A Kingdom of Conscience

Homeland Security Will Use The Excuse Of A Wartime Crisis To Liquidate The Resistance To The Police State

2012-02-06T10:22:00.000-08:00

November 25, 2002 - ????

"The soul is the perceiver and revealer of truth. We know truth when we see it, let skeptic and scoffer say what they choose. Foolish people ask you, when you have spoken what they do not wish to hear, 'How do you know it is truth, and not an error of your own?' We know truth when we see it, from opinion, as we know when we are awake that we are awake. It was a grand sentence of Emanuel Swedenborg, which would alone indicate the greatness of that man's perception,--"It is no proof of a man's understanding to be able to affirm whatever he pleases; but to be able to discern that what is true is true, and that what is false is false,--this is the mark and character of intelligence." In the book I read, the good thought returns to me, as every truth will, the image of the whole soul. To the bad thought which I find in it, the same soul becomes a discerning, separating sword, and lops it away. We are wiser than we know." - Ralph Waldo Emerson, The Oversoul

The threat that most unsettles the criminal U.S. ruling class is not the threat of Iran or the threat of terrorism, but the threat of a second American revolution, triggered by the political awakening of the American people.

The scale of America's political awakening and mankind's political awakening is too demographically large and geographically widespread to manage, ignore, or suppress with traditional methods of control such as propaganda and the political manipulation of elections.

The incredible rise of Ron Paul's popularity despite the media conspiracy against him as well as the growing influence of the global alternative media are proof that the American mass media has become an ineffective mind control tool.

The murderous and traitorous owners of Homeland Security Fascism who staged the tragic 9/11 events know very well that the political awakening of the American people represents the biggest threat to their existence. The growing public awareness of deceptions and crimes by the bankster dominated U.S. government is causing a volcanic political and psychological rift between the American people and the globalist oligarchs.

The rift is exposing a systemic crisis within American society, which has come about after decades of acts of injustice, murder, treason, and state terrorism against the American people by the hijacked American government.

There's no way to put the genie of revolution and restoration back in the bottle of stability and security. The U.S. ruling class cannot crush and kill the rebirth of the American spirit of liberty because the people are wide awake now, unlike in the 1960s when JFK, RFK, and MLK were taken from America by the terrorists in the CIA/FBI.

But the cannibalistic U.S. ruling class is not impotent and weak. It is trying everything in its power to revive the credibility of the war on terror, convince the American people that conspiracy theorists are wrong, and keep their illegal monopoly over money creation, the media, and the political process.

The banking oligarchs and war lobbies think they can secure their control over the domestic agenda in America as well as the global agenda by engineering a war with Iran through false flag terrorism.

On Wednesday, February 1, 2012, Tony Cartalucci warned that the war criminals in the U.S. and Israel will stage a false flag attack on American soil to demonize Iran in his article, "US Intel Director Prepares Public for False Flag Event." Cartalucci wrote:

Iran has nothing to gain and everything to lose by attacking the United States. US policy makers have expressed a documented desire to provoke the Iranians into a war the Islamic Republic is clearly trying to avoid. The United States government is on record funding, arming, and training terrorist organizations (LIFG & MEK) on it’s own “foreign terrorist organization” list,a violation of their own anti-terrorism laws. They have failed categorically to provide convincing evidence regarding the alleged “Iranian-Saudi assassination plot,” more over, the evidence suggests it is instead, the latest in a long string of contrived federal entrapment cases. If an attack occurs on US soil or against US allies in the near future under these circumstances, it is most likely Clapper, General Petraeus at the CIA, and Israel’s Mossad that will be to blame.

Others in the global alternative media have raised similar red flags, thereby letting the war criminals in Washington and Tel Aviv know that they are on notice.

On Saturday, February 4, 2012, Kurt Nimmo wrote in his article, "U.S. and Israel Set Stage for False Flag and Iran Attack," that the leaders in the U.S. and Israel have unleashed a stream of propaganda to mentally condition the American people in preparation for a false flag attack in the near future that will be pinned on Iran. Nimmo said:

Officialdom in the United States and Israel have issued a warning about an Iranian “threat stream” against Israeli “soft targets” in America.The warning arrives several days after Obama’s intelligence boss James Clapper said Iran may strike inside the United States,

“We predict that the threat on our sites around the world will increase… on both our guarded sites and ‘soft’ sites,”

states a letter sent out by the head of security for the Israeli Consul General for the Mid-Atlantic States. Guarded sites are Israeli government facilities like embassies while soft sites are Jewish synagogues, schools, and community centers. Yoram Cohen, the head of Israel’s security service Shin Bet, said recently that Iran’s Revolutionary Guard will attack Israeli and Jewish targets abroad in response to the assassination of Iranian nuclear scientists.

The intensifying rhetoric of war from Washington and Tel Aviv is based on pure paranoia and propaganda and driven by a desire to wipe Iran off of the Middle Eastern map. All the talk from Israel about the Iranian threat to its existence and security is a clever attempt to hide the reality that it is actually Israel and the United States that are waging war against Iran.

The war criminals in the U.S. and Israel need a war with Iran because they can't deal with their internal political and economic crises. They have destroyed their own countries by letting the plutocratic banksters run wild with the people's money, and now they are busy creating a new excuse of a wartime crisis to further consolidate power at the global level and crush democratic dissent.

Starting a war with Iran based on an illegitimate and fraudulent act of false flag terrorism is the best way to distract public attention from their years of corruption and from their criminal plan to dominate the world through force and fraud.

Once the war with Iran gets fully underway, FEMA, Homeland Security, and the hijacked American military will serve as the essential entities in the globalists' total takeover of America. These hijacked instruments of power are tasked with aggressively suppressing legitimate domestic dissent, popular uprisings, general strikes, patriotic mass protests, reform movements, urban riots, outbreaks of mob violence, rising homelessness, starvation, etc.

But FEMA, Homeland Security, and the hijacked American military will fail in trying to suppress the American people's quest for freedom and justice, just as the U.S. and Israel are failing to destroy the spirit of resistance in the Middle East. These tyrants will fall because history is not on their side. The force of history is with the truth.

The truth about the 9/11 attacks and the illegal war on terror is slowly beginning to reassert its divine power in the consciousness of mankind. No amount of political suppression can stop the truth of history from surfacing to the global public mind.

In America and the West, conspiracy theorists and 9/11 truth-tellers have already been vindicated. The overwhelming government support for tyrannical laws like the NDAA, which specifically say law abiding American citizens are the targets of the government's fascist counter-terrorism policies, is a sign of fear and failure.

Using government force to suppress the people and maintain the corrupt status quo is a stab in the dark. The shadow state terrorists and vicious tyrants in Washington and Tel Aviv better regroup and rethink.

This won't end well for them.

They have already fallen, but they have not yet reached the bottom of hell where the ghosts of history's tyrants are waiting to greet them.

Reposted with permission from The Excavator

The Politics of Unintended Consequences

2012-01-30T01:28:00.000-08:00

Who could shoot down a great idea based on sound research and motivated by the best of intentions?

If the idea crept out of the incestuous swamp we call Washington, I would summarily execute that idea. No blindfold, no last cigarette, no drum roll, as fast as they could foment new ideas; I would gun them down.

Wait, I know what you're thinking...

"I just hate all government so it stands to reason I would hate any idea that came from government officials."

I understand why you might feel that way, but my judgment is not based on knee-jerk emotional reactions or some visceral reflex. In truth, I have a great deal of respect for government so long as the government has a great deal of respect for the Constitution, and not a second longer. You see as long as the government respects the Constitution it is bound by the ideals it embodies. The foremost of which is, the government must respect my person, my faith, my privacy, my property, my liberty, and yours as well. When one takes the time for thoughtful deliberation rather than flying off on some rash tangent because it feels good at the moment it is a sign of wisdom. The virtue of wisdom, like all other virtues, are nearly extinct in Washington.

Unintendedconsequences are the political equivalent of Sir Isaac Newton's third law ofmotion, which states “for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction”.

1. The Treatyof Versailles was not supposed to incite the German people to into provokinganother world war, but it did.

2. The “GreatSociety” programs were not intended to increase out-of-wedlock births and brokenfamilies, but it has.

3. Extendedunemployment benefits were not meant to discourage employment searches ordissuade entrepreneurship, but it has.

4. Guaranteeingthe solvency of the banks was not meant to make them more reckless in theirlending and investing practices, but it has.

5. SocialSecurity and Medicare was not meant to nearly eliminate personal planning forretirement, but it has.

6. Easy creditloans were not intended to create massive foreclosures, destroying families,and their finances, but it did.

7. StudentLoans were not intended to send tuition costs skyrocketing while trappinggraduates in a crushing debt load which threatens to destroy their careersbefore they begin, but they did.

8. FarmSubsidies were not intended to artificially raise the price of food anddiminish the production so high that low income families required Food Stampsto eat, but they did.

9. The welfaresystem was not intended to become a snare for the impoverished entrapping themat a serf like subsistence existence for generations, but it does.

10. Public schools were not intended to produce thelowest common denominator of education with continuously declining standards,but it has.

Ifthis were the total of the unintended consequences produced by the short-sighted,herd-mentality policy makers we seem to have no shortage of in Washington itwouldn't be so bad, however it isn't the total and it is worse...

And yet more unintended consequences...

And more...

I could go on but at this point I'm too disgusted to write...

How Does America Compare to China, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Other Repressive Regimes?

2012-01-18T05:36:00.000-08:00

Top constitutional law expert Jon Turley notes in a must-read Washington Post article called “We are no longer the land of the free” (I have edited slightly to remove parentheses in several places):

Americans often proclaim our nation as a symbol of freedom to the world while dismissing nations such as Cuba and China as categorically unfree. Yet, objectively, we may be only half right. Those countries do lack basic individual rights such as due process, placing them outside any reasonable definition of “free,” but the United States now has much more in common with such regimes than anyone may like to admit.These countries also have constitutions that purport to guarantee freedoms and rights. But their governments have broad discretion in denying those rights and few real avenues for challenges by citizens — precisely the problem with the new laws in this country.

The list of powers acquired by the U.S. government since 9/11 puts us in rather troubling company.

Assassination of U.S. citizens

[The U.S. assassinates its own citizens.]

Nations such as Nigeria, Iran and Syria have been routinely criticized for extrajudicial killings of enemies of the state.

Indefinite detention

[The U.S. has passed a law allowing indefinite detention of American citizens.]

China recently codified a more limited detention law for its citizens, while countries such as Cambodia have been singled out by the United States for “prolonged detention.”

Arbitrary justice

The president now decides whether a person will receive a trial in the federal courts or in a military tribunal, a system that has been ridiculed around the world for lacking basic due process protections. Bush claimed this authority in 2001, and Obama has continued the practice. (Egypt and China have been denounced for maintaining separate military justice systems for selected defendants, including civilians.)

Warrantless searches

[The U.S. routinely conducts warrantless searches.]

Saudi Arabia and Pakistan operate under laws that allow the government to engage in widespread discretionary surveillance.

War crimes

[The U.S. has committed various war crimes, then refused to hold the actors to account.]

Various nations have resisted investigations of officials accused of war crimes and torture. Some, such as Serbia and Chile, eventually relented to comply with international law; countries that have denied independent investigations include Iran, Syria and China.

Secret court

[The U.S. uses secret courts under the guise of national security.]

Pakistan places national security surveillance under the unchecked powers of the military or intelligence services.

Immunity from judicial review

Like the Bush administration, the Obama administration has successfully pushed for immunity for companies that assist in warrantless surveillance of citizens, blocking the ability of citizens to challenge the violation of privacy. (Similarly, China has maintained sweeping immunity claims both inside and outside the country and routinely blocks lawsuits against private companies.)

Continual monitoring of citizens

The Obama administration has successfully defended its claim that it can use GPS devices to monitor every move of targeted citizens without securing any court order or review. It is not defending the power before the Supreme Court — a power described by Justice Anthony Kennedy as “Orwellian.” (Saudi Arabia has installed massive public surveillance systems, while Cuba is notorious for active monitoring of selected citizens.)

Extraordinary renditions

The government now has the ability to transfer both citizens and noncitizens to another country under a system known as extraordinary rendition, which has been denounced as using other countries, such as Syria, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Pakistan, to torture suspects. The Obama administration says it is not continuing the abuses of this practice under Bush, but it insists on the unfettered right to order such transfers — including the possible transfer of U.S. citizens.

Professor Turley stresses the fact that it is the ability of powerful men to make arbitrary decisions which defines an authoritarian country:

An authoritarian nation is defined not just by the use of authoritarian powers, but by the ability to use them. If a president can take away your freedom or your life on his own authority, all rights become little more than a discretionary grant subject to executive will.

The framers lived under autocratic rule and understood this danger better than we do. James Madison famously warned that we needed a system that did not depend on the good intentions or motivations of our rulers: “If men were angels, no government would be necessary.”

In fact, we go from the land of the free to tyranny the moment we go from a nation of laws to a nation of powerful men arbitrarily making laws in secret.

Indeed, Bush and Obama have claimed some tyrannical powers that even Hitler and Stalin never claimed.

As I pointed out last month, many American leaders appear to be consciously copying China:

The American copyright bill is modeled after the Chinese system. As I noted Monday:
Given that Joe Lieberman said that America needs an internet kill switch like China, that the U.S. economy has turned socialist (at least for friends of those with control of the money spigot), and that the U.S. government used communist Chinese torture techniques specifically designed to produce false confessions in order to sell the Iraq war, I guess that the bill’s Chinese-style censorship is not entirely surprising.

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Reprinted from: EquityJungle – v0.1 January 17, 2012

PRINCIPLES without Interest

2011-11-30T03:11:00.001-08:00

My Response to:

Confessions of a Flip-Flopper

November 21, 2011 - 1:18 am - by Roger L Simon

Changing one’s mind as we go through a process of gathering more information is an intellectual right, however there is a very clear line where matters of PRINCIPLE are non-negotiable.

I am not speaking of a choice between which deficit financed budget is more palatable to one’s own constituency be they conservative or liberal.

I AM speaking of, for instance, the PRINCIPLE that theft is wrong. There is no time, situation, or scenario when you will be found to have commissioned a "justifiable theft".

With blatant disregard, we are daily passing on debt we cannot by any reasonable means repay to our unborn future generations who have no voice or roll in these obligations other than to pay the bill.

That is THEFT and that is WRONG! Furthermore, looking at the global debt crises, it is an act of global inter -generational suicide upon our species! We, by the power of the printing press, are eating our own children. It is mass psychotic behavior on a scale which makes the Holocaust look more like a temporary FLIP-FLOP of good judgment for German citizens on their national policies.

I do not mean to offend the survivors of the Holocaust by trivializing their suffering. My intent is to elevate awareness to the eventual consequences our current course of action will have upon our children and their children for generations to come.

The Burden of Shame

2011-10-31T04:40:00.000-07:00

Do you feel the people inhabiting the modern day city of Rome should bear the burden of shame for the Roman decimation of the native (Indigenous) peoples who once resided, presumably peacefully, on that portion of the present day Italian Peninsula?

They were a pre-literate agrarian society known as the Etruscans, who were so thoroughly snuffed out by the Romans that not much more than this is known about them. The picture to the left is what a common Etruscan Sod and Stone Dwelling from the First Millennium BC would have looked like.

Perhaps, my initial question is premature since the Etruscans at the very least displaced, but more likely conquered and possibly enslaved, a previous civilization. This unnamed pre-Etruscan civilization built basic tombs and had developed religious rights for their dead. They crafted tools from not only elk bones, but had and developed metallurgy to the point of producing numerous bronze artifacts such as rings and axes specifically designed for war as well as others designed for hunting.

Wait, the evidence of war axes made of bronze indicates that even these ancient indigenous people had the blood of some other previous occupants of the real estate that the Pope calls “home” on their hands.

We really don’t need to creep around in the dark recesses of history where Stone Age people may have pounced upon one another for the nicer cave with all the modern conveniences (e.g. - access to hunting grounds, water, less bat shit, or what have you). What of the bloody Roman Empire? People flock from all over the world to see the Coliseum where the blood of millions of subjugated peoples was spilled for fun of the common Roman. Aren’t the People of modern Rome, as well as the modern nation of Italy as a whole, at this very moment not only enjoying the spoils of these murdered people, but they are profiting from the tourist trade. Hundreds of millions of Euros flow to Rome every year, should they not hang their heads in shame for their crimes against humanity?

No!
From Beijing to Machu Picchu and from Ireland to Polynesia everyone wiped out or enslaved someone else to take their resources or real estate. This process isn’t a recent occurrence either. It was not brought on by over-population of the virus, more commonly known as humanity. It is not caused by Capitalism, Western civilization, some murky inherent dehumanization within industrial society, or the religious “Right”, as many Social(ist) Studies textbooks in use today would have you and your children believe. These tools of "Critical theory" believe that the American people as a whole are culpable for an offence given by generations long dead against a people who are no longer living. Their ill-concieved rant fails to note that the vast majority of American citizens today are not descendants of those who profited from either slavery or the near extermination of the indigenous peoples of North America.

In truth, while the atrocities of African slavery and tribal genocide were being carried out, the majority of our European ancestors were living under near Medieval feudalism in Europe. The life of a serf is arguably equal to if not worse than that of a slave. A slave was purchased at a cost and considered valued property, while a serf was merely another mouth for the noble lord to feed once his crops had been harvested and when he needed no bodies to impale against another feudal lords pikes in his ambitious plan to take something that did not belong to him.

Once, again if anyone is to blame or to be called into account, it is not the People of the United States, Western culture, Capitalism, or Christendom, but government controlled by the few and claiming to be acting on behalf of a cause much higher than their own naked ambition.

How Long will you Slumber?

2011-09-01T16:40:00.000-07:00

WASHINGTON (AP) — Ignoring a presidential veto threat, the Democratic-controlled Senate moved methodically Thursday to complete a massive defense bill that would deny suspected terrorists, even U.S. citizens seized within the nation's borders, the right to trial and subject them to indefinite detention. Read More…

If you are over 30 and have a functioning synapses in you skull, you will recall that just a few years back it was the Democrats screaming that the Republicans were creating a police state in their single minded charge towards war in Iraq and the Afghanistan. Their enactment of the Patriot Acts and the National Defense Authorization Act were considered radical attacks on the Constitution and civil rights.

Here we are just a few years down the road and those military incursions continue, the Patriot Acts (both I & II) , as well as the National Defense Authorization Act stand unchallenged. Now, to extend the erosion of The Peoples Rights and Constitutional limits on the power of government American citizens can be held without trial FOREVER! This is the same power that the governments of Hitler, Stalin, Nero, Pol Pot, not to mention Saddam Hussein, and every other despotic regime throughout history has ever wielded. This authority renders all other Rights, you imagine yourself to have moot.

What good does the Right to free speech offer when your words can only echo off the walls of a cell in solitary confinement? What comfort does the right of a free press confer when those who invoke this right will disappear quietly into detention camps where dissenting voices are silenced anonymously forever. How much social progress can you claim when Universal Health Care comes at the discretion of your request to your cell blocks duty officer for the day?

Terrorism is a crime, no greater than mass-murder, no more egregious than crimes against humanity, no more vile than genocide, however we have and continue to offer a trial to those accused of committing these offences. Why would an often ambiguous charge of “terrorism” be treated any different?

“In ALL CRIMINAL PROSECUTIONS, the accused shall enjoy the right to a SPEEDY AND PUBLIC TRIAL , BY AN IMPARTIAL JURY of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; TO BE CONFRONTED BY THE WITNESSES AGAINST HIM; to have COMPULSORY PROCESS FOR OBTAINING WITNESSES in his favor, and TO HAVE THE ASSISTANCE OF COUNSEL FOR HIS DEFENSE.”

Debt Limit Drama Proves to be an Expensive Dog and Pony Show

2011-08-02T01:14:00.001-07:00

They had us, didn't they? It was griping, dramatic, emotional, and the shocking conclusion left us feeling much like the series finale of Alf. Do you remember that? No of course not, I was one of the 11 viewers who tuned in for that television event. I had to see how the writers could bring a show as asinine as Alf to anything resembling a logical conclusion. The answer is they couldn’t and it ended with,

“To be continued…”

I kid you not, and that is how the debt limit deal ended as well. There was no genius 11th hour catharsis, no remarkable turn of events that set us down the road to a bright or even sane fiscal future, and nothing to demonstrate that “The Tea Party” remains a force to be reckoned with. What we got was “To be continued…” and when the next debt limit ceiling looms near, it will terminate in yet another capitulation to the lure of reckless spending. This “compromise” could have been cut weeks ago. What was the point of running the budget cutting football all the way to the one yard line on fourth down only to take a knee and surrender the game? The drama? The photo ops? The lack of any useful work to perform?

Regardless of how you analyze this play by the Republicans, the final score read:

Conservatives: 0
Liberals: 2,400,000,000,000

Sure, there is the estimated $917 billion in initial "cuts", which in fact are reductions in spending increases. There is an additional $1.5 trillion to be carved from the bloated budget later. However, both of these adjustments will be implemented by the same pack melodramatic miscreants on a bi-polar spending spree who created the 14 trillion dollar national debt that precipitated this Stand-off Showdown in the first place. Create the beast, then play the white knight coming to slay the beast, mount your trusty stead and charge! charge! charge another two and a half trillion bucks.

Somehow this scenario seems strikingly familiar, doesn’t it? Of course, we have been the victim of these creative government financing arraignments repeatedly for the past 75 years. It was 1936 when the first Balanced Budget Amendment, House Joint Resolution 579, was introduced by Harold Knutson (R–MN) and summarily executed in Congress. Mr. Knutson must have appeared a serious killjoy that early in the game with only 16 Billion in public debt to be concerned about. Today the government will spend 16 billion dollars before noon tomorrow, and 6 Billion of that will have to be borrowed!

I must admit my disappointment the Tea Party is shared with the Obama Dream Team. I expected more from the "Smartest People on the Planet" as they were touted in the opening days of the Administration. With the large number of former Goldman Sachs executives in the Obama administration, I'm dismayed that they couldn't structure a magnificently pitched, highly leveraged, poorly labeled, and remarkably incomprehensible market security out of the national debt. Current debt could be exchanged for unsecured equity. When this house (and senate) of cards comes crashing down, the US stock price drops to zero, and the stockholders (China, Saudi Arabia, and anyone else but us) get screwed instead of our children! I suppose that only works for investment banks, insurance companies, labor unions, and other major campaign contributing types.

Inevitably the results of the hundreds of similar compromises in the past have yielded tax increases which materialize in multiples of the original figures and spending cuts which disintegrate in to the ether. Year after year the deficit recorded on the bottom line will grow inexorably and the National Debt will deepen exponentially. The chance of the horrific "default" will engulf the Treasury and become a mater of inevitability. The American Dream and our children's futures pass into history. The same Esteemed Members of our Distinguished Congress who produced this grand "compromise" will hastily resolve to retire internationally in a tropical land with no extradition treaty.

I hope you don't think I am being entirely cynical, because I'm really not completely pessimistic on the future. I'm sure our children will look back on this debt limit hullabaloo some day and laugh about our fuss and bother over the matter. They will have more pressing concerns to attend to as they huddle together for warmth against the freezing wind in the dirty alleyways they will call home.

Consent of the Governed?

2011-07-11T21:55:00.001-07:00

What gives some people the right to rule others? At least since John Locke’s time, the most common and seemingly compelling answer has been “the consent of the governed.” When the North American revolutionaries set out to justify their secession from the British Empire, they declared, among other things: “Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed.” This sounds good, especially if one doesn’t think about it very hard or very long, but the harder and longer one thinks about it, the more problematic it becomes.

One question after another comes to mind. Must every person consent? If not, how many must, and what options do those who do not consent have? What form must the consent take ― verbal, written, explicit, implicit? If implicit, how is it to be registered? Given that the composition of society is constantly changing, owing to births, deaths, and international migration, how often must the rulers confirm that they retain the consent of the governed? And so on and on. Political legitimacy, it would appear, presents a multitude of difficulties when we move from the realm of theoretical abstraction to that of practical realization.

I raise this question because in regard to the so-called social contract, I have often had occasion to protest that I haven’t even seen the contract, much less been asked to consent to it. A valid contract requires voluntary offer, acceptance, and consideration. I’ve never received an offer from my rulers, so I certainly have not accepted one; and rather than consideration, I have received nothing but contempt from the rulers, who, notwithstanding the absence of any agreement, have indubitably threatened me with grave harm in the event that I fail to comply with their edicts. What monumental effrontery these people exhibit! What gives them the right to rob me and push me around? It certainly is not my desire to be a sheep for them to shear or slaughter as they deem expedient for the attainment of their own ends.

Moreover, when we flesh out the idea of “consent of the governed” in realistic detail, the whole notion quickly becomes utterly preposterous. Just consider how it would work. A would-be ruler approaches you and offers a contract for your approval. Here, says he, is the deal.

I, the party of the first part (“the ruler”), promise:
(1) To stipulate how much of your money you will hand over to me, as well as how, when, and where the transfer will be made. You will have no effective say in the matter, aside from pleading for my mercy, and if you should fail to comply, my agents will punish you with fines, imprisonment, and (in the event of your persistent resistance) death.
(2) To make thousands upon thousands of rules for you to obey without question, again on pain of punishment by my agents. You will have no effective say in determining the content of these rules, which will be so numerous, complex, and in many cases beyond comprehension that no human being could conceivably know about more than a handful of them, much less their specific character, yet if you should fail to comply with any of them, I will feel free to punish you to the extent of a law made my me and my confederates.
(3) To provide for your use, on terms stipulated by me and my agents, so-called public goods and services. Although you may actually place some value on a few of these goods and services, most will have little or no value to you, and some you will find utterly abhorrent, and in no event will you as an individual have any effective say over the goods and services I provide, notwithstanding any economist’s cock-and-bull story to the effect that you “demand” all this stuff and value it at whatever amount of money I choose to expend for its provision.
(4) In the event of a dispute between us, judges beholden to me for their appointment and salaries will decide how to settle the dispute. You can expect to lose in these settlements, if your case is heard at all.
In exchange for the foregoing government “benefits,” you, the party of the second part (“the subject”), promise:
(5) To shut up, make no waves, obey all orders issued by the ruler and his agents, kowtow to them as if they were important, honorable people, and when they say “jump,” ask only “how high?”

Such a deal! Can we really imagine that any sane person would consent to it?

Yet the foregoing description of the true social contract into which individuals are said to have entered is much too abstract to capture the raw realities of being governed. In enumerating the actual details, no one has ever surpassed Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, who wrote:

To be GOVERNED is to be kept in sight, inspected, spied upon, directed, law-driven, numbered, enrolled, indoctrinated, preached at, controlled, estimated, valued, censured, commanded, by creatures who have neither the right, nor the wisdom, nor the virtue to do so. To be GOVERNED is to be at every operation, at every transaction, noted, registered, enrolled, taxed, stamped, measured, numbered, assessed, licensed, authorized, admonished, forbidden, reformed, corrected, punished. It is, under pretext of public utility, and in the name of the general interest, to be placed under contribution, trained, ransomed, exploited, monopolized, extorted, squeezed, mystified, robbed; then, at the slightest resistance, the first word of complaint, to be repressed, fined, despised, harassed, tracked, abused, clubbed, disarmed, choked, imprisoned, judged, condemned, shot, deported, sacrificed, sold, betrayed; and, to crown all, mocked, ridiculed, outraged, dishonored. That is government; that is its justice; that is its morality. (P.-J. Proudhon, General Idea of the Revolution in the Nineteenth Century, trans. John Beverley Robinson. London: Freedom Press, 1923, p. 294)

Nowadays, of course, we would have to supplement Proudhon’s admirably precise account by noting that our being governed also entails our being electronically monitored, tracked by orbiting satellites, tased more or less at random, and invaded in our premises by SWAT teams of police, often under the pretext of their overriding our natural right to decide what substances we will ingest, inject, or inhale into what used to be known as “our own bodies.”

So, to return to the question of political legitimacy as determined by the consent of the governed, it appears upon sober reflection that the whole idea is as fanciful as the unicorn. No one in his right mind, save perhaps an incurable masochist, would voluntarily consent to be treated as governments actually treat their subjects.

Nevertheless, very few of us in this country at present are actively engaged in armed rebellion against our rulers. And it is precisely this absence of outright violent revolt that, strange to say, some commentators take as evidence of our consent to the outrageous manner in which the government treats us. Grudging, prudential acquiescence, however, is not the same thing as consent, especially when the people acquiesce, as I do, only in simmering, indignant resignation.

For the record, I can state in complete candor that I do not approve of the manner in which I am being treated by the liars, thieves, and murderers who style themselves the Government of the United States of America or by those who constitute the tyrannical pyramid of state, local, and hybrid governments with which this country is massively infested. My sincere wish is that all of these individuals would, for once in their despicable lives, do the honorable thing. In this regard, I suggest that they give serious consideration to seppuku. Whether they employ a sharp sword or a dull one, I care not, so long as they carry the act to a successful completion.

10 Answers to the 10 Questions for 911 Truthers

2011-04-10T08:55:00.000-07:00

DEDICATED WITH LOVING RESPECT TO THE MEMORY OF THE VICTIMS, FIRST RESPONDERS, AND VETERANS LOST AS A RESULT OF THE 9/11 ATTACKS. THE GREATEST HONOR WE CAN EVER OFFER TO THEM IS TO DISCOVER THE TRUTH.

These are just a few of the grass roots groups of decent, honest, hard working, intelligent, and patriotic Americans who demand the Truth of their government.

John Hawkins runs Right Wing News and recently published and article on Townhall.com entitled 10 Questions for 9/11 Truthers. These are valid questions that have been asked by various people in the past and in turn have been replied to with valid answers by numerous respected experts whose exhaustive research corroborate and supports each others findings. The way to avoid asking the one simple question which really matters at this time, “What is the truth of the 9/11 attacks”, is by repeatedly asking the same inane 10 questions as if they have never been addressed by the Truth Movement. As an independent Truther, I will take the time to answer all of these questions once again in the hope that somehow, someday, the debunkers will come to see that the Truth Movement is not about Right vs. Left, but Truth vs. Lies…

1) If the United States government was actually behind 9/11, hundreds, thousands, and maybe even ten thousands of people would have to be involved. Do you really believe that many Americans would stay quiet about the murder of 3,000 citizens by our own government?

Mr. Hawkins is making a statement of his own assumption which is not an assertion made by any respectable Truther of whom I am aware. The idea that "hundreds, thousands, and maybe even tens of thousands of people would have to be involved” is simply untrue. Those knowingly involved and complicit may number in the dozens, perhaps even less. Many others many have just been following orders, manipulated, or deceived into action or inaction without ever understanding their roll in the matter. Ultimately, regardless of how extraordinarily large or absurdly small the number of individuals involved may be, the number will never be known so long as we continue to fail to seek the truth.
Furthermore, the idea that a conspiracy involving a potentially large number of individuals is preposterous to suggest does not stand up to scrutiny. The recent Climategate scandal demonstrates that not only individuals but respected institutions throughout the world can and have been knowingly involved and complicit in conspiratorial collaboration. The Gulf of Tonkin incident which was the grounds used for the Vietnam War which took 56,000 American lives did not happen as it was reported in every major American media source, and those knowingly involved and complicity involved (a relatively small number) were only exposed long after their deaths had placed them beyond the reach of justice. The sinking of the USS Maine used as a pretext to Spanish American War also stands as evidence that a few self interested individuals can and have murdered thousands of their countrymen without conscience.
Millions of Americans believed with absolute certainty in the existence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, this belief was originally fostered by a very few, albeit highly influential, individuals. However the assertion that Iraq possessed any significant quantities of WMDs remains unfounded. Some claim the WMD allegations were a premeditated lie to provide a pretext to war, others will defend the call to war as being justified by prudence and necessary to our national security. Still others believe that the WMDs in question were and still remain in Iraq somewhere beneath the ancient shifting sands of the fertile crescent. We may never know the fate of Iraq's WMDs or whether they ever existed. Whether factual or fictitious, as a pretext or prudence the impact of those WMDs is tangible in that they moved this nation to war. A war which has resulted in a nearly decade long occupation at a cost of more than $3 trillion dollars, and 4,446 of our sons and daughters lives, with another 30,000 Americans wounded and half of those seriously. Whether the reader considers this cost justifiable or not is a matter of perspective, but all perspective is abandoned along with reason when one compares the costs of the Iraq war in search of elusive, if not imaginary, WMDs to the paltry sum of perhaps a few hundred million dollars to fund an exhaustive inquiry into 9/11 that the Truthers have been (quite reasonably) been asking of the Congress for more than a decade.

2) Some Truthers believe a car bomb or a missile hit the Pentagon instead of a plane. So how do they explain the witnesses, like James Robbins, who saw a plane hit the Pentagon?

There are some Truthers who do make this allegation and they do so with good cause which I will explain momentarily. I do not claim that a car bomb or missile hit the Pentagon, but we have no video evidence of a plane hitting the pentagon which is at the very least odd since the Pentagon is one of the most video monitored buildings in the world. The video that was released by the Pentagon has the wrong date and time, and adding to the videos veracity is the complete absence of an airplane impacting the building. Eyewitnesses are often the least reliable form of presentable evidence as is demonstrated in the book Eyewitness testimony By Elizabeth F. Loftus. The testimonies of eyewitnesses becomes increasingly unreliable in traumatic events which tend to be colored by shock.
Physical evidence which can be tested remains superior to any individuals claim, however flying in the face of all standard investigatory procedures the very small amount of physical evidence collected from the Pentagon site was tampered with when it should have been quarantined as a crime scene. This is also the case with the large amount of physical evidence rapidly hauled away and subsequently discarded or recycled from the WTC sites.

3) If neither the WTC nor the Pentagon was hit by a plane (and, yes, there are Truthers who believe that), what happened to all the people on the planes?

I am aware, as all reasonable individuals, that there are always going to be that .5% who still insist that we never went to the moon, that the earth is indeed flat, and that under Bill Clinton we had a budget surplus. I do not consider those who would place any great importance on such a highly speculative theory as “Truthers.” We can pay great homage to our honored dead by dispelling the pawl of doubt that hangs like a dark cloud over the events of September 11, 2001, by providing the correct answers to the many questions that remain unanswered, are patently false, or had never been asked.

4) Osama Bin Laden publicly admitted that Al-Qaeda was behind the attacks. How do you explain that if our own government is really behind the attacks?

9/11 CONSPIRACY: THE BIN LADEN TAPE IS A FAKE!

When I first read your fourth question I felt compelled to answer them for you and all my fellow countrymen who sincerely want to understand what happened on 9/11. I was also immediately taken by how little investigation of these matters that Mr. Hawkins had done before penning his article. If you recall just a few minutes ago Mr. Hawkins was claiming that a the attacks of 9/11 would have involved necessitated the collusion of “…hundreds, thousands, and maybe even ten thousands of people…” and now he has reversed his entire assumption is apparently attempting to lay responsibility at the feet of one man, obviously supported by his terrorist organization. Which is it John, one man or did the attacks necessitate thousands? You can’t have it both ways, and I maintain that the assertion posited by Truthers is far more reasonable than either of the two self contradictory estimates that you have suggested thus far. Let us assume, as fairness requires, that Mr. Hawkins is not trying to muddy the waters, but has simply made an honest mistake. So, to answer the question regarding Bin Laden’s alleged claim of responsibility for the attacks, the video in which he appears is at best dubious. There are several obvious incongruities about this video which remain unexplained lending to the credence that the tape is a fabrication.

“What possible motives or benefit could could lead someone to manufacture such a video?”, you may ask.

There are people on both sides of the issue who would profit from the release of such a video. For the average Islamic militant who sees Jihad against the west as a religious duty

Bin Laden FBI most wanted page omits 9/11

demanded by Allah, the disappearance or death of one of the principle players on the Jihadist stage would diminish their claim to divine blessings and be a blow to the moral of their movement. Bin Laden’s ability to evade capture by the “Great Satan” in the west is often cited by sympathetic Muslims as evidence for his state of spiritual grace. For those of us in the west, we are well aware that there are those who profit directly from war and have in the past played a large roll in keeping America at war eternally. Manufacturing a video of the villain, not only taking direct responsibility for the September 11th attacks, but reveling in the destruction he is alleged to have wrought sure fuels the home fires to keep the bullets flying.

But let us put aside these suppositions, and let us focus on what we do know. On June 5, 2006, an FBI spokesman, Chief of Investigative Publicity Rex Tomb said, “The FBI has no hard evidence connecting Usama Bin Laden to 9/11.” This is a pretty explosive statement coming directly from the FBI because if there is no hard evidence connecting Osama Bin Laden to 9/11 then the government’s account of the events of 911 come crashing down and we are left, no we are compelled, to uncover the truth about the atrocities of that infamous day and to bring those responsible to justice.

5) "The 9/11 attacks, or at least parts of those attacks, have been investigated by the 9/11 commission, the CIA, FBI, FAA, FEMA, The National Institute of Standards and Technology, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, (and) the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence." None of these groups concluded the U.S. government was behind the attacks. So, were they all in on it or are they simply not privy to the same inside information that Alex Jones has?

911 Truth: The Bogus NIST Report & The Lingering Questions
Refer to my last answer and you will have answered your own question. There are many Truthers within these institutions who have spoken out against the governments account of 9/11. They have been censured, demoted, or fired because they dared to speak out. Alex Jones has been a respected member of the Truth movement and remains so because he has gone to great lengths to document and substantiate his allegations that the governments’ story does not hold water, much like the journalistic integrity of Mr. Hawkins article..

6) Bizarrely, despite the fact that the WTC was hit by planes, many Truthers claim the buildings were brought down by controlled demolitions. How in the world could that be done without people in the buildings noticing it? Why in the world would they wire the buildings with explosives and THEN fly planes into the buildings? It's not as if terrorists hadn't ever tried to bring down a building with bombs before.

This question is answered in the preceding video “911 Truth: The Bogus NIST Report & The Lingering Questions” but I would like to add that the question seems to place some merit on the value of historical evidence. With that in mind, I will ask the question how is it that 3 steel frame buildings collapsed as a result of fires (of which only two were hit by airplanes) when never in the history of construction has a steel frame building collapsed as a result of fire?

7) Certainly if there was a government conspiracy to target the WTC and Pentagon, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld would have been involved. Would he really have arranged for a plane (or alternately, depending on how loopy you are, a missile or a car bomb) to be used on the Pentagon while he and undoubtedly his friends and staff, were there?

The question seems to be a prima fascia case for the exoneration of Mr. Rumsfeld, however with just a small amount of investigation into the facts of the matter, what appears to be an exculpatory and self evident fact suddenly reveals itself to be some of the most damning evidence. The particular area of the pentagon that was struck during the attack supports the Truth Movements validity rather than diminishing it.

At the time of the attacks, the Pentagon was under renovation and several offices were unoccupied, resulting in fewer casualties. Only 800 of 4,500 people who would have been in the area were there because of the work. Furthermore, the area hit was the section best prepared for such an attack. It was the only area of the Pentagon with a sprinkler system, and it had been reconstructed with a web of steel columns and bars to withstand bomb blasts. The steel reinforcement, bolted together to form a continuous structure through all of the Pentagon's five floors, kept that section of the building from collapsing for 30 minutes—enough time for hundreds of people to crawl out to safety. The area struck by the plane also had blast-resistant windows—2 inches thick and 2,500 pounds each—that stayed intact during the crash and fire. It had fire doors that opened automatically and newly built exits that allowed people to get out. One must assume that the odd, unnecessary, and exceptionally difficult (if not wholly impossible, as many lifelong professional pilots have testified) 270 degree turn around the Pentagon that the alleged terrorist executed prior to striking the best protected, least occupied section of the Pentagon was the result of dumb luck, or someone who knew where the building was least susceptible to damage and loss of life was able to cherry pick the target.

8) If the Bush Administration was actually behind 9/11, how do you explain the fact that they didn't fake discovering weapons of mass destruction in Iraq? After all, if they were so corrupt that they'd be willing to kill 3000 Americans, surely they wouldn't have any qualms about planting a few WMDs in Iraq.

The attacks of 9/11 have no viable connection with the presence or absence of WMD’s in Iraq that I am aware of at the present time. However, since Mr. Hawkins has elected to spiral away from the issue germane to the subject (namely the attacks of 9/11) I will address his question.

The invasion of Iraq was never about WMD’s, if it had Iran or North Korea would have been, and remain, far more pressing targets for alarm. Furthermore, the fakery of WMD’s sufficed at accomplishing the administrations objective.. war. Planting WMD’s that could withstand the test of scrutiny is not as easy as your statement suggests, weapons are traceable and would open the door to a deeper investigation. The wave of anthrax poisonings in 2001 were eventually linked back to the United States military laboratory at Fort Detrick, Md. There are many unanswered questions regarding the anthrax attacks, and at the time it unlashed a series of official inquiries that nearly deposed the Blair government in the UK.

9) What exactly is the Bush Administration's motive for engineering an attack on Afghanistan supposed to be? Militarily, that was considered to be a high risk, low reward country to invade. If it were just about "popularity" (and historically, that's a very iffy proposition), why not claim that a closer, easier target like Cuba was responsible?

High risks demand high rewards. Does the capture of one man, Osama Bin Laden seem to be an equitable reward for 10 years of war and counting? That was the initial reasoning for invading Afghanistan? Hardly. If you recall, the justification for invading were terrorist training camps being run by Bin Laden and his lackeys and we were going to take them out. A decade later with no sign of Bin laden or any quantifiable progress towards a stable government in Kabul we’re still there. It would appear to be a complete mystery with no discernable answer on the surface. Once again, it is below the surface (literally) that one finds a viable and highly profitable answer to Mr. Hawkins’ question. Invading Cuba does not have the lure of some 3 trillion dollars in mineral resources.

10) If the Bush Administration was really behind 9/11, then surely the Obama Administration must be aware of it by now and they'd have every incentive to reveal it in order to damage the Republican Party. Why haven't they done it? Are they in on it, too?

You ask me, as the reader, what I think and I will answer that question unabashedly…
I think that an impeccably qualified, fully funded, independent, and exhaustive inquiry with the power to subpoena any and all witnesses in connection with the events of September 11, 2001 is not only merited, but essential. Such an inquiry is necessary to address the growing mountain of evidence which suggests that we are no longer a free society.
I think that this is our Right, it is our duty, as a free people to demand such an inquiry of our government.
I think our unwillingness to spend time, money, or even the lives of our precious sons and daughters are not viable excuses for refusal to establish such an inquiry. Furthermore, the only potential motive which remains for any power, party, or authority to refuse the People the Truth which is Rightfully theirs to know is complicity before or after the fact.
When a government is elected to act in the name of the People, We the People are responsible and accountable for the actions and inactions taken by that government. We must at all times and in all ways hold our government responsible and accountable to us, and the first prerequisite of this is knowing the truth, no matter how distasteful or painful that truth may be.
This is Truth Movement is not an act of sedition, it is the very essence of the American Constitution.
We the People demand and deserve the Truth.

Do you disagree , Mr. Hawkins?

Right is Wrong and Left is…Wrong

2011-03-10T05:39:00.001-08:00

We’ve all known for decades that multi-national corporations are screwing the consumer, the poor, animals, the planet, and just about anything else that should not be screwed in the interest of a few extra bucks. Yes, we’ve all known these things for decades, but what has been done to stop this corporate corn holing of America?

Any blame for corporate shenanigans obviously falls on the Republicans because we all know that the Republican party is for big business and the Democratic party represents the decent honest working people of this country…right?

WRONG!

Bill Clinton a Democrat held the White House for eight years, four of which President Clinton enjoyed the support of a Democratically controlled Congress. During this time President Clinton pushed for and passed:

Major legislation supported and signed into law

1993-02-05 - The Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993
1993-08-10 - Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1993: Raised income tax rates; income tax, top rate: 39.6%; corporate tax: 35%
1993-09-21 - creation of the AmeriCorps volunteer program
1993-11-30 - Brady Bill
1994-09-13 - Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act: Part of an omnibus crime bill, the federal death penalty was expanded to some 60 different offenses (see Federal assault weapons ban)
1996-02-01 - Communications Decency Act
1996-02-08 - Telecom Reform Act: Eliminated major ownership restrictions for radio and television groups.

OVERWHELMING BI-PARTISAN SUPPORT In the House of Representatives 414 Ayes, 16 Nays, 4 Present/Not Voting. In the Senate 81 Ayes, 18 Nays, 1 Present/Not Voting. In reality a huge coup for BIG business and a major loss for competition in the marketplace. Remember this is the same government that went out of its’ way to punish Microsoft for being a web browser monopoly, (which it was not) five years later legislating that creating media monopolies is just fine. Hypocrisy anyone?

1996-03-14 - Authorized $100 million counter-terrorism agreement with Israel to track down and root out terrorists.
1996-04-09 - Line Item Veto Act (Later declared unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in Clinton v. City of New York).
1996-04-24 - Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act
1996-08-20 - Minimum wage Increase Act
1996-09-21 - Defense of Marriage Act: Allowed states to refuse recognition of certain same-sex marriages, and defined marriage as between a male and female for purposes of federal law
1997-08-05 - Balanced Budget Act of 1997
1997-08-05 - State Children's Health Insurance Program
1997-08-05 - Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997
1996-08-26 - Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act: A welfare reform bill
1998-10-28 - Digital Millennium Copyright Act
1998-10-31 - Iraq Liberation Act
1999-11-12 - Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act: Repealed part of the Glass–Steagall Act of 1933, allowing commercial banks, investment banks, securities firms, and insurance companies to consolidate

This is as close to OVERWHELMING BI-PARTISAN (that means both REPUBLICAN AND DEMOCRATIC) support as a vote can get in the US Senate. By the way, this “deregulation” of the banking industry is purported to be partially a significant factor in the credit crisis and sub-prime mortgage meltdown that would occur 8 years later. While the Republicans defended the legislation claiming it was not a culprit in the debacle, the Democrats failed to mention they supported the act and neglected to own up to Bill Clinton signing it into law without a veto… rather convenient and remarkably cowardly.

For the record, I would also argue that the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act neither contributed to the crisis, nor would the Glass–Steagall Act of 1933 prevented or even mitigated the fallout of 2007 crisis. If I were looking for a scapegoat that provides the requisite easily identifiable target, yet retaining the aspect of mind boggling complexity that bamboozles the average voter into taking my word for it, I’d have gone a different route… the Steve Bartman incident always plays well in these scenarios when a good measure of smoke and mirrors is needed to hoodwink John Q. Public just long enough (varies between 15 minutes to 3 weeks) for him to forget there was an issue to be hoodwinked over in the first place.

2000-12-21 - Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000 : Deregulated the Derivatives Market

Once again we have OVERWHELMING BI-PARTISAN SUPPORT (Yeas: 292 and Nays: 60) for a bill that had a REAL effect on the credit crisis and sub-prime mortgage meltdown that would occur 8 years later. Neither party seems to remember their support of this Act, and their certainly not going to remind you of their support either.

Now wait, before you go attacking me as a Republican or a Democrat… I’m not! I don’t support either the Democratic or the Republican parties because support of one is support of the other.

It is far past the time when WE THE PEOPLE need to wake up and see the political matrix construct we are living inside and the answer is not one or either of the major political parties. One is not better, or less worse than the other, that is just an illusion meant to keep you engaged in this…

Is Western Civilization a Handicap?

2011-02-19T20:12:00.001-08:00

To my dismay, I have increasingly chanced upon not only Americans finding fault with the conventional American way of life, but with Western civilization et al. as being to blame for any of the challenges we face as a nation. There is nothing wrong with western thinking. We have not been doing a hell of a lot of western thinking. Western thought brought us the likes of Peter Abelard, Augustine, Boccaccio, Byron, Caravaggio, Cicero, Dante, Dostoevsky, Galileo, Hobbes, Gericault, Homer, Luther, Machiavelli, Masaccio, Michelangelo, Hayek, Petrarch, Habermas, Raphael, Locke, Rembrandt, Adam Smith, Rousseau, Sophocles, Stendhal, Vermeer, Virgil, and Nozick to name but a miniscule fraction of the brilliant minds produced, nurtured, and influenced by Western culture. Along with the myriad of unnamed original thinkers who produced, nurtured, and influenced Western civilization. The strength of the Western thought is its relative accessibility, when compared to the far more rigid, autocratic, and often esoteric philosophy of the East.

Had we simply applied the time honored Western school of thought, rather than a forensic review, of facts leading up to the current economic malaise in which we find ourselves firmly ensconced, we would find that …

1. Western thought would have told us that something is wrong with a housing market that is booming for more than a decade without an apparent natural demographic driving it.
2. Western thought would have told us that something is wrong with interest rates remaining in the low single digits while the economy is booming.
3. Western thought would have told us that something is wrong with people who have never qualified for even the most lenient of mortgages are suddenly homeowners in upscale neighborhoods.
4. Western thought would have told us that something is wrong with cooks, gas station attendants, and homemakers who are suddenly movers and shakers in the residential "flip" market.
5. Western thought would have told us that something is wrong with government insured deposits (FDIC) financing "Low Doc" or "No Doc" mortgages to nearly anyone with the ability to sign their names on a dotted line.
6. Western thought would have told us that something is wrong with real estate novices buying homes in lucrative neighborhoods for $500,000.00 and selling the same home a few months later for a $50,000 profit.
7. Western thought would have told us that something is wrongwith a family being able to refinance their new home twice in the first couple of years of ownership and being able to pull out substantial amounts of cash each time.
8. Western thought would have told us that something is wrong with and nation having a blazing hot economy while;

a) expelling its manufacturing base into foreign exile,
b) producing an annual crop of increasingly uneducated citizens,
c) drowning in public debt mainly due to unprofitable transfer payment schemes,
d) stripping the economy of capital to grow an expanding multitude of redundant, inefficient, ineffective, and often counterproductive bureaucracies staffed with highly compensated individuals of mediocre acumen.
e) steadily decimating its entrepreneurial spirit in the private sector by regulation, licensing, taxation, and employment liability.

Western thought would have told us all these things, but as I stated earlier, "We have not been doing a hell of a lot of western thinking." Instead, we have been PROGRESSIVELY (Hint-Hint) adopting ideologies, principles, and tenants foreign to us in the west. In stark contrast to those in the East who have been doing the exact opposite and growing fabulously wealthy using historically western ideologies, principles, and tenants. Western thought is unique in that it is inherently non-elitist. Wisdom is recognized, documented, and transmitted regardless of the social standing, rank, or pedigree of the individual from which it emanates.

The ongoing and deteriorating state of crisis we in the west are experiencing is not a failure of Capitalism; it is solely due to our failure to be the Rational, Resourceful, Inventive, Adaptable, Intellectual, Optimistic, Innovative, Capitalists that we are…thanks to our unrivalled Western school of thought.

Our Wasted Wealth

2011-01-11T01:11:00.000-08:00

In the past few years the Obama administration along with a large cadre within the Federal government have shoveled nearly Three Trillion Dollars (That is $3,000,000,000,000.00) down a rat hole under the guise of “Fiscal Stimulus” without ever stopping to check their Totem. While the Keynesian sycophants justify this wanton disregard for current and future generations of Americans by claiming that everything would have been much worse without the effort without a scintilla of proof to back up their claim, I say the economic impact is easy for those who can do the math. Follow along with me…

Number of US Taxpayers:	144,000,000¹
Average age of US Taxpayer:	34 Years²
Retirement Age:	68 Years³
Average Years to Retirement:	34 Years
Total “Stimulus” Spending:	$3,270,000,000,000.00⁴
Spending Per Taxpayer:	$22,708.33⁵
Average Equity Investment Return:	12%⁶
Wasted Wealth of Average Taxpayer:	$1,328,925.94

Now with that being said, I understand that there are those who will find some minute bone to pick with my projected rate of returns, or point out that I did not account for taxes or inflation, and these are valid claims which I am not only willing to discuss, but in the interest of full disclosure, I'm pointing them out myself. However these are at best marginal issues when you consider the big picture:

I did not add the interest payments which over the same 34 year period will raise the total cost of the already staggering 3.27 Trillion borrowed today to a devastating total of 9 Trillion Dollars.
I did not estimate the degraded economic conditions that every American will suffer throughout their lives due to the addition to our already commerce crushing national debt.

References, Citations, and Sources

Internal Revenue Service
Ibid.
Estimated Minimum Social Security retirement age in 2045
Heritage Foundation
Smartstockmarket.com
Assumes a modest monthly investment of $50.00 per month by the retiree

That Bah Humbug Spirit?

2010-12-24T18:33:00.000-08:00

This holiday season seems a little different, doesn’t it? A little less jubilant, perhaps? Maybe a bit more stoic than it has been in previous years. Many of us have had to scale back on the festivities, cut short our travel, and especially reign in the spending when compared to holidays of just a few years ago. For the most part, even among those considered to be “poor”, Americans are not very good at not doing at least fairly well. We have come to expect it as a birthright, our due prosperity to be very merry at this time of the year. While there is much that we have lost over the last few years, this is no time for self pity or despondence that leads to resignation. We have been beat down, but we are far from beat.

We have a purpose to remember who we are and those who gave liberty, security, comfort, and life to hand us the prosperity of yesterday. Most important among them was a man who did not have in this life the luxury to fix His mistakes because He lived and died for the mistakes of others. He gave His life so that each of us could live, and live with passion and purpose. Put aside your financial concerns for the moment. Accept that you may never again earn what you once did. However you can make a point to make His Life, His Agony, His Fear, His Sacrifice worth it …earn this. The dividends are certain, the growth potential limitless, and no one can take this investment from you as the only legal tender acceptable for this account was paid in His blood… earn it.

What can us little people do about the Fed (Part I)

2010-11-22T11:54:00.001-08:00

"Some people think that the Federal Reserve Banks are United States Government institutions. They are private monopolies which prey upon the people of these United States for the benefit of themselves and their foreign customers; foreign and domestic speculators and swindlers; and rich and predatory money lenders."

– The Honorable Louis McFadden, Chairman of the House Banking and Currency Committee in the 1930s

Dr. Ron Paul a Congressman from the State of Texas (and personal hero of mine) authored legislation with 114 co-sponsors to audit the Federal Reserve recently. Had the legislation passed there would be many, many people in our current and past administrations going jail or worse.

Ron Paul at his best…

If you look at the sub-prime credit crises, the housing bubble, the formerly frothy liquidity in our monetary system, and who ended up owning all the real properties in the end one need only follow the money. It began and ended with the PRIVATELY OWNED¹ Federal Reserve Bank.

Creates all our Money
Directly or indirectly sets nearly all our interest rates
Directly Regulates and Controls all our Banking
Regulates and Controls all our Lending

That’s a lot of power, so what do we get out of it?

The Federal Reserve absorbed all of the "Toxic Assets" from the Credit Crisis!

Those so called "Toxic Assets” were really the largest transfer of property since the Louisiana Purchase and how much did the privately owned Federal Reserve Bank pay for the property... NOTHING!

They printed the MONEY to buy all of the real property! Except in this case they just made an couple accounting journal entries and robbed the nation of a trillion plus dollars in real tangible (not toxic!) property in exchange for accounting wizardry, and people think Harry Potter is amazing! But wait there is more, we’ll call these the bonus powers of the Federal Reserve…

The Federal Reserve directly or indirectly controls the stock market
The Federal Reserve directly or indirectly controls the Bond market
The Federal Reserve directly controls the Inflation
The Federal Reserve directly or indirectly controls our entire economy
They are exempt from Federal Taxes
The owners of this institution are completely anonymous

The Federal Reserve (or Fed) has assumed sweeping new powers in the last year. In an unprecedented move in March 2008, the New York Fed advanced the funds for JPMorgan Chase Bank to buy investment bank Bear Stearns for pennies on the dollar. The deal was particularly controversial because Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan, sits on the board of the New York Fed and participated in the secret weekend negotiations.¹ In September 2008, the Federal Reserve did something even more unprecedented, when it bought the world’s largest insurance company. The Fed announced on September 16 that it was giving an $85 billion loan to American International Group (AIG) for a nearly 80% stake in the mega-insurer. The Associated Press called it a "government takeover," but this was no ordinary nationalization. Unlike the U.S. Treasury, which took over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac the week before, the Fed is not a government-owned agency. Also unprecedented was the way the deal was funded. The Associated Press reported:

"The Treasury Department, for the first time in its history, said it would begin selling bonds for the Federal Reserve in an effort to help the central bank deal with its unprecedented borrowing needs."²

This is extraordinary. Why is the Treasury issuing U.S. government bonds (or debt) to fund the Fed, which is itself supposedly "the lender of last resort" created to fund the banks and the federal government? Yahoo Finance reported on September 17:

"The Treasury is setting up a temporary financing program at the Fed’s request. The program will auction Treasury bills to raise cash for the Fed’s use. The initiative aims to help the Fed manage its balance sheet following its efforts to enhance its liquidity facilities over the previous few quarters."

Normally, the Fed swaps green pieces of paper called Federal Reserve Notes for pink pieces of paper called U.S. bonds (the federal government’s I.O.U.s), in order to provide Congress with the dollars it cannot raise through taxes. Now, it seems, the government is issuing bonds, not for its own use, but for the use of the Fed! Perhaps the plan is to swap them with the banks’ dodgy derivatives collateral directly, without actually putting them up for sale to outside buyers. According to Wikipedia (which translates Fedspeak into somewhat clearer terms than the Fed’s own website):

"The Term Securities Lending Facility is a 28-day facility that will offer Treasury general collateral to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York’s primary dealers in exchange for other program-eligible collateral. It is intended to promote liquidity in the financing markets for Treasury and other collateral and thus to foster the functioning of financial markets more generally. . . . The resource allows dealers to switch debt that is less liquid for U.S. government securities that are easily tradable."

"To switch debt that is less liquid for U.S. government securities that are easily tradable" means that the government gets the banks’ toxic derivative debt, and the banks get the government’s triple-A securities. Unlike the risky derivative debt, federal securities are considered "risk-free" for purposes of determining capital requirements, allowing the banks to improve their capital position so they can make new loans. (See E. Brown, "Bailout Bedlam," www.webofdebt.com/articles, October 2, 2008.)

In its latest power play, on October 3, 2008, the Fed acquired the ability to pay interest to its member banks on the reserves the banks maintain at the Fed. Reuters reported on October 3:

"The U.S. Federal Reserve gained a key tactical tool from the $700 billion financial rescue package signed into law on Friday that will help it channel funds into parched credit markets. Tucked into the 451-page bill is a provision that lets the Fed pay interest on the reserves banks are required to hold at the central bank."³

If the Fed’s money comes ultimately from the taxpayers, that means we the taxpayers are paying interest to the banks on the banks’ own reserves – reserves maintained for their own private profit. These increasingly controversial encroachments on the public purse warrant a closer look at the central banking scheme itself. Who owns the Federal Reserve, who actually controls it, where does it get its money, and whose interests is it serving?

Not Private and Not for Profit?

The Fed’s website insists that it is not a private corporation, is not operated for profit, and is not funded by Congress. But is that true? The Federal Reserve was set up in 1913 as a "lender of last resort" to backstop bank runs, following a particularly bad bank panic in 1907. The Fed’s mandate was then and continues to be to keep the private banking system intact; and that means keeping intact the system’s most valuable asset, a monopoly on creating the national money supply. Except for coins, every dollar in circulation is now created privately as a debt to the Federal Reserve or the banking system it heads.⁴ The Fed’s website attempts to gloss over its role as chief defender and protector of this private banking club, but let’s take a closer look. The website states:

* "The twelve regional Federal Reserve Banks, which were established by Congress as the operating arms of the nation’s central banking system, are organized much like private corporations – possibly leading to some confusion about "ownership." For example, the Reserve Banks issue shares of stock to member banks. However, owning Reserve Bank stock is quite different from owning stock in a private company. The Reserve Banks are not operated for profit, and ownership of a certain amount of stock is, by law, a condition of membership in the System. The stock may not be sold, traded, or pledged as security for a loan; dividends are, by law, 6 percent per year."

* "[The Federal Reserve] is considered an independent central bank because its decisions do not have to be ratified by the President or anyone else in the executive or legislative branch of government, it does not receive funding appropriated by Congress, and the terms of the members of the Board of Governors span multiple presidential and congressional terms."

* "The Federal Reserve’s income is derived primarily from the interest on U.S. government securities that it has acquired through open market operations. . . . After paying its expenses, the Federal Reserve turns the rest of its earnings over to the U.S. Treasury."⁵

So let’s review:

1. The Fed is privately owned.

Its shareholders are private banks. In fact, 100% of its shareholders are private banks. None of its stock is owned by the government.

2. The fact that the Fed does not get "appropriations" from Congress basically means that it gets its money from Congress without congressional approval, by engaging in "open market operations."

Here is how it works: When the government is short of funds, the Treasury issues bonds and delivers them to bond dealers, which auction them off. When the Fed wants to "expand the money supply" (create money), it steps in and buys bonds from these dealers with newly-issued dollars acquired by the Fed for the cost of writing them into an account on a computer screen. These maneuvers are called "open market operations" because the Fed buys the bonds on the "open market" from the bond dealers. The bonds then become the "reserves" that the banking establishment uses to back its loans. In another bit of sleight of hand known as "fractional reserve" lending, the same reserves are lent many times over, further expanding the money supply, generating interest for the banks with each loan. It was this money-creating process that prompted Wright Patman, Chairman of the House Banking and Currency Committee in the 1960s, to call the Federal Reserve "a total money-making machine." He wrote:

"When the Federal Reserve writes a check for a government bond it does exactly what any bank does, it creates money, it created money purely and simply by writing a check."

3. The Fed generates profits for its shareholders.

The interest on bonds acquired with its newly-issued Federal Reserve Notes pays the Fed’s operating expenses plus a guaranteed 6% return to its banker shareholders. A mere 6% a year may not be considered a profit in the world of Wall Street high finance, but most businesses that manage to cover all their expenses and give their shareholders a guaranteed 6% return are considered "for profit" corporations.

In addition to this guaranteed 6%, the banks will now be getting interest from the taxpayers on their "reserves." The basic reserve requirement set by the Federal Reserve is 10%. The website of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York explains that as money is redeposited and relent throughout the banking system, this 10% held in "reserve" can be fanned into ten times that sum in loans; that is, $10,000 in reserves becomes $100,000 in loans. Federal Reserve Statistical Release H.8 puts the total "loans and leases in bank credit" as of September 24, 2008 at $7,049 billion. Ten percent of that is $700 billion. That means we the taxpayers will be paying interest to the banks on at least $700 billion annually – this so that the banks can retain the reserves to accumulate interest on ten times that sum in loans.

The banks earn these returns from the taxpayers for the privilege of having the banks’ interests protected by an all-powerful independent private central bank, even when those interests may be opposed to the taxpayers’ -- for example, when the banks use their special status as private money creators to fund speculative derivative schemes that threaten to collapse the U.S. economy. Among other special benefits, banks and other financial institutions (but not other corporations) can borrow at the low Fed funds rate of about 2%. They can then turn around and put this money into 30-year Treasury bonds at 4.5%, earning an immediate 2.5% from the taxpayers, just by virtue of their position as favored banks. A long list of banks (but not other corporations) is also now protected from the short selling that can crash the price of other stocks.

Time to Change the Statute?

According to the Fed’s website, the control Congress has over the Federal Reserve is limited to this:

"[T]he Federal Reserve is subject to oversight by Congress, which periodically reviews its activities and can alter its responsibilities by statute."

As we know from watching the business news, "oversight" basically means that Congress gets to see the results when it’s over. The Fed periodically reports to Congress, but the Fed doesn’t ask; it tells. The only real leverage Congress has over the Fed is that it "can alter its responsibilities by statute." It is time for Congress to exercise that leverage and make the Federal Reserve a truly federal agency, acting by and for the people through their elected representatives. If the Fed can demand AIG’s stock in return for an $85 billion loan to the mega-insurer, we can demand the Fed’s stock in return for the trillion-or-so dollars we’ll be advancing to bail out the private banking system from its follies.

If the Fed were actually a federal agency, the government could issue U.S. legal tender directly, avoiding an unnecessary interest-bearing debt to private middlemen who create the money out of thin air themselves. Among other benefits to the taxpayers. a truly "federal" Federal Reserve could lend the full faith and credit of the United States to state and local governments interest-free, cutting the cost of infrastructure in half, restoring the thriving local economies of earlier decades.

The international financiers love war because they can loan money to both sides and ultimately decide who wins by controlling the purse strings, and there is nothing that a nation will willingly dive into deeply into debt for than its own survival.
This is a huge topic which would better be understood by all if they take the time to do the research, double, triple, quadruped check their facts, sift out the anti-Semitic¹ garbage that is mixed in to taint the truth, and put the pieces of the puzzle together for themselves because frankly they will have a hard time believing anyone else. It is too outlandish, too preposterous, too monstrous, and too... evil for the average decent human being to imagine, let alone to be true!
I'll warn you though along the way you will find things that you really wish you could un-know, so don't head down this path lightly. It will change your perspective on everything you ever thought you knew to be true, and that ultimately and irrevocably will change you. If it hasn't then you haven't done the research.
¹ You will find a lot of anti-Semitic propaganda as you delve into this, keep in mind that it was the Christians who forced Jews into banking because no Christian could lend money for interest in the Middle Ages being called the sin of "Usury". It was not a Jewish conspiracy to control the banks, but there is REAL conspiracy nearby that you’re not supposed to notice. Also keep in mind that Christ was and still is to my knowledge a Jew.

To answer your next question: No, I am not Jewish. Read the rest of my blog and it should become apparent to you.

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1 The Federal Reserve is not part of the Federal Government in the same way Federal Express is not part of the Government. If this seems preposterous to you that a private bank that is owned by persons unknown to even the highest level officials of our “Republic” should wield so much power and be entirely unaccountable to anyone, try to imagine that this same Central Bank system failed 3 times previously in our republics history each time ending with grim consequences for the American people.

What can we little people do about the Federal Reserve? Pt. II

2010-11-13T12:12:00.000-08:00

(Yes, Part 1 has not been posted yet, I will post it soon.)

Learn out lesson? Understand what the Constitution says and demand it of our government? While the Fed is "Independent" which means it is accountable to no one, we on the other hand are dependent upon the Fed as our source of money, credit, and ultimately our very survival.

Well first any Central Bank must be put under the direct authority of Congress. The US Constitution under Article 1, Sec 8 reads...

"The Congress shall have power...To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin..."

What is important to understand is that this is an AUTHORIZATION (giving permission or authority) AND a RESPONSIBILITY (a legal obligation or duty) that is ONLY allowed to the Congress just as it is to provide and maintain a navy, define and punish piracies and felonies committed on the high seas, and borrow money on the credit of the United States. These are exclusive powers and responsibilities of Congress and Congress only which are NOT transferable to any other institution within the federal government, let alone a private cadre of bankers outside the government, and seemingly above the law.

Had this clause of the Constitution read…

“The Congress shall appoint…”, “The Congress shall determine…”, “The Congress shall designate…”, “The Congress shall provide a system by which…”, or anything similar they would be authorized to delegate the authority (and authority only, while retaining in full the responsibility) to whom they preferred.

Moreover, and this is THE REAL CRIME OF CONGRESS the abrogation of this authority and responsibility to an institution that is autonomous, secretive, and unaccountable to the authority of Congress is an anathema to both the text and spirit of the clause.

Whether the Supreme Court wishes to acknowledge this or not makes no difference to the fact that no reasonable mind can deny, the Federal Reserve is an unconstitutional entity and the Courts failure to find it as such only implicates their corruption and collusion.

Never the less, at this point the Fed is a kind of parasitic “symbiot” where the cure may be as bad as the disease. I can find no parallel to our situation in history that does not end badly. Some like the Weimar Republic end “less badly” than others like the fall of Rome which had other serious issues to complicate matters beyond bankruptcy and a broken banking system. However we too have some serious issues of our own with which to contend. One might even look at our illegal immigration problem as being parallel to the Visigoths being allowed within the borders of the Roman Empire prior to its collapse. In short I have no easy answer, and hence my appeal to the Lord God as our only real hope in this life as in the next.

Amusing Ourselves to Death

2010-10-30T12:46:00.001-07:00

Aldous Huxley and George Orwell envisioned the future of mankind in strikingly dissimilar ways, yet resulting in very near the same effect on humanity.

Why so many Divorces?

2010-10-17T08:43:00.000-07:00

A question that needs answering. However, isn’t it obvious that we are too selfish and self centered to have a relationship that is about anything but ourselves. We are fed ridiculous expectations that we will get married and live happily ever after in bliss without interruption, when those expectations are not met, we turn to psychologists and lawyers rather than to each other.

After 40 years of seeding mistrust and divisiveness between the genders it is a wonder there is anyone willing to marry besides the gays, and they are so out of touch with the reality of marriage that they are calling it a RIGHT? How could anyone be called into account in a relationship for abuse or adultery when they were exercising their RIGHT to a marriage, hence self-interested and designing attorneys ensured there were quick and easy no-fault divorce...

Divorce on demand, no reasonable reason necessary, no money down, it's not you it's your spouse, we have the solution call the law firm of Screwup, Yourkids, & Howe, so we can liquidate our share of your dreams!

How foolish is our concept of a "RIGHT" when it takes the consent of another?

How asinine is our concept of marriage when we use it like a disposable lighter?

Is the flame gone, throw it away and get a new one?

Or when adultery is considered to be no ones fault? (Fault a noun meaning - a defect, flaw, blemish, imperfection, deficiency, shortcoming, weak point, weakness, failing, foible, demerit, vice)

How childish is our perspective on relationships when we imagine that Jerry Springer's four sentence monologues at the end of his show offer some deep wisdom or insight?

How twisted is our sense of reality when we call the most unrealistic, perverse, and insane mutations relationships aired on MTV "Reality Shows"?

Like so much of our modern culture, we have accepted the lies as truth because were too afraid to be called intolerant to speak up for principles, to voice objections, or to realize the unbearable damage to the fabric of a society when weaving suspicion between the societies cornerstone, the lifelong commitment between a man and a woman. Reinforcing idiotic notions of what it takes to have a marriage, rewarding an entire profession lucratively for profiting from their Sad* demise, afflicting the children with lifelong emotional scars that will render them unlikely to fair better, and then deluding ourselves that it was "for the best" and consoling the damaged adults "that they can move on to new relationships" (to spread the devastation having learned nothing of their failures in the first).

* Sad – The proper emotion for the experience of divorce. However our society is so twisted we see it as a time to celebrate.

American Moment or Airhead Moment?

2010-09-08T14:13:00.000-07:00

"We are advancing America's interests and making progress on some of our most pressing challenges," Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said in her September 8th speech to the Council on Foreign Relations.

She failed to site any specifics to bolster her proclamation, which was a wise decision by her speechwriters, namely because there is nothing tangible to substantiate the claim.

The Secretary added, "Today we can say with confidence that this model of American leadership works, and that it offers our best hope in a dangerous world."

Just another nebulous edict supported by air. What “model of American leadership” is the Secretary speaking about? Democracy? An overbearing executive branch? Obama’s brain trust? A black man in the White House? What?

While the Secretary of State boldly proclaims, “We will seize this new moment of opportunity this new American Moment.”

I think Madam Secretary should take a moment and do a reality check…

The haphazard and half-hearted “withdrawal” from Iraq has left many questioning the President’s judgment. Although claiming that combat operations for the US are over, there remains 50,000 (evidently “non-combat”) troops in Iraq.
The aimless war in Afghanistan drags on with no foreseeable end or even concrete objectives in sight.
While the American people demonstrated their willingness to go to war over fictitious weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, the administration has overtly failed when it comes to real weapons of mass destruction right next door in Iran.
The administration foreign policy has had no discernable impact on the really scary North Korean program to develop nuclear weapons.
The endless stand-off in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict remains deadlocked.

In true Obama Administration style, she speaks a substantial amount with no substance of which to speak.

Me vs. Hawking

2010-09-03T08:30:00.000-07:00

Stephen Hawking says universe not created by God

In his new book, Stephen Hawking reiterates that there is no big gap in the scientific account of the big bang. The laws of physics can explain, he says, how a universe of space, time and matter could emerge spontaneously, without the need for God. And most cosmologists agree: we don't need a god-of-the-gaps to make the big bang go bang. It can happen as part of a natural process. A much tougher problem now looms, however. What is the source of those ingenious laws that enable a universe to pop into being from nothing?
Adam Gabbatt The Guardian, Thursday 2 September 2010

First, allow me to say that I have nothing but respect for Doctor Hawking, the man who today fulfills the office once occupied by Sir Isaac Newton among other intellectual giants. His intellect has been a subject of wonder to me since I first read his A Brief History of Time, (Bantam Press) in 1988 and moreover when I began to understand what I had read roughly a decade later. In this spirit of respect I must regretfully and humbly disagree with this preeminent genius and arguably the smartest man on the planet. To Doctor Hawkins I offer my apology and the following polemic.

What specific, distinguishable empirical prediction deriving from his hypothesis will be disconfirmed if Dr. Hawking is wrong? That is, if Dr. Hawking's assertion is that God isn't necessary for the existence of the universe, how could that hypothesis be falsified empirically?

If it can't be---if, in other words, every observation deriving from Dr. Hawking's hypothesis is also consistent with the contrary hypothesis that God is in fact necessary for the universe's existence, is it not the case that Dr. Hawking's hypothesis fails to meet the criteria for being a genuinely scientific one?

Are the laws of physics made of matter/energy? If not, how can they affect matter/energy?
Where did the universe-generating laws come from?

It strikes me that Dr. Hawking is trading on his reputation as a scientist to make a non-scientific claim.

Another thing I'd say is that he uses the term 'laws of physics' without seeming to be familiar with the large amount of revision that such terms have undergone in both the history of and contemporary debates in the philosophy of science. For a taste see this short paper by Nancy Cartwright [PDF format] to the contentious debate regarding the concept of laws of nature.

Whatever else God is, God isn't a physically observable entity. The concept of God is the concept of an infinite mind.

The infinity of divine mind ensures that we cannot observe it as if it were a physical object. But in fact, God shares the property of being physically unobservable with all minds.

I find it ironic that some scientists are driven to posit an infinity of unobservables so as to avoid positing one unobservable infinite. I mean, if you're committed to verificationism, what's the point of positing a vast number of entities which we cannot observe nor have any causal interactions with? But the point I'd make is that there is no way string physics or any other physics can avoid positing an unobservable, infinite reality of some sort. Let me explain why.

Let's suppose that string physics, or some other development in physics, becomes scientifically established, and is shown to entail a Multiverse. Immediately we'd want to know, if we're curious about it, why there is any such thing as this physics, and why there is any such thing as a Multiverse. Well, there are two ways to go at this point.
One way is to say that the ultimate physics governing the universe will turn out to be in some way logically necessary, and that this necessity follows from the mathematics exhibiting it. But how would this ultimate theory establish the validity of mathematical reason itself…the very mathematical reason that underlies and is used to establish the ultimate theory of physical reality? After all, the construction of the theory would be presupposing the validity of the mathematical reasoning involved, and it would be suggesting that mathematical reason is valid not only for this universe, but for the multiverse as a whole. So where mathematical reason itself comes from is one issue.

A second issue is: why would this universally valid Mathematical Reason be such as to instantiate anything in physical reality, not least ourselves, who can appreciate and grasp and understand it? Or to put it another way, why is there something (even just this multiverse-generating mathematics), rather than nothing at all? Hawking famously asked why the equations would go to the bother of making anything like a universe, and one could ask the same thing about the string (or whatever) equations that make a Multiverse. Why, in other words, would the equations be self-instantiating in physical reality? Maybe you'd need another equation for that.... which at some point in this regress just has to be there eternally, instantiating the other equations, etc.

But then one would seem to be left with the choice of either theism, or a form of mathematical Platonism, and in either case, one would be positing a non-physical unobservable something as being responsible for both the multiverse and our reasoning about it. Moreover, mathematics itself is an infinite (abstract) structure. And it's physically invisible. (Cf. God)

The trouble with Platonism as an account of reason is that if the Platonic entity itself is suitably to be grasped by mind, then it's deeply puzzling why it should not be essentially and intimately connected with mind (or intellect, or consciousness) in the first place, and in fact actually just be the content of a mind, or intellect, or consciousness. We never encounter Platonic entities as freestanding objects---they are always encountered as contents of minds. But this suggests an infinite mental content, such as mathematics is, would need an infinite mind, or intellect, or consciousness to comprehend it, and be the content of.

There is perhaps a way around this problem, though. And that is to invoke once again the principle of natural selection. This is the second option (the aforementioned Platonism being the first.) The second option would go like this: We get this universe because it is naturally selected for us within a multiverse. And we get the multiverse described by the equations of string theory (or whatever the final theory is) because it is naturally selected within a multiverse of multiverses. And we get the multiverse of multiverses because it is naturally selected by a multiverse of multiverses of multiverses.... And so on, ad infinitum. But either way, you have to end up positing a physically unobservable infinite. Either, Mathematical Reason (Platonistically conceived). Or, an infinity of universes/multiverses.

But the point of going this route was to avoid having to posit a physically unobservable infinite (God). But it seems to me that point turns out to be self-defeating.

A coda to this result is that there is a good argument for thinking that order must be primitive at some level and cannot all be the result of natural selection. Here it is in a nutshell:

1. For natural selection to work at all, it must work upon some domain.
2. To identify any domain whatsoever in the first place, science must find order of some kind pertaining to that domain.
3. Hence, every domain upon which natural selection is to operate must already be ordered in some way.
4. Hence, natural selection cannot be the sole explanation of order in nature, unless one posits an infinite unobservable or an infinity of unobservables, which defeats the purpose of relying on natural selection in the first place, which was to explain phenomena without positing anything infinite and/or unobservable.

Some order, at some level of scientific analysis, must be primitive. It can't all be generated by natural selection. Or else, one must posit an infinity of some kind, which by definition must be physically unobservable by finite scientists.

Now a word about Ockham’s Razor.

The Ockham’s Razor principle says, 'Don't multiply entities beyond necessity.' Ok, to explain the perceived order of the universe, the proponents of a multiverse posit trillions upon trillions of additional entities---additional universes, or additional universe-regions (beyond the limits of what we observe). Theists, posit one additional entity. So prima facie theism is more ontologically economical.

Notice that both sides see the positing of something beyond what we observe as being necessary to explain the order inherent in what we do observe. Theists hold that because that order is intrinsically intelligible to mathematical reason, and because mathematical reason is essentially an attribute of rational mind, inference to an ultimately mind-like reality is more probable than either a materialist or Platonist alternative. But notice that all three worldviews posit something invisible and infinite to explain order:

1) God
or
2) A Platonic Mathematical Realm (which must contain at least as infinite a number of abstract entities as mathematics itself)
or
3) A Realm of Universes or Universe-Regions with no fixed or determinable upper limit on their number

As between these three alternatives, Ockham's Razor either cannot by itself decide since there are serious countability issues with all three, or else favors theism. (Aquinas has technical reasons to do with God not belonging to a genus or species and with God's existence being identical with God's essence, for not regarding God as a being and therefore not being strictly speaking a countable type of reality.)

My argument in this respect in purely defensive rather than positive; that is, my argument has been not to rely on Ockham's Razor, but simply to reject the claim that it favors the non-theistic alternatives. Because it does not! In other words, if you're going to appeal to Ockham, there's no reason to think that theism does badly in that regard. On the contrary. But my argument actually doesn't rely on it, it simply says all three worldviews are either on a par, Ockham-wise, or, if anything, theism is better, Ockham-wise.

Theism also does a better job in my view because it's better suited to account for consciousness, rationality, morality, aesthetics, and religious experience. A materialist multiverse can't account for any of that if materialism in the philosophy of mind is false. I am persuaded that it is false for reasons advanced by the likes of Saul Kripke and David Chalmers . And I prefer theism to Platonism since there's no good Platonist theory of causation, whereas we know that there are causally active minds.

So theism, as an a deductive inference , that is, an inference to a transcendent Mind as being the best explanation for cosmic order (as well the existence of consciousness, reason, morality, aesthetic value, religious experience and spirituality, etc.), strikes me as at least as, indeed more plausible than either a mysterious realm of impersonal mathematical laws and equations, or the apotheosis of meaningless, purposeless ontological extravagance represented by the Multiverse.

But notice in any case that all three notions…God, the Platonic Realm, and the Multiverse—are notions of an unobservable infinite.

" For Ockham, the only truly necessary entity is God; everything else, the whole of creation, is radically contingent through and through."

My Ten Rules

2010-08-21T08:08:00.000-07:00

A diversion into wisdom accumulated at great personal expense…

1. Never compromise on principles.

Nothing is more important than our principles. They are not mere guidelines or general precepts to be fudged when they become inconvenient or cumbersome. Principles are the guard rails in the journey of life. Principles can only be based on natural and moral Once we begin to negotiate on matters of principle we begin the decent into chaos. "God... has formed us moral agents... that we may promote the happiness of those with whom He has placed us in society, by acting honestly towards all, benevolently to those who fall within our way, respecting sacredly their rights, bodily and mental, and cherishing especially their freedom of conscience, as we value our own."^[1]

2. Test your limits.

This is life and in life there are very few certainties outside of the realm of realms of physics and mathematics. One certainty that you can count on is risk. There is an degree of danger in nearly everything we do from eating breakfast in the morning to driving home from work. Risk is inherent in life. The other certainty is that no matter how careful one is eventually the life expectancy of everyone drops to zero. I can not think of a single individual who bettered themselves or the human species without sticking their neck out. If you spend a good part of your day thinking about how to avoid risk, you are more likely lulling yourself into an illusion of safety that is far more dangerous than acknowledging inherent risk.

3. Understand that people seldom think outside their own heads.

People generally assume that everyone thinks just like they do. What we believe we naturally imagine others will believe. A thief will assume everyone else is stealing. A liar will always deduce that others are untrustworthy. A cheat will take for granted that everyone is a fraud.

4. Worry is pointless.

My father used to say, “Worry is interest paid on a debt not due”. He was right because all the worry in the world accomplishes nothing except cause stress. Actions make things happen and if you are not prepared to take action, then you obviously do not care about whatever it is to worry. Either, take action to defuse the situation your worrying about, or move on to your next order of business.

5. Deeds not words.

Leave the mangling of words to the lawyers and politicians. When the silence returns their words leave no trace. Let your accomplishments stand as monuments of irrefutable truth and manifest wisdom.

6. Never expect life to be fair.

Life isn't fair. Limit your use of the word fair to board games and a description of the weather. Each of us are born with different talents and limitations as humans. Accept this as a fact of life for the simple reason that it is a fact. Exploit your talents to the utmost in order to minimize your shortcomings.

7. Solve your own problems.

Never focus on problems as problems are and always will be problems. You can become bogged down and easily overwhelmed when you think in terms of problems. Only allow yourself to think in terms of long term solutions.

8. Be quick to decide.

General George S. Patton said: "A good plan violently executed today is far and away better than a perfect plan tomorrow."

9. Focus on matter of significance.

Once you determine what is significant, you have also determined by exclusion that which is insignificant. Focusing your energy becomes much easier and productive when you pick your battles in this way.

10. Keep a sense of humor.

This is how we light a candle rather than curse the darkness. I subscribe to the theory that "We're not here for a long time; we're here for a good time." If you are not having a good time, you are doing something wrong. Count your blessings and be thankful for them.

References, Notations, and Other Accoutrements

1. Thomas Jefferson to Miles King, 1814. ME 14:197

Maybe They Are Just Hairless Descendants of Apes…

2010-08-14T12:37:00.000-07:00

I often encounter a significant quantity of disapprobation from intellectuals, academics, and even one highly respected bus mechanic about my belief in Creationism. Invariably, these disciples of Darwinian’s theory on origin of species will explain to me, in the manner one would speak to a severely mentally challenged child, that Darwinian evolution is the only educated, enlightened, credible, and most importantly “scientific” principle available. Their eyes filled with compassion for the poor boy who has been misguided by fairy tales of God sitting on a mountain, or in the clouds, or someplace, somewhere, out there.

It’s not that I don’t recognize a back-handed insult when I have been slapped with one, but this is when I start smirking in a nearly futile attempt to hold back hysterical laughter. I do this out of respect, because I know that they have spent a great deal of time, money, and effort in the accumulation of knowledge, however erroneous it may be, and I do not wish to offend their fragile sensibilities. My silent reaction are often misinterpreted as an open door through which the concerned evolutionist can begin shoveling more of their erudite concepts. Perhaps the will assume the worst of me and begin with something like,

“You do realize that there are more than four basic elements of Earth, Air, Fire, and Water, right?”

“Well, of course I do! There are your solids, liquids, and gases which make up the seven food groups! I can read the sides of the cereal boxes too as I ‘m drooling back into my bowl of Captain Crunch”.

My tactic of ignorant indignation cannot hold up and I give myself away here every time.While I am relieved that they did not begin with,

“Do you believe in Zeus, the Easter Bunny, and Santa Clause as well?”

To which my only recourse is to act out wildly tearing at my clothes and screaming, “Blasphemy! Blasphemy! Blasphemy!” Needless to say, I’m a lot of fun at symposiums after a couple cocktails, or at least was until they took my name off the guest lists in 11 states and Canada. The scientific community is highly educated to the point of elitist, this vast intellectual burden makes relating to those of us who possess merely average comprehension a tedious bunch with which to communicate. Imagine the frustration of trying to instill the concept of equality in a pack of sled dogs whose every instinct runs counter to an egalitarian system. The scientist would avoid such a foolishness endeavor, while I might give it a try. After several hours of aggravation and disgruntlement the dogs will lose patience with my baffling antics allowing me the respite to delude myself into the illusion of having made progress.

Speaking of progress, the theory of Darwinian evolution is based on the twin pillar hypotheses of universal common ancestry and natural selection. Darwin describes the his hypothesis of universal common ancestry, the theory that all life on the planet originated from a single or very few primordial life forms in his On the Origin of Species in this way,

"There is a grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one" ^[1]

Personally, I see no conflict what so ever between and great harmony within much of Darwin’s assertion and that of the Genesis account aside from the mater of quantities. I would go so far as to say that Moses, assuming that Moses is in fact the author of Genesis, could not have described Creation better in a single sentence other than the one the author used,

“And Jehovah Elohim formed Man, dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and Man became a living soul.” ^[2]

Darwin never addresses the existence or absence of a deity which, “…originally breathed into a few forms or into one.” Darwin is describing the process to the best of his understanding at the time, which is no more advanced, educated, enlightened, credible, or scientific than the description found in the Genesis account. Now, who is acting out wildly tearing at their clothes and screaming, “Blasphemy! Blasphemy! Blasphemy!”

Darwin was a credit to science in that he was far more open to reason than most of the scientific community and other religious zealots, who cannot for a moment entertain that there theory on Creation of life on this planet may not be complete or even remotely correct. Several times over he presents his theory being incomplete and at points leaves open critical flaws that would discount his theory all together. One such point is his addressing the question posed by the sudden (rather than evolutionary) appearance of life in the Cambrian,

“The case at present must remain inexplicable; and may be truly urged as a valid argument against the views here entertained. To show that it may hereafter receive some explanation, I will give the following hypothesis. From the nature of the organic remains which do not appear to have inhabited profound depths, in the several formations of Europe and of the United States; and from the amount of sediment, miles in thickness, of which the formations are composed, we may infer that from first to last large islands or tracts of land, whence the sediment was derived, occurred in the neighbourhood of the now existing continents of Europe and North America. The same view has since been maintained by Agassiz and others. But we do not know what was the state of things in the intervals between the several successive formations; whether Europe and the United States during these intervals existed as dry land, or as a submarine surface near land, on which sediment was not deposited, or as the bed on an open and unfathomable sea.” ^[3]

There has yet to be a satisfactory answer to the inexplicable case life suddenly appearing in wide diversity and without evidence of the simpler progenitors required by natural selection or the interim species . However, the ability to present a valid argument against the evolution, universal common ancestry, or the process of natural selection has been silenced as blasphemy. The hypothesis of evolution called a theory is taught as a law of science and all else is discounted as primitive mythos. However science works by some very specific definitions and anything that does not conform to these definitions is NOT science…

Fundamental Definitions Used in Science ^[4]

A hypothesis - A supposition or proposed explanation made on the basis of limited evidence as a starting point for further investigation

A theory - A supposition or a system of ideas intended to explain something, esp. one based on general principles independent of the thing to be explained
Law - A statement of fact, deduced from observation, to the effect that a particular natural or scientific phenomenon always occurs if certain conditions are present: the second law of thermodynamics.

True science is the endless asymptotic pursuit of the truth. True science does not summarily dismiss a theory or hypothesis because a scientist does not wish it to be true, or disapproves of the implications incumbent with the theory or hypothesis. True science does not promote that which is theory or hypothesis as being more than theoretical or hypothetical.

A few hundred years ago the unexplored edges of mariners maps were marked with a stark warning “Here Be Dragons and Sea Monsters” along with a graphic illustration to impress upon the imprudent or illiterate sailor the dreadful disemboweling he was in for should he continue on his ill advised course.^[5] It is the purview of science to boldly venture on course in spite of the warnings, fears, and inherent disemboweling no matter how dreadful. When the scientific community acts to stifle the diligent and unbiased exploration of the unknown, the constituent members cease to be scientists and become dogmatic zealots.

When science acts on consensus, collusion, and conspiracy as tools to curtail the full realm of possibilities rather than explore them, it ceases to be science and becomes unreasoning fanaticism based on irrational fears. This is the antithesis of science. One need only look to the very recent history in the educated, enlightened, credible, and most importantly “scientific” principle of global warming being driven by CO₂ emissions to illustrate the potential for abuse. So many distinguished academics and researchers holding impeccable credentials agreeing on a thoroughly examined and exhaustively documented theory were invariably wrong in their initial premise. In the past CO₂ has never been a determining factor in temperature change, and there is no evidence to support that it is now.^[6]

The Vice-President and former Presidential candidate Al Gore was, and probably still is, convinced that the “Dragons and Sea Serpents” of global warming were just ahead when he said,

“Two thousand scientists, in a hundred countries, engaged in the most elaborate, well organized scientific collaboration in the history of humankind, have produced long-since a consensus that we will face a string of terrible catastrophes unless we act to prepare ourselves and deal with the underlying causes of global warming.” ^[7]

We must compile our understanding of the Universe from ALL the evidence at our disposal without prejudice. We must remember that science is not THE TRUTH, but the endless pursuit of it. History, is filled with well established scientific principles found to be without basis. Aristotle and Ptolemy (scientists and academics by any definition) were the proponents of the theory that the Earth was the center of the solar system, yes, even the universe and provided a myriad of calculations and circumstantial evidence to prove their assertions. The Catholic church later adopted the theory widely endorsed by the most learned minds of the day. Head he lived in Aristotle’s and Ptolemy’s time rather than ours, Mr. Gore would conclude “…they have produced long-since a consensus that the Earth is the center of the solar system.”

Very few today recall that Aristotle’s and Ptolemy’s geocentric solar system was all but universally accepted by the scientific community of that time. However, many recall that the Catholic Church’s inhumane treatment of those who did not agree with the accepted, yet fatally flawed, astronomy laid down by the Ancient Greek philosophers. Many forget that the at the time the Catholic Church acted far more as a government and political entity than a Christian denomination. In a hauntingly familiar way that government agencies, environmental groups, and the mainstream media across many countries for over a decade issued reports and documents stating that there is virtually unanimous agreement in the scientific community in support of human-caused global warming. Opponents who disagreed, were ridiculed, censured, had their funding cut, or were dismissed from their positions. This is the modern academic equivalent of an old fashioned witch burnings. We think ourselves so technologically advanced, so enlightened, but even today we certainly behave like the hairless descendants of apes that a consensus of science would have us believe.

References, Notations, and Other Accoutrements

Darwin, C., "The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle For Life", London, John Murrary, (1859) p. 490
Darby Bible Translation, Gen. 2:7
Darwin, C., "The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle For Life", London, John Murrary, (1859) p. 361
The sea serpents thoughts are conjecture based solely on my own wild speculation
“Climate chaos? Don't believe it”, Christopher Monckton, Sunday Telegraph, 05 Nov 2006
Al Gore, speech at National Sierra Club Convention, Sept. 9, 2005

Time Is Cyclical and Truths Are Linear

2010-08-07T14:44:00.000-07:00

“Time is the school in which we all learn, and time is the fire in which we all burn.”

-Delmore Schwartz, American poet

Indeed, man has always had an uneasy and intimate relationship with time. Though we are all currently alive at this exact moment, we may have an entirely different perspective on time. One of us sitting on death row knowing that the earth is careening towards the at a little over 1,040 miles per hour and sunrise this will be will be the last he will witness in this life. Concurrently, just 12 inches of masonry and mortar away sits a man with five consecutive life sentences for crimes, and each day creeps like like a timid animal. In the world outside the prison walls, people rush and scurry through their days without the slightest sign of precaution. We are obsessed with getting to what we imagine to be a better future, and only stop to remember the traumas of the past, and this is where we spend most of our lives although we are and always will be creatures of the present, we the least comfortable in our own space and time. It is a universal human characteristic to find humor in a puppy chasing its tail, perhaps it is that we recognize the symptoms of our own folly. Our pace of life has increased exponentially in the last 100 years, and our children are exhibiting symptoms of stress related disorders and social dysfunctions at alarming rates as a result of stress burden placed upon the society as a whole. All the while we are spinning ever faster in headlong pursuit of completing another cycle, the start and finish of our workday, the beginning and completion of our week at the office, and the reaping and sowing of crops are examples of regular, perhaps even mundane, short term cycles with which we are most familiar. Beyond these tight orbits that are our daily lives in which we chase our tails, are grander cycles with equally predictable results found in the booms and busts of our economies driven by the cycle of the waxing and waning of consumer confidence and bulls and bears that of Wall Street. There are longer cycles beyond these which are familiar to us found in the birth and death of generations, and the innovation and obsolescence of technologies. Beyond lay more wheels within wheels increasingly remote and seemingly removed our individual effect are cycles involving the rise and fall of nations, cycles of intellectual enlightenment and decay, and the warming and cooling of out planet due to yet another oscillation of solar activity. Although predictable in results the specific timing of these remote cycles are far more difficult to discern, only becoming clear through the lens of history. It is this parallax effect which gives us the illusion of time being linear, and that we are moving along between the two points of past and future, without much regard for the point at which we are now in what is the wheel of our cycle.

The Mayans were on to something when they compiled their calendar and almanac which was improved upon and refined from technology passed down to them by the the earlier Zapotec and Olmec civilizations. The design of wheels within wheels in a pattern so complex that we have only recently come to fully understand the amount of technology that went into this precise, not to mention very aesthetically attractive, system. By comparison our modern calendars however practical seem rather rudimentary, even crude to the Mayan craft of calendar design. Our calendar is a tool of scheduling and planning, while theirs was all these thing as well but there was another element of the sacred and mystical. While we tend to discount these aspects as the primitive pantheism of early man, is it so very different from the modern theistic belief found in Psalm 19:1 the prophet David acknowledges that "The heavens declare the glory of God." That is, a thoughtful look into the heavens will reveal something of the wonderful power of the God Who created it all. Then he goes on to explain that this witness to God in creation is perpetual (v.2) and universally understood (vv.3-4). We have excised this element of connection with the Divine from our secular calendar at the expense of seeing the complexity and wonder in the elegant cycles of the Universe and our eternal relationship with it as well as the Divine. Secular humanism wishes to divorce us from these concepts entirely claiming to do so in the name if progress, science, and reason. However, the Mayans were remarkably advanced in many areas some of them surpassing our own, such as their masonry skills, which as one would imagine is a real plus for a people trying to make a living in the stone age.

Their surviving buildings are a testament to this skill each stone having been laid without mortar and with laser like precision so that a sheet of paper cannot be slipped into the joints. This marvelous knowledge was lost to the cycles of time and perhaps human intervention as well. While we possess their calendar, and their stone artifacts, we have no evidence of what became of the Mayans themselves being lost in a cycle time recorded on the calendar left to us. Some very serious and respected “outside of the the box” researchers believe the Mayans possessed considerable aerospace skills as well. As for me, I can only assume that these esteemed scholars may be thinking outside of their minds as well. Another highly developed area of Mayan culture was their criminal code in which the severity of punishment increased the higher the offenders position or status in the society. A laborer who stole a loaf of bread may receive a public lashing, while the kings minister would have been put to death for such a crime. It seems that our justice system in this time of progress, science, and reason applies the opposite theory when a homeless man can get 90 days in jail for theft and Enron's Ken Lay get’s to pass away a very rich man vacationing in Snowmass, Colorado. Our principles claim equal protection under the law, but in application few would agree. However, we have a consensus of agreement among Mayan researchers that one of the most striking mystery’s about the Mayans is they seem to have vanished without leaving so much as a forwarding address at the post office, and there are several theories about how and why they went missing. The theories run the spectrum from (the ever so trendy) climate change, civil war, disease, even or the arrival of a rather rough group of Spaniards moving into the neighborhood. Records left by the Spaniards claim to no information on the Mayans’ fate, but details the retrieval of vast sums of Mayan gold. Yet another cycle well documented in human events, people disappearing without a trace and the last one to see them ending up with their gold. Of course, my money is on the Mayans, seeing the writing was on the wall and that neighborhood was going into decline, decided that all the gold they had been mining was too heavy to transport and opted to pack into their sandstone space ships and left for another planet in search of rising property values.

Body Bags or Puppies

Today we have the benefit of access to information that both the Spaniards and Mayans could not fathom. In their time, information was precariously stored on a limited hand written media and physically transported with difficulty and great expense. Today when I post this article, I will have exercised a transmission of information greater than the sum of that transmitted throughout the entire Mayan empires history with the pressing of the enter button on my keyboard. It is both an astonishing and commonplace occurrence at our level technological sophistication. However, along with every advancement of technology there are always inherent and often unforeseen hazards. While information can allow us the luxury of checking our favorite baseball teams progress in losing yet another years shot at the World Series, it can just as easily transmit a series of digits across the world to less favored team of individuals in Nigeria with a much better shot of scoring your checking account. Information in vast quantities can overload the human minds ability to interpret and vet it properly resulting in dangerous conditions, an experience known to fighter pilots as data overload. American politics are a perfect example of streaming data that is nearly impossible to understand. There are so many issues, estimates, projections, promises, denouncements, discussions, denials, claims, contingencies, debates, scandals, threats, crises, convictions, bail-outs, budget overruns, censures, committees, subcommittees, summits…STOP! Information is a double edged sword in that false information can be transferred as effortlessly as true information, and with so much more of it fly out of just Washington, D.C., it takes a great deal of time and effort to figure it all out. Being buried in information is no different than being bereft of information, it leaves you unable to make critical decisions and take proper actions when necessary, and the grand ubiquitous cycles of time will not wait for us to sort it all out. Politicians are well aware of this, and our government is exceedingly good at manipulating data to its advantage. We win wars more on the blade of our information technologies than our metallurgy, ballistics, or chemistry. Our primary targets are command and control elements for the obvious reason that an army without the a chain of command or orders is, if they are lucky, a group waiting for a comfy set of zip tie handcuffs and an all inclusive vacation at a Geneva Convention resort. Those less fortunate will be leaving behind only their unsightly remains to be aired on the prime time news, but again the government has command and control in mind. Military censors, like smart bombs for digital images, intercepted the footage and classify it as too graphic. Thus avoiding the embarrassment of the footage being seen by the average American while having a lovely evening meal with the family. The politicians and military know thanks to that very same information technology that you should not see the amazingly effective, although not necessarily glamorous ways, we kill an astounding amount of human beings in your name and on your tax dollars in less time than it have taken you to vomit up that lovely roast your wife made had you seen the video. I’m sure you will see what a blessing information technology and command and control strategy can be when your trying to gain and maintain popular support for a war and keep your supper down. In this case, all you see is an embedded reporter in her early thirties talking about a surgical strike which resulted in the anonymous although deserved deaths of four enemy combatants, and the rescue of a puppy named “Skipper”. Aw, Look at the puppy daddy!

As a government for and by the people, we have a duty to and responsibility for what this government does because we put them in that position of public trust and they act in our name. It is our duty and responsibility to determine fact from fiction when it comes to our political leaders, the ones who make the momentous decisions that effect not only us such as raising the gasoline tax, but our future generations like engaging in war, a decision which if made imprudently can eliminate the possibility all future generations. Separating truth from lies, good information from bad information, and between facts and puppy named “Skipper” is not as difficult as it first may seem when you use the cyclical nature of time, nature, and history as a lens through which to interpret all information. It is your duty and responsibility to educate yourself on current issues, and look for similar issues discussed by the this nations Founding Fathers in their day. While some will try to dissuade you because, “timers have changed”, we know that only the date has changed, but the fundamentals of human nature, power, virtue, valor, and corruption remain unchanged since long before the Mayans noted the cyclical nature of time. War is still war and it has the same consequence as it had 230 or 2,300 years ago, death and destruction. Our family relations are the same, parents are imperfect but love their children, and worry for them. Money was tough to come by, unless you were a remarkably lucky Spaniard. People were concerned with crime, but there were also a lot of decent people out there if you knew how to pick them. The Founder's focused on universal truths, many in politics today will deny there are any such things as universal truths. They live in world of relativism where the standards of right and good are malleable almost fluid. Take a look at the difference between these two American political documents of historic value. We have the Constitutions of the United Sates, the document which breathed life into what we know as America today, it instituted the greatest nation on earth.

Declaration of Independence

Declares an Act of Revolution against the greatest empire of the time in a specific, succinct, and philosophically moving document.
Introduces new vibrant political theories

Constitution and Bill of Rights

A powerful bicameral legislature with a House and a Senate
An executive chosen by The People
A judiciary, with life-terms of service and appointed by the executive
Check’s and Balances
States rights and Limits
An Amendment process
Declares Federal Powers
The Ratification Process
Enumerates Ten Specific inviolate civil rights
Freedom of Religion, Speech, and Press
Protection from illegal search and Seizure

Vs.

HR 3962 Affordable Health Care for America

Creates yet another wasteful, unproductive, and exceedingly costly leviathan government bureaucracy with invasive powers, unaccountable to voters and those are to whom they are to provide services
This legislation empowers the executive branch, namely the Secretary of Health and Human Services and a “Health Choices Commissioner,” to write thousands of pages of regulations, and to force Americans to comply with them
Creates 111 new boards, committees, programs, and other bureaucratic encumbrances
The bill amends the Public Health Service Act by granting new powers to the Secretary of Health and Human Services
A text search of the bill reveals more than one hundred instances of language such as “the Secretary shall determine.”

One of these two sets of documents contains the quintessential and brilliant works of a group of passionate, freedom loving, educated, and visionary men who were constructing a system that they would live in and bequeath to their posterity.

The other is something else.

WikiLeaks, The Last Free Press

2010-07-31T08:25:00.000-07:00

What is WikiLeaks?

WikiLeaks is a multi-jurisdictional public service designed to protect whistleblowers, journalists and activists who have sensitive materials to communicate to the public. Since July 2007, we have worked across the globe to obtain, publish and defend such materials, and, also, to fight in the legal and political spheres for the broader principles on which our work is based: the integrity of our common historical record and the rights of all peoples to create new history.

Freedom of the Press now considered an Act of Treason?

While the mainstream media in the United States and throughout much of the world has abandoned journalism in favor of some form of Jerry Springeresque entertainment format and become little more than the propaganda department of the national statists and globalists agendas. Some may claim that their journalism is unbiased and pulls no punches when it comes to reporting the facts, however the arena in which they are throwing the punches is maintained within the narrow confines that the White House draws for them. There is a well defined “appropriate” avenue of news where the main stream media presents their grand theater for the American publics consumption, entertainment, and endless bickering over marginal or even fabricated issues.

As a litmus test of how the main stream media has become the governments lap dog, we need only ask yourself “When was the last time U.S. Intelligence planned to destroy CNN, FOX, ABC, CBS, or MSNBC?” None to my knowledge, however WikiLeaks has been targeted just a few months ago. How odd, the “Home of the Free” and “Land of the Brave” using its military might to silence the Free Press. Well, I suppose the Constitution only says,

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press…”

Gee, the Founding Fathers could not possibly have foreseen the depraved, debased, corrupt individuals that we have elected to “represent” us since the Founders neglected to specifically preclude dropping laser guided bombs it or a Tomahawk missile strike.

In my daily interaction with people I come into contact with no less than 25-30 people every day and I have yet to find one who is even aware of the United States being implicated in war crimes in Afghanistan. This is not a Bush thing or a Cheney thing this is Our Thing! We are a nation with a government “For and by the People” supposedly, and as such the world sees any actions taken by Our government as actions condoned by the American People.

To complicate matters We have allowed Our government to control us through the propaganda network previously described to blind us to the actions Our government is taking in Our names. This is an outrage, it is criminal, and We must put a stop to it NOW!

US Accused of War Crimes in Afghanistan

Thomas Jefferson on the importance of Freedom the Press…

"To preserve the freedom of the human mind... and freedom of the press, every spirit should be ready to devote itself to martyrdom; for as long as we may think as we will and speak as we think, the condition of man will proceed in improvement."

- Thomas Jefferson to William Green Munford, 1799.

"The basis of our governments being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. But I should mean that every man should receive those papers and be capable of reading them."

- Thomas Jefferson to Edward Carrington, 1787. ME 6:57

The Zeitgeist Movement

2010-07-27T07:24:00.000-07:00

I have been asked by one of my acquaintances to render my opinion on the Zeitgeist Movement and while I will not berate anyone who believes in the lofty ideals that this group claims to promote, I question their pragmatism in attaining these lofty goals. If I had a magic wand that could make these things happen in the bold and revolutionary manner that they project, I would be inclined to wave it right now. I am no fan of the status quo, but massive, radical universal changes in society seldom if ever results in positive results. I am bereft of even one example in history where a populist Utopian group, which is what the Zeitgeist Movement is, has ever delivered a net positive benefit once their theories are implemented. To the contrary history is rife with many horrific, shameful, and grotesque abominations from those who promised heaven on earth.

However, when you come down from the fuzzy emotional high of the Zeitgeist Movement Guide, the Where We Are Now, and the Where We Are Going videos you must soberly ask yourself, "What are the implications of this movements ethos?" Let’s take a look at just the first four…

1. Conserving all the world's resources as the common heritage of all of the Earth’s people.

How do we define a “resource”? How do we define “conservation”? Who will establish these definitions? What will be the manner in which conflicts will be resolved when someone disagrees with these very basic definitions? If I ask 10 people to define these things I will get 10 different answers. Ants do hive mentality exceptionally well! Humans do not…so well.

2. Transcending all of the artificial boundaries that separate people.

Again the ideal sounds wonderful, it is the implementation that gets messy. Which are “artificial” boundaries and which are “real” boundaries? Are the walls of your home a real boundary? One might say “No, you built that boundary.” While others might argue, “Yes, that wall is the boundary of your privacy to which you are entitled.”

3. Evolving from a monetary-based economy to a resource-based world economy.

This appears to conflict with #1, people spend and waste money like mad even in the most resource destitute nations on earth. Take a look at the Saudi family, the Sultan of Brunei, or the Cali cartel in South America. How do we “conserve” the “common heritage of all the Earth’s people” when those who have ready access to the resources decide they want to “over utilize” the resource while those who have little access to them. As an example, fresh water is not equally distributed around the planet. The Great Lakes are a vast wealth of fresh water, how do we ensure that people in sub-Saharan Africa are not cheated of their share?

4. Reclaiming and restoring the natural environment to the best of our ability.

First we must establish that humans are unnatural, otherwise anything that we do becomes by definition natural as well. I think termites are destructive and methodically wreck havoc on forests with machine like precision, but I would be hard pressed to convince anyone that they are unnatural. There is a vast and deep chasm between what constitutes ecologically responsible behavior and Neo-pagan Druidism.

It seems to me that any one of these first four ideals establish the grounds for global warfare more than anything resembling the placid idyllic future the Zeitgeist Movement envisions. I don’t mean to sound pessimistic about the future of mankind, because I am not. It is said that the wise learn from their mistakes; however I believe that those we revere as brilliant remembered best the lessons of history and chose not to repeat them.

I hear the Zeitgeist Movements’ visionary promises of efficiency, plenty, and equality. I see the Great Leap Forward and at a cost of 30 to 40 million lives.
I hear the Zeitgeist Movements’ call to promises of efficiency, plenty, and equality I see the killing fields of Khmer Rouge.
I hear them convincingly explain how they have finally figured out how we as a species can all work together in freedom, peace, and prosperity… after 4.3 million years but how many times have we heard that before? The Sumerian, Macedonia, Egyptians, Persians, Chinese all had, at least for a little while, civilizations that were unparalleled and seemed sure bets.

Even an illiterate nomadic boy from the steeps of central Asia devised a simple and highly effective plan for making us all one happy family and nearly succeeded. He mounted his horse in the east and as he rode west he (and 200,000 of his best friends) kill all the men and impregnate all the women.

While we can recognize today through the perfect clarity of hindsight that all these great civilizations built their citadels using the blood of the conquered for mortar, this was not always the case. There were those few noble champions who came to do God’s work. Charlemagne brought the sword and the promise of redemption through Our Lord Jesus Christ to all his vanquished.While many say Mohammad never flew into or out of Jerusalem via angels, the opposition say the Muslims took Jerusalem by the will of Allah, but one thing is certain Godfrey of Bouillon made them give it back. Godfrey being renowned for his piety then demonstrated Christian love and charity by butchering tens of thousands of defenseless Muslims who had committed the mortal sin of surrendering to him. Hey… it was what God wanted, right? No… all was the acts of man, and man alone.

Jerusalem and her inhabitants play the part of a political football with the score being kept in misery, privation, and death. After nearly 1100 years of overtime in this genocidal match the offensive play book is well known to us all. The Romans killed the Germans, the Germans killed the Jews, the Jews killed the Arabs, and the Arabs killed the hostages…and that’s the news. Goodnight. I do not see the Zeitgeist Movement bringing a resolution to this, even though their intentions may be as pure as the driven snow. One of our species long standing handicaps is that our GREATEST CAUSES lose sight of their affect. Whether this is the result of some endemic character flaw in us or ravenous egos gorging on their own success and fearing the return to obscurity, a more tacit form of neglect as we ride the wave of mob mentality, or maybe it is easier to be a monsters than to confront the suffering you have loosed upon those you only wanted to help.

As I have said before I am not accusing the Movements rank and file or even their leadership of planning such atrocities or of clandestinely plotting global hegemony. If such machinations do exist within their leadership, I sat let them have at a crack at it. Their eventual downfall may illustrate my point and hopefully stand as a warning to others that those who disregard the lessons of history do so at their own peril and on average several million other human beings who had the misfortune to be caught in the middle.
I have all he respect for their ideals, and their bravery for speaking out in a time when so many are apathetic the suffering of their fellow man. I understand their wanting to somehow fix these hapless, hopeless, and sometimes horrific creatures…we…Humanity. We are beyond doubt irrevocably broken at our core, but before they done the mask and surgical gloves to remove our afflictions… they should remember that far more important than the hope and promise of panacea is the duty to do no harm.

As for myself, I believe that there are other less radical more prudent paths to that bright future we all seek. My paths are not as glamorous as the photos depicting the Movements vision of an ultra-modern archeology society. However, I feel confident that by virtue of being less radical experimental, and theoretical pose a better chance of success and moreover pose less risk that in our tinkering we do not , as Peter Gabriel would say, shock the monkey. We are very fortune, in that we have the ability to change when our survival depends on it. We are cursed because we rarely recognize when extinction is looming at our door. We are fools because we jump like to absurd action when Chicken Little shouts, “The sky is falling!” We are noble because as we have strived to lived boldly together on this unique pretty blue sphere, we envision a better place for those who will come after us, and then we will lay our burdens down, we return to the ground from once we rose. Therefore, since my time is short my efforts will focused on tangible returns that produce positive outcomes in the earthly realm of small judiciously chosen battles and leave the grandiose, epic and in my humble opinion ultimately unworkable or potentially harmful Zeitgeist Movement. However I wish them the very best in their bid to create the visionary world of The Jetsons.

The Precious Seed

2010-07-10T16:47:00.000-07:00

These United States of America can not be beaten to any acts of foreign military aggression or international terrorism. For it is more than a nation, a set of geographical borders, or patch of dirt situated between two large oceans, it is the ideal that was planet in the soil and in the hearts and minds of men that is America. So, I do not fear fir our “national security” which today means anything the government doesn’t want anyone to know. To those who would do harm to our property or our countrymen, be they foreign or a traitor within I say, "Let them come!” That Precious Seed of which I spoke will enrich their understanding of the resolve of an American patriot defending his own lands as they enrich our fertile soil supplemented by their blood.

That which made The United States of America great among nations does not reside in edifices such as the World Trade Towers, the Pentagon, or the White House. These are the mere trappings and props of America. ,During the War of 1812, nearly all public buildings in Washington, D.C. were burned to the ground and we remained undaunted, suffering little more than a bruised sense of national pride. Considering that when sufficiently annoyed, we have been known to put our own buildings to the torch as an expression of our discontent, so what can these things if stone, steel, or timber mean to us?

That which made The United States of America golden by the tarnish of past errors, such as slavery, racism, or the continuing treasons and crimes of the rogues who occupy our government’s capitol. The British occupied every American city of consequence and controlled vastly superior forces both numerically and in quality during the Revolutionary War, yet much to their consternation they were defeated. The Precious Seed cannot be conquered by force of arms, only surrendered or abandoned by those who fail to comprehend its incalculable value.

I know there are those who see America as a land of greed, a land of excess, a land without values, but I say that the are looking to the wrong place if they are looking elsewhere but in the heart of those Americans who understand the concepts inherent in principles such as,

Inalienable Rights
Consent of the Governed
Right and Duty of Revolution
Individual Human Rights
Rule of Law over the arbitrary divine right of kings

Our nobles are noble ideas, rather than the degenerate products of inbreeding. However, we have taken ill with an of insidious and progressive infection of amnesia about the principles and values that embodied in all virtue, every dream, and each prayer that the children of God whispered into His ear since perhaps the first time our reason was corrupted by madness. Then it was the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge and it the false promises of Godlike power. Today it is the false promises of security, safety, prosperity, protection, equality, convenience, affordable health care, and the countless other cradle to grave provisions for your wellbeing…all for the paltry price of relinquishing EVERYTHING that made us worth a nickel more than other patch of dirt on the planet be it Eden or Hades.We must atone for our relapse and answer the clarion call to protect The Precious Seed of Liberty or perish from the face of this earth in defense of it.

When the past no longer illuminates the future, the spirit walks in darkness.

Hypocrisy is Contagious

2010-07-04T09:07:00.000-07:00

“Liberty is the right of every man to be honest, to think and to speak without hypocrisy.” – Jose Marti

Eight years ago we launched ourselves into two extraordinarily stupid wars with no clear objectives or exit strategies. Despite the best efforts of Congress, the White House, the Department of Defense, and the major media outlets to polish these (pardon my expression) “turds”, the wars continue to carry that signature aroma to which we have all become accustomed for far too long. These unpleasantries I expect as par from the quality of individual that lurk about Washington D.C. but what has taken me completely by surprise is that everyone seems to have forgot that these things stunk to high heaven from the start. Many of us knew it but acted upon what they saw as being patriotic duty in support of the troops. Others, still reeling from the attacks of September 11, may have harbored misdirected frustration (coupled with an weak grasp of geography) and assumed the wars were retaliatory. However, I also remember boisterous protests all over the world and in my own little corner of the globe, being Seattle. The suburb of Lake Forest Park had at least weekly protest converge at the intersection of Bothell Way (Rte. 522) and Ballenger Way. Attended by 15 to 20 boisterous idealists getting the message out that these were illegal wars, the machinations of Bush family insiders out to make a few bucks, or just plain old imperialism. Similar protests were fairly common in Seattle’s Pioneer Square or other neighborhood venues.

However; there were no more protests anywhere nearly the instant Bush left office and Obama moved into the White House. If the war was illegal before January 20, 2009, what made it less so the following morning? The conflict surely did not gain legality by virtue of who occupied one public housing unit. Did Imperialism swing back into fashion? Did we make vital changes to ensure that the “correct people” were getting the loot from the military contracts now instead of Bush’s buddies? Defense Secretary Robert Gates was appointed by Bush after Donald Rumsfeld fell from favor in 2006, and is currently retained by Obama as head honcho of our armed forces occupying both Iraq and Afghanistan. What is the deal?

We are still in Iraq eight years after invading a nation that had nothing to do with 9/11, harbored no weapons of mass destruction, and who’s people have had about as much of our Freedom that they can stomach. The good news is the “insurgents” are attacking with far less frequency due to our militaries efficient efforts. The bad news is we have worn out our welcome, assuming we had one in the first place, long ago. Our epic and colossal failure to provide nearly everything we promised the Iraqi people prior to the invasion (with the exception of getting rid if Saddam) thus far may have something to do with this souring relationship. Basic infrastructure such as transportation and utility conditions such as clean water in Baghdad, which are by far the best in the country, are nearly unlivable for the average Iraqi. Many roads are cut off by blast walls 6 meter tall that have transformed neighborhoods and thoroughfares into a maze tiny box canyons to supposedly “protect the residents” from the adjacent prison yard communities. Is it any wonder that the Iraqi’s are handing us our hats, wishing us well, and holding the door open for us to leave? Is it any wonder that the opposition our forces are facing are increasingly the Iraqi people themselves?

I can find no evidence that our overall policies in Iraq have changed with the new Administration, barring a significant decrease in the abuse of prisoners being detained by United States forces thanks to scandalous headlines more than good administration or oversight. As a veteran myself, I know that there were protocols and procedures to be followed like everything else in the military. If the impossible happened and the soldiers guarding the prisoners had neither of these to guide their conduct, then the protocols of the Geneva Convention are there as a guide. Had these stalwart standards well known to every American soldier been applied with a modicum of common sense and maybe a shred or two of basic human decency, then the abuse never would have happened. At the risk of belaboring this point, wasn’t the abuse of prisoners by Saddam one of the primary “reasons” we sited to justify our invading Iraq in the first place?

Still, not a single protest from anyone who was so ardently dedicated to saving lives by standing up doing the right thing even if it was unpopular! I remember one of the protesters telling me that “dissent is the highest form of patriotism” a couple years ago, so where is his patriotism meter hovering now? A better question might be, where the hell is he, right now? Was the Anti-war movement wrapping itself in the flag and punctuated by quotes from the Founder Fathers' just another ploy of party politics being played out on the public stage? It sure seems that way to me. However I think the real problem is that ”Hypocrisy is Contagious“ both parties are acutely infected by it perhaps in different ways but just as terminally contaminated and it’s time to put both of them under strict quarantine before they spread the infection any further.

Please watch the following video and ask yourself:

What were our grounds for pursuing this conflict?
Have those grounds been proven legitimate?
What was our stated objectives in the beginning of this conflict?
Have those objectives been achieved or within reach?
Where are we now in the scale between benevolent liberator and malevolent invader?
How did we get to this point?

YouTube
- Endgame in Iraq

Happy Birthday America!

…now please try to remember who you are.

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politics,YouTube,Endgame,strategies,outlets,idealists,< ,prisoners,,protesters,

Healthcare Reform Wreaks Havoc

2010-06-05T13:24:00.000-07:00

After squandering half of his term in the Oval Office and most of his political influence hammering a healthcare reform bill through Congress that the vast majority of Americans did not want or need, the President blaming anyone but himself for the economy seems absurd. The convoluted healthcare reform is a major factor in the collapse of new business start-ups.

A new survey shows that start-up activity plummeted in the first half of 2010 and that is very bad news for the faltering economic recovery. The willingness of seasoned professionals to strike out on their own is clear indication of their lack of faith in the future of the American economy as well as emphatically shuts down the outlook for productive job creation in the foreseeable future. New business start-ups are the real powerhouse in job creation and offer the greatest potential for upward mobility to the truly talented employees that are lost in the bureaucracy of big firms.

The sweeping health care reform bill signed into law by President Obama last march holds several stark discouragements to would be employers starting new companies. Most notable among these include:

A requirement that companies with 50 or more employees must offer coverage to employees or pay a minimum $40,000 penalty if just a single employee receives a health care tax credit.

Employers who offer coverage but whose employees qualify to receive tax credits will pay $3,000 for each worker receiving a tax credit.

What is keeping even the most aggressive business mavericks on the sidelines is not what they know about the new law, but what is still up in the air. There are hundreds of ambiguous caveats in the law which are left to the “discretion of the Secretary of Health and Human Services” and no one, including the Secretary of Health and Human Services, knows how all those vagaries and variables will impact them.

With many Americans reeling from a 25% decline in their property values or a foreclosure and their consumer credit maxed out, the usual consumer spending savior of the US economy has little hope of coming to the rescue this time. Contrarians who might stick their neck out on a new business venture even with the economy faltering are keeping their heads safely tucked in their shells because Obama’s health care reform is a guillotine.

What Am I?

2010-02-01T06:24:00.000-08:00

“I am to be the man I was sent to become.”

This description about my essence and nature is the most honest, unbiased, and revealing as I can muster without in some way contaminating its consummate purity. Is it definitive, unambiguous, or unequivocal? No, yet it is absolute truth. I am neither Democrat or Republican, I have no vested interest in or against either major political party. I do not base my political opinions upon what is best for me personally (i.e. - religious denomination, union affiliation, racial/ ethnic background, or special interests such as reproductive rights, American Association of Retired Persons, National Organization for Women, etc.)

I am is an American patriot, by the classical standard not the standard affixed to right wing, erroneously labeled “militia groups” by the law enforcement. I am a nationalist, in the sense that I am ardently opposed to “global governance”, however I am well aware that my nation’s government by direct acts act or extension is guilty of many wrongs in both both domestic and foreign affairs, in the past and at present.

It is my belief that all Americas’ past and present problems stem from one common error… Failure to be the nation it was sent to become.
By what standard do I make this assessment? By the ONE AND ONLY SINGLE VALID STANDARD there is… the Original Intent of the Founding Fathers by studying their written documents, letters, opinions, and position papers within their seminal context.

The Nation We Were Sent To Become

These are not ancient national relics to be remembered school tests or passive historical documents to peer at through UV-shielded, bullet-resistant glass, distanced by velour ropes. These documents and the ideas contained therein are your birthright and mine. These writings I describe are current, comprehensive, without equivocation, and succinctly detailing WHO and WHAT WE ARE to become as The United States of America. I implore you to study these texts to their fullness and savor the richness of ideas, the visionary foresight, and intellectual excellence that is nowhere to be found in our politics today.

Your entire outlook on politics may change when you rediscover what we should and must have, rather than what we have settled for as an Free American.

There is something very wrong with this country, isn't there?

2010-01-01T18:21:00.000-08:00

I thought we could mark this New Years Day, by taking some time out of our daily lives to sit down and have a little chat. There are of course those who do not want us to speak. I suspect even now, orders are being passed along by telephones, and men with guns will soon monitoring, documenting, interpreting and logging who visits this blog.

Why?

Because while intimidation and the truncheon may be used in lieu of conversation, words will always retain their power. Words offer the means to meaning, and for those who will listen, the enunciation of truth. And the truth is, there is something terribly wrong with this country, isn't there? Cruelty and injustice in the form of torture inflicted by the hand of the government on defenseless people. Intolerable, no inhuman, things have been done by the authority of this once great and just nation, and most disturbing of all these heinous crimes against humanity, liberty, the rule of law, and our very own Constitution have been committed in our names. And where once we had the freedom to object, to think and speak as you saw fit, you now have censors and systems of surveillance coercing your conformity and soliciting your submission. Where once we had honorable men of conscience as leaders, we now have a consortium of self-interested and self-serving criminals in the employ of special interests that have bought and paid for their allegiance.

How did this happen? Who's to blame? Well certainly there are those more responsible than others, and they will be held accountable, but again truth be told, if you're looking for the guilty, you need only look into a mirror. I know why you did it. I know you were afraid. Who wouldn't be? War, terror, disease, economic uncertainty, technology outpacing our moral maturity to assess the difference between right and wrong, environmental disaster, doomsday harbingers. There were a myriad of problems which conspired to corrupt your reason and rob you of your common sense. Fear got the best of you, and in your panic you turned to a higher authority to sort it all out, our government. They promised you order, they promised you security, and all they demanded in return was your silent, obedient consent.

On this very soil more than 200 hundred years ago a handful great patriots wished to embed forever in our memory that when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.

Today I withdraw my consent, and ask that you join me.

Today I end my silence. Today I sever and dissolve all allegiance with that unconstitutional and illegitimate government, to remind this country of what it has forgotten, to remind the world that fairness, justice, liberty and freedom are more than words, they are perspectives , they are paradigms, they are principles. While politics may be the art of compromise, when we compromise our principles, then we abandon that which those brave few fought so hard and sacrificed so much to give humanity.