Category Archives: Freedom

Quote of the day–Rupert Murdoch

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As you all know the downturn we are operating in is more severe and global than anything we have seen before.

We are in the midst of a phase of history in which nations will be redefined and their futures fundamentally altered. Many people will be under extreme pressure and many companies mortally wounded.


Rupert Murdoch
February 24, 2009
Peter Chernin’s little shocker
[Risk and opportunity abound. Keep your eyes open for both. I’m listening to The Black Swan which appears to be applicable to the times as well.–Joe]

Some Foreign News to Relieve Your Boredom

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From our friend Howard in Israel.  Saturday, Feb. 21;



Friends:

 

Winter wind and rain have returned, but so far not as harsh as predicted.  And, knock-on-wood, no electric power outages.

 

John Kerry is here. He lied about getting a letter from Hamas to deliver to President Obama.  Senator Kerry lied?  Go figure!

 

Under cover of bad weather (fog up north) two Katusha rockets were fired at northern Israel from within southern Lebanon.  One hit an Israeli target and three civilians were wounded.  The UN forces and Lebanese (now spelled Hezbollah) army are at a loss to find the terrorists who launched the attack.  True to form the EU quickly condemned Israel for violating Lebanon’s sovereignty by firing several artillery rounds at the location from which the Katushas were launched.  Hezbollah said, “Katushas?  What Katushas, we no nut-in about no Katushas.”

 

I would tell you that Kassam missiles and mortar bombs continue to fall in the Negev, but saying so would simply be redundant and repeating the obvious.  Last week a Kassam took out three cars by my younger daughter’s (going to college in Sderot) apartment.  Hope she brings me some pieces of the Kassam next time she comes home.

 

Tomorrow Bibi starts trying to really form the next Israeli government.  When you hear that Liberman’s party wants the Ministry of Police and that they also want the present Minister of Justice (an Olmert appointee) to be reappointed and the anti-Lieberman forces say he is trying to gain control over the ministries pursuing the criminal investigations about him remember two things.  Being “under investigation” is about as close to a condition precedent to being an Israeli politician as there is.  Second, the investigations in Lieberman have been ongoing for 10 years…and counting.

 

Enjoy your weekend.

 

Howard

Yup; Katushas flying in from the North, Kassams from the South, politicians playing childish games, and the EU Press denouncing Israel for even the slightest, half-baked attempts at self defense (why is it that only the enemies of the West have what is referred to in the Press as “sovereignty”).  Sorry; I suppose none of this is “news” after all.  Is it?

Quote of the day–Edward Abbey

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May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view. May your mountains rise into and above the clouds.


Edward Abbey
(1927 – 1989)
[For some reason this struck me as perhaps describing our political and economic future. Dangerous but yet full of opportunity.


But then on a physical front I’m suspicious that our universe is actually a black hole with an event horizon several billion light years across and we are rushing toward the singularity at the speed of light on the time axis. So, in the long run, it doesn’t matter even if we do get off this planet and out of the solar system everything we know will be ripped apart down to the sub atomic particle level eventually anyway.


Have a nice day.–Joe]

Cracks are appearing

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If this and this (both via Say Uncle) pass and the Feds don’t bring in their lawyers and thugs I hope they soon start selling variants built on this:



Picture also from Say Uncle.


California, Kansas (another H/T to Say Uncle), Washington State and many other government entities are in or near economic crisis mode. If the Feds think it is politically unacceptable to allow banks and automakers to go bankrupt what are they going to think about states going bankrupt? Bailouts for local governments must be in discussion behind closed doors if not openly.


But the Feds are broke too. It just doesn’t show up quite a readily because they own the money printing presses. President Obama says he “will pivot quickly to address a budget deficit that could now approach $2 trillion this year” (H/T to Tam and pdb). That can mean little more than increased taxes. If history from other countries in similar situations is any guide when things get bad enough you can expect direct confiscation of your retirement funds and savings as well as nationalization of various industries who remain profitable. The rational used will be something along the lines of “the government must not fall so anything we do to prevent it is justifiable”. They have guns and they won’t be afraid to use them to take whatever they think they “must” have. The U.S. Constitution was written with enumerated powers granted to the government but court rulings early in the last century shattered those walls. The Federal government will attempt to get more and more “control of the situation”. More planning and “guidance” from the “central committee” such as the “car czar” and more regulations for the banks (which helped bring them down to begin with) will fail in a big way. Many of the politicians and “intellectuals” have no industry (real world) experience. They have been living off of the public dole where money is obtained via the point of a gun (taxes) and they don’t have a clue (see also this comment clues, lack thereof) as to how reality really works. Obama is believed to be the savior of the world (see the I Love You Obama Woman, the response from France, as well as all the other adoration such that we have never in our lifetime seen for a U.S. president–only dictators in other countries). To the best of my knowledge he is the most inexperienced president our country has ever known, he is facing the biggest crisis our country has seen in 80 years, he is a socialist, and his advisers are socialists. His solutions are all going to involve more power and control for the Feds. More power and control in the hands of those that have only the flimsiest of connections to the real world and no experience. It’s a recipe for disaster.


The only bright spots I see are some states, such as Montana, Tennessee (see the first two links in this post), Arizona, Washington, Oklahoma (via Sebastian), and New Hampshire (via Sebastian and email from hunter006) are thinking about going all Ninth and 10th Amendment on us. There could be some serious cracks appearing in the creeping Federal tyranny we have been experiencing. Within a few years we could be (almost for certain?) looking at some new form of government. What will it be? The Orwellian vision of a a boot stamping on a human face … for ever? Or something else as certain states and people take a successful stand against the socialists?


I’ve been thinking for a long time that the world is due a new form of government. Tribal leaders, witch doctors, kings, dictators, democracies, republics, and others have all had their day (and dark nights) in the limelight. But instantaneous communication and near instantaneous travel makes for some interesting thought experiments. I’m not sure The Probability Broach type world is practical but there may be something else that is. This crisis may be the impetus to figure it out.

Quote of the day–Robert Higgs

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For the economy in general, doing nothing is vastly preferable to doing the stimulus package, but doing nothing is not a political option; indeed, it would be political suicide. Given the dominant ideology and the political institutions that now exist, economically rational public policy is incompatible with political viability…. Having hit bottom, the politicians can only do one thing: keep digging. If Hell is down there, they’ll reach it, sooner or later.


Robert Higgs
Senior Fellow at Independent Institute
The Lighthouse Volume 11, Issue 7: February 16, 2009
[I was tempted to just use “rational public policy is incompatible with political viability” as the QOTD, but the mention of politicians attempting reach Hell was just too appealing.–Joe]

I had a dream

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I woke up early this morning after having a dream.

 

Today is the day I may get a chance to ask Senator Leahy a question or two. In my dream I asked my question, didn’t like his response, and my follow-up question was a bit hostile. As I was leaving the confernce center a couple of men in suits tried to stop me. They were unsuccessful. Things for me went downhill from there.

 

I must avoid being hostile. I think I can say nearly the same words with a smile and a friendly voice and everyone will have a much happier day.

 

Update: I have written down the exact words I want to use.

 

A few days ago at Georgetown University you suggested creating a “Truth Commission” to investigate constitutional excesses of the previous administration. Do you still think that is a good idea and do you think such a commission should also investigate the excesses of congress and the current administration in regards to violations of the Ninth and Tenth Amendments in the Bill of Rights who have exceeded the powers enumerated in the constitution?

 

Follow up questions may involve Just One Question and/or reference to 18 USC 242.

Quote of the day–John Longenecker

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As liberty purists say often, gun control isn’t about guns, it’s about control. As non-gun owners, you no doubt are beginning to feel the pinch of restraint on your wrists as your freedoms are being taken away on government fiat, freedoms which seem to have nothing to do with guns. This makes all Americans united on one front: experiencing abuses of powers not granted by the people.


Officials have this penchant for claiming to lift our burdens in what they call compassion or social justice, but in fact lift our liberties as if we have a bottomless pit of freedoms and can afford to surrender up some for their projects. Justice herself then suffers, as, little by little, self-rule, independence, and opportunity are snuffed out.


…


The whole idea of disarming the supreme authority of this country is piggish. Who in their right mind elects to disarm themselves as the supreme authority? Who in their right mind takes the word of servants over their own better judgment and gives up rights for nothing? Who in their right mind doesn’t learn from past disaster of who really loses when guns are taken and who doesn’t?


John Longenecker
February 15, 2009
Gun Control: the very first pig with lipstick on it.
[As usual, when Longenecker writes nearly every paragraph qualifies as QOTD material.–Joe]

Quote of the day–Michael Gaddy

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Rest assured, there will be a great majority who will not stand against
tyranny. Those who have “gone along to get along” and those who have
continually voted for the “lesser of two evils” will capitulate and surrender
their weapons, as cowards normally do. They will rue the day they failed to
support those who stood for liberty such as Ron Paul. Remember, they were
offered liberty, but chose instead to support the status quo, because, in
their eyes, liberty could not be elected.

Michael Gaddy
Buy, Buy, Buy
January 5, 2008

Quote of the day–Breda

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February, Friday the 13th, 2009 – the day the dream died. No dirge is playing, not yet, but wait…the lamentations will come.

And to everyone who voted to enslave the freest people on earth…

I curse you. 48% of of your countrymen curse you. Future generations will curse you. Your own descendants will curse you.

May that knowledge be like a yoke around your neck- the weight of it strangling you, pulling you down into the filth where you belong.


Breda
February 14, 2009
no love
[People should be making their lists.–Joe]

Multiple Quotes of the Day

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This is entirely separate from Joe’s “Quote of the Day” system, which is so good that I wouldn’t touch it.


One of the great (and therefore feared) minds of our time, Thomas Sowell is prolific in his generation of highly quotable phrases;



Democrats could sell refrigerators to Eskimos before Republicans could sell them blankets.


Ah, but the Republicans are only doing what the super smart people are telling them; trying to sell blankets with built-in cooling systems, to Eskimos, on the notion that both blankets and refrigerators are too extreme in their single-minded, fundamental design goals.  Who needs a blanket that keeps you warm, when you could have an ingenious blanket that does what the Democrats’ refrigerators are doing, but does it more slowly and in a less efficient manner?



I know that there are still voices of sanity around because I have counted them — on one hand.


Take heart, Mr. Sowell.  There are at least a dozen.  Actually I jest.  It’s just that you have to look far from DC, and far from the Old Media, to find them.  There are millions.  Lets not assume that just because the American press wants us to feel isolated and hopeless, that we are isolated and hopeless.



Our economic problems worry me much less than our political solutions, which have a far worse track record.


and;



One of the wonders of our times is how much more attention is paid to the living conditions of a bunch of cut-throats locked up in Guantanamo than to the leading international sponsor of terrorism getting nuclear weapons.


Well, when you put the two together (concern for cutthroats while ignoring Iran’s nuclear ambitions) along with much of the leftist dogma, it’s consistent in its opposition to American principles and its support for the enemies of Liberty worldwide.  It becomes a “wonder” only if you ascribe a shred of patriotism to the American Left.


All quotes from one short piece entitled, “Random Thoughts”.

Economics a bigger threat than terrorism

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Via US News:



President Obama’s senior intelligence adviser says that the world financial crisis has surpassed terrorism as the country’s “primary near-term security concern,” pointing to unrest in countries around the world as commerce stumbles. It was an unusual briefing by the new Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair, who was briefing Congress on the U.S. intelligence community’s annual threat assessment, which in the past has usually focused heavily on issues like Iranian nuclear weapons and progress in the global effort against terrorist groups. “Time is probably our greatest threat,” Blair said. “The longer it takes for the recovery to begin, the greater the likelihood of serious damage to U.S. strategic interests.”


I wanted to write my essay on economics this weekend but I may have something that is a higher priority get in the way.


I’ll get to the economics eventually. It’s really, really important. Here and here are some short courses to get yourself up to speed.

Economic history from the last great depression

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Robert Higgs, senior fellow in political economy for The Independent Institute, gives us some of the history of how the socialists ran roughshod over the Constitution in the 30s:



Until the 1930s, the Constitution served as a major constraint on federal economic interventionism. The government’s powers were understood to be just as the framers intended: few and explicitly enumerated in our founding document and its amendments. Search the Constitution as long as you like, and you will find no specific authority conveyed for the government to spend money on global-warming research, urban mass transit, food stamps, unemployment insurance, Medicaid, or countless other items in the stimulus package and, even without it, in the regular federal budget.


This Constitutional constraint still operated as late as the 1930s, when federal courts issued some 1,600 injunctions to restrain officials from carrying out acts of Congress, and the Supreme Court overturned the New Deal‘s centerpieces, the National Industrial Recovery Act and the Agricultural Adjustment Act, and other statutes. This judicial action outraged President Roosevelt, who fumed that “we have been relegated to the horse-and-buggy definition of interstate commerce.” Early in 1937, he responded with his court-packing plan.


Although Roosevelt lost this battle, he soon won the war. As the older, more conservative justices retired, the president replaced them with ardent New Dealers such as Hugo Black, Stanley Reed, Felix Frankfurter, and William O. Douglas. The newly constituted court proceeded between 1937 and 1941 to overturn its anti-New Deal rulings, abandoning its traditional, narrow view of interstate commerce and giving the federal government carte blanche to spend, tax, and regulate virtually without limit.


After World War II, the government enacted the Employment Act of 1946, codifying the government’s declared responsibility for managing the economy “to promote maximum employment, production, and purchasing power,” and it has actively intervened ever since, purportedly to attain these declared ends. Its shots have often misfired, however, and we have endured booms and busts, a decade of stagflation, bouts of rapid inflation, and stock-market crashes. The present recession may become the worst since the passage of the Employment Act.


I expect the socialists to complete their take-over and solidify an iron grip on us this time. As Newsweek said, We Are All Socialists Now. The court precedences set in the 30s essentially guaranteed it. The only way that I can see that has any potential to get us out of the abyss is to go deeper into it.

Quote of the day–Titanium Halo

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Let me tell you story. I know a guy. He’s a financial planner/investment banker type who from time to time helps me out. In November I had lunch with him after the first initial crash and wanted his opinion on the gather storm clouds I saw just over the horizon. He told me a few interesting things one of which kinda scared your Hero Halo a bit. He said, ‘Halo, I am advising my clients who have enough liquid assets to secure remote, sustainable property. I’m advising this because for very little capital outlay, they can have a lot of security.’


Ted, I looked right into this guys eyes and saw a certain fear that I have never seen before. This is a man who manages literally billions of dollars worth of assets and he looked as though his entire concept of reality had been shaken to the core. I wasn’t really sure what to do. In all the years I had been dealing with him I had never seen this and wondered why now? What’s different this time? Well, there are many things, but when a guy with these kinds of resources at his disposal says stuff like this, it might be time to start listening.


Titanium Halo
February 5, 2009
Sheep Say, “Baaaaaa”
[I’ve been putting a lot of time into economics recently and hope to have a post on the results of my research sometime this weekend. As a teaser let me just say:



  • The “stimulus plan” violates my Jews In The Attic Test.

  • Daughter Kim’s economics class is reading books that talk of the U.S. government and the CIA “forcing free trade”, and how “capitalism destroys community ties”.

  • My research has involved talking to people from China, India, Ireland, Romania, and Sri Lanka. People speak in hushed tones with a very somber demeanor. It’s bad everywhere.

  • While discussing the politics of our new socialist nation, even without explicit mention that my Jews In The Attic Test was being violated, a friend recently told me that an AK has an expected life of about 50K rounds and even though they have several such rifles it wasn’t enough to solve the problem even if they had enough rounds and didn’t encounter resistance.

We have very, very big problems ahead of us. And the worst part is that the people that caused the problems will likely get more support as the situation gets worse. They will demand more and more “help” from those that put everyone in jeopardy. And the unless very aggressive action is taken by people, who have shown very little backbone in the past, the last people to go down are likely going to be the people that created and aggravated the problems.


I know who John Galt is, but where is his gulch?–Joe]

Quote of the day–David E. Young

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First and Second Amendment protections were always given the very strongest possible restrictive language – no law shall be passed – shall make no law – inviolable – not be deprived or abridged – not be restrained – shall not be infringed – nor shall the right be infringed. The Second Amendment’s “right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed” language was clearly not intended to allow for extensive reasonable regulation. Rather, it was intended to prevent all laws and regulations that would result in the people being deprived, abridged, restrained, narrowed, or restricted in the exercise of their fundamental right to keep and bear arms.


David E. Young
February 8, 2009
The Meaning of ‘Shall Not Be Infringed’
[Unfortunately, intent and result are two different things. We still have a long way to go.–Joe]

Quote of the day–Breda

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Why does the government assume that they are the only ones with a list?


[Overheard by] Breda
February 7, 2009
watchlist*
[If such lists exist I strongly suggest they be encrypted. Free (and probably quite secure) encryption software is available here.–Joe]

Quote of the day–Mark Philip Alger

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Joe Huffman has his Just One Question. I have another:

 

If it is proper for a citizen to use force — even lethal force — to prevent or halt the commission of a felony (in the interest of preserving the life and property of the innocent), how much more-so to prevent an ongoing violation of a provision of the Constitution — given that the latter is the source of authority for the former?

 

When is it proper, for example, to use force to stop a legislator engaged in unconstitutional actions? Indeed, when is it required of those who have sworn oaths to… protect and defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic…?

 

Mark Philip Alger
February 7, 2009
Our Curmudgeon…
[See also my Civil Disobedience web page. When you have an answer please share.–Joe]

Respecting a specific enumerated right

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This is how the police regard people suspected of exercising a specific enumerated right:



Police suspected guns

Llewellyn said police had reason to believe a gun was in the residence, which was why they did not knock. 

A copy of the warrant provided by Hasenei listed items to be seized, including a Sig Sauer Rifle and three ammunition magazines for the rifle, as well as a police gear bag, county police field procedures manual and guide, and more police-related items. 

Llewellyn added that when police have reason to believe there might be firearms in a residence, they take precautions to ensure the safety of the officers and anyone inside the house.

“This often includes the use of the tactical team, which is specially trained to deal with potentially dangerous situations,” she said.

Llewellyn confirmed Hasenei filed a complaint about the incident with the Howard County Police Department and that police are investigating.

She said no officers had been placed on any kind of administrative duty following the complaint.

She declined to comment on whether any items were seized in the raid on Hasenei’s house, citing an ongoing investigation.


It also included killing their dog laying on a bed. The police say it “charged them” but there was a bullet hole in the bed.


What if the police suspected blacks or Jews were within the residence? Would that be enough justification for the newspapers to just report the facts rather than demand the officers involved be sitting in prison rather than continuing to go about their jobs? These thugs weren’t even suspended from their jobs!


Just a note to any police that raid my property. Yes, I own guns. I also own explosives–LOTS of explosives. Please just knock. We’ll all be much happier. If you have a warrant I will physically cooperate.


H/T to Say Uncle and PGP.

Quote of the day–Michael Gaddy

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The larger question is: how many of those who have gone out and purchased firearms and ammo will actually use them? I believe a large number would bring those weapons to bear against criminals who would steal and threaten their families and property, but, how many would use them against the criminal state as it moves to seize their weapons, as was done in New Orleans, when the next “emergency” occurs, be it an economic meltdown or terrorist attack?


Michael Gaddy
Buy, Buy, Buy
January 5, 2008
[Good question. I wish I knew the answer.–Joe]

Quote of the day–John Robb

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For those involved in transitions to resilient communities, the best situation is obviously a period of extended stagnation. It allows an organic and self-financed transition towards local resilience and an orderly disconnection from the global system. In contrast, the depression scenario implies an onset rate that will overwhelm local planners with a tidal wave of foreclosures, bankruptcies, and civil unrest. Disconnection from the global system will be in large part involuntary and the development of resilient local platforms will be ad hoc and desperate.


Global guerrilla proliferation in that scenario will be rapid and likely impossible to mitigate (no preparation) before it reaches critical mass/entrenched levels (as in, a functional bazaar of violence and extensive systems disruption). That eventuality would make for interesting times.


John Robb
February 4, 2009
JOURNAL: Economic Scenarios
[“Interesting times”? Indeed.–Joe]

I’ve been wondering when they would suggest this

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Imagine a tax on blacks with the proceeds going to the KKK. Or a tax on homosexuals with the requirement that the money be given via grants to organizations purporting to find a cure for homosexuality. Do you think maybe that might upset some people?


Well, yes. I think it’s pretty clear that would upset a lot of people. And so it is with someone who claims Hunting taxes better spent on gun control:



The Reynolds Game Farm and the Department of Environmental Conservation cater to the most violent members of society – those who derive pleasure from killing helpless birds. Meanwhile, public tax dollars from the state’s general fund are used to subsidize this atrocity.


The DEC and its animal-killing arm, known as the Bureau of Wildlife, should not be given what amounts to welfare payments just so the violent sport of recreational hunting can continue. Instead, the excise taxes affixed to the cost of weapons and ammunition should be spent on programs to fight gun violence, similar to the way a portion of the taxes on tobacco are used to promote anti-smoking campaigns.


Maybe it’s not fair to compare it to taxes on blacks or homosexuals. Maybe a better analogy would be a tax on printing presses, radio and television stations, with the money going to censorship boards. Or taxes on churches with the money spent on evangelical atheist groups. Specific enumerated rights such as freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and the right to keep and bear arms are justifiably worthy of more protection than things like being a homosexual or black which doesn’t affect as many people.


Hence, take all the perfectly valid outrage you have over the suggestion that blacks and homosexuals should be taxed to fund those that would see them exterminated and multiple it by about a factor of two to approximate my outrage at taxes on guns be used to restriction the specific enumerated right to keep and bear arms.