The question of secession was more or less settled during the Civil War. Thanks to that low point in American history the right of secession has been tied to slavery ever since. Isn’t it time again to make an effort of untying that knot?
I will not complicate the untying of that knot by quoting our Founders nor Abraham Lincoln. I will instead make an attempt to use logic. It is up to whomever reads this to decide if I’m successful in this endeavor.
The right of secession is a claim of freedom from the State. It is a rejection of State slavery. It is purely libertarian yet it has always been associated with the “peculiar institution” which was a complete rejection of liberty. Slavery has muddied the secession debate to the point that it is difficult for anyone to sound off in favor of secession without being demonized as a kook (at best) or a white supremacist (at worst).
I want to claim publicly, before I get labeled, I abhor slavery in all forms. It is pure evil. How hypocritical it was for the Confederate States to use States Rights in an attempt to continue violating human rights. It is also quite hypocritical today for those who claim to believe in liberty to marginalize those that support secession as a recourse for combating creeping State tyranny. Such tyranny is nothing more than a form of collective slavery.
How can individual slavery be so wrong and collective State-sponsored, taxpayer-funded slavery be right? The answer, of course, is that it cannot. Slavery in all forms is immoral, whether it be evidenced through the government’s incrementalist approach of freedom reduction or by the sound of a whip gashing a man’s back. The drama of the latter should not minimize the evil of the former.
To be a supporter of secession while denouncing human slavery is consistent and moral in the cause of liberty.
History has shown that one era’s fringe is another era’s mainstream. It is unlikely that secession would be considered a viable option by the masses for combating the ceaseless expansion of government today, thanks in large part to those that feel compelled to associate it with slavery. The secession principle is wholly libertarian and deserves more respect than it is receiving from the detractors.
Ron Paul has been a favorite target of the detractors because of his recently released pro-secession video. In it he focuses on the right message, the principle of secession. Instead of attacking Ron Paul we should be emulating him.
If we make the effort to unmuddy the water of secession in our time perhaps the next generation won’t be afraid to swim in its clarity. After we are gone they will thank us for our eternal vigilance so they still know liberty.
There were very few news reports about the Bush administration forcing some private banks that had no desire for bailout money to take bailout money. These were banks that had no need or desire to take government money, but were given an “incentive” to do so using the threat of multi-year audits by our compassionate federal government. While the government may term this tactic as an “incentive” most proper thinking citizens call it for what it really is, extortion.
So the Bush administration commited extortion paving the way for the Obama administration to hip-hop toward fascism. This is becoming even more evident with the recent Obama “firing” of GM head Rick Wagoner. I’m not a religious person, but I do recall that the Bible teaches us that the borrower is a slave to the lender (Proverbs 22). The Obama administration is now a slave owner of once private businesses. This point is further reinforced by the fact that some of these new government owned business “slaves” became government owned unwillingly.
The Bush administration bought the slaves. The Obama administration is lording over the slaves, whip in hand.
Some of these businesses came to the government on bended knee begging for loans. Perhaps they didn’t realize that in doing so they were also begging into slavery. I think Rick Wagoner may realize that now. I hope others begin to realize this and start fighting back. Companies that choose bankruptcy over slavery should be commended and supported.
Unfortunately, the problem with not supporting the government slave businesses just means that more tax money will be utilized to keep them functioning. That is, unless people start not only waking up, but also acting out by holding lawmakers accountable for supporting this kind of slavery.
The road to economic prosperity is not paved by the blood of government economic tyranny. The road to economic prosperity can only be paved by the sweat of free market liberty.
It seems that America is always at war with some country or some thing. We have the War on Drugs, the War on Poverty, and the War on Terror. The media made a point to mention that the Obama administration has chosen to cease using the term “War on Terror”. That’s certainly a good move, but semantics matter little when the soft-spoken administration continues to act hard, like drone bombing Pakistan and increasing troop levels in Afghanistan. There is another unspoken war going on right now from the Obama administration. Obama and his Keynesian minions have declared a War on Capitalism.
For our sake I hope it is a complete failure like the government’s other perpetual wars. Though I fear that with the popularity of Obama and his “wolf in sheep’s clothing” words it may end in success. If that happens, America will no longer be America as we once knew it. Some may argue that America is already gone, capitalism is dead, and those of us who fancy liberty should self-immolate. Thank god the nature of liberty coexists with the burning desire to keep it intact. Rather than self-immolate we should immolate, through the ballot box, all of those in DC who are enemies to liberty. As Chuck Norris has suggested, Ron Paul could be the arbiter of which of his colleagues deserve to be choked out of office.
We are in the midst of celebrating Abraham Lincoln’s 200th birthday at the same time Barack Obama is ready to put his signature on one of the largest spending bill’s in American history. It is quite appropriate. So appropriate to almost approach irony.
The United States was not a shining land of liberty prior to Lincoln’s Presidency. Slavery is the best and most popular testament to that. America was an imperfect country pursuing perfection. Lincoln made it worse. The fact that he is revered so universally from the surface dwellers is bothersome. However, the fact that so many historians make excuses for his authoritarian methods because he supposedly “freed the slaves” makes me downright ill.
Lincoln cared little for abolishing slavery. He cared about keeping the Union together and maintaining his own political interests. He was the first President to truly preside as a dictator. Some may argue that John Adams had dictatorial “qualities” as well, but Lincoln went far beyond the scope of the Alien and Sedition Acts.
Lincoln and other Presidents after him like Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, and George W. Bush paved the way toward a more oppressive authoritarian federal government. Lincoln was the first though. It’s all his fault that we are high kicking toward socialism today. He kicked first. The rest have followed.
Apparently, Barack Obama is going to be making a call for service during the telecast of the NBA all-star game this evening in Phoenix, Arizona. According to CNN, the White House released an excerpt of his message.
Obama says that we should “lace ‘em up” for service by preparing “a care package for a soldier”, reading to children, or fixing up a basketball court. He then plugs the service website USAService.org to find “service” events near you.
I thought, “Hey, this is a good thing for our President to be doing as long as it remains voluntary and non-partisan.” So I go to the site to see what types of events I could volunteer for in my area. What I discovered were some events among the “proper” ones that were nothing more than pep rallies for Obama and the Democratic Party. I think I’ll just continue to do what I’ve always done, pay attention to my own community and not seek acceptance from the service bean counters in Washington.
Here are two events in my area alone that are deemed “service”:
President’s Day Mix and Meet: Democrats are invited to first meeting and mixer to enroll and meet new members. We will reorganize Community Outreach, Communications, and Precinct sub-committees.
Obama Day: Have a ceremony for president Barack Obama and Family. And selected community guess[sic] will attend. We will have music, Food and Games, just to show our appreciation of the Obama family.
If your among the 30% of the U.S. population who voted for Obama then USAService.org is for you.
If you are in the majority who did not, then you may want to continue to do what he is asking of everyone, but do it on your own terms and in your own community.
If the recent economic situation and Obama’s ill-conceived efforts to fix it are any indication there are going to be a lot more people that need volunteer help. Also, if enough people actually volunteer and results are seen maybe Obama won’t make it mandatory some day. How ironic would that be, the first African American President enslaves the people? That can’t happen here can it?
In the next installment of “Ron Paul’s Walls”, Ron Paul discusses a quote that he has hanging on his wall from Senator Robert Taft.
He agrees with Taft in opposing the draft for individual liberty reasons.
“A compulsory draft is far more typical of totalitarian nations than of democratic nations. The theory behind it leads directly to totalitarianism. It is absolutely opposed to the ideas of individual liberty which have always been considered a part of American democracy.” -Robert Taft
Once again Ron Paul becomes the educator. He also talks bout his own experience as a young adult with respect to the draft.
The irony and hypocrisy of Barack Obama being sworn in on the Lincoln Bible is not lost on Liberty Hero Walter E. Williams in his most recent column.
President Obama can be forgiven for celebrating the hypocrisy of Abraham Lincoln because the victors of wars write their history and glorify the winners. The recognition that slavery is a despicable institution does not require hero worship of a president who made the largest contribution to the unraveling of our Constitution. After all when it is settled by brute force that states cannot secede, as they thought they had the right to in 1787, then the federal government can ride roughshod over states and their people’s right — in a word make meaningless the Ninth and Tenth Amendments.
On the President-Elect’s web site Change.gov, Obama advocates compulsory community service:
…all middle school and high school students do 50 hours of community service a year and … all college students … conduct 100 hours of community service…
Why oh why would the first black president of America allow, and perhaps even encourage, yet another form of slavery in our nation? Has Barack Obama forgotten the African-American side of his own heritage? Doesn’t he know that compulsory community service is just slavery by a different name?
The controversy over coercing young people into national servitude to their political masters emerged almost as soon as Obama named Rahm Emanuel as his Chief of Staff-in-waiting.
J.D. Tuccille, Civil Liberties Examiner for Dallas Examiner.com was one of the first to point out that Emanuel co-authored a book that calls for compulsory service for all Americans ages 18 to 25.
…I see no reason why compelled service should not be regarded as involuntary servitude — labor rendered against one’s will — of the sort forbidden in the United States under the Thirteenth Amendment. More importantly, I see no reason why compelled service, as an imposition against an individual’s right to exercise liberty and determine the course of his or her own life, should not be regarded as evil.
Liberty Maven![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=2751e73f-a5a0-4970-83ed-efabf60a8b2a)
Follow LM on Twitter