Category Archives: Freedom

He Forgot the Hate Factor

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Walter E. Williams has an excellent piece entitled Destroying Liberty in which he accurately describes the process that leads ordinary Americans to support destructive legislation.



But if you were to ask, say, the average senior citizen whether Social Security, Medicare and prescription drug subsidies should be continued, he would probably answer yes. The same would be true if you asked a college professor whether higher education should continue to be subsidized, or a farmer or a dairyman whether their products should be subsidized, or a manufacturer whether there should be tariffs and quotas on foreign products that compete with his product. The problem with congressmen producing favors and privileges to all interest groups is that it creates what none of us wants: massive control, numerous dictates and micromanagement of our lives.


Read the whole thing.  Superb as it is, he missed the hate factor.  There are a significant number of Americans who have been taught to hate the very things that make this country a success.  They hate the very idea of corporations for example.  The term “free enterprise” makes their blood boil.  The sight of a nice home, on a nice lot, with the American flag flying makes them want to spit.  They have a hateful name for it; “McMansion”.  They would tend to agree with Obama when he says with contempt that some Americans are clinging to guns and religion (the first two amendments in the Bill of Rights).  I suppose deriding Americans who “cling” to property rights, free speech, the right to a fair trial by jury, etc., will come next.  When FDR was pushing his Raw Deal back in the ’30s and ’40s, there was a famous (to me) quote, and I paraphrase; “For the first time, the rich are going to feel the same pain that the poor have felt.”  Spread the misery.  If I’m suffering, angry, and unhappy, then by damn, if I can’t do anything else, I will make you suffer, make you angry, and make you just as miserable as I.  That seems to be the mentality.  It’s far easier to tear down someone else’s house than to build one of your own.


Now we’re faced with the possibility that one of these America haters is going to be elected president.

Quote of the day–Aldous Huxley

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There is, of course, no reason why the new totalitarianisms should resemble the old.  Government by clubs and firing squads, by artificial famine, mass imprisonment and mass deportation, is not merely inhumane (nobody cares much about that nowadays); it is demonstrably inefficient and, in an age of advanced technology, inefficiency is the sin against the Holy Ghost. A really efficient totalitarian state would be one in which the all-powerful executive of political bosses and their army of managers control a population of slaves who  do not have to be coerced, because they love their servitude. To make them love it is the task assigned, in present-day  totalitarian states, to ministries of propaganda, newspaper editors, and school teachers.

 

 ….[such propagandists] accomplish their greatest triumphs, not by doing something, but by refraining from doing.  Great is truth, but still greater, from a practical point of view, is silence about truth.  By simply not mentioning certain subjects… totalitarian propagandists have influenced opinion much more effectively than they could have done by the most eloquent denunciations, the most compelling of logical rebuttals.

 

Aldous Huxley
Brave New World, 1946 revised foreword
[In other words, far more important than what the media does say is what they don’t say. For example, on gun control, they don’t tell you no one has been able to answer Just One Question. For example when school funding, health care, or social security is being discussed they don’t tell you 90% of what the Federal Government does is not authorized by the U.S. Constitution.–Joe]

Kevin Baker on hate

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Kevin wraps his mind around why the left, and to a lesser extent the right, has so much hate and shares the result via quotes as is his style.


Very good stuff and I highly recommend it. It explains so much.

The Financial Crisis for Dummies

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The shorter and even simpler version is, “You can’t fool the free market forever even if the politicians think they can. The laws of economics can no more be changed than the laws of physics. Obama and other Democrats were the biggest contributors. Vote for McCain.” Set to music:





H/T to George for the email with the link.


Update: The video was pulled and via Kevin I found the replacement.

Quote of the day–Roberta X

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… I don’t see the real world playing out like the last few chapters of Atlas Shrugged. We’re a bit short of Galts and Gulches an’ Midas Mulligan’s been in a Federal pen for a good long while now, accused of “redlining.”


Roberta X
Meanwhile, Back At The Launch
[Atlas Shrugged is a great book but there are lots of deviations from reality. It does have some wonderful points to make but as a plan for restoring our country’s freedom it obviously won’t work. Economic collapse may be required but an organized strike by the truly intellectual to force that just isn’t going to happen.–Joe]

Big Brother tightens his grip

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This is the sort of thing you can expect once Big Brother has taken your firearms away:



“CrimTrac has told us there will be 5000 cameras around the country, overwhelmingly in populated areas, taking some 70 million photos every day.


“There’ll be maybe 1000 cameras in downtown Sydney, close to that number in Melbourne, perhaps 100 or so in Brisbane.


“If you use the main roads, you’re likely to be snapped several times a day, and all those photos and any related data will be held by CrimTrac for up to five years.”


Mr Vaile said it was false to represent the proposal as number plate recognition: “It’s a photograph-all-drivers system.”


At present, there are an estimated 300 fixed ANPR cameras and 100 mobile units in Australia.


CrimTrac is due to hand a $2.2 million scoping study for an integrated ANPR to the Minister for Home Affairs, Bob Debus, and the Ministerial Council for Police and Emergency Management in November.


According to a privacy consultation paper issued in June, all ANPR data collected would be made available to participating agencies in real time, and retained for five years for future investigations.


This fails my Jews in the Attic Test with such authority it takes some thought to imagine ways to fail worse.


As my Austrialian friend who sent me the link said, “This is some scary shit…”

Headlines for Obama

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Barack What First Amendment Obama has sent threatening letters to new agencies in Pennsylvania and Ohio demanding they not run NRA advertisements. This act should be immediate disqualification of him as a candidate on at least two different levels. One is the obvious disrespect he has for the First Amendment (as well as the Second). The other is the crass stupidity. In addition to this being the Internet age where everyone can upload or download almost any video they want in a manner that is virtually impossible to block outside of a hard core police state this makes a news story out of the NRA ads. Which means TV stations are likely to start showing the ads for free!


As Dave Hardy said people will want to see what they are forbidden to see. A psychology prof lecturing about advertising once did a quick survey in his class about signs that were effective in getting the students to spend their money on a product. He was somewhat surprised to find one of the most compelling signs was “Under 17 not admitted without parent or guardian.” Has Obama never learned that people buy and read banned books (get your button here) because they are banned? The same thing applies with guns, ammo, and accessories.


Just think of the headlines (the following are copyright exempt) this act of stupidity will enable:



  • Obama Campaign Running Scared (NRA web page headline)
  • What Obama doesn’t want you to know
  • See the video Obama wants censored!
  • Obama attempts to ban free speech!
  • Obama jumps the gun and goes for the First first
  • Obama imposing “reasonable restrictions” on human rights
  • What’s next? Restrictions on the right to trial by jury?

Someone this out of touch with human nature and the Bill of Rights has no place in American politics.


Update: Barack Enlightened Leader Obama also has local law enforcement pledged to come down on certain anti-Obama ads. This reminds me a lot of the early days of Adolf Hitler. Only here we have these rights specifically enumerated and Obama is, in essence, saying, “Bill of Rights? We don’t need no stinking Bill of Rights!”


Update2: It’s not just Obama! The Democratic Party is trying to suppress free speech. But that is to be expected I guess. It was one of the most liberal Republications and a liberal that brought us McCain-Feingold. Repression of economic and political freedom–it’s what liberals do.

Quote of the day–David Hardy

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When will people learn? Upon hearing “you should not be allowed to see this,” every real American feels a Pavlovian urge to see it at once, even if it’s a Sanskrit manual on chariot repair.


David Hardy
September 25, 2008
Obama campaign tries to get stations to refuse NRA ads
[Apparently Obama is trying to get an early start on gutting the First Amendment. Apparently just signalling his attitude on the Second Amendment wasn’t enough. It’s obvious that he and his followers think of him as the Great Leader but one would think he could control himself until he seized power. Could it be that he just can’t help himself?–Joe]

Quote of the day–Dann Dalton

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It’s the public school system. Let’s be honest, it’s full of liberal loons.


Dann Dalton
September 23, 2008
Fifth Grader Suspended for Wearing Anti-Obama Shirt


[H/T to Say Uncle and David Codrea.–Joe]

What’s So Great About America?

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At this time– this very day when Congress is plotting the final stroke in yet another, years-in-the-making, offensive against capitalism, Bill whittle has brought our attention to his doctorate level thesis on American exceptionalism.  It’s called, Trinity (part 1).



If you believe, as I do, that wealth can be manufactured out of thin air, then there is no limit to the amount of wealth you can amass. And since you are creating it out of thin air, there is no moral onus on making money – you work hard to create it and have stolen from no one. There is an expression for this: you earned it.


Indeed, since charity depends on excess wealth, excess capacity, the more you make for yourself the better off everyone else is. You can even throw charity out the window if you are so hard-hearted; the fact remains that you will spend that money to get the things you want, and the more you have the more you can spend. That money goes to other people. This interchange is called “the economy”, and rich societies are rich because they understand in their bones the centerpiece of Capitalist thinking: Wealth can be created from thin air by human ingenuity and hard work.


Now people on the left have, in their guts, a revulsion towards the rich and the wealthy, because whenever they see wealth they naturally assume that it was stolen…


So true, Doctor Whittle.


If any of you haven’t read Bill’s piece, you’ve missed out.  We know at least 99% of politicians have never read anything like it.  Either that or they were unable to understand it and wandered off to catch happy hour down at the watering hole.  Certainly nothing like this is being presented within our public schools.  Ever.


Well, now’s your chance.  It’ll take some time, but you’ll thank Bill for it, I guarantee.


For you lefties out there; don’t bother.  Something like a curse in a foreign language, you won’t understand it but it will upset the hell out of you all the same.  Like when certain people ask me how to do something and I say, with total sincerity, “I’m sure you can figure it out.”  Curse in a foreign language.

Quote of the day–Philip Elmer-Dewitt

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In a Time/CNN poll of 1,000 Americans conducted last week by Yankelovich Partners, two-thirds said it was more important to protect the privacy of phone calls than to preserve the ability of police to conduct wiretaps. When informed about the Clipper Chip, 80% said they opposed it.


The battle lines were first drawn last April, when the Administration unveiled the Clipper plan and invited public comment. For nine months opponents railed against the scheme’s many flaws: criminals wouldn’t use phones equipped with the government’s chip; foreign customers wouldn’t buy communications gear for which the U.S. held the keys; the system for giving investigators access to the back-door master codes was open to abuse; there was no guarantee that some clever hacker wouldn’t steal the keys. But in the end the Administration ignored the advice. In early February, after computer- industry leaders had made it clear that they wanted to adopt their own encryption standard, the Administration announced that it was putting the NSA plan into effect. Government agencies will phase in use of Clipper technology for all unclassified communications. Commercial use of the chip will be voluntary — for now.


Philip Elmer-Dewitt
March 14, 1994
Who Should Keep the Keys?
[Those that criticize Republicans for “spying on U.S. citizens” forget how hard the Clinton administration worked to do the same thing.–Joe]

Quote of the day–Ayn Rand

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It only stands to reason that where there’s sacrifice, there’s someone collecting the sacrificial offerings. Where there’s service, there is someone being served. The man who speaks to you of sacrifice is speaking of slaves and masters, and intends to be the master.


Ayn Rand
[I’m thinking of certain Democrats and their tax plans.–Joe]

Quote of the day–Edward Abbey

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Anarchism is founded on the observation that since few men are wise enough to rule themselves, even fewer are wise enough to rule others.


Edward Abbey
[I was reminded of this by reading Roberta’s and Robb’s posts.–Joe]

He must think he is psychic

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From “The Gun Guys”:

Gun Pusher: noun. 1. Someone who pushes guns on others whether they need, want or should have them. 2. A person who cares more about profit generated from the sale of firearms and their own power than they do about their fellow-citizens. 3. A person who can pretend that 30,000 deaths from guns in the United States is simply the price we pay for “freedom”.
Like a drug dealer, a gun pusher will seduce you into believing that you want and need a gun. After all they say, “guns will keep you safe.” What they fail to tell you are about the terrible side effects of guns in America.
…
The NRA is little more than a two-bit gun pusher. Like a drug-dealer they peddle their wares regardless of consequence or conscience.
Beware of the gun pusher, they will leave no stone unturned in their relentless pursuit of profit and power. Schools, churches, malls, playgrounds, national parks and airports are all fair game to them. And, believe us when we say, the last thing they are concerned about is the safety of you, your family or your loved ones.

Apparently he is unaware that of those 30,000 deaths by gunfire half were suicides that nearly all would have occurred even if there were no guns on the planet.

Apparently he is unaware that of the remaining 15,000 deaths thousands of them were from legitimate self-defense by both the police and private citizens.

Apparently he is unaware that at least 74 Million people lost their lives in the last century because of gun control. Do the math on that when you estimate your price for freedom.

He apparently is unaware the NRA teaches thousand of people in personal protection and safety with and without guns each year.

Apparently he believes firearms in the hands of the police are not about the security and safety of innocent lives.

And finally, does this guy really think he is psychic and knows what we are and are not concerned with? He is actually closer to a psychotic disconnect from reality. But then we already knew he has mental problems. This isn’t really news.

Interesting correlation

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There are times when I’m certain I can tell who is going to be in favor of gun control just by looking at them. They look scared all the time. Sort of like they are about to run home and tell mommy because you looked at them wrong. I have commented on this before (see also the picture in that post). Now we have some research to indicate there is a correlation but it is different from what I expected:



Alford and his colleagues studied a group of 46 adult participants with strong political beliefs. Those individuals with “measurably lower physical sensitivities to sudden noises and threatening visual images were more likely to support foreign aid, liberal immigration policies, pacifism and gun control, whereas individuals displaying measurably higher physiological reactions to those same stimuli were more likely to favor defense spending, capital punishment, patriotism and the Iraq War,” the authors wrote.


…


The researchers noted a correlation between those who reacted strongly to the stimuli and those who expressed support for “socially protective policies,” which tend to be held by people “particularly concerned with protecting the interests of the participants’ group, defined as the United States in mid-2007, from threats.” These positions include support for military spending, warrantless searches, the death penalty, the Patriot Act, obedience, patriotism, the Iraq War, school prayer and Biblical truth, and opposition to pacifism, immigration, gun control, foreign aid, compromise, premarital sex, gay marriage, abortion rights and pornography.


There are some profound implications if these results are true:



The paper concluded, “Political attitudes vary with physiological traits linked to divergent manners of experiencing and processing environmental threats.” This may help to explain “both the lack of malleability in the beliefs of individuals with strong political convictions and the associated ubiquity of political conflict,” the authors said.

Quote of the day–Alan Korwin

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The good news is that 90 to 95% of the people from New Orleans have reached the evacuation areas, and have voluntarily taken wrist bracelets with bar codes on them so they could be safely evacuated, according to FOX news, 8/30/08.


Just think about that.
Bar codes for people.


Alan Korwin
September 15, 2008
Bar Coding People
[Those that understand the point won’t need any further comment from me. Those that don’t understand probably won’t ever get it–until it is too late.–Joe]

This is for Kevin

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I think Kevin Baker has his problems with the TSA mostly fixed now. I’m pretty sure he is now able to avoid getting special treatment when he flies. But had the normal channels not worked he could have just changed his name. Apparently it works quite well.


My contempt for the TSA Security Theater is at an all time high. But there is a certain amount of truth to the claim that a great deal of security is about feeling secure rather than actually being secure. However this doesn’t lower my contempt of the TSA, it just raises my contempt for sheeple and all government (redendency alert) idiots.

Couldn’t Have Said it Better…

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…than Thomas Sowell did in his recent piece, “Idols of Crowds”;



[Iran] is a country whose president has already threatened to wipe a neighboring country off the map. Does anyone need to draw pictures?


When terrorists get nuclear weapons, there will be no way to deter suicide bombers. We and our children will be permanently at the mercy of the merciless.


Reading Sowell’s post, I can’t help seeing the faces of those women on the verge of fainting with ecstasy at that big rally in Germany in the 1930s.  Those were the enraptured, delighted, happy, adoring faces of mass death.


Guns and freedom

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Does the presence of guns in a society increase or decrease freedom?


The NRA says, “Vote Freedom First“. But is it really true?


The answer is obvious to you and I. But it’s also “obvious” to the people of the Brady Campaign. David Kopel, Carlisle Moody, & Howard Nemerov did the research, crunched the numbers and concluded:



There are many causal mechanisms by which guns and freedom can advance or inhibit
each other. The mechanisms which are most influential at a given point in time can vary widely
from nation to nation. Historically and today, we can find ways in which freedom has increased
guns, guns have increased freedom, freedom has reduced guns, and guns have reduced freedom.
International firearms scholars, except those based in North America, have tended to focus their
research only on the latter two relationships, while ignoring the first two. Some of the more
enthusiastic proponents of gun prohibition have asserted that the relationship between freedom
and guns is always negative.


The data in this Article reveal a more complex picture. As general (but not invariable
rule), countries with more guns have more economic freedom, less corruption, and more
economic success. The broad international data do not support theory that more guns means less
freedom, for any of the measures of freedom.


The data provide reason for caution about embracing global agenda of reducing civilian
gun ownership. There may be particular countries where reductions might enhance freedom, but
the data raise serious doubts about whether the gun-reducing agenda makes sense as a categorical
imperative, at least if freedom ranks highly in one‘s hierarchy of values.


When we acknowledge that guns can have a positive and a negative relationship with
freedom, then we can begin to look for more sophisticated, carefully tailored approaches to gun
policy, which attempt to address the negative effects, and which are careful not to reduce the
apparently significant positive effects. Such an approach offers a better possibility of enhancing
freedom than does a simplistic program that only considers negative effects.


I’ll be reading the whole thing tonight after work.

Quote of the day–Gary Marbut

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Heller was a five-to-four split decision with the majority (prevailing) opinion written by Justice Anthony Scalia. Some call this a “razor thin” majority for the decision. Not exactly. The opinion was written as strongly as could be done and still keep the SC swing vote, Justice Kennedy, on-board. A more dilute opinion might have garnered a 6-3 decision, and a weaker opinion yet might have gotten a 7-2 vote.


Gary Marbut
D.C. v. Heller What does it mean?
Page 16, Front Sight, September/October 2008
[This is the way I read the decision as well. It may not be the best way to present the decision for propaganda purposes but I’m fairly certain this describes what happened.–Joe]