Libertarian Commentary on the News, #13-51B: Crash of 2009 still with us

Posted on 2014-01-01 by TPOL Nathan

Crash of 2009-Congress in Action – Theft by government
Democrats Say Pass Extension of Unemployment Benefits First; Pay Later
(CNSNews.com)

Nathan: Of course, many (most?) GOP types have this attitude as well: why worry about paying for something until you absolutely have to?  Meanwhile, stick it to the “wealthy” and “corporations” and future generations.  Meanwhile, extension of unemployment benefits might be “compassionate” but it will continue to drag on the economy: people have less incentive to do something when someone else is paying the bills.  Of course, the illogic of Congress – its inability to reason – is well-known.  But even some usually reasoning (and reasonable) conservative-bordering-on-minarchist commentators can’t seem to wrap their heads around this, as the next stories and their scary headlines show.

Mama’s Note: I doubt many of the truly wealthy, or large corporations are footing much of the bill. Instead, they are lined up to take as much subsidy as possible, no different than the old “welfare queens.” The problem is that almost everyone, at every economic level, has lived a long time with credit, subsidies and seriously distorted tax incentives as normal business practice, rather than savings, wealth creation and anything close to a free market. Government, and the skewed economy, destroyed millions of jobs and business opportunities over the last fifty years, and most of those now unemployed see little or no chance to find any sort of job. Electronics and automation will very soon replace all of the “burger flipper” jobs, and the noose will tighten. So, it is perfectly understandable why so many are in a panic at the end of the “unemployment benefit.” They don’t see any other real options.

Crash of 2009 – Stupid people (2 stories)
Breaking Point?  Anger grows as Unemployment Benefits Cut
(Bloomberg, via Freedom Outpost) And now extended unemployment benefits have been cut off for1.3 million unemployed Americans, and it is being projected that a total of 5 million unemployed Americans will lose their benefits by the end of 2014. In addition … 47 million Americans recently had their food stamp benefits reduced. The conditions for a “perfect storm” are certainly being created. So how much longer will it be until we see all of this anger and frustration boil over in the streets of our major cities? Is America about to reach a breaking point?

1.3 Million Americans lose unemployment benefits
(CNN via Freedom Outpost) Long-term unemployment benefits for 1.3 million Americans expired Saturday after Congress failed to pass an extension. Reinstating those benefits is expected to be one of the first priorities for congressional Democrats in the new year. “Extending unemployment insurance is the right thing to do for millions of Americans who are trying to support their families,” Democratic National Committee chairwoman and Florida Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz said in a statement Saturday. “What makes matters worse, the loss of benefits comes just a few days after the holidays.” CNN

Nathan: Both stories are as much commentary as news, because the reporters/commentators are fearful that this anger (or what is supposed to be anger) is going to boil over into flash mob attacks on WalMart and KMart and riots in the streets.  One does at least point out the futility of the three-month extension.  IF their visions (nightmares) of street riots and looting were real, I suppose an extension to the end of March would mean less fighting in really bad weather conditions in much of the country.  And less reason for mortgage companies (the “banksters”) and utilities (mostly owned “by the people,” that is, government) to evict people or turn off their services.  At this point, it is probably futile to point out that a lot of people know that this sort of thing is NOT sustainable for very long, and if it crashes (instead of ending with an upswing in a hag-ridden economy), the consequences would be far worse than not extending the benefits.

Crash of 2009 – Government lies
6 million Americans Unemployed; 15% of Youth
(ABC News/Daily News) Right now, there are approximately 6 million Americans in the 16 to 24-year-old age group that are not in school and that are not working either. What that means is that we have an alarmingly high number of very frustrated young people that do not have anything better to do than to cause trouble. In some of our largest cities this has become a massive problem. In fact, quite a few major U.S. cities actually have more than 100,000 “idle youth” living in them… Just look at some of the nation’s largest cities. Chicago, Houston, Dallas, Miami, Philadelphia, New York, Los Angeles, Atlanta and Riverside, Calif., all have more than 100,000 idle youth, the Opportunity Nation report found.

Nathan: As people look at the potential for society to collapse, and for canceling or reducing welfare benefits as an excuse, these numbers loom large in their mind.  A LOT of young people: easily riled and easily led into stupid actions, are roaming the big cities.  Even 1-2% of them can create massive problems.  Some point to recent disturbances (600 people in a movie parking lot, 400 people around a mall) as the beginning of the end.  In winter?  At the same time, it shows that government is not solving the problems, just lying about them.  And government CANNOT solve the problems; only people can, working together voluntarily to produce, sell, and buy.

Hoplophobes and hoploclasts – Stupid people tricks
Pennsylvania – State Trooper has gun on-duty but not allowed off-duty
(Penn Live via Freedom Outpost) Pennsylvania State Trooper Michael L. Keyes is in an odd situation. When on duty, he can carry a gun. Yet while off duty, he is barred by law from possessing any firearms, because seven years ago he suffered from deep depression, repeatedly tried to kill himself by taking drugs and was involuntarily committed for mental health treatment. Keyes’ latest attempt to be allowed to have a gun all the time was rejected this week by the state Superior Court. That court upheld an earlier ruling by Perry County Senior Judge Keith B. Quigley that Keyes’ involuntary mental health commitment constitutes an unsurmountable legal barrier to his ability to possess a gun while off duty.

Nathan: So wrong in so many ways.  The reason given is federal law, yet it seems the Commonwealth is violating federal law to let him carry on duty.  But since he is “cured” it would seem that it makes no sense to keep him from having a weapon! (Of course, we already knew the federal law is stupid.)  Even a Jack-booted Thug (and PA state troopers are literally jackbooted!) has God-given rights to defend himself and others – and yes, a God-given right to be stupid and kill himself. But gun control isn’t about guns, it is about control.  So these courts “uphold” the law and do stupid things.  It is a God-given right for the judge and the Congress to be stupid, but NOT on our dime.  And we wonder why people are frustrated and disturbed!

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Libertarian Commentary on the News, #13-51A: Abominations at year end

Posted on 2013-12-30 by TPOL Nathan

Abominable Act (ObummerCare) – The “messiah”
President Enrolls in Cheapest ‘Bronze’ Plan But Won’t Use It; No Subsidy
(CNSNews.com)

Nathan: Seems that since HE has enrolled in his own program, that the White House should be forced to cut millions a year from the budget by dismantling the entire White House medical office.  Space for wounded soldiers can be made available by having HIM go to Washington’s general hospitals (there is one in the old “Barbeque Zone” north of the White House, as I recall) instead of using Walter Reed, which surely is not in this Bronze Plan.  Of course, the “Bronze Plan” with its huge out-of-pocket costs and maximum limits on coverage is a joke, according to most people.  I suppose that the government will pay this guy’s out-of-pocket costs.  What a joke – and the joke’s on us!

Politics 2013, 2014, 2016 – Culture wars
Huckabee: Most Christians Would Rather Be ‘For Something’ Than ‘Against Something’
(CNSNews.com)

Nathan: Another of Huckabee’s slaps against the Duck Dynasty people, apparently.  According to other stories, he is definitely seeking the 2016 presidential nomination to win the White House, but his actions right now show he will be no different in the most important ways from what we have now and have had in the past.  He wants to avoid “offending” Log Cabin Republicans and other homosexual “moderates” and “conservatives,” but he also is showing the long-term (400+ years) Baptist antipathy towards churches of Christ such as the Robertson’s White’s Ferry Road Church of Christ in West Monroe, Louisiana.  I am surprised he has not used some of the old slurs, like calling them Campbellites and members of a cult.  Hukabee, like many GOP “moderates” who claim to be “conservative” does not like people who are independent, value their liberty, and are willing to speak their mind regardless of financial or social consequences.  In particular, he will not support them in 2014 campaigns.

As to his “theology” – if you are FOR SOMETHING, then that means, inevitably, that you are against a WHOLE lot of “SOMETHINGS.”  There is no way around it.  You can tap dance all you want, but if you claim to be a “Christian” and therefore “for Christ,” then you must be AGAINST Islam and Judaism, and people who have morality that is not the standard which the Christ taught.  But politicians pretend to be stupid, and his status as a preacher is a whole lot less important to him than his status as a politician.

Congress in Action – Abominable Act (ObummerCare)
Pelosi on Obamacare: ‘It’s a Glorious Thing’
(CNSNews.com)

Nathan: No doubt it is, from her point of view: a whole sixth of the world’s largest economy, and millions of people under micro-control by governments at all levels. Merely the fact that Nancy Pelosi is going overboard about it is a strong indicator that it is worse than ever.

New religions: Environists – Economy 2013 and beyond
Transporting Bakken crude needs reviewTribune editorial
(Bismarck Tribune editorial) Is Bakken sweet crude more volatile than typical crude oil? If so, do additional precautions need to be taken in transporting Bakken crude from well head to refinery?  The questions need answering.

Nathan: Thanks to Tim for this one! This may be the start of yet ANOTHER campaign against the production (“exploitation”) of the huge Bakkan play of the Dakotas and Montana..  “This stuff is too dangerous to transport; we must leave it in the ground.”  And pretend that “Peak Oil” really does exist, along with Global Warming and Evolution and presidents who don’t lie.

The story goes on to talk about how the Bakken oil is more like gasoline than “normal” crude and how it may have caused two big railroad fires – never mind that the CAUSE of the railroad accidents, which led to fires burning crude oil being transported – was human error, as is usually the case. Apparently, the people who are dealing with this issue are not familiar with the history of oil production in the United States, based on their “surprise” about Bakken sweet.  For decades, crude oil produced in the Permian Basin – the famous “West Texas Intermediate” was a very light, sweet oil which COULD be burned in the gasoline-powered engines of the 1930s – 1960s, with the possible need to add lead the the “white gasoline” which came directly from the well-head with a very simple filter.  It was “highly volatile” and additional precautions had to be taken with the handling and transport – techniques which apparently have been lost in the last two generations.  If we could haul that stuff from Wink and Odessa and Andrews and Crane back in the 30’s and 40’s, surely we can haul the stuff from Williston and Newtown and Plentywood to the coasts as well.  IF we aren’t hampered by stupid government facilitating the problem would not be anything but a minor bump.

TSA thuggery – Home front
Airport Security in US is Joke
(AOL/Huffington Post) “Checking luggage is very nice, it looks great, taking away the breast milk of the mother of a one month old baby, that looks great,” said Rafi Sela, the president of A.R. Challenges, a transportation consulting firm based in Israel. “It does nothing for security. It’s just a show.”

Nathan: TSA of course, has excuses for why the Israeli (or other systems) won’t work and why they HAVE to do it in as degrading a way as possible, because Sela and others do not understand (or at least don’t say it out loud) – it is not about security of the plane flights, it is all about the control and the domination that TSA thugs and others can have.  The problem is, there is a limit to the stupidity of the terrorists.  Sela says “two seconds” even for stupid terrorists.  So five seconds for the even more stupid false-flag attackers?  That is the second point that Sela misses: they WANT there to be more successful attacks to justify MORE power and control and money for TSA and the other official-pirate agencies, or so it seems.

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Food Stamp Lies

Posted on 2013-12-27 by TPOL Nathan

By Nathan Barton

Once more, I read news about how the SNAP (Food Stamps) cuts which started in November are nothing but a Congressional War on the Poor, and will cause millions of Americans to – if not starve – lose food security and go hungry.

A Reuters blog stated this:’ Congressional Republicans seem hell-bent on denying the most disadvantaged among us healthcare, unemployment benefits and, perhaps worst of all, food stamps, from which the House of Representatives slashed $40 billion last month. Elizabeth Drew, writing in Rolling Stone, calls it “The Republicans’ War on the Poor.”’

Wow!  That is a lot?  How much is SNAP costing the US government, and therefore, US taxpayers?  Well, a little searching on-line found the official US government website that told me how much: in FY2013 (last Oct to this October) $76.0703 billion was spent providing assistance to 47,636,000 people; an average of $133.08 per person per month.  Wow Again!  40 billion cut would drop that to only $36 billion: less than HALF!

Then I started looking.  That would mean that the SNAP/Food Stamp Program would STILL spend more than it cost the last year of George W Bush’s administration: in FY 2008 (which ended the month before the election), $34.6 billion was spent.  In just FIVE years, the amount of FEDERAL food assistance (well, direct assistance: this doesn’t include school breakfasts or lunches, doesn’t include state or local or church or food bank or other charitable spending, and doesn’t include the money my wife and I use to buy food for my elderly, senile relative); in just FIVE years, it more than doubled.  Still, the Congress (blame the GOP of course) is Scrooge-squared to do this.  How evil!

This sounds horrific!  Then I ran across some OTHER articles – and no, not published by those purveyors of pornographic pro-capitalist propaganda like the Cato Institute and Washington Times and Independence Institute and LewRockwell.org.  Published by that great, pro-government, pro-liberal, pro-welfare USA Today newspaper, which said: The actual cut was 39.5 billion OVER TEN YEARS, with about 4.5 billion the first year and declining each year after that!  So!  That means (go back to that government website and calculate: The 76 billion in 2013 gets cut to 71.5 billion in 2014.  That means that the program is cut DRASTICALLY to 2011 levels (71.8 billion).  Insane!  Hideous!  Horrific!  Skeletons of the starved will be found in the streets and in their cardboard shacks under railroad bridges!

This “drastic cut” will mean that a family of four on SNAP will get only $632 a month, instead of $668, a drop of $36 per month, or about $1.16 per day.  Imagine ONLY $632 per month for food for a family of four.  Even with inflation, that seems to be a WHOLE LOT of money to me: a whole lot more than MY family of four spends for groceries each month.  But that website explains “The cuts are especially painful in light of the inadequacy of existing benefit levels.”  Huh?

Let us look at it another way:  Aluminum now sells at the local metal place for about 60 cents a pound.  There are 25 cans to the pound, so to get 60 pounds ($36) of aluminum, you need to collect 1500 cans.  Sounds like a lot, until you realize just how many cans people buy and throw away, and how many you can find today on the roadside ditches and public trashcans of a typical American city.  That is an average of 50 cans – just over 4 12-packs, a day.  Hard work?  Yeah, unless you really need that additional 36 bucks for food.

OR you could learn to cook something as simple as beans – a 15-ounce can of precooked pinto beans (Kuners) runs about a buck; a 10-pound bag of pinto (or anasazi) beans (from Dove Creek, CO Adobe Milling) costs five bucks, and makes the equivalent of 30-40 cans of beans:  a cut in costs of 6:1. (30 cans at a buck each divided by 5).  A 10-ounce can of processed chicken runs three bucks (on sale), a five-pound  package of already-disassembled chicken costs about ten bucks, but makes the equivalent of 8 cans, a cut in costs of about 2.4:1. (80 oz at $10 versus 80 oz at $24).  Similar savings on dozens of home-cooked versus store-bought foods, and you don’t need to go out and collect aluminum cans.

OR you could decide that your family only needs TWO cell phones (for the adults) and NOT for all four of you, at $50/month/cell phone (Denver rates with tax).  $100/month.  (Unless you are getting “commod” or “Obama” phones, of course.)  Or you might have to – gasp! give up cable TV.  Or NOT get that 50-inch television.  Americans are the most incredibly wealthy poor people on the planet, and in history.

$36 lost might be a hardship, but hardly an insurmountable one.  Even at half minimum wage, that is all of eight hours of work.  Grunt work, under the table work, but WORK.

Excuse me, people, but WHAT gives?!?  Why do we let these people get away with these lies?  Why do we let them shame us into accepting that we are greedy Scrooges who OBVIOUSLY hate poor people?

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“Hostile to the United States” Part B: Internal countries, organizations, and individuals

Posted on 2013-12-27 by TPOL Nathan

By Nathan Barton

In my first segment, I discussed the 2013 NDAA and its language allowing gathering of information (spying) from external countries, organizations, and individual hostile to the United States now or in the past.  It seems to include a good 90 percent of the countries on the planet, and many tens of thousands of organizations and billions of individuals in those countries.  It includes virtually every nation now identified as an “Ally” by the United States, and most of the rest of the world. But what about internally?

The NDAA does not distinguish between external and internal “countries, organizations, and individuals” in its authority.  What, then, does that include? In the first segment, I talked about American Indian (AmerInd) nations  (sometimes, disrespectfully called “native American nations”).  These nations, legally called “dependent domestic nations” (an oxymoron) since 1831, have been largely hostile to the US government, whether accepting the “protection” and “guardianship” of the federal government or not.  (There are a few exceptions, of course, as I mentioned.  The Shoshone, the Crow, and a few others have not actually gone to war against the United States or one of the States, but certainly many of their actions can be considered “hostile” in the past and today. But internal hostility is far from limited to 310 AmerInd nations (and reservations) scattered from Point Barrow to the Everglades, and the two or three million enrolled (and non-enrolled) members of those nations.

Let us look at some others and get the magnitude.  Remember, the NDAA applies to “countries” and “organizations” and “individuals.” The easiest to deal with is the old Confederate States of America:  the eleven states which actually seceded and formed a new government.  Clearly today recognized as a “country” of four years duration, except possibly by the Courts of the United States.  Theoretically, those original states no longer exist: they were replaced by NEW entities which were readmitted to the Union during Reconstruction.  And obviously, almost 150 years later, there are no individuals which were part of or served that country still living.  Organizations?  Both the SCV (Sons of Confederate Veterans) and UDC (United Daughters of the Confederacy) as well as many other organizations, were established by and for the support of individuals who were hostile – and therefore, the organizations can be considered hostile.  Millions of Americans have been members or are now so. But there is more:  although the states were extinguished, there were and are many municipalities which existed in 1861 and supported secession and were NOT “dissolved.”  I do not count counties (pun intended) because counties are considered units of state government.

And we must remember that the movement of 1860-1861 was not the ONLY secession movement organized and hostile to the US government.  We know that in the early 19th century (1810s and 1820s) that several of the New England states were hostile to DC and proposed or planned secession, although they did not actually do so.  We know that during the War between the States, a planned “Northwest Rebellion” led by Democrats was very much hostile to the Lincoln government, planning to split off Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin.  Successors of those states, or the actual states themselves, still exist. In more modern times, we have the Alaska Independence movement, we have the various attempts to reestablish a new Texas Republic, and we have similar attempts to separate Vermont, New Hampshire, Wyoming, and elsewhere.

None of these are actually the state governments themselves, but organizations within them, which are hostile.  But many of the states themselves ARE hostile, some on a continuing basis, or have BEEN hostile to the US government, ranging from anti-desegregation states (Arkansas and Louisiana come to mind) to anti-Spanish-American War, anti-Philippine Annexation, anti-Vietnam War, anti-seatbelt, anti-drinking age, and all sorts of other kinds of and reasons for opposition to the dictates and actions of Congress, the White House, and the Supreme Court.  Indeed, maybe ANY states in which the people, legislature, or representatives in majority EVER were opposed (“hostile to”) ANY action of the US government can be on that list.  Hard to think of even one of the fifty which would not be in that category.

As for other organizations, well, internal organizations?  The list is even larger.  Let us start with the anti-ratification/anti-Federalist organizations of the 1780s and move forward, to include virtually every political group from the Republican Party and the Grand Old Army (Union veterans) to the Communist Party USA( and its hundreds of splinters) and Young Americans for Freedom to the SLA and Black Panthers (New and Old).  And let us not forget the religious groups, including the Roman Catholic Church and the Church of Jesus Christ Latter-Day Saints.  Even the League of Women Voters has been hostile to DC now and then.  And do not forget private business – even if in public ownership.  That leads us to individuals.

What constitutes “hostile?”  It appears, based on the way the government in DC – the “messiah” and his minions, and the raving of Congress and its staff, and the decisions of the Supreme Court and all its downstream courts, that any disagreement, including  minor ones, with the federal government, in which ANY action is threatened or encouraged,  can be considered “hostile” to the US government.

Did you question your tax bill?  Try to avoid or reduce or – gasp – evade taxes?  Did you disagree with the NPS closing your favorite restaurant or necking place? Did you cut off a US government plated vehicle?  Did you discourage someone from enlisting?  Did you argue with the extension agent on which crops to plant?  Did you complain because your school tried to follow federal guidelines and stopped serving french fries, or stopped singing “Here Comes Santa Claus” for the winter concert?

All of these actions are hostile: the NDAA apparently “gives” authority to the NSA, FBI, BATFE, DEA, USDA, FDA, PHS, IHS, FHWA, FCC, and two dozen additional agencies to be selected to read your e-mail, listen to your phone calls, record your television watching habits and browsing history, check your spelling on your documents on- or off-line, and use GPS to record your trips to the grocery store and the pawn shop and the church building.

If not now, then later.  How much later?  Did you hang around that seventeen-year-old girl too much when you were nineteen in college, thirty years ago?  Fair game: there is no statute of limitations for NSA to “investigate” and collect data.  Did you collect signatures to get Goldwater on the ballot in your home state in 1964?  Did you pick up a numbers ticket from Greasy Joe Luciano’s racket in Pittsfield, MA, in 1982?  (Talk about organizations hostile to the US government: the Mob, the Mafia, Greenpeace, the Sierra Club, and friends of George McGovern AND GG Liddy all fit in that group.)

I am SURE that somewhere, someplace, somehow in America’s fifty states and dozen territories there are people who were NEVER and are not NOW hostile to the United States – and also over the age of five.  But like Abraham in Sodom and Gomorrah, it might be difficult to find TEN really quickly.  Certainly no American sailor, airman, marine or soldier who ever looked at, and cussed their pay statement, can be considered to have never been hostile.  With this wording, even the “messiah’s” Consort herself, Queen-bee Michelle, might have been hostile, because she said “this is the first time I’ve been proud of my country” as an adult.

The bottom line is this:  Congress has constantly given and will and does continue to give the various secret police entities (“intelligence community”) a blank check to gather information on anyone, anywhere, anytime – essentially in the entire world.  That such power is clearly unconstitutional and in violation of every moral principle accepted by Americans for ten generations is a worthless argument against it.  They have the power, and they not only make the rules, but ignore the very rules they make.  When they write things like this, it is little more than arrogance on their part: see, we will do whatever we want to, and you can’t stop us.  It is force: not the open, brute force of the whip, the mailed fist, the pistol or Taser or shock baton, but still force:  intimidation and threats and constant pressure are the tools of violence, always backed up by sheer force.

Which brings us to the point of both parts of this article.  You and I and virtually everyone, every organization, and every country on this planet have been deemed hostile to the United States government.  It is already collecting information in every possible way and awaiting the right opportunity to take action on that information against you, your contact, your neighbors and friends and family.

So, what will you do about it?

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Libertarian Commentary on the News, #13-50B: Stupid, corrupt government

Posted on 2013-12-25 by TPOL Nathan

Nathan: This may be my last posting for this week, but check back anyway!  Merry Christmas, and Happy New Year!

Stupid (corrupt) government
‘Zero Dark Thirty’ leak investigators now target of leak probe
(McClatchy DC) More than two years after sensitive information about theOsama bin Laden raid was disclosed to Hollywood filmmakers, Pentagon and CIA investigations haven’t publicly held anyone accountable despite internal findings that the leakers were former CIA Director Leon Panetta and the Defense Department’s top intelligence official. Instead, the Pentagon Inspector General’s Office is working to root out who might have disclosed the findings on Panetta and Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence Michael Vickers to a nonprofit watchdog group and to McClatchy.

Mama’s Note: The whole government has sprung so many leaks… maybe it will bleed to death pretty soon. Investigating each other at least diverts a little of their attention, I guess.

Nathan: Yes, once upon a time, Virginia, IGs were involved in rooting out corruption in military units and government organizations, not uncovering people who blew the whistle ABOUT corruption.  But times have changed, haven’t they?  The government must protect itself from those evil people who believe that government is to serve the people (and NOT for lunch) and that honesty in government is a valued quality and not a defect in the system.  There is always, of course, a real fear that the whistleblowers and leakers in government agencies are really double-agents, trying to create a situation that will discredit the watchdog groups and political opposition.  And it is also very difficult to draw the line between just blowing the whistle and actively attacking and destroying the ability of the agency to function.  Such attack and destruction is not necessarily offensive in nature, as it can be purely defensive.  But the stakes are raised significantly and the risks to all involved increase.  Such revelations can (or at least have, elsewhere in the past) lead to a complete collapse of the agencies – and even to open revolt.

Culture wars: “homosexual marriage”
Federal Judge: Right to Same-Sex Marriage Is ‘Deeply Rooted in Nation’s History and Implicit in The Concept of Ordered Liberty’
(CNSNews.com) Utah: The judge argued that the Fifth Amendment, ratified in 1791, and the Fourteenth Amendment, ratified in 1868, are the two provisions of the Constitution that have guaranteed the “existing right” of a man to marry another man or a woman to marry another woman. – See more here.

Nathan: Another headline reads “Judge Strikes Down Traditional Utah Marriage Laws, Calls Them Irrational.”  This is just a week since a judge declared Anti-Polygamy laws in Utah (put there on demand of the US Congress 120 years ago) also unconstitutional. Are the lawyers for the LDS in Salt Lake kicking themselves for not claiming this argument way back then? The logic here for the most part escapes me. If this idea was applied across the board, then tens of thousands of laws at the state and federal level (and hundreds of thousands at the local level) would instantly have to go away.  But there is another more telling point overlooked. Can politicians OR judges at ANY level totally redefine a plain English word?  For centuries, “Marriage” has meant a man and a woman, and when you trace the word to its equivalent in Anglo-Saxon, German, Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, that definition has been in existence for millennia: probably at least 5,000 years.  If what this judge is saying is that any two people have a right to contract for some sort of bond or partnership and call it “marriage,” then why do any two people not have a right to contract for ANYthing and have it deemed legal, whether it is a contract for medical services (regardless of “licensing”) or for sale/purchase of recreational drugs, or for procuring murder services, or whatever else.  And at the same time, this judge apparently says that Congress or a legislature has the power to define a tail as a leg so that all dogs are five-legged.  To define truth as lies, war as peace, and liberty as tyranny.  If this principle canNOT be applied across the board, then WHAT authority is there for limiting it just to marriage – or just to “homosexual marriage between two persons” – why can it not apply between three or four or eight or ten?  Looney-style gang marriages?  700-woman harems?  Two, three, four or more men sharing a single woman?  Islamic-style “temporary marriages of convenience” to “protect public morals?” (That is a hoot.)  And why does not a right to contract whatsoever we will (the “open liberty” clause) not trump laws about felons owning guns or requiring background checks or Jonestown style suicide pacts or selling organs?

Mama’s Note: Seems obvious that the real problem is government involvement in the private lives of individuals, across the board, for any reason. A person can define “marriage” any way they please, obviously, and it only becomes a problem in trying to communicate to others who define it otherwise. Not a government concern, if there even is such a thing. A person can have as many five legged dogs as he can feed without resorting to theft… Nobody else’s business as long as they don’t keep the neighbors up at night with their barking, I suppose.  But then, that would be a matter of negotiation with the neighbors and still no business of any government.

The “messiah” – African collapse
Obama Tells Congress He ‘May Take Further Action’ in Turbulent South Sudan
(CNSNews.com)

Nathan: Oh “HE” may take further action.  What about the (former) powers of Congress – look, not even Kim or Chavez could claim this kind of power.  South Sudan is a mess and US troops are making it more of a mess. We have already taken casualties (no KIA yet, or at least none reported) and all we are doing is meddling in the internal affairs of two supposedly sovereign nations.  If we really wanted to help, we’d buy and donate some of those Korean War M-1s and M-1 carbines and ammo to the families threatened by the thugs from all sides.  But of course, that would be EVIL because we are allowing civilians to be armed.

Mama’s Note: The more this evil, imperial want-to-be god talks, the worse it gets. What was that old phrase about pride going before a fall? The fall of this one should be epic.

Abominable Act (ObummerCare)
Krauthammer: ‘Huge Gov’t Bailout’ of Health Insurance Industry at End of 2014
(CNSNews.com)

Nathan: Is there going to be a US government by the end of 2014, anyway?  Of course, with a solid Democratic (and Tranzi) Congress “behind” him, perhaps “HE” might just go ahead and draft all of the medical personnel into the Public Health Service, issue them uniforms, and make them work for a “reasonable” pay scale.  And nationalize all the companies that run and operate medical facilities, especially those that are city and county and state government owned and operated.  Single payer, single provider: a government monopoly of health care, just like a government monopoly of force and delivery of first class mail.  There, wouldn’t life be simpler?  Congress could just delegate everything to “HIM” and “HE” could dictate everything: what drugs are allowed, what procedures are allowed for what people, what the costs are, how much they get paid, and all the rest!  Bailout?  No, TAKEOVER!

Mama’s Note: And as if that wouldn’t be bad enough, I fully expect a full out “war” on any kind of alternative medicine and a witch hunt for professionals who refuse to join the chain gangs. It won’t happen all at once, of course, but gradually as any actual care deteriorates and the entitled masses scream for government to “do something.” They have no idea how terrible it will be when the only “health care” available is performed by the same sort of people as they see at the DMV.

The “messiah”
Obamacare Problems Tighten Key Senate Races
(CNSNews.com)

Nathan: One more reason for “HIM” to just take over.  Let us go back to traditional ways, and do it by decree (Executive Order).  By the power vested in me by God and Mother Earth, as President of the Americans, I hereby appoint the following individuals for the positions as indicated:

Senior Senator for Alabama, Marie Antoinette Carter, Junior Senator for Alabama, Louis Bourbon Wallace; Senior Senator for Arkansas, John Jay Rockefeller VIX, Junior Senator for Arkansas, Chelsea Clinton Mezvinsky; and so on.

Appoint them for life, of course, since that is a condition very easily changed when the government (read: POTA) has a monopoly on violence.  No need for “can no one rid me of this meddlesome priest” – just push a button and a drone, assassin, or local cop takes care of the problem.

The “Messiah”
Obama Took More Vacation on Average Than Private-Sector Workers 20 Yrs on Job
(CNSNews.com)

Nathan: Of course, “HE” is the anointed “President of the Americans” so he deserves it.  And (as I point out below) these media and political types believe that he must be judged as the unique, irreplaceable, superhuman and mythic hero that he is: not just above the law, but creating the law.

Mama’s Note: “Vacation,” my tush. Say, Mr. President, bet you can’t swim out to that little reef there. (What was that music for “Jaws” again?) Tee hee…

Abominable Act (ObummerCare) – Politics 2014
Schumer: ‘Number 1 Issue in 2014 Election Is Not Going to Be Obamacare…’
(CNSNews.com)

Nathan: Hmm.  Does Schumer figure that there won’t be any elections, either?  Which echoes my thoughts about just getting rid of these foolish, wasteful, elections.

Mama’s Note: Once again I have to insist that there is absolutely no danger of the “elections” being eliminated. The belief that ordinary people can direct, control or even influence the government by electing “representatives” and so forth is the main fiction that keeps government in power. Most people do believe that government at every level automatically has the legitimate authority to control their lives, and that voting is the way they participate in that control. Both are very powerful myths, and extremely useful to the “rulers.”

Obummercare itself may well not be an “issue” by then, but the meltdown of health care in reality will certainly be one of them. By then it ought to be very clear to most people that having “insurance” is meaningless all by itself, regardless of who pays for it.

The “messiah”
Sen. Manchin: ‘Just Not in the President’s Nature to Pal Around’
(CNSNews.com)

Nathan: Well, we can hardly expect him to slum with inferiors, can we?  And we know that he just doesn’t get along with Elizabeth Windsor, because of her track record.  (After all, many people say he was born as her subject, 53 years ago, when she was still learning her job as queen.)  And he just isn’t worthy to hang out with REAL kings like those guys in Saudi Arabia, by his own admission.  Seriously, the “messiah” is already being treated like some superhuman demigod by these people; he can’t be judged on the same level as the rest of us.

Mama’s Note: Sure, but he’s not immune to flirting with well stacked Nordic blonds at funerals. Did you see those photos? If looks could kill, Moochelle would have wiped them both out right then and there. I wonder what the blond got out of the deal, actually. That could not have been popular with the folks back home.

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“Hostile to the United States” Part A: External countries, organizations, and individuals

Posted on 2013-12-25 by TPOL Nathan

By Nathan Barton

The 2013 National Defense Authorization Act, as I write this, was hastily passed by both the House of Representatives and the Senate so that they could go “home” for Christmas.  (It proves that those who question exactly what their REAL home is, and imply that it is the infernal regions, may be on the right track.)

In addition to reinforcing and expanding the powers “granted” unconstitutionally to the Department of Defense and other government agencies by recent NDAA, it has some interesting features.

One is this: “Key to the functioning of this information exchange will be the collection of “captured records.” Section 1071(g)(1), defines a captured record as “a document, audio file, video file, or other material captured during combat operations from countries, organizations, or individuals, now or once hostile to the United States.”

Nathan: This is a most interesting phrase, and is what triggers my question: just who are the enemies of the United States?  Especially when the phrase “now or once hostile” is examined?

We must understand that the “United States” here refers, I believe, NOT to the fifty united States of America, but rather to their former agent, the so-called Central or Federal Government, and all of its branches.

We must also understand that “hostile” does NOT limit itself to “taking violent action against the United States” but to ANY opposition, whether violent or not, to any part of the United States, including any persons employed by it, any property owned or controlled by it, any elected or unelected officials of it, and any organization or action supported or directed by it.

That said, notice that “countries, organizations, or individuals” are included.  This would obviously include “internal” and “external” – not just “foreign” but also those organizations and individuals “inside” (under the jurisdiction) of the United States.  And of course, since the Fifty United States are considered under most traditional and international law as “countries,” it could include some of them.

But who or what are included?  Let us look first at foreign (external) countries which actually HAVE conducted hostilities against the United States, at one time or another.

(1)  United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.  This is of course the very first one, since their hostile actions caused the establishment of the United States and tried to strangle it in the womb, or certainly the cradle.  Of course, their hostility has continued since.  Here in 2013, we are still remembering the bicentennial of the next “formal” war: commonly called “the War of 1812” by Americans and Canadians.  But we must not forget other conflicts, since then, including the War of Jenkin’s Ear, the Pig War, and many other events, including the massive Nuclear Disarmament and Anti-cruise missile protests carried out by Her Majesty’s Subjects in the 1970s and 1980s.  Although touted as one of our Allies, this law as passed by Congress makes its hostile nature a reason to gather information from the UK and all its organizations and individuals.

(2)  Canada is of course right in there: not only because the bulk of its pre-WW2 population are the descendants of “Loyalists” or “Tories” who refused to support the United States in the 1775-1783 war and remained loyal to King George, but have continued to exhibit hostility since:  the War of 1812 involved British colonial militia from Canada fighting against US forces; and as a member of the Empire and then Commonwealth, Canada continued to oppose the US in various forms.  More recently, Canada harbored refugees from the US’s draft system during the Indochina War, has refused to embargo Communist Cuba, and has made it clear that the country, and many organizations and individuals in it are hostile to the US.

(3)  Mexico comes next to mind, starting with the Mexican-American War of 1845-1848, and continuing through the various revolutionary periods, its alleged collusion with Imperial Germany in 1914-18, and other problems.

(4)  Of course, we cannot forget the several hundred American Indian (AmerInd) nations within the fifty states, which again, by both federal and international law, are “countries” as well as organizations and persons.  With VERY few exceptions (perhaps the Shoshone and maybe some of the Great Basin and California tribes like some of the Piute), these nations were once (and often still are) hostile to the United States.  Of course, this might be considered “internal,” so I will address them in more detail later.

(5)  France was, of course, “America’s First Ally”™ but only a few years AFTER the withdrawal of the British in 1783 from the thirteen former colonies, the so-called “Republican” French nation waged war against the United States on the oceans 1798-1800 (sometimes called the “Quasi-War”).  It also occupied Mexico for several years in direct hostile action to the United States’ “Monroe Doctrine.”  More recently, it disagreed with the way the Wilson government wanted American troops to fight in the Great War (1917-1918), the Vichy branch of the French Nation and its colonies in North Africa opposed US invasions in 1942 and 1943, and General, later President De Gaulle was constantly hostile to the United States from 1941 to his death decades later.  Obviously, while supposedly considered an Ally, it has clearly been hostile to the United States government in the past and in many ways still is.

(6)  Germany and Japan, again considered Allies today, nevertheless were hostile to the US government in the past, killing or wounding millions of Americans, and all sorts of other ugly, nasty things.  Perhaps they are just biding their time…  And do not forget all their allies:  Italy and Serbia and the secret allies like Franco’s Spain and Peron’s Argentina.

(7)  Of course, in modern times we have the Soviet Union and its successor state, the Russian Federation, clearly still hostile in many ways to the US.  And all the countries that were once Communist and allies or under the control of the USSR, China, and the rest:  a long list indeed.

(8)  We must not forget about the Muslims, either.  All of the Ummah, from Moroland in the Pacific clear around to Morocco on the Atlantic, starting from the Barbary Wars in the 1790s and 1800s right up to Mesopotamia, Afghanistan, Yemen, and Iran of today.

(9)  Time does not permit to list all the external countries, organizations, and individuals (by the billion!) hostile in the past or today.  Maybe it is easier to list those who might NOT be or have NOT been hostile.  Let’s see: San Marino?  Maybe.  Andorra, Monaco.  Iceland?  Denmark?  Norway?  Maybe the Netherlands, Belgium, and Luxembourg?  The Swiss Confederation?  (Nope, sorry, remember they were hostile to new US demands for ending bank secrecy: definitely lost their non-hostile standing over that.)  The Republic of Korea and the Republic of China (Taiwan)?  Probably, except that the ROC is the successor of the ROC after the overthrow of the Chinese empire about 100 years ago: Boxer Rebellion and all that nastiness along the Yellow River were definitely hostile actions.  Gee, there are not a lot of non-hostile external countries, organizations, or individuals, are there?

So, reluctantly (having a lot of fun) we must move to the internal front, in my next segment.

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Chicken Little is Alive and Well (Libertarian Commentary on the News, #13-50A)

Posted on 2013-12-23 by TPOL Nathan

Chicken Little News – Everyone’s going to die!!!!
Dramatic decline in industrial agriculture could herald ‘peak food’
(Raw Story)

Mama’s Note: Couldn’t scare anyone with “peak oil” anymore, so they’ve moved on.  Of course, people are not using something like 80% of the planet yet… wars and political crap prevent an awful lot of agriculture, and we’re still paying farmers not to farm…. notice none of that is mentioned.

Nathan: This is one of a series of news stories and commentaries that have been sent to me by several folks this week, that I am putting in my “Chicken Little” file.

Here are some other examples, triggered by a blog from a friend (permission to quote in part but not to name my source):… the disastrous results following the April, 2011 earthquakes that damaged the Fukushima nuclear reactors in Japan.  Reports now indicate large areas of the Pacific Ocean are contaminated with radioactivity.   The water has not only poisoned U. S. Navy sailors on the USS Ronald Reagan who drank desalinated sea water before they knew it was radioactive but is also believed to be poisoning sea life, as well as waters along western U. S. and Canadian shores.

I have glanced at these stories, but they do not make sense.  The Reagan and other modern nuclear-powered warships use techniques such as reverse osmosis and flash desalination which do not allow radioactive particles larger than a water molecule (MW 18).  It is much more likely that their exposure (if indeed, it IS radiation exposure) was through some other route, especially since it was the Reagan that responded to Fukushima.  If the ship’s water supplies were contaminated as they claim, then it would be more than just 51 people who would be affected; but there are photos of these people (or so it is claimed) decontaminating the ship in makeshift protective gear.  Smells fishy to me. The stories in the Examiner and the Daily Mail just don’t add up.  The other reports sound equally exaggerated and hysterical in nature. The amount of fallout and radiation exposure from the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and from the massive nuclear tests conducted by the US and French in the Pacific over forty years, was far greater than these being reported.  To read these stories reminds me of the horror stories and predictions after Exxon Valdez,  the big spill in the Gulf, and others in the 1970s and 1980s.  None of their claims have proved out.  We need to encourage folks NOT to panic, and NOT to not trust what government or media says. At the same time, we need to also recognize that it is NOT just government and media that exaggerate and lie. The people filing the lawsuit seem to be as prone to exaggeration and lack of reasoning (assuming the articles are reporting them correctly) as the media sources are.  It just does not make sense that if the entire water supply of the ship was contaminated with radioactive particles, that only 51 of a crew of thousands would be showing the symptoms, especially when it is supposedly the same people as shown decontaminating the deck wearing what appears to be makeshift protective gear.  Yet the lawsuits are claiming that the USN was acting in good faith, and only the TEPCO and Japanese Government were acting in bad faith.

But what about contamination reaching the West Coast of the US from Japan, and the radioactive contamination reported in cans of tuna?

Nathan: As for the coasts, and the potential, Debby and I were stationed, and our older son was conceived, in northern Germany during the time that the fallout from Chernobyl was drifting across the area.  There were severe effects in and around Chernobyl, but the effect even 500 miles away, was never what was claimed would happen.  Again, radiation is normal – it has been part of earth since Creation, and has been a problem since the time of the Flood.  (One reason argued by many people for the significant reduction in lifespan.)  But sources of radiation like x-rays and TSA screening and things like that are much more of a concern than what is being seen from Chernobyl or Fukushima except on a local scale.  In reality, more radioactive materials are released by mining and burning of coal, on a daily basis, than was released at Chernobyl.  And probably Fukushima, although that is still to be seen.  Remember all the hideous panic over Three-mile Island?  The EPA estimates an added dose of 0.3 µSv per year for living within 50 miles (80 km) of a coal plant and 0.009 milli-rem for a nuclear plant for yearly radiation dose estimation. Nuclear power plants in normal operation emit less radioactivity than coal power plants.  It is difficult to compare dosages because of all the different measurement units used.

I figure the reports about canned tuna having “radioactive contamination” are true.  But what these stories do not point out is that there has always been a certain amount of radioactive material present in tuna (and ALL seafood), just like there has always been OTHER metals (gold, lead, etc.) present in seafood, because all those metals are present in seawater.  And they do not provide very good comparisons of what they claim is an increase, because they know how people panic over “radiation.”  Just as around Hanford, Washington, where people are warned to not eat the wild asparagus, which grows along the river banks.  Because asparagus draws heavy metals out of the soil, and the soil there is contaminated from the decades of uranium and plutonium processing.  But the increase, though significant as a percentage or original background radiation, is NOT significant when compared to normal exposures and dosages.  But every few years, somebody “discovers” the “awful truth” and “exposes” the horrors there, or at Los Alamos, or Savannah Plant in South Carolina. They “forget” this, from Scientific American.

Yellowstone’s Molten Magma Chamber Much Larger Than Previously Thought
(The Weather Channel)… article last week reporting that the magma chamber below Yellowstone National Park is much larger than originally believed.   According to a new study that measured seismic waves from numerous earthquakes in and around the park, scientists mapped the magma chamber underneath the caldera as 55 miles long, 18 miles wide and from three to nine miles deep, which is some 2 ½ times larger than expected.

Nathan: This story I in particular find hilarious.  Talk about “yesterday’s news” !!!  I took most of my courses in geology in the mid- to late- 1970s, at Colorado School of Mines (a minor little trade school “for the criminally bewildered” down in Golden, where the smell of beer from Coors drifts across the campus and kills brain cells)  I recall quite definitely that at least two of my professors (one in structural geology and one in environmental geology) quoted figures very similar to this – in 1977 or 1978.  And had maps, based on seismic investigations and mappings done in the 1960s and 1970s, that showed this 50-60 by 18-20 by 5-10 miles thick (not deep), and showed past and potential future impacts from a fresh eruption.  But the media wants to sensationalize everything (as do the political scientists) and cannot be bothered to go back in their own files, much less anyone else’s, to find the truth.

By the way, I was involved in a test well drilled not too far to the southwest of the magma chamber in 1978, near Star Valley, which went down to 115,000 feet below surface (that is nearly 22 miles deep).

Scientists believe a volcanic eruption from the site will take place, though they don’t know when.  However, predictions indicate it’ll be huge and will circle the Earth, causing massive destruction.

Like Tambora in 1815 and Krakatoa in 1883.  Funny, somehow, civilization survived.  Everything eventually circles the earth, from WW1 war gases to WW2 nuclear fallout to Cold War nuclear fallout to ash from Mount Saint Helens and Novarupta (1912) and Mount Pinatubo.  The world will end when God makes it so, in His own time.  This seems to be an attempt by media (ABC News and others) to sensationalize an already sensationalized National Geographic report by a self-serving, political-scientist type at the University of Utah, who is claiming things that were first measured about 40 years ago.

There are many other examples of Chicken Little (or Crying Wolf, if you prefer): especially those old bugaboos of global cooling and global warming, and the “we are going to blow ourselves up with all our nukes” and “the Russians/Muslims/Japanese/Germans/British are going to conquer us all” hysteria.  All seem to have similar motives:

(1)  To sell advertising and books and such:  We have such a fascination, and the media knows what sells.

(2)  To panic people into supporting one or another political or religious platform – usually the platforms that increase and centralize government/church control, provide for more power and wealth to an “elite,” and give more excuses for theft by government/priests/other con-artists.

(3)  To denigrate and isolate certain segments of the population, whether it be farmers or Jews or Gypsies or Christians or whomever.  This is, of course, closely related to #2.

The point to remember is: predictions of doom rarely prove true except in small numbers.  Usually they are lies or falsehoods triggered by irrational fears and emotions in general.  We are NOT going to get rid of them: these have existed throughout human history.  But we can keep them from harming us (and our liberty, lives, living, and community) if we understand and recognize them, and don’t get railroaded into jumping on the bandwagon.

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Libertarian Commentary on the News, #13-49C: Home front attacks

Posted on 2013-12-23 by TPOL Nathan

Self defense – Home front
Fake Delivery Men Rob, Pistol Whip Elderly Couple In Dorchester
(CBS Boston)

Mama’s Note: Hard to understand why people would open the door to strangers, especially in a city. Of course, I’m armed when I go to the door, but I still don’t open up for strangers without careful consideration.

Nathan: Especially in the large urban areas in the east, people seem very naive at times, assuming that nothing bad will happen to THEM, despite how everyone around them has been attacked, beaten, and robbed.  And they seem to have very poor situational awareness.  In our rural areas, unless it is a neighbor or a friend, someone trying to deliver a package better be wearing a recognizable uniform and have a matching truck;  AND look like a typical UPS or FedEx guy or gal, not some hopped-up homeboy with his pants dragging around his knees.  And even then, if it isn’t the regular route man, most people will at least be aware that something is possibly wrong.  But apparently big city residents don’t think like that.

Thug “cops” – Home front
Drug Warriors Kidnap and Sexually Assault a Woman After Getting Permission From a Dog
(Reason) In a case eerily similar to David Eckert’s humiliating ordeal at the hands of cops in Deming, New Mexico, a federal lawsuit charges U.S.Border Patrol agents with subjecting a U.S. citizen to six hours of degrading and fruitless body cavity searches based on an alleged alert by a drug-sniffing dog.

Mama’s Note: I hope she wins her lawsuit, but that’s not going to stop this insanity, unfortunately.

Nathan: I don’t know if ANY court action will, even if it is a murder trial when someone kills a BP officer in self-defense and is acquitted by the jury.  The “shoot, shovel, and shut up” scenario is of course a possibility.  And direct action (in the dirty sense of the word) might be one solution.  It is only when you can hold these people personally and immediately responsible for their actions that they will change:  otherwise, they will continue to justify their actions as “good” and take the Nuremburg defense.

This story lists two specific “doctors” by name involved with this sick little routine:  Dr. Michael D. Parsa, MD, age 42, specializes in “emergency medicine” at the Texas Tech University Health Center in El Paso, and he joined them in 2012 after working on the Central California Coast (what, Monterrey?) and in New Guinea.  You can see a glowing report about what a great man he is, and his picture, here. (pdf)

His address is 4801 Alberta Avenue, El Paso, TX 79905: Thompson General Hospital.

Christopher Cabanillas is a surgeon, also specializing in emergency medicine at Thompson General, and graduated from the University of Arizona; he likes El Paso better than Arizona. Less seems to be available about him.  It seems that evil DOES have a face, though.

When you get right down to it, what is the difference between these two “doctors” and the BP thugs, and the two men who attacked and robbed the elders in Boston?  Morally, these are more guilty: what they did was conspire with several government organizations to rape a woman.  Simple beating and robbing, free-lance, does not compare.

Meanwhile, we find that government agencies (schools, in particular) are doing their best to turn children (and adults) into mind-numbed, obedient robots who would not DARE take up arms to defend themselves or anyone else, except with the proper government uniform and license and training – if that.  But heaven help you if you LIKE playing soldier before you get that government-issued stuff officially.

Government-run, Theft-funded schools – Attack on families and children
More Zero Tolerance: 5 Year Old Issued Suspension for ‘Playing Army’ at Recess
(Conbustible.com) A five-year-old elementary student in Gaston County, North Carolina was issued a suspension for making a gun-like gesture with his hand although such an offense is found nowhere in the school handbook. The boy’s father, David Hendrix, said the one-day suspension was a punishment “too severe” for simply “playing army on the playground” and immediately called a meeting. Rather than go through with the meeting, principal and school board at Pinewood Elementary dropped the punishment.

Nathan: the bad stories keep coming more and more quickly.  A summary of several can be found at Conservative Action Alerts which includes a discussion of how the police state is destroying childhood in many places.  This morning, I listened to a school “winter” concert on Long Island, where they sang the old carol Silent Night, but in a version which expunged any mention of God, Jesus, or even Mary.  Parents and others complained and the school “apologized” but the deed was done: those children will have learned the censored song, and will have a hard time learning the real one.  I am not a fan of Christmas: it is NOT the birthday of Jesus but a pagan holiday used in a bait-and-switch by the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Churches centuries ago; but this is still not right.  It is as wrong to forbid children to sing a religious song as it is to force them to do so: and it is a way of destroying childhood, together with frequent police arrests, terrorism through “emergency drills,” creating irrational fears of guns or fire or nuclear radiation, and of course, the sick excuse for “sex education” implemented in more and more places.

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Libertarian Commentary on the News, #13-49B: Free Trade, Tranzis, and Culture Wars

Posted on 2013-12-21 by TPOL Nathan

Trade is the most basic of human activities outside the family:  I have something that you want, and you have something that I want.  We each know how MUCH we want, so voluntarily, and without any real coercion (unless the scent of that fried okra is overwhelming us and we haven’t eaten all day!) on the part of either party, we trade amount X of Item A for amount Y of item B, and both walk away, if not “happy” then satisfied that we got the best.  The world can (and did) go around with this sort of thing happening millions of times a day.  Then, we allowed princes and patriarchs and police and priests and pimps to get involved, and suddenly there was no “free trade” except as an ideal.  We had rules and regulations and licenses and permits and taxes and fees and (Lord love a duck) mandatory standards and inspections and law suits and prosecutions and arbitrators and mediators and mitigators…  What a mess!  Here are a couple of stories to show just how messed up it has become, in the last days of 2013.

The “messiah” – International Trade (2 stories)
Obama Allows Great Lakes Water To Be Sold To China As Half The U.S. Faces Extreme Water Crisis
Read More : (Conservative Action Alerts)

Nathan Allows?  ALLOWS?  This is derided as something evil, as if the man who claims to be the President of the United States has ANY power granted by ANYONE to prohibit China (or anyone else)  from buying water from the Great Lakes or anyplace else. Who makes these sorts of calls?  it is NOT legitimately government: it is a decision made by a voluntary seller and a voluntary buyer.  Which brings us to the NEXT story:

Obama Is Allowing Chicken From China
Read More (Conbustible/Constituent News) At the end of August, the Obama administration quietly decided to start allowing Chinese poultry processors to ship processed chicken into the United States.

Nathan: Hmm. Does this have ANYTHING to do with the new FDA report that states that (GASP!!) 78% of processed chicken in this country has BACTERIA?  You mean, bacteria like on our sink tops and on our hands and on the floor and the ground and everything else in the Country???  I am surprised that this story can even be published – after all, relating the “messiah” to CHICKEN must be racist.  And what about Congress?  Do they have any reason to be cited for this?

Mama’s Note: As usual, these things make no sense at all. First, I can’t see why China would buy water from the Great Lakes. It’s been polluted for decades, to start with, and the transport costs would be insane. I can’t imagine them wanting it even if it were given to them. As for the chicken, and so much else in the food news, this is just stupid fear mongering. The real problem is two fold: Far too many people have allowed their immune systems to languish or nearly die, antibiotic use and poor diet/lifestyle being the major causes. Second, far too few people have any common sense and can’t seem to bother to learn how to properly handle and cook much of anything. The bacteria on chicken, or in ground beef, is not any more a problem than it ever was, and in many cases far less. It’s just that nobody understands the situation and they are sure that “big brother” can and must rescue them from their ignorance and sloth.

Theft by government
Lessons from Dutch Welfare Reform
Read More (Conservative Action Alerts)

Nathan: In a nutshell:  Do NOT DO IT.  Welfare, I mean, not “reform.”  Evil cannot be reformed, it can only be ended. The Dutch are trying more than Americans are, to limit the evil, but are still not successful in making it a hand-up instead of a hand-out.  Emergency assistance instead of “entitlement?”  Why, because a national bureaucracy cannot successfully determine who really is in need and not just lazy, and is using STOLEN money to care for them – needy AND lazy.  Sadly, “conservatives” just do not get it: government cannot take care of the needy without creating bureaucracies, corruption, and welfare dependence which destroys families and communities.  Benevolence MUST be done voluntarily by individuals and SMALL local organizations (churches, community chest, etc.) – even national organizations (Red Cross, Church Aid, etc.) are likely to fail in the same way as government.

Tyranny – Big Brother International (2 stories)
NSA Spying Declared Unconstitutional
Read More (Conservative Action Alerts)
Second Federal Judge ‘Skeptical’ About Legal Case for NSA Phone-Record Collection
Read More (Conservative Action Alerts)

Nathan: I did not comment on the first judge who declared the NSA program unconstitutional, because of all the fawning that I saw libertarian and conservative AND liberal commentators do.  We rightfully condemn the judicial black robes for most of their decisions, based on the most ridiculous of reasons.  Should we fall over ourselves patting them on the back when once in a great while they make a decision which (on the surface) seems to be right?  The old saying is that “a stopped clock is right twice a day,” but we know that defective clocks are virtually never right, and having the right time on a purely random basis is far far worse than being stopped.  It is not much different than applauding those rare times when the electorate is willing to (and allowed) to chose a worthy man or woman for public office:  it does not mean that reform has been or will be done, or that we can trust the new government officials a gram more than the old ones: government is still broken and not going to change.  The solution for NSA and all the other alphabet soup agencies is NOT “reform” and NOT “court orders” – it is to drive a stake into the heart, followed by smashing each individual little piece until there is nothing but slime for the rain to wash away.

Mama’s Note: Ooooh, I really like that mental image. I’ll take a garden hose and help the rain wash the slime away.

Culture wars – Islamic war
Leader: Christianity Threatened in Middle East
(Vision to America) “I have for some time now been deeply troubled by the growing difficulties faced by Christian communities in various parts of the Middle East. It seems to me that we cannot ignore the fact that Christians in the Middle East are increasingly being deliberately targeted by fundamentalist Islamist militants. Christianity was literally born in the Middle East and we must not forget our Middle Eastern brothers and sisters in Christ.”

Nathan: I am positive that Scotland Yard must be on this, and are just trying to keep it a secret before panic sets in.  And I’m sure Interpol is cooperating, although the FBI is surely NOT aiding them any.  But I want to know HOW they put this ringer in for Charles Windsor!  I suppose it could be brainwashing, because admittedly those ears have got to be hard to replicate, but there is no way at all that the Tranzi Prince of Wales we so well know and dearly hate could say anything like this except tongue-in-cheek.  They obviously kidnapped the real one and substituted some poorly-trained Lorenzo Smythe for him.

“The greatest Glory of a free-born People, Is to transmit that Freedom to their Children.” — William Havard

Amen!  While I think that a number of us have succeeded in this as individuals, we have clearly, as a nation and as the Anglo-American people, FAILED.  May God have mercy on us.

Mama’s Note: While not perfectly freedom oriented, “The Tragedy of American Compassion” is a good overview of the history of charity and “welfare” in America, and has some good ideas for returning charity to its original form and purpose.

[I have changed formatting some what in this column, please let me know if this is better or worse than the standard way.]

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Libertarian Commentary on the News, #13-49A: Islamic evil, Islamic wars

Posted on 2013-12-19 by TPOL Nathan

In today’s world, there are many evil things.  Some evils are primarily damaging to those who practice them: gambling, fornication, homosexuality, and similar vices.  We can and must leave those alone and let them do their own thing.  Some are damaging to some around them: adultery, spousal and child abuse, theft, even sometimes murder.  Those are things that must be dealt with, but by the people around them: family and community (including church).  But some evil is practiced in a way which is a massive threat to hundreds of thousands, millions, or even billions of people around the world.  National Socialism (in its many forms) was such an evil.  Communism was (and is) such an evil.   Islam, the subject of this commentary on two recent news items, is such an evil.  Even when isolated and contained, these evils are such horrors, such threats, that at a minimum people have a strong reason to band together to defend against them, to contain them, and … often, to seek to negate and even destroy them.

Islamic wars – South Asian front
Pakistan: Female suicide bombers killed December 18, 2013
(Zee News [India]) “Alert security guards at an imambargah [in Karachi] on Tuesday foiled an attempt by two burqa-clad woman suicide bombers by killing one and injuring another. One of the women was shot dead whereas the other was critically injured as the guards at the imambargah or Shia prayer hall, opened fire on them. Security and rescue teams reached the site of incident and cordoned off the area as a probe into the incident went underway. Police officials later confirmed that both the women were equipped with explosives, media reports said.” (12/18/13)

Mama’s Note: This sort of thing is so completely incomprehensible. The more I see of it, the closer I get to considering the “lake of glass” idea. If the non crazies could be warned to move out of the area first…

Nathan: Incomprehensible to those of us who cannot understand the depth of evil that can exist, and the way in which people can be indoctrinated to accept that evil as normal and necessary.  Islam’s roots are deep into that vast sea of sewage that rejects the Creator for the lusts and evils of the flesh and the greed for power and control.  In the ancient Middle East were the worshipers of Moloch and similar evil false gods, whose priests demanded (and received) the sacrifice of human children in the fires of worship, and of adults in battle and on the sands of the arenas.  There were also those of Hatti (part of modern Anatolia) and elsewhere, who “honored” the death of their “god-kings” by burying the dead elite together with slain servants and soldiers to serve the elite in the afterlife.  In the depths of Northern Europe, we had druids and similar “faiths” who would also offer sacrifice to the soil, the forests, and their pantheon of gods by choosing men and women of high birth (or “promoted” to such) to garrote and bury in the fens and bogs.  In the Pacific, we had those who chose by lot whose bodies would be used to literally grease the skids to launch great war-canoes.  In Meso-America, we had the captives and docile underclasses of the Azteca and other empires who submitted in long lines to walking to the tops of pyramids where squads of blood-clothed priests cut out their living hearts and raised them to the glory of the sun and serpent gods.  In Southeast Asia, there were the fanatics and college professors who drove people out into the jungles to die and be killed for the glory of the proletariat, repeating the fate of Ukranian and Byelorussian kulaks starved to death in the midst of some of the most productive farmland on the planet.  Centuries before, and centuries before that, we had Hun and Mongol conquerors who stacked the chopped-off heads of the population of entire cities to mark their conquests, while half the globe to the south, we had fanatics who punished insufficient zeal for the cause by pouring gasoline into a tire, placing the tire around the neck or head of the victim, and lighting it on fire, only decades after an entire “civilized” nation went mad and processed millions of their own countrymen and neighboring countries through delousing chambers (which did, apparently, also kill the lice and bedbugs) before mining their bodies and converting them to human leather and more.  All in the name of some bogus deity, some warped philosophy, or just plain greed for power and wealth.  Once shut off from the light, evil thrives in darkness and grows into nightmarish consequences.  Notice, these women were NOT trying to kill “infidels” or “colonialists” or “occupiers” or the like: they were trying to kill their own kind.  AND themselves.  At least one of them partially succeeded.

Islamic wars – West African front
Nigeria: “More than 1,200 killed” December 17, 2013
(BBC News [UK state media]) “The UN says more than 1,200 people have been killed in Islamist-related violence in northeast Nigeria since a state of emergency was declared in May. The UN said the figure related to killings of civilians and the military by the Islamist group Boko Haram in the states of Adamawa, Borno and Yobe. It also includes insurgents killed by security forces repelling attacks. This is the first time independent casualty figures have been issued since emergency rule was declared.” (12/17/13)

Mama’s Note: Perhaps the world could stand two glass lakes…

Nathan: According to friends (preachers) in Nigeria, this is a vast under-reporting – possibly one-tenth of who has actually been killed, just as far as civilians go.  There are DAILY multiple killings, and Sundays are especially bad, since people are gathering for worship, and concentrated while the Muslims of course have already met on Friday.  The media harps far more on the people who claim to be “christian” and do revenge attacks against Muslims.  Unlike the Pakistani women, the killers in this case are MOSTLY killing infidels, even though they have the same nationality and skin color and heritage as the ones doing the killing.  But evil is evil, and this evil stems from the same source as the evil in Pakistan.

As for glass lakes, it seems to me that the logical targets are Mecca and Medina: because these are the sources of this infection called Islam. Certainly there will be innocents (children, many women raised as (in essence if not legally) slaves, and of course slaves.  (Yes, Saudi Arabia still has actual slaves, no matter what they call them.  Many are black, some are East Asian, and some are Euro-American.) Horrible as it is to contemplate, is it worse than centuries more of this evil religion?  Islam is so much a geographically-based religion that destruction of these two sacred cities might cause a collapse of it overall, in part because they could not imagine that Allah would allow it.  It may be necessary to sanitize other places: Cairo and Tehran and Kabul and Islamabad all come to mind.  As Abraham tried to do, regarding two other sources of unspeakable evil, Sodom and Gomorrah, we need to get the “non-crazies” out first, if we can.   But as awful and terrible as making a decision to spare the world such hideous evil, versus saving innocents who are being abused and corrupted in the “name of Allah,” is a decision I am grateful to God I do not have to make.

Mama’s Note: Amen to that last. The only consolation is that great evil has historically been its own destruction, eventually. The toll of human suffering is, however, very hard to accept.

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