Liberty Maven

Ron Paul appeared on Fox Business and MSNBC today. Check out the excellent appearances below. For some reason I really enjoy Dr. Paul’s appearances with Rachel Maddow. He seems to rise above all the politics and just talks about what is right.

First on Fox Business:

Then, on Maddow:

For four years DC Downsizers joined with other organizations and countless farmers to oppose the National Animal Identification System (NAIS).

Finally, the USDA saw the writing on the wall. It is scrapping NAIS!

The USDA still has plans for an animal tracing system, but it is to apply only to animals moving in interstate commerce, meaning . . .

* animal owners won’t have to file a report every time an animal leaves their property, whereas under NAIS horseback riders, for instance, would have had to file a report every time they went for a ride
* there will be no premise registration
* those who raise animals for personal consumption or to sell in local markets won’t be part of the new regulatory system

Moreover, the new system promises . . .

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“With the Democrats in charge, man exploits man. When the Republicans are in charge, it’s the opposite.” - seen on a local bumper sticker

The campaign is in serious need of funds to enable us to spread the message, and I have a challenge for supporters. If supporters raise $20,000 or more between Valentine’s Day (it’s a rEVOLution, after all!!) and February 20, I will donate an additional $5,000 of my own money. This is a significant amount for me personally, and is not a candidate loan but a donation. The challenge is if campaign supporters and donors are willing to make a significant contribution towards saving our country, I will do so with my wallet as well as with my time. During the week, grassroot supporters are holding two money bombs, and totals from both these will count towards the weekly total. Updates on the totals will befound here on February 15, and in the comment thread below.

Through December 31, 2009, 387 donors have raised $16,400 for the campaign, including over $2,000 from myself. As a small independent campaign, we do not have a fundraising coordinator, so all funds raised has come from grassroot supporters in the district and nationwide. The median donation is about $25, so no donation is too small.

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Originally published on February 7, 2010 at http://towneforcongress.com/economy/americas-greatest-and-strangest-political-secret-1

The path I have chosen in 2010 is to run as an independent under no political party in 2010.  As a candidate for United States Congress, this was – and still is – the best possible route for myself to win the November election and fulfill the campaign’s mission statement.   I have a severe dislike for both the Republican and Democrat politicians and party leaders as they are taking my country  - OUR country – on a path to both moral and economic ruin.  In my particular district, third parties are unfortunately not active and (locally in my district) have largely missed the boat on addressing the economic unrest.

However, as your fellow citizen, I want to share with you all the most effective way to become politically active, and that is to join with one of the two major parties and run for committeeman or committeewoman.  This gives you a vote in selecting local party leaders, and both major parties can be taken over on the local level by a determined minority.

America’s greatest and strangest political secret is that, in the dead of the winter, the two parties have a brief signature gathering process and then each precinct (usually just the few streets around your home) elects a committeeman/woman.  In Pennsylvania, just 10 signatures are required to be listed on the May 18 primary ballot.  The signature gathering is from February 16 to March 9, hence the timing of this post.  The May primary vote elects the precinct committeemen/women.

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A few weeks ago, Ron Paul introduced one of the Downsize DC Agenda bills.

Throughout 2009, DC Downsizers ALONE called for Congressman Paul to re-introduce the three “Honest Money” bills using our “End the Inflation Tax” campaign. We had specifically called for the Congressman not only to resubmit these highly important levers to destroy the government’s inflation tax and to “End the Fed,” but we’d also encouraged every member of Congress to re-introduce these three bills in ONE NEW BILL.

We applaud Ron Paul for doing exactly that. Here is the Statement of Congressman Ron Paul Introducing the Free Competition in Currency Act HR 4248 (edited for publication, with emphasis points added) . . .

Currency, or money, is what allows civilization to flourish. In the absence of money, barter is the name of the game; if the farmer needs shoes, he must trade his eggs and milk to the cobbler and hope that the cobbler needs eggs and milk. Money makes the transaction process far easier. Rather than having to search for someone with reciprocal wants, the farmer can exchange his milk and eggs for an agreed-upon medium of exchange with which he can then purchase shoes.

This medium of exchange should satisfy certain properties. It should be . . .   Read More »

Ron Paul participated in a short but quite good interview with Bankrate.com in its “Fame and Fortune” series. With one answer Paul sums up the health care debacle.

Bankrate: What do you think of the health care reform package?

Ron Paul: It’s a disaster! As a matter of fact, it was in the early ’70s when the Republicans started accelerating intervention and having managed care. That’s when the tax codes changed and there were mandates. It was the government all of those years that has participated in pushing the cost of medicine up and causing it to become bureaucratic and causing the charity hospitals to go out of business. Managed care has been around (since) about the same time as we lost the gold standard, and it’s managed care that we should blame.

The real problem with medical care is it costs too much. Nobody would complain if it didn’t cost so much. But it costs so much because of inflation plus the bureaucracy we’ve created.

Read the full interview here.

Here is one of the Indianapolis Colts players revealing the essence of Ben Bernanke.

(Thanks to Minnesota Chris)

by Peter Schiff, president of Euro Pacific Capital and author of Crash Proof 2.0: How to Profit from the Economic Collapse

With today’s unexpected decline in December payrolls, the cry for more job-related stimulus will grow even louder. But the sad truth is that any new stimulus or jobs bills will ultimately swell the ranks of the unemployed, thereby raising calls for an even bigger federal effort. If we are not careful, government regulations, subsidies, and spending, all designed to fight unemployment, could push the labor market into a death spiral.

Regulation acts like a tax on job creation. By subjecting employers to all sorts of extra expenses when they hire people, regulations increase the cost of employment far beyond the wages employers actually pay their workers. In fact, some regulations are specifically tied to the number of workers employed. This provides some employers with a strong incentive to stay small and not hire.

The minimum wage law, which is really just a very visible workplace regulation, actually makes it illegal for employers to hire certain individuals and destroys entire categories of jobs. For instance, faced with high labor costs, some restaurants will avoid hiring dishwashers by switching to plastic utensils and paper plates. On a larger scale, factories may decide to switch to robotic assembly lines if human labor gets too expensive.

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What do the Federal Reserve and the Democrats’ health care reform proposals have in common? No, it’s not the start of a bad joke nor a rhetorical question. It’s all about the role of government.

Some question whether or not the Federal Reserve is a government entity. I don’t. It has government written all over it. It was created by the government and, like most government creations, it is a failure.

Congress created the Federal Reserve primarily to stabilize the dollar and the U.S. economy. Prior to the creation of the Fed the dollar was relatively stable. Following the creation of the Federal Reserve the dollar has declined nearly every year, but especially since the early 1970′s. By this rather essential measure, the Federal Reserve is a colossal bust.

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by John Browne – Senior Market Strategist, Euro Pacific Capital

President Obama’s State of the Union message only serves to reinforce my forecast that investors will continue to find better returns in markets outside America and in currencies other than the U.S. dollar. Indeed, the reward gap may well increase.

Nothing in the President’s speech indicated willingness to do the hard work of cutting spending. Rather, he reiterated his commitment to a costly new healthcare entitlement and more spending on make-work programs. Only days later, his budget acknowledged that, even before factoring in the cost of his proposals, the federal government is unlikely to be in surplus for the foreseeable future. In response, Moody’s has issued a warning that the United States’ triple-A credit rating is not unassailable. In short, the trend set some ten years ago will continue.

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