By Tom Rhodes, 7/29/2014
Some Facts about the Palestinian Israeli war; If the Palestinians put down their arms today the violence would stop - PERIOD. If the Israeli put down its arms, the Palestinians would eradicate all the Jews. What Israel needs to do is declare WAR. They have the right to defend themselves and should treat Gaza the same as Rome treated Carthage, or the USA treated Japan. Total war with nothing less than complete unconditional surrender as an acceptable end. Screw proportional response, you want the violence to end, decimate the Palestinians in Gaza with such overwhelming force, death, destruction, violence, gore, and suffering, that nobody considers attacking them again.
Jim Croce wrote a couple songs about messing with the wrong person on the South Side of Chicago; “Bad Bad Leroy Brown” and “Don’t Mess Around with Jim.” The basic idea is you pick a fight with the wrong guy and you will suffer. In the Movie the “Untouchables” Sean Connery explained it another way, “the Chicago Way.”
These themes exist because they are true. If you were ever bullied you know there is only one way to stop a bully, and it isn’t the liberal mantra of reasoning or going and telling a teacher or some other authority. You can capitulate and minimize the damage, but the bullying won’t stop. Or you can pound the crap out him, get your big brother to pound the crap out of him, or get some friends gang up and pound the crap out of him, and the bullying will stop. The fact is to stop a bully you must make him realize that bullying will be met with fierce fighting and the pain associated with continued bullying will be far greater than the rewards. This is easily seen in fact is the fundamental plot in the movie “Back to the Future.”
The international community is acting like a school principle, it’s only prolonging the conflict. The reason Hamas has no problem attacking Israel even though they know Israel has the capability of kicking their ass is they know in advance that whatever Israel does in response will be limited by calls for a cease-fire, backed by political and economic pressure from the international community.
Israel was attacked, by vast numbers of rockets and invaded, from beneath through a mazes of tunnels. In as much as Hamas claims that its goal is to eliminate Israel, and has proven repeatedly to be the aggressor, and the Palestinian people choose to keep Hamas as their leaders, the violence can and will continue until the Palestinian people so severely suffer the consequences that they never again tolerate leadership that won’t live in peace with Israel.
The overall barbarism of the Muslim world is self-evident; it repeatedly says by word and deed that it cannot tolerate even subordinate Christian minorities can hardly be expected to tolerate an independent, and more advanced, Jewish state whose very existence is a daily rebuke to their egos. The very idea of a Jewish state that not only exists, but is far more advanced, and can easily kick their ass, in the middle of the Arab world is not something the people of the Arab world will peacefully allow to exist.
The non-aggression principle is clear, initiation of force is wrong, but just as clear is the right to self-defense, including overwhelming deadly force to crush those who aggress against you. Nothing in the non-aggression principle indicates that only a “proportional” response to aggression is acceptable. A woman shooting a rapist is clearly overwhelming disproportionate response to the aggression. Not only does such a response stop the current violent act of the rapist, it is a strong deterrent, to other would be rapists.
Israel’s solution is to declare WAR, go building by building through Gaza and kill or drive all the Palestinians out, with such massive force to clearly demonstrate that the consequences of attacking Israel are so dire that no Arab country will start it. When attacked from across a border Israel has the right to counter attack and expand its borders as it did in Golan to protect itself. So long as it doesn’t initiate force, it has the right to use force, even overwhelming deadly force far disproportionate to the aggression perpetrated.
Israel crushed the Arab aggressors in the 6 day war. It could and should do the same today. The result is that the violence would stop. Israel has shown it can and will live in peace with its neighbors if they do the same. The Palestinian people are not innocent, since they refuse to live in peace with Israel, and continue to choose leaders who call for Israel’s eradication, more of the same limited response will get the same results - continued not stop aggression from the Palestinian people. Israel has the right to and should crush them and drive them out with overwhelming disproportionate response. Nothing else will stop the violence.
Israel should change the current tune of adopting “limited” and “proportional” response. They should be singing a new tune similar to US police use against sellers of raw milk; send in overwhelming force, a SWAT team. It’s clear the Palestinians have “Tugged on Superman’s Cape.” Israel should adopt Croce’s "You Don't Mess Around With Jim" as it’s anthem. Look at the map and it’s clear Israel is “Slim” in this tune.
The Palestinians are like the skinny kid in this video:
Showing posts with label Rights. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rights. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 29, 2014
Wednesday, August 28, 2013
All Men are Created Equal – Not All Cultures
by Tom Rhodes, 8/28/2013
The values and culture of Western Civilization did not pop up from nowhere. It took centuries; more than 500 years after the Magna Carta we wrote our Declaration of Independence, the basis for the founding of our country. It took another century to end slavery in the USA and another century to end segregation, etc. The Declaration of Independence is highlighted by the idea expressed in these words, “All men are created equal, endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights.” The implication isn’t to ignore the obvious fact that not all people are equally strong, or equally tall, or equally fast, or equally smart, rather it demands the equal application of the “Rule of Law”; meaning that the law should apply to every person equally with no special protections, punishments, nor privileges to anyone for any reason. The culture that developed under this auspice, “Western Civilization,” produced a set of values based on the concept of individual rights and the idea that government existed to protect these rights not to dictate how individuals should live.
The concept of individual rights, flies in the face of and defies the vast majority of human history. Even today it only applies to a minority of the world’s people. The reality is that through all of human history the plight of man is for the vast majority to live in privation, while a relative few live in relative luxury by controlling the masses through the use of force. Most cultures now and through history work on the premise of some ruling elite controlling the masses. Other cultures are jealous of the prosperity Western Culture brought but are unwilling to embrace the idea’s that made it possible, like liberty and freedom.
Contrary to what egghead academics try to promote and claim, all cultures are not equal. Western culture based on the idea of individual rights and application of the rule of law is demonstrably superior to all other cultures. Western values, not necessarily western people, as people from all over the world, Japanese, Chinese, African, Arab, etc. can and do share western values. The objective, observable, output that the application of reason and individual rights (a Western value) has produced unprecedented quality of life, including; longer life, better health and more wealth for the ordinary person than any culture in the history of man; a culture where a obesity is a more pressing problem for the poor than starvation.
Multiculturalists egghead academics want us to ignore all semblance of logic and reason and not only grant moral equivalency but celebrate all cultures as equal. They even label and attempt to shame those who don’t accept the lie of multiculturalism as bigots. Consider the following mores of other cultures; In around 30 African and Middle East cultures they practice forced female genital mutilation; In most of the middle east there are severe limits on women’s rights to drive, work, walk without male escort, vote and receive an education; Niger still practices slavery; Some pockets of South American still practice cannibalism; Sudan still practices slavery; some Islamic countries stone women for adultery; and in many Islamic countries professing to be a Christian results in a death sentence. How exactly are the mores of these cultures in any way equivalent to the fundamental values of Western Civilization?
The multicultural egghead academic elite on our university campuses across America today want to end individual rights and liberty. They seek to trade liberty and the risks it entails for government control and the security it promises (but fails to deliver). Rather than equality before the law, they want “entitlement.” The multicultural “diversity” agenda is to revert Western Civilization, to the norm for mankind, with a few ruling elite dictating how the masses should live. They believe the ruling elite know better where people should live, what they should eat, what they should learn, what they should drive, what risks they can take, etc. regardless of individual wants, desires, effort, and ability. Like the ruling elite throughout history they claim if only people would live as we dictate there would be utopia.
If it were just multicultural egghead academic elites on our universities, the attacks on Western Civilization might be ignored. But the regression from the rule of law to rule by elite dictates is manifest in our government. The height of the attack on Western Civilization is reflected in new laws which grant certain corporations exemption from prosecution, or exemption from competition, or exclusive rights that other companies and especially individuals don’t have. The idea that a corporation or any group has rights and privileges that don’t apply to every other individual is reprehensible. Image a law that identified John Doe, the mechanic, immune from any law suit for damages due to his faulty break repairs. H.R. 933, AKA the Monsanto Protection Act, is just such a law. The laws in the USA and their disparate enforcement looks more like feudalism of a millennium ago than modern Western Civilization. Oh the feudal lords of today don’t claim a Divine right through heredity or combat, but the day of the citizen representative to our government is dead. The choices offered to the people for elections are as carefully cultivated and controlled by the ruling elite today as the appointment of barons and dukes was in feudal times.
The values that were adopted and created modern Western Civilization can be summed up in one word: Libertarian. Any call for the elimination or restriction on individual rights and special laws that grant some people rights, protections, punishments, or privileges that don’t apply to others is an attack on Western Civilization and the idea that “All men are created equal, endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights.”
All cultures are not equal and should not be celebrated. By embracing the two party system with its limited statist choices you are embracing neo-feudalism. If you embrace any culture that doesn’t support equality under the law for everybody, you are embracing tyrannical rule by some despotic elite rather than a government “of the people, by the people and for the people.”
The values and culture of Western Civilization did not pop up from nowhere. It took centuries; more than 500 years after the Magna Carta we wrote our Declaration of Independence, the basis for the founding of our country. It took another century to end slavery in the USA and another century to end segregation, etc. The Declaration of Independence is highlighted by the idea expressed in these words, “All men are created equal, endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights.” The implication isn’t to ignore the obvious fact that not all people are equally strong, or equally tall, or equally fast, or equally smart, rather it demands the equal application of the “Rule of Law”; meaning that the law should apply to every person equally with no special protections, punishments, nor privileges to anyone for any reason. The culture that developed under this auspice, “Western Civilization,” produced a set of values based on the concept of individual rights and the idea that government existed to protect these rights not to dictate how individuals should live.
The concept of individual rights, flies in the face of and defies the vast majority of human history. Even today it only applies to a minority of the world’s people. The reality is that through all of human history the plight of man is for the vast majority to live in privation, while a relative few live in relative luxury by controlling the masses through the use of force. Most cultures now and through history work on the premise of some ruling elite controlling the masses. Other cultures are jealous of the prosperity Western Culture brought but are unwilling to embrace the idea’s that made it possible, like liberty and freedom.
Contrary to what egghead academics try to promote and claim, all cultures are not equal. Western culture based on the idea of individual rights and application of the rule of law is demonstrably superior to all other cultures. Western values, not necessarily western people, as people from all over the world, Japanese, Chinese, African, Arab, etc. can and do share western values. The objective, observable, output that the application of reason and individual rights (a Western value) has produced unprecedented quality of life, including; longer life, better health and more wealth for the ordinary person than any culture in the history of man; a culture where a obesity is a more pressing problem for the poor than starvation.
Multiculturalists egghead academics want us to ignore all semblance of logic and reason and not only grant moral equivalency but celebrate all cultures as equal. They even label and attempt to shame those who don’t accept the lie of multiculturalism as bigots. Consider the following mores of other cultures; In around 30 African and Middle East cultures they practice forced female genital mutilation; In most of the middle east there are severe limits on women’s rights to drive, work, walk without male escort, vote and receive an education; Niger still practices slavery; Some pockets of South American still practice cannibalism; Sudan still practices slavery; some Islamic countries stone women for adultery; and in many Islamic countries professing to be a Christian results in a death sentence. How exactly are the mores of these cultures in any way equivalent to the fundamental values of Western Civilization?
The multicultural egghead academic elite on our university campuses across America today want to end individual rights and liberty. They seek to trade liberty and the risks it entails for government control and the security it promises (but fails to deliver). Rather than equality before the law, they want “entitlement.” The multicultural “diversity” agenda is to revert Western Civilization, to the norm for mankind, with a few ruling elite dictating how the masses should live. They believe the ruling elite know better where people should live, what they should eat, what they should learn, what they should drive, what risks they can take, etc. regardless of individual wants, desires, effort, and ability. Like the ruling elite throughout history they claim if only people would live as we dictate there would be utopia.
If it were just multicultural egghead academic elites on our universities, the attacks on Western Civilization might be ignored. But the regression from the rule of law to rule by elite dictates is manifest in our government. The height of the attack on Western Civilization is reflected in new laws which grant certain corporations exemption from prosecution, or exemption from competition, or exclusive rights that other companies and especially individuals don’t have. The idea that a corporation or any group has rights and privileges that don’t apply to every other individual is reprehensible. Image a law that identified John Doe, the mechanic, immune from any law suit for damages due to his faulty break repairs. H.R. 933, AKA the Monsanto Protection Act, is just such a law. The laws in the USA and their disparate enforcement looks more like feudalism of a millennium ago than modern Western Civilization. Oh the feudal lords of today don’t claim a Divine right through heredity or combat, but the day of the citizen representative to our government is dead. The choices offered to the people for elections are as carefully cultivated and controlled by the ruling elite today as the appointment of barons and dukes was in feudal times.
The values that were adopted and created modern Western Civilization can be summed up in one word: Libertarian. Any call for the elimination or restriction on individual rights and special laws that grant some people rights, protections, punishments, or privileges that don’t apply to others is an attack on Western Civilization and the idea that “All men are created equal, endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights.”
All cultures are not equal and should not be celebrated. By embracing the two party system with its limited statist choices you are embracing neo-feudalism. If you embrace any culture that doesn’t support equality under the law for everybody, you are embracing tyrannical rule by some despotic elite rather than a government “of the people, by the people and for the people.”
Monday, August 26, 2013
USA – Now a Statist Nation
By Tom Rhodes, 8/26/2013
Question: What does a modern technological tyrannical police state look like?
Answer: USA circa 2013
Does that answer seem extreme? Hardly, when you consider the facts. The overflow of news about government abuse of individual rights and privacy is so great it cannot be contained. Among the news that the government wished remained secret is the fact that secret courts found the NSA in clear violation of the Fourth Amendment. Judge John Bates wrote in his Oct. 3, 2011, opinion, “For the first time, the government has now advised the court that the volume and nature of the information it has been collecting is fundamentally different from what the court had been led to believe.” The fact is that NSA collects email not just of foreign correspondence but of domestic nature as well.
There were zero arrests, and zero accountability of the NSA. It took a FISA (freedom of information act) request and over a year of litigation to release the heavily redacted 2011 secret court ruling. The WSJ reports that NSA captures and has access to 75% or more of all internet traffic in the USA. Like it or not the 4th amendment is dead.
Some say that the government is only looking for terrorists, and won’t/doesn’t abuse the information they collect. If you say that then you missed the August 1, 2013 story where in the kitchen a woman was looking up pressure cookers and recipes while in the other room her husband was looking up backpacks for the kids, the police show up wanting to search the place to make sure they weren’t making bombs. Finding no evidence they left after a 45 min search they left. The agents reportedly told the husband "that they do this about 100 times a week. And that 99 of those visits turn out to be nothing."
Your internet searches, and browsing history, are known by the government - Period. Ignoring the constitution they monitor everybody. You can use things like DuckDuckGo.com or StartPage.com which don’t store the ISP or other information on people doing searches, you can use TOR, and you can use encrypted mail, pay for your purchases with cash, avoid giving your name to retailers, etc. But ..... if you do these things the government assumes probable cause that you are doing something illegal.
Do you understand that??? If you take steps to protect your Fourth Amendment Right to be secure in you person, property, and effects (especially electronic effects), then you have given the government probable cause to search your person, property, and effects. Talk about circular reasoning.
Today, in the USA, the government can and will show up at your door with guns based on your use of the internet. Without probable cause or even reasonable suspension of any particular crime or item or communication they are searching your effects. The secret court to protect your rights is toothless, and even when it finds the government violating constitutional rights holds nobody responsible.
Tyranny in the USA is here, it’s happened incrementally like boiling the proverbial frog. Little by little statism has overtaken our formerly free nation. It is becoming evident that the two factions of the Statist Federal Government, Republican and Democrat Parties, are not and will not defend the constitution, and ever seek more power for an ever increasing statist government. After the Snowden leaks, the politicians who said they would do something, investigate, etc. from both sides of the aisle have grown silent, and are actually doing nothing to protect your Constitutional Rights.
Obama as a senator, often made bold statements condemning the violation of individual rights, yet after attaining the White House has continued, extended and increased such violations. His actions have been no different than Bush’s. Of course as a senator there was much he didn’t know that after becoming President he learned that affected his positions. That or his change proves the axiom that “Power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely.” It matters not; Protecting the safety of the people has long been the excuse tyrants use to curb individual liberty and increase the power of the state.
There cannot be both absolute safety and absolute liberty. Our statist government is choosing safety over liberty. It is not giving the people a choice. The government not works under the assumption that it’s compelling interest supersedes individual liberty, and the constitutional limits placed on the government must be discarded.
Statism is defined as the theory or practice of concentrating economic and political power in the state, resulting in a weak position for the individual or community with respect to the government. So the answer to the question, “What does a modern technological tyrannical police state look like?” is Statist. The results of both the Democrats and Republicans actions is clear, they are bringing the USA to become a totalitarian statist nation; where the individual is servant to the state not the other way around.
If you want liberty, what are you doing to take it back, as you no longer have it? The question is do you want security of liberty?
Malo periculosam, libertatem quam quietam servitutem
Question: What does a modern technological tyrannical police state look like?
Answer: USA circa 2013
Does that answer seem extreme? Hardly, when you consider the facts. The overflow of news about government abuse of individual rights and privacy is so great it cannot be contained. Among the news that the government wished remained secret is the fact that secret courts found the NSA in clear violation of the Fourth Amendment. Judge John Bates wrote in his Oct. 3, 2011, opinion, “For the first time, the government has now advised the court that the volume and nature of the information it has been collecting is fundamentally different from what the court had been led to believe.” The fact is that NSA collects email not just of foreign correspondence but of domestic nature as well.
There were zero arrests, and zero accountability of the NSA. It took a FISA (freedom of information act) request and over a year of litigation to release the heavily redacted 2011 secret court ruling. The WSJ reports that NSA captures and has access to 75% or more of all internet traffic in the USA. Like it or not the 4th amendment is dead.
Some say that the government is only looking for terrorists, and won’t/doesn’t abuse the information they collect. If you say that then you missed the August 1, 2013 story where in the kitchen a woman was looking up pressure cookers and recipes while in the other room her husband was looking up backpacks for the kids, the police show up wanting to search the place to make sure they weren’t making bombs. Finding no evidence they left after a 45 min search they left. The agents reportedly told the husband "that they do this about 100 times a week. And that 99 of those visits turn out to be nothing."
Your internet searches, and browsing history, are known by the government - Period. Ignoring the constitution they monitor everybody. You can use things like DuckDuckGo.com or StartPage.com which don’t store the ISP or other information on people doing searches, you can use TOR, and you can use encrypted mail, pay for your purchases with cash, avoid giving your name to retailers, etc. But ..... if you do these things the government assumes probable cause that you are doing something illegal.
Do you understand that??? If you take steps to protect your Fourth Amendment Right to be secure in you person, property, and effects (especially electronic effects), then you have given the government probable cause to search your person, property, and effects. Talk about circular reasoning.
Today, in the USA, the government can and will show up at your door with guns based on your use of the internet. Without probable cause or even reasonable suspension of any particular crime or item or communication they are searching your effects. The secret court to protect your rights is toothless, and even when it finds the government violating constitutional rights holds nobody responsible.
Tyranny in the USA is here, it’s happened incrementally like boiling the proverbial frog. Little by little statism has overtaken our formerly free nation. It is becoming evident that the two factions of the Statist Federal Government, Republican and Democrat Parties, are not and will not defend the constitution, and ever seek more power for an ever increasing statist government. After the Snowden leaks, the politicians who said they would do something, investigate, etc. from both sides of the aisle have grown silent, and are actually doing nothing to protect your Constitutional Rights.
Obama as a senator, often made bold statements condemning the violation of individual rights, yet after attaining the White House has continued, extended and increased such violations. His actions have been no different than Bush’s. Of course as a senator there was much he didn’t know that after becoming President he learned that affected his positions. That or his change proves the axiom that “Power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely.” It matters not; Protecting the safety of the people has long been the excuse tyrants use to curb individual liberty and increase the power of the state.
There cannot be both absolute safety and absolute liberty. Our statist government is choosing safety over liberty. It is not giving the people a choice. The government not works under the assumption that it’s compelling interest supersedes individual liberty, and the constitutional limits placed on the government must be discarded.
Statism is defined as the theory or practice of concentrating economic and political power in the state, resulting in a weak position for the individual or community with respect to the government. So the answer to the question, “What does a modern technological tyrannical police state look like?” is Statist. The results of both the Democrats and Republicans actions is clear, they are bringing the USA to become a totalitarian statist nation; where the individual is servant to the state not the other way around.
If you want liberty, what are you doing to take it back, as you no longer have it? The question is do you want security of liberty?
Malo periculosam, libertatem quam quietam servitutem
Monday, January 21, 2013
Do you have a right to privacy?
By Tom Rhodes, 1/21/2013
If you believe the sum of the Bill of Rights implies that you have right to privacy then what do you do about the government violating that right? Are you consistent in your belief in a right to privacy? If the decision to have an abortion is a privacy decision between a doctor and the patient, then should all medical records and choices be just as private? Should what you choose to eat or drink be a private decision between you and your chef? Should the government know what you choose to read, should your reading decisions be a choice between you and your librarian?
Right now the government commands every business and internet provider who has an email server to keep copies of all emails ever sent or received forever. The government cannot command any person from keeping their post mail forever. The idea that the government could force FedEx or UPS to open and retain a copy every document they deliver is reprehensible and clearly unreasonable. Why does modern technology, and private not public delivery systems grant them the authority to require copies of all mail be retained forever? Imagine the outcry if the government directed the post office to open and make a copy of every letter, postcard, periodical, ever sent, who sent it to whom from where and to where.
Ever read the Fourth Amendment to the US Constitution? It reads: The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. This begs the question: What exactly is unreasonable? The dictionary says that something that is unreasonable is not in accordance with practical realities, as attitude or behavior; inappropriate.
We instituted our government to protect our rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It cannot be reasonable argued that a people under continuous government surveillance, can be free to pursue happiness, much less be happy. The constitution is clear, that for the government to look at a person, their property, and their papers (communications) the government must have some probable cause for wrong doing, and may only look for what they specifically have cause to see. That means that they have to have some reasonable suspicion of some wrong doing before they can open your mail, look in your closet, peek in your safety deposit box, etc., and have a judge affirm by warrant that they have grounds to look at your stuff.
Why is it reasonable for the government to require businesses and individuals to report activity to law enforcement agencies simply because private and legal activity is taking place. What is reasonable about the government requiring cell phone companies to keep copies of every text sent? What probable cause is there for the government to have access to that data without a warrant, is the fact that technology has negated requiring actual "paper" to record transactions and communications make them any less your papers? With no evidence of criminal behavior what is the reasonable justification to constantly monitor all persons emails, travel and financial transactions.
What reasonable justification is there to create databases of personal information, medical records, and communications without consent, probable cause, or a warrant?
What reasonable justification is there to require the registration of legally owned private property without consent, probable cause, or a warrant?
What reasonable justification is there to assume that just because a person is traveling that they consent to being searched. How is it reasonable for the government to take away persons right to travel, merely by putting their name on a secret list, without demonstrating probable cause or due process in a court of law?
Why is your email not as sacred, and as protected your physical mail? Is that reasonable? Does the fact that your papers are now composed and stored electronically make them any less your papers than if you'd created them with a quill ink on parchment? Are your computer files any less your effects because they are electronic, than a photo album in your sock drawer? The imagery of government officials coming into your house and rifling through your file cabinet, closet, attic, and sock drawer searching for some evidence of crime with no warrant and no probable cause is a tyrannical image of an abusive government that outrages us all. Yet the image of some nerdy government official tapping away at a keyboard in some fare away cubical to rifle through your neighbors files and internet activity seems reasonable, and doesn't stir emotional outrage.
As an American you should oppose the power of government at all levels to monitor, account for, and keep under surveillance its citizens, especially where there is no evidence of criminal behavior. Without a warrant the government shouldn't be allowed to force businesses and individuals to report activity to law enforcement agencies simply because private and legal activity is taking place. You as an American should oppose all laws that legitimize the means, without probable cause, to universally monitor personal mails, travel and finance. As an American you should deny your government the ability, power, and authority to create databases of personal information, medical records, and communications without consent. As an American you should reject the idea that you must register personal property. And as an American you should deny the government the use of technology to continually observe you and your neighbor. We should oppose the searching of travelers without probable cause. Not only are these violations of the Fourth Amendment of the Bill of Rights, but they in many cases universal government surveillance violate the first, second, fifth, ninth, tenth and fourteenth amendments as well.
Technology has outpaced the law. People and government can use technology in ways never before imagined. Our government now considers searching through every email and text of every person as reasonable. Not because your personal correspondence is any less your personal papers and effect, but because they now have the technology to do so. Why is that reasonable or constitutional? Why does the ability to search everything grant the government a compelling interest that justifies the authority to search every email and text without a warrant? What enumerated constitutional power grants the government have to monitor its citizens?
If you believe the sum of the Bill of Rights implies that you have right to privacy then what do you do about the government violating that right? Are you consistent in your belief in a right to privacy? If the decision to have an abortion is a privacy decision between a doctor and the patient, then should all medical records and choices be just as private? Should what you choose to eat or drink be a private decision between you and your chef? Should the government know what you choose to read, should your reading decisions be a choice between you and your librarian?
Right now the government commands every business and internet provider who has an email server to keep copies of all emails ever sent or received forever. The government cannot command any person from keeping their post mail forever. The idea that the government could force FedEx or UPS to open and retain a copy every document they deliver is reprehensible and clearly unreasonable. Why does modern technology, and private not public delivery systems grant them the authority to require copies of all mail be retained forever? Imagine the outcry if the government directed the post office to open and make a copy of every letter, postcard, periodical, ever sent, who sent it to whom from where and to where.
Ever read the Fourth Amendment to the US Constitution? It reads: The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. This begs the question: What exactly is unreasonable? The dictionary says that something that is unreasonable is not in accordance with practical realities, as attitude or behavior; inappropriate.
We instituted our government to protect our rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It cannot be reasonable argued that a people under continuous government surveillance, can be free to pursue happiness, much less be happy. The constitution is clear, that for the government to look at a person, their property, and their papers (communications) the government must have some probable cause for wrong doing, and may only look for what they specifically have cause to see. That means that they have to have some reasonable suspicion of some wrong doing before they can open your mail, look in your closet, peek in your safety deposit box, etc., and have a judge affirm by warrant that they have grounds to look at your stuff.
Why is it reasonable for the government to require businesses and individuals to report activity to law enforcement agencies simply because private and legal activity is taking place. What is reasonable about the government requiring cell phone companies to keep copies of every text sent? What probable cause is there for the government to have access to that data without a warrant, is the fact that technology has negated requiring actual "paper" to record transactions and communications make them any less your papers? With no evidence of criminal behavior what is the reasonable justification to constantly monitor all persons emails, travel and financial transactions.
What reasonable justification is there to create databases of personal information, medical records, and communications without consent, probable cause, or a warrant?
What reasonable justification is there to require the registration of legally owned private property without consent, probable cause, or a warrant?
What reasonable justification is there to assume that just because a person is traveling that they consent to being searched. How is it reasonable for the government to take away persons right to travel, merely by putting their name on a secret list, without demonstrating probable cause or due process in a court of law?
Why is your email not as sacred, and as protected your physical mail? Is that reasonable? Does the fact that your papers are now composed and stored electronically make them any less your papers than if you'd created them with a quill ink on parchment? Are your computer files any less your effects because they are electronic, than a photo album in your sock drawer? The imagery of government officials coming into your house and rifling through your file cabinet, closet, attic, and sock drawer searching for some evidence of crime with no warrant and no probable cause is a tyrannical image of an abusive government that outrages us all. Yet the image of some nerdy government official tapping away at a keyboard in some fare away cubical to rifle through your neighbors files and internet activity seems reasonable, and doesn't stir emotional outrage.
As an American you should oppose the power of government at all levels to monitor, account for, and keep under surveillance its citizens, especially where there is no evidence of criminal behavior. Without a warrant the government shouldn't be allowed to force businesses and individuals to report activity to law enforcement agencies simply because private and legal activity is taking place. You as an American should oppose all laws that legitimize the means, without probable cause, to universally monitor personal mails, travel and finance. As an American you should deny your government the ability, power, and authority to create databases of personal information, medical records, and communications without consent. As an American you should reject the idea that you must register personal property. And as an American you should deny the government the use of technology to continually observe you and your neighbor. We should oppose the searching of travelers without probable cause. Not only are these violations of the Fourth Amendment of the Bill of Rights, but they in many cases universal government surveillance violate the first, second, fifth, ninth, tenth and fourteenth amendments as well.
Technology has outpaced the law. People and government can use technology in ways never before imagined. Our government now considers searching through every email and text of every person as reasonable. Not because your personal correspondence is any less your personal papers and effect, but because they now have the technology to do so. Why is that reasonable or constitutional? Why does the ability to search everything grant the government a compelling interest that justifies the authority to search every email and text without a warrant? What enumerated constitutional power grants the government have to monitor its citizens?
Monday, October 8, 2012
Taxes Used to Violate Rights
By Tom Rhodes, 10/8/2012
Last Sunday was Pulpit Freedom Sunday. As Libertarians we should celebrate the bravery of the hundreds of pastors who thumbed their nose at the IRS and preached about politicians and politics in defiance to the government. The idea that the first amendment allows the state to regulate the speech of the church is absurd. The entire Bill of Rights it is a limit on the government not the people or any organization which they form and belong. Pastors not the government should determine what is said from the pulpit.
Statist arguments from those who say to pastors, "If you want to exercise your right to free speech, just give up your tax-exempt status" are illogical and absurd on their face. It would be the same as telling everyone that in order to deduct your homes mortgage interest from your taxes you must give up your right to be free from warrantless searches of your home. The idea is that because the government is in essence paying for your house with a tax deduction it has the right to search your house any time for any reason or for no reason at all. That idea is invalid on many fronts.
It makes as much sense as saying, "if you want to maintain your right to a jury trial, just give up your tax-exempt status." Just like a jury trial, and the right to keep and bear arms, and the right not to testify against yourself, are all rights not privileges grated by the government which can be taken away based on an arbitrary tax classification, the right to free speech and religion is just that, constitutionally protected rights, not privileges that can be revoked by dangling the tax-exempt status of a pastor's church over his head. The IRS rule against free speech for pastors should be declared unconstitutional.
Tax cuts or exemptions do not "subsidize" religion or anything else. An IRS tax-exempt status to a church is not a subsidy unless all money belongs to the government. Last year the US Supreme Court rejected that idea. Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote for the majority in Arizona Christian School Tuition Organization v. Winn. "Like contributions that lead to charitable tax deductions, contributions yielding STO tax credits are not owed to the State and, in fact, pass directly from taxpayers to private organizations. Respondents' contrary position assumes that income should be treated as if it were government property even if it has not come into the tax collector's hands. That premise finds no basis in standing jurisprudence. Private bank accounts cannot be equated with the Arizona State Treasury." It is clear that the government has no automatic right to a church's money because a pastor doesn't give up his right to free speech. There is no right for the government to be free from the church or from the beliefs of the citizens; rather the government is restricted from restricting free speech and the free exercise of religion. Our constitution doesn't restrict churches or pastors or the people, it restricts the government.
Whether a group is formed to promote model aviation (the AMA) or promote doctors (the AMA) or promote motorcycle racing (the AMA), or promote management training (the AMA), or to market marketing (the AMA), or to give music awards (the AMA), or promote a religion, or promote a group of workers, they should all have the same rules applied equally, and all have their rights respected equally. Any other position is unjust. Charities are non-profits and have been outside the legitimate tax base since the founding of our nation. Our government has no more right to a church's money because its pastor won't give up his constitutionally protected right to free speech, than it has the right to curb the speech of any other non-profit, like the AMA, ACLU, PETA, VFW, or AFL-CIO.
If you think that because an individual receives a tax deduction for contributions to a church as being a benefit that justifies restricting the freedom of speech from the pulpit, why isn't that claim as true for any other organization that you can receive a tax deduction when you make a donation. Should the United Way have its free speech squelched? Why should churches be treated any differently?
Union dues are tax deductable and unions are tax exempt, if churches can't promote or endorse a candidate without losing their tax exempt status why can unions? I know the IRS classifies churches as 501(C)3 organizations and Unions as 501(C)5 organizations, but it is illogical, absurd, and reprehensible to limit the speech rights of a group of people for some arbitrary classification by the government; especially when it is the government and not the people or any assembly of people that is constitutionally limited.
If you support the idea that pastors should not be allowed to endorse or financially support candidates then you must support the idea unions should not be allowed to endorse candidates. As libertarians we can and do support all forms of free speech, even that of pastors to endorse and criticize candidates from the pulpit. Last Sunday 1600 pastors were brave enough to stand up to statism, we salute all of you who took up the challenge. Our current tax system is now being used to control and restrict our constitutionally protected freedoms, it is time to scrap the entire thing and start over.
Last Sunday was Pulpit Freedom Sunday. As Libertarians we should celebrate the bravery of the hundreds of pastors who thumbed their nose at the IRS and preached about politicians and politics in defiance to the government. The idea that the first amendment allows the state to regulate the speech of the church is absurd. The entire Bill of Rights it is a limit on the government not the people or any organization which they form and belong. Pastors not the government should determine what is said from the pulpit.
Statist arguments from those who say to pastors, "If you want to exercise your right to free speech, just give up your tax-exempt status" are illogical and absurd on their face. It would be the same as telling everyone that in order to deduct your homes mortgage interest from your taxes you must give up your right to be free from warrantless searches of your home. The idea is that because the government is in essence paying for your house with a tax deduction it has the right to search your house any time for any reason or for no reason at all. That idea is invalid on many fronts.
It makes as much sense as saying, "if you want to maintain your right to a jury trial, just give up your tax-exempt status." Just like a jury trial, and the right to keep and bear arms, and the right not to testify against yourself, are all rights not privileges grated by the government which can be taken away based on an arbitrary tax classification, the right to free speech and religion is just that, constitutionally protected rights, not privileges that can be revoked by dangling the tax-exempt status of a pastor's church over his head. The IRS rule against free speech for pastors should be declared unconstitutional.
Tax cuts or exemptions do not "subsidize" religion or anything else. An IRS tax-exempt status to a church is not a subsidy unless all money belongs to the government. Last year the US Supreme Court rejected that idea. Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote for the majority in Arizona Christian School Tuition Organization v. Winn. "Like contributions that lead to charitable tax deductions, contributions yielding STO tax credits are not owed to the State and, in fact, pass directly from taxpayers to private organizations. Respondents' contrary position assumes that income should be treated as if it were government property even if it has not come into the tax collector's hands. That premise finds no basis in standing jurisprudence. Private bank accounts cannot be equated with the Arizona State Treasury." It is clear that the government has no automatic right to a church's money because a pastor doesn't give up his right to free speech. There is no right for the government to be free from the church or from the beliefs of the citizens; rather the government is restricted from restricting free speech and the free exercise of religion. Our constitution doesn't restrict churches or pastors or the people, it restricts the government.
Whether a group is formed to promote model aviation (the AMA) or promote doctors (the AMA) or promote motorcycle racing (the AMA), or promote management training (the AMA), or to market marketing (the AMA), or to give music awards (the AMA), or promote a religion, or promote a group of workers, they should all have the same rules applied equally, and all have their rights respected equally. Any other position is unjust. Charities are non-profits and have been outside the legitimate tax base since the founding of our nation. Our government has no more right to a church's money because its pastor won't give up his constitutionally protected right to free speech, than it has the right to curb the speech of any other non-profit, like the AMA, ACLU, PETA, VFW, or AFL-CIO.
If you think that because an individual receives a tax deduction for contributions to a church as being a benefit that justifies restricting the freedom of speech from the pulpit, why isn't that claim as true for any other organization that you can receive a tax deduction when you make a donation. Should the United Way have its free speech squelched? Why should churches be treated any differently?
Union dues are tax deductable and unions are tax exempt, if churches can't promote or endorse a candidate without losing their tax exempt status why can unions? I know the IRS classifies churches as 501(C)3 organizations and Unions as 501(C)5 organizations, but it is illogical, absurd, and reprehensible to limit the speech rights of a group of people for some arbitrary classification by the government; especially when it is the government and not the people or any assembly of people that is constitutionally limited.
If you support the idea that pastors should not be allowed to endorse or financially support candidates then you must support the idea unions should not be allowed to endorse candidates. As libertarians we can and do support all forms of free speech, even that of pastors to endorse and criticize candidates from the pulpit. Last Sunday 1600 pastors were brave enough to stand up to statism, we salute all of you who took up the challenge. Our current tax system is now being used to control and restrict our constitutionally protected freedoms, it is time to scrap the entire thing and start over.
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Our inviolable right to self-defense
by Phil Elmore
March 10, 2011 © 2011
The state in which I live, New York, is contemplating a law that would register and tax every firearm in the state. Already ruling the state most hostile to gun owners, New York's Democrats wish to enact a precursor to confiscation that is not just transparent in its intensions, but onerous in its financial burdens. What is often lost in debates over laws of this type is what they truly say to the citizens they affect. A law that restricts the technology of self-defense is a law that criminalizes self-defense itself. It is a law that violates your civil rights. It is a direct affront to you as a human being.
The Founding Fathers of the United States indicated their acceptance of, and based the United States Constitution on, the concept of natural rights. For the purposes of this discussion, it doesn't matter if you believe in God or not. Most deists and theists believe rights are God-granted, while others believe natural rights come from nature. Natural rights exist regardless.
Because you are a discrete biological entity, you are an individual. Every group of people can be broken into individuals. No group of people can exist as a single living organism because they simply aren't one, any more than a parking lot full of cars can be a single automobile.
Because no human can be another human, no one can live another's life. By virtue of your nature as an individual, you are born with the inalienable property right to yourself as a person. This means that no human being has a claim on your time or your effort without your consent. Think about it. If you do not own you, who does? If you are anything but your own property, you belong to someone else, which makes you that someone's slave. Are you a slave?
Your property right to your person extends to a general right to possess legally acquired property, for no human can exist without property of some kind. This is an axiom of existence. You cannot exist in space unconnected to all other existents, the sole resident of an empty bubble of space-time. This does not mean you have an automatic claim to someone else's property by virtue of your need for it, however. This means that you necessarily have the right to possess property if you can indeed acquire it. Claims to the contrary made by Marxists, collectivists and Michael Moore are empty. If you have no right to possess property once you have obtained it, those making this assertion must be making it naked while floating in empty rooms from which even air has been evacuated.
Your property right to yourself and your effort can be used to obtain rights to real property (land). He who first "mingles his labor with the land" earns a property right to it. What of land (or other property, for that matter) whose acquisition is disputed as being illegitimate? The longer an illegitimate claim goes uncontested, the more the passage of time legitimizes it – because the passage of time increases the possibility that an attempt to correct the illegitimate acquisition would harm parties who themselves have acted in good faith and who have committed no immoral actions. When redress of wrongs creates more wrong than it cures, it is not credible.
What is a property right, anyway? A right to property is the right to its use. If property belongs to no one, we have none, which contradicts the necessity of property. If we say all property belongs to everyone, we have a problem, because we would then only be able to use property with the mutual consent of every member of society. Because this is impossible, some delegation of humans within society would have to make this determination – and it would then be those people, not all the people, who hold the property right.
This points to a critical issue concerning rights. Either you recognize that you have sole dominion over your person, as does each human, or you do not. If you do not, you are saying either that all of society – the Collective, the State, whomever – has first right to you as property, or that some other person does.
A right is, by definition, unquestionable, and not dependent on some responsibility on your part. Many times, those who support some infringement on your natural rights will appeal to the idea that "With rights come responsibilities." This is not true. A right carries with it no concomitant responsibility, because it is, by definition, inviolable. Responsibilities, by contrast, are accepted, not imposed.
You are born into society accepting, by virtue of your existence, exactly one clause of the "social contract" – the agreement not to infringe on the natural rights of your fellow human beings. Humans who operate according to this guideline obtain what they require from other humans through exchange to mutual benefit. They are traders, giving value for value received. No human being has a claim to your life or your assets simply because you are born into his society. Your property rights to your person remain intact and inalienable regardless of the circumstances of your birth.
Given these facts of existence, the only legitimate role of government in a free society is the protection of individuals' natural rights. That is why governments are instituted among human beings – or at least, that is why they should be.
When a government denies its citizens' rights or actively seeks to infringe on these rights, it subordinates the individual to the state and injures that individual in the name of the community. By what right is this done? By what right is this force initiated and this theft made? How dare New York's commie libs steal the right of self–defense through their burdensome taxes and their obvious schemes for future confiscation? They have no right to do this; there is no justification for it.
Self-defense is an individual right and, as such, is inviolable ... no matter what lies Democrats tell.
Phil Elmore is a freelance author, technical writer and publisher of the self-defense e-zine The Martialist. This article originally appeard at WND.com
March 10, 2011 © 2011
The state in which I live, New York, is contemplating a law that would register and tax every firearm in the state. Already ruling the state most hostile to gun owners, New York's Democrats wish to enact a precursor to confiscation that is not just transparent in its intensions, but onerous in its financial burdens. What is often lost in debates over laws of this type is what they truly say to the citizens they affect. A law that restricts the technology of self-defense is a law that criminalizes self-defense itself. It is a law that violates your civil rights. It is a direct affront to you as a human being.
The Founding Fathers of the United States indicated their acceptance of, and based the United States Constitution on, the concept of natural rights. For the purposes of this discussion, it doesn't matter if you believe in God or not. Most deists and theists believe rights are God-granted, while others believe natural rights come from nature. Natural rights exist regardless.
Because you are a discrete biological entity, you are an individual. Every group of people can be broken into individuals. No group of people can exist as a single living organism because they simply aren't one, any more than a parking lot full of cars can be a single automobile.
Because no human can be another human, no one can live another's life. By virtue of your nature as an individual, you are born with the inalienable property right to yourself as a person. This means that no human being has a claim on your time or your effort without your consent. Think about it. If you do not own you, who does? If you are anything but your own property, you belong to someone else, which makes you that someone's slave. Are you a slave?
Your property right to your person extends to a general right to possess legally acquired property, for no human can exist without property of some kind. This is an axiom of existence. You cannot exist in space unconnected to all other existents, the sole resident of an empty bubble of space-time. This does not mean you have an automatic claim to someone else's property by virtue of your need for it, however. This means that you necessarily have the right to possess property if you can indeed acquire it. Claims to the contrary made by Marxists, collectivists and Michael Moore are empty. If you have no right to possess property once you have obtained it, those making this assertion must be making it naked while floating in empty rooms from which even air has been evacuated.
Your property right to yourself and your effort can be used to obtain rights to real property (land). He who first "mingles his labor with the land" earns a property right to it. What of land (or other property, for that matter) whose acquisition is disputed as being illegitimate? The longer an illegitimate claim goes uncontested, the more the passage of time legitimizes it – because the passage of time increases the possibility that an attempt to correct the illegitimate acquisition would harm parties who themselves have acted in good faith and who have committed no immoral actions. When redress of wrongs creates more wrong than it cures, it is not credible.
What is a property right, anyway? A right to property is the right to its use. If property belongs to no one, we have none, which contradicts the necessity of property. If we say all property belongs to everyone, we have a problem, because we would then only be able to use property with the mutual consent of every member of society. Because this is impossible, some delegation of humans within society would have to make this determination – and it would then be those people, not all the people, who hold the property right.
This points to a critical issue concerning rights. Either you recognize that you have sole dominion over your person, as does each human, or you do not. If you do not, you are saying either that all of society – the Collective, the State, whomever – has first right to you as property, or that some other person does.
A right is, by definition, unquestionable, and not dependent on some responsibility on your part. Many times, those who support some infringement on your natural rights will appeal to the idea that "With rights come responsibilities." This is not true. A right carries with it no concomitant responsibility, because it is, by definition, inviolable. Responsibilities, by contrast, are accepted, not imposed.
You are born into society accepting, by virtue of your existence, exactly one clause of the "social contract" – the agreement not to infringe on the natural rights of your fellow human beings. Humans who operate according to this guideline obtain what they require from other humans through exchange to mutual benefit. They are traders, giving value for value received. No human being has a claim to your life or your assets simply because you are born into his society. Your property rights to your person remain intact and inalienable regardless of the circumstances of your birth.
Given these facts of existence, the only legitimate role of government in a free society is the protection of individuals' natural rights. That is why governments are instituted among human beings – or at least, that is why they should be.
When a government denies its citizens' rights or actively seeks to infringe on these rights, it subordinates the individual to the state and injures that individual in the name of the community. By what right is this done? By what right is this force initiated and this theft made? How dare New York's commie libs steal the right of self–defense through their burdensome taxes and their obvious schemes for future confiscation? They have no right to do this; there is no justification for it.
Self-defense is an individual right and, as such, is inviolable ... no matter what lies Democrats tell.
Phil Elmore is a freelance author, technical writer and publisher of the self-defense e-zine The Martialist. This article originally appeard at WND.com
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
Crime, Punishment and Justice
On November 15, 2010 the Associated Press reported the following:
The Constitution of the United States, includes a Bill of Rights, which doesn’t grant rights to anybody, but assumes people have the rights and severely limits the government from infringing on those rights. The US Constitution is not politically correct and does not place the ideas and speech of some people’s values over the ideas and speech of others. Wanting to instill a value of “tolerance” does not give the government or any of its agents, the right to stifle speech they don’t approve. That is exactly what Jay McDowell did when he threw the student out of class because he didn’t like the “where the discussion was going.”
It is a shame that a teacher was so intolerant and thought he had the right to punish a student for exercising his right to free speech. What is good is that he was rightly reprimanded and punished proportionately.
Far too often do we see disproportionate punishment for "crimes." The reason for a fine or punishment is to deter future bad behavior and offer restitution to the victim. In this case Justice was served; the minimal punishment did both. It affirmed that student's right to free speech, it sent the message to other students that the school would protect their basic civil rights, and deterred not only the McDowell but other teachers from infringing on the rights of other students in the future. More severe punishment would have been counterproductive, costly, and unjust.
Compare that to the punishment another student received when she had a plastic butter knife in her lunch box. The typical punishment for that offence is expulsion from school for having a weapon. This zero tolerance nonsense is not proportionate to what reasonable people would not even consider a crime. Whereas McDowell, as an agent of the government, clearly violated the civil rights of the student, in the other case a powerless minor committed no crime. It seems the punishment associated with zero tolerance government rules for minors is to instill a fear, and belief that the government has the authority and right to force you to obey any rule or regulations they want, and failure to obey will be severely punished.
We must as citizens all try to hold our government accountable, even the petty tyrants in our public school systems. We can and did hold our government officials accountable as reported in the news this week in the story of a middle school boy who was ordered to remove an American Flag he put on his bike to honor veterans.
How did this country get to the government that thinks it can silence citizens who express non politically correct ideas? It is hard to fathom how and why we accept a government that punishes a child who is threatened rather than hold accountable those who do the threatening.
We are teaching our children that their rights are not important, and that the government can take them away at will, without due process, without proof, without cause, just because zero tolerance and other stupid school rules make it easier for the school to maintain order. Contrary to Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” law which says you have a right to defend yourself, the general rule in most schools that if you are caught fighting you are suspended. So if a high school bully with failing grades who doesn’t care about learning decides to pick on a good kid and the kid defends himself (or worse yet steps in to defend a smaller weaker kid from the bully), the victim (or defender) gets punished along with the bully. If you’re a white middle class kid, who’s only hope at college is an academic scholarship, then that 5 day suspension could cost you your GPA and thousands of dollars of scholarship funds and the bully gets what he wanted, out of school. The victim is assumed guilty and there is no due process, and no defense. The zero tolerance for fighting policy of most Florida schools punishes victims, and violates the civil rights of students. We are teaching our children: that they don’t have basic civil rights, that they must be cowards, they must never stand up for themselves or others, and meekly obey the government tyrants, or be punished. Regardless of what our Constitution says, our actions and the actions of our government are teaching our youth that the government does not protect individual civil rights, and that punishments are drastically disproportionate to the crime, if the crime is failure to obey the government.
This zero tolerance policy has but one purpose, to teach our children that they never have the right to use force for any reason and that the government (school) has a monopoly on the use of force, and that there are no limits to what authority can do. This zero tolerance policy also teaches that justice does not exist, and can be denied for the convenience of the authority. This is contrary to the US and Florida constitutions and laws but is exactly what the ruling elite what the public to believe. The idea that no individual has the right to use force for any reason is contrary to the Constitution, Declaration of Independents and even the Libertarian Party Platform; which states “The only legitimate use of force is in defense of individual rights — life, liberty, and justly acquired property — against aggression. This right inheres in the individual, who may agree to be aided by any other individual or group. . . . and oppose the prosecution of individuals for exercising their rights of selfdefense.”
There is a need for legitimate authority, our children should be taught to respect those in authority, and obey all legitimate requests of that authority, BUT they should also be taught there are limits to government authority, what those limits are, how to respectfully stand up to the illegitimate exercise of authority, and when if necessary to use force to defend themselves or others. As citizens and parents, we must stand up for the rights of our children against the tyrannical excess of authority. If we want our future to have liberty, not an all controlling socialist nanny state, then this is where we start. Educating our children and protecting their rights. If students now coming of age and future generations believe that only the government has a legitimate claim to the use of force, that the government can silence ideas and speech they don’t like, and that it can deny justice for convenience, then we are no longer the home of the free and the brave, but the home to slaves.
I’m encouraged by the national uproar that forced one small government school district to uphold the civil rights of one boy. That uproar should be happening in every school district across the country. We must end the systematic attacks on civil rights, end stupid zero tolerance rules and insist that our schools teach the Constitution, Bill of Rights, and the true meaning of Liberty and Justice for all.
DETROIT -- Michigan high school teacher Jay McDowell says he didn't like where the discussion was going after a student told his classmates he didn't "accept gays."
So McDowell kicked the boy out of class for a day.
In return, the teacher was suspended for a day without pay for violating the student's free speech rights...
The Constitution of the United States, includes a Bill of Rights, which doesn’t grant rights to anybody, but assumes people have the rights and severely limits the government from infringing on those rights. The US Constitution is not politically correct and does not place the ideas and speech of some people’s values over the ideas and speech of others. Wanting to instill a value of “tolerance” does not give the government or any of its agents, the right to stifle speech they don’t approve. That is exactly what Jay McDowell did when he threw the student out of class because he didn’t like the “where the discussion was going.”
It is a shame that a teacher was so intolerant and thought he had the right to punish a student for exercising his right to free speech. What is good is that he was rightly reprimanded and punished proportionately.
Far too often do we see disproportionate punishment for "crimes." The reason for a fine or punishment is to deter future bad behavior and offer restitution to the victim. In this case Justice was served; the minimal punishment did both. It affirmed that student's right to free speech, it sent the message to other students that the school would protect their basic civil rights, and deterred not only the McDowell but other teachers from infringing on the rights of other students in the future. More severe punishment would have been counterproductive, costly, and unjust.
Compare that to the punishment another student received when she had a plastic butter knife in her lunch box. The typical punishment for that offence is expulsion from school for having a weapon. This zero tolerance nonsense is not proportionate to what reasonable people would not even consider a crime. Whereas McDowell, as an agent of the government, clearly violated the civil rights of the student, in the other case a powerless minor committed no crime. It seems the punishment associated with zero tolerance government rules for minors is to instill a fear, and belief that the government has the authority and right to force you to obey any rule or regulations they want, and failure to obey will be severely punished.
We must as citizens all try to hold our government accountable, even the petty tyrants in our public school systems. We can and did hold our government officials accountable as reported in the news this week in the story of a middle school boy who was ordered to remove an American Flag he put on his bike to honor veterans.
Thank God for the uproar of the American people. The uproar forced the California school board to reverse its decision. I read in one account where a US Soldier in Afghanistan called the school board to complain. It was absurd for the government agents to think that they can deny a boy his civil rights because others didn’t like his expression. This is the so called hecklers veto. The first action should have been to focus on those students who made threats, not take away the rights of the student who violated no laws, nor rules, nor rights of another. But the government now says that because your exercise of your civil rights may upset others, and those others may do criminal things, you are responsible for the criminal actions of people who don’t want you to express an opinion or idea they don’t like.
Friday, 12 Nov 2010, 5:05 PM EST
SACRAMENTO - A boy in California is now allowed to ride to school with an American flag. Earlier this week, a middle school told 13-year-old Cody Alicea to take the flag off his bike. He was carrying the flag to honor veterans, like his own grandfather. He had been riding his bike with the flag for about two months.
The school district says the boy was asked to remove the flag because some students complained about it and apparently made threats.
School officials worried students would come to school with flags from other countries, sparking racial tension and possible violence. . .
How did this country get to the government that thinks it can silence citizens who express non politically correct ideas? It is hard to fathom how and why we accept a government that punishes a child who is threatened rather than hold accountable those who do the threatening.
We are teaching our children that their rights are not important, and that the government can take them away at will, without due process, without proof, without cause, just because zero tolerance and other stupid school rules make it easier for the school to maintain order. Contrary to Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” law which says you have a right to defend yourself, the general rule in most schools that if you are caught fighting you are suspended. So if a high school bully with failing grades who doesn’t care about learning decides to pick on a good kid and the kid defends himself (or worse yet steps in to defend a smaller weaker kid from the bully), the victim (or defender) gets punished along with the bully. If you’re a white middle class kid, who’s only hope at college is an academic scholarship, then that 5 day suspension could cost you your GPA and thousands of dollars of scholarship funds and the bully gets what he wanted, out of school. The victim is assumed guilty and there is no due process, and no defense. The zero tolerance for fighting policy of most Florida schools punishes victims, and violates the civil rights of students. We are teaching our children: that they don’t have basic civil rights, that they must be cowards, they must never stand up for themselves or others, and meekly obey the government tyrants, or be punished. Regardless of what our Constitution says, our actions and the actions of our government are teaching our youth that the government does not protect individual civil rights, and that punishments are drastically disproportionate to the crime, if the crime is failure to obey the government.
This zero tolerance policy has but one purpose, to teach our children that they never have the right to use force for any reason and that the government (school) has a monopoly on the use of force, and that there are no limits to what authority can do. This zero tolerance policy also teaches that justice does not exist, and can be denied for the convenience of the authority. This is contrary to the US and Florida constitutions and laws but is exactly what the ruling elite what the public to believe. The idea that no individual has the right to use force for any reason is contrary to the Constitution, Declaration of Independents and even the Libertarian Party Platform; which states “The only legitimate use of force is in defense of individual rights — life, liberty, and justly acquired property — against aggression. This right inheres in the individual, who may agree to be aided by any other individual or group. . . . and oppose the prosecution of individuals for exercising their rights of selfdefense.”
There is a need for legitimate authority, our children should be taught to respect those in authority, and obey all legitimate requests of that authority, BUT they should also be taught there are limits to government authority, what those limits are, how to respectfully stand up to the illegitimate exercise of authority, and when if necessary to use force to defend themselves or others. As citizens and parents, we must stand up for the rights of our children against the tyrannical excess of authority. If we want our future to have liberty, not an all controlling socialist nanny state, then this is where we start. Educating our children and protecting their rights. If students now coming of age and future generations believe that only the government has a legitimate claim to the use of force, that the government can silence ideas and speech they don’t like, and that it can deny justice for convenience, then we are no longer the home of the free and the brave, but the home to slaves.
I’m encouraged by the national uproar that forced one small government school district to uphold the civil rights of one boy. That uproar should be happening in every school district across the country. We must end the systematic attacks on civil rights, end stupid zero tolerance rules and insist that our schools teach the Constitution, Bill of Rights, and the true meaning of Liberty and Justice for all.
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
We are Teaching Our Youth to Accept Totalitarianism
It starts out the very first class in Kindergarten, because there are not unlimited funds, the kids are given a list of things the class needs, and everybody is expected to bring: safety scissors, crayons, etc. Now because not all kids can afford those things a note is added that asks if you can that you also buy enough for another student. Generously that happens and usually there is extra. So far so good, the kids see charity and voluntary caring for those less fortunate. Then the Kindergarten teacher gets all socialist. Rather than let each student keep and use the property they brought in, and give the extras to those who couldn’t afford any, demonstrating that Americans can and will voluntarily help those less fortunate, all the supplies get combined into individual tubs, all the scissors in one tub, crayons in another, they all become everybody’s community property. This way the kid who’s parents bought the best Crayola crayons doesn’t have something better than the kid who’s parents could only afford the cheap generic ones. It’s not “fair” that some have nicer things than others and we are trying to teach that community property is better than private property. In fact private property rights of children are suppressed and treated as evil.
Next year in first grade when the parents get the list almost all of them purchases the cheapest stuff they can, because since it all becomes community property, there is no reason to provide the best you can, your kid will probably not benefit from your added expense, since there is no ownership, there is incentive to provide the best. Since nobody will see that there is charity to those who are less fortunate, few parents provide extra for the community, and often there is not enough to go around, so some of last year’s old worn out supplies are recycled, or pleas for more support are issued. It’s not “fair” that some get better, or have more, etc. so right from the start the first lesson our schools teach is community property, and it’s not fair that some have more than others. Although not said our actions in school teach socialism.
When our children go to middle and high school, the Bill of Rights is barely mentioned, but the actions of the school are that the “Authority” has the right to search you whenever they want; force you to testify against yourself, you have no right to defend yourself, you have no freedom of speech, you have no right to privacy, you have no right to a fair hearing or trial, and due process is what the authorities say it is. Arbitrary rules with no basis in fact can and are abusively enforced. If at lunch you use a plastic knife to spread peanut butter on your crackers; you’re expelled for having a knife on campus. Imagine a 15 yr old girl expelled for having a Mydol to relieve cramps from her monthly friend. Or an 8 year old boy suspended for drawing a soldier with a gun (his dad’s in the National Guard). How about throwing both the bully and the victim out of school for fighting, doesn’t matter who started it if you hit back and defend yourself your suspended or expelled, you have no right to either due process or self defense.
When two Norview High School teachers distributed classroom materials to a 12th grade government class, which gave advice on how to deal with police if stopped, they were placed on paid administrative leave because the materials where “unauthorized.” They’d shown a video from Flex Your Rights which explains how legal rights apply to police searches of vehicles, homes or individuals and how people can cite those rights during encounters with police. Clearly it’s unauthorized to teach students when and how they can tell authorities no. (Watch the Video)
The results are that our students know that the authorities can abuse them and that bucking authority has swift arbitrary punishment without due process, and although they may have “rights” the reality is they are subjects to authoritarian rule. Worse is the fact that they are ignorant of their rights and how our government works. In a national survey of high school students it was revealed that only:
2% can identify the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court
35% know that "we the people" are the first three words of the U.S. Constitution
1.8% know that James Madison is considered the father of the U.S. Constitution
25% know that the Fifth Amendment protects against double jeopardy and self incrimination, among other legal rights.
Think it gets better in college, visit http://www.thefire.org and review the legal cases they have fought. Look at all the cases they have exposed where due process is denied and the arbitrary dictates of University Leaders are the law, and students have no rights except not to be offended. They give most Florida Universities a red light on protecting individual rights. Just note that at the University of Florida examples of Prohibited Conduct Include, but Are Not Limited To:
Writing or displaying letters, notes, or e-mails which are derogatory toward any individual's race, color, marital status, sex, religion, national origin, disability, age, sexual orientation, or military status.
Making comments, slurs, or jokes which are derogatory toward any individual's race, color, marital status, sex, religion, national origin, disability, age, sexual orientation, or military status. ...
Making gestures or displaying pictures, cartoons, posters, or magazines which are derogatory toward any individual's race, color, marital status, sex, religion, national origin, disability, age, sexual orientation, or military status ....
I guess if you’re a college student at UF, you have to watch South Park in secret. The First Amendment at this publicly funded university is not even a consideration. Again we teach that the authorities have the right to control what you say and do.
Is it a wonder that since from the day kids start school until the graduate college the actions of our schools hammer into them the fact that those in power can control you, and we don’t teach by action or word what unalienable rights are, or the founding principles of our country and government, that there is no outcry when our President acts like a third world despot. Due process and the rule of law are not discussed and definitely not demonstrated by our schools to our children.
Look at our public elementary and secondary schools, they look like prisons, bared doors, armed polices wandering the halls, and nearly constant surveillance. Our student’s time in school is marked by overreaching zero tolerance policies, heightened security and surveillance and a greater emphasis on conformity. The result is the acceptance of destruction of privacy and freedom. In fact I believe we are now in The War on Kids www.thewaronkids.com
Maybe that’s been the goal all along, to change the education system to teach the people to accept totalitarianism. It is the results.
How else do you explain the people of this country accepting the third world like despotism of Obama extorting 20 billion from BP without due process? When did Obama become Judge and Jury and get granted the power to adjudicate crime and pass sentences on private corporations? He’s not a judge. When did Obama get the power and authority to create laws that allows the federal government to take the assets of a private company and determine how best to distribute them to people the private company may have hurt without a trial? He’s no longer a Senator. What law granted Obama the power and authority to deny BP due process? When did the USA become a totalitarian state with the President having the powers to dictate the actions of private companies? When we took teaching civics and the bill of rights out of our schools and taught socialism and totalitarianism by example.
Obama is acting like a King not a president. Our schools have taught our children to accept totalitarianism. Imagine if they were teaching what a few decades ago was common. We must change what and how our schools teach our children about civil rights and government. Graduating high school students don’t even know as much as kids who watched Saturday morning TV did in the 70’s. When was the last time you heard or saw a School House Rock video? I’ll close with the lyrics of the School House Rock song No More Kings (Watch Here)
Rockin' and a-rollin', splishin' and a-splashin',
Over the horizon, what can it be?
The pilgrims sailed the sea
To find a place to call their own.
In their ship Mayflower,
They hoped to find a better home.
They finally knocked
On Plymouth Rock
And someone said, "We're there."
It may not look like home
But at this point I don't care.
Oh, they were missing Mother England,
They swore their loyalty until the very end.
Anything you say, King,
It's OK, King,
You know it's kinda scary on your own.
Gonna build a new land
The way we planned.
Could you help us run it till it's grown?
They planted corn, you know
They built their houses one by one,
And bit by bit they worked
Until the colonies were done.
They looked around,
Yeah, up and down,
And someone said, "Hurray!"
If the king could only see us now
He would be proud of us today.
They knew that now they'd run their own land,
But George the Third still vowed
He'd rule them till the end.
Anything I say, do it my way now.
Anything I say, do it my way.
Don't you get to feeling independent
'Cause I'm gonna force you to obey.
He taxed their property,
He didn't give them any choice,
And back in England,
He didn't give them any voice.
(That's called taxation without representation,
and it's not fair!)
But when the Colonies complained
The king said: "I don't care!"
He even has the nerve
To tax our cup of tea.
To put it kindly, King,
We really don't agree.
Gonna show you how we feel.
We're gonna dump this tea
And turn this harbor into
The biggest cup of tea in history!
They wanted no more Mother England.
They knew the time had come
For them to take command.
It's very clear you're being unfair, King,
No matter what you say, we won't obey.
Gonna hold a revolution now, King,
And we're gonna run it all our way
With no more kings...
We're gonna elect a president! (No more kings)
He's gonna do what the people want! (No more kings)
We're gonna run things our way! (No more kings)
Nobody's gonna tell us what to do!
Rockin' and a-rollin', splishin' and a-splashin',
Over the horizon, what can it be?
Looks like it's going to be a free country.
Next year in first grade when the parents get the list almost all of them purchases the cheapest stuff they can, because since it all becomes community property, there is no reason to provide the best you can, your kid will probably not benefit from your added expense, since there is no ownership, there is incentive to provide the best. Since nobody will see that there is charity to those who are less fortunate, few parents provide extra for the community, and often there is not enough to go around, so some of last year’s old worn out supplies are recycled, or pleas for more support are issued. It’s not “fair” that some get better, or have more, etc. so right from the start the first lesson our schools teach is community property, and it’s not fair that some have more than others. Although not said our actions in school teach socialism.
When our children go to middle and high school, the Bill of Rights is barely mentioned, but the actions of the school are that the “Authority” has the right to search you whenever they want; force you to testify against yourself, you have no right to defend yourself, you have no freedom of speech, you have no right to privacy, you have no right to a fair hearing or trial, and due process is what the authorities say it is. Arbitrary rules with no basis in fact can and are abusively enforced. If at lunch you use a plastic knife to spread peanut butter on your crackers; you’re expelled for having a knife on campus. Imagine a 15 yr old girl expelled for having a Mydol to relieve cramps from her monthly friend. Or an 8 year old boy suspended for drawing a soldier with a gun (his dad’s in the National Guard). How about throwing both the bully and the victim out of school for fighting, doesn’t matter who started it if you hit back and defend yourself your suspended or expelled, you have no right to either due process or self defense.
When two Norview High School teachers distributed classroom materials to a 12th grade government class, which gave advice on how to deal with police if stopped, they were placed on paid administrative leave because the materials where “unauthorized.” They’d shown a video from Flex Your Rights which explains how legal rights apply to police searches of vehicles, homes or individuals and how people can cite those rights during encounters with police. Clearly it’s unauthorized to teach students when and how they can tell authorities no. (Watch the Video)
The results are that our students know that the authorities can abuse them and that bucking authority has swift arbitrary punishment without due process, and although they may have “rights” the reality is they are subjects to authoritarian rule. Worse is the fact that they are ignorant of their rights and how our government works. In a national survey of high school students it was revealed that only:
Think it gets better in college, visit http://www.thefire.org and review the legal cases they have fought. Look at all the cases they have exposed where due process is denied and the arbitrary dictates of University Leaders are the law, and students have no rights except not to be offended. They give most Florida Universities a red light on protecting individual rights. Just note that at the University of Florida examples of Prohibited Conduct Include, but Are Not Limited To:
I guess if you’re a college student at UF, you have to watch South Park in secret. The First Amendment at this publicly funded university is not even a consideration. Again we teach that the authorities have the right to control what you say and do.
Is it a wonder that since from the day kids start school until the graduate college the actions of our schools hammer into them the fact that those in power can control you, and we don’t teach by action or word what unalienable rights are, or the founding principles of our country and government, that there is no outcry when our President acts like a third world despot. Due process and the rule of law are not discussed and definitely not demonstrated by our schools to our children.
Look at our public elementary and secondary schools, they look like prisons, bared doors, armed polices wandering the halls, and nearly constant surveillance. Our student’s time in school is marked by overreaching zero tolerance policies, heightened security and surveillance and a greater emphasis on conformity. The result is the acceptance of destruction of privacy and freedom. In fact I believe we are now in The War on Kids www.thewaronkids.com
Maybe that’s been the goal all along, to change the education system to teach the people to accept totalitarianism. It is the results.
How else do you explain the people of this country accepting the third world like despotism of Obama extorting 20 billion from BP without due process? When did Obama become Judge and Jury and get granted the power to adjudicate crime and pass sentences on private corporations? He’s not a judge. When did Obama get the power and authority to create laws that allows the federal government to take the assets of a private company and determine how best to distribute them to people the private company may have hurt without a trial? He’s no longer a Senator. What law granted Obama the power and authority to deny BP due process? When did the USA become a totalitarian state with the President having the powers to dictate the actions of private companies? When we took teaching civics and the bill of rights out of our schools and taught socialism and totalitarianism by example.
Obama is acting like a King not a president. Our schools have taught our children to accept totalitarianism. Imagine if they were teaching what a few decades ago was common. We must change what and how our schools teach our children about civil rights and government. Graduating high school students don’t even know as much as kids who watched Saturday morning TV did in the 70’s. When was the last time you heard or saw a School House Rock video? I’ll close with the lyrics of the School House Rock song No More Kings (Watch Here)
Rockin' and a-rollin', splishin' and a-splashin',
Over the horizon, what can it be?
The pilgrims sailed the sea
To find a place to call their own.
In their ship Mayflower,
They hoped to find a better home.
They finally knocked
On Plymouth Rock
And someone said, "We're there."
It may not look like home
But at this point I don't care.
Oh, they were missing Mother England,
They swore their loyalty until the very end.
Anything you say, King,
It's OK, King,
You know it's kinda scary on your own.
Gonna build a new land
The way we planned.
Could you help us run it till it's grown?
They planted corn, you know
They built their houses one by one,
And bit by bit they worked
Until the colonies were done.
They looked around,
Yeah, up and down,
And someone said, "Hurray!"
If the king could only see us now
He would be proud of us today.
They knew that now they'd run their own land,
But George the Third still vowed
He'd rule them till the end.
Anything I say, do it my way now.
Anything I say, do it my way.
Don't you get to feeling independent
'Cause I'm gonna force you to obey.
He taxed their property,
He didn't give them any choice,
And back in England,
He didn't give them any voice.
(That's called taxation without representation,
and it's not fair!)
But when the Colonies complained
The king said: "I don't care!"
He even has the nerve
To tax our cup of tea.
To put it kindly, King,
We really don't agree.
Gonna show you how we feel.
We're gonna dump this tea
And turn this harbor into
The biggest cup of tea in history!
They wanted no more Mother England.
They knew the time had come
For them to take command.
It's very clear you're being unfair, King,
No matter what you say, we won't obey.
Gonna hold a revolution now, King,
And we're gonna run it all our way
With no more kings...
We're gonna elect a president! (No more kings)
He's gonna do what the people want! (No more kings)
We're gonna run things our way! (No more kings)
Nobody's gonna tell us what to do!
Rockin' and a-rollin', splishin' and a-splashin',
Over the horizon, what can it be?
Looks like it's going to be a free country.
Thursday, April 29, 2010
To Be or Not to Be (an Organ Donor)
I’ll start by saying I’m an organ donor, and have been since I got my Drivers License over 30 years ago. I ride motorcycles, so both the chance of me needing an organ, and being able to donate an organ is a little higher than most. This is a choice I made concerning my body. The question is do I own my body or is it the States?
The State of New York is losing productive citizens by the thousands who are moving to states with less taxes and regulations. Fundamentally the newly proposed law by Assemblyman Brodsky, is the heart of why people are leaving NY and in general why the left doesn’t appreciate middle American values. Assemblyman Brodsky introduced a bill that would give state the right to decide if you are an organ donor or not. The law would make everybody an organ donor unless they opted out. Right now hospitals and the State have a hard time keeping track of those who voluntarily donate their organs. If this law passes they can assume you are, harvest your organs, even if you’ve opted out, and say it was a screw up later (how is your family going to get them back once transplanted?) Brodsky believes that because enough people don’t volunteer to be organ donors that the State has a right to your body parts, but should offer individuals a way to opt out.
This is typical liberal thought, if people don’t make the choices that liberals think then use government to force people to make the “right” choice. The FDA’s war on salt is typical. The FDA without direction or law passed by congress is proposing rules that would force food manufacturers to cut salt from processed foods. Voluntary reduction in salt has not been as successful as the government would have hoped. The problem is when people are given a choice between saltier foods and less salty foods they vote with their wallets for food that tastes good (salty). The FDA (hence the government) feels that they must dictate to people what they can and cannot eat. This is a fundamental shift in thinking. By what right does the federal government have in dictating what a person can and cannot eat?
If you believe that it is the purpose of government to take care of the sick, the poor, the needy, and decide what’s best for the people then you are very wrong, and may want to find another country to live in. The purpose of our government is clearly not to provide for its citizens needs but protect their rights. Again I will call on you to examine the purpose of our government as so clearly stated in our founding document the Declaration of Independence; “ 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.”
Now obviously NY isn’t the federal government, but how a law that assumes the State has a right to people’s body parts unless they actively protest meets the purpose of government is beyond me.
Notice how because they powers that be in the Obama administration cannot get the laws they want passed through congress, are dictating rules (which carry the weight of law) through bureaucratic agencies like the FDA. Clearly rules that dictate the salt content of food do not serve the stated purpose of our government, and worse yet, because it is enacted and enforced by unelected bureaucrats who are not accountable to the people, the proposed salt rules are not at the consent of the governed. Laws like Obamacare, clearly enacted against the will of the people; the placement of unelected Czars, who are not approved by the senate, the dissolution of the rule of law for political purposes are all the actions of despotic rule, not a republic, and are typical of Obama’s first year in office. This kind of arbitrary tyranny, over a few decades is exactly what lead to the Revolutionary War. Since history, specifically the reasons and actions of a tyrannical government which did not want or accept the wishes of the governed, are no longer taught in our public schools, we may be forced to repeat history again. Where the people threw off the yoke of tyranny from a government that was destructive to the purpose for which it was established. In fact when a government’s actions are destructive to the purpose for which it was established it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it.
Our long and established government should not be changed for light and transient causes; experience has shown that we are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which we are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is our right, our duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for our future security.
I sincerely hope that: a dramatic change will be seen in our next election; That the oligarchy that is our “two party” system will the thrown out; That the tea party voters will put principled temporary citizen leaders into office like Libertarian Senate Candidate Alex Snitker; and That the despotic statist actions of the past few years can be turned back. I fear that if the despotic statists remain in power and continue to ignore the will of the people, the Russian analysts who’ve predicted the breakup of this great nation may be right, and because the socialist overcrowded urban areas of this country cannot survive without the productive minority of flyover country it may get ugly.
It’s your body not the states and nobody has the right to it, not even its parts when you die. Since it is your body not the governments, what you choose to put into it is your business not the theirs. I urge you to eat healthy because it’s good for you, but I also urge you to be vocal and fight against any government actions which try to control what you put into your body, which is your ultimate property. Please become an organ donor, because it is a good thing to do for your fellow man, but be vocal and fight against any government actions that tries to force you to do so.
The State of New York is losing productive citizens by the thousands who are moving to states with less taxes and regulations. Fundamentally the newly proposed law by Assemblyman Brodsky, is the heart of why people are leaving NY and in general why the left doesn’t appreciate middle American values. Assemblyman Brodsky introduced a bill that would give state the right to decide if you are an organ donor or not. The law would make everybody an organ donor unless they opted out. Right now hospitals and the State have a hard time keeping track of those who voluntarily donate their organs. If this law passes they can assume you are, harvest your organs, even if you’ve opted out, and say it was a screw up later (how is your family going to get them back once transplanted?) Brodsky believes that because enough people don’t volunteer to be organ donors that the State has a right to your body parts, but should offer individuals a way to opt out.
This is typical liberal thought, if people don’t make the choices that liberals think then use government to force people to make the “right” choice. The FDA’s war on salt is typical. The FDA without direction or law passed by congress is proposing rules that would force food manufacturers to cut salt from processed foods. Voluntary reduction in salt has not been as successful as the government would have hoped. The problem is when people are given a choice between saltier foods and less salty foods they vote with their wallets for food that tastes good (salty). The FDA (hence the government) feels that they must dictate to people what they can and cannot eat. This is a fundamental shift in thinking. By what right does the federal government have in dictating what a person can and cannot eat?
If you believe that it is the purpose of government to take care of the sick, the poor, the needy, and decide what’s best for the people then you are very wrong, and may want to find another country to live in. The purpose of our government is clearly not to provide for its citizens needs but protect their rights. Again I will call on you to examine the purpose of our government as so clearly stated in our founding document the Declaration of Independence; “ 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.”
Now obviously NY isn’t the federal government, but how a law that assumes the State has a right to people’s body parts unless they actively protest meets the purpose of government is beyond me.
Notice how because they powers that be in the Obama administration cannot get the laws they want passed through congress, are dictating rules (which carry the weight of law) through bureaucratic agencies like the FDA. Clearly rules that dictate the salt content of food do not serve the stated purpose of our government, and worse yet, because it is enacted and enforced by unelected bureaucrats who are not accountable to the people, the proposed salt rules are not at the consent of the governed. Laws like Obamacare, clearly enacted against the will of the people; the placement of unelected Czars, who are not approved by the senate, the dissolution of the rule of law for political purposes are all the actions of despotic rule, not a republic, and are typical of Obama’s first year in office. This kind of arbitrary tyranny, over a few decades is exactly what lead to the Revolutionary War. Since history, specifically the reasons and actions of a tyrannical government which did not want or accept the wishes of the governed, are no longer taught in our public schools, we may be forced to repeat history again. Where the people threw off the yoke of tyranny from a government that was destructive to the purpose for which it was established. In fact when a government’s actions are destructive to the purpose for which it was established it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it.
Our long and established government should not be changed for light and transient causes; experience has shown that we are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which we are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is our right, our duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for our future security.
I sincerely hope that: a dramatic change will be seen in our next election; That the oligarchy that is our “two party” system will the thrown out; That the tea party voters will put principled temporary citizen leaders into office like Libertarian Senate Candidate Alex Snitker; and That the despotic statist actions of the past few years can be turned back. I fear that if the despotic statists remain in power and continue to ignore the will of the people, the Russian analysts who’ve predicted the breakup of this great nation may be right, and because the socialist overcrowded urban areas of this country cannot survive without the productive minority of flyover country it may get ugly.
It’s your body not the states and nobody has the right to it, not even its parts when you die. Since it is your body not the governments, what you choose to put into it is your business not the theirs. I urge you to eat healthy because it’s good for you, but I also urge you to be vocal and fight against any government actions which try to control what you put into your body, which is your ultimate property. Please become an organ donor, because it is a good thing to do for your fellow man, but be vocal and fight against any government actions that tries to force you to do so.
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
2010 Census - Know Your Rights
originally posted last may, but more relevant now
The 2010 census is coming up, and if your even the slightest bit cantankerous you might not fill out form they mail you. You might not fill out the second form they mail you. They will then send somebody to your door to ask you the questions.
Now that's not so bad but by law you are required to answer the census. Now the good news, the law also states that agents of the government can be required to provide you with information if requested, before you can be required to answer their questions.
The amount of info you can require, and ask about is extensive. You not only can use this form for agents like the Census takers, but any other government agent who is questioning you. Kind of cool, put them through what they put you through.
Some bright people have compiled an nice questionnaire you can have the government agent fill out. (at the bottom are links to several versions)
Search the net using:
Key Points:
Click Here for PSQ version 2
The 2010 census is coming up, and if your even the slightest bit cantankerous you might not fill out form they mail you. You might not fill out the second form they mail you. They will then send somebody to your door to ask you the questions.
Now that's not so bad but by law you are required to answer the census. Now the good news, the law also states that agents of the government can be required to provide you with information if requested, before you can be required to answer their questions.
The amount of info you can require, and ask about is extensive. You not only can use this form for agents like the Census takers, but any other government agent who is questioning you. Kind of cool, put them through what they put you through.
Some bright people have compiled an nice questionnaire you can have the government agent fill out. (at the bottom are links to several versions)
Search the net using:
THE PUBLIC SERVANT QUESTIONNAIRE
Key Points:
- An American does not have to speak with a government agent unless the citizen has been arrested.
- Americans have a right to privacy, to be left alone.
- The PRIVACY ACT OF 1974 (Public Law 93-579), empowers citizens to require full, written disclosure from a government official who seeks information.
- You may insist on complete disclosure as a precondition to speaking with any government official.
- Law-abiding citizens are sometimes visited by agents of the Federal government for no apparent reason. It is helpful, at the time of these visits, to recall that unless a citizen has been placed under arrest (either because a law enforcement officer has probable cause to believe the citizen has committed a crime or because the officer has in his possession an arrest warrant issued by a judge who believes there is probable cause the citizen has committed a crime, a citizen does not have to entertain the company of government agents.
- Citizens also have the right, guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution, not to testify against themselves. Thus, when "the government" comes knocking on one¹s door, you have the right to simply say, "Please go away." Unless the government officer places you under arrest (there must be probable cause, or an arrest warrant based on probable cause), the officer must obey your wishes.
- Of course, citizens also have a vested interest in assisting "the government" in its role of crime-solver. Most of us understand the need to help "the government" to apprehend criminals. But it is also helpful, when "the government" arrives at your place of employment or at your home, to know how to find out why government agents have appeared on YOUR doorstep.
- A handy little questionnaire that I came across years ago will do the trick. It¹s called the "Public Servant Questionnaire." A version following the link. The "PSQ" was developed by Lynn Johnston, author of Who's Afraid of the IRS? (Libertarian Review Foundation: 1983, ISBN 0-930073-03-7).
- The PSQ is based on the requirements placed upon the government by the Privacy Act of 1974 (Public Law 93-579), an amending law to Title 5, United States Code, Section 552, and is included as Section 552a.
- If a citizen chooses to cooperate with government officials who are seeking information, BEFORE questioning begins, the citizen should politely inform the government agent or agents that a prerequisite for the citizen's cooperation with "the government" is the agent¹s cooperation with the citizen.
- The questions should then be put to each agent, and the citizen should enter the answers onto the questionnaire. Copies should be provided to each agent, either at the time of the questioning or by mail to the agent after the visit. The questionnaire informs the government agent that the citizen knows his rights and knows which limited powers the government agent has been granted by the people.
- Most probably some government agents will not want to fill out or sign the PSQ. That’s fine. They can then be sent on their merry way. They may need to explain to their superiors, and a court of law, and a jury, on another day, why they refused to cooperate with the reasonable questions of the highest officeholder in the land, a citizen.
Click Here for PSQ version 2
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Fundamental Questions
Here are some fundamental philosophical questions that I'm curious as to other peoples opinions.
1) Are rights "unalienable" or are they privileges granted by the government?
2) Should laws and rights insure equal treatment or equal outcome?
3) Do groups have rights that supercede individual rights?
4) Do individuals have the right to the labor or property of other individuals by means of force?
5) At what point does an individual have the right to use force against another individual?
6) Should the "rule of law" be applied to everybody equally, or does "might make right"?
7) Does society have the right to force individuals to be charitable?
8) Is there a right for individuals to use force to protect themselves, their family and their property?
9) Obedience to the Government
Should all laws be obeyed?
Is civil disobedience justifiable?
Should jury's be allowed to acquit the accused if they believe the Law is unjust?
10) Knowing that you could lose your life, be injured, or imprisoned:
Would you fight to protect your basic rights and liberty?
Would you send your child to fight for basic rights and liberty?
What rights would you fight for?
What rights would you abandon before fighting for?
1) Are rights "unalienable" or are they privileges granted by the government?
2) Should laws and rights insure equal treatment or equal outcome?
3) Do groups have rights that supercede individual rights?
4) Do individuals have the right to the labor or property of other individuals by means of force?
5) At what point does an individual have the right to use force against another individual?
6) Should the "rule of law" be applied to everybody equally, or does "might make right"?
7) Does society have the right to force individuals to be charitable?
8) Is there a right for individuals to use force to protect themselves, their family and their property?
9) Obedience to the Government
10) Knowing that you could lose your life, be injured, or imprisoned:
Saturday, September 19, 2009
Liberty vs. Universal Health Care
I’ve finally figured it out. The people supporting government run health care don’t like, value, or want democracy, freedom and liberty. They don’t believe that the people should (or can) be allowed to make choices in how they live their own lives. They are using health care as an excuse to control the choices people can make.
“We provide you with health care; therefore we can determine how you must live to minimize the cost of that healthcare to everybody else”.
That’s the excuse liberals use to increase taxes and create laws governing a plethora of personal choices like what you can eat, what you can drink, smoking, drugs, seatbelts, motorcycle helmets, ad nauseum. The excuse that they can govern your personal choices because your choice costs all of society is a red herring. They only cost the government because we have let the government force the “Nanny State” upon us. If the government didn’t pay for health care, then you choices wouldn’t cost the government anything.
The liberal elites hate our constitution; they are even brash enough to say it. President B. Obama noted in an August 2009 town hall meeting about healthcare, that our constitution was the problem, it makes large wholesale changes to society very difficult. You see our constitution limits the federal government to specific delegated powers. Providing charity is not among the powers our federal government has. Details Here Our constitution was designed to protect the rights of individuals, not groups, not provide for the needs of the people, but protect their freedoms and liberty.
Here is the problem liberals who want to provide health care for everybody have; with liberty and freedom comes free will. When people exercise free will some people don’t choose to do, or act in ways that liberals approve. They drink, smoke, do drugs, eat too much fattening food, don’t wear helmets, they actually take risks. People exercising free will means that the governing elite don’t have control of what they do, their money, or their lives. They only want people to be able to choose what they think is right or good. Many (probably most) have their hearts in the right place, they don’t want others to suffer; they know that certain choices people make may lead to suffering; therefore they want to control the choices people can make. They are in fact willing to sacrifice liberty for security. They want to sacrifice the free will of all Americans so that they don’t have to see any suffering. They think it is unfair that some people make good choices and benefit from those choices and others don’t. They think it is unfair for you to make good choices for your children instill them with beliefs that help them make good choices, and to pass along your good work ethic to your children and belief in self sufficiency, because some other parents don’t and their children suffer.
It’s the same problem non-Christians have with Christianity, free will. If a person chooses correctly they receive salvation, if they choose incorrectly they receive damnation. The entire bible is a story of free will, and the consequences of exercising choices. The belief that it is unfair for people to suffer the consequences of the choices they make is the fundamental problem with liberal elites who believe that they know what choices people should make; right down to whether or not to purchase health insurance.
There is a moral imperative to help those who through no fault of their own need help. Recent examples of Katrina, and the Tsunami prove that people-to-people charity is more efficient, less costly, more humane and compassionate, and more likely to inspire change and self-sufficiency in the beneficiary. People can and would and do readily satisfy society's "moral imperative." There is no constitutional right to charity like health care, housing, etc. Liberals who don’t believe in liberty and freedom are using those as tools to gain control of the people.
“We provide you with health care; therefore we can determine how you must live to minimize the cost of that healthcare to everybody else”.
That’s the excuse liberals use to increase taxes and create laws governing a plethora of personal choices like what you can eat, what you can drink, smoking, drugs, seatbelts, motorcycle helmets, ad nauseum. The excuse that they can govern your personal choices because your choice costs all of society is a red herring. They only cost the government because we have let the government force the “Nanny State” upon us. If the government didn’t pay for health care, then you choices wouldn’t cost the government anything.
The liberal elites hate our constitution; they are even brash enough to say it. President B. Obama noted in an August 2009 town hall meeting about healthcare, that our constitution was the problem, it makes large wholesale changes to society very difficult. You see our constitution limits the federal government to specific delegated powers. Providing charity is not among the powers our federal government has. Details Here Our constitution was designed to protect the rights of individuals, not groups, not provide for the needs of the people, but protect their freedoms and liberty.
Here is the problem liberals who want to provide health care for everybody have; with liberty and freedom comes free will. When people exercise free will some people don’t choose to do, or act in ways that liberals approve. They drink, smoke, do drugs, eat too much fattening food, don’t wear helmets, they actually take risks. People exercising free will means that the governing elite don’t have control of what they do, their money, or their lives. They only want people to be able to choose what they think is right or good. Many (probably most) have their hearts in the right place, they don’t want others to suffer; they know that certain choices people make may lead to suffering; therefore they want to control the choices people can make. They are in fact willing to sacrifice liberty for security. They want to sacrifice the free will of all Americans so that they don’t have to see any suffering. They think it is unfair that some people make good choices and benefit from those choices and others don’t. They think it is unfair for you to make good choices for your children instill them with beliefs that help them make good choices, and to pass along your good work ethic to your children and belief in self sufficiency, because some other parents don’t and their children suffer.
It’s the same problem non-Christians have with Christianity, free will. If a person chooses correctly they receive salvation, if they choose incorrectly they receive damnation. The entire bible is a story of free will, and the consequences of exercising choices. The belief that it is unfair for people to suffer the consequences of the choices they make is the fundamental problem with liberal elites who believe that they know what choices people should make; right down to whether or not to purchase health insurance.
There is a moral imperative to help those who through no fault of their own need help. Recent examples of Katrina, and the Tsunami prove that people-to-people charity is more efficient, less costly, more humane and compassionate, and more likely to inspire change and self-sufficiency in the beneficiary. People can and would and do readily satisfy society's "moral imperative." There is no constitutional right to charity like health care, housing, etc. Liberals who don’t believe in liberty and freedom are using those as tools to gain control of the people.
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Is the US Govt. A Fascist State?
Current actions of our Obama lead government:
The US government is trying to take over the private and personal health-care decisions of the people and establish bureaucracies to make life-and-death decisions and banning unapproved transactions between doctors and patients.
The US government characterizes honest and open expressions of dissent as the expressions of "angry mobs".
The US government has turned the Census into a weapon designed to spy on the most personal aspects of the life of citizens.
The US government is asking its supporters to "snitch" on opponents of its policies.
The US government wants to monitor broadcasts and establish itself as the guardian of "fairness" on the airwaves.
The US government hires and fires the top executives of major corporations and redirects their corporate policies.
The US government becomes the sole arbiter of whether you can keep some of any of the wealth you accumulated legally.
The US government ignores the laws of the land and replaces them with the arbitrary whims of men. (how else would you explain ignoring bankruptcy law and giving unions unsecured debt higher preference to secured debt in the Chrysler and GM bailouts regardless of US bankruptcy laws)
The US government metes out punishment not just for criminal actions, but for "criminal thoughts".
The US government created the current unemployment crisis and now uses it promote policies of government control.
Considering what fascism is, it may be too late and the US has already become a Fascist state.
The US government is trying to take over the private and personal health-care decisions of the people and establish bureaucracies to make life-and-death decisions and banning unapproved transactions between doctors and patients.
The US government characterizes honest and open expressions of dissent as the expressions of "angry mobs".
The US government has turned the Census into a weapon designed to spy on the most personal aspects of the life of citizens.
The US government is asking its supporters to "snitch" on opponents of its policies.
The US government wants to monitor broadcasts and establish itself as the guardian of "fairness" on the airwaves.
The US government hires and fires the top executives of major corporations and redirects their corporate policies.
The US government becomes the sole arbiter of whether you can keep some of any of the wealth you accumulated legally.
The US government ignores the laws of the land and replaces them with the arbitrary whims of men. (how else would you explain ignoring bankruptcy law and giving unions unsecured debt higher preference to secured debt in the Chrysler and GM bailouts regardless of US bankruptcy laws)
The US government metes out punishment not just for criminal actions, but for "criminal thoughts".
The US government created the current unemployment crisis and now uses it promote policies of government control.
Considering what fascism is, it may be too late and the US has already become a Fascist state.
Sunday, June 21, 2009
Rights and Government
Here in the USA we have a unique form of government founded on principles that no other government created before or sense has ever been based. This form of government was codified in two very short documents, the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution.
Let’s first discuss why a government exists. A government is loosely defined as: The Body or group which exercises the control and administration of public policy in a political unit. Most if not all societies have regarded man as a sacrificial means to the ends of others, and society as an end in itself. The common characteristic of most societies and hence their government’s is the fact that the government stands above the moral law. To put it succinctly whatever the government deems as moral is moral. Governments through history impressed upon individuals that self-sacrificial devotion to social duty was regarded as the main purpose of ethics in man’s earthly existence.
To quote Ayn Rand, "The most profoundly revolutionary achievement of the United States of America was the subordination of society to moral law.... All previous systems had held that man’s life belongs to society, that society can dispose of him in any way it pleases, and that any freedom he enjoys is his only by favor, by the permission of society, which may be revoked at any time." Our Forefathers held a different belief that a man’s life is his by right, and that a right is the property of an individual. They believed that society as such has no rights. They wrote about and established the government of the United States based on the idea that the only moral purpose of a government is the protection of individual rights.
A "right" is a moral principle defining and sanctioning a man’s freedom of action in a social context. There is only one fundamental right (all the others are its consequences or corollaries): a man’s right to his own life. Life is a process of self- sustaining and self-generated action; the right to life means the right to engage in self-sustaining and self-generated action-which means: the freedom to take all the actions required by the nature of a rational being for the support, the furtherance, the fulfillment and the enjoyment of his own life. (Such is the meaning of the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.)
If you read the Bill of Rights in the US constitution, you’ll note that it limits the government not individuals. You should also note that it limits the government from infringing on peoples actions, it does not limit objects. You don’t have the freedom to have something you have the freedom to do something. Your rights/freedoms are meaningless unless you have the right to the consequences of your actions. Hence property rights are a right to an action, they are not a insurance that a man will earn any property, but only an insurance that he will own it if he earns it. It is the right to gain, to keep, to use and to dispose of material values.
Go read the The Bill of Rights. What is common among all of them. They limit Government not individuals. None of these rights depends upon the action or property of another individual.
There is no moral ground for any individual to take the labor or force another to do any specific action. Since acquiring property is the result of the actions of individuals, no other individual has the right to the property of another.
Consider the eight listed economic rights from the 1960 Democratic Party platform, which mirror the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights
1. The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation.
2. The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation.
3. The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living.
4. The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home and abroad.
5. The right of every family to a decent home.
6. The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health.
7. The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accidents and unemployment.
8. The right to a good education.
Above it was clearly stated that an individual has the freedom to the results of his own actions. Let’s look at the right to travel. If you have a right to travel, then you have the right to acquire means to travel. In the US that usually means a car. You have the right to own a car. You do not have the right to force others to give you a car, or if your car is broken to fix your car. Hence an auto mechanic has the right to be paid for his services; nobody has the right to force him to repair their car unless the mechanic voluntarily chooses to do so for whatever compensation is agreed upon. The mechanic may if he chooses offer his service for free, but is under no moral obligation to give away his service. You do not have the right to use force to make him fix your car.
Considering our "Healthcare Crisis" let’s just examine #6. Does an individual have the right to the labor of another without just compensation? The answer is clearly NO. You have a right to life, hence your body is your own, not somebody else’s. Just like the car in our example above, if your body is somehow broken you do not have a right to have a mechanic (doctors, nurses, hospital owners, and drug company share holders) fix it. How then can you have a "right" to adequate medical care? Your medical care depends upon the property and actions of other individuals. You have no right to another person’s labor so have no right to adequate health care.
Considering #5, you have a right to a decent home, but you do not have the right to force others to provide you with one.
Considering #7 You have the right to a good education, but you do not have the right to force others to provide you with one.
All of the Economic rights listed above are not rights, but means for government to convince people to give up their rights. All of these so called Economic Rights depend upon taking the labor of one person and giving it to another. To make this more clear, read Article 29 from the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
(1) Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible.
(2) In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic society.
(3) These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.
The UN believes that society can subject and limit individual rights to secure the "rights" of others. In other words society has the right to your labor to make sure others have property.
None of the activities of Obama (and most of Bush’s activities), corporate bailouts, healthcare, taking over GM, forcing Chrysler into a deal with Fiat, etc. are moral, or even constitutional. While we are distracted from the true nature and actions of our government over so-called but non-existent economic rights, we are missing the degradation of our political and property rights.
The wealthy, gun owners, property owners, drug companies, etc. are not a threat to other individual’s rights or freedom. A entity who resorts to physical force, fraud, etc. and violates the rights of others is a criminal-and men have legal protection against him. Remember that rights are moral principles which define and protect a man’s freedom of action, but impose no obligations on other men.
Obviously our government no longer believes in the principles the US was founded. The UN has never believed in those principles and even clearly states that individuals only have the rights that Law allows. Think about what it means to have the rest of the world which doesn't believe in our founding principles, determine what our laws should mean, or what we should have to do, or force their beliefs upon us.
Our government was created to protect the rights of individuals, not groups, not society, but individuals. How can any of the actions of our government over the receint past be considered to be doing what our government was instituted to do. Jefferson may have been right and from time to time the tree of liberty............
...
Let’s first discuss why a government exists. A government is loosely defined as: The Body or group which exercises the control and administration of public policy in a political unit. Most if not all societies have regarded man as a sacrificial means to the ends of others, and society as an end in itself. The common characteristic of most societies and hence their government’s is the fact that the government stands above the moral law. To put it succinctly whatever the government deems as moral is moral. Governments through history impressed upon individuals that self-sacrificial devotion to social duty was regarded as the main purpose of ethics in man’s earthly existence.
To quote Ayn Rand, "The most profoundly revolutionary achievement of the United States of America was the subordination of society to moral law.... All previous systems had held that man’s life belongs to society, that society can dispose of him in any way it pleases, and that any freedom he enjoys is his only by favor, by the permission of society, which may be revoked at any time." Our Forefathers held a different belief that a man’s life is his by right, and that a right is the property of an individual. They believed that society as such has no rights. They wrote about and established the government of the United States based on the idea that the only moral purpose of a government is the protection of individual rights.
A "right" is a moral principle defining and sanctioning a man’s freedom of action in a social context. There is only one fundamental right (all the others are its consequences or corollaries): a man’s right to his own life. Life is a process of self- sustaining and self-generated action; the right to life means the right to engage in self-sustaining and self-generated action-which means: the freedom to take all the actions required by the nature of a rational being for the support, the furtherance, the fulfillment and the enjoyment of his own life. (Such is the meaning of the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.)
If you read the Bill of Rights in the US constitution, you’ll note that it limits the government not individuals. You should also note that it limits the government from infringing on peoples actions, it does not limit objects. You don’t have the freedom to have something you have the freedom to do something. Your rights/freedoms are meaningless unless you have the right to the consequences of your actions. Hence property rights are a right to an action, they are not a insurance that a man will earn any property, but only an insurance that he will own it if he earns it. It is the right to gain, to keep, to use and to dispose of material values.
Go read the The Bill of Rights. What is common among all of them. They limit Government not individuals. None of these rights depends upon the action or property of another individual.
There is no moral ground for any individual to take the labor or force another to do any specific action. Since acquiring property is the result of the actions of individuals, no other individual has the right to the property of another.
Consider the eight listed economic rights from the 1960 Democratic Party platform, which mirror the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights
1. The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation.
2. The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation.
3. The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living.
4. The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home and abroad.
5. The right of every family to a decent home.
6. The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health.
7. The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accidents and unemployment.
8. The right to a good education.
Above it was clearly stated that an individual has the freedom to the results of his own actions. Let’s look at the right to travel. If you have a right to travel, then you have the right to acquire means to travel. In the US that usually means a car. You have the right to own a car. You do not have the right to force others to give you a car, or if your car is broken to fix your car. Hence an auto mechanic has the right to be paid for his services; nobody has the right to force him to repair their car unless the mechanic voluntarily chooses to do so for whatever compensation is agreed upon. The mechanic may if he chooses offer his service for free, but is under no moral obligation to give away his service. You do not have the right to use force to make him fix your car.
Considering our "Healthcare Crisis" let’s just examine #6. Does an individual have the right to the labor of another without just compensation? The answer is clearly NO. You have a right to life, hence your body is your own, not somebody else’s. Just like the car in our example above, if your body is somehow broken you do not have a right to have a mechanic (doctors, nurses, hospital owners, and drug company share holders) fix it. How then can you have a "right" to adequate medical care? Your medical care depends upon the property and actions of other individuals. You have no right to another person’s labor so have no right to adequate health care.
Considering #5, you have a right to a decent home, but you do not have the right to force others to provide you with one.
Considering #7 You have the right to a good education, but you do not have the right to force others to provide you with one.
All of the Economic rights listed above are not rights, but means for government to convince people to give up their rights. All of these so called Economic Rights depend upon taking the labor of one person and giving it to another. To make this more clear, read Article 29 from the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
(1) Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible.
(2) In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic society.
(3) These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.
The UN believes that society can subject and limit individual rights to secure the "rights" of others. In other words society has the right to your labor to make sure others have property.
None of the activities of Obama (and most of Bush’s activities), corporate bailouts, healthcare, taking over GM, forcing Chrysler into a deal with Fiat, etc. are moral, or even constitutional. While we are distracted from the true nature and actions of our government over so-called but non-existent economic rights, we are missing the degradation of our political and property rights.
The wealthy, gun owners, property owners, drug companies, etc. are not a threat to other individual’s rights or freedom. A entity who resorts to physical force, fraud, etc. and violates the rights of others is a criminal-and men have legal protection against him. Remember that rights are moral principles which define and protect a man’s freedom of action, but impose no obligations on other men.
Obviously our government no longer believes in the principles the US was founded. The UN has never believed in those principles and even clearly states that individuals only have the rights that Law allows. Think about what it means to have the rest of the world which doesn't believe in our founding principles, determine what our laws should mean, or what we should have to do, or force their beliefs upon us.
Our government was created to protect the rights of individuals, not groups, not society, but individuals. How can any of the actions of our government over the receint past be considered to be doing what our government was instituted to do. Jefferson may have been right and from time to time the tree of liberty............
...
Thomas Jefferson Quotes of Interest
Thomas Jefferson Quotes of interest.
The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not.
When we get piled upon one another in large cities, as in Europe, we shall become as corrupt as Europe.
When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty.
The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.
The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.
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