“I called the Speaker and Leader today and emailed my representatives. Thanks for encouraging me to do so. It feels good, real good.” — Will Ashby, DC Downsizer
“GOP leaders argue that extending the PATRIOT Act is especially important because the killing of Osama bin Laden might inspire retaliatory terrorist attacks against Americans. Call me cynical, but had Bin Laden not yet been killed or captured, I’m sure that these same GOP leaders would argue that extending the PATRIOT Act is especially important because Osama bin Laden remains on the loose.” – Don Boudreaux
Three controversial provisions of the so-called Patriot Act are set to expire on May 27.
Quote of the Day: “Liberty is the possibility of doubting, the possibility of making a mistake, the possibility of searching and experimenting, the possibility of saying “No” to any authority — literary, artistic, philosophic, religious, social and even political.” — Ignazio Silone (1900-1978) Source: The God That Failed, 1950
The politicians are trying to tax the Internet again. Let’s stop them.
You’re paying an invisible tax — the Regulation Tax. It has grown by two-thirds over the past ten years, and is now more than $15,000 per household.
The Federal State’s price controls, paperwork, entry restrictions, environmental controls, and workplace regulations increase the prices you pay for everything you buy. These costs also discourage businesses from expanding and hiring. They often force lay-offs.
As the letter below indicates, the sheer size of the regulatory burden is shocking.
This morning Ron Paul appeared on Good Morning America ahead of his speech in New Hampshire where he announced he is officially entering the race for POTUS 2012. This is unsurprising given his recent move toward running and the results in recent polls.
Here is his appearance on GMA. Note his excellent responses to all of the questions posed to him. Much like his fire in the first GOP debate, it has become obvious to me that this 2012 effort is no longer just an educational effort like 2008 admittedly was. He’s in it to win it this time around. The thing about Ron Paul is that even if he loses in the conventional sense (which right now appears likely) he will win and has already won the hearts and minds of a new generation of leaders. And their sole focus is what the America of the future needs most: liberty.
What do we demand from government? Jobs? Prosperity? These days those come to mind first, but during the post World War II years we had prosperity and jobs and discontent was rampant. Did we want something else then? I came of age with the first Boomers in the 50’s and 60’s and the country’s prosperity did little to dampen our discontent. What were we so mad about? I believe we were mad because we didn’t have a good national story that pertained to our generation.
And I think that in addition to our clamoring today for jobs and a return to prosperity, mine and succeeding generations have continued the yearning for a good national story. Now we have the makings of the sort of compelling story we lacked before. The only problem, as I shall conclude, is that sometimes stories can be too satisfying, too soon.
First let’s rid ourselves of the idea that a story is essentially fiction. After all, the words “history” and “story” share the same root. This is not to say that stories and history are equally non-fictional- they may be equally fictional. Their truth or falsity is beside the point. We eagerly adopt stories of either kind to underwrite our lives.
Hitler is relevant to this discussion, as he was the most strident and successful storyteller of the generations just before mine. He told different stories to different people, and everyone believed him. He told Germans that Jews and the rest of the world generally had conspired to destroy the destiny of the German people. This story was a bestseller, so to speak. Great swaths of German society devoured it as precious mental nourishment, because it made them feel good, made them feel part of something important and justified, as an effective story does. Then he told the rest of the world that he was a ferocious megalomaniac, poised to take over and punish all states and societies that were not in his thrall. That story too was a great hit, in the sense that people followed it and adopted it as their story.
The stories told by Roosevelt and Churchill were predicated on Hitler’s story: We were the defenders against Hitler, the homicidal maniac. Of course Hitler was a homicidal maniac, but as I say my use of “story” denotes neither fiction nor non-fiction. It was Hitler’s story telling capability that put him on the map. Our mental wards are full of crazed megalomaniacs whose stories are listened to by no one but bored staff. Hitler might well have been one of these isolated souls, but as a powerful storyteller, his story became, well, “real.”
Then what was wrong with post-war America’s story? Looking back I see a few things: the dreadful Hitler-enhanced war story that our parents lived, with its heroism and triumph, was not available for us to identify with, partly because it had not happened on our soil, and partly because we were so definitively post-war. Nor could we derive self-esteem from the earlier Depression, with its tales of injustice and endurance, awash as we were in surplus. We had for our coming of age rituals- not recognition of triumph over adversity- but endless exhortations conveyed via the new wonder, TV, to spend our parents’ money on keys to popularity like Brylceem (a little dab ‘ll do ‘ya!). We were just consumers of hair grease always on the look out for new products. I think I sensed even then the potential for Tom Brokaw to slander my entire generation as something less than “great.”
Ron Paul is on fire. That is my opinion of his performance in this first GOP debate. Of course, I’m biased. Feel free to make your own judgement after watching the entire debate below. There were a few stellar moments from Ron Paul, including his answer when asked about legalizing drugs, and his answer about being the “Founding Father” of the Tea Party movement regarding Michele Bachmann.
I don’t agree with a lot of what Herman Cain says, but I have to admit he has charisma that will give him a lot of support. Expect the other candidates to start attacking him if his poll numbers go up. I think they will.
Gary Johnson did very well with a few odd moments. If I’m looking at him through social-con or neo-con eyes voting for him would likely be impossible. He did come off as a very honest “make the hard choices” candidate. Sort of like Cain without the charisma.
Pawlenty seems to be channeling John McCain a bit too much and Santorum just comes off as angry. Both seem to be going after the George W. Bush voting block; however small that is these days.
Last Friday, several functions of the Federal State nearly shut down as Democrats and Republicans fought over things like tax funding for abortion providers. It’s the usual con game . . .
In other words, the politicians are still pretending to fight a “Culture War.” But are the people following their lead? I think not.
It seems to me that times have changed. People are waking up. They’re becoming harder to manipulate. As the letter below indicates, the real Culture War isn’t the one being portrayed by the institutional media. It’s not the conservatives against the liberals; it’s the politicians against YOU.
My libertarian soul was hooked immediately. Yours will be as well. From the very first pages of The Immune, a libertarian-infused, science fiction thriller from Doc Lucky Meisenheimer you will crave something. Something that all authors wish their readers would crave–to see what is on the next page, and the one after, and the one after that, and so on.
The Immune reads like a movie that keeps you guessing until the very end. It could easily be a huge blockbuster big screen thriller someday. Of course, that is if those in Hollywood are able to overlook the anti-government and decidedly libertarian message of the story. The great thing about Doc Lucky’s story is that it remains true to the liberty message without being overly preachy. In other words, this is not an Ayn Rand novel. I do love reading Ayn Rand, but this is much more mainstream and accessible. In fact it could be used as a gentle introduction to the libertarian ideology for those just starting down that path.
The book explores privacy, gun rights, civil liberties, foreign policy, government health care, global governance, and more. There’s even an evil character that I can only guess was patterned after Nancy Pelosi.
The story follows physician John Long in the not so-distant future when bio-genetically manufactured organisms that resemble flying “man-o-wars” (called airwars) begin emerging all over the world and killing humans randomly. Long is an ordinary physician who is lucky enough to be immune to the stings of the airwars. This makes him supremely useful to the propaganda machine of an international governing body that uses the airwar crisis as an excuse to continually strip individual freedoms from the world’s citizens. Hmm… doesn’t that sound all-too-familiar? And that’s not all they try to strip away as you’ll find out when you read the book.
This is truly a wonderful first novel for Doc Lucky Meisenheimer. The Immune succeeds on several levels. It is both heavy and light. It works equally as a “beach book” page-turner, and as an intellectual pursuit of individual liberty. Perhaps some of those that utilize it as the former will morph into using it as the latter by the time the last page is read.
If you are going to pursue liberty you might as well have fun doing it. That’s what reading The Immune is all about. I can’t recommend it enough. Add it to your reading list now. You’ll thank me later.
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The Immune by Doc Lucky Meisenheimer goes on sale May 13th, 2011. To order and find out more, see http://www.theimmune.com/
Quote of the Day: “The problem isn’t the abuse of power, it’s the power to abuse.” — Michael Cloud
The Electronic Frontier Foundation is urging people to call the White House TODAY, and urge President Obama to veto any Patriot Act renewal that doesn’t contain civil liberties protections.
We agree. This is a good opportunity to remind the President that he promised to reform the Patriot Act when he was a candidate.
Marriage is and has long been a cultural, social and wedge issue in American politics. One of the more dramatic turns of defining marriage came in the landmark 1967 Supreme Court decision Loving v. Virginia in which the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that bans on interracial marriage were unconstitutional. Some forty years later, interracial marriage inspires little debate and has mostly been seen as an acceptable definition of marriage. However, as the twenty-first century dawned and developed, the issue of marriage definition has again come into American politics.
In 1996, President Clinton signed the federal Defense of Marriage Act or DOMA into law. DOMA, which President Obama has recently (and unconstitutionally) declared unconstitutional, said that the United States federal Government recognized marriage as a relationship between one man and one woman. It also said that no state would have to recognize the gay marriage of another state. Thus, an Alabama gay couple could not be married in Massachusetts and return home as newlyweds.
In 2008, Californians passed Proposition Eight, a measure barring gays from marrying in the Golden State. The proposition had passed narrowly in the general election and was later struck down by federal judge Vaughn Walker. A similar measure had previously been declared unconstitutional by the California Supreme Court.
Still, all the talk about how government defines marriage begs another question: should the government define marriage?
In several interviews, former Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura has expressed the idea that “love is bigger than government” and argues that government should recognize civil unions between any two consenting adults and that the term “marriage” should be saved for churches and the private sector.
This is an idea that Libertarians should embrace. Americans have become hung up on the term “marriage”. Still, public opinion poll has showed time and time again that the vast majority of Americans support basic rights for gay and lesbian individuals including legal and sometimes financial benefits. Granting every adult, consenting couple a civil union would allow all citizens the rights they deserve as far as their partners are concerned. Additionally, it would continue the support of separation between church and state.
For too long, the American People have allowed their government to define what is and what is not marriage. A couple who love each other shouldn’t need the State’s permission to bind themselves legally and equivalently together. Civil Unions would grant equality to law abiding citizens and would promote freedom for all individuals regardless of their political, professional or marital positions.
Liberty Maven
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