Category Archives: Freedom

Quote of the day–Barack Obama

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And we’re going to grow our Foreign Service, open consulates that have been shuttered and double the size of the Peace Corps by 2011 to renew our diplomacy. We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we’ve set. We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded.





Barack Obama
July 2, 2008
Colorado Springs, Colorado
[Lots of people are wondering what he meant by this. Xenia says, “He’s the reincarnation of Hitler. He’s charismatic and doesn’t like our military.”–Joe]

Quote of the day–Bill Whittle

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I do, however, blame the press for allowing an individual citizen to do the work that they employ standing armies of so-called professionals for. I know they are capable of this kind of investigative journalism: it only took them a day or two to damage Sarah Palin with wild accusations about her baby’s paternity and less time than that to destroy a man who happened to be playing ball when the Messiah decided to roll up looking for a few more votes on the way to the inevitable coronation.


We no longer have an independent, fair, investigative press. That is abundantly clear to everyone – even the press. It is just another of the facts that they refuse to report, because it does not suit them.


Remember this, America: the press did not break this story. A single citizen, on the internet did.


There is a special hell for you “journalists” out there, a hell made specifically for you narcissists and elitists who think you have the right to determine which information is passed on to the electorate and which is not.


That hell – your own personal hell – is a fiery lake of Irrelevance, blinding clouds of Obscurity, and burning, everlasting Scorn.


You’ve earned it.


Bill Whittle
October 27, 2008
SHAME, CUBED

Quote of the day–Varifrank

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You understand when a politician says that he wants to ‘spread the wealth’ that what he is going to do is confiscate your wealth and give it to other people. You understand that, right? Confiscate…Your…Wealth! Your home, your property, your 401k, your bank accounts, your stocks and bonds, your health accounts – all are in the process of becoming the property of ‘the state’. All of it. Thats what “spread the wealth” actually means, it means CONFISCATE and then “distribute along party lines’. This is no longer about this tax rate or that tax rate or what party has a better plan to grow the economy, its about the Government of the United States – all three branches of it – that is now actively and aggressively pursuing and acting on a plan to confiscate private wealth (your wealth) and punish those who create it (you).


Varifrank
October 24, 2008
Monster
[H/T to Kevin. When the politician claims he is only going to take from other people I can see why some people might go for this. But how those people justify themselves is beyond me. That is the sort of thing you would expect from people put on masks and drag people into an alley to “spread the wealth”. It’s the same thing except in the case of the politicians case they have enough people with guns at their disposal they don’t need to wear a mask when they rob you.–Joe]

What they think of us

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There is a huge gap between the world viewpoints of the reality that I live in and that of some other people:



While most nations recognize that absolutely no good can come of exposing children to guns at a young age, we live in a gun culture that promotes romantic notions of generations of families hunting and shooting together.


…


Sadly, it took us no longer than 5 minutes to find a broad range of videos, showing what could be considered in some cases to be blatant child endangerment.


There is no telling how many more of these videos exist on the Internet or how many other children have participated in or been exposed to these kinds of events– but no doubt it’s expansive if you have the time to do the research.


There is no mistaking it, as these images show, this is an outrageous problem unique to American culture that is perhaps more common than many of us even realize.


No so called “enlightened” country could possible delude themselves into thinking this is normal behavior that should be protected even under the loosest interpretation of the Second Amendment.

The gun pushers in the gun lobby have gone too far as have the sponsors and supporters of these events. This kind of activity needs to be exposed and outlawed immediately. Children’s lives are at risk and as adults, we need to demand that our lawmakers do more to protect them from dangerous activities like these.


Think about it. While you are taking your kids to swimming or soccer, these kids–encouraged by their parents and other trusted adults–are blasting away at their target.


This issue of children firing machine guns, encouraged and emboldened by parents, demonstrates to us the need to change our perspective and the way we think about gun culture in the United States.


We are in a culture war. Their objective is to extinguish the last great hope for freedom on this planet. Our objective can be no less than to completely and totally defeat them.

A letter to Obama

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Via an email from Ry a letter posted on ARFCOM:



Mr. Obama,

Given the uproar about the simple question asked you by Joe the plumber, and the persecution that has been heaped on him because he dared to question you, I find myself motivated to say a few things to you myself. While Joe aspires to start a business someday, I already have started not one, but 4 businesses. But first, let me introduce myself. You can call me “Cory the well driller”. I am a 54 year old high school graduate. I didn’t go to college like you, I was too ready to go “conquer the world” when I finished high school. 25 years ago at age 29, I started my own water well drilling business at a time when the economy here in East Texas was in a tailspin from the crash of the early 80’s oil boom. I didn’t get any help from the government, nor did I look for any. I borrowed what I could from my sister, my uncle, and even the pawn shop and managed to scrape together a homemade drill rig and a few tools to do my first job. My businesses did not start not a result of privilege. It is the result of my personal drive, personal ambition, self discipline, self reliance, and a determination to treat my customers fairly. From the very start my business provided one other (than myself) East Texan a full time job. I couldn’t afford a backhoe the first few years (something every well drilling business had), so I and my helper had to dig the mud pits that are necessary for each and every job with hand shovels. I had to use my 10 year old, 1/2 ton pickup truck for my water tank truck (normally a job for at least a 2 ton truck).

A year and a half after I started the business, I scraped together a 20% down payment to get a modest bank loan and bought a (28 year) old, worn out, slightly bigger drilling rig to allow me to drill the deeper water wells in my area. I spent the next few years drilling wells with the rig while simultaneously rebuilding it between jobs. Through these years I never knew from one month to the next if I would have any work or be able to pay the bills. I got behind on my income taxes one year, and spent the next two years paying that back (with penalty and interest) while keeping up with ongoing taxes. I got behind on my water well supply bill 2 different years (way behind the second time… $80,000.00), and spent over a year paying it back (each time) while continuing to pay for ongoing supplies C.O.D.. Of course, the personal stress endured through these experiences and years is hard to measure. I do have a stent in my heart now to memorialize it all.

I spent the next 10 years developing the reputation for being the most competent and most honest water well driller in East Texas. 2 years along the way, I hired another full time employee for the drilling business so that we could provide full time water well pump service as well as the well drilling. Also, 3 years along the path, I bought a water well screen service machine from a friend, starting business # 2. 5 years later I made a business loan for $100,000.00 to build a new, higher production, computer controlled screen service machine. I had designed the machine myself, and it didn’t work out for 3 years so I had to make the loan payments without the benefit of any added income from the new machine. No government program was there to help me with the payments, or to help me sleep at night as I lay awake wondering how I would solve my machine problems or pay my bills. Finally, after 3 years, I got the screen machine working properly, and that provided another full time job for an East Texan in the screen service business.

2 years after that, I made another business loan, this time for $250,000.00, to buy another used drilling rig and all the support equipment needed to run another, larger, drill rig. This provided another 2 full time jobs for East Texans. Again, I spent a couple of years not knowing if I had made a smart move, or a move that would bankrupt me. For the third time in 13 years, I had placed everything I owned on the line, risking everything, in order to build a business.

A couple of years into this, I came up with a bright idea for a new kind of mud pump, a fundamentally necessary pump used on water well drill rigs. I spent my entire life savings to date (just $30,000.00), building a prototype of the pump and took it to the national water well convention to show it off. Customers immediately started coming out of the woodworks to buy the pumps, but there was a problem. I had depleted my assets making the prototype, and nobody would make me a business loan to start production of the new pumps. With several deposits for pump orders in hand, and nowhere to go, I finally started applying for as many credit card as I could find and took cash withdrawals on these cards to the tune of over $150,000.00 (including modest loans from my dear sister and brother), to get this 3rd business going.

Yes, once again, I had everything hanging over the line in an effort to start another business. I had never manufactured anything, and I had to design and bring into production a complex hydraulic machine from an untested prototype to a reliable production model (in six months). How many nights I lay awake wondering if I had just made the paramount mistake of my life I cannot tell you, but there were plenty. I managed to get the pumps into production, which immediately created another 2 full time jobs in East Texas. Some of the models in the first year suffered from quality issues due to the poor workmanship of one of my key suppliers, so I and an employee (another East Texan employed) had to drive across the country to repair customers’ pumps, practically from coast to coast. I stood behind the product, and made payments to all the credit cards that had financed me (and my brother and sister). I spent the next 5 years improving and refining the product, building a reputation for the pump and the company, working to get the pump into drill rig manufacturers’ product lines, and paying back credit cards. During all this time I continued to manage a growing water well business that was now operating 3 drill rig crews, and 2 well service crews. Also, the screen service business continued to grow. No government programs were there to help me, Mr. Obama, but that’s ok, I didn’t expect any, nor did I want any. I was too busy fighting to make success happen to sit around waiting for the government to help me.

Now, we have been manufacturing the mud pumps for 7 years, my combined businesses employ 32 full time employees, and distribute $5,000,000.00 annually through the local economy. Now, just 4 months ago I borrowed $1,254,000.00, purchasing computer controlled machining equipment to start my 4th business, a production machine shop. The machine shop will serve the mud pump company so that we can better manufacture our pumps that are being shipped worldwide. Of course, the machine shop will also do work for outside companies as well. This has already produced 2 more full time jobs, and 2 more should develop out of it in the next few months. This should work out, but if it doesn’t it will be because you, and the other professional politicians like yourself, will have destroyed our countrys’ (and the world) economy with your meddling with mortgage loan programs through your liberal manipulation and intimidation of loaning institutions to make sure that unqualified borrowers could get mortgages. You see, at the very time when I couldn’t get a business loan to get my mud pumps into production, you were working with Acorn and the Community Reinvestment Act programs to make sure that unqualified borrowers could buy homes with no down payment, and even no credit or worse yet, bad credit. Even the infamous, liberal, Ninja loans (No Income, No Job or Assets). While these unqualified borrowers were enjoying unrealistically low interest rates, I was paying 22% to 24% interest on the credit cards that I had used to provide me the funds for the mud pump business that has created jobs for more East Texans. It’s funny, because after 25 years of turning almost every dime of extra money back into my businesses to grow them, it has been only in the last two years that I have finally made enough money to be able to put a little away for retirement, and now the value of that has dropped 40% because of the policies you and your ilk have perpetrated on our country.

You see, Mr. Obama, I’m the guy you intend to raise taxes on. I’m the guy who has spent 25 years toiling and sweating, fretting and fighting, stressing and risking, to build a business and get ahead. I’m the guy who has been on the very edge of bankruptcy more than a dozen times over the last 25 years, and all the while creating more and more jobs for East Texans who didn’t want to take a risk, and wouldn’t demand from themselves what I have demanded from myself. I’m the guy you characterize as “the Americans who can afford it the most” that you believe should be taxed more to provide income redistribution “to spread the wealth” to those who have never toiled, sweated, fretted, fought, stressed, or risked anything. You want to characterize me as someone who has enjoyed a life of privilege and who needs to pay a higher percentage of my income than those who have bought into your entitlement culture. I resent you, Mr. Obama, as I resent all who want to use class warfare as a tool to advance their political career. What’s worse, each year more Americans buy into your liberal entitlement culture, and turn to the government for their hope of a better life instead of themselves. Liberals are succeeding through more than 40 years of collaborative effort between the predominant liberal media, and liberal indoctrination programs in the public school systems across our land.

What is so terribly sad about this is this. America was made great by people who embraced the one-time American culture of self reliance, self motivation, self determination, self discipline, personal betterment, hard work, risk taking. A culture built around the concept that success was in reach on every able bodied American who would strive for it. Each year that less Americans embrace that culture, we all descend together. We descend down the socialist path that has brought country after country ultimately to bitter and unremarkable states. If you and your liberal comrades in the media and school systems would spend half as much effort cultivating a culture of can-do across America as you do cultivating your entitlement culture, we could see Americans at large embracing the conviction that they can elevate themselves through personal betterment, personal achievement, and self reliance. You see, when people embrace such ideals, they act on them. When people act on such ideals, they succeed. All of America could find herself elevating instead of deteriorating. But that would eliminate the need for liberal politicians, wouldn’t it, Mr. Obama? The country would not need you if the country was convinced that problem solving was best left with individuals instead of the government. You and all your liberal comrades have got a vested interested in creating a dependent class in our country. It is the very business of liberals to create an ever expanding dependence on government. What’s remarkable is that you, who have never produced a job in your life, are going to tax me to take more of my money and give it to people who wouldn’t need my money if they would get off their entitlement mentality asses and apply themselves at work, demand more from themselves, and quit looking to liberal politicians to raise their station in life.

You see, I know because I’ve had them work for me before. Hundreds of them over these 25 years. People who simply will not show up to work on time. People who just will not work 5 days in a week, much less, 6 days. People always looking for a way to put less effort out. People who actually tell me that they would do more if I just would first pay them more. People who take off work to sit in government offices to apply to get free government handouts (gee, I wonder how things would have turned out for them if they had spent that time earning money and pleasing their employer?). You see, all of this comes from your entitlement mentality culture.

Oh, I know you will say I am uncompassionate. Sorry, Mr. Obama, wrong again. You see, I’ve seen what the average percentage of your income has been given to charities over the years of 2000 to 2004 (ignoring the years you started running for office – can you pronounce “politically motivated”), you averaged of less than 1% annually. And your running mate, Joe Biden, averaged less than ¼% of his annual income in charitable contributions over the last 10 years. Like so many liberals, the two of you want to give to the needy, just as long as it is someone else’s money you are giving to them. I won’t say what I have given to charities over the last 25 years, but the percentage is several times more than you or Joe Biden (don’t you just hate goggle?). Tell me again how you feel my pain.

In short, Mr. Obama, your political philosophies represent everything that is wrong with our country. You represent the culture of government dependence instead of self reliance; Entitlement mentality instead of personal achievement; Penalization of the successful to reward the unmotivated; Political correctness instead of open mindedness and open debate. If you are successful, you may preside over the final transformation of America from being the greatest and most self-reliant culture on earth, to just another country of whiners and wimps, who sit around looking to the government to solve their problems. Like all of western Europe. All countries on the decline. All countries that, because of liberal socialistic mentalities, have a little less to offer mankind every year.

God help us…

Cory Miller, just a ordinary, extraordinary American, the way a lot of Americans used to be.

P.S. Yes, Mr. Obama, I am a real American… http://www.cmillerdrilling.com/


Follow up comment from Lyle in the email thread:



“Liberals are succeeding through more than 40 years of collaborative effort…”


Uh, try “more than 70 years” and you’ll be closer to the mark.


What Cory doesn’t seem to understand is that the Socialists don’t care if he’s right.  If they cared, they wouldn’t be socialists.  That makes his very well-reasoned and well-written message into that “rattling noise” you’ve mentioned before.


In essence they’re jihadists.  They want to bring the Corys of the world down.  It’s a purely emotional/visceral motivation and any such arguments as Cory’s will be rationalized away as “Rush Rhetoric” or as “Right Wing propaganda”, and ignored completely.


Things could go either way, but McCain won’t have had much to do with it.  What we need is someone who’ll run on the “I’m going to kick the socialist’s asses out of government altogether and then put them in cages for public entertainment” platform, but as usual we’re faced with a decision of more socialism, slower, verses more socialism, faster.


Have you seen Thomas Sowell’s latest bit?  He sees this problem as about as serious as it gets:
http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/sowell1029b08.php3


As I say; jihadists.

Keep the change

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A point I heard Glen Beck make this morning was that history shows us the more the difficult the economic situation is the more people support/demand socialism and communism. This was true in Russia, China, Nazi Germany, Western Europe and in the United States earlier this century. But in all cases it extended and worsened the economic situation.


Via Robb Allen we have this ad. But what occurs to me is that this may actually make him more popular rather than less. But like sick children given a choice between bitter medicine that works and a candy placebo most will go for the candy.




Quote of the day–Barack Obama

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But, the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth, and of more basic issues such as political and economic justice in the society. To that extent, as radical as I think people try to characterize the Warren Court, it wasn’t that radical. It didn’t break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution, at least as its been interpreted and Warren Court interpreted in the same way, that generally the Constitution is a charter of negative liberties. Says what the states can’t do to you. Says what the Federal government can’t do to you, but doesn’t say what the Federal government or State government must do on your behalf, and that hasn’t shifted…


Barack Obama
Chicago Public Radio Interview — 2001
[H/T to Kevin and Say Uncle.


This may be the deciding factor in the election. My guess it will be a very tight race between “spreading the wealth” quotes and the voting fraud as to which will ultimately decide the election.–Joe]

Potowmack Institute blind spot

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I’ve briefly mentioned these guys before but they have updated their website for our current election. They haven’t become any more connected to reality since the last time I visited:



The McCain Campaign has denounced Barack Obama for his tenuous association with William Ayers, characterized as a domestic terrorist who hates America. Sarah Palin has her own associations with those who espouse insurrectionist and secessionist doctrines. The doctrines are pervasive in the present political culture. Are these the people who love America?

The problem is both embrace the National Rifle Association’s childish political fantasy. A member of the NRA’s National Board wrote in the Washington Post in 1989:


Ayers can only be faulted for acting out the NRA’s childish political fantasy. The Obama Campaign can be faulted for the failed political leadership to turn the whole issue around on the McCain Campaign and exploit the opportunity the courts have given to bring rationality to firearms policy. See below. The gun rights militants need not worry that political and intellectual leadership will emerge anywhere else.

Their most glaring flaw in the above is they seem incapable of distinguishing between violently overthrowing our constitutional established republic (as Ayers attempted) and defending the freedoms guaranteed by the constitution from a tyrannical government attempting to infringe those rights.


As near as I can tell the person or persons at the Potowmack Institute regard all governments as equally valid and deserving of having a monopoly on the use of force. This is a false assumption. The truth is that no government is deserving of a monopoly on the use of force. No government can legitimately claim to possess powers that the individual also does not have and were granted to the government by the individuals. The individuals may grant the government a monopoly on the use of force in certain circumstances such as when declaring war on a foreign state, enforcing contracts, or punishment of criminals. But those are limited monopolies and are subject to revocation by the people.


There are other uses of force the government may never have a legitimate monopoly on such as the use of force to defend ones self and other innocents against imminent serious injury or death. Any government that claims to have a such a monopoly on the use of force is an illegitimate government.

I know that guy!

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Ry points out a great article on the evolution of sniping gear and deployment in the last few years.


The article was written by Michael Haugen who attended two Boomershoots. Michael also wrote three articles which are posted on the Boomershoot website:



If you have ever heard me tell the story about shooting on the 1000 yard range at Fort Lewis–Michael was the guy next to me with Eugene Econ spotting for both Michael and me.


Michael was the guy that referred to watching me build reactive targets on the tailgate of my pickup as “Bomb Building 101“.


I’m glad to hear he is still in the sniping business and apparently is well. I was impressed with his brains, seriousness, and dedication to our country and constitution.


And, as Ry said, I’m happy he calls out American Snipers as Good Thing. I donate money to them which Microsoft matches dollar for dollar.

Quote of the day–Barrett Tillman

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Tell me why you think a woman should ‘lie back and enjoy being raped’ instead of shooting a rapist dead with the handgun in her handbag.


Tell me why black Americans should submit to being lynched instead of shooting the lynch mob dead.


Tell me why homophobes should be free to beat up homosexuals without the risk of being shot.


Watch Schindler’s List and tell me again why only the police and military should have guns.


Tell me why you think police should be able to shoot an attacker to save their lives but I shouldn’t.


Tell me why I shouldn’t have the best means of defending myself — a semiauto firearm with a standard capacity magazine.


Tell me why a woman’s right to choose should not include weapon, mag size and ammunition.


Tell me why you think I shouldn’t be able to defend my life or my freedom.


More than that, tell me why you should not have that right!


Barrett Tillman
Via Alan Korwin October 25, 2008 — Liberty Poll Grows

Because Criminals Have Rights Too…

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…We must advocate tougher gun restrictions.  I found this on Oleg’s blog.




 


and part two, “The Carjackers”;




 


That’s the way to do it!  Humor.  Blistering sarcasm actually– illustrating absurdity by being absurd.  There is no other proper response to the anti-rights movement.  Not at the moment.

Muggers for Obama

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I doubt this is part of their official campaign:




A knife-wielding man robbed a McCain-Palin campaign volunteer and etched a “B” into her face after he saw a McCain bumper sticker on the woman’s car, Pittsburgh police said.


But socialism does inspire and in fact outright demand (read Karl Marx) violence to achieve Utopia.


So I’m not surprised.

In 2004 there were hundreds of reports of Republican campaign offices being vandalized and worse. There was something like 10 or 20 Democrat campaign offices damaged in the same time frame.

In the big scheme of things–think about willingness of Stalin, Hitler, Chairman Mao, Pol Pot, etc. and their followers to use force to implement socialism. Barack Obama and his followers come from a long line of violent political ancestors. That doesn’t even count the “white collar” crime activities they engage in like the governor’s election in Washington state last time where in King County (Seattle area) there were more votes counted than there were registered voters.


Democrats and crime? Typical. Who do you think some of the most dependable democrat voters are? Why do you think democrats want to register people to vote in prison and those with criminal records?


And the gun bans? If you wanted to get put on your tin-foil hat you could hypothesis they want to enable criminals so the political “leaders” can acquire more power to “protect the little guy”. Hitler sent his goons out to break things then claimed he needed more power to “protect the people”. What Schumer, Feinstein, Obama, and the others are doing is just a low level, indirect means of accomplishing the same thing. That they have supporters taking it to the next level is just showing us the trend and their roots more clearly.


They hate us and they hate freedom and they are certain they are right. That gives them justification for anything they do that furthers their cause. Think I’m exaggerating? Then read this. Here is a sample:



If a kid in a red state finds his daddy’s handgun and blows his head off, we’ll feel terrible (we’re like that), but we’ll try to look on the bright side: At least he won’t grow up to vote like his dad.


This is the mindset of the socialists. This is the mindset that resulted in socialist governments murdering tens of millions of their own citizens in the 20th century. This is the mindset of muggers for Obama.


Update: The attack on the girl was probably a hoax (H/T to Sebastian).

Spreading the Wealth Around

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When I heard BO talking to Joe The Plumber, saying that when we spread the wealth around, everyone benefits, I agreed with his words.  Any time you help to produce or deliver products or services, you are “spreading the wealth around”.  Anytime you trade products or service with another person, both parties in the transaction are “spreading the wealth around”.  Any time you buy stock in a company, you help finance that company and you’re spreading the wealth around.  Any time you put money in a savings plan, you’re helping to finance others, and you’re spreading the wealth around.  If you hire someone, you’re spreading the wealth around. If you go to work for someone else, you’re spreading the wealth around.  Even if you’re a miser and you buy gold to bury in your back yard, you’re supporting the gold mining and processing industry and all the people they employ throughout the supply chain, and you’re spreading the wealth around.


But we all know that Obama wasn’t talking about peaceable, voluntary exchange of goods and services between free citizens.  He was talking about spreading the wealth around using force and the threat of force.  To put it another way, Obama, and all who think similarly, does not trust you to produce they way HE thinks you should produce, so he wants to tell you how to do it.  He doesn’t trust you to make your own purchasing and financing decisions, so he’s going to do more of that for you.


Obama and socialists everywhere are jealous of your abilities to produce and they’re jealous of the freedom you’ve had in spreading your wealth around.  Make no mistake about it– that jealousy leads to anger and hatred.


We can look at the political struggle in this country in this way; Either you favor spreading the wealth around through peaceable, voluntary exchange, or you favor spreading the wealth around through the use of force and the threat of force.


Lest you be tempted to demand a look at history to find which method of spreading the wealth has a better record of success, I would warn you that the two sides (socialists and capitalists) have incompatible measures of “success”.  You may think that success means more people living at higher standards, with more choices in life, more mobility, a better life span and so on.  You’d be wrong if you think socialists will see that as a desirable outcome.


Update; Of course there is a whole lot more to participation in a free market beside “spreading” wealth.  In fact you are creating wealth– something the socialists have never been able to comprehend.  In the mind of a socialist, to become rich is to deprive someone else.  In fact, and as with virtually all socialist beliefs, the opposite is true.  In the process of building your own wealth in a capitalist market, and in the process of using it in a capitalist market, you are invariably benefiting others.

Quote of the day–Tamara K.

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…[W]hen I get to the moon I’d like a choice of food other than Happy Family Pork Seafood Rice #5. I was kinda hoping for a Big Mac rather than some soy & curry concoction, though. If we want to get back in the game, I say we tell Americans that anything that happens over a hundred miles up is tax-free, and then stand the hell back.


Tamara K.
October 22, 2008
The space race goes on…
[I’d prefer a little lower altitude, like five miles, but we’re just quibbling over details at that point.–Joe]

It’s the government–we can trust them

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Remember the post from last week? In the article I linked to they said:



It’s not an image people would find invasive.


And:



It’s not possible to save an image or get it out of the machine, it’s physically not possible.


That was in Australia and this is the same technology being tested in Europe:



I wonder why the picture they share with us to demonstrate their technology is cut off the just below the breasts–NOT!


They are arguing about it now but I fully expect arguments that it is “for the children” or “the good of everyone” will prevail and within a year or so it will be back to normal Security Theater as usual with most everyone thinking they are safer when in fact they are not. But maybe it will save the little old ladies from getting their feet broken by TSA quite so often.


Update: Via a comment from Barron we now have more of the picture:



Nice, huh?

Nanny is tightening her grip down under

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Via my Aussie friend at work I found out Australians are going to be prevented from viewing Internet materials their Nanny state deems “illegal”. As he put it, “North Korea, China and now Australia all have something in common. Content filtering.”

Details here, here, and here:

Details have begun to come out about Australia’s Cyber-Safety Plan, which aims to block “illegal” content from being accessed within the country, as well as pornographic material inappropriate for children. Right now, the system is in the testing stages, but network engineers are now saying that there’s no way to opt out entirely from content filtering.

It was “for the children” and now it’s for everyone.

As pointed out in the articles the concern is what will be considered “illegal”. This blog and my Boomershoot web site are blocked by many schools and businesses. I wouldn’t be surprised if there aren’t some countries it is blocked in as well. Just firearms training videos could be blocked in countries that have repressive gun laws. Even the concept of being responsible for yourself and fighting back when attacked is already essentially illegal in the U.K. Will just talk of the right to self defense soon be considered a thought crime there and other formerly free countries?

As they were getting their guns taken away I kept wondering why they didn’t start shooting the politicians then. I can’t help but think they are probably now wondering the same thing.

Anything you video can be used against you

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The first thing I thought of when I read this was the gun bloggers who went to summer camp at Blackwater a couple months ago. The critical portion is this (emphasis added):



The video that spurred the investigation of five men accused of plotting an attack on soldiers on New Jersey’s Fort Dix shows some of them in camouflage clothing, firing rapid-fire weapons on a snowy driving range.


An investigator who was on the case from the beginning testified Tuesday that the way the men were firing was unusual.


“They were actually advancing toward a target,” said Fred Lang, a member of an FBI anti-terrorism task force who was previously in the military. “Through my years as a firearms instructor, I’ve never seen that done.”


“There’s only one reason for that,” Lang said. “It’s a fire-and-maneuver tactic.”


We did that at summer camp (see the video here). We do that in USPSA matches all the time. Yet this is being used against these guys as if it were something essentially unheard of.


It may in fact be these guys were training to kill U.S. soldiers and should be sent to prison for a long time. But this one thing in and of itself should not be conclusive proof of evil intent. I am concerned of precedent being set.

Federal judges critical of Heller ruling

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This seems so odd to me. How can they possibly make such a claim?



Judge Richard A. Posner, in an article in The New Republic in August, wrote that Heller’s failure to allow the political process to work out varying approaches to gun control that were suited to local conditions “was the mistake that the Supreme Court made when it nationalized abortion rights in Roe v. Wade.”


Would he say the same about the right to a trial by jury, freedom of religion, or freedom of speech? The RKBA, is a specific, enumerated right. Yet Posner thinks it should be subject to “the political process”? If that were the case then what does he think a right really is?


And if you read his article in The New Republic you will find he misstates facts and overlooks things like the state constitutions at nearly the same time as the U.S. Constitution that specifically spelled out the RKBA as an individual right.


How can someone like this be considered fit to be a judge?


Or what about this?



“In both Roe and Heller,” Judge Wilkinson wrote, “the court claimed to find in the Constitution the authority to overrule the wishes of the people’s representatives. In both cases, the constitutional text did not clearly mandate the result, and the court had discretion to decide the case either way.”


What about the wishes of the people’s representatives in Alabama, Mississippi, and the other deep south states of 50 years ago. Should have they been respected?


It seems to me that these judges are unable or unwilling to embrace the concept of inalienable rights.


If I were able to change the structure of our government one of the changes I would make is there would be specific provisions for a small minority to overthrow any law which plausibly granted to the government powers beyond those enumerated in the constitution. It seems too many people are unable to think of there being a problem that would not benefit from a government solution. And what I think of when government tries to solve problems is best described by the picture here.

Right to chose

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I’m all for freedom of choice and it’s interesting to me the debate over open carry is sometimes actually framed in those words in the media. But then this is an Oklahoma newspaper.


Sometime I’ll have to spend an hour or three and collect my thought on open carry for a post. I’m all for it but I do worry about scaring the sheeple and it backfiring on us.

Bigotry and ignorance on display

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What follows is what the believers of unity think of gun owners. Sometimes I just have to shake my head at the extraordinary displays of bigotry and ignorance of those that think they are enlightened. From the comments:



bengaliman Oct 20 08, 11:03am


Ignorant fools who deserve every bit of bad news they get. Lets hope they use it on themseleves at soem point. Lets face it they are racists who wont come out with what they really think.


Ahh… yes. Someone who thinks they can read the minds of other people and is ignorant of the racist origins of gun control. I’ll ignore his spelling errors…



Struggling Oct 20 08, 11:32am


Hear the store guys’ closing words: He’s a hard nut to crack.


Their effort to convince Marc must have been all the bullshit they were spouting about Obama.


Just shows the extremity of some people’s distance from reality. Their viewing must be entirely Fox or some cable effort of even more extreme outlook. I don’t know what their reading might be (Mein Kampf would be a funny suggestion but an unfair one may be??).


These are people perhaps Obama is not going to be able to convince? Perhaps his drive for votes might not need to expend so much on them?


Crazy guys.


Obama has me convinced. His record is clear.



MrPoisson Oct 20 08, 12:18pm



These are people perhaps Obama is not going to be able to convince?


Well that’s a given – there’s a vast population of gun totin’, chequered shirted, and outspokenly racist redneck types across the states. I went (out of bemused curiosity) to a pawn shop/gun range in south Florida which was entirely staffed and frequented by a section of society you wouldn’t want to have access to a pen knife let alone an enormous 7.62mm assault rifle. They all seem to possess that stubborn, unwavering, and willfully ignorant patriotism which really has no place in todays world.


I just hope the latest polls accurately reflect these idiots.


7.62mm is “enormus” and he thinks we are idiots? And how was it he determined the people at the gun range should have access to a pen knife? Was it because of their checkered shirts or was it because they were patriotic? The important part is he doesn’t think people with the viewpoints opposed to his have a place in “todays world”. I’m reminded of someone else who had similar thoughts.



Roosterbooster198 Oct 20 08, 12:47pm


Secession for the East and West coasts looks more attractive by the day. Secede, and leave these imbeciles to rot in Third World squalor.


This guy displays mind-boggling ignorance of reality. And he really, really, doesn’t want to go there. If the heartland put an blockade on the food and water flowing into the East and West coasts within two weeks there will only be rats and cannibals crawling through the rubble of the burned out cities. The farmers, ranchers, miners, factory, and construction workers may not be able to get much content on their TV sets and their medical resources would be diminshed but they would have plenty of food, water, and ammunition as they manned the big dirt berms pushed up around the cities and put out the run away fires, and shot the arrogant elistists who believe themselves smarter and superior as they attempted to crawl out of the hell they created for themselves.



jigen Oct 20 08, 4:31pm


The National Rifle Association — which is the lobby for gun manufacturers and sellers, but poses as an organization fighting for the rights of the little guy — has been putting out literature saying ‘Obama will take your guns’. The literature even looks like an Obama flier, which must be confusing for these hillbillies when they see a stack of them at the local gun-show.


http://www.factcheck.org/elections-2008/nra_targets_obama.html


In a way, I feel sorry for these people. They are under-educated — products of a school system the Republican Party wants to keep in place because it favors them — and fearful, because they are told to be afraid. If it comes to the crunch, these people aren’t going to be the ones who survive. What will they do, make their own bullets? The stockpile won’t last for long, and survival will need intelligence, strength and good health much more than cowardice, brute force and a lack of fashion sense.


The NRA is a lobby for gun manufactures and sellers? This is an extraordinarily common belief among anti-gun socialists. My hypothesis is their hatred of capitalism blinds them to reality–they are incapable of seeing the world other than in terms of the “evils of capitalism” and those that oppose socialism are either dupes of, or in collusion with, the capitalists. In the case of the NRA it is very, very clear they are completely, totally, wrong.


Under-educated? I have a BSEE and MSEE, my wife has two college degrees, our only son has a BS in computer science, and both daughters are in college. I have to wonder what sort of education jigen has such that he thinks I and/or my family are under-educated. Yes, people can and do make their own bullets. And I love it when he mentions fashion sense as related to “survival”.