Yes to Dr. No?

I really haven’t taken the time to verify everything I’ve read about Dr. No.  But I’ve met him several times – even went to his birthday party a couple of years ago – and, full disclosure, he sent me money for a political campaign.  I am very highly biased in favor of this man’s integrity and purpose.  So, I’m just posting something here that somebody sent me.  I believe (but don’t know for certain) that it’s all true:

In his high school years Ron Paul became the 220-yard dash state champion, he played football and baseball, and was student council president. An injury ended Ron’s career in sports, but he still managed to become the only Congressman in history to knock the ball out of the park in the Congressional Baseball Game.

He began working at his father’s dairy at age five, and later delivered newspapers and became a milkman upon reaching driving age. He paid for his first year at Gettysburg College with saved lemonade-sale and lawn-mowing money. In the later college years he started delivering mail and also managed the college coffee shop called “The Bullet Hole”. He earned a medical degree from Duke, became a “career obstretrician” and delivered over 4000 babies. In his practice, he refused Medicare and Medicaid payments, instead treating the poor at a discount rate or for free.

Ron Paul’s been married to his spouse Carol for over 50 years. He has 5 children, all of whom believe in him and support him.

He is a Southern Baptist and a Christian of deep faith, but never uses his religion in political fights.

Ron Paul is the only veteran in the race and he served part of his time close to the Afghani-Pakistani border back in the 60s. He gets three times as much donations from active military duty personnel as all other republican candidates combined, and 10 times the amount the next candidate, Romney, gets. That’s because Ron Paul is the one who wants to use the military with a clear goal – to defend the country. This means that if necessary he would send the troops to war, fight it, win it and get the troops back home. Other candidates want to continue the policy of sending the troops to wars without specific goal, nation-building missions without end, where soldiers risk their lives and they don’t know what for. Soldiers want to know that what they’re doing makes sense and they believe Ron Paul is the one who will not put them into fight without good reason.

Ron Paul entered politics not for personal gain, but because he was worried about wrong economic policies Washington was pursuing. He wanted to stop the out-of-control growth of the federal government. He opted out of the lucrative congressional pension plan and over the years returned over (…) million dollars from his budget to help pay off the national debt.

He is known to be incorruptible and the lobbyists don’t even bother to go to him. They know he will follow the Constitution and not what they tell him.

Ron Paul is the only Congressman in the last 20 years with a 100% Constitutional voting record. How is it possible? Simple. Before he decides on a bill, he always checks if it’s allowed by the Constitution. If it’s not, he votes against it.

He has always stood on principle, regardless of the political winds. He gave his support to Ronald Reagan long before it was popular, when Reagan was still sidelined and mocked by the establishment in 1976.

While the top campaign contributors of all other candidates are Wall Street and big corporations, Ron Paul gets almost all of his support from ordinary people who give him 50 or 100 bucks at a time.

Ron Paul is the only candidate with a deep and proven understanding of economics and monetary policy, far beyond the talking points other candidates use.

He’s been the only politician in Washington to predict the housing bubble, suspected it was coming in 2001 and was certain of it in 2003. You can check his old writings and congressional testimonies if you don’t believe it. He almost single-handedly raised public awareness about the Federal Reserve Bank, the institution which used to operate entirely in the shadows for decades. He is the only candidate with the knowledge needed to reform the banking sector and resurrect the economy after the financial crisis.

Thanks to an audit that Ron Paul pushed through Congress, we learned that the Federal Reserve had been bailing out foreign banks to the tune of 5 trillion dollars, and had given 30 billion to Qaddafi’s Bank of Libya, when Qaddafi was still in power. Ron Paul is the only candidate in the race, who has opposed the bailouts from the beginning and has never flip-flopped on the issue.

Ron Paul is the only candidate in the race who offers a plan to cut spending. None of the other candidates wants to cut any spending, what they’re talking about is cutting the proposed increases. Instead of raising spending by 500 billion they want to raise it by 400 billion, and they call it a cut. All other candidates guarantee that America will have a debt crisis like the bankrupt welfare states in Europe and the Social Security and Defense budgets will have to be slashed in a chaotic manner.

The establishment in Washington already discussed plans to take over the people’s pension funds to pay for the government spending. Ron Paul will avoid this by cutting wasteful and unnecessary government spending in a sensible fashion, so that people’s IRAs, the Social Security fund, and Defense of the Homeland are not sacrificed.

The health care system in the United States is costly and often ineffective. Instead of fixing it, president Bush added to the costs by introducing the prescription drug program and president Obama introduced the Mandated Insurance, taking control over medical expenses further away from the patients. All that the other Republican candidates are capable of is repealing Obamacare. Ron Paul has a plan to empower the people to take control of their money, bring the competition back into health care and restore the doctor-patient relationship.

Ron Paul’s health care plan provides the employees with the same tax deductions that today apply only to employer-provided insurance. It empowers the people to take full control over their health care money themselves. Everyone will be allowed to put together an individual medical plan that best suits one’s needs. Ron Paul will allow the people to purchase insurance over state lines, ending the local insurance monopolies and bringing prices down. The excessive restrictions put on the medical personnel by lobbyists will be undone, and the nurses will once again be able to perform easier procedures, bringing the costs down. A tax credit will encourage doctors to provide services charitably to the poor. Finally, the out-of-control legal liabilities which force hospitals to spend hundreds of billions of dollars every year on unnecessary procedures in fear of the lawsuits, will be in most cases eliminated and replaced with the medical insurance contracts. Allowing the hospitals not to perform unnecessary procedures will bring down the cost of health care by additional 3000 dollars per household every year.

Health insurance is now 1/4 of the whole worker’s compensation. Lower costs of health insurance will bring down the cost of work and employers will be able to hire a lot more people. With health care costs reduced, the people will have more money left to spend and invest. Ron Paul’s health care plan alone would be enough to kick-start the economy.

The other politicians constantly invoke fear: fear of global warming, fear of people having guns. They need it to grow the size and power of the government, because the scared population is more likely to give away their rights and their money. Ron Paul has been a staunch defender of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, fighting to protect the 2nd amendment, to protect the right to privacy, to protect the right to a fair trial.

Ron Paul’s opponents scare the people with a nuclear bomb being smuggled to the USA and exploding in one of the American cities, yet none of them has any plans to secure the American border. If some ordinary criminals can smuggle weapons and drugs through the border, the terrorists could do the same with the bomb, if they had one. Ron Paul understands that the leaky borders are a great threat to national security. He will save money on fruitless nation-building in the Middle East and use it to protect the borders and expand the Coast Guard, to insure that no terrorist can infiltrate the United States either by land or by sea. Ron Paul is the only candidate with a serious plan to make America substantially safer, by protecting the border, concentrating the defense forces that have been spread thin, and avoiding a financial debacle.

Ron Paul is the only candidate with enough conviction, knowledge and integrity to shape the course of events in these difficult times. None of his corporate-funded opponents has a credible plan to reform the banking system, avoid a debt crisis and secure the entitlements for the people that have paid into them all their life. None of these establishment candidates is willing to put the rule of law, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights first, like Ron Paul does. Every one of his opponents supported the bailouts. None of them has a plan to secure the border. None of them has a plan to fix the health care system.

The opponents of Ron Paul are not going to challenge the status quo on the issues that matter. They are guaranteed to go with the tide, bringing the country closer to national bankruptcy and endangering the accomplishments of generations of hard-working Americans. Learn about Ron Paul, search the Internet, ask your children to find more information about him for you, and you will see that he’s the best candidate for President America has had in a long time. You have a choice, your actions matter. Register to vote in the state Republican primary, become a delegate to the caucus, choose Ron Paul and help restore the American Republic.

RON PAUL 2012

Ron Paul is totally different from any of his opponents and most other politicians. Compare and contrast and you’ll see that every time he’s different, it’s for the better. Hire a friendly show host or someone alike who can pump up the crowd with a speech. Distribute the message in print so that the rally attendees take it home. Attach it to the Super Brochure mailings. Spread it. Do something with it. Ron Paul’s ideas are great, but their greatness can be recognized a hundred times better when compared to the others’.

The community needs to spread this. I don’t know who would reject this reasoning. Someone with better writing skills could rewrite it more eloquently. Ultimately I wish we will create a polished text similar in content to the one presented and make it into a pdf file that anyone could download, print in large amount (even at home) and distribute. What do you think?

Please VOTE UP & COMMENT.

Nice link about Ron’s life: http://streetsmartdirect.com/ronpaul.html

Andy’s Annotated US Constitution

With all the disinformation and historical revisionism buzzing like flies on politics (even with the “Tea Party” as much as anywhere else), I just had to present what I believe to be the facts.

So here’s an annotated USA constitution again: http://wedeclare.files.wordpress.com/2011/06/the-united-states-constitution.pdf

What he should’ve said

I’m not breaking my vow to never blog again…I’m just sayin’ that our President’s speech was too long, and all wrong. 

Here’s what he (or McDonnell) should’ve said:

My fellow human beings, over the past hundred years, American voters have gradually surrendered their property, initiative, freedom and security to politicians, and that was a stupid thing to do. 

Now our debts and fears, crime and perversions have grown so big and obvious that, frankly, I’m embarrassed that you still think that you can trust politicians with your life, liberty and pursuit of health insurance.  The whole point of our constitutions was to put a leash on politics, so that real people could live by their own choice, generosity, sweat and ingenuity.  But we rob you blind, tell you we saved you from worse, and you’re still voting for our two-headed, Demorepublicrat monster.

Dang, people.

It’s by your choice that those who’ve been right all along are called “fringe,” and most accurately, “loser;” while those who’ve been wrong, or worse, deceived you intentionally, are called “expert,” “wonk,” or of course, “The Honorable so and so.” 

I cannot apologize for your choices, but I am truly sorry that we politicians did what comes natural to us, and that you still have much to suffer before our mess can be made right. 

I’ve already said that I’d rather be a good one-term President than a mediocre two-timer.  So whether voters have learned from our collective mistakes or not, I now intend to do what’s right.

And what’s right is to recognize that, while any fool can wield power, only the great restrain it. 

My fellow Americans, I am the President who will wean you off politics. 

You want somebody to care for you?  Make some friends, join a church or voluntary service association, and raise a good family.  If you can’t get people to care for you voluntarily, I’m sure not going to sqeeze taxpayers for you.

As for a financial stimulus?  I will suggest that Congress gets double-pay to just stay home and leave you the heck alone. 

About terrorism…we never should’ve gone weak-kneed over zealots with exploding underpants.

I’m telling all you red-blooded game hunters out there, that as of right now, it’s open season on terrorists.  Have at ‘em, but of course try not to make too many mistakes. 

Does that scare you?  If so, then you have no idea how much suffering takes place in the homes of our soldiers; and you have no idea how much our endless wars cost you in money, social disorder, freedom, security and opportunities lost forever.

Overnight, ordinary rednecks could end and forever scare away terrorism at a tiny fraction of the current cost in dollars, corruption and human life; and allow us to bring our troops home.  Not just from Afghanistan and Iraq, but from all over the world.  We’d no longer flex our muscles or play nanny on foreign soil, because the world would know that we are impenetrable here at home. 

As far as job creation goes?

I know economics was supposed to be two-thirds of my speech.  But government is violence, not business.  Government is more about oppression, slavery, genocide and war than anything else it may pretend to be.  It never creates.  It cannot give without first taking.  You should never have let us rob Peter to pay Paul.  Not only is it morally wrong in its essence, but you should have known that you are not Paul.

To wrap this up, let me say that I have read the Constitution that I swore to uphold against all enemies, foreign and domestic; and I now aim to do just that, as written in both black, and white.  People have fought and died for this precious contract, and I will never again let anyone in my administration treat it with anything other than respect. 

Then again, it’s up to you, American voters, to hold me to that.

Thank you, and may God bless us all.

Where are Samaritans when you need them?

I’ve had it with “religious leaders” spewing socialism.

If Satan has a Bible, I’m sure this is in it: that people should, with all the best intentions, delegate their own, personal role on earth, to politicians.

Where in the Bhagavad-Gita, Torah, Tipitaka, Bible or Koran could you find such evil sophistry?

Universal Healthcare isn’t charity – it is putting a gun to your neighbor to make him do what you won’t do yourself. Social Security isn’t caring for your mother – it’s the hole you personally push her, and your children, into to assuage guilt and allay fears. And you already know that “Homeland Security” has nothing to do with peace and liberty, right?

Our nation’s founders intended that citizens should defend themselves; not just against petty criminals, but against all enemies, foreign…and domestic, as citizen militias. They intended that our churches and voluntary associations, working without the armed aggression of politics, would comprise the departments of Health, Education and Welfare, so that the abstract and erratic junkyard dog we call “politics” would stay in the junkyard, restrained by the tall fence we call Rule of Law.

All of this required that individual citizens, personally, serve the needs of their neighbors; and that we remember, with cold chills, the true history and nature of politics, and people.

Imagine a man was just starting his Corvette after a sales call in northwest Houston, when he was beaten, stripped and left for dead where his car used to be. A TV preacher saw the man, and noted that he really should call 911, but this gave him a sermon idea, so he hurried on. A well-regarded politician saw the man, and said, “dang, I sure don’t want to be seen with a naked man!” And so he also scurried on. But a Mexican, fresh over the fence and scared, hauled the man into his rusty Corolla, took him to the hospital, and even gave his contact information to the ER admitting staff, just if he could be of any help at all, or could pay in any way, for the man’s care.

Who should we emulate? Are there any lessons, in any religion, that tell you otherwise?

Being President Means Never Having To Say You’re Sorry

What if I were to say to my justifiably angry, insulted and hurt wife, “I could have calibrated those words differently”??

What if I were to saunter into work six hours late after hosing up a multimilliondollar project and call it a “teachable moment” for all Americans?

Oh for crying out loud.   Is it so hard for a President to simply say “ I screwed up and I’m sorry?”

The constant twisting of words, arrogance, continual and prideful invocation of his office should convince us, once and for all, that Barack Obama is just another politician.   No different from the previous one, or two, or six.

He is not “The One.”   He is not our “Saviour” or any other lofty abstraction publicly applied to this Chicago machine tool.   He is no better than the least of us.

…Except, of course, that this man has access to armies, cops and nuclear weapons.  And he likes using force and intimidation to get what he wants.

We should humbly, seriously reflect on that.

In fact, this really should be a teachable moment for all Americans.  We should wonder out loud and with our friends; not just why his mistakes are America’s lesson, but also why the violent, failure-doomed ideology of Nero, Stalin, Hitler and Che is “cool.”  Why do bumper stickers, logos and banner waving, cheering crowds of young people promote oppression?  How did hip young people, within just a generation or two, transmogrify their ideology from the 60′s-70′s mistrust of power and armed agents of government, into today’s violent disarmament of citizens to make them submit under authoritarian rule? 

How did that get cool? 

How did the totally voluntary interactions between adults in a free market become a bad thing, while the inherently armed aggression of politics is …hip?

Words are powerful.  Obama knows that.  That’s why he almost never uses any real words; and instead butters our ears shut with fairy-dusted snot.   It was an accident that he actually said something of meaning.

The inconveniencing of his elite friend raised emotions in this typically cold creature, and he said something revealing.  

Words send armies to war.  Words heal bruised feelings.  Words comfort the frightened and frighten the wise.   It’s insidious necromancy that “government” sounds good when it’s the same thing as “politics;” which we all know sounds bad.

Pseudo-smart young kids think that (often because they’re taught to) it’d be cool if “government” were to take a role in every aspect of business, education, health and welfare.   But who’d think it’d be so swell if “bickering and corrupt politicians” were to get their mitts on those things?  This isn’t just words we’re playing with – it’s oppression, slavery, genocide and war we’ve made into catchy slogans.

It’s time for some idol-smashing.   Look hard at that man we’ve elected to be the savior of humanity.   Look hard at the history of “In Politicians We Trust.”  

The collection of swaggering elitists who’ve been both law-breaking and dead-wrong about everything they’ve said for over a hundred years shouldn’t be called “experts” and “your honor.”   They should be called the criminals and liar-fools they are and dealt with accordingly.

Or, what the heck?   Maybe we should all act like that.   Maybe we just keep ignoring the blossoming of crime and injustice we’ve been ignoring for decades (admit it; you’ve ignored the headlines of human traffic/slavery and exploding corruption, rape and murder), and just go with the examples set from the top.   Never say you’re sorry.   Never admit anything, in fact.   Try to never say what you mean or mean what you say.   Make horrible plans that you know are stupid and can’t happen, and watch them come true before your eyes!  

And then, above all, forget about “please” and “The customer comes first.”   It’s every man for himself and Rule Of Tyrants instead of Rule Of Law.   Yee haw!   Grab your guns and leave morality behind; we’re all politicians now!

Maybe I have finally figured out why the bumper stickers say “Power of Pride” instead of, “how about some humility?”  Maybe I more fully understand why we train our kids to be confident instead of competent.

Sheesh.  What have we become?

Ma Hastim

I think that most of us, if we were to think about it and put it to words, would define “maturity” as a degree and kind of self-control, self-sufficiency, self-denial and self-sacrifice that just doesn’t exist among the immature.

Mature people don’t demand much from others, and rather contribute to their loved ones, their employers, and their world.  The most admirably mature people, no matter their status or circumstance, give more than they take.

Truly mature people not only do not need the involuntary-collectivist, nannied authoritarianism that now, unfortunately, exists everywhere on earth, but they also suffer in such a violent climate.

Mature people, I submit, do not exist in sufficient numbers to keep this nation alive.  We have devolved into a nation of prattling, squabbling, violent and ignorant children, and we are thereby almost surely doomed.  We’re blubbering, misbehaving, thoughtless, selfish children, practically begging for a good spanking, and we’re going to get it. 

Have a nice day.

Oh, I dunno.  I suppose there is hope.  Immature people can grow up quickly after a good, hard, painful lesson.  And while you’d think we’ve had ample opportunity to wake up and smell pleurosis, we ain’t seen nothin’ yet.  We are about to get a real whuppin’.  …And from the worst sort of people.

It’s long been known that while the most stupid, inept criminals act alone, get caught and pay for their crimes, there exists a hierarchical law that determines what happens as a criminal learns his craft.

The somewhat better criminals form alliances and layers to both increase their takings, and shield themselves from getting caught.  Still more astute criminals organize into larger quasi government arrangements like the Mafia, Yakuza, Tong, Thugee and Medain. 

I’m sure you can see where I’m heading with this.

Yes, the craftiest of the crafty become politicians.  The worst crimes ever, like oppression, slavery, genocide and war, could only be perp’d by the organized crime we call politics.

But let me be clear about something crucial.  By “politician,” I do not mean the people who win elections and get their affairs of state made gossip in daily papers.  You probably don’t know who’s really running the show here.  In all my years of examining politics from various and increasingly depressing angles, I believe I have met only one of the men who dwells (I did not say “lives” because the man is too evil to call living) behind the curtain.  And I’m sure he’s only a minor minion in our ever-ancient New World Order.

This corruption/theft/gambling/banking system, is, as Jefferson warned, worse than standing armies.  It’s taking us down hard very soon.  Maybe even as far as our oppression, slavery, genocide and war human default state will go.

I’ve tried to think of various schemes around this, and I’m not done trying.  My hope is fading, but it’s still there insomuch as I cannot let it die as long as I’m sending my children into my generation’s failures.

So, here’s my latest proposal:

I propose somebody (not me!) run for President of Texas.

Not Governor of Texas, not President of the USA…President of Texas.

I propose that the platform not be the amended-to-pointlessness Texas Constitution, but the Constitution for the United States of America.

The Texas Constitution provides all the grounds necessary.  Nullification and secession are the stated remedies for federal constitutional breach.  Yet the current Texas member-state Constitution becomes irrelevant in the event of this remedy.  So let’s bypass all the “constitutional convention” rot now circulating among the red herring patriots, since there are precious few in public office smart and/or wholesome enough to craft a sane constitution these days – and just use what’s proven to work better than anything else ever tried – the contract made by adults, for adults…the US Constitution.  This is still the shortest, tightest, best leash on governing power yet devised. 

I believe that there are still a sufficient number of adults here that we can get this ball rolling.  We exist.  We need only a little chutzpa.

Let’s replace pride with humility and learn our lessons before the spanking.  Let’s grow past the child and into maturity to our mutual benefit.  Let’s grow up, OK?

I’m picking up your gauntlett, Paul

It was April 1, but it was no joke.  My friend and feisty fellow constitutionalist Paul Caudell had died.  I had talked with him just a few hours previously, and I didn’t even know he was ill.  When Jerry Titus called me the next day with the news, I was jarred, as if from sleep.  Yes, I was sad.  But I was also angry with myself and feeling inconsolably stupid.  Sure, mortality is a problem.  But wasting life and opportunity and talent is an inexcusable crime. 

You see, here’s the scoop:  I’d given up.  I was flat disgusted with voters, non-voters, citizens and even my allies.  I was feeling hurt and betrayed by people who’d made and broken promises, by all the work and all the expense and all the failure…I was feeling sorry for myself that I lost my political races, lost my social campaigns, and, dang it, lost my business.  I thought it was time for me to not just leave Indiana, but leave behind all the failed hopes. 

Paul spent time in his final hours trying his best to bring me back; not just to Indiana, but to what I’d become all about for the past fifteen years.  I listened to him impatiently.  I was at work and feeling as though I was listening to futility.  I hope I wasn’t rude.  I pray to God that I wasn’t rude…

But then he went and died.  And I was slapped again with a most important and casually dismissed lesson.  Life is precious, and short.

My friends, what are we doing with our lives?

I spent half of my years in the “education system” before starting my life, and my life is probably a little more than half over (I’ve got longevity in my family profile).  Given all our marvelous “time saving” devices and the world’s highest productivity per worker, we should be working two-day weeks on a pleasure cruise through life.  And yet, the long hours away from home, little time spent with kids, and worsening statistics in physical and mental health make me wonder what the heck we think we’re doing to ourselves?  And why?

Why waste so much time and wait so long to start living life?  Why is that life and youth spent in such feverish pursuit of retirement and death?

Well, you should know. 

It’s Tax Time again. 

You know who you’re working for. 

I still want to know, why? 

Our lives are too short and life is such a sweet gift to waste it on politics and the sick pursuit of power over others.  We should get our hands out of our fellows’ wallets and off of their lives and rights, and just enjoy short, sweet life. 

OK, so we admit we’re all socialists now.  The media have been working hard to paint a rosy face on this so you don’t recall the history of Pol Pot, Mao, Stalin, et al.  They’ve been telling us that the best “right” (fascists) are much worse than the worst “left” (socialists), and that we can thank the elite for having saved us from the clutches of those like Hitler, Mussolini, and Tito.

Ours is a culture based and steeped in debt and violence.  The violent taking of taxes, property and rights is how we get nice little park benches and politically-run car companies.  Our debt-based currency/central banking model is why consumerism is good, and saving for your own retirement is bad.  Our debts lead to desperation, the violence leads to more violence, and claiming that it’s all for the greater good of some abstraction like “state” is cave-man ignorant.  It’s all failure, death, pain, and waste of irreplaceable, fleeting life.

Authoritarianism, whether you call it socialism, fascism, serfdom or just Standard Operating Procedure, is stinking foul and self-destructive-dumb.  I’m sick and stupid for thinking I could just give in to it while I still have the breath of life in me.

I am sorry, Paul.  Not that you died, really; I know you’re in a much better place than I am.  But I’m sorry that I wasted time, and you had to call me on it.  I’m sorry that I was hardly there when you called.  I’m sorry that I had given up.

I may not be able to stay in Indiana as you’d wished.  But I now promise that you did not call in vain.  I will not give up. 

An open letter to my fellow patriots

My liberty-loving friends, we have lost.  We had our chance, and we muffed it. 

Gun rights activists fight the loss of gun rights, but not for the constitution upon which those rights depend.  Free speech activists protest their losses too, but they have no legal right to speak with out the constitutions.  Tax protesters haven’t a legal leg to stand on in the absence of constitutions.  Without constitutions, you’ve got no rights to property, due process or even life, because without constitutions, there are no agreed-upon, legal, contractual or practical restraints upon political power.  And we haven’t even asked for Rule of Law under the Constitutions since the New Deal and it’s “Switch in Time that Saved Nine.”  In point of irritating fact, most of us have fought for one right while opposing another for decades.  Speech activists oppose the constitutions’ religious freedom, while gun rights activists typically oppose the constitutions in moral, drug and lifestyle issues. 

We have stubbornly refused to unite over what it is that we all really want (Rule of Law under our existing constitutions, as written), while our enemies represent no more than our default state of oppression, slavery, genocide and war.  They win by our default in disunity.  We have torn ourselves apart and have nobody to blame but ourselves.

Sigh…

But let us not be bad sports.  Our side lost.  C’est ça.  Finito.  Now we must all Move On.

For years I have championed Rule of Law, but from now on, I want to be a Good Socialist.

Look at the positive side.  Authoritarians have always had the best uniforms.  Most people look good in a trim little cap, a neat military outfit with red epaulets and brass buttons.  And those shiny black boots sound so fetching as you’re running down side streets on a cold, rainy night, chasing down someone who just won’t fit in.

Think of the imagery.  Who else gathers thousands of cheering idolaters under triumphant banners and bold emblems?  Who else goose-steps a half-million troops with tanks and jet formations right through the heart of the capital?  What thrills!  Authoritarians have chutzpa! 

OK, I do so hope we don’t get stuck with a bad-hair ruler like the North Koreans got.  And murderous thugs like Che too often lack any cultural polish at all.  

But I, like Hitler and Mussolini, do enjoy fine cars, art, and well-choreographed young people.  I adore the martial music and stylized posters depicting gloriously happy workers.  I am ready to raise my arm in salute to our great Obama nation!

Dear friends, we must become the Übermensch; perfection in body, mind and… well, not spirit.  Who needs spirit when you have the state! 

We must reject our fetish with freedom, and replace it with devotion to global citizenship.  We must grow past and even spurn the apron strings and umbilicus of “traditional” family ties in favor of service to the family of humanity.

No sacrifice is too great for this dream.  You may be asked to give your life, but the promise is no more sickness, no more poverty, no more homelessness, no more injustice.  You may have to report your mother to the authorities, but you’ll be rewarded with the warm embrace of the global collective; from each according to his or her ability, to each according to his or her need.

We are now building a human bridge over the troubled waters of humanity’s brutal past; to embark upon a wonderful voyage so promising, that you’ll be jubilant and grateful to give your all, right up to your very last choking gasp.

Forget the tear-filled past with its tiresome clinging to “right” and “wrong.”  Forget the laws and old ways that held you back.  Forget humility and restraint.  Forget the chains and cages of individualism and family, and embrace the Power of Pride! 

Join me, my friends.  Let us erase the boundaries between nations and faiths and social norms, and march triumphantly toward the cliffs of a new day…

…In matching outfits!

John Stossel is an American Hero.

I wish I could be a tenth as effective as a Free Market missionary as is John Stossel.  Here is a video that you should watch with your kids, neighbors and coworkers.  It’s excellent.  You can also watch this 20/20 piece, “the Politically Incorrect Guide to Politics” as a six-part YouTube video.

Just do it.

 

Our ancient habit of failure

I am running for the constitutional office of Indiana Governor.  That job is all about governing government, not governing you. 

The good news is that I am running for that office unopposed. 

The bad news, however, is that the overwhelming majority of voters don’t care about constitutions, and will almost certainly choose a “Governor” who’s job and powers are unrestrained by any laws, or even customs.  I don’t blame the candidates for that.  No, I grieve for what it says about just who Americans have become.

Despite Obama’s lofty rhetoric about “the American spirit,” modern Americans are no longer the self-governed patriots who kept their politicians on a leash, and who placed their trust in God instead.

Nope; just as foolish, barbaric people have done for thousands of years, we have once again bowed low to the Golden Calf of State.  We are not the Land of the Free or the Home of the Brave.  We are the Land of the Fearful, and the Home of the Dependent.

In other words, we vote for, and bow to, human kings.  Minor kings, major kings…their power is limited only by the king(s) above and the tolerance of oppression below.  Our tolerance is nearly unlimited, and their kingly power reaches into every aspect of our lives in a most destructive way.

They tell us what we can and cannot eat; who and how we marry, hire, live and die.  They take our money because we think they know best what to do with it, and they decide who works, how we work, and how much our wages are worth. 

Of course with that power comes a lot of greed, deceit and supplication. 

This is where the Golden Calf thing becomes truly grim – because such a political faith/ religion requires priests that today we call “lobbyists.”

As with the ancients, it’s all about robbing Peter to pay Paul, once again.  And your job in this Brave New World is to do whatever you can to be more Paul than Peter.  You join or form a special interest group in order to collectivize your power under a lobbyist to get a piece of the pie.  But as more special interest groups are formed and start their battle for the best priests and the best parts of the pie, the Golden Calf itself and the priests who serve it take a bigger and bigger cut.  The pie itself gets smaller through corruption, your piece of it becomes a smaller percentage; so you work harder and harder for less and less until, ultimately, the bread and circuses don’t work anymore, and the whole thing topples.

I’m afraid that our triune Golden Calf god (comprised of Democrat, Republican and Federal Reserve Bank) has won another, perhaps final victory over us.  Obama has turned away fears of his arrogance and terrorism ties with a really good speech (is a teleprompter another sort of god?  Hmmm.); and McCain has brushed aside conservatives’ righteous disgust with a pandering pick for Veep. 

(She’s a fine woman, and if she were the GOP’s pick for President, I’d think a lot differently about this election.  But they’re suckering you in knowing you’ll hope McCain dies or something.  Don’t fall for it.) 

You’re not even voting for President these days, you know…you’re now voting for his funding mechanism, his entrenched party’s leaders, and a system gone terribly, tragically wrong.

So I’m guessing that once again, we’ll vote the way we’ve been voting, and the Golden Calf will grow bigger, fatter, hungrier and more oppressively intrusive until, maybe 18 months from now, you’ll see just what the Federal Reserve and all our new debt instruments (credit cards, 40 year mortgages, etc.) have really wrought.

Disaster.

Please turn us away from this ancient pattern of destruction.  Demand Rule of Law under the state and federal constitutions which are already law and have been proven to work better than anything else ever tried.

Don’t let us fall back to ancient failures older than Hammurabi.  Don’t let them tell you that their schemes of shifting more power into fewer hands is “modern” or “a fresh start,” when it’s as old as the fall of Adam.

Do you want change?  Well, you’re headed for it one way or another.  You can choose change that goes the way of all fools, or you can do better.

Choose wisely.