Map: All the Countries John McCain Has Wanted to Attack | Mother Jones.
Personally, I think McCain got some serious brain damage when he was in solitary during the VietNam War and its coming out more and more. Too bad the people can never seem to vote out ANY incumbents, no matter how bad they are 🙁
Check out the article, the comments are especially ‘entertaining’.
Science Confirms: Politics Wrecks Your Ability to Do Math | Mother Jones.
Well, this is a different kind of article but I still found it interesting. Remember, I did manage to get a degree in math so it might not be interesting to many of you 😉 I think its interesting since it seems to show that the better you are at math, the more you’ll let your political views skew your outcomes to other problems, even math. I think some of the comments below the actual article come up with some other results. I do think this sort of study could be useful. I definitely think people need to question EVERYTHING they are told by the so-called experts. Especially when those ‘expert’ opinions are going to be used to dictate how the rest of us are going to be able to live our lives. It’s worth paying attention to how they design their studies and so how they get their results.
Growing US Police State: War on Drugs.
Here’s another excellent article from Global Wealth Protection (GWP). This one written by Paul Seymour. Its a good reflection on how far we’ve come from once being the land of the free, to becoming a police state. Besides wasting over $90 BILLION (just in the US) to prevent people from living their lives the way they choose, we have restricted ALL of our lives and turned this country into a full-fledged police state! Don’t believe me? Watch the video!
MV Gold Star Becomes Epic Cannabis Campfire Off Malta | gCaptain
Interesting story. Wondering just how they got their estimate? Before or after they hung out downwind for a while??
What SwedenCare Can Teach Us About Obamacare – Liberty Crier.
Excellent article in the Liberty Crier about Obamacare. In case you haven’t figured it out yet, I am totally and completely against Obamacare or any other type of socialism/communism that isn’t completely voluntary. Of course, Obamacare is based totally on FORCE.
That alone should be enough to discourage anyone from accepting it. In addition, it flies in the face of the laws of economics AND the laws of human nature! How on Earth could ANYONE think this will turn out to be anything but a major disaster?
The article explains it all a lot better than I can. Please take the time to read it to the end (and comments below). It really does a good job of explaining the situation.
A good article from Kelly Diamond writing for Global Wealth Protection. She mentions a few instances of taxes that have been enacted “for-your-own-good”. One of which is the law stating that you MUST wear a seatbelt or pay a huge fine. This has been a pet peeve of mine for years, so I’ll concentrate on that one in my comments and you can read her article for the others (rain, sunshine, recycling).
I have been bitching about that seatbelt ‘law’ since they first started talking about it here in Texas. I’ve been ticketed for it and it just infuriates me that I can’t find even ONE lawyer to fight against the law itself! As usual, the legislature lied through their teeth to pass this “law” and so now we’re stuck with one more unconstitutional bunch of BS on the books just to make more money for the state to waste. I consider it a major violation of my rights. Yeah, most people think I’m flat out nuts to think that way but what else would YOU call something that literally restricts your bodily freedom as it TIES YOU UP???
I am not hurting anyone by not wearing a seat belt. I am not even hurting myself. I might have a very slight chance of being more hurt one of these days by not wearing one then if I was. Who the hell knows??? I may or may not ever get in an accident. I may or may not be hurt. I may or may not be hurt badly enough to need medical attention. I may or may not be helped by wearing a seatbelt. In fact, I could be hurt WORSE by wearing one! When did we start punishing people for something that hasn’t happened yet???
It should be MY decision and mine alone whether to wear a seatbelt or not. This all ties into the BS brainwashing going on that we’re all responsible for each other and we need to take care of each other. All because they forced us to buy insurance that we wouldn’t have needed if they hadn’t forced us to buy it (it more than tripled in price when they made car insurance mandatory)! Because everybody thinks their insurance cost goes up if anybody else gets hurt, they insist that they need to make sure that nobody gets hurt (so their insurance doesn’t go up any more). That is nothing but a load of CRAP! We are adults, we are supposed to be responsible for OURSELVES! If I am responsible for myself, and you are for yourself, we do not need anybody else to step in and make stupid rules about what kind of choices we can make in OUR lives.
“They” are stealing away my choices with their ridiculous “laws”, by stealing my choices, they ALSO take away any responsibility I have for whatever actions I take from that point on. Of course, they don’t admit the truth of that. They want me to still take the responsibility when I really have no option, no choice, no freedom. If someone is being FORCED to do something, then how in the hell can you say they have any responsibility??? They don’t! You took that away when you took away their choices!!
The other point to make in regards to their stealing away my choices, is that by taking away my choices, they are taking away my freedom and my liberty. By doing that, they are making me a slave. They are in effect taking away my very LIFE. How can someone say they are living THIER life if they have no say-so about what happens in it????? In fact, your life becomes someone elses! You are now nothing more than some sort of zombie, out there in the world working your ass off so someone else gets to tell you what you can and can’t do down to the nit-picking little detail of telling you that you MUST conform to their wishes and wear a seat belt! In the meantime, stay safe and healthy so you can keep working to pay the taxes they’ll waste on something stupid like one more war in the Middle East we have no business being involved in.
We’re All Edward Snowden Now | Laissez-Faire Bookstore.
Another good post from the Laissez-Faire Bookstore… Yes, I agree, we are all in the position of having to make a choice. Make a stand. How much are we going to put up with? How many wrongs are we willing to just stand by and allow them to perpetrate in our names???
You can no longer deny that ‘our’ government is acting illegally thanks to Edward Snowden. THANK YOU EDWARD SNOWDEN! They have absolutely NO reason, NO authority, NO permission, NO consent to violate our rights and spy on us! They never did, they do NOT NOW!
They are spying on everybody here in the USA and around the world. NOTHING they could find would ever be able to justify this kind of thing, NOTHING! IF they had some kind of reasonable cause, they could always go and get a warrant. Since they don’t do that, obviously they do NOT have any kind of cause.
This needs to STOP NOW!
TGIF: The Phony Trade-off between Privacy and Security The Future of Freedom Foundation.
OK, first of all, there should be no ‘trade-off’ between privacy and security. There is no such thing as total security, ever! You want to go lock down the entire country? Go take a look at what goes on in our maximum security prisons! There’s your trade-off! You TRY to get security by giving up your freedom and you’ll get neither! Ben Franklin said it 200+ years ago, the principle has not changed and it never will.
I’m so sick and tired of having to live under this corrupted system where somehow people here have been brainwashed into believing that this is a democracy. NO, it is NOT! It is a Constitutional Republic! My RIGHTS are NEVER up for any kind of vote, NO, NOT EVER!!!
You do NOT have a right to security since there IS no such thing in the real world. Yes, it is the governments job to protect us from others who would harm us, but NOT if they have to violate our rights to TRY to do that! We would ALL be a hell of a lot better off if we would take responsibility BACK from ‘our’ government and start protecting ourselves. Start LIVING life as a grown-up, free human being instead of the sheeple the government is turning us into, using our FEAR against us.
Climate Activists, Eco-Terrorism, and the Green Scare – Politics – Utne Reader.
Another great article from Utne Reader. I really love that magazine, even tho I usually don’t agree with how they state the problem or the solutions they come up with. They are usually VERY statist and I am the opposite. Sometimes they are communitarian (people choosing to live together in a voluntary manner and helping each other by CHOICE), which I DO agree with and support. There is a world of difference between voluntary cooperation and all other systems which are based on force. I will not support any of those in any way (which includes “our” system here in the USA now, since it has utterly violated the original constitution set up and intended to PROTECT our rights, and instead it now constantly violates them).
As for the article, it reports on the usual cooperation between big government and big business to keep the people in their places. Lots of spying on anyone engaged in community organizing or otherwise politically active by both private companies and government to benefit the corporations . Of course, this damages the ability to get anything useful done. They talk a lot about fracking specifically but also mention the Keystone pipeline and animal rights, factory farming,etc. I really can’t say I’ve made up my mind which side of the fracking issue I’ll take.
I DO like the fact that it is helping us get off the Arabic tit and become energy independent again. I like that very much! I would LOVE to be able to say to the entire Middle East to go jump in a lake! They’ve had us over the barrel (of oil) for so long and we’ve been sucking up to them for years because of it. We spend BILLIONS of dollars “protecting” their countries so we can get access to that oil. I say let them keep their oil! We should’ve spent all those billions developing alternative energy all those years and we’d be a HELL of a lot better off by now.
So, now our oil people have come up with directional drilling and fracking to get more of our own oil out of the ground. I’m happy about that. Lets concentrate on making fracking safer, if the environmentalists concerns about groundwater pollution are valid, we need to fix that problem somehow before we continue fracking near any problem areas. Let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater, lets FIX the specific problems with fracking and use it for our benefit. Since we have NOT developed our alternative energy supplies to where they’re anywhere near competitive yet, it gives us some control over our foreign policy again, IF our politicians will just THINK about things and do whats right for the country for once instead of being their own usual greedy pandering selves.
I would LOVE to see solar, wind, geothermal, ocean current, fuel cell technology become as efficient and affordable as fossil fuels. Is any of that going to happen in my lifetime??? In the meantime, we CAN get affordable, politically cheap oil- (meaning NOT located in some foreign country where they all hate us). I say go for it.
As to the environmentalists and other critics of fracking, I want to know just what exactly are THEIR solutions to the issue of our need for energy? I’ve already heard about their ideas that we all go back to living off the land. Yeah, well, I agree with that but don’t think that’s at all possible unless and until we’re ready to eliminate at least a few billion of us humans off the face of the earth. Birth control would be my preferred method, space colonization would work for me just fine, our so-called leaders would prefer we kill each other off in expensive wars, and mother earth will probably do it with some sort of plague sooner or later.
OK, so what OTHER solutions are there???
How Do Innocent People Find Justice In America? : Personal Liberty™.
They don’t! Unless you have a LOT of money for a GOOD lawyer, you are better off taking the plea bargain. You will be found guilty by a jury (unless that jury knows their rights to nullify bad laws and keeps their mouths SHUT about it so the judge doesn’t disqualify them)! I know this from personal experience. Yes, (woooo, scary music), I am a “criminal”. I hope that doesn’t chase off too many of you 🙂 I was convicted of DWI back in 1982, the jury insisted over the pure physical impossibility of my breathalyzer results that they were indeed correct and NO police officer would EVER tamper with the evidence or LIE. In fact, the officers involved did BOTH.
Since the invention of cell phone cameras and the internet, more people are coming to the realization that the cops DO in fact LIE and tamper with the evidence. They do that quite often. So, knowing these FACTS, how can anyone trust the “justice system” in the good ol’ USA???
I think they have a good idea with these “affiliate newspapers”. To help “vindicate the innocent”. We definitely need something to stop the rise of the police state we are becoming. We actually have a pretty good one started around S Texas. It’s called the Texas Free Press. I think they publish it in the Corpus Christi area. My local Campaign for Liberty meetup group was helping to distribute it around the Brazoria County area but I think we’ve stopped lately due to lack of advertising interest. Too bad 🙁
We need to get creative and find ways to take back our freedom. We are never going to win this war against us if we can’t do that. We are totally out financed and out gunned (literally). We need to win the war of ideas! Newspapers are still a great way to get the word out. Too bad all the mainstream media that most people read are all owned by the big money and so they are NOT doing their job! We need newspapers for the PEOPLE, NOT corporate owned shills!
The Double Standard of Smoking Marijuana – Arts & Culture – Utne Reader.
This is an article from Utne Reader on a new book, “Marijuana is Safer”. Well, duh, YES, it IS! MUCH safer! I could say I can’t believe how we have spent so much time, effort, money, to keep it illegal in this “free” country. But I do believe it since I know the history of how it was made illegal in the first place.
Federal marijuana prohibition is the direct cause of the continual violations of our 1st, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th amendments and the filling up of our prisons. First of all, the prohibition was not legally passed by congress like alcohol prohibition was. They did not make any constitutional amendment to make marijuana illegal. Instead, they listened to the lobbyists for DuPont, Hearst and their puppet doctor. Congress was bought off by those who just plain didn’t want the competition that the marijuana plants (and hemp) would give their companies making paper from trees and artificial fibers such as nylon. Watch the movie “Hemp for Victory” (put out by the federal government to encourage farmers to grow the weed to help with the war effort) and you will get an idea of just how useful the marijuana (and hemp) plants are. Of course, the prejudice they stirred up against blacks and Hispanics didn’t hurt any either.
I want to know, how many MILLIONS of people do we have to put in prison, how many lives to we have to completely destroy? before we will come to our senses and legalize weed??? I am going to come out and say it, it is a RIGHT! Rights which we enjoy not only under our constitution, (which only says our federal government was formed to PROTECT those natural rights we had BEFORE there was ever any government), rights we have due to the fact that we are human beings. We have allowed “our” government to get its foot in the door, due to prejudice and greed, and of course FEAR, and now we are paying the price. They have used this so-called War on Drugs, which is really a war on US, to take away our rights and destroy our country.
I am sick and tired of having to listen to people who don’t know what they’re talking about tell us all that we need to continue the ‘drug war’. NO, we do NOT! We need to STOP it asap! I hope lots of people will read this book and learn the truth about the issues, STOP listening to the politicians, they do NOT do anything that is not in THEIR interests, they do NOT represent US anymore, if they ever did.
A good article on Obamacare. In case you don’t know it yet, I’m totally against Obamacare. I think it will do nothing but harm to us, our health care system, our finances, our country. I don’t think people should be depending on the government to solve all our problems and I certainly don’t think “our” government should be FORCING us to buy a product from anybody, much less a private company. There are so many things wrong with Obamacare, it would take me hours to get into it all. Sorry, but I don’t have time for that right now. You’ll just have to wait til later for my ranting on that subject 😉
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=m2KEKvhP0dA
I just watched this video with John Stossel talking about what’s happening in Detroit with Shihka Dalmia of the Reason Foundation and Darcy Olsen of the Goldwater Institute. It makes a lot of good points about why Detroit is failing and compares it to places like Sandy Springs, GA which is doing quite well by privatizing everything 🙂
Congratulations to the people of Hackensack! This is what we ALL need to do- throw the bastards ALL out!!!
There has been a growing trend of eminent domain abuse all over the country. We had a case a few years ago locally in Freeport when the city tried to steal the Gore’s property to build a marina. There’s even a book about that episode, “Bulldozed” by Carla Main.They have only gotten worse since then 🙁
I want to read the book but haven’t got around to it yet. Since I own property in Freeport myself, I already know how hard to deal with those city officials (and everyone associated with the city) are. Enforcing ridiculous rules and regulations that increase the costs of doing repairs or improvements to where no one can afford to do necessary work. It almost seems like they are trying to deny people the ability to fix their property so eventually the city can come and condemn it. I have been trying to fix my property and all I get from the city is grief! I WISH the people would get together and throw them all out in Freeport too! Good start, then we can work our way up to Congress 🙂
Here’s a link to some more on what happened in Freeport:
http://ownerscounsel.blogspot.com/2010/09/more-on-texas-developers-attempt-to.html
Mises Institute Explains How The State Destroys Social Cooperation : Personal Liberty™.
Good article explaining the differing effects of cooperation vs coercion. I have always had a bad attitude towards ‘authority’ and its been getting even worse lately. I guess its probably because they are trying to enforce it more and more. I think I’m at the point of thinking that there IS no such thing as authority at all. Either you give your cooperation willingly, or you are being FORCED to do something you wouldn’t choose to do on your own. The use of force is NOT the same thing as authority. It is only force, violence in other words.
Personally, I think people get along much better in a cooperative society. Live by as few rules as possible. Do whatever you want as long as you don’t hurt anybody else. Simple 🙂 That is what this country was supposed to be all about and that way of life that we had for the first 100 years or so was what made us the most advanced, prosperous, favored country in the history of the world. Now that we’ve thrown all our freedom down the drain after 9-11, we are steady losing everything. Our ‘leaders’ can’t come up with anything else but more and more force. What would they do if we ALL just refused to obey their so-called authority???
Senior Living: How the Trailer Park Could Save Us All – Mind & Body – Utne Reader.
Another interesting article from Utne Reader. I think they brought up some pretty good points about people living together in a real community. I can see how it would be easier to form a real community in a trailer park than in an apartment complex or many suburban neighborhoods. I can see how it would help people stay healthier and happier longer. I think the whole idea of community is something we’ve lost somehow. I grew up with that. We had a great community where I grew up, even if we were looked down upon by others. We all knew each other and took care of each other. We all knew what was going on and we were involved with each others lives. I don’t have it where I live now. I’ve been in this house for over 20 years and barely know my next door neighbors 🙁
I think we ought to try figuring out how to get our sense of community back. If a trailer park makes it easier, we should try to see why that is and copy it in other places. Maybe we should look into how to make it easier for the people in the trailers to be able to live, to set down roots. It seems we might need to think about the obstructions to allowing more people to make that choice. It seems like it might be a good choice for many more people than the ones that do it now. I get it that there’s prejudice against trailer parks but not sure why.They do mention some things in the article but those things don’t make a whole lot of sense to me. Anybody have some thoughts on that?
I got this from the Dollar Vigilante, I love their newsletter, they have lots of good information about what’s going on in the US and around the world
Why Christie Is Wrong – Peggy Noonan’s Blog – WSJ.
Very good points Peggy! Thanks for getting them out there in the Wall Street Journal. Maybe some people with some influence will actually start thinking about all this totally illegal and unnecessary government spying on US citizens (and others). Somebody needs to say, ‘hey, we really need to THINK about the risk/reward ratio’ on this subject. Yeah, I am willing to face those widows and orphans! Yeah, I DO think its more important to protect the principles of the ONLY country in the history of the world based on individual liberty and freedom. YES, I DO think its worth upholding those principles even if a few people die because we value those principles more than ‘safety’ (which is IMPOSSIBLE to get at any cost).
Someone once said, “its better to die standing than to live on your knees”. I totally agree with that statement. Its too bad more Americans don’t anymore.
Plain and simple, “our” government has been telling us nothing but LIES about this security stuff since the very beginning. There is NO legitimate purpose to any of this and they know that. They are illegally spying on you, me, EVERYONE in the USA and around the world! They are collecting and storing the data on every phone call, email, website you look at, financial transaction, everything you buy, where you go, EVEN YOUR DNA NOW!! WHY????? Does anyone really think they will NOT use this against us one day? When EVERY single time in the history of the world when a government had the means to abuse their power, they DID! Believe me, I’ve read enough history to know that ‘our’ government is no different. It may have been once, but those days are long gone.
It looks like there are 1-2 Congressmen who actually take seriously their oath to uphold the Constitution. Here’s to ya GOP Rep. Morgan Griffith of Virginia and Democratic Rep. Alan Grayson of Florida! Why aren’t the other 433 members of Congress also clamoring for this illegal, unconstitutional domestic spying to STOP??!!? Are there only 2 who are doing their JOB??
This is a listing of all the past Prometheus Awards. They’re awarded for the best Libertarian science fiction of the year. I’ve read and enjoyed quite a few. I like books that make you THINK and these sure fit the bill! I’ve already read a lot of these books and seeing the list now makes me want to read some more of them 🙂 Some of my favorites on the list (I didn’t even know about the list when I read them)…
2009- Little Brother- Cory Doctorow
2011- Animal Farm- Hall of Fame- George Orwell
2009- Lord of the Rings- Hall of Fame- J.R.R. Tolkien
1998- Time Enough for Love- Hall of Fame- Robert Heinlein
1984- Farenheit 451- Hall of Fame- Ray Bradbury
1983- Atlas Shrugged- Hall of Fame- Ayn Rand
It’s A Gray Area: Politics is sports by other means – Daily Pilot.
I was at the FreedomFest in LasVegas a while back and met both Judge Gray and Gary Johnson. They were running for President and Vice President of the Libertarian party. I really enjoyed their speeches (unlike those of most politicians) and only wish they had the same chance to get their message out as the other parties did. I think they would have SLAMMED them both if they were only able to get the word out to the general public.
Where do you stand? Go ahead and try the World’s Smallest Political Quiz. at the Advocates for Self Government website. While you’re there, take a look around. I’m definitely a Libertarian 😉 Here’s the definition from the Advocates website…
Libertarians support maximum liberty in both personal and economic matters. They advocate a much smaller government; one that is limited to protecting individuals from coercion and violence. Libertarians tend to embrace individual responsibility, oppose government bureaucracy and taxes, promote private charity, tolerate diverse lifestyles, support the free market, and defend civil liberties.
Wondering how many of the people who check in here or follow me love liberty like I do? Please comment…
This is an interesting article on why our wages are not going up. There’s a video in there too that explains a lot. I wonder if anyone of our ‘leaders’ is going to try to fix things or if they’re all just going to continue letting the Fed ruin the country along with the economy?
Ron Paul’s Texas Straight Talk.
I LOVE Ron Paul. He was my congressman for all the years I’ve lived in Lake Jackson until he ‘retired’ recently and moved on to other projects. He has ALWAYS stood up for the Constitution on EVERY issue and I really admire him for that. After all, that is the job EVERY one of our ‘representatives’ from the President on down swore and oath to do and he is the ONLY one for decades who has actually done that. His son Rand Paul is not even close tho he at least does try on a few issues.
Since Ron was a doctor, he probably knows about health care and how Obamacare will hurt the medical profession better than the rest of our “leaders”. I know he knows finances and how the market works better than 99.99% of them. I know how the market works better than the huge majority of them, from their actions, they are almost all completely ignorant of how the free market works and how any interference with it causes problems.
People here keep saying the government has to fix the problem since the market can’t. I call BS on that! First of all, we have nothing like a free market in health care or anything else. We USED to, and then the government stepped in and started screwing things up. Now we have a corporatocracy (facism in other words). I really hate the idea of Obamacare and its ‘individual mandate’. Mandate???? In a FREE country???
The government has come to believe that they OWN us now. What else could you call it when they will be dictating the way you can take care of your own body? I guess it’s NOT your own body anymore when you can’t decide what to do with it anymore but somebody else can. This is just the last step on the road to complete totalitarianism in the once land of the free. I am doing my best to get the hell out but still stuck here trying to figure out HOW??!
Area 51: Black Helicopters Or Little Green Men? : Personal Liberty™.
So they FINALLY fess up??? No, not really, they redacted almost all of the information. We just don’t “need to know” what they’re doing with OUR money, in OUR name, to use against US??? I’m so sick and tired of being lied to by ‘our’ government. 🙁
Sexual Jihad And Spreading Crabs In The Name Of Muhammad : Personal Liberty™.
WOW! And you thought the Jihadists were crazy before? I just read this article and now just trying to digest these new interpretations of the Islamic religion. I never liked it, I never liked ANY religion, but I especially don’t like Islam because of the way they treat women. OK, they always explained their despicable treatment of women as “respect” of women, protection of their dignity and chastity (I always thought “why punish the women when it’s the MEN who can’t control themselves and are doing wrong,NOT the women”)… So now, they are asking women to prostitute themselves and give up those very things, all in the name of promoting Islam. WTF???!! They’re also into protecting head lice (that live in their beards), and frogs, so who’s to say which is the more crazy idiot that came up with this stuff? How the hell can anybody justify this crap???
Weapons Of Mass Repetition : Personal Liberty™.
Good article on Obamas latest war. I am totally against this war, as I was totally against every other “war” we have been involved in since probably the War of 1812! I say “war” with quotes since according to the Constitution, only Congress can declare war and they have not done so since WWII! History has shown that we were manipulated into both WWI and WWII, the Spanish American War and the Korean War and the Vietnam War. What is it going to take for the American people to stop listening to our so-called leaders? They have been telling us nothing but lies and manipulating us for decades now (if they EVER told us the truth). All I can do is HOPE we don’t get into yet one more stupid “war” where we will LOSE once again, since we really have no business there. The only other thing I can do is to pass on these articles in hopes that other people will also think about whats really going on and get riled up enough to get involved. Any comments???
Armed Lifeboat: Government’s Response to Natural Disaster – Politics – Utne Reader.
This is an interesting article about opposing reactions to disasters. They are mostly talking about global warming but I think they can mean any kind of disaster. The opposite sides seem to be top down – government- or bottom up- community. Of course, being Utne Reader, they want government to be involved in BOTH. I think things should be done if at all possible (and most everything IS) through bottom up approach. I think most people here (USA) have come to depend on the government approach and many are already very dependent on all sorts of government aid. How will we be able to stop the militarization/dystopian governmental approach they refer to in the article if we do not get some independence back again? I think we are finally starting to wake up to the reality of what “our” government is doing (mostly behind our backs) and some are even starting to fight back and demand whats right. I only hope we’re not too late.
Unbelievable how much money we spend on ‘intelligence’ (spying). The Washington Post is reporting it’s 52.6 BILLION dollars!!!!! Since Edward Snowden did us all a favor and finally got someone to pay attention to this story of the illegal, unconstitutional spying on EVERYTHING we’ve ever done, now we know and it seems that most of that money is spent spying on US. YOU and ME! I have been keeping my eyes open for years and so I already knew about a lot of what he said. Things like CARNIVORE, TIPS(?), FACTA and others. I have been telling people about it for years and people seem to think there’s something wrong with me for being concerned about the loss of privacy (and so liberty). The constant comment is: “if you’re not doing anything wrong, you have nothing to worry about”, yeah, riiiiigggghhtt…
First of all, privacy is a natural HUMAN RIGHT! It is necessary if people are going to live together in a peaceful society. It is a basic component of freedom! The concern about being spied on constantly has NOTHING to do with if someone is doing something “wrong” or not! On that issue, who the hell is deciding what is right and wrong any more? “Our” government????? Yeah, riiiiigghhttt… those same ones that can’t exist without stealing every dollar they spend from the people who actually produce it? Those same ones who do everything they do through FORCE and force ONLY, they do not convince, they do not persuade, they FORCE. Those are the ones we think should be deciding right and wrong????? Well, I do NOT give up my RIGHT to decide how to live my life to anyone else. They do NOT have the authority to decide right and wrong and they do NOT have the right to spy on me or anybody else. They do NOT have the right to pass “laws” that go against the constitution (which promises to PROTECT those rights we already had), and so I expect that out of those 52.6 BILLION dollars they are spending (stealing from productive society), they could eliminate about 99% of it and we would all be just fine. Probably a hell of a lot better off since all that spying is just pissing off everybody around the world!
Thanks to the Washington Post for reporting on this, I hope it gets some good play.
Fast-Food Strike Means Time to Buy Gold – Sovereign Investor
Another good article showed up in my email today. I really have a hard time keeping up with all the interesting newsletters I get. Some are free, some I pay for, I enjoy reading all of them (when I have the time). This one today is on the fast food workers strike. Funny, cause I was at a hotel in Galveston this morning after visiting a friend up there last night. I had to get up early for a job interview and get home by 0800 when it was supposed to start. So anyway, I don’t usually watch TV and especially not the news since it either gets me pissed off or depressed. This morning, they were interviewing one of the leaders of the fast food workers strike. He said they were actually ALREADY OFFERED $14/hour! They turned it down???!! This is for flipping burgers! Basically a low skilled, entry level job. The TV interviewer also mentioned that they wanted to interview more people for the show but they could only find 2 (!) that spoke English and so they had a major issue with communication. The strikers reasoning was that “they can afford it”. Well, yeah, they probably can afford it (especially if they are not going to pay their CEO and other bigwigs multi-million dollar salaries), but what else goes into the cost of labor at these places other than just salary? Do they get ANY benefits?? Training? Uniforms? Discounts? I don’t know, I’ve never worked in a fast food place. I did work in a small family owned restaurant as a dishwasher when I was a kid, I worked at a place in the mall that sold hot dogs when I first moved to Texas, I worked occasionally as a bartender when I couldn’t get offshore for whatever reason. That is my entire experience with that kind of work. I also worked as a head housekeeper at a big resort which didn’t pay much either even tho it was a supervisory position. I was able to survive on those low wages. I accepted the fact that my skills were not worth much to my employer and that when I learned to be more useful, I would be able to work my way up and earn more money (which I did). So, can somebody please explain to me why the people who work that kind of job should be able to demand that kind of money? Why don’t they just go find another job that pays better, has more benefits, whatever? Remember, this was HOUSTON where they were doing the TV interview I saw. Houston is in another of its periodic booms at the moment. There are all kinds of places crying for workers, especially offshore, where they DO pay good money, even for relatively unskilled labor. I just don’t get it, what do they think they’re going to accomplish? They get more pay and everybody else will too, and EVERYTHING will go up in price as well, its called inflation! The laws of unintended consequences are bound to strike here and the strikers will be worse off than they are now (along with the rest of us).
http://www.smokersclubinc.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=5416
I saw this earlier today and just had to post it here with comments. I have been saying for years, (ever since I read the report- the META study- that supposedly links secondhand smoke to all kinds of increased dangers), that all the foofoorah over secondhand smoke was a bunch of BS! That meta study was used to convince everybody that they found some kind of new evidence that secondhand smoke was oooohhhh soooo dangerous, well, fact is, that they did NOT find any new evidence, they could not have since they did NOT do any new experiments! They manipulated the old data which came from decades worth of studies, all of which showed very slight, if any, increased risk from second hand smoke. Most (not all) showed NO, ZERO, NONE, NIL, NADA, increased risks even when exposed to very large amounts of second hand smoke. Say, something like a person living for decades with a 3 pack a day smoker. NO increased risk was found! OK, so now, all the sudden, we paste all these studies together and find a huge increased risk??? HOW exactly would someone come up with that??? Simple, they manipulate the data! I posted the link above to show there ARE actually people who agree with me on this issue, I am NOT just another smoker who is intent on killing you off 😉 But I DO want to get back some sense into the whole smoking thing, I want to be able to fly on a smokers airline! I would even pay MORE to be able to smoke in the air again. And why can’t I? Because the federal government has outlawed that 🙁 I want to be able to smoke in a bar again! Damn, it just plain SUCKS to have to go outside in the cold, rain, heat, etc when you WERE in the middle of a good conversation, listening to some good music, etc. Why the hell can’t a businessman decide for himself what kind of atmosphere he wants in HIS business? Why can’t his customers be the ones to decide if they want to go there or not??? Put a sign on the door saying “Smokers welcome” and be done with it! If the non-smokers don’t want to deal with the smoke, fine, THEY can feel free to go somewhere else. It should NOT be a LAW.
PS- ALL of the posts on this page (link) are great, read them all 😉