Modern American cult of death

By Nathan Barton

Aretha Franklin was a talented, gifted, popular and influential musician.  She is missed.

McCain also seems to be missed by a whole lot of people.

Since they both died recently, we got a double serving of the modern American cult of death this last week. It was, all told, a disgusting meal.

Americans have politicized and commercialized death – perhaps to a degree not seen since Ancient Egypt.

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More on ghettos and refuges

by Nathan Barton

A few weeks ago, I suggested that ghettos can sometimes be refuges for people and businesses, when society (or the powers-that-be) is very much against the people, their business, or their products and practices. Yes, they can be traps, as well.  You are not always in a ghetto by choice, of course.

Thanks for lots of comments from various folks, named and unnamed. Published and not. Here are some further thoughts on the topic.

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Commentary #1400 – loss and vision

This is the fourteen-hundredth commentary published on The Price of Liberty, courtesy and the dedication and work of Susan Callaway, Mama Liberty.

It has only been a few weeks since we lost her after her tough fight with cancer.  There is a big hole in our hearts, our thoughts, our daily activities.  I even find myself avoiding the drive through Newcastle, knowing she’s not there anymore.

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Prohibition on steroids

By Nathan Barton

When we hear “prohibition” we immediately think of the 1920s-1930s alcohol fiasco, or the failed War on Some Drugs, especially on cannabis.
See the source image

But there are two ways to have “prohibition.” Yes, the traditional method is to just outlaw the product.  (As Federal Nazgul and a whole bunch of states are trying to do with 3D-printed guns and many Tranzis want for ALL firearms (in private hands other than their own, of course).)  But the other way is often more effective (and sly).

Tax them out of existence.

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Eating their own… even if long dead

By Nathan Barton

There is afoot a proposal, “bipartisan” of course, to rename the Russell (Old) Senate Office Building (SOB – a worthy acronym for the place) in honor of recently dead John McCain.

It is fascinating to compare these two men, especially when you read the biography of RIchard B. Russell, (D) Georgia, US Senator 1933 to 1971. You can see it here, courtesy of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and the mainstream media.

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Collapsing institutions

By Nathan Barton

A comment on a recent column “Get your children out …” points out that it may take a “catastrophic extinction event” to rid ourselves of the odious institution of government-run, theft-funded “public” schools in the United States.

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Is this what it takes to get rid of “public” schools and their evil in today’s world?

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Goodbye and good riddance

By Nathan Barton

We were taught, as we grew up, to respect the dead, to show sympathy for the families suffering the loss, and above all to “speak no ill of the dead.”

How naïve we were back then. Of course, back in the 1950s and 1960s and 1970s, there were limits to that rule of civility. Certainly not many people, worldwide, spoke anything but ill of Uncle Adolph.  Or, in the West, of Uncle Joe. Truth is more important than being nice, when it comes to people like that.

Today, nice people still try not to speak ill of the dead. But not everyone is nice.  In all corners of the political room, the voices are loud and rude. There are those who not just  rejoice in the death of anyone who does not agree with them, continuing to trash them after death as they did before they died. Some publicly proclaim their desire for their opponents to die. Preferably in some painful, drawn-out, way.

Or worse, they do everything that they can to hasten or cause those deaths.  And the deaths of tens, hundreds, thousands, even millions of others. And then dance on their graves.

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Get your children out…

By Nathan Barton

A Blaze story points out one of the many evils of government-run, theft-funded schools – so-called “public schools.” The teacher punished the fifth-grader and threatened him for treating her with the respect his parents expected of him towards his teachers.

His crime?  He answered her with “yes, ma’am.”  The story does not report WHY the teacher believed that he was disrespectful to her by using a standard American English term of respect. But in her eyes, his way of showing respect was unacceptable in her classroom – indeed, evil.

The evil, of course, must be immediately punished.

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Welcome to the Ghetto

By Nathan Barton

Today, the word “ghetto” has really bad connotations.  It refers to slums where the vast majority of residents are black,  living in these inner-city neighborhoods of rotting buildings and utilities, crime, and neglect.  (See also “barrio” and “the ‘hood.’)

See the source image

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Innocent until … Part 2

By Nathan Barton

Part one is a short piece of fiction about surveillance cameras and police and public perceptions.

Surveillence cameras and their complex and sometimes amazing software are a modern fact of life.  In many cities, and even suburban areas, we and our vehicle may be in the view of dozens of cameras, all recording our presence, actions, and even our identity and vehicle identification. When we pull out a credit card, or an ID and check, the cameras may be recording our personal information.

In order to “protect against identity theft,” in reality the cameras and their recordings may make identity theft even easier and more profitable.  And if we have enemies or even dishonorable opponents who can get access to them, we may be facing even greater problems.  As in the story.

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