now considered to be reasonable and compassionate to let thugs take over your public parks? Thugs whose stated goal is the overthrow of your government? Not only is that not unreasonable, but, if your government is based upon the rule of law, what can it possibly mean to allow a mob to violate your laws, other than actually aiding them in overthrowing your government?!

Good lord, wake up people, Halloween is over!

The Mayor goes on,

"From the first week they arrived in Kiener Plaza, I have reminded the people who have gathered there to obey the law or accept the consequences – citations, arrest – of not doing so. That is the basic formula for civil disobedience in this country."

Obey the law? That's the issue here Mr. Mayor, they aren't obeying the law right now! But maybe what the Mayor means to say, is that he is going to pick and choose which laws he feels comfortable with allowing them to violate, and in doing so, ladies and gentleman, he is announcing his particiapation in the occupation of St. Louis. Mayor Slay is effectively using the Occupy Wall Street to enable him to Occupy the Rule of Law, unceremoniously shoving equal justice for all out of the building.

He as much as admits this... and for those of you who never seem to be able to grasp the concept of the slippery slope, here it is:

"In the intervening weeks, some arrests have been made; but, for the most part, the City’s ordinances regarding encampments in parks have not been enforced.
(This is the kind of tolerance with which the City tries to handle minor matters about which no one complains and which do not threaten life or public safety. Food trucks operating outside the vending zones and the Gus’s Pretzel guy vending on Jamieson are other examples of that philosophy.) "

And there is the real meaning of 'toleration', when voiced by those in power, 'toleration' means enabling the passions of men to rule in place of the rule of law. If you've ever found yourself looking around for the proverbial slippery slope, there it is, and Mayor Slay is taking a sleigh ride down it.

he continues,

"But, we went a little further than just ignoring the Occupy encampment. The City offered a permit and, even wrote one, but Occupy’s occupiers declined it."

Allow me to translate:

'We offered to fudge appearances by offering a permit - but the occupiers chose to fully and blatantly thumb their nose at even making a pretence of respecting the law - and I, as your Mayor, decided that that was just fine with me. After all, hey, I'm only here to uphold and enforce the laws I choose to, for the benefit those we like, so... why pretend that it has any meaning anymore at all? Whatever.'

BTW, just a little bit off topic, but I'm not aware of the city offering, let alone writing permits for other groups to express their opinions for free, the Tea Party for instance. And, no, it would not have been ok in that case either.

Unhappily for the Mayor, the actual 99% who are disgusted by these hippie retreads, have been letting the Mayor's office know that they're starting to notice the smell of something rotten in Denmark,

"Over the past several days, there has been a rising tide of complaints. I know, and the Occupy participants know, that they cannot stay there forever. Bad weather and other programming for Kiener Plaza are racing each other to mark the end of their tenure.
The City’s Parks Department has prepared a list of ordinances and regulations which it believes Occupy is in current violation. We will present that list to Occupy.
I expect that we will reach an accommodation that allows Occupy to use Kiener Plaza, to exercise its First Amendment rights, but to follow City ordinances and regulations. "

Are you serious? The Mayor of St. Louis expects to 'reach an accommodation' with lawbreakers? Would he seek to reach an accomodation with drug gangs who decided to occupy the streets of their neighborhood? Why not? What, may I ask, in principle, is there left still standing to prevent them?

A more supliant and craven response they could not have hoped to receive from the government which you thought you had. And together with offering "We will present that list to Occupy.", the Mayor of St. Louis is legitimizing a lawless group of wannabe hippies and thugs, to pick and choose the laws they wish to ignore or obey, and give them standing from which they will deign to peruse the wishes of the government of the 100%, whose lands they are forcibly occupying, and by deigning to allow them to, he is gelding the law.

Here's a thought from a century ago, upon the actions of leaders a thousand years earlier. Hint to Mayor Slay - the Anglo Saxon kings dissappeared within a century after paying the Dane-geld.

Do any of you see anything that could possibly go wrong with that scenario?

Think you should be considered capable of driving home without making a political statement? Not if They think otherwise.

Think you'd like to listen to someone's point of view? Not if They think otherwise.

Think you'd prefer to make your own decisions? Not if They don't approve.

Think you'd go to your bank in peace? Not if They would rather use it as a toilet.

Think you'd like to get a burger? Not if They want theirs for free.

Think you'd like to... Not if They think you should't. And what's to stop them... the Law?!

Getting the picture here?

Do you really not see a problem when those in power tacitly authorize the breaking of the law, because they approve of what the law breakers are doing?

If not, then there's another angle you ought to look at this form - does the name Richard Millhouse Nixon ring any bells for you?

From 'A School History of England (1911)' by Rudyard Kipling:

Dane-geld - A.D. 980-1016

IT IS always a temptation to an armed and agile nation
To call upon a neighbour and to say: –
"We invaded you last night – we are quite prepared to fight,
Unless you pay us cash to go away."

And that is called asking for Dane-geld,
And the people who ask it explain
That you've only to pay 'em the Dane-geld
And then you'll get rid of the Dane!

It is always a temptation for a rich and lazy nation,
To puff and look important and to say: –
"Though we know we should defeat you,
we have not the time to meet you.
We will therefore pay you cash to go away."

And that is called paying the Dane-geld;
But we've proved it again and again,
That if once you have paid him the Dane-geld
You never get rid of the Dane.

It is wrong to put temptation in the path of any nation,
For fear they should succumb and go astray;
So when you are requested to pay up or be molested,
You will find it better policy to say: --

"We never pay any-one Dane-geld,
No matter how trifling the cost;
For the end of that game is oppression and shame,
And the nation that plays it is lost!"

You might want to ask yourself what would likely have happened, if the press, and the congress, were in sympathy with Nixon? Was Nixon run out of office because he broke the law... or because those who didn't agree with him found the law to be useful for running him out of town? There is a difference... do you see it?

Occupiers are any of those who feel that the law is preventing them from doing what needs to be done now!, and the call of the Occupiers can be heard coming from Wall Street, to City Hall, to the Whitehouse, and what they are all saying is We Can't Wait!
Hint to St. Louisans, and the nation as a whole - the Occupiers aren't new... they've been occupying your schools for a century... what is new is that they now feel that they've successfully occupied enough of the minds of your neighbors and kids, that they can now bring their troops out of hiding. The Dane-Geld has been paid.

This is a nation of ideas will you allow it to be occupied?

For Veterans Day - The Harder Right

2011-11-05T10:13:00.003-05:00

For Veterans Day, a clip that doesn't at first appear to have anything to do with Veterans or Veterans Day. It's the climactic scene of a movie that's really grown on me over the years, The Emperor's Club. In this, the point of not only an Education, but of a life well lived - or squandered - is conveyed in just a few moments.

The now aging Mr. Hundert, a Classics Professor, is found in the restroom after a debate competition, by his former student, Sedgewick Bell, who is now grown and launching a campaign for the Senate. Bell was a student he'd tried far more than he should have to help, and Hundert has realized that Sedgewick has yet again cheated in the "Mr. Julius Caesar" debate, which Mr. Hundert was moderating.

He lets his former student know that he knows he tried to cheat, again...

Mr. Hundert:"I'm a teacher Sedgwick, and I failed you. But I'll give you one last lecture, if I may. All of us, at some point, are forced to look at ourselves in the mirror, and see who we really are, and when that day comes for Sedgewick, you'll be confronted with a life lived without virtue, without principle - for that I pity you. End of lesson."

Sedgewick Bell:"What can I say Mr. Hundert? Who gives a shit. Honestly, who out there gives a shit about your principles and your virtues. I mean, look at you, what do you have to show for yourself? I live in the real world, where people do what they need to do to get what they want, and if that means lying, and cheating... then so be it.
So I am going to go out there, and I am going to win that election Mr. Hundert, and you will see me EVERYwhere! And I'll worry about my 'contribution' later.
(Sound of a toilet flushing, stall opens, Sedgewick's little boy comes out, stares at his dad in disgust)
Sedgewick Bell:"Robert? Robert...."
(Robert turns and leaves)
Sedgewick stares after him, stares down, glances at Mr. Hundert, and leaves.

What Mr. Hundert has, he has without need of power, position or wealth... what Cedric threw away, he can't replace through any amount of power, position or wealth.

The best things in life are free... but you've got to earn them, and sometimes fight for them; and some worthy few even choose to risk their lives for your chance to enjoy them.

Thank you to all those who chose the harder right, and especially the Veterans who agreed to risk their lives for it, if need be.

UPDATE - Pictures from the St. Louis Veterans Day Parade
Special thanks to Dana Loesh for inviting us to march with her crew in the parade, my daughter & I were honored to show our support.

Dana Loesh (in a strep throat burqa), Me, Patch Adams and Chris Loesch , ready to roll

... coming around the corner... (pic swiped from Patch Adams)

Parading past Soldiers Memorial

The best message of all!

Patch posted a video that should be an alarming shame in contrasts to all. For those who did turn out for the parade yesterday, thank you, your quality isn't questioned, but for the quantities of others who couldn't be bothered, shame on you.

The three gates to Occupy Wall Street: Lust , Anger and Greed

2011-10-30T22:16:00.002-05:00

Picture this scene. You're standing across the street from a bank. You hear some commotion, and suddenly as a Police car screech's up in front and the officers jump out with guns drawn, several robbers come running out the doors - the two groups see each other, and begin shouting and waving their guns at each other.
Got that image?

Ok, now, if you were asked to describe what you were seeing, if you were asked to describe those two groups, would your first comment be anything remotely similar to this?

"Well, there are a number of very striking similarities between these two groups, both of them are very much involved with hurriedly running around in groups and yelling and waving their arms around in regards to financial matters, and that both are understandably concerned with correcting perceived wrongs."

What would you think of a reporter, if that was how they described these two groups activities outside of the bank? If you challenged them by saying,

"Wait... wait...wait... one of these groups is trying to take what belongs in the bank, and the other one is trying to the prevent the theft of another's property! One of these groups is deliberately using violence to get their way - there are HUGE differences between these two groups! How can you possibly compare them?!"

, and their response to you was that you should get past your ideological differences that you have with one of the groups, and pay more attention to their obvious similarities, and then continued to cite the fact that both groups made noise and waved their arms around about financial matters as being the most relevant characteristics with which to describe cops and robbers to everyone else listening.

What would you think of those reporters and politicians then?

Is that any different from how the press - and President Obama, - are currently relating the nature of the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) and Tea Party protesters?:

"On Tuesday, Obama said he understood "the frustrations being expressed in those protests," on Wall Street, noting that "in some ways, they're not that different from some of the protests that we saw coming from the Tea Party.""

Now I know the media is having a problem with analogies lately, so let me clarify, I am not comparing the two groups here, OWS and Tea Party, to bank robbers and policemen (that would be too rude a thing to do to bank robbers), but I am comparing that hypothetical person's reporting of the scene, with how the Press and media people are actually discussing, reporting and comparing the OWS & Tea Party movements.

Remember, the Freedom of the Press was specifically protected under our Constitution - because it was originally understood that the Press would not only concern itself with reporting to We The People on the objectives and relevant facts which are important to our lives and the state of the nation, but that they would also have a responsibility to question the statements of politicians and anyone else aspiring to political power, and yet it has, for the most part, analyzed these two groups... one, the

Tea Party, which has been nothing but peaceful over the course of a few years time

, and the other,

OWS, which has been violent and law breaking since their very first week

, and declared them to be similar, based upon something so insignificant and non-essential, as the fact that they are both protesting the state of the economy and their dissatisfaction with Politicians and (some) corporate behavior.

Aren't there a few other questions and issues that should be getting raised here?

Such as... oh I don't know, something like WHAT ARE THEY PROTESTING FOR?!?!?!?! Aren't the purposes and aims of the two groups of more relevance than the incidental fact that both came together in large numbers to wave signs and protest? There are at least a few contrasts that should be compared, aren't there? Such as the fact that, while the Tea Party was roused, in part, by the economy, and the greed of some of those involved, that it is not whythey've been protesting,

The Tea Party has been protesting for the need to restore the position of the Constitution to the American form of government - to reestablish the Rule of Law instead of the whims of impassioned men OWS is about tearing the entire government and system down, in order to satisfy the desires of impassioned men.
The Tea Party is marked by orderly protests OWS is disorder incarnate.
The Tea Party is about restoring the law OWS is founded on and through, violating the law by taking over occupying, and refusing to leave, public and private areas.
The Tea Party is protesting for Govt to return to its proper place and allow people the liberty to live their own lives OWS is entirely oriented around demanding favoritism and govt intrusion into peoples lives.

And the press - and President Obama - say there are many striking similarities because they are both protesting? How is that possible?

If you think this is just my bias, that I'm over-reacting, if you see OWS as simply a case of youth expressing high minded ideals, perhaps you should consider the comments made from a vantage point of an ocean away.

The UK's Daily Mail has been following the occupation closely, and says:

That the U.S. 'Occupy Wall Street' demonstrations are a protest movement is a false narrative played out by the press. To equate them to the Tea Party is a moral relativism that stands logic on its head. This is a mob and the goal is mob rule.

And yet our press and President, say they are similar. How can they possibly describe the flea-baggers (yuk-yuk!) as high-minded idealists?

Or maybe a better question might be why would they describe them in this way, and make the unwarranted comparisons that they do?

The Epitome of Greed
Here's a clue towards the answer; I nearly let out a whoop when Big Journalism’s Dana Loesch was commenting on the Republican debates on CNN last Tuesday night; after she noted that,

"Any movement that argues for a living wage regardless of whether you work or not is the epitome of greed."

I did a quick fist pump as I watched that the next morning (TIVO, gotta love it), accomplishing what my coffee was having a hard time with up to that point - waking me up. She was exactly right of course, the fevered desire for what you have not earned, the desire to possess, enjoy and revel in what you may or may not have any rightful claim to, simply because you want it, and wanting ever more of it is Greed. But that isn't what really woke me up, you see, the really interesting part was what came after Dana's comment.

I was looking forward to how the leftists on the panel would respond, or react, to that, because it's so blatantly true, I wondered would they try to minimize it? or deny it? or try to dismiss it?

Nope. They completely surprised me.

The camera immediately cut to Democrat operative Donna Brazille... who proceeded to have absolutely nothing to say about Dana's statement at all, not even in denial of it; instead, she spoke as if Dana had said nothing at all - it was of no concern to her - whatsoever.

That planted a question in my head that plagued me for the rest of the day.

What about greed?... or any other vice for that matter, what about that? Why is it that vice - which is practically on a storefront, plate glass window-shopping level of display in every photo or video of OWS - why is it of absolutely zero concern to nearly everyone? Media and protesters alike? And please, don't try telling me that Greed is of concern to them, that that is what Occupy Wall Street is all about, that 'greed is the whole purpose of what they are protesting about' - B. Friggin' S.!

It's a pretext, an excuse, nothing more.

Well, that's not quite right, it is something more than that - but only because they still think that it means something to you - that much they still grasp (and fear). And because it does still means something to most of you, it serves as a stone for them to hurl within your mind at their enemies.

But what does it mean to them? It is meaningless.
Maybe a definition is in order here:

Definition of 'Greed'
1. (n.) greed - excessive or rapacious desire, esp. for wealth or possessions; avarice; covetousness.

Etymology: (1600–10; back formation from greedy)

If Greed was actually a concern for any of these people, if they understood or cared about what it actually meant, and the harm it could inflict upon people, they would be watchful for any signs of it, and above all, in their own words, but in their own words, they have things like this to say,

Demand one... Another policy that must be instituted is raise the minimum wage to twenty dollars an hr.
Demand three: Guaranteed living wage income regardless of employment.
Demand four: Free college education.

, and so on. Now, if they were truly concerned about greed, they'd be on the lookout for it everywhere and I would think that they would, at the very least, call those demands before their public councils and give it at least a few 'Down Twnkles', wouldn't you? But the thought of Greed being in their midst, or of any of it's six deadly brothers and sisters tagging along with it, troubles their minds not at all.

Why not?

Back in the old days, as defined by the New York Times as being a time when people still cared about Right and Wrong and used Reason as a method for discovering what was True in order to improve your life, rather than simply as an effective weapon for defeating opponents in arguments, as the NYTimesian modernists claim; once upon a time it was common knowledge that there were a set of virtues and vices which sensible people attempted to either emulate or avoid, and it was common knowledge because it was taught in schools, taught in stories, taught in the media and even, for a time, even taught in the movies , and the appearance of unvirtuous behavior was vigorously shunned.

In case that fabled once upon a time was too long ago (or too far away in fly over country) for you to recall, the moral Virtues 'were':

courage, temperance, self-discipline, moderation, modesty, humility, generosity, friendliness, truthfulness, honesty and justice.

The moral vices included:

cowardice, self-indulgence, recklessness, wastefulness, greed, vanity, untruthfulness, dishonesty and injustice.

And those behaviors were cultivated, or denounced, because it was thought that habituating yourself to abiding by them made your life better for having done so.

Sanctimony aside, and without going into whether or not such an idyllic time ever really did, does or could, exist in this country, humor me a moment, put on your thinking cap and tell me which of these two sets of pictures do you see as being more strongly representative of the virtues, and which of the vices?

Why do you suppose that is?

On One Hand Or The Other - Reaching for the Apple or the Worm?
Those Cardinal Virtues, Temperance, Courage Justice and Prudence, and the Christian ones that followed, Hope, Faith and Charity, were considered to be the behaviors, which, if developed into habits - or ignored - would define your fate, "Character is Destiny!" sending you towards either the Light or towards the Dark Side.

There was a time (and IS a time, depending upon where you mark it) when manners were observed, peoples rights were respected, and 'Please and Thank you' were fighting words if not spoken, because the virtues, and the manners which follow from them, were taught, learned, respected, and expected, and in the world today, the people most likely to remember and reflect those ideals, will be found in conservative circles, which is what the Tea Party draws most of its people from, and so not surprisingly, for those who don't mind engaging in some thought, pictures from Tea Parties are going to tend to reflect those values.

On the other hand, there's a story going around today, that conservatives flinch more at writhing maggots, than leftists do.

Why would that be? Why do you think it might be? I haven't bothered to look too far into it, but if their press release is representative of their findings, they are laughably, and predictably, worthless:

"“The proper interpretation of the findings (in the current study) is not that biology causes politics or that politics causes biology,” the authors write, “but that certain political orientations at some unspecified point become housed in our biology, with meaningful political consequences.”

Acceptance of the role of involuntary physiological responses is not easy for many, however: “Most are proud of their political orientations, believe them to be rational responses to the world around them, and are reluctant to concede that subconscious predispositions play any role in shaping them,” they write."

Taking this at face value, that seems to me to be the confident proclamation of a smart idiot - someone with the bio-mechanical capability of being intelligent, but whose cultural and philosophical ignorance has rendered their judgments primitive baubles of ignorance.

This response which they are attempting to spin as biological in origin, Aristotle observed 2,500 years ago as being the type of unconscious, or 'habituated response' to be expected from a person who has habituated themselves towards virtuous practices,

"...men will be good or bad builders as a result of building well or badly. For if this were not so, there would have been no need of a teacher, but all men would have been born good or bad at their craft. This, then, is the case with the virtues also; by doing the acts that we do in our transactions with other men we become just or unjust, and by doing the acts that we do in the presence of danger, and being habituated to feel fear or confidence, we become brave or cowardly. The same is true of appetites and feelings of anger; some men become temperate and good-tempered, others self-indulgent and irascible, by behaving in one way or the other in the appropriate circumstances. Thus, in one word, states of character arise out of like activities. This is why the activities we exhibit must be of a certain kind; it is because the states of character correspond to the differences between these. It makes no small difference, then, whether we form habits of one kind or of another from our very youth; it makes a very great difference, or rather all the difference."

, and it is the entirely predictable (except to a modernist who sees only division between mind and body rather than unity), and normal response, to be expected from them.

"...We must take as a sign of states of character the pleasure or pain that ensues on acts; for the man who abstains from bodily pleasures and delights in this very fact is temperate, while the man who is annoyed at it is self-indulgent, and he who stands his ground against things that are terrible and delights in this or at least is not pained is brave, while the man who is pained is a coward. For moral excellence is concerned with pleasures and pains; it is on account of the pleasure that we do bad things, and on account of the pain that we abstain from noble ones. Hence we ought to have been brought up in a particular way from our very youth, as Plato says, so as both to delight in and to be pained by the things that we ought; for this is the right education...."

The absence of that outward response, the flinch, is the reflections of the absence of those virtues within, the absence of 'Right Education'.
Because Virtues presume an outlook, they are integrated, they extend through habits of virtue and courtesy, deep into your respect for what is Good and what is True, and into your appreciation of what is Beautiful. And when neglected, such as with bad manners, or on being lied to, or on being presented with an aesthetic assault (ugliness), you mentally and even physically, flinch.

Practicing those virtues consistently is not easy, and it is certainly not something that can be done unthinkingly, it takes the effort of focused thought followed by the physical effort of transforming your thoughts into actions, it requires a mindful adherence to Truth over emotion, Judgment over passion, logic over demagoguery, in order to come to those conclusions which were considered, in our Founding Fathers era, to be the very height of Liberal Thinking - those being the Free Market, living virtuous lives and seeking equal Justice for all - and not to be practiced in order to receive a reward but because it is right to behave that way; though of course there is a real reward for living in that way, as they well knew, you find that you are living a life worth living, one lived in pursuit of happiness.

But on the other (anti-Western civilization) hand... not practicing them leads you to sssuch a state of mental unfitness, that you could easily find yourself spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on expensive and detailed scientific studies, and yet come to entirely worthless conclusions, as with the intellectual flinch above. And that IS what it was, for just as conservatives flinch at ugliness, the leftist materialist flinches at the possibility of the Good, the Beautiful and the True... and that which habituates you towards respecting the same - Virtue.

Without it, you are lost in a rudderless, relativistic, nausea, as Sartes put it, and as OWS is demonstrating it in cities across our land, and around the world. The squallor of their encampments, is a demonstration of the leftist lack of possessing a flinch. It is ugly, but they don't seem to know it... why do you suppose that is? And that being the case, it's also not too surprising that what follows them is filth, open defecation, and rats and riots.

I suppose that if the old saw about cleanliness being next to Godliness is in any way true... it probably tells us more about what OWS truly is, than anything else I could say.

Let me try putting it this way, letting a few pictures tell a few thousand words: The person accustomed to expect

the imagery of the left,	... have very different reactions to this sort of imagery, whether it be visual such as this,	or the imagery of the right,
Whatever....		OMG!(Flinch)

Get the picture?

And the same goes with it's equivalent in manners, dress, music, politics, etc, etc, etc. and it usually comes with heaping helpings of stimulation, adrenaline rush, endorphins, etc, right? But seriously, which of the above do you associate with the politics of the left, and which with the politics of the right?

You know the answer.

Right?

The lure of the flinchless path, is that it appears to be easy, self satisfying, usually makes an outward show to startle, simply 'striking a pose' is enough to seem rebellious... even if you've no idea what you are rebelling against... at least it requires no effortful thought in order to come to the sorts of conclusions which follow from emotional reactions, rather than through substantiated and careful, principled reflection; the tugs of the bleeding heart and the 'fairness' of an issue require of the 'thinker' only that they follow the easiest and self satisfying path of reactions, without concern for probable or actual results.

Likewise, to let run your anger and outrage lead your actions in pursuit of those ends, is the simplest course of all - positions, rather than principles, action rather than reflection.

We can't wait! is one that fits in well with it's siren song.

Isn't their reaction against 'corporate greed!' a sort of a flinch? No, I don't think so, it is less a recoiling from disorder, ugliness and falsehood, and more a pricked desire, a self indulgent craving to have and to take, and a response at not being able to follow through with what they want to do - which is to take what they want. Aristotle again,

"Self-indulgence is more like a voluntary state than cowardice. For the former is actuated by pleasure, the latter by pain, of which the one is to be chosen and the other to be avoided; and pain upsets and destroys the nature of the person who feels it, while pleasure does nothing of the sort. Therefore self-indulgence is more voluntary. Hence also it is more a matter of reproach; for it is easier to become accustomed to its objects, since there are many things of this sort in life, and the process of habituation to them is free from danger, while with terrible objects the reverse is the case. But cowardice would seem to be voluntary in a different degree from its particular manifestations; for it is itself painless, but in these we are upset by pain, so that we even throw down our arms and disgrace ourselves in other ways; hence our acts are even thought to be done under compulsion. For the self-indulgent man, on the other hand, the particular acts are voluntary (for he does them with craving and desire), but the whole state is less so; for no one craves to be self-indulgent."

The Path to the Dark Side, was, is, Yoda might say, easy, more enticing. In the Founders era, not having the benefit of Yoda, they were taken with the Choice of Hercules, where he had to choose between the lure of sultry pleasure, and the sober modesty of fair Virtue.

But here I'll stray form the Western path, which usually calls heavily on Western classics, with Aristotle, Aquinas and the like, just to show that they were not alone in their understanding of the importance of Virtue, and there is a line from the Bhagahvad Gita which nails the issue quite well:

"Hercules is depicted with two women flanking him, who represent the opposite destinies which the life could reserve him: on the left the Virtue is calling him to the hardest path leading to glory through hardship, while the second, the Pleasure, the easier path, is enticing him to the vice."

"Hell has three gates: lust, anger, and greed"

Scroll back up to those pictures above, doesn't that look about right? Look again, but this time while keeping in mind what a fellow named Kesava Kasmiri had to say about these three gates,

"Lord Krishna has now ended descriptions of the basic details of the nature and characteristics of the demoniac. Now He strongly advises by any means to avoid the triple threat of lust, greed and anger which is the underlying root cause of all demoniac vices and evils. As soon as lust, greed and anger are abandoned all other vices and evils dissolve and dissapate. Birth in hellish existences has three doors in the form of the door of lust, the door of greed and the door of anger. As soon as anyone enters into any one of these three doors they become void of discrimination and their mind becomes apprehended and controlled by the senses. This causes complete chaos and utter ruin to any human being, blocking access to their higher nature and totally obscuring the consciousness of the atma or immortal soul which leads to moksa or liberation from material existence. The three doorways of lust, greed and anger causes one to perform such sinful and abominable activities that damnation is the only result and leads a human being directly to hell to suffer immensely for their sinful inequities. Hence one should be extremely vigilant to avoid these three doors and keep them far away at a safe distance."

, any one of those three gates function as an entryway to hell itself.
Again, this does not require any particular religious affiliation, or any religious belief at all for that matter, in order to find the wisdom in it; it is every bit as significant when looked at from a secular, psychological, point of view, as from a religious one; hell is what awaits you here and now in your own heart and mind and in the life you create for yourself, once you allow yourself to pass through these doors and become committed to traveling down that road.

Is it really that surprising that there is little else on display with the Occupy Wall Street leaders and their messages, than what you would expect to find on passing through one or all of those three gates?

This is not a simple rhetorical point I'm making or attempting to score against 'the left', this is a consequential issue and worth looking little closer at and comparing further - shall we?

Who's that knocking on the door

How do these two groups approach these three doors, do they knock? Do they enter? Lets look behind -
Door #1: Lust - seriously? Lust is not a keyword that is typically associated with the Tea Party, is it? Not that there aren't some gorgeous women in the Tea Party, but lust isn't what draws them there; defending their families is, which owes more to courage, than lust.

What about the OWS crowd? You mean other than their parading around naked and having sex under tarps in public parks, exposing themselves to minors and multiple rapes? Really??

Door #2: Anger Hmmm, welll... I can see how someone could try to make an argument that anger is on display at Tea Party events, particularly during the early ones when facing clueless and condescending politico's telling us there was no need to read the bill before passing it. But IMHO, I'd say that had far more to do with being understandably indignant, than with ungovernable anger.

Compare that to the OWS's Look at the OWS crowds, look at their dress, look at their signs, look at their manner, it SCREAMS anger and , violence , which isn't confined to the supposed political purpose of their gathering. And it is spreading now, not surprisingly, to fighting even amongst themselves,

"Fights are erupting among Occupy Wall Street protesters, so much so that one corner of Zuccotti Park has emerged where protesters say they won't go for fear of their safety, the New York Daily News is reporting.

Police officers also have been warned of "dangerous instruments" being concealed in cardboard tubing, the News says it has been told by unidentified police sources."

Theirs is not an anger that follows from a perceived injustice, but from an unreasoning grudge against reality in general.

The Tea Party people may be in some sense angry, but they are not at levels approaching frothing at the mouth, letting dogs loose on reporters or hurling plates, rocks and paint at the police - Tea Partiers are indignant in the face of real offences, and perceived evils, but they don't participate in them.

Issues	Tea Party	Occupy Wall Street
Coherent statement of principles ................. Public Nudity Public Sex Rape ................. Anger Violence Riot ................. Filth Theft Child abuse Sedition	Yep ................. Nope Hell Nope Nope ................. Some Nope Nope ................. Nope Nope Nope Nope	Hell Nope ................. Yep Yep Yep and Yep ................. Yep Yep Yep ................. Yep Yep Yep Yep

Door #3: Greed. Spot me the greed in the Tea Party movement, I'll wait.

No, wanting to keep what is yours, what you've earned, is NOT greed, that comes from a sense of Justice - now we could argue about whether they've judged correctly or not, and IMHO they have, but you can't seriously argue that they are coming from a motivation of Greed.
The OWS however, is incessant in their demands for what is not theirs ("...regardless of employment..." and "...Free college education...") the demands for free wages, free education, forgiven loans, gimmee, gimmee, gimmee more! Gimme what I want without my having to earn it... is a greed that is even more naked than their lust.

And this isn't simply confined to the OWS, but to those favoring them, including our President who feeds it with sympathy and promises of using his executive power to enable students to 'cut out the middle-man' to misuse his power as president to refinance their loans, is, fittingly, shameless demagoguery without even the virtue of a fig leaf.

And there is also a greed for the moral standing which the Tea Party has - even in the face of three years of perpetual assault by the media - whenever they spoke of the Tea Party and its peaceful protests and demonstrations, it was either in mockery or while casting them as dangerous threats to the republic - Nancy Pelosi's quavering voiced "I've heard this rhetoric before", and yet they've maintained their respectable character. Don't laugh, the proof is in what the media and talking heads are attempting to do, and that is attempting to take that respectability, unearned, and associate it with their favorites in the OWS, which is what they are doing when they attempt to say the OWS is 'just like the Tea Party'.

This attempt to praise the OWS as being a movement driven by youthful virtue and noble ideals, is a farce, and their claims to be 'speaking truth to power' has passed through the gates of Lust, Anger and Greed and is now coming out as 'mouthing any available pretext for exerting violent power', which is why they ignore the reality in favor of their regurgitated virtual reality.

Virtual Virtues
The very visible fact is that there is far more lust, greed and anger to be seen in abundance, reflected in just one of the OWS demonstrations, than in all of the Tea Party's parties over the entire last three years.

Now, of course, there's little likelihood of a drive by sainting occurring within the Tea Party, and I wouldn't dream of painting any of us as being in any way better than who we are - people who are trying to live normal lives - but you cannot seriously say that you can see any resemblance between the Tea Party protesters and those of Occupy Wall Street! Neither is there any similarity in the motives or the ideals which lay behind them.

What Virtue which some of them may have held before, has passed through the three doors of their encampment, and come out the other side as vice, and any patina of virtue is only virtual.

In many ways, and often deliberately, our entire culture has been passed through these three doors, and in certain circles, there are entire industries, such as the entertainment, politics and educational industries, that have taken the long march through all three of them in a wild parade.
But while they have walked through, they cannot drag you with them without your consent, and if you, you, are still able to conceive of vice as a bad thing, then ask yourself, does it not seem likely to you that a group of people, gathered together under circumstances which are ungoverned by the normal rules of society, a group which is openly practicing some vices, and not just openly, but boastfully, does it seem likely to you that one or two vices are going to remain in compartmentalized isolation amongst the people sprawled about so closely under such minimal standards of behavior?

Are their practices likely to stop with only one or two? Really? I mean, vice is like the Lays Potato Chips of human behavior... you can't have only one. If you've had any experience with being human, you've got to know that it is far more likely that the vices you openly indulge in, not to mention the even more enticing and appealing ones, are going to be exercised in gleeful concert with their friends, you know, the other Seven Deadlies, right?

We've already passed through the gates of lust, anger and greed... do you really think that this behavior is going to stop there? What does it have to say for those people who didn't see this coming? Are those really the people you want as your leaders? As your educators? Seriously?
It used to be that vice was unquestionably considered to be something objectionable, especially if you were accused of engaging in one or more vices. Can you really watch what they are demonstrating in OWS, and preaching from the White house, and still say that the left believes vice to be a bad thing? Something that is worthy of being denounced in and of itself?

It used to be socially unacceptable to be accused of such behavior... there were morals clauses in contracts that were actually enforced. Today, with the public parade that has led us through violations of political morals clauses which were the spectacles of Nixon, Clinton, Gore, Weiner... the morals clauses linger on as little more than a joke, or as a convenient loophole to cancel a contract you no longer want to honor.

In today's society, in our popular culture, it has long been not only acceptable to indulge in the vices, but it has become popular to do so. And our popular culture has passed through the gates of lust, anger and greed and brought us to a state of transgendered classroom instruction... a state where public officials no longer feeling compelled to either present themselves as virtuous or to distance themselves from vice, or to worry about how some of their supporters so clearly associated with vice that it is not only no longer an issue, and their politicians such as Pelosi & Obama are attempting to 'reach out' to them. reflecting the ailing heart of the republic.

Getting to Here from There... one gate at a time... where will we be Tomorrow?
Where did this come from, how did they not learn better? Or maybe the better question, is how did they learn about anything else being better?

The fact that the popular media and pundits deliberately overlook Greed, as did Brazille, or any of the other vices so prevalent amongst the OWS, screams out that neither this, nor any other vice, is of enough concern for them to even bother with denying.

While it may very well serve as a stone for them to throw at their opponents, they sure as heck don't treat it as kryptonite, and that shows more about what they are about, than anything else. For OWS Greed is actually a value to them, as a tool or a weapon, they've no concern for the harm it may pose to either themselves or to society - it's but a means to advance their own ends.

Simple political partisanship is not enough to explain how these groups respective virtues and vices are obscured, excused or entirely dispensed with, in any consideration of OWS, and that brings us to a very revealing question.

Q: When comparing the Tea Party with OWS, why are their stated (and demonstrated) principles, purposes and practices, not the primary issues being discussed in comparisons between the two groups of protesters?
A: Because they are of no concern to either OWS, or those reporting on, or approving of, them.

It is because Principles & Practices, Virtues & Vices, are of no importance to them, that the pundits are able to say that they do see a resemblance between the Tea Party protesters and those of Occupy Wall Street.

This is a huge confession - and a significant revelation - for them, Policemen and Bank Robbers are similar because they do both yell and wave guns around in front of banks!

The key matter that does distinguish them - Virtue and Vice - is not in their world view. If Che' Guevara is thought of as a mass murder, then you could not possibly dream of wearing him on your T-Shirt. But... if that doesn't rate in your list of 'priorities', in the way that political revolution does... it's not a problem; if you can set Virtue and Vice aside, then the murderer is virtually transformed into a saint.

How has that been accomplished? I've already gone too long with this post, and I have gone into the details of what has happened to our schools in other posts, so I'll just point out the fact that the warning of where we were headed - which is where we find ourselves today - was first raised, not in the 1950's, but the 1920's... and even that was over sixty years too late.

Those Cassandra calls and missed warnings, did far worse than simply open us up for a military attack such as we suffered at Pearl Harbor, they opend us up for embracing a moral and intellectual attack upon our true heart and soul, our Virtues, which, as our Founders did their best to alert us, are our true strength and vulnerability, that Virtue is what made us Americans in the first place, and without which, we lose our exceptionalism.

Being a nation of ideas, which America always was, and still is today, the real battles we have been engaged in, the real war we've been losing, has been an intellectual and a spiritual one. Because of our failure to heed their warnings, we've been steadily losing the war most of us never even realized that we've been engaged in, and we've been losing it because of our inattention to it.

The first wave began with the philosophy of the 18th century, with little opposition to the philosophies of Rousseau, Kant and Hegel, they gained beachheads in our own turncoat philosophers of Pierce, William James and John Dewey and their Delta Force of Pragmatism. That gave us the educators of the 19th century, and their triumph delivered us up to incessant loss of territory we've yielded up through the daily assault in the classrooms.

From those new launching platforms we suffered through the cultural bombing runs of the hippies in the 1960's, which softened us up for the moral living room invasion, utilizing the brilliantly camouflaged landing craft vehicles such as M*A*S*H throughout the 1970's, and then the ever advancing boots on the ground that has been led by the likes of MTV, moving implacably forward in a steadily descending spiral of depravity from the 1980's down to today.

The popular culture of the 20th and 21st centuries has left us utterly dazed and confused. Without reinforcements, without ammunition, without the intelectual-military intelligence so necessary to track and counter attack the enemy, we have been overrun in so many quarters that we see many of our fellow Americans are entirely unaware of their position behind enemy lines; they are unimpressed and unconcerned about charges of vice - in fact they have become traits that are openly admired and pursued, and in doing so they give real material aid and comfort to the enemy.

Far worse than Pearl Harbor in 1941, this continuous assault has led us not only to 9/11 in 2001, but has so much more devastating than even the twin towers falling, they've leveled our moral defenses to the point that a Mosque is being openly built directly around the corner from Ground Zero, here in 2011 - this goes so far beyond any physical equivalent of 'they sunk my battleship', that it ain't funny.

The Alamo or Midway - Time will tell
If you want to know how so many of our fellows can stare at Occupy Wall Street and express no shock or surprise, you might get a glimpse of enemy territory with the fact that this guy, Bill Ayers, a terrorist, has been an influential teacher, a very popular teach TO teachers, across the nation, for decades.

“I think you should use your brilliance, your humor, your wisdom, your body to dramatize the violence that exists. But we do not live in a neutral — not when there’s a trillion dollar military budget — the biggest in the world, not when they’re recruiting kids to be in the service, not when every athletic event begins with guns and marching…that‘s a violent culture and that’s where we live…”

And with a flourish of lefty irony, he added,

"Somebody like Barack Obama who drone strikes American citizens is saying ‘I want you all to be non-violent.’ Well, I want you to be non-violent,”

Isn't that clever? What do you suppose he wanted kids to learn from that? Could it be that they've already learned it? A 'If you think that's violence, I'll show you violence!' And here we were all under the impression that our schools have been failing... apparently, not so much.

It is ugly.

This Occupy Wall Street movement is not noble, this is not inspiring, this is not in anyway shape or form, Good.

When the press lauds these grubby vandals and their 'youthful idealism' they aren't talking about real Virtues, but only virtual ones. Careful looking at the man behind the curtain. Occupy Wall Street is ugly, mean, filthy, cowardly, self-indulgent, reckless, wasteful, greedy, vain, lustful, untruthful, dishonest and unjust.

But other than that....

The Question is Liberty or Tyranny - is Your Answer the Red Pill or the Blue Pill?

2011-10-21T13:54:00.011-05:00

In reply to my last post on the questions that lead to Liberty and a Free Market, my goad friend Lance asked:

"I would be more likely to agree with you on much of this Van. But I do not think we have had a "free market" in my lifetime and probably my grandparents. "

I'm not quite sure what Lance meant by that... since I've been saying and complaining about that fact for years, he couldn't have meant it as a piece of news for me... was it intended as an argument against seeking after something worthwhile, because it has not existed for some time, if ever?	Morpheus: This is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back. You take the blue pill - the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill - you stay in Wonderland and I show you how deep the rabbit-hole goes."
If so, then how would you then ever argue for doing anything at all? Do you argue against seeking after the correct answer... because... you've been wrong for so long? Do wrong and false answers get some sort of tenure when we're talking about law and economics?

When I asked what he meant, he answered that he'd had it with Wall Streeter's & Occupiers (which I can sympathize with), and that,

"I am just tired of the 24 hr a day media cycle and the business of politics and the era of sound bite thinking as opposed to true thoughtful analysis."

Maybe Lance was just running head first into some sound byte-itis, I know he isn't the only one... but he's also not the only one letting that frustration dissuade them from the real issue at hand - and that's a problem that extends far beyond Lance's comments and into many, many peoples thoughts.

But... people... seriously... should you yield to the sound byte for or against anything? If an issue of substance, of significance, is raised, should you let the media or political sound bytes... or the equivalent presumptions of friends, distract you from pursuing the meat of the issue?

Free Market or Forced Market... that's a fairly significant choice, isn't it? The implications of your choice certainly are.

Should you let the media, politicians or friends reduce an issue of such significance, to the equivalent of a sound byte, by allowing them to simply say,

"Oh things aren't that simple!"

Really? In fact the issue IS that simple, though facing up to it might not be; but then you are faced with another simple issue - if something is difficult, do you face up to it, or do you do your best to avoid it?
If you agree in general with the answers which those questions provoked, why would you want to avoid them? Are you ever justified in swallowing the blue pill and going back into the Matrix? IMHO, the simple answer is No, you aren't, and you don't. You take the red pill, face up to the Truth, which only honestly questioning what you believe can reveal to you, and pursue the answers to wherever they might lead.

The Questions I posed in the last post are important questions, as are the answers which most rational people will find themselves arriving at - should they be denied because they are incompatible with what you may have been (perhaps mistakenly) supporting for years and years?

The Free Market has never fully existed, but it did more fully exist here, under our constitutional form of government, which was conducive to its growth, for a time, during the early years of our nation, and more so here than anywhere else in the world. And it was due to that approximation of the Free Market, that our explosive growth and prosperity resulted from, and it was because of that, that America came to represent freedom and liberty to the world, drawing such a true 'diversity' of people to immigrate to our shores.

Is it possible to deny that? Can anyone seriously suggest that it was the ever more restrictive laws and regulations which hampered the Free Market, that resulted in our wealth and prosperity? If so, why didn't such wealth and prosperity occur in nations that were even more restrictive and more hostile to a Free Market and Property Rights, than ours was? Because of their 'people'?(I dunno... sounds a tad 'racist' to me.)

That early approximation of a Free Market in America, took its first deliberate step backwards with the passage of the first proregressive 'reform', the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887 (mentioned in this post a while back), and with each additional regulatory law and agency that has been established, our proregressive steps have taken us further from freedom, and closer to the political collusion of those having wealth and power and few scruples, in business and government - and insulating them from the reach of the Law and Justice, while distancing the people from participation in their own society - and the unavoidable loss of the liberty for each of us to live our own lives, has been the direct result of their reforms.

The Free Market brought us this:

The New Colossus

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Emma Lazarus, 1883

<>The Unfree Market has delivered us to this:

The reeling housing market has come to this: To shore it up, two Senators are preparing to introduce a bipartisan bill Thursday that would give residence visas to foreigners who spend at least $500,000 to buy houses in the U.S.
The provision is part of a larger package of immigration measures, co-authored by Sens. Charles Schumer (D., N.Y.) and Mike Lee (R., Utah), designed to spur more foreign investment in the U.S.

The New Tone: Keep your dregs, sell us your rich

Not like the golden heights of American fame,
Upon the cities upon our hills now fire-sale signs;
You must act now, lay your money down;
Craven Senator's with winning words, and a wink,
A once sacred land, the sellers name,
Fathers of lies. For coin in hand
Cry out midway barkers; flinty eyes demand
Her land offered up upon the block ill famed,
"The new world, yours for a song!" their jingle rings
With sharpened smile. "Come you foreigners, get your visas,
"For gold we'll sell you 'lady liberty'!,
Crony kings yours for a steal!
For a half a million dollars, a castle!, a wench for ye!,
A Red, White & Blue light special... and more!
Bipartisan Schumer & Lee, 2011

Not surprisingly, the willingness and ability of people to address problems on their own, or in associations or to form charitable organizations - and to support them - has decreased, as the power of the govt/business cronyism has grown - and it has grown, not in spite of, but because of, the regulatory state.

Ask yourself why it is that the first thought of those who want to 'Help the ___, (fill in the blank), is to turn to politicians in government, instead of turning directly to those of like mind in their own neighborhoods and society? Why would someone want to go through government... what does it offer them except interference? The truth is that they would not choose to, unless they are either being forcibly prevented from doing what they feel is right to do, unless they beg favors or permissions (aka permits) from govt ... or on the other hand, the go through government because they want to force others into doing what they want them to do?

One presumes and relies upon Liberty, and the other presumes and relies upon Tyranny... which would you prefer? The Red Pill... or the Blue Pill?

It comes down to this, if people are being wronged in some new way by an industry, technology, etc, then you pass a clear law to punish those who engage in such unjust actions, and include with that law clearly stated punishments, best suited to penalize them and re-compensate their victims. On the other hand, if you want to control what people do, if you want to promote some behaviors, and suppress others (which is a rejection of Free Will and Reason and an endorsement of Behavioristic and Utilitarian theories of stimulus response), if you want to increase your own power - political and/or economic - then you go about granting favors to those best able to further your interests, through regulations chock full of artfully inserted, and lucrative, loopholes.

If you want Justice, you pass Just, brief, clear laws and enforce them across the board, swiftly and as severely as justice demands and permits.

If you want power and wealth without having to suffer the burden and annoyance of intelligent effort, then you pursue regulations - as many of them as possible, the more extensive and unintelligible as possible - which rely upon the interpretations of faceless and traceless men to impose, or overlook, them as it is politically and/or financially expedient for the 'parties concerned' to do so.

The first option is open to anyone having the desire and ability to pursue them.

The second option is open only to those having the wealth and power to manipulate the system to their advantage.

Liberty or Tyranny - each has its characteristics.

Have you asked the questions necessary to enable you recognize which is which? Will you even ask which one is the Red Pill, and which one is the Blue Pill?

Occupy Your Own Street: Questions to ask yourself, If... Then... Use it or lose it!

2011-10-13T22:20:00.025-05:00

Out of some exchanges with a communist organizer, some Occupy Wall Street’rs, and some regular folks just wondering how the heck to get our point across, here’s a few points and quick questions to ask yourself, your friends, relatives and neighbors, which might finally succeed in getting us all onto the battlefield where the war we've been losing, is actually being fought.

#1, if you are thinking that you should ‘Give the benefit of the doubt' to the people occupying Wall Street, or Occupying St. Louis, etc, then you first need to stop, and read Po’ed Patriot’s post on the thuggish reality behind them.

Then with that out of the way, I think we need to head towards the sound of the guns, by concentrating more on asking questions, than replying to them, because, to paraphrase Winston Churchill,

“We are a people separated from ourselves by a common language”.

The words and terms we’ve been taught to use to think with, are in the main, incorrect, do not convey what we expect them to, and in too many cases do not even apply anymore.

We think of Leftists as Liberals - they are not.

We are taught to think of ourselves as a Democracy – we are not.

We are taught to think that Capitalism is what our economic system has always been... it is not.

Or... at least, the system which most Tea Party Conservatives refer to when we think of Capitalism, is our traditional economic system, but what most other people think of when they think of Capitalism, is a relatively new innovation that has been destroying our true economic system for the last hundred years.

We began this nation with our Founding Fathers as Liberals, True Liberals, meaning those who believe that Man, if Educated (not degree’d, Educated – two very different things) and Virtuous, is capable of self-government, capable of living their lives in Liberty, and capable of interacting with each other in a Free Market. The Free Market was once thought of as the very defining term, expression and accomplishment, of being a Liberal! The nature of our original economic system, was that it wasn't really a system at all, there was no place in it for government, except to uphold the law, enforce legal contracts and collar the criminals - our 'system' was simply the result of free people interacting with each other without being under the thumb of the policies or payoffs and manipulations typically imposed upon a people by one king or another.

Our system was never referred to as ‘Capitalism’, until it’s arch-enemy, Karl Marx. named it that!

That can’t be good, can it?

No, no it can’t be good. We are a nation of ideas, and the main battleground we've always fought upon has been that of whether or not man is capable of living his own life, and if not, could he really be capable of ordering the life of another? It is the idea that drove people to come here. It was the cause of the Revolution. It was the driving force behind the Civil War. Our greatest mistake has been to think that once the Revolution was over, and the Constitution ratified and Slavery done away with, that that battle was over.

It wasn't.

The battle has been raging all along, and is still going on today, but it has moved off the physical battlefields, where the enemy could not win, and it moved into our own minds... where we didn't even realize we were being attacked. Our words, phrases, concepts and themes have been the tanks, planes, aircraft carriers and geographic strongholds of this war - and we have been conceding nearly every one of them.

Occupy Your Own Street - It Is The Fight You Can Fight, Now!
An organizer for the communist youth league, recently told Patch Adams, of Po’ed Patriot... after attempting to dump out a cartload of Marxist manure at his site, that

"I in my heart believe that the majority of Americans believe the same thing despite their understanding that we call that socialism."

Well, in my heart, I’m quite certain that Americans believe no such thing, but the labels they’ve been given to use, lead them, like a trail of bread crumbs, down a false trail and to a place where “X” marks the spot, and Socialism is what's on the nameplate at that address.

But that is not either our home or our destination. Knock on that door, my friend, and Hell will be pleased to usher you in.

I’d advise against that.

So how do we begin fighting the actual battle for America? Start by getting past the words which no longer mean what we think they mean, and in fact serve to put us at odds with each other. This was driven home to me by a video one of our St. Louis people took while talking with the occupiers. Some of them, it was painfully obvious, were lost causes, but a surprising number of them had a grasp of the same ideas which we do... but because they'd bought into the re-purposed names, they were unwittingly there fighting on the side of their own enemies.

We first need to take back the questions by not using the most disputed words when asking them -we can deal with the words we use as 'answers' afterwards. Start by asking questions that don't involve the disputed ground, and start taking the fight to the enemy in your own mind and on your very own street, amongst your very own friends and relatives and neighbors. But before doing that though, there's a very key point you need to understand - this is a very strange war... if you start off by being confrontational, you lose the fight; the disputed ground succeeds in lifting the drawbridge, raising its defenses, and you never even get the opportunity to scratch it.

We can't win this with a war of words... and believe me, that goes against my grain... big time!

The only way we can get within striking distance of the real battlefield, is from the inside - and that can only be accomplished by getting our friends, relatives and neighbors, to ask some key questions of themselves - they have to fight the battle, our job is only to supply them with the ammunition to do so, and that can only be done by getting them to ask themselves the questions that will expose the enemy to the truth in their own minds.

Once that's done... it collapses. The enemy is a lie, it has no real defenses, it is utterly exposed and prostrate before the Truth... but it can only be put into that position by its unwitting defender - your friend, relative, neighbor (and possibly even yourself) - exposing it themselves, and that can only be done by their actually questioning their own premises.

Accomplish that, and the fight is as good as over, the battle won without having to be fought - Sun Tzu would like that.

If... Then...
So, here ya go, here are some questions to walk yourself through, and out into, the opening skirmish of the real war. Taking this ground will help put you, your friends, relatives and neighbors, onto the right path to understanding your positions correctly; do that, and the lie can be exposed. Once it is, then they will begin questioning their positions themselves, and the Truth can begin doing the work you could never have hoped to accomplish - once that happens the was is over; once these fundamentals are understood, then what words are best to use to label the answers for these questions can be argued over, harmlessly, endlessly, for years afterwards. Academics have to have something to do.

* Do you believe a person should be free to make their own choices? Should a persons life be their own?
If so, then congratulations, you've won the most important battle of all, you believe in free will, and you believe that man is capable of governing himself.

* If you actually believe in a person’s freedom to make their own choices, then you must believe in their right to retain the fruits of those choices, and their right to conduct themselves, to speak their mind freely and to assemble with those fellows they choose to, without fear of recrimination, violence, intimidation or of having their property taken from them - does that seem reasonable?

Well that is what is meant by supporting Individual Rights and Property Rights. Congratulations, you're on your way to becoming an American in more ways than simply by a certificate of live birth.

* If you believe in a person’s freedom to make their own choices and to be secure in their Individual Rights and Property, then you must also believe that people should be free to offer their services and products for the consideration of other free peoples, and if another is interested, to be free to come to an agreement for compensation with them, without fear of threats of physical force and intimidation, right?

Then congratulations again, you believe in the Right to Contract.

* Do you believe that people should have a right to make their own decisions about what they would like to eat, wear, shelter, protect, read, adorn or amuse themselves with? Do you believe that people should be free to exchange with other people, for some mutually agreed to amount of their own property, for those items? Do you believe that they should be free to do so without the threat of intimidation and physical force by either party or from some third party?

Then congratulations, you believe in the Free Market.

* Do you believe that anyone who threatens to, or who actually exerts force to compel people to act against their own wishes, or who robs or swindles them of what is theirs, or to otherwise deliberately or negligently injure or endanger them, do you believe that they should be fined and or imprisoned - No Matter WHO they are or what their position in society, business or government, is?

Then congratulations, you believe in the Rule of Law.

* Do you believe that people in a society should be able to agree upon general norms of conduct, and to establish laws to uphold and defend their lives, rights and property from the abuse of anyone else, foreign or domestic? Do you believe that these rules and laws should be written and publicly accessible to all, and that no one should be able to improperly alter or manipulate those rules and laws for their personal benefit?

Then congratulations, you believe in a Western form of government.

* Do you believe that it is the responsibility of those in that society who are protected by that government, to aid in supporting that government? That there can be no right to not support the institution which defends and upholds the Rights of everyone in that society?

Then congratulations, you believe that there is no right to evade proper taxation (yeah, well... some Rights are more enjoyable than others... but unfortunately no less necessary!).

* Do you believe that no one should be able to abuse another, intimidate them, force them to act against their will or to take what rightly belongs to another? Do you believe that simply having a majority of the people present saying that they'd like to abuse another person in that way, does not make it okay to do so? Do you believe that even if that majority of the people REALLY wants to, and even writes it down as a rule that it's now okay to abuse a particular person or people, because a majority of the people agree that they REALLY want to do it; do you believe that even then, such a thing would still be wrong and so must not be allowed to be done?

Then congratulations, you DO NOT believe in a Democracy, what you believe in is called a Republic, and only in a Republic is the person, rights and property of a minority, protected by law.

* Do you believe that members of a community should be able to choose from those amongst themselves who they believe are best suited to maintaining, amending or writing new laws, and to represent them in their government?

Then congratulations, what you believe in is a Constitutional Representative Republic, and your ideas are compatible with being a Citizen of the United States of America.

* Do you believe in the "Abolition of private property"? You do? EHHHhhhh... Ooh, sorry, sorry, no, if you believe in that, or any obfuscatory way of edging towards that, then you reject every one of the preceding points above; if you believe that, then you are a Communist, and no matter your best of intentions - which were also doubtlessly shared by those who supported and formed the USSR, Mao's Red China, Pol Pot's Cambodia, etc - then your system will result in nothing but death and destruction because violence, and the threat of it, the abandonment of objective law and true rights, the abolishment of contract and even the denial of the potential of individual human worth, is what must follow from your best intentions, as Hell always does.

I think if we lose hold of these questions... then there will be no battles left to win.Why?

Because what results from asking the preceding questions, is the only known way, to secure to each individual the right to engage in life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, on their own terms, and the only known, proven, method for structuring such a government, is the Constitution of the United States of America.

The reasons for why that is, can be found in a quote from John Adams, which I've noted often in the past, when he was helping to more clearly define the purpose of a Republic for his fellow Founding Fathers, that the purpose of a Republic, was the protection of Property Rights:

"...the original meaning of the word republic could be no other than a government in which the property of the people predominated and governed; and it had more relation to property than liberty. It signified a government, in which the property of the public, or people, and of every one of them, was secured and protected by law. This idea, indeed, implies liberty; because property cannot be secure unless the man be at liberty to acquire, use, or part with it, at his discretion, and unless he have his personal liberty of life and limb, motion and rest, for that purpose. It implies, moreover, that the property and liberty of all men, not merely of a majority, should be safe; for the people, or public, comprehends more than a majority, it comprehends all and every individual; and the property of every citizen is a part of the public property, as each citizen is a part of the public, people, or community. The property, therefore, of every man has a share in government, and is more powerful than any citizen or party of citizens; it is governed only by the law...."

And through his extensive study of history, he found that the reason for this is, that

"The moment the idea is admitted into society, that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. If "Thou shalt not covet," and "Thou shalt not steal," were not commandments of Heaven, they must be made inviolable precepts in every society, before it can be civilized or made free."

What Adams and many others of the time realized, was that without a solid support for property rights, no other rights are even possible, and if these questions are not understood, no amount of legislation can uphold or enforce them.

And with that in mind, it is equally important to note that Karl Marx felt that the most important, distinguishing aspect of his theory of Communism, was one that he could sum up very simply, he said that:

" In this sense, the theory of the Communists may be summed up in the single sentence: Abolition of private property."

That goal, the abolition of private property, is the purpose behind the methods of communism, of socialism, of progressivism and of fascism, they differ from each other only in their styles of governing, and how quickly and fully they feel they can proceed towards their shared ultimate goal of abolishing private property. Whatever good intentions they and their supporters may have, the fact is, as it has played out again and again in history, from the USSR to Cambodia and all points in between, their schemes will bring only death and destruction, because the target of their power - private property and the mutual respect for it - is the only thing which can make it possible for people to live together in freedom.

The path Marx beckons you down doesn't end well. It never has, it never will. If you choose this thing, Then you will lose your liberty and loose death and destruction across the land.

Wake up America, talk to your friends and neighbors, Occupy your own mind, Occupy your own street! You have the greatest political treasure of all the ages right here in your hands, right now, the United States Constitution, help your friends, relatives and neighbors to understand it by thinking through the questions that led to it, and then learn to use it... or lose it.

Chess-eckers - Easy questions and hard answers

2011-10-12T12:55:00.001-05:00

♫ ♪ ♬ What are words for, when no one listens anymore.... ♬ ♪ ♫
If I ask how to best win a game, the easy answer is: with a winning strategy.

M'kay, true enough.
If I ask how to overcome a lie, the easy answer is: with the truth.

Yep, also true.

But.

What if you sat down to a tournament game of Checkers, and in between moves and conversation, the game was transformed into Chess, and the chess pieces are only identified with a coded label under each piece... and if you touch a piece, you have to move it? And those crowded around to watch your game are not only fine with that and agree with that, but deny it was ever different and they won't let you change the game back or quit it?

Now, how do you overcome the lies surrounding you, what is the winning strategy, when the crowd watching you are as much a part of the game as the pieces on the board?

Maybe the first step is realizing that those gathered around the game, are not the only ones in the room - there are many more who came to the tournament, but who lost interest when they saw the game had changed.

In our world, those gathered around the table, 'educators', press, intellectuals, political players, all insist on playing the transformed game, and they don't intend to allow you to stop playing.

They are outnumbered, but they are outnumbered by people who don't know that, people who are either not willing to play the game, or who when they look up, see only those standing around the table, and don't realize that "WE" surround "THEM".

People like Glenn Beck and Hank Williams say to stop trying to figure out which piece is which, stop playing the transformed game, return to playing Checkers. But the problem is that that requires everyone out there, to stop going on living their lives, and stand up, deny the game has changed, and push them away from the table.

Problem is that those standing around the table are armed.

Are you?

I don't mean with guns, but with ideas.

Those standing around the tables are armed with the words they've put into your head - they control what your words mean, not only do they refuse to allow you to use any others, you don't have the words or ideas necessary to expose them, and you react, you dance, to the words and tunes they call.

They yell RACIST!!! and you react.
You're NOT a racist, but you don't want to be called one, so you don't say or do what you were thinking of doing because you don't want to be called that.
They yell FASCIST!!! and you react.
You're NOT a fascist, but you don't want to be called one, so you don't say or do what you were thinking of doing because you don't want to be called that.
They yell HOMOPHOBE!!! and you react.
You're NOT a homophobe, but you don't want to be called one, so you don't say or do what you were thinking of doing because you don't want to be called that.

THEY are armed with your own mind, and they are using it against you.

They've sold their idea of what the game is, they've sold the idea that you have to analyze what each piece is by some hidden feature that only some select and credentialed few know about, but don't you dare touch a piece, or you'll be committed to moving it - RACIST!!! FASCIST!!! HOMOPHOBE!!!

Ask Hank Williams if you don't know what I mean.

A friend nailed it earlier this morning: "The issue is the defense of our free market system."

Absolutely yes. Part of that defense requires that we stop aiding the assault upon it. It is, and always was, the Free Market - stop calling it anything else. Capitalism was the term Marx popularized because it took the idea of Freedom off the table, and painted the entire system as a tool of money management.

Unless you like being a 'Human Resource', stop calling it Capitalism, and call it by what we all expect it to be: The Free Market. Only the later will allow you to live your own life.
Another touched on the issue when he said we don't have a bogeyman anymore... we can see him, we can see him shitting all over our flag right in front of our faces, but we aren't able to identify him. It's like we're stumbling around after the Tower of Babel, none of our words identifies them for what they are, none of them raises an alarm - too many people think all of our words and names mean something else.

I am as Frustrated as hell. I'm trying to tell my friends and neighbors that those people they think 'mean well' are latent murderers - not because they intend to, but because they are acting under the power of ideas that will end up driving them to slaughter their children in front of their faces.

He doesn't understand a God damn thing I'm saying.

People came out in droves to fight a socialist bill in D.C., but I can hardly get them to raise an eyebrow over actual communists taking over their city squares.
We sat down to the game of life with the Constitution and Natural Rights, and we find ourselves sitting at a game with a living dead set of constitutional interpretations and a Czarfull of political regulatory agencies.

We need to stop playing the game. That's obvious. How?

Hank Williams song is being downloaded like crazy. Maybe I'm just talking to the wrong people. It seems that some people out there still understand what plain words mean.

How do we get them back in the game? Help me get them back in the game. Hey! You! Yeah, that's right, I'm talking TO YOU!

Get in the game, and do it now, because these people are not playing around.

Five dangerous questions to Occupy the occupied.

2011-10-11T14:27:00.003-05:00

Lets put the kibosh on some dangerously misleading questions that are occupying the minds of people preoccupied by those Occupying Wall Street, and other cities across America.

1 - “Where did the Occupy Wall Street protesters come from?”
I've heard this question often and I find it hard to take it seriously that they are seriously asking it, because it is the easiest question to answer. Here’s a clue from the Missouri University system, our own Professor of communism, violence and rioting (aka Labor Studies), Judy Ancel, as she made a comment to a crowd of Occupy squatters in Kansas City,

“It is so great to see that so many of you are outraged,” Judy Ancel, a labor studies professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, told the crowd. “I’ve been waiting for this for a long time.”

Yes, she certainly has been waiting a long time. She’s been agitating for mass riot and revolt since the Seattle WTO riots, and even earlier. If you remember Prof. Ancel, she co-led the UMSL/UMKC class that indoctrinated college kids in the uses of violence, or the threat of violence, in order to get favorable bargaining positions.

Those were the class examples which she, and fellow communist organizer, Don Giljum, used in their class instruction, but the point of the instruction was to drive home the lesson that the 'Ends Justify the Means', that no matter what levels you have to sink to, however violent or debauched you behavior may become, it is ok, as long as your ends, your goals, are 'noble' and well intentioned.

And were their lessons learned? What do you think?

"Among the hardcore of well-intentioned protesters sleeping rough in Zuccotti Park are also the children of the wealthiest ‘one per cent’ – taking a break from classes at private schools to show their solidarity… and join the fun.

As millionaire celebrities pledged allegiance to the protesters despite very healthy bank balances, MailOnline spoke to youngsters who have joined the movement, many of whom study at colleges which cost their parents up to $200,000."

Yeah. They learned it all right. And whaddayawanna bet that Mom & Pop, are proud of their little investments? These parents, and their children, are prime examples of what our educational system is designed to produce, and if Professors like Judy Ancel get their way, no child will be left behind.

2 - 'But I'm sure they mean well... don't they?' - What remains after assenting to the 'Ends Justify the Means'
Not surprisingly this was also Stalin’s excuse for starving millions of Ukranians to death in order to reform the agricultural system. Mao’s too. It was also Hitler’s excuse for slaughtering millions of Jews, Slavs and others, to improve Germany, for the greater good, because, after all, 'Ends Justify the Means'. Same with Robespierre, who in the French Revolution, began cutting off the heads of not just the Royals, but of everyone who disagreed with him… for the betterment of the movement, for the betterment of France, for the greater good.

Why?

Because the Ends Justify the Means. It is a lesson our society has been teaching with, an American slant, for over a century now.

From this position on the (presumed, by them) moral high ground, it’s ok to presume

... that businesses would be guilty of doing the wrong thing if allowed the freedom to make their own decisions, so we'd better to regulate their every action (unless politically well-connected enough to get a loophole) before they can, to ensure ‘acceptable’ behavior for the greater good. IOW, their rights to think, act and assemble are abridged, because those in power think it'll benefit the greater good... and they are ok doing that because - the Ends Justify the Means.
...Affirmative Action says it is ok to discriminate against some people, because others were discriminated against before. It is ok to violate the rights of businessmen and force them to deal with a union, because they only want what’s best for their workers.
...It’s ok to forbid smoking in your own establishment, for the greater good. It’s okay to forbid you from using ‘too much salt’, it’s for the greater good. “Imposing Cap & Trade would necessarily cause power plants to fail and energy costs to skyrocket”, but it advances a ‘good’ green agenda… for the greater good.
...It’s okay to take the wealth of the nation to bail out politically well-connected banks and corporations, because they are ‘too big to fail”, it’s all for the greater good, and as we’ve all been taught so well, the Ends Justify The Means.

That is in fact nearly the only lesson that our schools, through vermin like Professor Ancel, have succeeded in teaching American children for well over a century… which is how it finally came to be accepted in America, a nation which was founded in opposition to that very notion.

Fairness is the ‘End’ which is used to justify their means, and Rights are no longer taught, except as a word pasted over goodies you hope to be given.

3 - Isn't this about Freedom of Speech and Assembly?
Even boneheads like Ron Paul, are falling for this one,

" what he made of the ongoing Occupy Wall Street protests, which have included a noticeable contingency of Paul supporters. On Thursday night, for example, a group of young men assembled at Liberty Plaza in Lower Manhattan were wielding anti-Federal Reserve placards and promoting Paul's presidential campaign. "If they were demonstrating peacefully," Paul told me, "and making a point, and arguing our case, and drawing attention to the Fed–I would say, good!""

This is not about their freedom of assembly or free speech – I’ve no doubt that most Tea Party people would defend their right to that, because we understand that all of our rights would be in jeopardy – if some people unjustly lose their rights, then all of us do.

They are violating the rights of all of us... for the greater good, and they can feel morally satisfied and oh so superior, because...- their Ends Justify their Means.

So with that in mind, have another look at our protesters.

Have a look at that wistful gaze at the image of a CEO’s head on a pike. What do you suppose will follow from that? Today the Occupiers are planning to march past the homes of 'the rich' - if there happens to be no violence, do you think that will be because of, or in spite of, such sentiments?

Think about it.

Something else you really should understand about the philosophy of “The Ends Justify the Means”, there is nothing in those ends, that says they must be attainable. That’s right. You only have to intend that they be good, fair, etc. That intent, your desire that it be good and fair, is enough. When in the 2008 Democrat Primary Debates, Obama was pressed that cutting capital gains taxes would raise more taxes than increasing them, Obama answered twice, that it was more important to impose fairness upon all (and by that he meant raising taxes on those who earn more than (then) $200k), even if it meant possibly losing the revenue you were raising the taxes to achieve.

With a deft twist, their Intentions take precedence over their stated ends, and any means 'reasonably necessary' become justifiable in the pursuit of them, even if they are understood to be unattainable.
Those of you rattling on about 'Don't be ridiculous, no one is saying that!' or 'It couldn't go that far' are mistakenly reasoning that their intention is to achieve their ends. It is not. It is to act on their intentions to achieve their ends. Whether or not they will, or even can, is immaterial to them.

This OWS person tries to evade the issue, tries to clothe herself in 'reasonableness'

“We aren’t arguing for socialism, we aren’t arguing for capitalism”

But it's a good idea to remember that the New York Times declared that 'Reason is no longer a tool for truth, but a weapon to win arguments - logically or illogically doesn't matter, only winning does'.

Why? Go on - guess.

The real focus for us should be what they say they are for, and what they say they are for are unattainable Utopian ideals. It doesn't matter in the least what good intentions they tell themselves they desire to attain, what matters is that they ARE unattainable, and that the only way to attempt to attain them, is the same way that people have attempted to attain them since Robespierre, by depriving others of their Rights – and they will destroy the rights – and lives - of everyone else in the process of pursuing them.

If they gain the least bit of momentum, all of their good intentions will mean nothing at all, they will lead to nothing but death and destruction in fact.

IOW, the unintelligible, fractious message, and the angry sense that someone has somehow wronged them...IS their message, they believe that those actions advance their intentions... and that is all they need to feel morally satisfied and superior. Even as they crap on police cars, or the flag... or [insert anything near and dear to you that might be in their way or just serve as a convenient excuse for making a 'statement'].
Others have even said that we shouldn't indict the entire movement for the unwise actions of a few.

That isn’t the issue. And indicting the 'movement' for the actions of a few isn't either. The real issue is in what they say they are for - unattainable Utopian ideals. It doesn't matter in the least what good intentions they tell themselves they desire to attain, what matters is that they ARE unattainable, and that the only way to attempt to attain them, is the same way that people have attempted to attain them since Robespierre, by depriving others of their Rights – and they will destroy the rights – and lives - of everyone else in the process.

If they gain the least bit of momentum, all of their good intentions will mean nothing at all, they will lead to nothing but death and destruction in fact.

4 - This is about the Govt/Business partnership! It's about the bailouts!
Really? Who has done more to mingle and unite the government with corporations, than this congress and this administration? What are the stated aims of these protesters, Bill Ayers, and everyone else?

They want to pass laws and regulations which will involve the government, and its agencies and its regulatory bureaucracy, in the intimate details of not only the largest corporations in America, but the smallest of businesses.

Have you looked at Obama care? Have you looked at who is getting exemptions from it? Do you think they are the smallest, or the largest, of businesses? The largest corporations, friends of Obama, G.E., AFL-CIO (yeah, that's a BIG business), have received exemptions because they have the wealth on hand to influence those who make the rules, and the aim of those who make the rules is the famous proregressive third way - to combine government and corporations!

These people are NOT for getting govt out of business, but for uniting them into a single, seamless whole, socialization by other means, is socialization all the same.

5 - So then what is your answer?!
As I said in my last post, if you want a useful answer, make sure you are asking a useful question, then you have a chance of getting an answer that's worth considering. My answer is to ask the right questions - Do you want to live your own life? If so, what will that require?

Is your goal to ensure that corporations do not have power over you?
* There is only one system which can take that power away from them.
Do you want to put an end to government granting favors to corporations?
* There is only one system which can prevent the government from granting favors to corporations.
Do you want to live your own life without interference from either the government or from corporations?
* There is only one system which can ensure you of that.

The only answer is to bring real, radical change to America, not by transforming it, but by fulfilling it! That can only be accomplished by bringing America home to the Free Market.

How?

The Free Market requires establishing a wall of separation between business and state.

In a free market, those who infringe upon, negligently endanger, violate the rights of, or take the property of another, are subject to the swift and severe long arm of the law and the hand of Justice.

It is only when you begin to merge them, 'for the greater good', that you make politicians financially useful tools for the rich and powerful, and it is only through mingling the interests of business and state, that businesses can become vulnerable prey for corrupt politicians.

Do not fool yourself - if you are arguing for more regulations, then you are arguing for giving government access to corporate power and influence, and you are giving the biggest, most corruption friendly corporations, direct access to the power of the government. If you are advocating taking the property from anyone, then you are arguing for the elimination of Individual Rights, and advocating for giving the politically powerful the ability to grant favors to it's friends... and take them from those they dislike.

If you are arguing for taking away the right of people to make their own choices, and keep the results of those choices, you are arguing against the Free Market.

The Free Market is nothing other than a society where people are free to live their own lives, make their own decisions, and count on the government and rule of law to uphold and defend their rights and property from crooks and thieves.

Btw, if you are arguing against, or for, ‘Capitalism’, then what you are arguing upon, is the playing field Karl Marx arranged for you.

Why?

Ever try to argue with an American, even one of these OWS idiots, that they should NOT be Free to make their own choices? That’s a losing strategy. But if you can get them to argue about a financial technique, the management of capital, then even the ones defending it, secretly feels guilty about it.

That was Marx’s most brilliant, and most successful move.

But remember, we are fighting for the Free Market, so that you, your family, friends and neighbors, will be free to make those choices and agreements which they choose as being worthwhile, and that no one should be able to prevent them from making their own choices, or from keeping the results of those choices, their property.

That is the Free Market.

If you are truly for fairness, for true justice and true liberty, then that is what you should be protesting for... anything else is only a direct, or indirect, assault upon your own life, liberty and pursuit of happiness - and allowing irrelevant questions to distract you from that core truth, is dangerous.

Before Giving Answers, Please Ask This Question First

2011-10-09T22:42:00.010-05:00

I see lots of answers around today - but does anyone understand the question? There is most definitely a choice to be made in the world today, please be sure you understand the question properly before you give your answer.

I've had some exchanges with friends over the last week which makes it painfully clear that many people are going straight to their favorite answers, and never considering the actual question at all, and several people are even doing their best to seem 'open minded'... in order to avoid the question.

One friend of mine, whose political views do not reflect mine, said that,

“As for the Tea Party, well in my case I would have to do much more research in order to make any kind of informed statement.”

I told them that if they did their research well, what they'd find, is something that should be extremely shocking to them - because it'll come as a shock to them. We don't want anything from them, we don't want to do anything to them - we want the rule of law, fiscal responsibility, and to be left alone. That's it. The Tea Party is a diverse group of people, of all ages, colors, lines of work and levels of wealth, stretching across the nation, who are united by nothing more than their

expectation that the government should be bound by the laws which formed and define it – the Constitution - and we call for the rule of law,
we expect our laws to uphold and defend everyone’s Liberty and Individual Rights equally and without exception, and
Govt should spend wisely in support of those aims, and that its programs should not conflict with the Constitution or its laws

, these are our stated aim, which you can find in one form or another on every groups web page and blog posts.

The sorts of signs you'll see at our rallies are

Give me liberty don’t give me debt
Stop shredding our constitution
Taxed enough already
Can’t read? Run for congress!
Don’t spread my wealth, spread my work ethic,

Do these goals or signs seem to you to be seeking anything other than to be left alone? Are they shocking? Is there anything there that is threatening to anyone? We've held hundreds of rallies across the nation, always peaceful, never accompanied by destruction of property, no violent or unruly (Tea Party) demonstrators, and with zero arrests. I’d say that our stated aims and our track record of behavior reflect each other. Yet we have been portrayed in the press as not very intelligent, inherently violent, thuggish and racist people who yearn for slavery and robbing 'the little guy'.

Does that make sense to you? I’d say the disparity between aims our aims and actual actions, as opposed to how we are portrayed, is something that is definitely worth researching.

On the other hand....
The Occupy Wall street people, well… they aren’t too coherent on their stated demands, but look how the New York Times calmly noted, about them that,

"Occupy Wall Street is a diffuse group of activists who say they stand against corporate greed, social inequality and other disparities between rich and poor. On Sept. 17, 2011, the group began a loosely organized protest in New York's financial district, encamping in Zuccotti Park, a privately owned park open to the public, in Lower Manhattan.
The idea, according to some organizers, was to camp out for weeks or even months to replicate the kind, if not the scale, of protests that had erupted earlier in 2011 in places as varied as Egypt, Spain and Israel."

Hmm... the Protesters own signs, noted in an article in theAtlantic,

A Job Is A Right! Capitalism Doesn't Work
I'm a student with $25,000 in school loans - I'm the 99% - Occupy Wall St. Sept 17 - SOCIALIST PARTY USA www.socialistparty-usa.org
Make Banks Pay!
Demand jobs and income for the workers and poor!
Sh*t is f**ked up and bullsh*t

What do those signs tell you about the sign holders? Do they sound like they just want to be left alone? Do they sound like they're willing to leave you alone?

Idealistic protestors with a representation of Goldman-Sachs CEO
Lloyd Blankfein's head on a pike. Isn't that special?

Look again at what the Times so calmly notes… what were the purposes of protests in they mention there, such as Egypt? Oh yeah, overthrowing the govt. That is making direct comparisons to violent revolutions... and yet the press is on the whole... sympathetic to them.

Unlike the Tea Party, who the press is so eager to say they are 'just like a leftist version of', these protesters have been slovenly, rude and disruptive, resulting in 700 arrests in one instance alone. Another New York Times article notes that,

"Heather Amato, 35, a psychologist who lives near the protest area, said she felt disturbed by some of the conduct of the protesters. She said she had to shield her toddler from the sight of women at the park dancing topless. “It’s been three weeks now,” Ms. Amato said. “Enough is enough.”"

And yet what the opinion leaders and talking heads have to say about these people and their demands, is on the whole, sympathetic, Reuters said,

"When Paul Friedman met the rag-tag youth camped out near Wall Street to protest inequality in the American economy, he felt he was witnessing the start of a protest movement not seen in America since the 1960s.
And Friedman should know. The 64-year-old was a student organizer during the anti-Vietnam War movement, protesting from 1964 for 11 years until the war ended. He also joined Civil Rights actions against racial segregation in America."

Aside from the obvious fond ‘memories of youth’ bias of the press, do these summaries fit the ideas being summarized? These protesters, their signs, their aims, their behavior, they definitely express a consistent set of ideas – Those who have, should be forced to give to others, and the current institutions of America should be overthrown, and spreading revolution, is the way to do it.

Yet how are they portrayed? Warmly.

Here we have a newscaster from "Free Speech TV", Nora Flanders, excitedly talking with Nelini Stamp, an organizer with the 'Working Families Party', established by members of the socialist organization The New Party, ACORN, SEIU and other unions and 'community organizations',
The Newscaster jubilantly says:

"Finally, some occupations we can believe in!"

Nelini says she is there helping with 'bridging the gap' between the occupiers on wall street and those organizations, in order to, as she puts it,

"The goal is to bring Revolutionary change to the States"

And the newscaster finishes with,

"Thanks so much for joining us, keep it up."

In case that isn't clear enough for you let me point out, those calling for the basis of our government to be respected and for our laws to be upheld, are being called lawless thugs; while those calling for revolution, behaving in a disorderly manner resulting in hundreds of arrests, are being called idealistic rag-tag youth.

Hello?

What does that say about the level of concern which the popular press has, that ideas the ideas they are concerned with, and are reporting on, should reflect reality? Do they ever think the least about what the ideas behind these statements are? Can Truth really matter to them? What do you think? Before you answer that, consider this about our event last Tuesday.

Forcing Ideas
A fellow I've met and I’ve worked with on several events over the last couple years, someone I've had meetings and meals with, Martin D. Baker, has decided to run for Congress in Missouri's 1st Congressional District, which has gone democrat for over 60 years, and he was at our event last week... and he was treated by those who disagreed with his his position, with us, like dirt.

Not one of those from the left who behaved so abusively towards him had an ounce of curiosity about why he was running as a Republican; not one of them wanted to ask him why he would consider doing such a thing, their only and immediate response, was to call him an Uncle Tom Ni**er!, and one hell of a lot more.

Why he was running was of no interest, because ideas are clearly of no interest to them, they oppose him not because of his ideas, but because of the color of his skin!

And THAT is something which I think is worth researching.

The article in the Atlantic linked to above, offered this summary,

" If you look across the placards at the protest, there is no one cause. Some signs call for student loan reform. Some call for tax reform. Some call for legal reform. Some are contradictory, such as the calls for anarchy and better government. Some don't make all that much sense. But so what? This is a populist movement, not a campaign platform. Not yet, anyway."

So what? So what?! First of all, he's wrong that there is no one cause being supported, dead wrong, the cause being supported across the board is that they haven't been properly taken care of, and they are mad about it. So what? With that as a basis for a populist movement, the answers they're going to demand is going to reflect the means they are using right now - force. Force and action.

In just the same way as Martin was attacked not because of his ideas, but because of the color of his skin, the Occupy Wall Street people are not attacking 'The Rich' not because they got so much of their money wrongly, but because they have so much money at all.

When ideas are of no interest, force is the only option remaining. And nothing but force, real or implied, is what I've found it reasonable to expect from the proregressive left. Whether we're talking about SEIU union thugs or even Democrat Office Holders, or their supporters, intimidation and violence is the go to response of the proregressive left, and if that surprises you - then in my book, you have a lot of explaining to do.

These “kids” are not only using force to occupy public grounds, obstruct public places and walk ways and bridges, and even storming public buildings; they are engaging in ignorant, rude, crude, uncivil behavior, because that is the only response available when you have cast reason aside, and that should speak volumes to you. If you pass these 'protests' off as if ‘they mean well’, you are saying that the ends justify the mean, and that it is ok - and that means nothing but a blank check for whatever actions and violence that they decide 'is necessary'.

Nothing can come of this behavior, and the tolerance of it, but violence, destruction, and if it ever reaches the scale which they themselves are publicly calling for, death. Mark my words.

Please. Just look at what their manners and actions are, look at what the meaning of their words is, connect the dots, and realize what the result must finally be.

I was recently accused, by someone who should have known better, that

you think "everything is political"

, which is laughable (and cryable) because just the opposite is true. Politics is the bottom rung of philosophy, it is where ideas are put into action - nothing, IMHO, can be changed by politics alone, the best that can be hoped for is to offer counter actions, but if the actions being taken do not reflect the ideas behind those taking them, what is that possibly going to accomplish and for how long?

The Boston Globe actually got it partially right, though not in they way they meant, with this:

"The protests are in some ways the liberal flip side of the tea party movement, which was launched in 2009 in a populist reaction against the bank and auto bailouts and the $787 billion economic stimulus plan."

They are the very opposite of the Tea Party movement,

The Tea Party believes in the Rule of Law, they believe in lawlessness.
We believe in Liberty, they believe people should be forced to behave 'correctly'.
We believe that we are responsible for our own lives, they believe that their lives and livelihoods should be provided for them.

The Question You Need To Ask Before Deciding On An Answer
Ideas are everything, and right now the idea that needs to be thought about, the question that every one desperately needs to ask themselves, is who is the person that should have the Right to choose how you will live your life?

The people who come out and support the Tea Party, the people who nod their heads at us and honk their horns at us as they drive by, they believe that you are the person who should choose how you should live your own life.

The left believes that government should make the choices of your life for you, and provide for you what they think you need.

The Tea Party believes that no one can force you to live in anyway other than you choose, and the left believes, along with Rousseau, that you must be forced to be free, by experts who just know better, what is better for you.

The Tea Party believes that you are the one to choose how best to live your life, liberty and pursuit of happiness.
The Left believes that experts should tell you what choices you are allowed to make and how you should choose between them.

The choice is before you, do you want to live your life... or do you want the government to do it for you?

Everyone wants to do good. But to do Good, requires thought. To intend to do Good, requires only intent. Only one can even hope to do accomplish anything Good, the other is almost a guarantee of unintended evils, born of the thinking you did not do.

Before you give your answer, ask the question first, and think your way to a worthwhile answer - stop taking your favorite brightly packaged one off the shelf.

The Tea Party has been protesting for the need to restore the position of the Constitution to the American form of government - to reestablish the Rule of Law instead of the whims of impassioned men	OWS is about tearing the entire government and system down, in order to satisfy the desires of impassioned men.
The Tea Party is marked by orderly protests	OWS is disorder incarnate.
The Tea Party is about restoring the law	OWS is founded on and through, violating the law by taking over occupying, and refusing to leave, public and private areas.
The Tea Party is protesting for Govt to return to its proper place and allow people the liberty to live their own lives	OWS is entirely oriented around demanding favoritism and govt intrusion into peoples lives.