Cassandric Ruminations

When I shared this on Facebook after the tragically fumbled (but otherwise correct) withdrawal from Afghanistan, I wrote: “Well, #7 is a little less true today, even though we’ll still have wars going on once we’re finished blowing up charity workers in Afghanistan. Thanks, Joe!

But the others are much 𝙢𝙤𝙧𝙚 true today.

What I thought was pretty funny when I said some of this two years ago, is less funny now.”

I should add, however, that the tribal rhetoric varies greatly depending on which tribe has the government’s keys. For example, Republicans talk a good story against spending, debt and the inherent inflation of the Fed’s money presses when the Democrats are in charge. And Democrats talk a good story against the anti-USA-citizen militarization of our government when Republicans are in charge.

And I should add a third #9 (or maybe a #11):
That THIS PARTICULAR ELECTION IS TOO IMPORTANT to vote for anything different.

Anyway, you can see that this is now tearing us up, apart, and down right now. Maybe it’s not yet too late to turn this around before this becomes history-making catastrophe. Maybe it is. But I sure wish we’d try…

The eBook is out…

The Truth about Excelsior is now available in both paperbackand Kindle eBook.
No, I’ve not yet heard about film rights, who might direct or star in the movie no doubt forthcoming.
But the significant news is that in both eBook and paperback, you can read “Far more than the usual fanciful tale of precocious children, fire-breathing dragons, disastrous monetary policy and World War.”
“‘The Truth about Excelsior’ offers a unique perspective on today’s cultural madness, and a glimpse into a world of peace, prosperity and …freedom.”

Let me know what you think of it.  If you like it, please leave a rating and review.

If you don’t like it, well, let me know what you think of it.

The TRUTH about Excelsior…on Amazon

My brother Greg published a book about three years ago.  I don’t think of myself as particularly competitive, but doggone it, I couldn’t let him beat me!  So I wrote one too.

He also has a website for both his book, and a bunch of stories from my mom (she wrote and illustrated some hilarious stuff).

…Anyway, The Truth about Excelsior is now available in paperback: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0849X45LQ?ref_=pe_3052080_397514860.

I don’t like the way it looks as an eBook, but I’ll likely publish that, too, in a couple of weeks or so.  It’ll be cheaper, of course.

But since some stuff gets lost in the eBook version, I’m resisting it as long as I can.

The blurb is, “Far more than the usual fanciful tale of precocious children, fire-breathing dragons, disastrous monetary policy and World War, “The Truth about Excelsior” offers a unique perspective on today’s cultural madness, and a glimpse into a world of peace, prosperity and …freedom.”

I mean it to be fun, but you know me…I had to insert some serious stuff in there, too.

Anyway, let me know what you think of it…and if you like it, tell everybody, and leave a review!

Fearing our own shadow

The Land of The Free has been surrendering freedom hand-over-fist because the Home of The Brave is scared of its own shadow.  Almost literally, its own shadow.

We’ve for generations been the arms dealer and political destabilizer to the world.  Our CIA and armed forces have interfered with elections and even violently taken down one dictator to prop up another for over seventy years.

Our government has lied about its wars, warmongering, entangling alliances and foreign interventions for much longer than that.  Our CIA and NSA have been spying on the whole world, including every person within our own borders, as well as prying into foreign elections (and our own) for long enough that it’s disingenuous to complain about foreign spies and foreign interference in elections…unless we claim we’re the only ones who’re supposed to do all that.

To everybody.

All the time.

Though China is certainly a strong contender – even with its fingers in our sock puppets – We The People are still the most heavily-armed, most globally nannying and bullying, domestically intrusive, imprisoning and militarized nation of all time.

It is our own shadows that both terrify and genuinely threaten us now, and, surprisingly, in the past, too.

You think our soldiers are fighting for freedom?   Which freedom?   How many freedoms must we lose to get that elusive freedom we’re fighting for?   At what financial/future security cost?   At what moral/social spiritual cost?

We have literally reordered and molded our society’s defense/military, monetary and legal and political structure to our collective trembling nerves.   Why?

While nobody ever says it exactly like this, the predominating justification for the USA’s violent, costly Fear-Aggression Syndrome is:

Our past screw-ups necessitate today’s screw-ups.

Rational people can look at the USA’s past mistakes reasonably.  Our government made horrible, murderous, costly mistakes when it was far smaller, less powerful, less secretive, less snooping, and vastly less heavily-armed and militarized both globally, and domestically, than today.  But ironically, the closer we get to the present, the more wrong we call right, and the more we justify today’s wrong by yesterday’s wrong.

We all know that slavery and native genocide was bad.  Only the more educated among us know that the wars against Mexico and Spain were motivated by greed and desire for empire, and had nothing whatsoever to do with protecting American liberties and land.  But very few consider how Teddy Roosevelt stimulated the Empire of Japan and the USA helped create the Soviet Union, however, so we tend to think of WWII as a wholly Good War, where the USA wore white and saved the world for liberty and justice for all.

The point is that, the closer we get to the present, the more our views of USA government become disconnected from reality.
Even after we learned that the Vietnam War was justified on, at best, a screwup, we tend to think of USA government as a benevolent god of peace and love, incapable of wrongdoing (though we keep seeing new wrongdoing every day).

This is a freakishly weird phenomenon.  But it’s also the nature of tribalism and idolatry.  We love our team, and we hate the other guys.  We can’t see the wrong in our idols, teams, champions and leaders, but we know that the other peoples’ idols, teams, champions and leaders are pure evil.

And it’s also just human: People of the past were THEM.  People of today are US.  We can easily admit that our ancestors did horrible, stupid things; but we sure don’t want to admit that, today, right now, WE are screwing up.  We’re blind to our own errors.

In other words, we see the past more clearly than the present.   And we see other sinners more clearly than we see ourselves.

So, as a result, we exemplify, even if unintentionally, the exact opposite of The Golden Rule.

This is self-immolation.   We have so many impending disasters of fiscal, social, monetary and military nature (will it be WWIII when China takes Taiwan and Russia takes Ukraine on the same day?), that we desperately need an epiphany and revolution of heart and mind.

You can’t be the Land of The Free if you’re not the Home of The Brave.   But no nation can survive at all with this kind of stupid.

The Truth about $#!+holes, and the people thereof

We’ve got “immigration” all wrong

I’m not an “open borders” libertarian.  And borderless anarchy isn’t possible with humans (see I Samuel 8:6-20).  So at least for some degree of control over communicable disease (we’ve been lucky so far), human trafficking, etc., we need to have some border security.  If you allow that you’ve got a political government, and other states/nations have theirs as well, there have to be borders and jurisdictional limits to politicians’ rules.  And I’m more about actual law and order than 99.999873% of the planet. 

So don’t get me wrong.

But our current problems aren’t with illegal aliens, immigrants, or any of the laws and policies thereof.

1. We are luring illegal aliens here with free stuff. Free healthcare. Free education. Special rights, privileges and immunities unavailable to even legal citizens.  There are lots of reasons why we’re doing it…but I propose we stop doing this.
2. We’ve made “legal” labor so expensive, complicated, legalistic and impractical that “illegal” labor is a very attractive option, or sometimes the only workable option.  I propose we reverse this.
3. We’ve been tormenting and destroying other nations with our “War On Drugs”, CIA crime rings and coups, oppressive policies/embargoes and direct attacks, such that We The People have, both directly and indirectly, made some $#!+holes that don’t need to be $#!+holes.  In other words, we’ve made other people’s countries practically uninhabitable, driving them here for survival.  I propose we stop doing all this.
4. Our ever-changing, unpredictable and absurdly unfair immigration laws and policies force illegal aliens to lay low, force employers to keep secrets and break laws, and generally force the realities of illegal aliens under the rug.  I propose we make our immigration laws and policies fair, consistent, and focused on our domestic security, health and interests…and then just enforce them!
5. Do you know how hard it is for potential immigrants to get visas?  Pretty much impossible.  So smugglers make a great business getting tens of thousands of dollars for every person they get to the border illegally.  But if it were easier/possible to get visas, then the sort of people we want here, the ones who’re desperately wanting to build a better life for themselves and their loved ones, could hop a plane for tens of thousands less, go through controlled checkpoints with drug sniffing dogs and people wearing blue gloves, and go legit.  I propose we make it much easier and cheaper to come here the right way.  That’d welcome the good folks and put the squeeze on only the bad ones.
6. There actually is, since the 14th Amendment, a constitutional stipulation that anyone born in the USA is automatically a USA citizen.  “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”  So, really, there’s a powerful incentive for pregnant women to dive over the national goal posts to deliver a baby in the citizen end-zone.  It’s not their fault if they succeed.  However…  Think about how the rules of monitoring “documented” citizens and trans-border “security” would be enforced.  Given the sort of nazi/commies we continuously re-elect, this could get really ugly.  “Your papers please” is already a problem.  Spying on us all is already a thing.
7. Besides…if you know you live in a $#!+hole, can’t make it better, and want a better life for you and your loved ones, you’d be a fool not to find a way here, where you’ll find life better than you’ve ever known. Right?  Wouldn’t you do the same?

The first four bullets above exist only in breach of the federal constitution.  In other words, those problems would be solved if all we did was affirm and enforce the Constitution for The United States of America against our government. 

In other words, if we’d just quit making “legal” labor so costly, quit making illegal entry the only door, quit giving away freebies to illegal aliens, and stop messing up other countries, we’d not likely even talk about a wall. 

In fact if we were to just DO the constitutions, state and federal, as written and amended, we’d not likely be constantly fiddling with our immigration laws, and we might even legally, legitimately welcome people looking for a better life as our friends, coworkers and neighbors.

While The US of A is no longer the freest, wealthiest or healthiest nation on earth, we are among the most accommodating to foreigners.

Is that really a bad thing? We can discuss that. 

Of course, if you’re one of those “‘Merica – Love it or Leave it!” people, you’ve got a little ‘splaining to do…

Sure, there are the “Reconquistas,” the criminals, the terrorists. But their numbers are tiny compared to the home-grown murderers, rapists and thieves (even outside the DC beltway); and their numbers are tiny compared to the regular human beings trying to do better for themselves and their loved ones.  They didn’t love what became of their country, and they left it.

The discussion we’ve been having over illegal aliens in major media and political discussions is stupid. We play word games, divide ourselves against ourselves, and place blame and propose punishment for our screw-ups on people who’re doing the best they can to get by in a world gone mad.

Think of the people you know that annoy or plague you the most. Think of the worst people you can think of. Are they immigrants? Illegal aliens?

Probably not.  Illegal aliens actually comprise a much lower per-capita percentage of crimes and criminals than native-born citizens represent.  Most don’t want trouble.  Most just want a better life than they had, and they get it here. 

So, let’s try to think both in context of reality, but also think as if we’re all just humans trying to do our best. OK?

Liberty or Bust!

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Just Say No to war with Iran

Freedom, IN – It’s a quote attributed to pretty much everybody, that “the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” The saying is more true and applicable to USA foreign policy than to anything else.

None of our foreign aggressions worked as promised, or even as we’ve been told. Yet we’ve had scarcely a year’s peace since the War to End All War.

And we’ve been getting worse, not better, at finagling foreigners into serving us and our Saudi allies. Does anyone doubt that our interventions in Libya and Syria have been disastrous? Have we really fixed anything in Somalia, Yemen or Pakistan? When will we be done with Iraq? Afghanistan is the USA’s longest war, ever…and we’re losing. What’s the plan? What’s the goal?

We’re sure not fighting for freedom.  Not anybody’s freedom.  And we’re sure not making friends when we blow up their children.

A leaked May 17 memo reveals that the USA government once again intends to replay the same failed script; this time against Iran (again).

The key directive sent to Rex Tillerson is “…that the U.S. should use human rights as a club against its adversaries, like Iran, China and North Korea, while giving a pass to repressive allies like the Philippines, Egypt and Saudi Arabia.”

Let’s think like a human, and not a politician, for a moment.

What actual human beings on the planet would not hate us for our arrogant, armed and deadly games and manipulations? Why wouldn’t we be creating more enemies than friends with such obvious duplicity? Does anybody on this planet think they’re the ones who’re wrong, and deserve death?

Is the Golden Rule really so bad?

I’m no pacifist. I believe in security through strength. And I understand the theory of “Humanitarian Intervention” (though that’s been irrelevant lately, and it certainly doesn’t work in practice!).

But we’re acting like stupid teenage “swatting” and “knockout game” thugs; not at all like rational adult humans. We’re acting as though we can use killing force against others with impunity, when in fact, we’ve been hurting ourselves as much as anybody else.

This is insanity. We’ve got seven “whack-a-mole” wars going on now, and we’re losing our wealth, security, and of course, freedom as a very direct result.

Our armies are protecting the petrodollar and drug trade, not anything We The People should value.  Not freedom; not for anybody.

And we’ve for some time been lobbing missiles and troops and drones at people and nations who, really, are no threat to us.  What will we do when China decides to take Taiwan?  That’s been slowly brewing since 1949, and heating up fast since 2012 and the dictatorship of Xi Jinping made plain that China was already waging war against us and buying up haf the world with our consumer’s money and our governments’ cooperation.  What will we do when Russia decides to take Ukraine?  That’s been Russia’s plan since our broken promises to stop expanding NATO onto Russia’s doorstep in 1994, then accelerating since at least 2013, and certainly since 2014 when Ukraine, spurred on by the USA, pushed for NATO membership, Russia annexed Crimea and began campaigns of hacking, subversion and propaganda.  How long can we be party to the corruption that’s kept Ukraine out of NATO up to now, without some response from Putin, who we know wants the old USSR back?  Not very long, I suspect.

Will we fight people who can fight back?  Could we afford to?

I propose we just say stop the madness, and give Peace, Prosperity, Security and Freedom a chance.

Liberty or Bust!

Andy Horning

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Quit mortgaging our future, dang it!

Freedom, IN – Of course we need to cut taxes.  I’d vote to end income tax entirely.

But we already know this game. Politicians say that “government is too big,” but then make it bigger. They trumpet the need to cut spending, but then spend more.

And, of course, they sometimes cut taxes (just a little) without fixing the first two things; which means that they’ll later raise taxes, and cut promised benefits.

Nobody likes to pay taxes.  But taxes are a symptom, not the disease itself.  The disease is ungoverned, unregulated, out-of-control politics and all the cost and violence that entails.

Every single one of the other 2018 primary election candidates for Indiana’s US Senate seat are promising more government. Every one of the others promise more fear-aggression-syndrome foreign policy, more domestic militarization, more intrusions into our privacy, trade and personal interactions.

I’m the only candidate promising less.

A lot less. 

I have a plan for Peace, prosperity, Security, Liberty and Justice for ALL, in eight steps.

But the summary is that I mean to cut the corruption, cost, intrusiveness, abusiveness and ineffectiveness of our central government by actually cutting powers, programs, agencies…and people, from that government. I propose establishing a truly federal (instead of our increasingly unitary) government as defined by the authorizing compact.

That is how this is supposed to work. That is still the law, as written and amended.

And I’m the only candidate who’s all about that.

Liberty or Bust!
Andy Horning
Freedom, Indiana

It’s time to talk about our spies

Freedom, IN – ♬♪ They see you when you’re sleeping, they know when you’re awake; they know when you’ve been bad or good, so be good for goodness sake! ♩♫

Our US Congress is trying to give its cronies a Christmas present – re-authorization and more funding for the unconstitutional mass surveillance programs we were once told didn’t exist.

I say it’s time for what some might call a “courtesy flush.” The corruption and destruction and stench of our lawless, secretive societal saboteurs has grown too great.

Thomas Jefferson wrote “…that knolege is power, and that ignorance is weakness.”

So let’s stop being ignorant about who’s got the real power here, and what they’re doing with it.

The FBI was, from its start in 1935, corrupt, snooping, deceitful, and deadly.  It took some brave thieves to reveal some of the agency’s crimes.  Truman regretted creating the CIA, and Kennedy said he would “splinter the CIA into a thousand pieces and scatter it to the winds” (right before he was assassinated).  The CIA developed the first spying engine of the NSA; and we know that agency has been anti-constitutionally spying on all of us, and have repeatedly lied about it.

Now, just think about the power of unlimited, unregulated spying, lying, and political immunity, mixed with armed force and the ability to make opposing voices go silent.

Imagine you had the power to find out everything about people, convincingly make up what you don’t find, or make even powerful people, maybe even in our own country, die…without facing any consequences.

What government on the planet wouldn’t abuse that power? We have good reason to believe that a government that performed medical experiments on school kids, doesn’t even resist abusing it.

Could such knowledge and power actually control our elected politicians?
This is what people are talking about with the term, “deep state.”

So-called “federal” agencies’ famous rivalries, withholding of data, rejection of congressional oversight, their anti-constitutional actions against citizens, media and foreign governments, and their trampling of local law enforcement really do make them more enemy than friend.

I propose we abolish the FBI and CIA, and give their money back to the states and people. I would reinforce the constitution’s already clear ban on domestic spying, deception and subterfuge, and leave all domestic law enforcement to more local, appropriate units of government, and already-constitutionally authorized courts.

I propose that the US Congress directly manage our foreign spy operations under specific congressional warrants and limitations, including the Geneva Conventions.

“… we want no Gestapo or secret police. The FBI is tending in that direction. They are dabbling in sex-life scandals and plain blackmail. J. Edgar Hoover would give his right eye to take over, and all congressmen and senators are afraid of him.” — Harry S. Truman

Liberty or Bust!

Andy Horning

Freedom, Indiana

Eight Steps to Success

Here’re my suggestions for Peace, prosperity, Security and Freedom in eight steps:

1. End the cronyism/corruption network and culture.  This is fundamental and critical.  Our government is captured by people and parties who do not share our collective best interests.  So we must bust up the self-appointed, inherently divisive, eternal tug-of-war “Two Party System,” and nullify the recent, unconstitutional, immoral state codes that suppress competition, create classes and sub-classes of citizens, and make taxpayers pay for the promotion of only D and R candidates at the expense of everybody else.  To do this, we need to …vote them out of power.  Not just the individual candidates – the whole power network behind the curtain.  This needs to happen.  And make no mistake…this is not just about the parties themselves, which are really just puppet shows for a much wider, deeper system of cronies that we scarcely see.  We won’t get anywhere trimming the claws of kingmakers, bundlers, lobbyists, permanent staffers and eternal bureaucrats without first replacing the 2-party puppet show and firewall that prevents us from doing the rest of what follows:
2. Stand down our military-industrial complex and global imperialism, and replace it with strong, constitutional national defense.  This of course includes killing the CIA/NSA monster to which Eisenhower also referred to in his famous Farewell Address as the “scientific-technological elite.”  Besides, we’ve been misidentifying real dangers.  China is already in a very effective, winning war against us, and we apparently don’t even know it.  Hopefully their internal problems will lessen the danger soon, because it is the worst, in my opinion, this nation has ever faced.
3. Monetary/banking reform.  Click the link for details.  I wish this could be #1.  It is a fundamental, and currently a terrible, fast-growing problem that’s about to result in massive inflation and turmoil.  The system of monetized debt begun here in 1912/13 has gone global, and is perhaps the biggest enabler of corruption.  But as with #2, it is well protected by the crony system.  
4. Rule of Law.  …Which of course means, kill “The Administrative State” of executive agencies and unelected bureaucrats that have taken unto themselves legislative, judicial and executive powers. This would cut a lot of stuff from what we’re calling “government” today. You may not like some of the cuts; but I’m certain you’d like the end result.
5. No more loaded bills. One subject at a time, and no earmarks/pork.
6. End special classes, special deals for special people – equality under law for all at long last.  This is partially implied/ included in #1, but needs to become a fundamental moral of our society if any real progress is to last.  And it would involve scaling back and phasing out many of the extraordinary powers, rights, perks and immunities granted to politically powerful corporate abstractions.  In other words, we need to stop fearing “Big Pharma,” “Big Ag,” “Big…anything.”  We’re all people here.  We should all be equal under the law.  That is certainly not the case now.
7. Sunset provision/amendment to refine and reduce the number of laws, and keep them few, simple and important so that our rules are:
   1. Few enough to actually know.
   2. Simple enough to actually obey.
   3. Important enough to enforce without exceptions or special classes.
8. Term Limits.  Let’s face it; voters haven’t been doing their part, and there’s no procedural fix for bad choices.  But term limits won’t happen until after voters make better choices.  Similarly, I have for decades favored alternative voting schemes like Condorcet, Ranked Choice or Approval Voting (RCV or AV).  And I definitely love the idea of increasing the number of representatives to better suit our population; and we have the technology to keep them in their districts with more local accountability.  But we won’t get such changes UNTIL we get rid of the politicians who like things the way they are.  That’s why I’m placing term limits last both procedurally, and in importance, because we’ll get term limits only after a sufficient number of people wake up and act appropriately such that we fire the bad guys and, at least for the short term, defuse the huge advantage of incumbency… particularly the power of “committee” rulers based on tenure.   …But after that cultural epiphany and revolution, their kids and grandkids will gradually fall asleep again.♣   That’s just how civilizations inevitably decay and die.  If we’re to delay our self-destruction at least a little, we need term limits shorter than human life expectancy…particularly in the context of tenure/corruption-based power structures.

To summarize, I want to cut the cost, intrusiveness, abusiveness and ineffectiveness of our central government by actually cutting powers, programs, agencies…and people, from that government. I mean to establish a truly federal (instead of our increasingly unitary) government as defined by the authorizing compact.  I want to make living life more voluntary, and much less driven by deceit, tribalism, anger, fear, mandates, prohibitions, and an impenetrable thicket of taxation.

♣A good part of my reasoning for term limits is encapsulated in this quote:  “Hard times create strong men. Strong men create good times. Good times create weak men. And, weak men create hard times.” ― G. Michael Hopf, Those Who Remain

I believe it takes “strong men” (strong-minded, individualist, non-tribal voters) to fire bums and clean up corruption.  But the “weak men” (look around) who follow will let anything go, and continuously reelect bad politicians…or let the whole system collapse.

Horning into GOP race for Indiana US Senate

For Immediate Release

December 7, 2017

Freedom, IN – Americans want options. We have unlimited choices in coffee, shoes, electronics, cell service…everything, in fact, excepting whatever politicians control.

It’s literally a shame that only two political parties can fully participate in our democratic processes. But it’s even more of a shame when both of those two parties offer only one option: more debt, more inflation, more wars, more regulations, and of course more corruption; meaning less peace, prosperity, security and freedom.

The Republican Party’s platform is actually quite good; it’s yet another shame that with a total lock on both federal and state political power, the GOP has been spitting on their own ideals.

Until today, it was hard to find any substantive differences between the Republican Party candidates for the Indiana US Senate seat.

But today, I’m throwing my hat into the ring as a Republican Party candidate for US Senate, and I have a plan to set things right. I am putting peace, prosperity, Rule of Law, real security, and (you know I’m big on this) freedom, on the ballot.

“Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end.” – Lord Acton

Liberty or Bust!

Andy Horning

Freedom, Indiana

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