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Also click on some of the links in the 'comments section' for more
http://www.examiner.com/charleston-conservative-in-charleston-sc/full-911-audio-shows-zimmerman-a-more-positive-light
Full 911 audio shows Zimmerman in a more positive light
Kyle Rogers
Charleston Conservative Examiner
+StumbleUponredditPrintEmail.Thousands of newspapers and media outlets have reported that a 911 operator told George Zimmerman that the police did not need him to follow Trayvon. The entire uncut recording is now available online. It is four minutes and twelve seconds long. The rest of the call provides a lot more details as to what happened.
Many in the media have characterized Zimmerman as targeting Trayvon simply because of his skin color. The 911 operator asks Zimmerman if he is following Trayvon at 2:30 in the 911 tape. The first two minutes and thirty seconds of the call primarily consists of Zimmerman describing the behavior of Trayvon.
Initially the 911 operator asks Zimmerman about the race of Trayvon and Zimmerman indicates that he "might be black." Shortly after that Trayvon turns and starts walking towards Zimmerman. When he gets close, it is only then that Zimmerman describes him as a young black male.
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At about 2:20 on the tape Zimmerman describes Trayvon as having suddenly taken off running. Most of the rest of the call consists of Zimmerman and the 911 operator discussing a location for the police to meet Zimmerman. Zimmerman is not following Trayvon at this time, and reports that he can no longer see Trayvon.
We now know that Trayvon had been suspended from school at the time. His mother had sent him to his father's house, and he was out late on what would have been a school night. After Trayvon was tragically shot, he remained a John Doe in the morgue for almost three full days before his parents came looking for him.
Tiny excerpts of the phone call have been used to portray Zimmerman as a vigilante or even someone just looking to pick a fight. The entire four minute twelve second call shows someone that is passionate about his neighborhood and wanted to assist the police any way he could.
.
George Zimmerman
Credits: Zimmerman Family ..Suggested by the author:
Fox Tampa breaks silence on Trayvon shooting witness
Zimmerman was on the ground being punched when he shot Trayvon Martin
Should race play a role in how the media reports crime?
The Trayvon Martin shooting: More proof of the failure of diversity
Why the left wing media is falsely calling George Zimmerman white
Related topics:
Trayvon Martin, George Zimmerman
. ReportPrintEmail. Kyle Rogers, Charleston Conservative Examiner
Kyle is a Conservative activist in South Carolina. He co-organized the 2006 Greenville, SC rally against the Lindsey Graham/Ted Kennedy sponsored amnesty bill. More than 1,000 people attended. The event helped launch the SC Tea Party movement. He has organized numerous other conservative protests...
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...Next article » .Zimmerman was on the ground being punched when he shot Trayvon Martin
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Continue reading on Examiner.com Full 911 audio shows Zimmerman in a more positive light - Charleston Charleston Conservative | Examiner.com http://www.examiner.com/charleston-conservative-in-charleston-sc/full-911-audio-shows-zimmerman-a-more-positive-light#ixzz1q9hqS44u
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The Specter of Centrally Planned Economic Fascism Continues to Hover over the United States
By Robert Higgs | Monday March 19, 2012 at 11:49 AM PDT
During World War II, the U.S. government created and operated a system of fascist central planning. (I have described this system in my books Crisis and Leviathan and Depression, War, and Cold War.) After the war, much of this system was abandoned, but it was revived in large part during the Korean War, and it was retained afterward in the form of statutory authority for its reinstatement whenever the president might so order under the authority of the Defense Production Act of 1950, as amended. As I wrote in Crisis and Leviathan (p. 246), after the Korean War "[t]he wartime wage-price and production controls lapsed, although the authority to reinstate the production controls remained"that is, the Defense Production Act was never repealed, and it has been in force continuously since its initial passage, though amended from time to time. Under this statute, the president has lawful authority to control virtually the whole of the U.S. economy whenever he chooses to do so and states that the national defense requires such a government takeover.
The latest executive order to stipulate in detail how the president will exercise these standing powers over energy, transportation, human resources, raw materials, and so forthstating in particular the subordinates to whom he will delegate various specific powers, among other thingswas issued last Friday, March 16, 2012. It shows plainly that private control of economic life in the United States, to the extent that it survives, exists solely at the president's pleasure and sufferance. Whenever he chooses to put into effect a full-fledged operational fascist economy, controlled from his office, he has the statutory power to do so; all he has to do is to murmur the words "national defense" and give the orders. In this regard, as Paul Begala's infamous saying puts it, "stroke of the pen, law of the land, kinda cool."
http://blog.independent.org/2012/03/19/the-specter-of-centrally-planned-economic-fascism-continues-to-hover-over-the-united-states/
Australian comedian Tim Minchin comments on Americans and Their odd
disbelieve in evolution.
Very Funny
disbelieve in evolution.
Very Funny
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KMAezEgYFeE&feature=related
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/when-the-supreme-court-debates-health-care-get-ready-for-some-memorable-quotes/2012/03/21/gIQAeC4KWS_story.html
What's going to happen during 3 days of arguments on health care?
By Jeffrey Rosen, PROFESSOR OF LAW Published: March 23
Starting Monday, the Supreme Court has scheduled six hours of oral
arguments over three days to consider the constitutionality of
health-care reform, the most time given to a case in more than 45
years. We're certainly in for a historic event — but it might be an
entertaining one, too.
Oral arguments are always theatrical: The lawyers stand only a few
feet from the justices, who loom above them on a curved bench, and
they are barraged with so many questions that they often have trouble
completing a sentence. The hearings are also an opportunity for the
traditionally secretive Supreme Court to cut loose. In fact, the
Roberts court is known as a "hot bench" — not a reference to the
unusual sexiness of the justices but to the fact that eight of the
nine are unusually chatty during oral arguments (Justice Clarence
Thomas hasn't uttered a word since 2006). Even though the justices
rarely change their minds during oral arguments if they already have
strong views about a case, the hearings can clarify their thinking,
offer some lively give and take, and occasionally lead to humor.
So, will the oral arguments over health-care reform produce some
laughs? Here's a preview of what might transpire when the commerce
clause becomes a punch line.
Justice Antonin Scalia
According to a 2010 study in the Communication Law Review, Scalia is
the funniest member of the court, based on how many laughs the various
justices have elicited in the courtroom. But his wit sometimes has a
sharp edge. In 1988, when a lawyer fumbled for the answer to a
question, Scalia exclaimed, "When you find it, say 'Bingo!' "
Expect some zingers from Scalia in the health-care argument, perhaps
focused on the not-so-side-splitting subject of whether Congress has
the authority to require people to buy health insurance as part of its
power to regulate interstate commerce. Imagine, for example, the
following exchange:
Solicitor General Donald Verrilli: "In 2005, Justice Scalia, you held
that Congress has the power to prevent California from authorizing
people to grow marijuana for their own use. Surely, the decision not
to buy health insurance has a far greater impact on the economy."
Justice Scalia: "Depends on what part of California you're from."
Justice Stephen Breyer
Breyer's jokes often follow a long question identifying the hardest
issue in the case. He cares about legislative history and may focus on
a striking irony in the health-care law briefs: During the debate over
the legislation in Congress, Republicans insisted that the mandate to
buy health insurance should be considered a tax, and Democrats
countered that it shouldn't. The moment President Obama signed the
bill, though, both sides rushed to court to claim the opposite:
Democrats now insist that the mandate is absolutely a tax (and
therefore authorized by the taxing clause of the Constitution), and
Republicans are equally confident that it's not.
This debate is also relevant to whether the court has the power to
hear the case in the first place. If the mandate is a tax, according
to a 1867 law, litigants may have to wait until it goes into effect in
2014 to challenge it. If Breyer can get a laugh out of the "is it a
tax?" debate, he deserves to be promoted to funniest justice.
Chief Justice John Roberts
All eyes will be on Roberts to see whether he is inclined to interpret
the commerce clause of the Constitution as narrowly as he did in an
opinion that gave rise to one of his most memorable one-liners as an
appellate judge. In 2003, Roberts dissented from a ruling holding that
the federal government could use the Endangered Species Act to prevent
development on the habitat of the arroyo toad. He said the federal law
couldn't be applied to "a hapless toad that, for reasons of its own,
lives its entire life in California." Verrilli will try to convince
Roberts that the interstate economic effects of thousands of uninsured
sick people are far greater than those of the hapless toad, all the
while avoiding the word "toad."
As the crucial swing vote, Kennedy is most frequently flattered in
Supreme Court briefs. Some libertarians hope that he will strike down
the health-care mandate by invoking the same right to privacy that he
recognized when he reaffirmed Roe v. Wade in 1992. "At the heart of
liberty is the right to define one's own concept of existence, of
meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life," Kennedy
wrote; Scalia later ridiculed this as the "sweet mystery of life"
passage. For Scalia and the other conservatives, Roe v. Wade is the
root of all constitutional evil. So if Paul Clement — who will argue
before the court for the health-care law's challengers — wants to
appeal to Kennedy without alienating the other conservatives, he may
try to murmur "sweet mystery" so quietly that only Kennedy can hear
it.
Justices Elena Kagan
and Sonia Sotomayor
These justices weren't yet on the court during the period covered by
the 2010 laughter study, but Kagan may have her eye on Scalia's
"funniest justice" title. She delivered the best one-liner of the
current Supreme Court term. Noting that the Federal Communications
Commission had interpreted its TV indecency policy to allow the
cursing in "Saving Private Ryan" and the nudity in "Schindler's List,"
she said: "It's like nobody can use dirty words or nudity except for
Steven Spielberg."
It will be hard to top the "Spielberg exception," but perhaps Kagan
can make something of the "Romney exception" — namely, the fact that
the same arguments about the economic effects of self-insurance that
Mitt Romney used to justify health-care reform in Massachusetts are
the ones that lawyers challenging the Affordable Care Act are
rejecting before the Supreme Court.
Sotomayor has made her mark in oral arguments and in recent separate
opinions by wondering aloud whether long-established Supreme Court
doctrines should be reexamined. During arguments in the Citizens
United case in 2009, she suggested looking again at the idea that
corporations are people. "There could be an argument made that that
was the court's error to start with," she said. In the health-care
argument, perhaps Sotomayor will press the government to explain why,
if corporations are people, they can't be forced to buy health
insurance, too.
Justices Ruth Bader
Ginsburg and Samuel Alito
Though not prone to punch lines, both are respected by lawyers for
asking the most technically difficult questions about a case.
Ginsburg, who once taught civil procedure, may be especially
interested in the complicated question of whether, if the court
strikes down the individual mandate, it should grant the government's
request to wait for future cases to decide whether other provisions
should be struck down as well.
Alito may be interested in the question of whether the expansion of
Medicaid unconstitutionally coerces the states by threatening them
with the loss of federal funds.
Justice Clarence Thomas
Thomas is considered the justice most likely to strike down
health-care reform. He alone among the current justices has signaled
willingness to overturn a landmark 1942 case in which the court
allowed Congress to regulate a farmer's cultivation of wheat in his
own back yard for his own use. Thomas also ranks as the least funny
justice, since he hasn't asked a question at an oral argument for the
past six years. (Still waters may run deep, but they don't run funny.)
Nevertheless, he has been known to speak when he cares passionately
about an issue, as he did in a 2002 argument about a Virginia law
banning cross-burning.
Lucky ticket-holders will be waiting eagerly to see whether Thomas can
restrain himself from leaning forward in his chair, pounding the bench
and exclaiming, as those challenging the law have asked: "If the
government can force you to buy health insurance, why can't it force
you to buy broccoli?"
Jeffrey Rosen is a law professor at George Washington University and
the legal affairs editor of the New Republic. He is also an editor of
"Constitution 3.0: Freedom and Technological Change."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/when-the-supreme-court-debates-health-care-get-ready-for-some-memorable-quotes/2012/03/21/gIQAeC4KWS_story.html
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Together, we can change the world, one mind at a time.
Have a great day,
Tommy
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Together, we can change the world, one mind at a time.
Have a great day,
Tommy
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From: Mary Kay Henry, SEIU President
Date: Sunday, March 25, 2012
Subject: Let's stop giving Big Oil a second payday.
To: majors.bruce@gmail.com
<http://img.seiu.org/bluestate/email-template/email-header.jpg>
I agree, it's time to end taxpayer giveaways to wealthy oil companies.
Dear Friend,
Higher energy prices are hurting families like yours all across the country. Meanwhile, the five richest oil companies in the world are grabbing record-shattering profits, and then getting a second payday in the form of billions of dollars in taxpayer subsidies.
In 2010, when 99 percent of working families were scrimping and saving, the top five oil companies sent their CEOs home with a total of $73 million in executive compensation.
President Obama has called on Congress to vote to end government giveaways to Big Oil. Senator Robert Menendez has answered that call by proposing a bill that ends wasteful oil subsidies and the Senate will vote on it this week.
If you agree that Big Oil should stop getting help and start paying its fair share, please ask your Senators to vote in support of Sen. Menendez's bill.
Republicans in Congress have voted in lockstep to keep these subsidies going, even as they tell us that we can't afford essential public services like education, child care, sanitation and emergency response. They say there's no money to create new jobs or invest in the industries of the future, but they keep shoveling cash to these outrageously wealthy, dinosaur oil companies.
Enough is enough. Join us in telling the Senate to stop wasting money on Big Oil.
http://action.seiu.org/page/speakout/big-oil-subsidies
In solidarity,
Mary Kay Henry
President, Service Employees International Union
SERVICE EMPLOYEES INTERNATIONAL UNION
SEIU
1800 Massachusetts Ave NW, Washington, DC 20036
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From:
Subject: [Hope4America] Insider Reveals CIA Heart-Attack Inducement Weapons (Probably Cause Of Andrew Br
To: Hope4America@yahoogroups.com
Insider Reveals CIA Heart-Attack Inducement Weapons (Probably Cause Of Andrew Breitbart Death)
Friday, March 02, 2012 10:53
100% of readers think this story is Fact.
By Josey Wales
"The CIA is a state-sponsored terrorists association. You don't look at people as human beings. They are nothing but pieces on the chessboard."
-- Verne Lyon, former CIA agent in revealing documentary Secrets of the CIA
On July 13 2009, the New York Times ran a story about the CIA running an assassination squad using U.S military special forces.
The covert CIA program allegedly began in 2001 soon after the 911 attacks. The unfolding revelations of CIA death squads using U.S. military special forces personnel coincides with the online release of video testimony of a former U.S. Navy SEAL who said he was recruited to perform 18 assassination assignments for the CIA, and also targeted U.S. citizens. Source: examiner.com/exopolitics-in-honolulu/testimony-of-cia-assassin
Secrets of the CIA is a revealing 45-minute Turner Home Entertainment documentary available for free viewing at the link below. In this riveting exposé, five former CIA agents describe how their initial pride and enthusiasm at serving their nation turned to anguish and remorse, as they realized that they were actually subverting democracy and killing innocent civilians all in the name "national security" and promoting foreign policy agendas. www.personalgrowthcourses.net/video/secrets_cia
So with the history of the CIA as high level assassins, willing and able to kill U.S Citizens at the president's command, it should not be hard to imagine that Andrew Breitbart would eventually become a target of Obama's CIA. Throughout history Presidents and Vice Presidents have used the CIA to further their agendas. Andrew Breitbart was a real threat to President Obama and his political agenda. By now most of you know that Breitbart single handedly went after the political system, ACORN, Anthony Weiner, and was about to destroy Barack Obama's political future, by Obama's own admission with videos of Obama during his college years hanging out with extreme Communist radicals.
So how does the CIA go about Assassinating targets like Andrew Breitbart?
Well there are a couple of weapons that the CIA has at their disposal that most people have never dreamed of, let alone heard of. One is an electromagnetic type weapon used by CIA and off-budget deep black ops. Called the "Venus Technique Shooter". It puts out a small beam, and if you're caught in that beam, it throws your heart into uncontrollable and wild oscillation; fibrillation; you have about 10 seconds to get out of the beam or you'll die; autopsy will show "heart attack". There is no way for a coroner to detect any fowl play as there are no drugs or chemicals needed and there are no signs of electrocution. This simply disrupts your heart beat and causes a heart attack.
Then there are Ice Darts. Ice Darts containing quiary(sp?) are fired from a special little gun, from close range of 3 to 4 feet.
This throws the heart into violent paroxysm, causing a heart attack. The dart from this secret CIA weapon can penetrate clothing and leave nothing but a tiny red dot on the skin. On penetration of the deadly dart, the individual targeted for assassination may feel as if bitten by a mosquito, or they may not feel anything at all. The poisonous dart completely disintegrates upon entering the target. The lethal poison then rapidly enters the bloodstream causing a heart attack. Once the damage is done, the poison denatures quickly, so that an autopsy is very unlikely to detect that the heart attack resulted from anything other than natural causes.
Sounds like the perfect James Bond weapon, doesn't it? Yet this is all verifiable in Congressional testimony.
There are not that many who specialize in these things. Only those who are highly familiar with advance assassination techniques would be familiar with these tools. If you have intelligence friends, ask them; deep operatives, in theory, they don't even exist. But the Video and other links provided in this article tell a different story. The more people like you who know these things, who know what is going on, the better. Please help raise awareness by sharing this article.
Much of the information in this article was provided by an associate of Sterling Allan, CEO of PES Network, Inc. (PESWiki.com and SterlingDAllan.com), who wishes to remain anonymous, for obvious reason.
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March22nd
Seven Signs of a Sociopath
Tom Woods
Our politicians exhibit all of them. The great Doug Casey writes:
- The US is already in a truly major depression and on the edge of financial chaos and a currency meltdown. The sociopaths in government will react by redoubling the pace toward a police state domestically and starting a major war abroad. To me, this is completely predictable. It's what sociopaths do.
- There are seven characteristics I can think of that define a sociopath, although I'm sure the list could be extended.
- Sociopaths completely lack a conscience or any capacity for real regret about hurting people. Although they pretend the opposite.
- Sociopaths put their own desires and wants on a totally different level from those of other people. Their wants are incommensurate. They truly believe their ends justify their means. Although they pretend the opposite.
- Sociopaths consider themselves superior to everyone else, because they aren't burdened by the emotions and ethics others have – they're above all that. They're arrogant. Although they pretend the opposite.
- Sociopaths never accept the slightest responsibility for anything that goes wrong, even though they're responsible for almost everything that goes wrong. You'll never hear a sincere apology from them.
- Sociopaths have a lopsided notion of property rights. What's theirs is theirs, and what's yours is theirs too. They therefore defend currency inflation and taxation as good things.
- Sociopaths usually pick the wrong target to attack. If they lose their wallet, they kick the dog. If 16 Saudis fly planes into buildings, they attack Afghanistan.
- Sociopaths traffic in disturbing news, they love to pass on destructive rumors and they'll falsify information to damage others.
- The fact that they're chronic, extremely convincing and even enthusiastic liars, who often believe their own lies, means they aren't easy to spot, because normal people naturally assume another person is telling the truth. They rarely have handlebar mustaches or chortle like Snidely Whiplash. Instead, they cultivate a social veneer or a mask of sanity that diverts suspicion.
- There are seven characteristics I can think of that define a sociopath, although I'm sure the list could be extended.
http://www.tomwoods.com/blog/we-really-are-governed-by-sociopaths/
Why Is the Recovery Slow?
Posted by David Boaz
Here are some news stories you could find in Friday's Wall Street Journal:
- The Federal Reserve is holding an international conference of central bankers to reassure themselves that their "easy-money policies" are working and won't cause too much inflation this time.
- The IRS is ramping up audits of the most successful people in the economy. If you make more than $5 million in a year, you can pretty much expect a time-consuming audit.
- "Federal regulators are preparing a drive to tell workers at nonunionized businesses they have many of the same rights as union members, a move that could prompt more workers to complain to employers about grievances ranging from pay and work hours to job safety and management misconduct."
- "The Department of Energy has placed nearly one-third of its clean-energy loan portfolio on an internal 'watch list' for possible violations of terms or other concerns, according to a copy of the list obtained by The Wall Street Journal, highlighting how such concerns have spread beyond the now-bankrupt Solyndra LLC."
- The European Union is beefing up its permanent bailout fund to keep failed businesses alive.
- States are circling Amazon and other online retailers, about to pounce with new taxes.
- The Labor Department has "stepped up pressure" on PulteGroup, demanding thousands of records on its contracts with employees and subcontractors.
- FedEx scaled back its forecasts for domestic and global growth.
- "New signs of a slowing global economy rattled investors on Thursday and put stocks on pace for their worst week this year."
- Burton Malkiel writes that, while stocks don't look as bad as bonds, "we are likely to be in a low-return environment for some time to come."
Note that few if any of these stories made headlines, or even appeared in other newspapers. Many voters know about Obamacare, the massive 2009 stimulus bill, and Cash for Clunkers. Many fewer realize the tax tsunami planned for 9 months from now. Hardly anyone knows about the costs of stepped-up regulation and regulatory enforcement. But everyone wonders why the recovery is so slow and unemployment remains so high. Just read the papers in detail.
http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/why-is-the-recovery-slow/
The Tyranny of the Obligation
by Chris Dates
February 4th, 2012
"Liberty, then, is the sovereignty of the individual, and never shall man know liberty until each and every individual is acknowledged to be the only legitimate sovereign of his or her person, time, and property, each living and acting at his own cost." -- Josiah Warren
![[]](http://www.tumblr.com/photo/1280/anarchyagogo/16930785272/1/tumblr_lys6v2GMls1qagyvo)
The argument of the Collectivist seems to be premised on one basic point: an obligation.
The excuses may be different for the obligation they claim I have, but this premise is shared by Collectivists of all stripes. The Minarchist and the the full-blown Statist may be vastly different in their theories and practices, but in principle, they are exactly the same. Their arguments reduce to this: I owe something to someone for some reason. The tactic of the Collectivist is to try and cloak their aggression in nobility and morality. They may claim I am obligated to pay for the "rule of law", or I need to help the less fortunate. I have no doubt that they may have honorable intentions, but are they good enough "reasons" for aggression? I'd like to take a deeper look at my so-called obligation.
For thousands of years the single Tyrant stood alone and his will was commanded into law. Lysander Spooner had this to say about it in No Treason:
"The single despot stands out in the face of all men, and says: I am the State: My will is law: I am your master: I take the responsibility of my acts: The only arbiter I acknowledge is the sword: If anyone denies my right, let him try conclusions with me."
A look at the tyrannies of ages past proves Spooner to be correct; tyranny is born with the sword and it is kept with the sword, and with the every swipe of the sword your obligation is born. The aggression of the Tyrant is the midwife of your obligation.
We all remember the part in Braveheart where William Wallace is charged with treason against "his" King. Wallace proclaims that never in his whole life did he swear allegiance to the King, and the response is, "it matters not, he is your King."
You see, It matters not, you have an obligation of allegiance. The obligation is thrust upon you, and a dissenting opinion would almost surely cost you your life. This is how the Tyrant stayed in power; by crushing dissent and rebellion through ruthless aggression. A gruesome show of force is what maintained the Tyrant's Kingdom, and throughout history the aggression tended to be thinly veiled in Divinity, but it was always covered in blood.
But these were the ways of the Old World, right? Why would I revisit this bloody past to uncover the source of my so-called obligation? Even though the Tyrant was banished from America long ago, the concept of the obligation lingers on like an infected wound. The banishment of King George from the Colonies did nothing to remove the tyranny of the obligation, but is it the same? Did anything change? Or is it the same old blood-soaked obligation?
We have already established that the Tyrant demanded an obligation of allegiance through the sword, but how can any normal "citizen" still claim I have an obligation in a democratic society? The tyrant's claim was completely subjective and absolutely false, but there was always the threat of force to back up his claim. As I mentioned, I've had many people claim I am obligated in some fashion or another, but what makes their claim true? I'll give some examples of some of the "reasons" I have come up against in past discussions.
The government has the consent of the governed; I am obligated to follow the "Law of the Land": I've heard this one many times, and it very quickly breaks down circular reasoning when the claim is put up against a little Socratic questioning. The analogy I always liken it to is this: The slave master owns a chattel slave, and this slave gives birth. Does the master automatically have the consent of the child? How is this any different than our situation? Because there is some parchment protected in a glass case that begins with WE THE PEOPLE? Apparently, in the minds of the slaves, this changes the morality of it all, and now it's not slavery; it's democracy, the pinnacle of human government. When consent is used in the context of sexuality, we are all very clear on what consent means, but this concept is lost on the masses when used in the context of government. We should be thankful that consent has still retained its original meaning when speaking of sexual matters, otherwise there could be no rape; just a little rough sex.
I am my Brothers Keeper: I have an obligation to help the poor, the elderly, and the sick. I have been in arguments with Collectivists who claim this very thing, and it always makes me think of what Murray Rothbard said:
"The great non sequitur committed by defenders of the State, including classical Aristotelian and Thomist philosophers, is to leap from the necessity of society to the necessity of the State."
The error that is committed by the Collectivist is this: they do not have confidence in the other members of society to do what they imagine to be moral. Since they assume this to be true, they turn to the violent entity known as the State to force others to be their so-called "Brothers Keeper". These Collectivists imagine themselves to be the stalwarts of society; the defenders of the poor, the downtrodden, and the sick. To them, the ends justify the means. It does not seem to matter to them that in their quest for morality, they engage in immoral means. The Collectivist who advocates for "social justice" commits the same logical error. The State is not society, but the Collectivist looks to the State as the source of social justice. Social justice can only be found in one place, and that place is within society. The State does not know what justice is, because it is founded in injustice; it is founded in immorality and deceit. Putting power into the hands of a few, and excluding them from the morality pool will never deliver justice; it has never delivered justice. It is irrational to expect moral ends from immoral means. This is the reason for the continuous failure of the State, and it will continue until this truth is realized. Sadly, the Collectivists that believe this strongly in the State will not stop until they are shot in the head with bullets they paid for by guns that they advocated for.
It is the Minarchist Collectivist who quite possibly makes the biggest error of all. The cry of the Minarchist is this: if we don't plan for some sort of defense we will be overran by those who seek to do us harm. I do, at least, understand the position of the Minarchist, because most of them actually fear this sort of thing. They believe without the State, the land mass known as the United States will be invaded by millions of Chinese or Russian troops or some other rabid herd of bad guys. I don't know if any of that is true, because I can't get past the massive logical contradiction that is painfully evident, and it is this: in order to guard against the bad guys, the Minarchist must become the bad guy. The argument of the Minarchist always reminds me of what Marc Stevens says:
"If the purpose of the State was to protect life, liberty, and property, they wouldn't be the first ones to try and take it."
The Collectivist who supports this approach is still a Tyrant, because if you refuse this obligation, you will be dealt with in the same fashion as if you were under tyrannical rule. I will say this about the Minarchist position; I have more respect for the Tyrant's invading horde, than those Tyrants who claim to be my Countrymen. At least the invading Tyrant does not mask his aggression in Patriotism. Nope,it's nothing but cold hard steel with this Tyrant, and his obligation is born out of the barrel of his gun, and he is not ashamed of it. The Minarchist cloaks the obligation in pretty pieces of parchment, but a peak behind the paper quickly reveals the same cold hard aggression that the invading Tyrant would use to demand my obligation of allegiance. The Minarchist is so sure of the State solution to defense that he is blinded to other options. The market is more powerful than the State, and if defense is valued by the people, then they will voluntarily pay for it; the market will provide it. The Minarchist has the poison of Collectivism running through his veins just a much as the Communist does. He has such little trust in the market that he is willing to become the thing that he allegedly fears the most; the Tyrant. This is the reason I do not fear the would-be Tyrant across the ocean, I have a Tyrant across the street.
It's quite possibly the biggest scam ever pullled, Democracy I mean. When the slaves finally demanded that they have the same Divine Right as the King, they should have taken the ring of power and destroyed it in the fires of Mordor, but instead the slaves forged new rings by the billions and passed them them around and proclaimed democracy to be the apex of freedom. To the anarcho-abolitionist, nothing could be worse, because now instead of one despotic ruler, there are billions of them. Here's the worst part–the Oligarchs who were always in control, bear no responsibility for the mess–now the Collectivist Kings blame each other. It's a perpetual war of the Collectives, and the Oligarchs sit back and get rich beyond belief, and the slave who falsely thinks the vote has power will keep blaming the collective that he does not belong to. The Ruling class has found a way to retain power, and keep their heads out of the gullotines. Genius.
In closing, I also argue that the Collectivist has an obligation, and that obligation is to keep their guns holstered while trying to figure out how to organize and maintain society. The truth is this; the Collectivist will never, ever, have a good enough excuse for the tyranny of the obligation, because the Collectivist is the one who is choosing to wield the gun, and the anarchist is not. I need no excuse for my claim of an obligation, because my obligation is not backed by aggression, it is backed by reason.
"It is not desirable to cultivate a respect for the law, so much as for the right. The only obligation which I have a right to assume is to do at any time what I think right." ~ Henry David Thoreau
http://zerogov.com/?p=2575
War, Social Values, and Ron Paul
by Jon Basil Utley
Is supporting war more important for evangelicals than their social values? Isn't Ron Paul a social conservative? He opposes abortion, gay marriage and promiscuous sex, he has never been divorced and certainly supports family values, but he believes in limited government. Two of his brothers are ministers. Why then are evangelical leaders now opting for Santorum, and before him Gingrich? The one big area of disagreement with Ron Paul is war; foreign wars and the domestic one against drugs. For this they oppose him. Santorum supports unending war in Afghanistan, backing Israel without limit and a new war against Iran.
Earlier there was a major far leftist candidate who supported all the issues that evangelicals oppose, and was a vocal proponent for expanding Israeli settlements on the West Bank and promoting the war on Iraq. He was overjoyed when open homosexuality became allowed in the military, he supports abortion, gay marriage and the leftist agenda for big, intrusive government; power to labor unions as well as expanded, unconstitutional police powers within the U.S. Evangelicals adore him and went all out to support him 2006, when he lost his primary race and ran as an independent for the Senate. He is Senator Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut.
All this shows how evangelical leaders put support for wars ahead of their social values. Their support includes every new law giving Washington ever greater police powers over American citizens, such as the Patriot Act, Military Commissions Act and the recent National Defense Authorization Act which tear asunder much of the Bill of Rights. Most also supported torture of prisoners of war (with the notable exception of Chuck Colson of Prison Fellowship). All this comes with their "social values."
They loved George Bush. They were major supporters of the two wars against Iraq and the occupation of Afghanistan. Fear and ignorance of the outside world joins together with a belief that God uniquely favors America. Mostly poorer Southerners they also have strong affinity for the American military and its industrial complex. In addition, author Chris Hedges has written about how they are joined by many Northern blue collar families hurting from new technology, globalization, and poor schools in seeing government as out to undermine their communities and social values. Their solace is to hope for Armageddon.
I know many of their leaders from the Reagan era when they joined in supporting his anti-communism, indeed in making his electoral victories possible. While the older ones consider my views against empire and for peace in the Middle East anathema, I find many younger ones much more receptive.
Pollster John Zogby also notes that there is a strong divide on issues between evangelicals over 40 and younger ones. Christian economist Gary North wrote some years ago that they numbered about 20 million. He told me also that younger evangelicals were not so enthused with end of the world dreams as their elders. If you think this view excessive see this video of Tom Delay hoping for the end times and others saying that the Anti-Christ is a leader who seeks peace in the Middle East.
This is the dark side to their religious world view. Their fantasy is often sung to uplifting gospel music of a soon-to-come Paradise. Its concomitant message (not openly discussed) is that God will then (brutally) kill the entire human race except for Christians (for many meaning "born again" Christians). The Left Behind book series dwells on how God will eviscerate, torture and kill all non-Christians. Why so many of them dwell on this is not clear. Perhaps it gives meaning to their lives. Or instilling fear is a way to keep them in line under their preachers' domination. In any case they are cleverly used by the Israeli lobby, imperial neoconservatives and (more profitably) by the military industrial complex.
The Book of Revelation is the integral passion of their foreign policy, their belief that the founding of Israel foretells the imminent Second Coming, conversion or death for Jews and eternal happiness for themselves in Heaven. In their view America, as God's instrument, should encourage wars and chaos in the Middle East in order to "hurry up" God and His agenda. One of their leaders is John Hagee, founder of Christians United for Israel. Senator Lieberman is a friend and favored speaker at his events. I have described The Strangest Alliance in History about how each side thinks it is using the other for its own ends.
Evangelicals like to quote a biblical text that God favors those who favor the Jews. However, for them they mean only Jews who make wars and contribute to chaos in the Middle East. Jewish peacemakers are cursed in their view. No tears were shed for Yitzak Rabin who negotiated peace with the Arabs until Israeli fanatics killed him. Indeed Pat Robertson said that Rabin was killed because he was trying to thwart God's plans.
Herein lies their antipathy to Ron Paul, who in all other respects is a family values conservative. Indeed, most of them are Baptists who used to look upon Catholics with suspicion. Today they would prefer Senator Santorum or Newt Gingrich, both Catholics, to Ron Paul, who is Baptist.
Santorum is no libertarian believer in limited government (he would use government to enforce his social values) and urges absolute support for Israel and the military industrial complex.
These evangelicals don't want peace because it would mean postponing Armageddon. That's why their leaders oppose Ron Paul.
A version of this originally appeared at The American Conservative.
Winning
by Anthony Wile
We track dominant social themes here at the Daily Bell, and the spectacular implosion of the "Stop Kony 2012" campaign is a further example of how these memes are disintegrating under the pressure of what we call the Internet Reformation.
We commented on this in this past week, in " Kony 2012 Debunking Shows How Far Alternative Media Has Come." But we wrote that article before the spectacular implosion of the "artistic creator" of the video, who apparently had a nervous breakdown due to the reception of the video and was sent to a psychiatric facility.
I am not one to rejoice at this sort of thing. In fact, it is a personal and familial tragedy for the person involved, obviously. On the other hand, the video itself was fairly despicable, in my view, and obviously and evidently the intention was to create a power elite meme.
This is not idle speculation. Alternative media reports may have firmly fixed the producers of the video, "Invisible Children," within the larger framework of the State Department and its infamous AYM sponsorship.
The "youth movements" that the power elite has assiduously cultivated over the past decade or more are responsible for destabilizing numerous countries around the world now.
The Invisible Children non-profit seems to me to be firmly entrenched within this Intel paradigm. No doubt, if their funding stream is analyzed closely it will emerge that various strands of support lead back to elite foundations and personalities.
What was the meme? It was to create a groundswell of support for a kind of neo-colonialist attack on Africa. Some of what is intended has been clearly elucidated now by alternative media and some has not.
The alternative media, as we have pointed out previously, has been superb in rising up to denounce the video and the intentions behind it. Alex Jones led the charge with a hundred – maybe a thousand – websites and blog-sites all focusing on the true disinformation inherent in the "Invisible Children" effort.
Many facets of what the video was intended to do have been analyzed by now. But let me try to sum up in a few sentences:
The video may be part of a larger power elite plan to take control of the Middle East and Africa more directly. In the Middle East and upper Africa, as we've reported many times, the power elite has destroyed a number of secular regimes (Egypt, Tunisia and Libya) on their way to installing what seems to be a region-wide Caliphate.
The idea seems to be to create a wider war on terror by building a Muslim-oriented Caliphate using the Trojan Horse of the Muslim Brotherhood, which is apparently CIA connected at the very top. The Kony video is obviously aimed at providing a wider justification for more African military involvement by the West.
All the above actions are CONTROL oriented. There are other reasons, as well, having to do with gold, with the world's next reserve currency and, of course, natural resources. Some of these we've pointed out in the past. But the larger issue is the one-world government that elites are continuing to pursue.
The moves in the Middle East and Africa and even the Kony video itself needs to be looked at within that context. And seen in that context, I think we can come to certain conclusions.
The main conclusion we can come to is that the elites' dominant social themes are really in a kind of free fall now. The elites RELY on these dominant social themes to organize society and instill belief systems that allow for the gradual implementation of what has been called a New World Order.
The idea of a consolidated global government run by the current elite – and at the top it is apparently composed of dynastic banking families – ought to be scary to anyone. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. A one-world government cannot be anything other than tyrannical.
But these dominant social themes, having worked so well in 20th century and even earlier, have certainly been undermined by the availability of 'Net information. One by one, they are toppling, or at least losing credibility. I'd like to think we've contributed to this trend.
Whether it's global warming, the so-called "war on terror" or various scarcity memes having to do with food, water and oil, people are a lot less likely to take what they read and hear from the mainstream media at face value anymore. There are too many other outlets via the Internet.
This is why the powers-that-be have tried to crack down on Internet information via such ploys as copyright enforcement. It's exactly the same tactic that was used after the Gutenberg Press began to change the way people thought about the Way the World Worked.
As we've often pointed out, this is a big problem for the power elite. Lacking the ability to propagandize the masses, the elites have turned to more brutal techniques. They are trying to accomplish via the brute force of law and regulation what they cannot accomplish via the propagation of memes.
Even worse, the elites have increasingly turned toward and encouraged, in my mind, economic disintegration. The idea is to make people so miserable and insecure via "austerity" and various wars that we will simply cry out for "order" at any cost. At that point, world government will start to become a reality.
But wait just a minute. As far as I'm concerned, however, "Kony 2012" and the pushback it has received mark a kind of watershed moment for the Internet. There have been several I recall.
One was when Dan Rather was fired after the Internet exposed the phony documents he was trying to use to attack then US President George Bush. I have no admiration for Bush, who was a deliberate war-monger, but Rather was rightfully caught.
Another watershed moment, in my view, was the "ClimateGate" exposure of emails that showed fairly convincingly that global warming was a contrived hoax. The "movement" has never recovered from this setback.
And another, very recent, watershed moment has been the unraveling of the case against Dr. Andrew Wakefield who first identified a potential link between autism and the MMR vaccine. One of Dr. Wakefield's colleagues just had disbarment from the British medical establishment reversed.
But the rapid and seemingly complete collapse of the Kony gambit must rank as the most astonishing yet in my view. The anger of seemingly the entire alternative media community is palpable and the "nervous breakdown" of the man who made the video when see in this light is perhaps no accident. They're under enormous pressure.
The elites will continue to do what they do. They've been doing it for thousands of years apparently, and the exposure of their thematic mechanisms won't stop them from trying to achieve their goals.
But above all the elites seek justification for what they do, and the Internet regularly strips these self-serving and manufactured justifications away from them.
This leaves the brutality of planned depressions, manufactured wars and unjust laws supported by crony favoritism. How long they can manufacture consent via fear rather than conviction remains to be seen.
There is a reason that the elites counted on the dissemination of their memes in the 20th century. There are a lot fewer of them than us.
Maybe at some point, as the Internet Reformation rolls onward, the top tier of elites – the powerful banking families themselves – will see fit to take a step backward. This won't be something done within a vacuum, of course. They will have to be convinced it is in their own self-interest to keep a lower profile.
It could happen, in my view. Perhaps it already is.
http://www.thedailybell.com/3711/Anthony-Wile-Winning
The Law Is Dead
by C.T. Rossi
Thus from the four preceding articles, the definition of law may be gathered; and it is nothing else than an ordinance of reason for the common good, made by him who has care of the community, and promulgated.
-- St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, First of the Second Part, Q. 90, Art. 4
The law is the organization of the natural right of lawful defense; it is the substitution of collective for individual forces, for the purpose of acting in the sphere in which they have a right to act, of doing what they have a right to do, to secure persons, liberties, and properties, and to maintain each in its right, so as to cause justice to reign over all.
-- Bastiat, The Law
As a member of that noble profession that concerns itself with the above subject matter, I take care to proclaim that the great Law is dead (or, at best, feeling quite unwell in 21st-century America). There is little hope for a resurrection of Law until the most important question is answered – whodunit?
Like any good suspense novel there are a retinue of likely suspects. Was it the pompous and hypocritical Politician, who rather than acting as guardian of the Law, turned his sacred trust into a tool for personal benefit and needed to off the Law before she squealed? Was it the shadowy Corporate Special Interest in the dead of night who needed the Law out of the way to effect his dastardly plan? Or was it the Professor, envious that Law always took center stage over him and his work? Perhaps it was the unassuming John Q. Public, who seemingly had no motive. Was Public put up to it by the seductive Media – who had an agenda of her own? Or was it – the unkindest cut of all – Lawyer, the Law's own lover, the most natural suspect?
I will spoil the plot by telling you the ending of this mystery – stolen directly from Murder on the Orient Express – that there are two possible explanations. First, as the sleuth Poirot explains, we can blame the murder on a random stranger – a tragic twist of fate. Alternatively, we can posit that all of the suspects took their turn plunging the blade into her bosom. Poirot suggested adoption of the former in his mystery. I suggest the latter in ours.
The Law died because she had to in order to make room for what Bastiat called "legal plunder" which "destroys for its own profit, and in different degrees amongst the rest of the community, personal independence by slavery, liberty by oppression, and property by plunder." The story is too in-depth to be told in a single article, so I hope to provide fuller detail in the future. But for now, I briefly want to provide an outline of the roles and motives of the players.
The Politicians: Individuals whose skill set, natural or acquired, consists of those things necessary for getting elected. The main skill is the art of telling people what they want to hear (or avoiding what they do not want to hear) – otherwise known as pandering. However, there is a prerequisite to really successful pandering – acquiring the resources necessary to pander – also known as begging.
The essentially negative, passive, and defensive nature of Law is an impediment to promising a chicken in every pot, in the case of the voters, and delivering said chickens in the case of moneyed special interest. To give cover to the fact that special interest gets the gold mine and voters the shaft, the Law has to be replaced with a brummagem system of regulation underpinned by a purely positivistic concept of law, i.e., unreasonable ordinances against the common good, made by those receiving questionable delegations of power, and concealed as much as possible.
Corporate Special Interests: As opposed to those individuals and entities attempting to engage in lawful commerce, these are promoters of perverting the Law either to win themselves graft or to use the power of government to bludgeon their competition in a way the market would not normally allow. In short, they want the game rigged in their favor and are willing to pay to make that happen.
Academia: This is bifurcated entity: there is the institution and there are the individuals. The legal profession was once learned by apprenticeship and largely self-regulated on state and local levels. The advent of the law school was ostensibly done to elevate and standardize the level of legal learning. But eventually the law schools hungered for the profits that only monopoly could bring and the path of apprenticeship was largely outlawed. Controlling the doorway for entry into the profession, the law schools soon learned that they could teach what they wanted – first out of hubris and later the curriculum could be put up for auction. Through partnership with the politicians and special interest, the law schools soon learned that opening a floodgate of free-flowing student loans – specially exempted from bankruptcy – meant they could charge what they wanted.
Then there is the individual law professor. Under the strictures of "publish or perish," legal innovation is his friend. There is nothing more exciting than when the Supreme Court makes a "major ruling" in his specialty – for with such rulings the dreams of new law review articles (prestige) or the revised 8th edition of his treatise (money) come. Those that choose as their mistress the mastery of sound principles of Law find themselves relegated to the dusty corners of the law library.
Then there are the select few, the legal rock stars, who labor proactively to change the law and advocate new policy positions. But to carry out such designs, the would-be legal divas need two things – access to the power brokers and money – things that bring these legal geniuses directly into the waiting arms of politicians and special interest.
The Public: Beginning with Prohibition, the hoi polloi were gradually inculcated with a disrespect for law and a tolerance for corruption. The disdain for (positive) laws is not wholly unjustified as Joe Six-pack can intuit that the game has been rigged, that the bureaucratic regulation of his life inures not to the good of the common man but rather to special interest. The only line from Shakespeare he knows (and he may not know it be Shakespeare, and certainly does not know it to be a villain's line) is "let's kill all the lawyers." While one may forgive Joe for failure to brush up on his Shakespeare, it cannot be denied that he is the product of an educational system which has robbed him of the ability to tell that there is a difference between babies and bathwater. When encountering the reality of "legal plunder," Joe is ill-equipped to appreciate that "Law" exists – or might be possible. So for Joe the only good lawyer is a dead one, unless – of course – he needs one.
The Media: There was much wisdom in Jefferson's preference for "newspapers without a government" but what would he have made out of the chimera known as the corporate media? Most likely it would have filled him with dread second only to the corporate farm. The corporate media, owned by corporate plunderers and designed to (give) cover to political plunderers, exists to make the public think that there is a difference between "High Popalorum" and "Low Popahirum" – the two official brands of legal plunder. Implicit in the media's pimping of official two-party plunder is the marginalization of any other politico-intellectual flavor –see Ron Paul as exhibit A.
The Legal Profession: Modern legal practice is fueled by insurance companies, i.e., corporate special interest. For plaintiff's attorneys, the presence of policy monies means that a judgment is recoverable and that they can afford to take the risk in investing time and money (usually in the form of a line of credit) in the prosecution of a case. For insurance defense attorneys, the insurer fuels his practice by supplying the firm with (the attorney hopes) a steady stream of cases to litigate. This, in essence, places the insurance defense attorney in the moral hazard of serving two masters – the insurer, upon whom his livelihood depends, and the single-event client in the form of the insured. While the ethical codes are clear about the insurance defense attorney's loyalty to the insured/client – such a system calls for moral courage on the part of the attorney as he risks alienating his primary source of income.
The insurance companies evaluate lawsuits, not on the legal merits, but on cost/benefit of litigation. The potential "hit" that the company will take determines the vigorousness with which the defense will be pursued. The companies have no qualms with settling somewhat dubious smaller claims but will fight to the death larger claims where liability is almost certain.
Rather than trim the fat they pay out in small claims, the insurance companies attempt to job the system they created by resorting to politicians in the form of tort reform. Tort reform is in essence wage and price controls applied to the legal system. The "reforms" usually consists of heightened evidentiary hurdles and damage caps. The heightened evidentiary hurdles mean a greater investment of the plaintiff attorney's time and resources – sometimes stretching to the point where the claim becomes economically unfeasible. The caps not only aid the insurance companies in their cost/benefit analysis, but exploit the economy of scale of large insurance defense firms in order to financially exhaust the plaintiff into settling the case before it becomes cost prohibitive to maintain.
We should not forget the third attorney present in every litigation – judges. The great majority of judges are elected, meaning that they are to some degree forced to become politicians whether they wish to or not. The sober qualities of a good trial judge seem antithetical to the qualities generally comprising "electability." The alternative is the appointment of judges – placing the bench under the direct control of the special interest-dominated politicians.
Is there a way to resurrect the Law? It may be possible to find her again but not unless we pursue her and we cannot pursue her if we passively accept as bona fide the system of legal plunder.
http://lewrockwell.com/rossi/rossi20.1.html
President Paul?
by Joseph Sobran
January 25, 2007
Dozens of people have announced their candidacies for the White House in 2008, and if I had to bet at this point, I would put my money on the old woman. Hillary may be awful, but at least she is predictable. I suppose I can learn to resign myself to her.
What difference does it really make? Our next president will have his or her hands full cleaning up after George W. Bush. In a negative sense, he has already set the agenda for his unfortunate successor. Just getting this country back to normal would be a labor of Hercules. And Hercules isn't in the race.
Politics doesn't often produce good news, but I am slightly heartened to learn that Congressman Ron Paul is contemplating a run for the presidency. The Texas Republican has now taken the standard preliminary step of forming an exploratory committee.
Paul, a pro-life medical doctor, is a genuine political maverick. When the House votes for something 434 to 1, you can safely bet that Paul is the 1. He really fights for the principles other Republicans only pretend to stand for, and does so with carefully reasoned explanations of his positions.
In essence, Paul appeals to that subversive document, the U.S. Constitution, long since abandoned by both major parties, not to mention the U.S. Supreme Court. He tests every proposed law by asking whether it exercises a power authorized by the Constitution. The answer is seldom yes.
Many years ago Paul told me, with his affably ironic smile, that he felt more pressure from his fellow Republicans than from Democrats, because the Democrats weren't embarrassed when a Republican voted like a real conservative, but the Republicans were. Showing up his own party has been the story of Ron Paul's career. No other Republican has voted against President Bush as consistently as he has.
Paul isn't flamboyant or defiant about it; his style is quiet and reasonable, not combative. Being a maverick isn't a pose for him. It's a matter of conscience and logic.
As a result, the GOP doesn't care much for him and, if he runs, will try to stifle him. The allegedly right-wing Newt Gingrich, when he was riding high, once supported Paul's opponent in the primary race; Gingrich knew what he was doing. A genuine conservative's worst enemy is a fake one. And vice versa.
Paul ran for president once before, in 1988, when he bolted the GOP to run on the Libertarian Party ticket. Much as I admired him, I voted for George H.W. Bush, afraid of "wasting" my vote on Paul, who had no real chance of winning. Silly me. I soon realized I had really wasted my vote on Bush. It made no difference to Bush, after all, since he was going to win no matter what I did; but it made a difference to me. I still regret it. (And to this day, Bush has never thanked me.)
Paul has no chance of winning this time either, but he may make a real difference just by being himself. He is what liberals used to call a conscience-raiser. He makes people reflect. After six years of supporting George W. Bush, conservatives should be in a reflective mood. American democracy has come down to an unappetizing choice between the War Party and the Abortion Party. Paul could offer an alternative to this bitter dilemma.
The Constitution must never be mistaken for Holy Writ, but at least it is based on the idea that there should be what William F. Buckley has called "rational limits to government." At this point, even that may well be a utopian hope.
But we have subscribed to the principle that the Federal Government must confine itself to powers actually enumerated therein. And after all, our rulers are still sworn to uphold it, just as Bill Clinton is still legally bound by his wedding vows.
Taken literally, this would reduce the government to about 5 percent of its current size. That would be a huge improvement. If nothing else, the Constitution stands as a reminder of what normality used to be.
Well, I can dream, can't I? And today I'm dreaming of President Ron Paul, with a Congress he deserves.
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