It’s official, but no surprise, Sonia Sotomayor of the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals is Obama’s pick to replace retiring Justice David Souter on the U.S. Supreme Court.
Barrack Obama made it clear from the beginning he wanted to renovate the Supreme Court by picking a Justice who empathizes with special interests and perceived victims groups. Speaking at a Planned Parenthood gathering, Obama laid out his criteria for picking judges: “We need somebody who's got the heart, the empathy, to recognize what it's like to be a young teenage mom. The empathy to understand what it's like to be poor, or African-American, or gay, or disabled, or old. And that's the criteria by which I'm going to be selecting my judges.”
Not withstanding, “empathy” being code for Judicial activism, Obama claimed today that the Judicial role is to interpret law not make law, but this is what Sotomayer has to say:
Showing her predilection for political activism (and lack of Judicial objectivism), Sotomayor quipped, "I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion [as a judge] than a white male who hasn't lived that life." -- Diversity Lecture Berkeley Law School.
Not only is this indicative of judicial subjectivism it is also indicative of a racial connotation. Just imagine the uproar if a White male judge said that a white male can make better decisions than a Latino woman.
Sotomayer is just the ticket Obama needs to achieve his social agenda. Obama writing in his book, Audacity of Hope, confirmed his belief that the Constitution "is not a static but rather a living document and must be read in the context of an ever-changing world." Translation: Your liberties are subject to judicial re-write. She certainly personifies this progressive ideology.
As an example of what we can expect on how Sonia Sotomayor will likely rule she recently gained some modicum of notoriety by killing a reverse racial discrimination case brought against the city of New Haven CT. This case was brought forward by white firefighters who topped the promotion exam but where not promoted. The case cites the city’s review which found that black candidates scored below the level required for promotion and as a result, the city threw out the test results.
Criticizing Sotomayor for a lack of reasoning dissenting Judge Jose Cabranes complained that Sotomayer’s single-paragraph oppinion ignored the evidence and did not even address the constitutional issues raised by the case.
The case is currently pending in the Supreme Court. Sotomayer has a history of having her decisions overturned by the High Court. Now she stands to be a member of it.
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Unveiling the lies
Thomas J. DiLorenzo In his article on “Never-Ending Government Lies About Markets” on Mises eloquently points out the truth about the deceptions perpetrated on the public about the great failures of capitalism for the purposes of creating more regulation in the name of protecting the public. Like a good parent government knows best but unlike a good parent they are willing to deceive you in order to fulfill their agenda.
Most recently, the current economic crisis is said to be caused by the "excesses" of economic freedom and "too little regulation" of the economy, especially financial markets. This is said by the president and numerous other politicians, with straight faces, despite the facts that there are a dozen executive-branch cabinet departments, over 100 federal agencies, more than 85,000 pages in the Federal Register, and dozens of state and local government agencies that regulate, regiment, tax, and control every aspect of every business in America, and have been doing so for decades.
Laissez-faire run amok in financial markets is said to be a cause of the current crisis. But the Fed alone — a secret government organization that is accountable to no one and which has never been audited — performs hundreds of regulatory functions, in addition to recklessly manipulating the money supply. And it is just one of numerous financial regulatory agencies (the SEC, Comptroller of the Currency, Office of Thrift Supervision, FDIC, and numerous state regulators also exist). In a Fed publication entitled "The Federal Reserve System: Purposes and Functions," it is explained that "The Federal Reserve has supervisory and regulatory authority over a wide range of financial institutions and activities." That's the understatement of the century. Among the Fed's functions are the regulation of
• Bank holding companies
• State-chartered banks
• Foreign branches of member banks
• Edge and agreement corporations
• US state-licensed branches, agencies, and representative offices of foreign banks
• Nonbanking activities of foreign banks
• National banks (with the Comptroller of the Currency)
• Savings banks (with the Office of Thrift Supervision)
• Nonbank subsidiaries of bank holding companies
• Thrift holding companies
• Financial reporting
• Accounting policies of banks
• Business "continuity" in case of an economic emergency
• Consumer-protection laws
• Securities dealings of banks
• Information technology used by banks
• Foreign investments of banks
• Foreign lending by banks
• Branch banking
• Bank mergers and acquisitions
• Who may own a bank
• Capital "adequacy standards"
• Extensions of credit for the purchase of securities
• Equal-opportunity lending
• Mortgage disclosure information
• Reserve requirements
• Electronic-funds transfers
• Interbank liabilities
• Community Reinvestment Act subprime lending requirements
• All international banking operations
• Consumer leasing
• Privacy of consumer financial information
• Payments on demand deposits
• "Fair credit" reporting
• Transactions between member banks and their affiliates
• Truth in lending
• Truth in savings
That's a pretty comprehensive list, the result of 96 years of bureaucratic empire building by Fed bureaucrats. It gives the lie to the notion that there has been "too little regulation" of financial markets. Anyone who makes such an argument is either ignorant of the truth or is lying.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Story of stuff
This video is supposed to be the story of the "effects of human consumption" that teaches kids to be accountable. Does this challenge the minds of kids or does it indoctrinate them?
Monday, May 11, 2009
The Unholy Alliance
The assaults on freedom take on many forms and come from many directions. In our fight to remain a free people we must realize it isn’t only the altruists who worship at the altar of collectivism that we need to watch out for. It also comes in the form of vicarious entanglements between big business and government.
This unholy alliance between government and big business has wreaked havoc once again on the economy and instead of being exposed for what it is it goes largely unnoticed. Government in its outrage gives the corporate elites trillions in taxpayer money while hiding its culpability behind a veil of anti-business rhetoric and lip service.
Not everyone gets off so easily however. In an attempt to muddy the water and rescue union workers in the auto industry the government threatened non-tarp lenders resisting the sale of Chrysler with the full-force of the White House press corps to ruin their reputations. They were also threatened to have the IRS sicced on them and having the Securities and Exchange Commission rip through their books looking for anything and everything to destroy them with according to Thomas E. Lauria the lawyer representing the hedge funds. Faced with these sorts of threats, these funds submitted to the White House.
The fact is the treasury department is being run by boogieman Rahm Emmanuel who is infamous for being the attack dog for the Clinton Administration. It isn’t any secret that he wants the Treasury where he can finally wield omnipotent authority over the most untouchable dept. in the U.S. government.
Such outright thuggery by Obama’s henchmen is a sure and certain sign of our descent into “Fascism” or at least it certainly gives the appearance of a dictatorship—and in some ways it is.
Economic fascism takes on many forms and sooner or later one can be sure it will morph into political fascism or at least it is another pillar of support for political fascism.
America’s form of fascism is very advanced and complex it has been woven into the fabric of society through years of legislation and court rulings. It’s really an interwoven patchwork of laws, philosophies, and relationships and as such it would be difficult if not down right impossible to undo—at least completely. Normally fascism is when private industry owns the means of production but government dictates controls over them. In America it has taken on the face of unholy matrimony between government and business where both partners protect the interests of the other–for good or for bad.
What the corporate elites get out of the marriage is conditions favorable to them that bestow protection from competitors and allows them access to easy money and easy credit to make billions of dollars. This also allows for the creation of mega-corporations that are to big to fail.
Of course this isn’t always a synergetic symbiosis by any means because what is required by the corporate elites in return for this favoritism is an obligation to lend moral support—or at least keep silent—for legislation and policies that might not always seem business friendly. They must gratuitously give financial support for political campaigns and surrender tax dollars for financing massive government expansionism—In other words the big business elites are the catalyst for the political elites to gain and maintain POWER.
Do you ever wonder why corporations give so much money to political campaigns? Have you noticed they almost always give money to both parties? It is because no matter who wins the elections it is business as usual. Some of the most devout supporters of government intervention are some of the richest capitalist elites—Warren Buffett talking head for government bailouts and Obama’s stimulus plan as one example. And despite all the anti-capitalist rhetoric that has gone on for the past fifty or so years on Capital Hill nothing really ever changes.
Let me explain, the Federal Reserve is made up of a board of directors who come form investment banking, naturally they are going to give preferential treatment to the financial markets. Although the FED is not a government entity per se it is still the purveyor of government monetary policy. The FED has been infamously implicated with every boom and bust cycle since its inception. During the recession of the late 1920’s it was the FED’s mis-correction of the markets resulting in unrealistically high interest rates and withholding money from circulation combined with war debt from WWI, and corporate protectionism through tariffs that caused the Great Depression. The FEDs culpability in today’s crisis is by creating easy money by setting unrealistically low interest rates and putting to much money in circulation. These sorts of artificial manipulations distort market forces and create bigger boom cycles but also cause bigger bust cycles.
Everyone in the business world knows about these boom and bust cycles. They are a part of the everyday economic landscape. Traditionally the way the financial sector handles these booms and bust cycles is to get in on the boom make as much money as possible and try to predict when to get out before the bust. There will be a bust because the market has to correct itself. Usually these boom and bust cycles come and go fairly quickly without much harm being done. But every now and then artificial market manipulations combine with other aberrant and unforeseen forces to create a financial tsunami. But before it washes ashore engulfing everything in its path, the financial elite, with surfboards in tow, rush into the waters hoping to catch a ride on the big kahuna wave and cash in and get out before the wave breaks with catastrophic impact upon the rocks. In other words it is an all-out hit and run speed race to make billions in a short period of time risking everything if they don’t get out in time. That’s how it works—more or less. Sometimes they don’t get out of the way fast enough. Of course government acting as a life lifeguard, backed with what must seem to them as an endless supply of taxpayer dollars, is ready and obligated to bail them out.
All anyone has to do is to take a closer look at the connections between Wall Street and Washington to see that many folks in influential positions in Washington came from Wall Street or went to work for Wall Street making huge fortunes after they left the government.
For example, President Bush’s family made their fortune in oil; Dick Cheney was a former CEO of Halliburton. Robert Rubin, former Secretary of the Treasury under Bill Clinton, later became the CEO for Citigroup’s executive committee, Henry Paulson was the CEO for Goldman Sachs before becoming the Secretary of Treasury under Georg Bush. And the list goes on. Many in Congress and the Whitehouse have made fortunes in capital ventures and other forms of business.
Barrack Obama, with all his talk of “change we can believe in” and hailing himself as the savior of the working class, hasn’t changed a thing. For all his talk it is the big business elites who are getting trillions of taxpayer dollars. Of course John McCain would have done the same thing as did Bush with his TARP funds. This is why this is a non-partisan problem—after all freedom is in everyone’s best interest, right?
The question one needs to ask himself for a clearer view of things is who is benefited from government bailouts and stimulus bills Big Business or the taxpayer?
Perhaps one of the most damaging thing this unholy union does is it creates a misaligned view of capitalism which fosters fear of exploitation and anti-free market sentiments. This fear or mistrust of capitalism is the exact impetus that allows such an alliance to persist. Of course the economic model we have today is NOT capitalism. Under capitalism businesses are at the mercy of market forces that keep things streamlined and in order. Disorder brings chaos which brings more streamlining and integrity. In its current form there can be no integrity. True capitalism breeds competition, fairness in the marketplace, integrity, opportunity, choice, quality, and freedom. The mega corporations could have never grown so large that they couldn’t fail if it weren’t for government intervention.
What all the bailouts and stimulus packages really amounts to is just another wealth redistribution scheme only this time instead of taking from the rich and giving it to the poor, worse, it takes money from every taxpayer—in fact, generations of taxpayers—and redistributes it to the corporate elites. Now tell me government and business is not in bed together. Whether you call it economic fascism or a mixed economy or whatever, what it really boils down to is a pseudo–uncapitalist economy run by a handful of corporate and political elites.
Change we can believe in would be a divorce between government and big business—and other special interest elites too. We need to allow the free market to be free from the corruptive influences of this unholy marriage. This would allow the market forces to police corrupt corporations—in other words let the company, who’s CEO and Board of Directors who make bad decisions, fail and investors who throw money into risky ventures that artificial prop up values, that cause bubbles, die by the sword. In the end there will be less of a tendency towards fascism, better business models, less risk, more choices of products and services, better products at lower prices, more jobs, more opportunity for the creative entrepreneur, and fewer and less severe booms and busts.
This unholy alliance between government and big business has wreaked havoc once again on the economy and instead of being exposed for what it is it goes largely unnoticed. Government in its outrage gives the corporate elites trillions in taxpayer money while hiding its culpability behind a veil of anti-business rhetoric and lip service.
Not everyone gets off so easily however. In an attempt to muddy the water and rescue union workers in the auto industry the government threatened non-tarp lenders resisting the sale of Chrysler with the full-force of the White House press corps to ruin their reputations. They were also threatened to have the IRS sicced on them and having the Securities and Exchange Commission rip through their books looking for anything and everything to destroy them with according to Thomas E. Lauria the lawyer representing the hedge funds. Faced with these sorts of threats, these funds submitted to the White House.
The fact is the treasury department is being run by boogieman Rahm Emmanuel who is infamous for being the attack dog for the Clinton Administration. It isn’t any secret that he wants the Treasury where he can finally wield omnipotent authority over the most untouchable dept. in the U.S. government.
Such outright thuggery by Obama’s henchmen is a sure and certain sign of our descent into “Fascism” or at least it certainly gives the appearance of a dictatorship—and in some ways it is.
Economic fascism takes on many forms and sooner or later one can be sure it will morph into political fascism or at least it is another pillar of support for political fascism.
America’s form of fascism is very advanced and complex it has been woven into the fabric of society through years of legislation and court rulings. It’s really an interwoven patchwork of laws, philosophies, and relationships and as such it would be difficult if not down right impossible to undo—at least completely. Normally fascism is when private industry owns the means of production but government dictates controls over them. In America it has taken on the face of unholy matrimony between government and business where both partners protect the interests of the other–for good or for bad.
What the corporate elites get out of the marriage is conditions favorable to them that bestow protection from competitors and allows them access to easy money and easy credit to make billions of dollars. This also allows for the creation of mega-corporations that are to big to fail.
Of course this isn’t always a synergetic symbiosis by any means because what is required by the corporate elites in return for this favoritism is an obligation to lend moral support—or at least keep silent—for legislation and policies that might not always seem business friendly. They must gratuitously give financial support for political campaigns and surrender tax dollars for financing massive government expansionism—In other words the big business elites are the catalyst for the political elites to gain and maintain POWER.
Do you ever wonder why corporations give so much money to political campaigns? Have you noticed they almost always give money to both parties? It is because no matter who wins the elections it is business as usual. Some of the most devout supporters of government intervention are some of the richest capitalist elites—Warren Buffett talking head for government bailouts and Obama’s stimulus plan as one example. And despite all the anti-capitalist rhetoric that has gone on for the past fifty or so years on Capital Hill nothing really ever changes.
Let me explain, the Federal Reserve is made up of a board of directors who come form investment banking, naturally they are going to give preferential treatment to the financial markets. Although the FED is not a government entity per se it is still the purveyor of government monetary policy. The FED has been infamously implicated with every boom and bust cycle since its inception. During the recession of the late 1920’s it was the FED’s mis-correction of the markets resulting in unrealistically high interest rates and withholding money from circulation combined with war debt from WWI, and corporate protectionism through tariffs that caused the Great Depression. The FEDs culpability in today’s crisis is by creating easy money by setting unrealistically low interest rates and putting to much money in circulation. These sorts of artificial manipulations distort market forces and create bigger boom cycles but also cause bigger bust cycles.
Everyone in the business world knows about these boom and bust cycles. They are a part of the everyday economic landscape. Traditionally the way the financial sector handles these booms and bust cycles is to get in on the boom make as much money as possible and try to predict when to get out before the bust. There will be a bust because the market has to correct itself. Usually these boom and bust cycles come and go fairly quickly without much harm being done. But every now and then artificial market manipulations combine with other aberrant and unforeseen forces to create a financial tsunami. But before it washes ashore engulfing everything in its path, the financial elite, with surfboards in tow, rush into the waters hoping to catch a ride on the big kahuna wave and cash in and get out before the wave breaks with catastrophic impact upon the rocks. In other words it is an all-out hit and run speed race to make billions in a short period of time risking everything if they don’t get out in time. That’s how it works—more or less. Sometimes they don’t get out of the way fast enough. Of course government acting as a life lifeguard, backed with what must seem to them as an endless supply of taxpayer dollars, is ready and obligated to bail them out.
All anyone has to do is to take a closer look at the connections between Wall Street and Washington to see that many folks in influential positions in Washington came from Wall Street or went to work for Wall Street making huge fortunes after they left the government.
For example, President Bush’s family made their fortune in oil; Dick Cheney was a former CEO of Halliburton. Robert Rubin, former Secretary of the Treasury under Bill Clinton, later became the CEO for Citigroup’s executive committee, Henry Paulson was the CEO for Goldman Sachs before becoming the Secretary of Treasury under Georg Bush. And the list goes on. Many in Congress and the Whitehouse have made fortunes in capital ventures and other forms of business.
Barrack Obama, with all his talk of “change we can believe in” and hailing himself as the savior of the working class, hasn’t changed a thing. For all his talk it is the big business elites who are getting trillions of taxpayer dollars. Of course John McCain would have done the same thing as did Bush with his TARP funds. This is why this is a non-partisan problem—after all freedom is in everyone’s best interest, right?
The question one needs to ask himself for a clearer view of things is who is benefited from government bailouts and stimulus bills Big Business or the taxpayer?
Perhaps one of the most damaging thing this unholy union does is it creates a misaligned view of capitalism which fosters fear of exploitation and anti-free market sentiments. This fear or mistrust of capitalism is the exact impetus that allows such an alliance to persist. Of course the economic model we have today is NOT capitalism. Under capitalism businesses are at the mercy of market forces that keep things streamlined and in order. Disorder brings chaos which brings more streamlining and integrity. In its current form there can be no integrity. True capitalism breeds competition, fairness in the marketplace, integrity, opportunity, choice, quality, and freedom. The mega corporations could have never grown so large that they couldn’t fail if it weren’t for government intervention.
What all the bailouts and stimulus packages really amounts to is just another wealth redistribution scheme only this time instead of taking from the rich and giving it to the poor, worse, it takes money from every taxpayer—in fact, generations of taxpayers—and redistributes it to the corporate elites. Now tell me government and business is not in bed together. Whether you call it economic fascism or a mixed economy or whatever, what it really boils down to is a pseudo–uncapitalist economy run by a handful of corporate and political elites.
Change we can believe in would be a divorce between government and big business—and other special interest elites too. We need to allow the free market to be free from the corruptive influences of this unholy marriage. This would allow the market forces to police corrupt corporations—in other words let the company, who’s CEO and Board of Directors who make bad decisions, fail and investors who throw money into risky ventures that artificial prop up values, that cause bubbles, die by the sword. In the end there will be less of a tendency towards fascism, better business models, less risk, more choices of products and services, better products at lower prices, more jobs, more opportunity for the creative entrepreneur, and fewer and less severe booms and busts.
The Road to Fascism
They say the road to hell is paved with good intentions. So it would seem the road to fascism is also paved with good intentions.
Big government is intended to help people, taxation is a means for a benevolent government to afford to help people, the bailout plan is intended to save our financial institutions, the stimulus package is intended to save and create jobs, support for organized labor is intended to help to protect American workers, etc.
The unfortunate reality is each of these points also has unintended consequences. For example big government centralizes and consumes power—perhaps the most dangerous consequence of all. Taxes are taken from one group of people and redistributed to another group of people which diminishes property rights and feeds class warfare. Our current economic crisis was due to failed government policy, corporate favoritism, and Wall Street greed perpetuated by their government allies, the bailout plans and stimulus packages benefit the corporate elites. Unionized labor—perhaps at one time relevant—in today’s society of world markets and international competition makes American companies less competitive.
For those who wish to remain a free people need to recognize the philosophies that are inherently malignant to freedom. The philosophic combatants are “reason and logic” on one side and “pragmatism” on the other. It is the ability to recognize and interact appropriately with an independent reality. It is the ability to recognize the unintended consequences and their causes.
Unfortunately “pragmatism”—which ignores independent reality when it is inconvenient—has been winning the battle.
For instance, how many of you have come to the realization that there is little difference between the Democrats and Republicans philosophically? The difference between modern Democrats and Republicans is so insignificant that it could be said we are nearing a one party system. For all the rhetoric between them at the core they are both fascists pushing our country dangerously close to totalitarianism.
As a measure to understand the relationship between causality and consequence—cause and effect—of this philosophic “nationalized pragmatism” to compare where we once were to where we are now, and to see where we are heading politically as a nation, imagine if you will, a horizontal line-graph numbering 0-10; 0 being the far extreme political “left” and 10 being the far extreme political “right”. Also, 0 represents totalitarianism and at the opposite end of the spectrum is a 10 which represents anarchy.
To illustrate; the original colonists prior to the constitution, under the “Articles of Confederation,” were about an 8 or 9 on this graph. Later when the Constitution was ratified, with added governmental controls, the colonists were at about a 7 on the graph.
Today we find our society tittering at the ragged edge of totalitarianism at about a 2 on the graph. Why? The philosophies and agenda of both the Democrat and Republican parties are fundamentally the same, they both embrace the same moral philosophy which is synonymous with “altruism” and in politics altruism is practiced as “collectivism.” In order for collectivism to be initiated and maintained government has to coerce individuals to sacrifice their incomes and property for the greater good of society. Such an immoral philosophy obviously pushes the country further to the left towards totalitarianism and serfdom, if in fact, the country isn’t already there.
The majority of Americans today stand somewhere in the middle politically, at or near the center— a 4 or a 5 on the graph. Yet the government is still much further to the left. What accounts for this difference? It is because the individual voters only matter in an election year. This can be seen when all the candidates running for office make a mad dash towards the center of the political spectrum during the campaign trail and then back to the left after the election is over. A good example of this was witnessed during the 2008 Presidential elections when the most liberal Senator in the U.S. Senate, Barrack Obama, reinvented himself as a moderate and made appeals to the political center vying for moderate votes. Now that he is President he is governing from the left. The same can be said for President George Bush who ran for President on so called conservative principles but once in office he began a campaign of spending and government expanding programs including the massively expensive social “Drug Prescription Plan” for seniors. Bush’s spending and expansionism is only outdone by Obama.
Once the elections are over it is back to business as usual which is catering to special interests. To further illustrate my point, there is a deception being perpetrated here—or at least a misconception. Have you ever stopped to think about who is benefited and who is harmed by the bailouts and stimulus packages? Big Business wins out and the individual taxpayer—the working class—is the loser. So tell me, who is government more beholden to?
Anytime a group or movement or industry seeks protections or subsidies from government and is granted them, forces are unleashed that drive the nation towards totalitarianism. This is because more government, more spending, and more coercion of the taxpayer are needed to fund and administer the new programs.
Regardless of where the pressure is coming from, whether it is from big business, the environmental movement, oil, agriculture, or defense industries, etc, it doesn’t matter. When government grants these groups with special privileges, bestowing upon them protractions from competitors, giving them taxpayer backed insurance (FDIC), price controls, or subsidies—or quite frankly anytime the government creates a new program it creates a special interest—such actions either create a new special interest or expands an existing special interest who in-turn begin seeking more favors from government which puts government on a dangerous and reckless course towards totalitarianism as government grows, new taxes are levied, and power is centralized.
As government moves increasingly further to the left, individualism finds less relevance in society and individual rights are regarded as secondary to the rights of the state.
When freedom-loving segments of the population protest such abuses they are labeled as extremists. Take the recent media attacks on “Tea Parties” for example. The further to the left the government trudges the more the folks on the right seem extreme in their views.
This new view of the right is amply illustrated in the DHS report on “Extreme Right Wing” threats, where the DHS redefined what constitutes a potential threat. Basically what the report implies is that any ideology that is not consistent with their new found mores is a threat to government and ultimately to society. The report identifies Iraqi Veterans, gun owners, people who buy ammo, opponents of abortion, tax protesters, and just about anyone else who disagrees with the current administration. By the way the DHS report is consistent with Missouri’s own report who identifies people who display bumper stickers with third party candidates such Ron Paul or Bob Barr as potential threats—I wouldn’t be surprised to see some law enforcement agencies profiling folks driving four-wheel drive pickup trucks displaying NRA stickers.
To further illustrate this point: Recently a Louisiana man was pulled over, detained, and questioned by law enforcement officers, for having a “Don’t Tread on Me” bumper sticker displayed on his vehicle. He was subsequently warned by the police officers of the "subversive" message it sent.
Basically what we are witnessing is a paradigm shift away from patriotism and individualism, replacing it with statism and collectivism. This is echoed in the words of former Sec of State Colin Powell when he said, “…people want more government in their lives not less”—so be careful what you whish for because you just might get it. In our strange new world people who are vocal about their individual rights, favor constitutional restraints on government, and oppose spending and unfair taxes are people to be loathed by government (and the left) and profiled as potential threats.
Of course there are some who welcome this shift as liberating. Abraham Lincoln once made an enlightening observation:
"We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing. With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor; while with others, the same word may mean for some men to do as they please with other men, and the product of other men's labor. Here are two, not only different, but incompatible things, called by the same name- liberty. And it follows that each of the things is, by the respective parties, called by two different and incompatible names - liberty and tyranny."
Big government is intended to help people, taxation is a means for a benevolent government to afford to help people, the bailout plan is intended to save our financial institutions, the stimulus package is intended to save and create jobs, support for organized labor is intended to help to protect American workers, etc.
The unfortunate reality is each of these points also has unintended consequences. For example big government centralizes and consumes power—perhaps the most dangerous consequence of all. Taxes are taken from one group of people and redistributed to another group of people which diminishes property rights and feeds class warfare. Our current economic crisis was due to failed government policy, corporate favoritism, and Wall Street greed perpetuated by their government allies, the bailout plans and stimulus packages benefit the corporate elites. Unionized labor—perhaps at one time relevant—in today’s society of world markets and international competition makes American companies less competitive.
For those who wish to remain a free people need to recognize the philosophies that are inherently malignant to freedom. The philosophic combatants are “reason and logic” on one side and “pragmatism” on the other. It is the ability to recognize and interact appropriately with an independent reality. It is the ability to recognize the unintended consequences and their causes.
Unfortunately “pragmatism”—which ignores independent reality when it is inconvenient—has been winning the battle.
For instance, how many of you have come to the realization that there is little difference between the Democrats and Republicans philosophically? The difference between modern Democrats and Republicans is so insignificant that it could be said we are nearing a one party system. For all the rhetoric between them at the core they are both fascists pushing our country dangerously close to totalitarianism.
As a measure to understand the relationship between causality and consequence—cause and effect—of this philosophic “nationalized pragmatism” to compare where we once were to where we are now, and to see where we are heading politically as a nation, imagine if you will, a horizontal line-graph numbering 0-10; 0 being the far extreme political “left” and 10 being the far extreme political “right”. Also, 0 represents totalitarianism and at the opposite end of the spectrum is a 10 which represents anarchy.
To illustrate; the original colonists prior to the constitution, under the “Articles of Confederation,” were about an 8 or 9 on this graph. Later when the Constitution was ratified, with added governmental controls, the colonists were at about a 7 on the graph.
Today we find our society tittering at the ragged edge of totalitarianism at about a 2 on the graph. Why? The philosophies and agenda of both the Democrat and Republican parties are fundamentally the same, they both embrace the same moral philosophy which is synonymous with “altruism” and in politics altruism is practiced as “collectivism.” In order for collectivism to be initiated and maintained government has to coerce individuals to sacrifice their incomes and property for the greater good of society. Such an immoral philosophy obviously pushes the country further to the left towards totalitarianism and serfdom, if in fact, the country isn’t already there.
The majority of Americans today stand somewhere in the middle politically, at or near the center— a 4 or a 5 on the graph. Yet the government is still much further to the left. What accounts for this difference? It is because the individual voters only matter in an election year. This can be seen when all the candidates running for office make a mad dash towards the center of the political spectrum during the campaign trail and then back to the left after the election is over. A good example of this was witnessed during the 2008 Presidential elections when the most liberal Senator in the U.S. Senate, Barrack Obama, reinvented himself as a moderate and made appeals to the political center vying for moderate votes. Now that he is President he is governing from the left. The same can be said for President George Bush who ran for President on so called conservative principles but once in office he began a campaign of spending and government expanding programs including the massively expensive social “Drug Prescription Plan” for seniors. Bush’s spending and expansionism is only outdone by Obama.
Once the elections are over it is back to business as usual which is catering to special interests. To further illustrate my point, there is a deception being perpetrated here—or at least a misconception. Have you ever stopped to think about who is benefited and who is harmed by the bailouts and stimulus packages? Big Business wins out and the individual taxpayer—the working class—is the loser. So tell me, who is government more beholden to?
Anytime a group or movement or industry seeks protections or subsidies from government and is granted them, forces are unleashed that drive the nation towards totalitarianism. This is because more government, more spending, and more coercion of the taxpayer are needed to fund and administer the new programs.
Regardless of where the pressure is coming from, whether it is from big business, the environmental movement, oil, agriculture, or defense industries, etc, it doesn’t matter. When government grants these groups with special privileges, bestowing upon them protractions from competitors, giving them taxpayer backed insurance (FDIC), price controls, or subsidies—or quite frankly anytime the government creates a new program it creates a special interest—such actions either create a new special interest or expands an existing special interest who in-turn begin seeking more favors from government which puts government on a dangerous and reckless course towards totalitarianism as government grows, new taxes are levied, and power is centralized.
As government moves increasingly further to the left, individualism finds less relevance in society and individual rights are regarded as secondary to the rights of the state.
When freedom-loving segments of the population protest such abuses they are labeled as extremists. Take the recent media attacks on “Tea Parties” for example. The further to the left the government trudges the more the folks on the right seem extreme in their views.
This new view of the right is amply illustrated in the DHS report on “Extreme Right Wing” threats, where the DHS redefined what constitutes a potential threat. Basically what the report implies is that any ideology that is not consistent with their new found mores is a threat to government and ultimately to society. The report identifies Iraqi Veterans, gun owners, people who buy ammo, opponents of abortion, tax protesters, and just about anyone else who disagrees with the current administration. By the way the DHS report is consistent with Missouri’s own report who identifies people who display bumper stickers with third party candidates such Ron Paul or Bob Barr as potential threats—I wouldn’t be surprised to see some law enforcement agencies profiling folks driving four-wheel drive pickup trucks displaying NRA stickers.
To further illustrate this point: Recently a Louisiana man was pulled over, detained, and questioned by law enforcement officers, for having a “Don’t Tread on Me” bumper sticker displayed on his vehicle. He was subsequently warned by the police officers of the "subversive" message it sent.
Basically what we are witnessing is a paradigm shift away from patriotism and individualism, replacing it with statism and collectivism. This is echoed in the words of former Sec of State Colin Powell when he said, “…people want more government in their lives not less”—so be careful what you whish for because you just might get it. In our strange new world people who are vocal about their individual rights, favor constitutional restraints on government, and oppose spending and unfair taxes are people to be loathed by government (and the left) and profiled as potential threats.
Of course there are some who welcome this shift as liberating. Abraham Lincoln once made an enlightening observation:
"We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing. With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor; while with others, the same word may mean for some men to do as they please with other men, and the product of other men's labor. Here are two, not only different, but incompatible things, called by the same name- liberty. And it follows that each of the things is, by the respective parties, called by two different and incompatible names - liberty and tyranny."
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