My Quest for Truth and Liberty
Posts tagged The State
What the Tea Party Needs to Hear, Part 2
Sep 15th
And now we are left with three topics that, were it not for Lincoln, we might not have to discuss, taxation, the military, and the federal reserve.
If prostitution is the oldest profession known to the world, taxation is without a doubt the second oldest. Taxation is the extortion of money through the threat, or actual use of violence. when it is done by a gang, or by a common criminal, it is known as theft, or extortion, but when it is done by the most powerful gang in the land, and the strongest criminals it is called taxation. Go. Read Common Sense by Thomas Paine. He articulates far better than I ever could how the King traces his lineage not to some saint appointed by God, but to William the Bastard, a Norman leading a band of criminals onto the British Isle to subjugate the Anglo-Saxons to his own rule, to kill their men, ravage their women, enslave their children, and deprive their remaining descendants of their land, and their money. But for the Thomas Paines of today, there is no king, instead, we have democracy. where there is not one man, that might be poisoned beheaded or overthrown, but where there are 150 million men and women who subject the other half to their rule. I implore you, love liberty, and do not let your loyalty to liberty be subdued because it is a whole population that taxes you rather than a solitary king. Hold the democracy to the same standard that you would apply to the monarchy. If we were under a king today with the laws and regulations and restrictions, not to mention taxes that are imposed on us, there would be revolution. but because it is a democracy and not a king, this humble gathering reflects all of the outrage present in Comanche County! Taxation is theft. This is what Henry Lightfoot Lee referred to when he said “Government is a necessary evil.” he said that it was evil. evil is the chief adjective in the sentence, necessary only modifies evil. And let me add that he said necessary because he did not have sufficient faith in the free market to leave necessary out. But I will save this topic for another time. my complaint is not that we are taxed to Heavily by D.C., but that we are taxed at all! Let me digress back to the founders and the revolutionaries once again, Ben Franklin suggested that, since we were being taxed without representation, that we send representatives to London, to the house of Commons that we would be represented. Had his advice been followed we would never have gained our independence, nor thrown off England’s oppressive taxes. But the taxes weren’t only oppressive they were unjust, and even if we had sent men to London, they would have remained unjust, for what the Revolutionaries meant when they cried out against “taxation without representation” was not that we should be represented in the central government thousands of miles away, but that the assembly in Massachusetts had not approved the taxes that were levied on them. That the house of Burgesses had not approved the tax. The revolutionaries saw their own local body as their representatives, not some would be out of touch politician sent to the capital of the central government, as likely as not to get caught up in all kinds of scandals and self gratifying political deals. Now you may ask, without taxes how would we fund the government? This we can save for another time, but for now let me just ask just how much government exactly do you want to have? The fact is, if we were to eliminate the entire tax code, and to only allow our tariffs to stay in force, we would still be able to fund a government of the size that we had when Clinton left office. And even then, for those of you who remember, wasn’t the government then to big to bear?
Again let me turn back to history, we know why the patriots resorted to arms, over taxation, but what was it that sparked the taxation of the American colonies in the late 1760’s and early 1770’s? What caused the British government to resort to the Townsend Acts, the Stamp Act, the Navigation Acts? It was nothing else but the expenses incurred by the British Military and the recent war with the French. Understand I am not unsympathetic to those who have loved ones in the military, or those who have made sacrifices for what they thought was liberty. But the same case then is before us now. The British started a war, and sent soldiers to North America in order to “protect us from the French and the” allegedly “savage indians.” But did we need protecting? it seems that we had been doing quite well on our own for the previous century. but they started a war again for our defense and then want us to pay for it. The patriots knew it was nonsense, We didn’t need defending from the central government, we could defend ourselves just fine. In fact the war was quite unnecessary and caused great hardships the the families and the commerce of the colonies. To add insult to injury, they decided to tax us for it. Things are not so different today. The federal government has instigated revolutions, helped to put down other revolutions, and performed coups all over the world until finally someone attacked us, they use this to start a war, and then tax us in order to pay for it. We spend more on our military today than the next 25 countries combined. Now where does this money come from except from taxes? Any one who is truly against large government must also be against a large standing army. Remember that the Military is also part of the government and a very expensive branch of it.
Continuing on the military thread I have 2 points to make one historical, the other economical. For those interested in history, in Roman history in particular, no question draws more debate than that of “When did Rome begin to fall?” Some say with the Rise of Caesar, I say that was the end. I say the beginning came in 396 B.C. during an otherwise forgotten battle only 12 miles from Rome. The Siege of Veii was taking longer than expected, and the men were anxious to go back home to their farms, their jobs, and their families. They could not afford to fight through the harvest and into winter. So the Senate decided to pay the soldiers. From that point on, Roman men no longer fought solely for their home, or for “The Gory of Rome” as flawed as that cause was, but also for a paycheck. Finally the time came when the soldiers didn’t fight at all for Rome, but only for a paycheck. This should bother you. And my response to the question, how then will the soldiers be provided for, I say, that if you require a paycheck to defend your home and your family, you are not a man! Of course fighting on another continent isn’t exactly defending your family, and so I suppose we wouldn’t be in the wars we are in today.
On to the economic aspect. We currently view welfare as a person getting a check to buy food and pay the rent while he sits at home with the A/C running and watches Jerry Springer. This is certainly welfare, but it would be no less welfare if we gave him a check for digging a hole on the odd days of the month and filling it back in on the even days. A job is not just something to do, but something that needs to be done. Whether or not it is something that needs to be done is determined by the free will of people as reflected in the free market. Clearly no one will pay any amount of money to have a hole dug one day only to have it filled back in the next, and so this is welfare. The truth of the matter is, unless a job is done, and the wages for that job are agreed upon in the open and free market, it is nothing short of welfare. Given that the military is not hired on the free market, it must be concluded then that those in the military, and indeed all government employees are welfare recipients. Now you know how much of a drain on the economy and on your own pockets the welfare system is, but the same is true of our military system. instead of holding jobs that contribute to the betterment of the lives of others, we have over a million men and women receiving checks to fight wars and stir up even more trouble for ourselves in Iraq and Afghanistan, or at best sitting in motor pools smoking cigarettes in over 50 other countries around the world. How much richer would we be, how much better off would we be, how much freeer would we be if those million men and women were working at jobs contributing to the economy rather than being paid out of stolen money? Jefferson said that A standing army was one of the greatest threats to a free people. most people take that to mean that the army would come under the control of some tyrant like Caesar or Lincoln, but even without this occurring our liberty is put in peril by its economic implications.
Finally we come to the central bank, or the Federal Reserve as it is known today. You see if taxes were the sole means in which to pay for the military, everyone here, infact everyone across the country would be as opposed to the government military as Patrick Henry and Thomas Jefferson were. but the Federal Government came up with a trick, they would create a central bank that could just print money out of thin air. This way taxes could stay low (relative to what they would be if taxes were the only way to pay for things) which is good for getting votes, but they could still fund the military, and whatever projects, schools, roads, bridges, everything from NASA to the Navy, and Welfare to Warfare. But of course printing money is in fact a tax, it is a hidden tax. You all have heard of supply and demand, when there is a greater supply of a commodity then the price for it goes down, from cars to cereal this is the case. But few stop to ponder its validity when its applied to money itself. Turns out it still holds. the more dollars their are, the less purchasing power each dollar has. Economists on t.v. talk as if rising prices are inflation, but the fact is that inflation refers to the inflation of the money supply. Meaning that more dollars have been printed. This, as I’ve said leads to prices going up. Many complain that we are taxed when we earn money, and taxed when we spend it, but because of the Federal Reserve, we are also taxed if we save it! Because for every dollar printed, the dollars you have in the bank, and even the ones under your mattress loose in value. you will be able to afford less, to buy less with a dollar 5 years from now as you can today. Democrats respond to this problem with minimum wage laws, and Republicans ignore it. but the fact is that rising prices are only a symptom of a greater problem. The Fed! Were we to be on a gold standard, if gold were money today, You wouldn’t have to hire a wall street genius to invest your money. Instead of money loosing its value because its constantly being printed, your money would gain value, because the amount of gold in circulation would rise, due to mining, but only marginally so, since mining cost much more than a printing press, and relative to the population and increase in both capital and consumable goods it would actually decline. Supply and demand, the supply increasing slightly while demand increasing significantly over time, would cause the purchasing price of your money to increase over time, you would only need to have a secure safe in your own home to have a reliable retirement account. And even those getting paid the minimum wage, wouldn’t need a real raise, since the dollar as defined (today as 1/1250th of an ounce of gold) would increase in value slowly over time. giving the person at $7.25 an hour a slight real raise gradually over time.
This concludes every topic I wish to cover insofar as an outline of my core goals and values are concerned. Now let me turn to the area of strategy. Its said that Socialists concern themselves 90% with how to implement their programs and only 10% with how their ideas will actually work. While Libertarians spend 90% of their time thinking of how a libertarian society would work and what is wrong with the state, and only 10% of their time thinking about how to implement their programs. If there were a 12 step program on how to implement Libertarian policies, I wouldn’t be able to tell you what steps 2 through 12 would be. but I can tell you what step one would be. To work on Theory. What do we stand for? (if I haven’t said it explicitly yet, Life, Liberty, and Property. What does and what does not warrant violence? For this movement to be successful, we must be well read. and be educated. We had a revolution here, and it was successful, I attribute that success to the level of education and the ideological purity of the revolutionaries. Shortly thereafter, the French had a revolution, it started off strong, and it looked like it would be successful. but the French were just upset with the king. they had not read John Locke, nor John Trenchard, nor Thomas Gordon, nor John Wilkes, nor John Lillburne. And at the end of the day the French Revolution failed. They ended up with blood running in the street, starvation, conscription, the reign of terror, and an Emperor even worse than the king they had killed.
The Ludwig von Mises Institute is the vanguard, the elite, the best of the best when it comes to resisting governmental tyranny. It is primarily an economic institution, which I can not over emphasize the importance of understanding economics. As easy as it is for you and I to understand the depravation of Liberty under Socialism, many will only understand the unfeasibility of Socialism as an economic system. Ludwig von Mises, Systematically refuted Socialism as a system of production in 1927 in a time when everyone thought it was the wave of the future. The institute is named in his honor. His best student Murray N. Rothbard was the founder, he was also the founder of the Cato Institute, but it of course what hijacked out from under him. Rothbard wrote many books, What has the Government Done to Our Money? and The Case against the Fed are both must reads dealing with… Money. He also wrote Conceived in Liberty a history of the colonies from their planting until the Treaty of Paris in 1783. and the single work that needs to be read by everyone here before you read anything else. The Ethics of Liberty. the first 4 or 5 chapters being crucial to establishing a solid basis for a philosophy of Liberty.
The Mises institute, online at www.mises.org has over 6 TBs of data dedicated to accurate history, sound economics, and Liberty available for free. They have hundreds of books for sale, and dozens for free in PDF, .epub, and on audio that you can download for free either on their site or on itunes, under mises university along with plenty of speeches, covering everything from anti trust laws, to intellectual property laws, and the history of Rome, to the history of WWII.
Being in the moment, it is to soon to tell, but I can tell this much, unless we dedicate ourselves to liberty, and to being educated, this movement will at best fizzle, and at worst end up like the French Revolution.
Thank you for your time.
What the Tea Party Needs to Hear, Part 1*
Sep 14th
It seems rather strange to have someone else posting on www.savannahliston.com, but there are two reasons, 1) Savannah Liston doesn’t always have the time to write posts and 2) sometimes (well, a lot of times) other people can say things better than Savannah Liston does, so why not let them have a go at it? The author of this post is Andrew Hayes. I’m stealing his bio from his FB profile…Andrew Hayes is married and presumably happily married to someone who will remain unnamed until the aforesaid chooses otherwise. He appears to live in Oklahoma, but I can’t be sure because another FB friend says she lives in India when I clearly know she lives in Wisconsin. He has studied in some form at the Mises Institute and specializes in studying the boom-bust cycle, political philosophy, ethics and liberty. Without any further ado, I present…Andrew Hayes on “What the Tea Party Needs to Hear.”
The Tea- Party has finally come to Comanche County. And so I suppose this is my cue to finally get involved. But before I do I would like to address a few things.
In the first place its important to recognize that not all of the “founding fathers” were patriots. There was quite a large contingency of men during those formative years that were not in favor of liberty for mankind, nor for low taxation, nor for a limited government. Ben Franklin at one point put fourth the idea of doing away with the states entirely and having a single central government to rule the entire country. Hamilton envisioned an American empire based off the British Empire. And George Washington after Fighting a war over taxes on tea, was ready to fight a war against his own people who were rebelling over his unjust tax on whiskey. On the other side there were principled men, who were of the opinion that what London was doing wasn’t right, and it wouldn’t be right even if it were our government that did it. George Mason, and Patrick Henry, chief among them, campaigned against the Ratification of the Constitution in Virginia, and were instrumental in the drafting of the Bill of Rights, without which, the constitution would be clearly seen for what it is, the Charter of a centralized, overbearing, intrusive and unjust centralized government.
The Constitution is not holy, it was not written by the finger of God on stone tablets and brought down from Mount Sini by Washington! the men who voted for it, were not founding fathers, but traitors to the revolution. Its justification, the very excuse for a stronger centralized government was to beat the british and gain our independence, they said the Articles were not strong enough. And if we lived in Ray Bradbury’s novel, we might accept this as truth, but the fact is that the King signed a peace treaty with the 13 colonies and Vermont four years before the constitution was ratified. Turns out the constitution was entirely unnecessary. Yet there was a silver lining, in that dark our. The Anti Federalist, those against a strong centralized government gave us the bill of rights, the first 10 amendments to the constitution.
They were not the founding fathers, that is they had very little to do with establishing the government that we know today, instead I like to call them Revolutionaries. The Washington’s and the Hamilton’s wanted freedom from the british only to Found their own British system here in America, The Revolutionaries, wanted a real Revolution, to get out from under the yoke of the centralized government of England and to live free, not to “found” anything!
Thomas Jefferson and his compatriots would be shocked to know that millions of school children across this land pledge allegiance to the federal government. His idea of our republic was one of men, not of government. Imagine, that in those days, even eighty years later, a fellow living in a relatively rural area such as ours would likely live his entire life without seeing a federal employee except the USPS worker who brought his mail. (the USPS owes its origins to Franklin who again wanted the british system transplanted into America, the British established a government post office for the sole task of reading private letters of its subjects in order to sniff out sedition.) What has the federal government got to do with me?
The federal government is the servant of the states and of the people, thus it seems backwards, even Orwellian that the servant should demand allegiance from its master! How is it conceivable that a sovereign should pledge allegiance to his servant? It was only in the warped and twisted mind of a socialist named Francis Bellemy that this would be the case. He Authored the Pledge of Allegiance in 1892. His cousin wrote a socialist utopia novel entitled Looking backwards, assuming that shortly after 1888 America became socialists and imagining what the world would look like in the year 2000. Of course he and his cousin knew that socialism could never be realized until the State were supreme, and to that end Francis wrote the Pledge in order to reinforce that idea, that the central government demanded our allegiance over all other things and in all areas of life, the phrase liberty and justice was either meant as in “social liberty and justice” or just as ploy to make it more palatable to the masses.
I’ve seen on t.v., not on my own mind you, since I don’t have enough loose money to spend on FCC filtered media, that the United States flag is waved at Tea Party rallies across America. I promise you this, I will never be seen doing so. I am told that that is my flag and that I should love it. I can not muster this love. That is the flag flown outside the IRS building, where they count my hard earned money I’ve worked for. That is the flag flown outside of the FCC building where they do everything they can to filter the information that I am able to take in. That is the flag flown outside the Human Services building where they redistribute our money to those unwilling to work, and in the case where the individual is unable to work, they usurp one of the roles of the Church and the community. The flag flown outside the Social Security Administration building that takes your money for old age, but that you will most likely not see. It is the flag that is flown outside the Federal Education Department that tries to teach our children that the states are mere provinces of the federal government and that Lincoln saved the country.
He did not save the country, he saved the federal government, the country is the church houses, neighbors, businesses, friends and family, and even the landscape that you see everyday. The government is the monopoly apparatus of compulsion and violence that rules over the country. Thus I elect to fly the Gadsden Flag, the true American Flag, not the United States Government flag.
But let me touch more on Lincoln. You were taught in school that he saved the country, as I mentioned what he really did was save the American Empire. He a hero not just to the likes of George W. Bush and Obama, but was first the hero of Bismarck, Hitler, Karl Marx, and Stalin. Why? Because he did everything in his power, and even things outside of his power to retain control over people who wished to have their own government, be self ruling, and be left alone. He instituted a central bank, which created money out of thin air, the forerunner to the Federal Reserve today. It was under him that the income tax was first levied on Americans, a tax so vile it would make Patrick Henry cry out for british rule again, if not lead him to suicide. When a man named Vandingham in Ohio, a former congressman, at a rally spoke out against the income tax, Lincoln had him arrested without a warrant and deported to the South. Upon hearing this Chief Justice Tanney wrote the president a letter, rebuking him, Lincoln’s response was to issue an arrest warrant for Tanney himself (no one executed the warrant). He shutdown hundreds of newspapers in New York City and across the North. He forcibly kept the Maryland state legislature from convening. He did nothing to reign in his generals who stole from southerners, even those who wanted nothing to do with the war one way or another, or when they burned civilian homes and businesses, even churches across the South. Prior to lincoln the states had on occasion instituted drafts, but Lincoln was the first to successfully institute a national draft. denying men of their liberty, and in many cases ultimately their lives in order to deny other men their freedom. And while we are on the topic of freedom, the most famous and least read document must be the Emancipation Proclamation. The government schools teach us that Lincoln freed the slaves, in fact it freed not a one. The document only had effect, or only claimed to have effect, where the federal government had no control. Whole states were exempted, those that remained loyal to the federal government, Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland, the capitol city itself, Delaware along with the 67 counties of Virginia that later became West Virginia. Even the places where the federal army had taken control of like parts of Tennessee were purposefully omitted from the Emancipation Proclamation. It was nothing more than a cheap political trick, the document was sent out across Europe in the hopes of casting the war as one over slavery in order to keep European powers from intervening on the side of self determination.
I mention this history to bring to light whats real, what is true. If we were a football team playing a game perhaps we could afford to aspire to a fictional hero. But the stakes are far to high here. Know your history. He who controls the past controls the present, and right now the past and the present is controlled by those who see the government not as the servant of the people, but the other way around.
And now we are left with three topics that, were it not for Lincoln, we might not have to discuss, taxation, the military, and the federal reserve.
* As I said, the reason I wanted to publish this is because I wanted to take a break from posting. It would be more effective if I were to split this article up into 2 parts. It would give me more vacation time and spare you from having to read a rather long article at one time. I tend to have a short attention span while at the computer, so if this is published in two parts, you might read it all…I hope. At least that’s my intention.
Our “Inheritance”
Sep 13th
Recently a commenter asked this question, “Why have we inherited such a militant approach to the difference in language, culture and identity do you think?”
He then said that he could answer this in a thousand words, but didn’t want to bore me. This question, however, intrigued me. It was a different approach to a subject I’ve long considered. Since this is my site, and since I’m supposed to write thousands of words, I thought I might spend a few minutes exploring this issue.
To reword the question, why do we have such intolerance towards different cultures, languages and identities? I find this ironic in light of the postmodernism which has swept our country. We must “tolerate” all things. “My wrong is your right so don’t get all uppity about things and think you can tell everyone how to live.” But it is true, and perhaps this is another facet of postmodernism: we say one thing and do another. We say tolerance but cannot tolerate Christianity. We say “everyone is right” but deride Christians as being wrong. But that’s not really what this commenter is talking about.
I’ve developed a few thoughts on it.
1) This militant approach to differences might be attributed to the Arminianism that has overtaken Christianity. Let me take a moment and sort this out. Before Arminianism, Christians believed that a) all people are depraved (sinful) by nature and through the Fall their whole being (mind and body) has been corrupted by sin. Therefore b) only God can save any person. Even our best works are but filthy rags before God. He must reach down and change our heart before we will be inclined to Him. But then Arminianism came in (way back in oh, around 300 A.D., I think) and argued that no, there are some parts of us that aren’t corrupted. Our mind/intellect is still “perfect” and so we can move towards God and “accept” Him on our own without any of His help. We can be good enough for God, if we try hard enough. So what did this change? Instead of focusing on the Gospel, on the Work of Christ, on God’s grace, Christianity become focused on us and what we do. It shifted from the true grace-based salvation to a false works-based salvation. And what did that mean? This brings me to the Philippines War. In the 1890′s the American government waged a war on the Philippines. They pretended it was about saving the Philippines from the Spanish, but it was much more than that. There was a militant religious motivation. It was America’s “manifest destiny.” The justification?”God has blessed us with so much more than those people. It is our duty to go over there and share with them what we have.” Translated out of the propaganda it was basically: “We’re so much better than those people, we’re smarter, richer, morally better, etc…so we’re going to go over there and shove our religion, our traditions, our culture, etc…down their throat.” Now, if they were based on a true understanding of Scripture they would have realized that religion can’t be shoved down peoples’ throats. It isn’t like that at all. We can preach and share the gospel, but must let God do the work. Because of this Arminianism, conversion to Christianity became a) an outward and works-based activity, and b) state-supported and spread. For who can shove things down throats better than the government?
Our doctrinal understanding certainly hasn’t gotten any better in the last 100 years.
Or another theory is this.
2) As I said at the beginning, there seems to be a disconnect between what we say, “tolerate everyone” and what we do, “don’t let those evil Muslims/right-wing extremists/conservative Christians take over this country!” And according to Gene Edward Veith, this is an integral part of postmodernism. From “Postmodern Times” he says, “…holding mutually contradictory ideas has become characteristic of the contemporary mind-set….Many people fail to think through their positions and make little effort to be consistent.” But it gets even more interesting from there. Postmodernism rejects any sort of universal commonality between all people. There are a few subpoints to this thought. 1) If there are no absolutes, no God, no Creator, there is no reason why “we” as humans are any better than pigs, elephants, dogs, or even mosquitos. Veith says, about environmental extremists, “To think one’s own species is somehow superior to other species to branded ‘speciesism,’ the moral equivalent to racism.” 2) Postmodernists argue that the word “we” is doing violence to all the “he’s and “she’s” because it is destroying their uniqueness. By saying “we” I’m forcing on you some sort of commonality which you may or may not want to accept and hold to. Veith, “We must not assume that human beings have anything in common. To do so is innately oppressive, forcing others into our own molds.” To clarify, Veith is rephrasing the Postmodernist idea, he is not arguing for it or supporting it. So practically, this means that there’s no reason why I should treat an Iraqi as I would want to be treated because I cannot think of him/her as my equal. Again, Veith, “If there are no universal principles, why act morally toward him, or, as we used to say, why treat him humanely?”
And in an epic turn of irony, because universals are denied to save the individual, the individual is swallowed up in meaninglessness and cruelty. I just expressed that idea poetically, let me now say it logically. After taking logic, my brain started thinking in logical statements. a) We must deny all universal absolutes, all commonalities among all humans because this destroys the individuality of each person. b) If there are no universals, we lose the concept of human rights, of liberty, of equality, of justice. c) Without rights, without liberty, equality and justice, the individual cannot survive. Therefore: Denying the absolute to save the individual leads to the destruction of the individual.
But then, paradoxically, postmodernism has split the world into mutually antagonistic groups. It is obvious that our world is not united…even within countries there are groups battling other groups. Why? If there are no universals, there is no identity. If all humans are not a “group” made in the image of God, living under the command of God, then other groups must be made. These groups are generally based on superficial commonalities. We reject our commonness as humans, but because we are humans we must find our identity based on some sort of group. These groups are formed religiously, culturally, politically, etc…and the individual is lost in the scope of these groups. “The child killed becomes irrelevant because she belonged to the group we call Muslims and I don’t belong to that group so they are my enemies.”
I can be persuaded by both of these arguments. I think that our current situation is probably a combination of both. Among the religious right, I think that answer 1 is probably more likely but as a whole in our nation, postmodernism seems to be more of an issue than the Arminian/Manifest Destiny response. What to take away from this?
All people were created by God in the image of God. We are all equal under God. This means that no person and no group of people have the right to dominate any other people. Only by embracing these universal absolutes can individual liberty be saved.
From the Next Generation…and I don’t mean the Star Trek series
Sep 11th
Today is the anniversary of 9-11. On Facebook and all around I hear various responses to this. I suppose it is because I have a well-rounded group of “friends” (I used friends in a loose sense to mean people I “know” merely through social networking). One post said something like “we must keep the memories of the younger generations sharp.” Well, I guess that must be me, as someone who was about 9 when 9-11 happened, I do remember it. I remember it as well as I want to. In fact, I remember it too well. I remember my hatred against “those people” who did such a thing. I remember my fear, “will they blow up all of America?” I remember my loyalty, “I’m not gonna let them destroy my country!” I’m ashamed of all that now. I was too young to realize the truth. I just responded the way I was expected to respond.
So, as a member of the younger generation: We don’t need to remember. We must move on. Yes, we must remember 9-11 as a tragedy. We must remember the innocent lives cut short. But that is all. None of this hatred, this purposeful stirring up of memories to kindle the fires of fear and hatred against “them.” What will that gain us? The world has enough hatred already.
We’ve been distracted. If I were more sure of my philosophy, I’d throw something in about the Hegelian Dialectic. But what I mean is this. The government has pitted our society against the Muslims. They’ve led us to believe that our mortal foe in this life are the Muslims who just hate us so much they can’t wait to murder us all. We are focused on this “mortal foe.” We don’t see the Patriot Act. We don’t see our liberties being taken away. Not by the Muslims, but by our own government. We’re so busy watching the stage-show that we don’t notice the pickpocket emptying us all of everything we hold dear.
Yes, there are Muslims who hate us, probably. But how much does that have to do with their religion and how much of it is caused by our foreign policy? Someone said something like this, “I won’t forget the killings. I won’t forget their IED’s. I won’t forget their beheadings, etc…” Likewise, we must not forget what Wikileaks has shown us. We must not forget the American drone attacks that kill innocent civilians in the mideast. We must not forget the slaughter of children, mothers, the elderly, the sick.
In order to survive, we must stop hating. Islam is a religion of hate because it is a religion of works. Christianity is a religion of love because it is a religion of grace. How can we bear the Christian name and yet hate those who need the grace of the gospel most?
“God Bless Our Troops”
Sep 9th
I seem to have a problem with this phrase. Some will argue that it is because the troops are risking their lives. I can agree with that. I can admire their courage in doing so. But according to several articles I’ve looked at, fishermen, loggers, and pilots have the most dangerous job. Here, read it yourself. So, theoretically, we ought to have little stickers on our cars saying, “God Bless Our Fishermen,” and “God Bless Our Loggers.” Yeah, it doesn’t have the same sort of feeling as “God Bless Our Troops.” But from a purely economic perspective loggers, fishermen and pilots are more productive than the troops. I mean, think about it–from an economic standpoint, try to forget for a moment everything you’ve heard about our military and how good they are–fishermen engage in that dangerous job so we can eat. Loggers do their dangerous job work so that we can have homes and all the other countless things that come from wood. Pilots risk their lives so we can get places faster and spend our time in more productive ways than driving across the country. So from an economic perspective, I really can’t see what is so important about the military that we must all ask God to bless them.
I have to thank the person (who will remain anonymous for their sake) who keeps sending me emails every morning. This is the second day that I’ve opened one of those emails and decided to launch into a tirade about it. And the tirade invariably ends up here on my website.
Here’s what one email said this morning. It is from a supposedly legitimate source.
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So what in the world is that supposed to mean? I have two responses to it:
1) Suppose that the Iranian is right and that the American is in Iranian airspace. How is it “reason” for that American to ignore that information and violate their property rights? Now, if I were to apply the reasoning of yesterday on national borders, that would change things quite a bit, so I’ll leave that discussion to those better-versed in property rights theory. So imagine with me that the American is trespassing on Iranian airspace. We’re supposed to be proud that he won’t respect the rules and boundaries around him?
2) Suppose that the American is right and that he’s in Iraqi airspace and the Iranian is mistaken. Is this American willing to start a scuffle (to put it mildly) simply because the Iranian has made a mistake? Wouldn’t it be more diplomatic to try to sort things out without engaging in any sort of fighting? Especially considering the “delicate” state of Iran and how everyone is tip-toeing around trying not to set them off and yet make them give up their nuclear weapons. How can we be proud of this brashness? It doesn’t seem very American to me.
So there’s my thoughts on that…if it matters at all, which it probably doesn’t.
The Illegal Debate
Sep 8th
This post title is a little confusing. I didn’t mean that this particular debate is illegal, like, outlawed by the government. I’m talking about the debate in this country over illegal immigrants. I have several things to say. As a word of caution, my first point will seem like it is irrelevant, but trust me, it will make sense in the end.
1) It is extremely important to consider where our rights come from. There’s a grammar rule that says you shouldn’t end a sentence with a “from,” so perhaps I should have said, “It is extremely important to consider from where our rights come,” but that seems a bit more awkward. What I mean is this: We have no “constitutional rights.” The Constitution never gave us any rights. That was not the purpose (the purpose was to create a big government, in my opinion…but that’s another story). Besides that, a piece of paper can’t give rights. If it did, I could get together a group of very well-known and smart people, find a large piece of paper that appears to be rather ancient, and in my best handwriting with a feather and ink, declare, “All Americans have the right to 3 cookies per day.” And of course, if each person doesn’t get 3 cookies a day, their rights are being violated….right? Anyways, I digress. I’m a little hungry (this blog post is being written pre-breakfast), so the thought of cookies was slightly distracting. I believe that we have our right to life, liberty and property because of the existence of God, because He made all people equal, because we were made in the image of God, etc…some people believe that we have those rights because, well, we’re obviously better than monkeys, so we must have more rights. Okay, that’s probably not quite how they phrase it, but that’s how I imagine that it must be. Obviously, those sorts of people are at quite the disadvantage here on my site, but they’ve probably got their own sites where I’m at a disadvantage, so it all comes out even, I suppose. But I digress again. My 1st point is that all people have the right to life, liberty, and property and that these rights come not from human inventions, thoughts, or devices, but from something higher than humanity itself.
2) This illegal immigrant debate sometimes scares me. Maybe I’ve studied history too much. Not matter what is happening, I usually can say, “oh, this is just like __________, when so-and-so did ________ to _________,” or whatever it might be. It scares me that we are turning the Mexican race into a subhuman sort of people. And yes, this is like what we did to the Germans and Japanese during WWII. That will makes me sad and angry, thinking about those Americans imprisoned in what were basically concentration camps…all because they happened to have Japanese or German ancestors. Atrocities happen when we begin to think of some people have being not quite as good as we are. Nagasaki and Hiroshima will be eternal proof of that. It is like these suspected terrorists who are always depicted as looking something like the “missing link”…not quite human, not quite beast. I saw a series of pictures this morning in an email. I should not have opened the email. It was a bitter start to my morning. It was a series of pictures taken by this motion-sensing camera posted near a watering hole in Arizona. It wasn’t really a watering hole, but more like a giant tub of water. So obviously it was placed there by someone, not just a natural feature. The first picture was a cougar or something similar drinking from the tub. The next was a deer. Then a badger or something similar (I’m not real strong on my Arizona animals) came. And then a few other creatures. And then a small group of Mexicans. Now most people wouldn’t object to having wild animals come and drink from their watering hole. A deer is fine. Even a cougar. But no illegals, please! For heaven’s sake, why not? Are these humans (yes, in case you are wondering, I assure you, Mexicans are people) even below the cougar and the deer? That picture just made me sick because I can imagine how many people open it and go, “oh, those rotten thieving illegals…look at them!”
Now it is true, these illegals were probably trespassing on private property. And that is wrong. But must we regard them as subhuman because they are trying to improve their lot in life?
And that leads to a subpoint, (don’t worry, I will eventually get to point 3), about the nature of political borders. I’ve often lectured on the stupidity of the political borders in the mideast. These borders were drawn for political purposes. They forced enemy tribes together and split up tribes. It was absurd. It had led to no end of fighting and tension because of these ridiculous borders. So, in the interest of being fair, I must ask, what’s so significant about this line in the sand that some big-wig (i.e., president, government official, etc…) deigned to draw, and suddenly, anyone who crosses the line without permission is a criminal. It doesn’t really make sense, does it?
3) I happen to believe that our anger against these “illegals” is falsely directed. Instead of being mad at them, we should put the blame squarely at the feet of the government. You say that they come and take our jobs? Yes, because they are illegal, they can and will work for under minimum wage. Get rid of the minimum wage laws and you too could have their job. You say that they live off welfare? Yes, they do. I happen to know that at least in one state, they have several side jobs that they do “under the table” and collect unemployment or whatever government benefits they can. Well, get rid of the government handouts, get rid of welfare, get rid of unemployment (I mean the unemployment benefits from the government, not unemployment itself. I think that’s economically impossible), and you wouldn’t have millions of “illegals” living off the system. Get rid of the system and they would have to stand on their own two feet and make a go of it like all immigrants did 100 years ago. Many would find that they don’t want to do it on their own and they would leave. Others would prove to be productive members of society (I don’t like that phrase, but I’ll use it, just this once) and would make our “country” better off.
So that’s my theory. Stop getting mad at the “illegals” who cross this line in the sand, and instead work to get rid of the system that is ruining us all.
Happy Socialist Holiday!…
Sep 6th
As one of my friends said this morning on Facebook. I doubt if many Americans think of it that way. But last night my little sister said, “what is Labor Day about?” And I had to try to remember what I read about it last year, but couldn’t. I thought it had something to do with Marxism, but promised to do research on it and let her know the details.
There were several reasons why I speculated that Labor Day was motivated by Marxism. 1) We must never forget the enormous emphasis that Marxism puts on labor. The labor theory of value, etc…so when I think of a holiday celebrating the “working man” or the labor class, I think immediately of Marxism. 2) Related to the first point, I suspect that originally, this was a holiday that encouraged and was built on class conflict. The labor class vs. the rich capitalists. It is a classic Marxist set-up.
It seems that in most of the world, Labor Day is held on May 1st. Back in the 1800′s, the Socialists and Communists used May 1st as “Labor Day”…the day to celebrate the working class. And so here in America, to avoid being associated with the Socialists, the government decided that Labor Day would be in late summer/early fall instead of May 1st.
If I had more time, I’d do more research. But I’m so busy laboring that I don’t have time. So you’ll have to look up Labor Day on your own. Suffice to say, it is not what it appears, as few things are.
Pragmatism over Principles?
Sep 6th
I was reading this great article this morning on the real history of our country. It started off talking about how the “Revolutionaries” of the American Revolution were not part of the writing of the Constitution, i.e., the founding of a central government. Some of those who played a major role in the Revolution were fighting for the freedom to do whatever they wanted. Others engaged in it because they wanted to be the ruler, not George III. For some it was a struggle between liberty and tyranny (no, I’m not a Mark Levine fan, I find it annoying though that the phrase liberty and tyranny makes me think of his not-so-great “book”), and for others it was about who was going to rule. If that didn’t catch my attention, the article went on to “bash” the myth of Lincoln. So the author went on tearing down what I call the state myths. These ideas that are so well-trenched in our minds that we don’t recognize them as being carefully nurtured by the state.
Suffice to say, I thought it was an excellent article.
But then I read a comment someone left about it. That was interesting. They brought up the whole issue of “what good does it do to stand around bashing our Founding Fathers, tearing Lincoln down, destroying nearly every hero we ever believed in? That doesn’t do anything for our current situation.” They said something like, “we should focus on the practical and plausible, not the philosophical.”
And that made me stop and think about the whole issue of pragmatism and principles. The practical vs. the philosophical. And here’s my take on it.
Ideas are the most powerful thing in this world. More powerful than armies. More powerful than dictators. You can assassinate a dictator. You can burn all books and make certain things “thought-crime.” And yet that will not kill an idea. I’m a fan of Alexander Solzhenitsyn, the Russian writer who lived through years in a Siberian prison. If there were any conditions that would kill the idea of liberty, it would be those conditions under Stalin. And yet Solzhenitsyn did not despair. He did not give up. The idea of liberty was so firmly planted in his mind that years of hard labor and indoctrination could not remove it. We can argue about why ideas are powerful. I tend to think that the concept of liberty is directly related to the existence of God, and just as we cannot erase the idea of God from our hearts, no one can “kill” the idea of liberty.
In light of that, I think that the philosophy of who Lincoln was, what motivated our Founding Fathers, etc…will determine what we think about practical subjects. For instance…if we believe that a central government was absolutely necessary in the beginning of our country, if the Founding Fathers saw that we simply had to have some central authority, if we believe that the War of Northern Aggression (aka the Civil War) was about saving the Union and that this Union, united by the central government, was of paramount importance and was more important than individuals and individual liberty, then we will have a very centralized idea about the United States now. We will resist nullification, as this means that states are rebelling against and weakening the Union, and we cannot have that. If we think Lincoln was all good, we will think that some bad things are necessary for a good end. We will believe that the end justifies the means. And so we will not hesitate now to support something bad in order that something good come.
So, when we talk about historical events and people, it is more than just an intellectual exercise, more than just being entertained by these politically incorrect ideas. What we think about the past will determine what we do now, and of course, if we don’t understand the past, then we will repeat it.
Powerpoint Presentation from Chicago
Sep 4th
This is the presentation I gave on Friday, September 3rd in Chicago. There is no sound, it is just the powerpoint. If you have questions about it, or don’t understand a slide, let me know. The slide changes every 7 seconds, in case you were wondering. Enjoy! 
Chicago Seminar Report
Sep 3rd
Firstly, I’m extremely tired. I woke up at 3.45am this morning so we could catch the train from Harvard to Chicago. It has been a long day, but very rewarding.
The seminar this morning was great. We had a good turnout, and I think it went really well. Kudos to Justin and Chris for their work in putting it together. Despite some confusion and difficulty with computers, powerpoints, projects, etc…at the beginning, we managed to make it work smoothly.
I was excited to meet a new homeschooling family, that always makes me so happy. It totally made my day to see these dedicated parents bringing their kids on a field trip to the seminar and then the End the Fed Rally. Amazing. Good for them.
A point of observation: Chicago isn’t called the Windy City just because it was the only thing someone could think of. Actually, there’s a very good reason to call it the Windy City. I might go so far as to say, the Cold Windy City…at least in the early morning. I never quite warmed up from our trek through Chicago this morning. I’m very thankful for the little structures that you can wait for buses in…keeps the wind from freezing you through and through.
Another observation, if you do your homework ahead of time, the bus schedule isn’t really complicated. I think we were a little intimidated at first looking at the map, but after my third trip to Chicago, I’m getting the hang of it…a little.
In a way, Chicago is really quite fascinating. From a literary perspective, it is interesting to observe all these lives being lived out right in front of you. I like that part. The buildings are interesting too. Especially when the sun is shining. But it gets a little lonely too. Tends to make me wish I were alone in the middle of nowhere. Somehow I wouldn’t feel so alone there. And the noise. I think that’s the main reason I wouldn’t want to live there. I was getting a headache from all the noise and commotion…trains, cars, construction, on and on, that’s what I don’t like about it. Although, I suppose Chicago wouldn’t be quite the same if it were a quite city.
So, this isn’t exactly a report on the seminar…right now I’m a little too exhausted to fully comprehend how the seminar went and to put my thoughts into coherent sentences. So that will have to wait till morning. Suffice to say, it went well, and I think the rally was a success as well…still waiting to hear an official report on that from someone who attended. We didn’t stay for the rally as we needed to get home by late afternoon, and it was already a long day.
