Archive for December, 2008

After finishing a great Christmas season, it is time to look forward to the future.  Typically, at this junction, it is common for people to examine their lives and make a governing decision to improve their lives.  While I am seriously modifying my apportionments at meals, I still struggle with taking all the necessary steps to reacquire a healthy and svelte appearance.  That is going to be my personal struggle though and I am thinking big today.  It’s time for me to hitch up my belt and step back onto the stump for what was the vision for America circa 1789.

I was running errands for my wife yesterday and I listened to some fill-in hosts for Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity.  I thought that both were pretty good, but Rush’s host said something that I found interesting.  In discussing the arguments between Federalists and Anti-Federalists about whether there should be a Bill of Rights tacked on to the US Constitution, the discussion was never about whether or not the Inalienable Rights should be protected by the United States Government.  The debate was whether or not the Bill of Rights were necessary.

Thomas Jefferson and the Anti-Federalists were rallying support for the Bill of Rights.  They had the distinct foresight to know that an institution that is granted power by the people will inevitably try to take power from the people.  The Federalist camp saw an enumeration of Rights as unnecessary.  If the Constitution was set up to define the operating functions of this current incarnation of the United States Government, why would you need a Bill to tell the Government what it already knew it could not do?  Clearly, both sides were driving toward the same end of limited government.

How does that hit you?  Has it sunk in?  The debate wasn’t about limiting the Government.  The Government was supposed to be limited anyway.  Instead of debating what programs to spend their grandchildrens’ tax dollars on, the Founders debated on whether it was overly redundant to tell the Government, where it already stated by omission, its limitations.

Now we are living in an age of unprecedented government expansion into spheres of the private sector that would make Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton the best of friends.  This really is a Libertarian’s hell on earth.  Bailouts and Loans on top of illegal entitlement programs started by the Socialist agendas of the New Deal and Great Society debacles.  The one truly fiscally conservative policy that the current Bush administration attempted was to privatize Social Security, which is one of the best ideas of his Presidency.  It got killed because Bush tried to do the unpopular thing of taking away power from the Government.  Juevos Grandes.

After that resistance, whatever Laissez-fairre economic theory that the Bush administration had co-opted to get elected went by the wayside to preserve his image in the media.  The war situations will not sell in a vehemently anti-war media.  They felt like they got lied to.  Anything that Bush touched was automatic poison, so let’s get all cylinders firing against this guy.  They got help with fellow leftist conspirators in the United States Congress who measure their value by wins and losses every 2 or 6 years.  The role of the Congress was to shift the blame over the “fair” lending practiced encouraged by delusional Congressional Liberals, and even opposed by former President Bill Clinton, to the Bush administration.  Here they got help because Paulson wanted to save his old employer and started the Bail-Out Spree.

The Republican National Committee’s New Year’s Resolution should be a incorporation of Libertarian ideals into their fiscal platform.  That means that all answers to spending outside of Constitutionally mandated Government activities is an emphatic No.  No dealing, just No.

2009 should be the year of No.  No to Bail-Outs and loans.  If a company can’t hack it, too bad.  No help for struggling mortgages, if you can’t afford a house, rent an apartment.  Make the incentive to work more than not getting a smaller welfare check.  Make people responsibly plan their retirement instead of depending on their grandchildren to pay them $300/month.  Stop using income taxes to propagate inflated bureaucracy.  Cut programs.  Operate within the limits of the Constitution.  It sounds so simple, but it is not done because Liberals (i.e. Socialists, Communists, etc.) believe in a living document, loose interpretation.

Loose interpretation is tantamount to absolutely throwing away the document altogether.  RNC REVOLT!  Welcome more Libertarian ideals into the fold.  You will get more votes by promising to be more Constitutionally focused and delivering.  There is a Center-Right majority that is just waiting to be invoked into supporting a movement that we all have been waiting for.  Don’t depend on a bankrupting Presidency to laud the virtues of Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit (not promise) of Happiness.

It is hard for me to sit down to write lately.  It has literally been hell for me.  I want to write so much, but Ifear that once i start, I will just ramble for thousands of words.  You don’t want that.  You want me to be succint and to the point.  Therefore, I am going to address my current thoughts quickly and not try to express anything through a clever metaphor.

I.  Blagogate

This recent development is meant to shock me?  I am actually shocked though.  How can a Chicago/Daley Machine Politician be dumb enough to get caught?  Seriously, ”Pay-For-Play” Politics has always been practiced and will always be practiced.  However, if one of the main thugs of your machine gets taken down, get paranoid.  Rezko is going to start rolling on all sorts of people to reduce his sentence.  He singled out Blagojevich first because Blago appears to not be playing with a full deck of cards in the first place.  Additionally, why not admit that you talked to Blago if you are Obama?  What does it hurt?  Say, “Our staffs discussed who we would like to see as the replacement and when it became clear of an intention by the Governor to profit off of the nomination, we cut off all ties.”  That’s not hard.  Now, you’re administration starts out with scandal.  This whole thing smells of a Leftist Illuminati that is infiltrating the State of Illinois and branching out into the country at large.  More to come, I’m sure.

II.  Auto Industry Bailout

Let’s just call this what it is, United Auto Workers Bailout.  Let me first commend the union.  By hamstringing the industry to meet your standards for working, you have killed it.  I hope you guys have fun freezing your asses off in Michigan while cars keep being assembled at non-union plants in the South.  Is there something in the water in the Southern United States that doesn’t put up with Communist bullshit like unions?  I know that unions do exist in the South, but you don’t see them wield the crippling effect.  Somewhere along the line, a weak manager started looking at their labor force as more than capital expenses.  You want higher wages?  We are going to make the process robotic.  Have fun getting another job.  I hope that by the time I want to buy my next car, I can buy the Chevy Silverado Hybrid that I want.  I’m not going to hold my breath though.  Bush and Paulson will kick their problem down the road though.  I soon see the following as a very real reality:  I want a new car, I apply for the loan for said car, but the loan won’t be given by the now Government owned lender unless I agree to get a car from a certain list of approved cars now made by Government backed manufacturers.  Isn’t the free market system awesome?

III.  Heisman Winner

You got to go with Tebow.  He just finds the way to win.  Bradford and McCoy are great QBs and have both done spectacularly, but if I am coaching a team, I want Tebow as my Field General.  He’s a winner.  I’d like the Big XII to name their own QB of the year also.

IV.  Consumerism

I got a little heat for being so negative about the power that the internet can provide to an individual.  It is the way that I can reach out and share what would usually be totally pointless thoughts bouncing around in my head with the people who actually stop to read them.  In this light, I still stand by my statements.  The Industrial Revolution’s culmination in the PC has done more to cripple the spirit of the Rugged Individualism than anything else in the world.  We went from a society where you grow your vegetables in a garden, can them, and use them for a year to grocery stores and ice-boxes to now, being able to order your groceries online.  You want proof, look at the soaring numbers of obesity.  We don’t have to get off our asses and do hard work for the most part, and you better believe our slip is showing to a couple of sleeping super powers that are ready and starting to pounce.

V.  Who Are You?

Voilà! In view, a humble vaudevillian veteran, cast vicariously as both victim and villain by the vicissitudes of Fate.  This visage, no mere veneer of vanity, is a vestige of the vox populi, now vacant, vanished.  However, this valorous visitation of a by-gone vexation, stands vivified and has vowed to vanquish these venal and virulent vermin van-guarding vice and vouchsafing the violently vicious and voracious violation of volition.  The only verdict is vengeance; a vendetta, held as a votive, not in vain, for the value and veracity of such shall one day vindicate the vigilant and the virtuous.  Verily, this vichyssoise of verbiage veers most verbose, so let me simply add that it’s my very good honor to meet you and you may call me V. 

VI.  Snow In Texas

Climate is a changing thing by it’s nature.  If it wasn’t, the Farmer’s Almanac would always be right.  Guess what Al Gore, there is this large round burning thing in the sky called a Sun.  This star happens to operate on a cycle of variation for its intensity.  The time periods of “Global Warming” were actually part of the observed 11 year cycle of higher solar intensity.  Now, we are on the trough swing of that curve and it’s cold enough to snow in Texas before Winter even begins.  Climate will change.  You can’t infuse Carbon Dioxide back into the Earth’s crust with a huge syringe.  This is just a money making scheme for you and it’s time somebody said so.  Al Gore is the champion of the environmental movement.  You don’t need me to point out that he still travels around to his speaking engagements in a private jet or that he has a largely inefficient house when it comes to energy consumption.  However, when he begins to speak about mitigating for pollution (i.e. paying someone to offset pollution with a “Green Credit”), you may be surprised to know that the largerst bank set up to do this in the US has Al Gore as its majority shareholder.  Champion or Charlatan?  I leave that to you.

VII.  The Scammies

Nominations for the Grammies were announced and the Punch Brothers weren’t nominated for anything.  This is really a huge knock against the music industry for me because the Punch Brother’s 2008 album Punch was possibly the masterpiece of the year.  This is Chris Thile’s (formerly of Nickel Creek) new chamber music played by exceptional bluegrass picker type of style with a forty minute suite in four movements entitled “The Blind Leaving The Blind.”  This is really a gem of originality, and Lil’ Wayne is going to be what gets celebrated.

VIII.  Gas Prices

I saw gasoline selling for $1.41 today.  Congratulations on everyone who did buy a fuel efficient car.  You might have done it to be green, or (in my case) because you’re incredibly cheap.  This doesn’t detract from the fact that we can still hold sway over OPEC.  I think the largest determining factor is that the Iraq War is turning into a US victory and that will help our standing with hostile Sheiks.  They see that we cannot be discouraged totally.  The Dems will show their stomachs to be yellow, but America as a whole was established as a nation ready to fight for our standing in the world.  Now all we need is for idiots in Washington to not tax the cheaper gas back to its higher levels so that the average American can realize their purchasing power and maybe, just maybe, help themselves get out of the financial troubles that the Democrats’ Housing debacle has created.

I worked real hard not to make any lame metaphors to explain anything and will close with a statement that has been burning in my chest as of late.  Our way of life is being threatened by a radical Communist movement that has slowly been allowed to seep into our way of thinking.  The Russian people were easy to institute Communism on, they had been ruled for most of their history.  When facing America though, the Left knows that it must move slow to breed the spirit of Rugged Individualism out of us, so that one day the citizens of this nation would cry to Government to provide.  Looks like that time is approaching.  Communism/Socialism isn’t dead.  Wake up!  Be aware!  Let’s not raise another generation of such easy targets.

As I witness a lame duck administration of supposed Fiscal Conservatives embrace the most overtly Socialist takeovers of private industry alongside the Liberal legislature and incoming administration, I really hang my head in shame.  Freedom is being taken, and the government perpetrating these criminal usurpations of power is being silently approved by generations that have embraced the current human condition.  In the study of Humanity, an observor would never be able to find a situation like today that has existed before.  Improvements in communication technology have virtually destroyed the individual and grouped us into a collective.  One hundred years ago, the only individuals who were debating a global poverty debate were wealthy dynastic liberals in the Northeast United States.  They could afford to not focus on the basic insurance of their liberties, because monitarily, they were set and were not preoccupied with the day-to-day struggle of living free.  Now, even those who are in poverty in this country have the opportunity to connect themselves up to a PC and can become a consumer and critic. 

Is consumerism freedom?  Frankly, the evil of consumerism sickens me.  What sickens me more is that even I am guilty of this evil.  Everyone is.  I guess I just missed the clause in some obscure section of the US Constitution that said that you are entitled to everything you want.  If someone can show it to me, please direct me to it.  The only thing that gives me some sort of sollace in my personal consumerism is that I am working to earn a wage and not buying beyond my means.  What debts I do have, I am paying back.  I am working to ensure that I have the ability to purchase a home one day.  I just do not understand the mindset of expecting healthcare, a home, transportation, clothing, and food out of a government that was NOT set up to give you any of those things.  Our government was set up to ensure that the individual’s innate rights are not infringed upon by it or any other party.

It is in that spirit that I approach the main topic of this particular article.  California’s Proposition 8 was recently passed.  Although, it will probably be litigated away in the near future, I have trouble either damning or endorsing this measure.  Personally, I am a heterosexual and find nothing at all attractive with the male anatomy of Homo erectus.  However, I do not discount that there are people who are generally attracted to people of their own sex.  When looking at the issue from my moral goggles, I have observed in scripture (specifically of the Judeo-Christian tradition) that homosexuality is a sin.  These sentiments are expressed in both the Old and New Testaments.  As a professed Christian, it would hold constant that I adopt these beliefs and that I would see homosexual acts as a sin against God.  However, I hold no malice towards homosexuals for the simple reason that I am no person to realistically judge another.  Also, it really does not affect my world if someone is homosexual.  Some see it as impeding on humanity’s morality.  Jesus also calls humanity to be loving towards all, so I do not think that I can honestly descriminate against someone based on their sexual orientation.  I think that’s what should be focused on when the “Religious Right” addresses an issue like Gay Marriage.  Does it show Jesus’s love to discrimate against them?  I don’t think so.  Also, as a Libertarian, I have have adopted a laissez faire attitude.  I am not a homosexual, but if one of my future children happens to be, I will not love that child less and I would like them to have the option to live their life with the rights that their mother and I have been able to enjoy.  Do I think that Civil Unions are the same thing as a Civil Marriage?  No, I think offering the institution is a cop out unless you institute that all State arrangements of binding two people together are all classified as a Civil Union.  If a two people want to enjoy the status of being mutually exclusive partners, no matter their sexual orientations, and all rights that they are entitled to through that action, then by all means they should be allowed.  In this way, I am opposed to defining Marriage as stated in California’s Proposition 8.

On the other side of this argument, I do support the Constitutional right of Californians to excersise their own judgment on the issue.  If the State’s constituents decide to support Proposition 8, I can only say that by majority voting standards, California has made Gay Marriage an institution that will not exist in their State.  I myself believe that the Marriage issue is something that should be handled by State to State referrendums.  If a State’s constituency chooses to support it, then it is legal in that State.  If the State’s constituency chooses not to support it, then it is not legal.  In this way, I am in support of the voters of California’s wishes to be their law.

I guess this will be the best time for me to address the current controversies that have gripped the The Episcopal Church of the United States of America.  In the matter of consecrating homosexual marriage inside the Church, the document that we profess as scripture forbids homosexuality, so I can only guess that Gay Marriage would also get the axe.  Additionally, if a congregation, convocation, or diocese decides to support an issue that the larger Anglican Communion does not profess, then that entity should not be included in the Communion.  This also works with the consecration of an open and practicing homosexual taking up positions in Clerical Ministry.  As a part of the vows a priest or bishop takes, the candidate is asked to renounce all known sins.  If you renounce something, you do not continue to do it.  If I were to become part of the Clergy of the Episcopal Church, I would have to renounce some of my practices and I would also keep my word once I took that oath.  I do not support someone who takes an oath that is supposed to be accountable between themselves and God and then committing a sin that is explicitly stated in both Testaments that they believe to be the scripture upon which our understanding of the Divine is built.

In summary, I support Civil Gay Marriage and the right of a State’s Voters to reject it if they want to.  If you are upset about Californians taking this step, move to a State that is more tolerant.  Here is an even more lurid suggestion.  Why not work for Universal Freedom through limited Government interference in our lives and thusly a limited role for the US Government as prescribed in the Constitution?  How tempting is that?