Doc Thought

Baby Steps

2012-01-24T05:07:00.000-08:00

The article below reports the close vote of the Indiana Senate to abolish the fees forced on non-union employees. An analysis follows.

Indiana Senate votes 28-22 for right-to-work bill

Published January 23, 2012

| Associated Press

Senate has voted to approve the right-to-work bill that has prompted the legislative boycotts by House Democrats.

The Republican-dominated Senate voted 28-22 in favor of the proposal Monday evening. The bill prohibits companies and unions from agreeing to contracts that require workers who aren't union members to pay representation fees.

Republican Sen. Carlin Yoder of Middlebury argued the bill not only would help attract business to Indiana but also give workers freedom to decide what to do with their money.

Democratic Sen. Vi Simpson of Bloomington questioned whether the law was needed. She says good companies such as Honda and Toyota have expanded in Indiana in recent years without it.

Nine Republicans joined all 13 Democratic senators in voting against the bill."""""""

Just think of the insanity of all this. We got our current jumble of labor laws from years of collectivist courts and legislative action, all driven under the premise evil big business was abusing the worker. Nevermind, that without the effort, time, and minds of the business creators, those 'workers' would still be lighting tallow lamps, tilling the ground behind a donkey, and threshing wheat by hand. The only perk to be seen if you could erase the business man from history would be the shorter life span to suffer. So, for the genius of efficiency and production, that led all those workers into the era of unheard of salary for a fraction of the work previously required, and the immeasurable benefit provided by the businessmen by producing a vast array of time and life saving products for the workers to buy with their new earnings, what is their reward? Immolation by government force. Specifically, our laws force one man to deal with another - to trade with him whether he likes it or not - salary for work, regardless of whether the man seeking to trade money for work agrees that it is a fair trade. What is the result of this breach of freedom? Injury to all, as is always the case, when real individual rights are trampled. We get no or very little real increase in buying power for the workers forced on the employer. We get not the best workers employed, but those with pull in the union or government, because now the hiring and firing of workers is based in the realm of influence, not in the realm of merit. This yields a dramatic drop in efficiency across any industry. This leads to higher prices, poorer product, and a cost of living increase that outstrips even the forced rise in wages for the government imposed workers. (It also leads to generation after generation of young men and women learning not the self-esteem and righteous pride of a job well done and the rightful attendant rewards, but rather the soul rotting pessimism of injustice in the workplace, progress by seniority regardless of merit, and bitter resentment of wealth since they have learned it is somehow always come by through some sort of theft.) Of course, the union workers feel the rise in costs (that they have caused) slightly less because of their forced higher wages. Those not in a union end up paying for the 'advantages' the union workers have forced, via the higher prices now necessary for their lives. (Non-union Bob pays the higher prices for his car, that then are used to cover the greater number of inefficient union John, Joe, and Larry's who work at forced higher salaries.) The higher union wages themselves are initially just another cost of doing business to the employer, initially just passed on to consumers, but the drop in his ability to maintain the highest quality (efficient) workforce is very damaging. As the labor laws, minimum wage laws, insurance and benefit requirements, and taxes expand, the employer's profit (the wealth created by any endeavor - think: the # of potatoes grown above the # planted) shrinks, as does his ability to improve, grow, expand, research, compete, and, eventually his reason to stay in business. There is a french word for this process, it's called "DETROIT" (day'-twa)......
Once we are all in such a pickle, the Unions of course can't let avoiding the union be attractive in any way. So they've managed to, by pull, get laws that enforce fees on non-union employees, such that the heavy dues they charge their members (so as to have a $ war chest for political pull) are not viewed by their members as an avoidable burden. Heaven forbid that a worker see and be able to enter into a free, mutual contract with an employer!
Then, for the govt to pay for all the handout programs to assist those in need during the resultant dreadful economic state of affairs, what do they do - Raise taxes, of course -- on whom most - on the rich, the producers, the businesses. In the context of their businesses, though - they don't pay taxes - they just collect them for the state. Those taxes are simply added to the price of the products sold to cover the new cost of doing businesses. This is why it is so silly when 'right-wingers' grumble about the "50% who pay no taxes" -- Oh no -- they pay taxes. It's just that most of them don't know it. They pay them, and at a MUCH higher percentage of income rate - in the form of higher prices for consumable goods. The irony is fantastic! The liberals who really understand must have a hard time not blowing their soup out their noses every time they hear a poor constituent cry to raise taxes on 'the business or the wealthy.' Short of shooting a poor person in the leg, NOTHING could better keep them down.
So in the end, we all suffer -- all except the moocher type of union employee who does as little as possible and counts on the law given power of his union to keep the feed bag (paid for by all others) in front of him -- and the mass of union organizers and govt bureaucrats who live and breathe and make their ill gotten living from this rotten structure. The rest of us -- we pay for it -- higher prices and taxes for worse and less stuff, for their retirements, for those bureaucrats' schmancy dinners, for the expense of the legislators who keep it in place, for the courts to settle disputes arising over which pressure group should win any particular non objective legal battle over which group of individuals' rights should be breached and how much, for enormous bailouts when the irrationality of it comes crumpling down every decade or so, for the unemployment benefits when the businesses flee overseas, and on and on and on....
When will we learn: The rights of the individual are NOT ever to be breached in the name of the group, the tribe, the class, the 'society,' etc. without great injury to some men (usually many) for the unjust gain of others (usually few.) We did not intend to trade the tyranny of the king for the tyranny of the majority.... We intended real individual freedom. Europe never has realized this. It is a shame that we have forgotten it, or, in some cases, willfully distorted or hidden it....
Yes - Indiana did something good. Baby steps, I guess, Baby steps....

Greed

2012-01-09T05:15:00.000-08:00

The term 'greed' is commonly tossed out as an explanation for this country's economic woes. This is broadly understood as the "evil" desire of those in business, especially "big" business, to make a profit. The following clarifies where this intellectual laziness or intellectual dishonesty leads:

Often, the term "greed" is used negatively to refer to a desire to make a profit. This is wrong however, because a profit is the measure of value that has been created by a man-- a value that did not exist before. If a man makes no profit - he planted four potatoes and harvested four potatoes. To seek to produce new value, by thought and effort and time to create a product or provide a service of quality by the most efficient means -- this is the very definition of GOOD. But for this desire, and the (shrinking) freedom that makes it possible, we could not produce and then trade for the ability to feed our family, shelter ourselves, obtain the materials with which to make our finished product, or invest to do it better, bigger, or in an entirely new way. Put the label 'greed' on that - and you damn yourself as a parasite - the sort that does deserve the invective "greedy." Greed is the combination of two things - the desire to possess value without creating or earning an objective value of the exact amount for which others are willing to freely trade, and, especially to possess so that others can not. The man who produces his best as efficiently as he can to trade his values for the values that others produce - he exhibits neither of these flaws. He is neither a looter nor a moocher. You can identify countless looters and moochers throughout our local state and federal governments, and in many of our unions.

Briefly on creation and thus ethics

2011-11-13T06:09:00.000-08:00

God created an existence in which individuals are sacred. No real good can be achieved for anyone by either an individual killing or harming himself for the supposed benefit of others, nor by an individual killing or harming others for the supposed benefit of himself. The message of the cross was not that we should all be killing ourselves for each other. When man kills the human incarnation of his creator, the lesson is NOT that this is the model for all human relations, by the evil doctrine that sacrifice is the criterion of the good. It is true that when one loves another individual to the greatest degree possible, he is willing to die for that other, because an existence devoid of that individual is not deemed worthwhile. It is one of the greatest evils ever perpetrated to conclude from this that then people all live as spiritual vampires either yielding their own blood to prove love of others, or demanding others' blood as proof of their love for him.

Among other things, the story of the cross and Christ's resurrection shows us that the kingdom of God will not be blackmailed by demands that the 'loving' God 'prove it' by destroying Himself 'for' us. Short of the anihilation of all existence, God will travel any road to reach each individual, but all of existence shall NOT be held forfeit for any individual to attempt to claim value apart from the unalterable fact that he is a creation whose preservation in existence is, was, and can only be dependent on the creator.
In the final analysis, evil is always a hatred of that which will not bend to force -- reality -- that which one can only break oneself against.

Shriek at molehill; Not a peep at Mountain

2011-11-02T06:45:00.000-07:00

The following was a response to the news of multi-million dollar bonuses to the executives of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The outrage from those who pushed these institutions into being a major cause of the housing bubble and crash is laughable. Frank, Reid, Pelosi and others should have their pensions, special health packages, and salaries revoked for what they blame on Fannie and Freddie. Of course we don't hear much outrage that *they* are still being compensated in grand manner. Anyway, here's the response:

Sigh. There are so many people who should be IN JAIL for the unspeakable fraud that was the housing bubble. Start with Clinton's white house. They forced the regulatory changes that penalized lenders if they DIDN'T make bad loans (bad by any standard traditional measurement --- "good" if being a low income supposed ethnic minority on welfare was counted as a positive indicator of ability to repay.) The regulations also rewarded lenders who met "goals" (quotas) for making such ill-advised loans. Whine and complain all you want. It was Clinton and his cronies who wrote these rules, and was thus a large part of the reason the taxpayers who DID NOT make bad financial decisions are being bled dry to pay for the results. The other major part of the debacle was the use of the "supposedly private - but - really - everyone -knew - was - government underwritten - if -the doodoo - hit the fan" Fannie and Freddie. Led by a dumber Barney than Fife, the relevant congressional committee was happy to have these companies buy up a huge portion of the bad loans generated by Clinton's regulatory policies. See, first you have to create the problem, THEN you have to put the problem on the backs of those evil people out there who go to work, don't over spend, pay their bills, save as much as possible, and don't ask for the unearned - DISGUSTING! So full of themselves and their rational independent wise goodie-two-shoe ways! This'll surely show 'em. How dare they pretend that any particular way of living, like, living within your means, is BETTER (liberal intake gasp of horror) than any other way of living! Even... wait for it... more... MORAL!! (they fainted.)

Anyway, the final piece to this pie of pending penury is our head exploding FTC policies and shadow banking system which, among many more unreal and crazy-nuts-o things, allow things like 1) forcing sub prime lending 2) insure sub prime loans, 3) bundle and trade such insurances, loans, or bundles of each 4) link other traded financial instruments, commodities, etc. to these bundles, each bundle having varying percentages of 'good' or bad 'loans' 5) exponentially magnify the problem by allowing non-real commodity trading of instruments which are just numbers based on complex formulas of variables based on features of rafts of other financial instruments. Oh - then stir in the confusion of which percentage of which loans in which bundles involved in which non-real instrument values ..gasp...are to be or have been picked up by fannie / freddie and thus (previously) were thought to be insured by the govt (read: taxpayer)....
Now, throw all that (and more) in a pot and stir it through the upwards portion of the bubble (Clinton years) when life was GRAND! Everyone could afford a house, demand far outstripped supply, prices soared, didn't matter cause anyone could get a nice ARM loan, the entire economy surged to supply all the things that go with building more houses.... Ah the roaring 90s.... What Wikipedia refers to as the "largest peacetime economic expansion in history"... And by expansion they mean - artificial government fiat suppressing the cost of housing money, leading to an unsupported boom of all housing related industries and their derivatives before the sure bust when the fact that those taking the loans were not and did not create the value necessary to support them became apparent in defaults. We didn't see the collapse until late in BUSH II's presidency because the government via Fannie and Freddie kept buying up the toxic instruments - all with the unstated government backing. I don't know if Bush understood the situation or not. If he did early in his presidency, it would have been cowardice not to expose what Fannie / Freddie were doing, how bad the loan situation was, and be much more open about the situation than the administration ever was, even at the end. Regardless, I can't see any evidence that Bush's white house made the situation any better, and they probably made things worse.
Obama? Well, he's just continued the bailout policy that Bush decided on... though admittedly on a more grand scale. Once we went down the 'too big to fail' path... well, it'll be tough to get out of that dead end....One would think that at the very least the congressional sections responsible for "working with" Fannie and Freddie would be impeached, jailed, or at least voted out. But apparently scot free they go... Clinton *should* be in jail... The banks? Well, they certainly played by the rules set by the government... how much crony pushing did they do? Probably not much on the 'force me to lend badly' front. Probably A LOT on the, "be sure the govt buys up these insane loans were making" front, and the "if you let us go bust, the sky will fall" front....
Really, coming back to the article, a couple million to CEOs who really weren't the architects of this monstrosity makes very little difference... The real evil is that our federal government is in control of supposedly private lending institutions (and other things).... that was really the case by unspoken understanding for a long time. This means at least though, that the congressional groups running the show can't get away with blaming those awful Fannie / Freddie guys any longer (one would think, but never knows)... we all know now that they ARE those awful Fannie / Freddie guys. It's so odd. You'd think after all this, we'd all be crying "Never again let government artificially make loan money for ANY purpose cheaper than the market dictates -- we've seen the boom / bust this creates and we want NO more of THAT!" and "Never again let government act to be the backer, accepting the risk, that private industries take in doing business and lending!" And yet... we hear the exact opposite. We're loaning away to all manner of whacky business schemes with NO publication of the details, and no doubt NO method of getting our money back. And we CONTINUE to artificially suppress insterest rates. You'd think somebody WANTED to create an economic bomb.

Disappointing Longfellow

2011-07-31T09:21:00.001-07:00

Published on American Thinker.

What we have here..

2009-11-17T22:19:00.000-08:00

What is the economic system of America?

I can imagine the consternation of a well informed student attempting to answer that question for a class. One hundred years ago, he could have answered "capitalism" and been about 99% correct.

Today, what we have here is an unholy mixture - a small bit of capitalism, a heaping spoonful of socialism, and a liberal dousing of corporatism.

Capitalism is a politico-economic system in which property and specifically the means of any production are privately owned, and men deal with one another as traders - trading value for value.

Socialism places property under the (in name) ownership of the entire public, and production and value are distributed (by a few) in an equitable manner "to all" as determined by 'the few.'

Corporatism can exist in various forms along with socialism or capitalism, but is generally a deviant form of capitalism in which the government (which is supposed to be protecting the individual rights of the individual people) is in bed with various corporations (to the corporations' market advantage). IE the corporations by political "pull" with the government, use the force of the government to gain forcible advantage (or total control) in their market.

So, what we have here, is an ugly, smelly mixture. We take the one moral and effective system, capitalism, and create all manner of evil by enslaving individuals to the group "for the public good" - socialism. Then, since there is really no such thing as "the people" - just individuals - we naturally get not competition among private companies but rather competition among political pressure groups and between companies and even nations competing through political /legislative/regulatory pull within our own government. Competing for what? The summed productive value (eventually in terms of money) of all American individuals. A healthy chunk (taxes) of all production is confiscated from all the actual producers, then political groups war over dividing up that stolen pie and corporate powers buy and pressure government favor so as to be paid some of that pie by the government or be positioned via the power of the govt regulatory functions to obtain unfair market advantage so as to soak up (unfairly) the production of the nation that was left over after taxes. And thus we are enslaved to corporations (those which are in bed with the govt.)

And that's how we get what we have here.... A disintegrating realm of freedom, chiseled away on one side by enslavement to "the group - the public," and cut and mangled on the other side by forced enslavement to politically powerful corporate interests eager to loot some of that "public" money.

Be aware - those advocating socialism have and will continue to claim that corporatism IS capitalism or is inherent in capitalism. This isn't the case, but it's one of the reasons many well meaning people are confused about capitalism.

Here used to be a place of freedom and thus hope, and now, after just 80 or so years of misguided political and economic ideology, here is a place of decay, enslavement, unfathomable debt, disillusionment, confusion, corruption, and despair.

And this horrible horrible journey was all due to, at bottom, one single wrong idea.

God has ordained it, reason and an objective view of the nature of man confirms it, and the very nature of cause and effect will not disobey.

A man's life may not be made a means for another.

You can not build a friendship on the contrary view. You can not build a family. You can not build a nation.

And yet our media and nearly all in Washington go on, day after day, trying to make that simple truth untrue. If we just moderate our policies (based on that idea) a bit - compromise - THEN it'll work. No. 'We haven't gone far enough - if we just go ALL out and make EVERYONE a means for everyone else - THEN it'll work!' No.

The cloud of preconceptions, pressing crises of the moment, and a national ideological landscape smeared with the detritus of Kant and misunderstood religiosity make the application of such fundamentals entirely opaque to them.

This is what we have here..

Veterans' Day

2009-11-14T21:25:00.000-08:00

On this day of gratitude, celebration, and remembrance, sadly, we see even more clearly than usual, the moral confusion in the American mind. Think how often, on this day, you hear the glorification of sacrifice – over and over lauding the 'sacrifice' of the brave men and women who have served this country. It is clear from the manner in which the many media sources discuss the merit of these men and women, that, to them, it is the supposed sacrifice of the veterans' personal values which makes what they have done so admirable. It is again and again stressed how these service members gave up or disregarded their personal interests or values – IE. sacrificed their personal interests – for the sake of the nation. But is this really what these great men and women have done, or have they rather pursued a true prioritization of values, and is this not the fact that makes them so remarkable? Have they neglected a greater personal value and pursued the lesser personal value of protecting their country? Or rather, awesomely, have they truly held a greater personal value for the protection and preservation of this country and what that means for themselves, their fellow men (whom they value), and for their family?

These men and women are noble and worthy of admiration, not because they have disregarded their own interests for the sake of the nation, but because they have personally valued this nation of liberty rightly. They have identified and defended that on which their own values, and historically the personal values of all men, depend – liberty – the rights of the individual as superseding the mob, the group, or the government. It is this which is awe inspiring, that they see a true primary value and realize that their own and all true human life depends on it. The correlation between truth and human action is a glorious sight. Men and women willing to die to protect the ideas which make true human (rational and free) life possible are not 'sacrificing' their own interests for the interests of others, but rather seeing a value (freedom) on which all other real values depend, for themselves as well as the rest of mankind. To see a man or woman engaged in the preservation of that which is truly valuable, disregarding any lesser or secondary whim or fancy, is an awe inspiring and instructive sight.

It is hideous to encapsulate this high virtue as noble because “they sacrificed themselves for others.” It is a pernicious lie to say that the value of these men and women lies in their disregard for themselves. Their value lies in the freely chosen correlation between their identification of their values and the truth of fundamental human value. This is right and beautiful human action in avid defense of that which makes humanity possible. These men and women are not engaged in self immolation for others, and if they were it would not be virtuous or admirable. These men and women are the defenders of the true good, a good that makes their own and all others' moral actions possible.

To emphasize that 'caring nothing for one's self' is the key feature making Veterans great is horribly offensive and simply another device of the ideologies threatening America. These men and women are not great for offering or living their lives for anyone other than their own selves. No. They are great because they have recognized a great good, a good on which true human life depends, and have not looked to others to secure it, but have acted to secure and preserve that which they rightly value, with great courage and great honor. Those who have died in this great task are not to be remembered for valuing their own lives so little, but for valuing human life so greatly. God bless them.

Don't throw the Baby out with the bathwater...

2009-07-26T09:35:00.000-07:00

The political Right has failed to understand and thus explain the fundamental moral high ground it actually holds. I believe this is due in large part to a misunderstanding of the idea of sacrifice within a Christian or generally religious context. True Christian sacrifice is NOT the trading of everything for nothing, but this is the effectual understanding which has been allowed to stand, unspoken, unchallenged. The 'right' view is to see sacrifice as an INDIVIDUAL choice in pursuit of another human's value based on the conviction that each individual is an end in him or herself (just as we understand God to view each of us). The left's unchallenged, bent view makes sacrifice the submission of each individual's status as an end in him/herself, to the group as a whole. This is exactly as absurd as trying to fornicate your way to chastity. The right has NOT done a good job clarifying this evil ideology, and providing the clear correct alternative for the past 100 years. Instead, we hear supposed defenders of the right submitting to the left's basic philosophic premise and then trying in vain to construct a right structure with an inconsistent foundation. If I hear that "socialism is great in theory but not in practice" one more time from a supposed right winger, I will dive through my TV set and choke the foolish windbag. All collectivist ideology, socialism included, is evil and awful in THEORY, which is WHY it fails in practice. Is it any wonder our youth often side with the left, when we spout such contradictions? We HAVE the right ethical base, but we do not understand it nor teach it, then wonder why our state indoctrinated children can not defend the right principles with conviction and moral certainty.

Ayn Rand got this basic philosophic correction right, and was one of the few in the past 100 years to consistently point out the Right's failure to properly identify it's superior moral basis. Unfortunately, Rand succumbed to emotionalism when she addressed the influence of Christianity and religion in general. She threw out all religion as non-objective irrationalism instead of simply correcting the error that the religious and especially the bulk of Christians make about sacrifice. The common error Christian's make concerns the atonement, which many explain as the satisfaction of all righteousness by the sacrifice of the perfectly good (Christ) for the sake of evil, the utterly lost (man). This misunderstanding, among other things, leads to an attempt to model these wrong ideas in the economic arena with the sacrifice of the producer (individual property rights) for the sake of the vague 'group,' - society. This, of course, leads to the sacrifice of EVERYTHING, for Nothing. Of course, this is NOT what God did in Christ. Rather, when we realize that the cessation of God's existence (annihilation) would mean the cessation of all existence, we can see that He extended Himself (in Christ) as far as would not negate the value which He pursued - that value (to Him) being *us* - treated as ends in ourselves individually. Missing this correction of confused Christian sacrifice is a main road by which the young, the uncritical, or those new to political or economic thought stumble into the self defeating 'morality' of collectivism (socialism). These folk have a notion that "everybody ought to be OK, and, you know, have stuff,' and a vague idea (due to the popular misconception) that self-sacrifice is the criterion for an action's ethical merit, and the next thing you know they're shouting, "rise up proletariat!" with Marx, and voting for socialists.

The opposite error is to, like Rand, ignore Christianity and religion entirely due to an emotional response to the ugliness collectivism generates in practice. The false premise to which Rand fell prey was that Christianity and religion 'must' contain the morality of self immolation, of bleeding individuals for the imaginary 'common good.' Rand's tossing of the Baby (Christ) out with the bathwater (the incorrect interpretation of Christian sacrifice) did terrible damage to the public acceptance of her philosophy and tremendous political damage to the Right. Christians nod enthusiastically with Rand as she logically destroys the Left's philosophical base, but draw back violently when she pitches all religion because of this simple error. So, the Christians remain conflicted - valiantly defending individualism in the economic arena because they see the ugliness and evil of collectivism applied there, but then grunting and gesticulating helplessly when asked to reconcile this view with the 'popular' flawed understanding of Christian sacrifice . It is so sad, because the Right was never so close to embracing a clear and CONSISTENT philosophical base. The effect of this error about sacrifice has had unfathomable effects on this nation's and the world's history.

If we receive Christ with true understanding, we can, among many more important things, confidently proclaim our consistent support of individual rights, an objective philosophy, and a rational system of ethics.

Universal Slavery

2009-07-22T20:11:00.000-07:00

We all want people who need health care to get care, just as we all want the hungry fed, etc.

In accomplishing this, however, it is immoral to revoke another human's right to the product of his mental and physical effort - his property.

It is evil to steal from Bob and give to Jane, and this will always be the case, even if Bob is rich and Jane poor.

(This may not have been true in the case of a rich feudal lord or monarch whose wealth came by forcible economic rape of the people, BUT, in American capitalism, wealth is CREATED by the producer of value through mental or physical effort. The value is in the created good or service. Men voluntarily trade monetary markers of value for that CREATED value. Except for those rich who became so and thrive by lobbying (bribing) the government to favor their company/interests with legislation, regulation, or the competition stifling tax code --- except for those evil parasites --- wealth in America is NOT come by through the oppression of others, but through the creation of value. Many have never understood this, and still talk as if all wealth came to be through a manner of theft.)

There are many many practical 'system' reasons that the stealing from Bob to pay for Jane's health care is wrong, and many reasons drawn from the poor results such stealing yields, but the bottom line - the real reason is that Bob has a right to life which includes a right to dispose of the product of his work and mental effort as he sees fit. To deny him this right to dispose of his effort is to deny him the right to support his life. There is no such thing as 'partially' destroying a right.

So, you can not create some new medical right (which is an economic "right" by the way) without negating the right to property, and thus the right to life. This is true of any so called economic 'right.' If someone receives without working, then someone has worked without receiving. If that ' work without receiving' was not voluntary, that man or woman is a slave. This is wrong. It is to bleed dry the life from the healthy for the sake of the dying.

This is true in all economic endeavors that place the so called interests of the tribe or the group or "society" above the RIGHTS of the individual. It is just more ugly and absurd to do so in the health arena.

We see the sick baby without medical insurance, and say - "wouldn't we ALL give some of our wealth to help her? *shouldn't* we all do so?" The answer is likely yes for most, and it *should* be done through voluntary giving. The moment we try to use the power of the government (the legalized force of a gun at base) to force *all* to give, we have destroyed the right to property, to life. Though we envision such heart wrenching sights as the sick child, we should not forget that the more common reality in universal health care is the stealing of money from the average family or average income worker to pay for the astronomical health care costs of the millions who choose to smoke, drink, drug, or eat themselves to ill health and death. Much more common will be the loss of some struggling family's small vacation (through the certain higher taxes which will be required) to pay for an obese heroin addict's methadone clinic and eventual liver transplant. There are countless such ugly real scenarios which this sort of legislation WILL create.

I am a physician in socialized medicine - the military health care system. The bureaucracy is astounding and the best and brightest physicians are fleeing the system. The 'weeds,' those angling only for promotion, those playing politics, the bean counters, the 'regulators,' all thrive in this system. Those men/women honestly attempting to most efficiently and effectively provide medical care, die in such an environment. They leave. They become fed up and go practice elsewhere. What, when there is no elsewhere?

Giving Back

2009-07-10T19:59:00.000-07:00

Wrong headed liberal / collectivist ideology is frighteningly pervasive, often in forms in which it is unlikely the people involved are even aware of their infection.

As I was watching the latest professional golf tournament, I counted at least a dozen instances in which the announcers used a phrase with subtle, skewed implications. In reference to several PGA professionals' impressive charity work, the announcers referred to the activity as "giving back." As a paraphrase, they would say, "It really is impressive, Jim, how David Toms has taken the time and made the effort to give back." Or, "you can really see that these guys think that 'giving back' is really important."

It is not sufficiently tempting to simply write this off as benign happenstance of word choice. There are too many more obvious, and more longstanding phrases to describe the charity which these pros are performing. They are *giving.* They are NOT giving *back*.
Giving "back" implies that the property they are giving to the various groups was somehow once 'taken' from those groups in some sense. This is the evil idea propagated (sometimes knowingly, sometimes not) by liberals / collectivists for over a century.

When those who have property or wealth have come by it by looting or parasitizing his fellow man as in feudalism, tribalism, socialism, fascism, or communism, then, yes, for such a wealthy man to give to another in need could be considered 'giving back.' But in a free politico-economic capitalistic system, wealth is CREATED by individuals who think and exert themselves to provide a product or service which is DEMANDED by the freely choosing people who make up the market as a whole. The method by which a man in this system becomes wealthy is the moral 'day' compared to the moral 'night' of the listed collectivist systems. It makes all the difference in the world. A wealthy man within capitalism has created the good, the wealth. The market did not create it. The purchasers did not create it. The PRODUCER created. The others recognized the objective worth of his creation and freely traded value for value. **NOTHING** is 'owed' to those who sought and traded for the valuable good or service that the wealthy man created. NOTHING.

So to say that he is "giving back" is tantamount to saying that, like the despots, like the tyrannical mob of socialism, or like the feudal lord, the honest producer has in some sense 'bled' the public of that which was or could or should have been "theirs," and that now we can benevolently nod approval that the wealthy man is somehow doing his just penance and returning some of the good life that he 'took' from them by 'giving back.' This is evil. Though subtle, it is as great a wrong as can be committed. It is the calling the good, evil, and the evil, good. It perpetuates the uncritical ingraining of an evil idea into the vernacular. It furthers the continued unthinking acceptance of the idea that all wealth is generated by a manner of theft, and that therefore rightful claim to wealth is only with those who earned or created NOTHING.

It is good to expose the absurdity of this evil ideology.

Golf Digression - on lost balls.

2009-06-25T19:38:00.000-07:00

Watching the US Open is one of the more enjoyable events for the average to above average golfer. In this, the supposedly sternest test of golf, we get to see just how tough (or not) the pros really are as the thick high rough, baked fairways, cement greens, and ridiculous length bombard their golfing fortitude. It's a malicious joy to watch them fold, whine, and complain their way to a satisfying missed cut, and/or an embarrassing 80-something. There is something refreshing about seeing the very best experience golf the way most of us have known it for our entire lives - as a wicked tormenting mistress all too gleeful in crushing our small feeble hopes of golfing success.

Well, this is how I had happily envisaged the US Open....

Now, after noting the small heard of official 'ball finders' on every hole, I'm not so sure. On each hole, 90% of the terror of that thick lush awful US Open rough is just blithely swept aside by a small army of USGA officials camped along each fairway to find poor little Pro's errant tee shot.

When did this become golf?!

If you or I ever played Bethpage Black and hit it where I saw all of the leaders hit it multiple times this year, we'd have been hiking back to the clubhouse to buy another couple sleeves of balls. Or, had we smartly packed plenty of ammo for the day, we would at least have spent a goodly portion of that day returning to tees for stroke and distance lost ball penalties. None of those pros would be under par if they had to tramp all three-hundred and ten of the awe inspiring yards they just fired their drive INTO THE GORSE, only to root around for the allowed 5 minutes of fruitless hunting before trudging, stricken with shame, back to the tee for a re-do.

There are no ball finders in real golf. There ARE lost balls in real golf. This is one of the main things that makes golf HARD. To remove this real danger for the "pros" is the antithesis of the spirit of the game which the USGA should be working to protect.

We, the common golfer, can proudly say in the spirit of Bobby Jones, the USGA plays a game with which we are not familiar (and do not wish to become so.)

The Lobby - 21st Century Tribal Looting

2009-03-11T19:15:00.000-07:00

As you read the lists of pork spending of late, do not dream that this is an anomaly of government malfeasance. No this is but the continued natural history of false ideology in practice, unhindered by coherent dissent for well over fifty years. The poisonous ideas, which we as a country have been sipping in diluted form with the teaching of a mixed economy and justifications of capitalism with socialist principles, we are now preparing to drink unmixed. The evil ideas are that human rights originate from need, that individual rights are granted BY society and incur an obligation to society, and that the interests of the 'group,' the 'nation,' the 'world,' or 'the society,' outweigh the rights of individual men and women.

The idea that rights originate with need has led to the absurdity that a person's created wealth (through free trade of the products of his thought and effort) is always at the mercy of the governments legalized gun, but the looted money from the coal miner's, or small business owner's, or doctor's paycheck via income tax - this is the welfare recipient's, or medicare recipient's, or "earned income tax credit" recipient's, or earmark benificiary's property BY RIGHT. We have swallowed more and more of this poison with each passing year. We are about to guzzle the bottle.

This idea is closely tied to the liberal distortion that an individual is granted his rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness by society as a whole, and thus the individual is obligated to society. So creating wealth by thought and effort does not warrant one's right to the product, but rather someone's 'need' serves as the moral justification of rights to OTHERS' production, and the government is in the position of judging which 'needs' are most aligned with 'what is good for society.' Once the idea that 'the good of society' is allowed to be used as a justification for government action, outweighing the rights of the individual, it is a fight to the death within the tribe to position this group or that group as "society." I'm sorry. I meant to say "within Washington" to position this interest or that interest, foreign or domestic, as the interest "of society." You should realize that our battle of pressure groups in Washinton is just the 21st century equivalent of savage tribal feuding, and based on the same immoral ethic. For that matter, our present day sacrifice of the producers to "society" is just the modern day moral equivalent of savages repeatedly sacrificing virgins for the 'good' of the tribe. I give you the obscene spectacle of the lobby industry to (formerly) our American government over the past 70+ years.

Here is a letter regarding the process of purchasing, three times your investment in other people's production. In other words this is how, for a 30% investment, one secures the “legal” robbery of one's neighbors. This is only one small example of the processes involved in our recent splurge of earmarks (all the worse because it is smuggled in during a time of economic distress – distress, not surprisingly caused by the same fundamentally evil ideas.)

(from http://omnibusting.heritage.org/2007/12/17/11402-earmarks-and-counting/)

outragedtaxpayer // June 7, 2008 at 7:12 am
Some months ago I was treated to the spectacle of a K Streetlobbyist explaining how one goes about legally bribing Congressmen and Senators to get them to deliver a million dollar earmark. The lobbyist was too well trained to use words like “bribe” or “graft,” but the message was clear. I’d like to share it because I’ve been told that sunlight is the best disinfectant.I pride myself on my cynicism. I haven’t voted in years, have never voted for a Republican, and the last Democrat I voted for was Jimmy Carter (the first time). Yet despite my resignation to the institutionalized corruption in Washington, the matter-of-fact nature of this sales pitch offended me so deeply I feel compelled to speak out. I was introduced to this lobbyist by a prospective angel investor in a privately-held company on whose board I sit. This investor, who I admire, is a wealthy self made man, the kind of smart, hard-working immigrant this country could use more of. Although he is still learning the ways of his adopted land, he appears to be a quick study. His advice to our fledgling startup: Congress is giving away buckets of money and we would be foolish not to get some. The lobbyist, employed by a prestigious law firm, hails from a tradition of service. His resume shouts duty-honor-country. You would never expect to see him pop up in a Boss Tweed cartoon. I signed no non-disclosure agreements prior to our call, nor was I sworn to secrecy, nor did anyone reveal the secret handshake. The lobbyist didn’t know me from Adam. I could have been a front for Woodward and Bernstein. I can only assume I’m not the only one who heard his pitch that week.So, how does one buy a million dollar earmark? The lobbyist costs $6,500 per month plus a 7.5% kick-back, more genteelly called a “commission.” The lobbyist makes sure that your application is properly constructed and gets into the overflowing earmark inbox of your particular Congressman by the specified date. More importantly, he makes sure that your Congressman, the two members of your Senate delegation, and the chairman of the targeted appropriations subcommittee (an apparently central player in this process named Peter Visclosky) all understand the importance of your request. Failure to line up all four of these supporters results in proportional discounting of your earmark.I inquired how we go about convincing these keepers of the public trust of the merits of our project. “By holding fund raisers,” explained the lobbyist.“Is there a price list?” Nothing is written down but the lobbyist assured me that the going rate is $10,000 per Congressman and $20,000 per Senator. Wow, these guys work cheap, I thought. We can’t even get simple audits done for that price, much les buy a million dollar earmark. This must be some volume operation.“Can our company write $60,000 worth of checks and be done with it?” I asked. Oh no, I was told. That would be illegal “Donations” must come from employees, directors, and their families in individual checks that do not exceed hard-money limits. I noted that our company is still quite small, which means that to collect $60,000 everyone connected with the company would have to write checks, not all of whom could afford that level of “generosity.” Never mind whether they even support the political positions of the target legislators. (What are their names, again?) The lobbyist patiently explained that it was perfectly legal for a company to give bonuses to employees provided these are not directly tied in timing and amounts to political donations in such an obvious way that they could be construed as illegal reimbursements. Not being accustomed to this way of doing business, I asked how we could be sure that “donations” made before the earmark was delivered would be honored. “Let me put it this way,” assured the lobbyist, “they’ve never let us down. There was a little more to it than that, but not much. The lobbyist explained that the money, or “plus-up” as they call it, had to be routed through a funding agency, and not every federal agency is willing to be a party to this process. “But,” he advised, “agencies under budget stress are usually willing to cooperate.” In return for passing along the money, the conduit agenc keeps a handling fee of anywhere from 5% to 15%. I didn’t ask what that negotiation involved.So here’s the math. A year’s worth of lobbyist fees comes to $78,000. The company’s compensation committee doles out $60,000 worth of bonuses on the understanding that directors and executives must be comfortable swearing under oath that these bonuses are not intended to reimburse political donations, even though they are. Figure a 7.5% commission for the lobbying firm and a 10% commission for the funding agency adds another $175,000 to the bill. For a total investment of $313,000, then, the company gets $1,000,000 in taxpayer money with no strings attached. This is better than a threefold return in less than a year. I wish all my investments did that well.The phone call ended cordially and I had a sleepless night. Everyone else is doing it. No one could ever prove that we’d broken the law. Our competitors are getting earmarks, which they proudly announce in press releases. Our promising young company is just as deserving of support, and certainly more so than a lot of earmark recipients we’ve all read about in the papers. And as one of the 1% of the taxpayers who carry nearly 40% of our country’s income tax burden, it’s my own money they’re giving away, damn it. Would it be so wrong to try to see some of it put to good use?Perhaps out of romantic nostalgia, I keep a pocket copy of the U.S. Constitution on my desk. When I woke up the next morning one look at the cover answered my question. Instead of holding a “fund raiser” I offer you this testimony. I wish I had the courage to put my name on it but I fear exposing our portfolio companies to retribution by our esteemed elected officials, whose unbounded power over our economic affairs is only enabled by our willingness to keep paying for it. Outraged Taxpayer

This country will fail if the natural expansion of these ideas is not stopped. The answer is that government is rightfully engaged in the protection of individual liberties and VERY little else. The robbing of some for the interests of whichever group has sufficiently bribed the legislators to be considered “society” is not only immoral, but is one expression of the fundamental poison destroying our country – the first and last (originally) moral politico-economic system. All of the other so called “free” societies simply traded slavery of the masses to the king or the dictator for slavery to the state. We were the first and the last to trade slavery for true politico-economic freedom where each man's individual rights outweighed the claims of “society.” The last vestiges of this first moral system are being destroyed. And the evil, as always, is winning by default.

Slavery in America

2009-02-19T21:48:00.000-08:00

If you are a producer in America, a person who spends his thought and effort to provide a good or service to others in fair trade, then you are a slave. You are a slave and either suffer under the whip or ignorantly whip yourself depending on whether you vote for or against the liberals, or, as they should be called, the anti-capitalists or feudalists. Realize that, as the non-producer - entitlement class has grown, they have grown to enslave the producers of this nation. The lawmakers elected by this group strengthen their hold on aristocracy by promising to take more and more from the producers and give to those who consume only, to those who either entirely parasitize the producers or exist in a job by pull or union pressure, and not by merit or efficiency. Or worse, they give to the very countries who hate America, ironically for the very ideals that the liberals are killing - most prominently, the concept that the rights of the individual supersede what some group 'says' are the interests of 'society as a whole' - that individual rights supersede the supposed interests of the 'tribe.'
So realize that well over 30% of your thought, your effort, the labor of your time, your very life are taken from you, by force of the growing entitlement class and foreign lobbyist parasites. This itself is a moral obscenity, but what is worse is that your stolen production is then spent as a payback by these lawmakers to either entice their entitlement voters or satisfy the demands of their lobbyist benefactors, who by influencing the legislature keep either their unworthy company in existence or, in the case of foreign lobbying groups, maintain their tyranny in some oppressed nation. It is sick that we, the producers, are enslaved to support our own destruction. It is obscene.
When will we see a leader who can destroy this new irony of an aristocracy? As the feudal lords existed by consuming the production of their serfs, so the entitlement class (in either the welfare state, or the welfare medical system, or the welfare job system - i.e. those who do little but bleed a good company through union power, or those of evil companies who exist only by pull in Washington) - that entitlement class votes the true producers into slavery - a life as a serf to work for his/her own death - yes, death, for this is the process which destroys dreams, ambitions, goals for persons and families, plans for truly great production, for truly great businesses; this is the process which has and continues to destroy unfathomable potential. The world does not know nor even take time to consider what would have happened if the lives of never known brilliant, industrious, creative people were not stifled by the policies of state-ism, the policies which say the rights of some to the product of their labor should be broken, their effort stolen, and given to those who claim that their very uselessness gives them a moral claim on others. Again, it is obscene.

Contradictions

2009-01-31T13:56:00.000-08:00

A letter to the editor, from my Father.

It is generally agreed that Franklin Roosevelt’s "New Deal" did not end the "Great Depression". While massive deficit spending failed, the beginnings of democrat-sponsored socialism emerged. During that decade, the perceptions by Fascist as well as Communist socialists that democratic capitalism was on its last legs emboldened both. The Fascists tried first to exploit this perceived weakness when Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor was immediately followed by Germany’s own declaration of war on the United States. Thus galvanized by war, the citizens of the United States succeeded in marshaling the latent power of democratic capitalism under God that not only crushed the thousand year reign fascist powers envisioned but ended the ‘Great Depression" as well. Even Joseph Stalin credited American manufacturing with determining the outcome of the war. Unfortunately, he couldn’t bring himself to acknowledge that the Source of American economic power rested in the God-given rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness that entailed cultivating virtue and the right to private property. If he had, another forty-five years of misery, ruin, and death in his own country could have been avoided as the Soviet Union immediately took its shot at the United States in WWIII also known as "The Cold War". His unbelief perpetrated by his successors calamitously affected/infected the rest of the world as well. It is now astonishing that the United States is embracing the very essence of our past enemies’ economic policies and religious beliefs. The current so-called stimulus plan is based on the idea that the reason the "New Deal" didn’t work was due to not spending enough taxpayer money fast enough. Socialist thinking is the greedy, envious enemy of free enterprise’s unique, wealth-producing power. A socialist government becomes an all-powerful intimidator of the individual entrepreneur there-bye depressing the standard of living of all economic classes. The rich are not the enemy of the poor or the middle class. Indeed, the greed of a government consisting of a socialist elite trumps the occasional, greedy, individual capitalist simply because of the power it is able to wield over everybody’s property. Serfdom looms as the engine of wealth creation, the risk-taking businessman, is driven from the economy. The current economic crisis is due to the socialist virus in our own government suppressing energy production of both nuclear and fossil fuels while forcing banks, for over twenty years, to make bad loans to people who did not meet sound financial standards. Because of the government’s intimidation of banks — make the loans or feel its full wrath — the world now knows how long it takes to generate such a crisis. Today’s government personifies the schoolyard bully’s demand "give your lunch money or else" and is hardly the noble political body the founders as well as Adam Smith envisioned as the protector of private property, life, and liberty. The current proposals appear to be a lemming-like rush to utter catastrophe. The premise seems to be that if enough lemmings rush into the water fast enough, the dead bodies, that is, the impoverished, will pile up sufficiently to eventually enable the few remaining lemmings to reach the other side, that is, prosperity. How utterly gruesome and foolhardy! How typically socialist! Make no mistake, just as in the Thirties, the enemies of this country are watching intently and calculating when to make their move to fill the power vacuum they believe the United States is creating. William M. Yavelak

Quote on Target

2009-01-24T20:54:00.001-08:00

The late Dr. Adrian Rogers (1931 to 2005) offered the following observation several years ago and it bears poignant significance today: "You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the rich out of freedom. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is about the end of any nation. You cannot multiply the wealth by dividing it."

You get what you pay for.....

2008-12-18T17:36:00.000-08:00

Fascism anyone? It's what you have when the government takes meaningful control of key industries while allowing the semblance of private ownership. The countless governmental strings that will be attached to this administration's "bailout" of three poorly run car companies just adds to the growing list of industries coming more and more under government control. And now, it isn't just that most companies that "succeed" in the marketplace do so via the destruction of free competition through lobbied legislative and regulatory favors. While that state of affairs has grown and grown with its complicated mesh of pull and favors and owed 'cover' and protections and inside information, it does not begin to approach the injury to the (cough) "free" market that will be caused by the explicit tax supported government involvement in the auto industry. On the backs of the American worker, the beaurocrat will now be in a position to decide just what sort of automobile innovation is best, just what sort of cars 'should' be made, just what sort of competition from other companies 'should' be allowed, just how much control the auto workers union 'should' be granted. Freedom and merit shall be all but dead in the American auto industry. We the people will pay for three poorly run companies strapped with a union which bleeds its members as well as the companies. We will be forced to spend our daily thought and effort on these companies which have survived not on merit and innovation and cost effeciency, but on government 'pull.' We will get and perpetuate the continuance of exactly what we're buying - poorly run companies and the worst of corrupt unions.
Can no one see that we WANT the unwise and inefficient to fail, and the wise and efficient to succeed? Can no one see that paying for the continuance of bad businesses just gets all of us - bad businesses?
While all of this is somewhat moot until the American people take back their government from the lobbying foreign and business insterests, it sets a very dangerous precedent.

Extreme Moderation

2008-11-15T18:36:00.000-08:00

The next time you hear someone denounce the 'greed' of the extreme *free* market, of capitalism, try to remember that this is NOT what we have. The US economy was close but not entirely free during the early parts of the industrial revolution. Now, even the term 'mixed' economy is starting to be strained by the overwhelming pervasiveness of the American government in regulating, pressuring, tweaking, pulling, and adjusting all aspects of the economy.
At times you will hear a leader of a big business disparage laissez faire capitalism or the free market. Do not be misled into thinking that, well, if a big business man thinks the free economy is unfair or ill suited to producing a just, profitable economy for all, then surely we are justified in fiddling with it. Without exception, this will be a businessman whose interests and competitive advantage depends on PULL in Washington. The very presence of the innumerable Congressional lobbyists and the billions poured into their efforts stands as an objective testament to the fact that we have nothing close to a 'free' economy. (What do you think those lobbyists are lobbying for? And why would they continue if our representatives were beyond influence?)

Rather, what we have is sadly, a politico-economic landscape aptly foretold by Rand in the 60's -- a situation maintained by (among other things) the 'virtue' of moderation preached in our compulsory schools, and ingrained in our uninformed populace.

The safely undefined, indeterminate, mixed-economy, ‘moderate’ middle—with a ‘moderate’ amount of government favors and special privileges for the rich and a ‘moderate’ amount of government handouts for the poor—with a ‘moderate’ respect for rights and a ‘moderate’ degree of brute force—with a ‘moderate’ amount of freedom and a ‘moderate’ amount of slavery—with a ‘moderate’ degree of justice and a ‘moderate’ degree of injustice—with a ‘moderate’ amount of security and a ‘moderate’ amount of terror, and with a moderate degree of tolerance for all, except those ‘extremists’ who uphold principles, consistency, objectivity, morality, and who refuse to compromise.

A Mostly Correct Frenchman

2008-11-12T19:13:00.000-08:00

Though Alexis de Tocqueville’s analysis of democracy in America in the 1800’s included a variety of misunderstandings, some of his insights deserve revisiting, for they were sadly prophetic of how a government founded on individual liberty could be poisoned and destroyed from within.

Democracy and socialism have nothing in common but one word, equality. But notice the difference: while democracy seeks equality in liberty, socialism seeks equality in restraint and servitude.
The man who asks of freedom anything other than itself is born to be a slave.
The American Republic will endure, until politicians realize they can bribe the people with their own money.
After having thus successively taken each member of the community in its powerful grasp and fashioned him at will [via a compulsory collectivist, revisionist education], the government then extends its arm over the whole community. It covers the surface of society with a network of small, complicated rules, minute and uniform, through which the most original minds and the most energetic characters cannot penetrate, to rise above the crowd. The will of man is not shattered, but softened, bent, and guided; men are seldom forced by it to act, but they are constantly restrained from acting. Such a power does not destroy, but it prevents existence: it does not tyrannize, but it compresses, enervates, extinguishes, and stupefies a people, till each nation is reduced to nothing better than a flock of timid and industrious animals, of which the government is the shepherd.
It is easier for the world to accept a simple lie than a complex truth.

Great Googlely-Mooglely

2008-11-12T13:45:00.000-08:00

There is a real danger in reading this post. Your eyes will likely cross, gloss over, and a bit of spittle will possibly begin to trickle from the corner of your mouth. In my attempt to understand the causes of the recent financial crisis, I, by necessity, undertook what has turned out to be self torture - the attempt to understand the mechanisms and definitions of the "shadow banking system." Mortgage backed securities are the most well known component of this shadow system. The least painful exposition of some of these instruments has been provided by Mr. Holloway. Read his article "Is this complicated, or What?," by scrolling to the last article on the page.

Whack-a-Mole

2008-11-12T12:35:00.000-08:00

This bit from Eugene Holloway aptly describes the picture of our government, the few who presume to speak for society rather than defend individuals, as they try to control what is beyond control.

Recent decades give ample evidence of the disastrous futility of the Fed’s attempts to use its crude tools to repair the damage of its own previous actions. Injections of liquidity to stop the meltdown in the wake of the failure of Long Term Capital Management fueled the internet bubble. Injections of liquidity to avoid a market crash when the internet bubble burst fueled the housing bubble. Now, following the bursting of that bubble, the Fed is making historically huge amounts of credit available to keep the economy afloat. But the size of each of the bubbles grows progressively. If this were only a game of whack-a-mole, it would be amusing. But money is ubiquitous, and whatever moves the Fed makes can, and do, affect anyone and everyone. The human consequences of Fed-generated boom-and-bust cycles can be, and usually are, tragic.

A Beginning

2008-11-11T22:25:00.000-08:00

This blog is intended to articulate what made this country great, and why and how that greatness is disintegrating. In the broadest of strokes, this country became great by doing what no country had done, and no country has done since - setting out to defend the rights of the individual (life, liberty, pursuit of happiness) as SUPERSEDING the rights or demands of government, or society as a whole. Based on a Christian worldview, the founders of the United States created a government that saw each man and woman as AN END IN THEMSELVES, and NOT as the means to the ends of society or government. They conceived the government as a policeman, protecting the products of each man and woman's minds and efforts from the clutches of other men, other groups, government, and most importantly from the community as a whole. Men and women were NOT to be slaves. This was historic in the most awesome sense. It led to the greatest period of economic growth, increase in living standard, wealth creation, and technological innovation the world has ever seen. Sadly, the idea, once started, was soon infected and poisoned by the philosophies of collectivism. The painful story of this country's turning back on its vow to protect the individual can be traced through government entrance into railroad markets, non-objective anti-trust laws, the elimination of the gold standard, the establishment of the federal reserve system, law upon law establishing the welfare state, the social security system, the medicare/aid system, the income tax system, etc., etc., In each of these cases, the life of the individual is step-wise, taken from him or her. In each case, by either direct action or through more complicated steps of money exchange, the product of individual thought and labor is confiscated from some men, and given to others, by NO right, but that of force, of a gun (for this is the nature of all government action - if you don't believe me, stop paying your income tax, and then continue to refuse; refuse to go to jail; you will see the gun.) In each case, YOUR property - the product of your effort and mind - your LIFE, is taken from you by force. When the individual elects a representative, by the nature of the relationship, protection of the individual's rights is foremost. But it hasn't been. For the past 100 years, the betrayals have been perpetrated ever more brazenly, and for at least the last 50 years, criticism of this practice of forced enslavement has dwindled in the face of collectivist forces exerted in the media, the compulsory education system, and confused pop-culture. As a result of this deterioration and obfuscation, we have reached a state in which the latest government caused economic disaster can not only occur, but be BLAMED on the people who were coerced into poor business practices by the government, and worse, paid for by the individual taxpayer. During the Clinton administration, collectivism in the form of 'politically correct' criteria were forced on the lending institutions of this country. This was not corrected by the Bush administration. Lending institutions were, by law, PENALIZED for following tried and true lending practices like denying loans to those without sufficient assets. Lending institutions were rewarded with financial incentives for making risky loans to marginal and even outright poor candidates, particularly if they were to a "minority group." The result was a housing and investment BOOM since capital could be had by nearly ANYONE. (Think back now to the 1920's when there was an investment BOOM following the institution of federal reserve practices to make investment capital readily available purely on the backing of congressional taxing ability, since the gold standard was gone.) Now look at the result today when the government infuses essentially 'free' money into the market, not by MARKET forces, but by "let us 'do good' by giving loans to the minority and 'unable to pay' groups." When those who could obviously not pay, don't pay, the market trembles, then halts, then values fall, and the panic begins, as the loans - those "IOU's" become worthless. Think back to when the same thing happened in the late 1920's, when all that easy federal reserve investment money was poured into countless risky investment schemes, poorly run businesses, and unwise loans. Recall the crash of 1929 when REALITY was realized by the forefathers of today's foolish collectivists. Recall the response of the government to try to infuse TAXPAYER money into first the failing British economy and then our own. This response made it worse, by taking a problem that would have financially ruined SOME, and spread that misery to the entire country (and the world). The government created the problem by making tax payer money the backer for run away loaning practices in BOTH cases (and designed the loaning practices in this case). Then, when values fell, what was the collectivist response? It was to take MORE of the taxpayer money (the effort and labor of you and me) and, in essence, give it to the institutions which made the poor decisions. Today's evil is worse, in that it was the government's policies which coerced the financial institutions into following such insane (but pc) lending practices. Now, instead of learning from policies of the US government after the '29 crash, policies which for years worsened the Depression, we, in the same collectivist spirit, are doing the EXACT SAME THING -- throwing good taxpayer money (your effort and my effort) after bad. It is not possible to expect a better result. Now, businesses can not get necessary and well secured loans. Thank you, Bill Clinton, for making the United State's lending practices **fair** for all. It is sickening that not one of the supposedly "conservative," or republican, or even libertarian parties can stand up and clearly articulate and denounce this crime, and more importantly the evil philosophy behind it - the philosophy that the rights of the individual are superseded by the interests of the collective, of society--- which only means in the end that the rights of SOME men are superseded by the interests of others. And so we have the men who legislated poor business practices in the name of political correctness, causing a financial disaster, then increasing the harm by forcing the American taxpayer to cover the losses of the companies crippled by their legislation, and THEN - then to BLAME the **FREE** market and the supposed 'greed' of that system for the problem!! What the HELL was free about the movements of lending institutions pressured by legislation? Free men running successful lending institutions DO NOT make insanely risky loans out of *greed* freely -- They didn't become successful by being freely STUPID. They did it because legislation rewarded them for doing so, made it financially harmful to do otherwise, and reassured them that the government’s taxing power would back them up. And the collectivists, the "liberals", have the audacity to blame "the greed of the *free* market?" It is nauseating. Does no one see that this collectivist, liberal attempt to redistribute wealth did just that? – take from the group creating the bulk of government confiscated revenue, the so-called middle class, and give to whom? – to the very lending institutions which were legislatively coerced into insane policy, to the same lending institutions tacitly ‘backed’ by the actions of the legislature, a legislature which is LOBBIED BY these institutions (notably our new president), to, in fact many of whom the liberals would (and did) loudly denounce on TV as ‘the rich.”

This sort of evil must be fought in every way possible. That is the purpose of this blog, to be one more (admittedly small) voice of the people - the American individual, who was and still is the suffering, condemned, abused, motive power for this country and the world, shackled by the collectivist looters, and bled by apathetic parasites. This individual deserves a defense.

(For a real life example of this individual, read this letter.)