Charity for Police-State Parasites?

Recently I received in the mail an advertisement, soliciting donations to an organization supporting local (Houston) police officers. It featured a photo of a militarized Houston cop, all dressed up for military combat, automatic assault rifle and all — as if about to bust down some innocent citizen's door and shoot him — and/or his dog.

Why, I wondered, did they think that picture would motivate me to give money to help that guy? He's already drawing a parasitic wage, as he and his buddies routinely arrest and imprison local citizens for nothing more than possessing negligible amounts of recreational substances, and fining innocent, law-abiding drivers — to the tune of hundreds of dollars per "traffic stop" — for actions that neither harm nor endanger the persons or property of anyone. Untold heaps of taxes already go towards enabling him and his buds to dress up, not as policemen, but as assault troops. Yet somehow, this image was supposed to prompt me to voluntarily pay something extra?

The photo doesn't depict the kind of "police officer" I would picture serving and protecting me, but the kind I would fear a fellow citizen facing in one of numerous documented cases of "mistaken address" in which innocent citizens have lost their front doors, dogs, and lives to a combination of bureaucratic ineptitude and despotic bravado.

The $100 donation solicited by the mailer is rewarded with a vehicle sticker, identifying the donor as a supporter of police-state assault troopers. Houston traffic is already peppered with those stickers. Ironically, those drivers whose cars and trucks sport the trendy sticker probably feel a little safer, while I most certainly do not.

You Can't Outlaw Stupidity

There is a popular notion today that endless new laws must be enacted to constrain and control one side of the (formerly) free market (i.e., the sellers, often generalized into a single class or category of evil "robber-barons," "big corporations," or "greedy capitalists."), for the sake of "protecting" the other side of the (formerly) free market (i.e., the buyers, often generalized into a single class or category of "innocent victims").

The commonly typified scenario, then, is one of harmless consumers (buyers) being unfairly and helplessly victimized by immoral, predatory businesses (sellers).

The error inherent in this notion is the false assumption that one side (i.e., the buyers or "consumers") have some exclusive, unilateral "right" to participate in the market without risk, personal responsibility, or duty (e.g., to do any research, ask questions, pre-read contracts, teach their children, learn from their parents, etc.).

[Let's make it clear right up front that a truly free market, by definition, is the ideal "capitalistic" environment for exchange — both buying and selling. Both the seller and the buyer are capitalists, and both are greedy, in that each wants the best advantage he can get from any transaction. Let's dispense with the caricature of all sellers, and only sellers, as greedy capitalists. If anyone is ever "victimized" by another's "capitalism," it is also — always — equally by his own capitalism. And if anyone is ever "victimized" by another's "greed," rest assured that his own self-interest for the best possible advantage in the transaction (i.e., his own "greed") also played a role. His apparent failure to get what he wanted doesn't necessarily render the other party's "greed" more "evil" (or even more "capitalistic") than his own.]

This alleged "right" to participate in the market without risk or personal responsibility is purely an arbitrary invention of the popular imagination. However well-intended the assumption may be, it often turns out be driven far less by a genuine sense of fairness than outright laziness, jealousy, and (concealed?) greed. If some number of people organize themselves into a company (or, God forbid, a corporation) and prosper from their combined endeavors in the market, it's just a matter of time before one or more "victims" emerge to complain that the group somehow "profited" at their "expense."

To be sure, there are times when unethical and underhanded tactics are invoked, but these are already commonly addressed in common law justice. Things like genuine fraud, failure to execute one's part of a contract, and theft don't need new "consumer protection" laws, price controls, or government agencies for their correction. In fact, these things only serve to muddy the waters of justice by putting unwarranted distance between all parties in the market and their direct, personal responsibilities for their own choices and actions, while making the market itself generally less free — for everybody.

Buyers, incidentally, also can (and do, though perhaps not often enough) organize themselves for the purposes of self-education, sharing information (good or bad) about sellers, and taking combined legal action against sellers who have defrauded them, as a facet of a healthy free market at work.

The greatest threat to the modern consumer is his own naive and baseless presumption of a "right" to make decisions and/or take actions driven essentially by stupidity and/or ignorance — without having to deal with the consequences. The old Latin maxim "caveat emptor" ("buyer beware") will always be relevant in a free market, because no one (least of all government!) can truly guarantee anyone else a "risk-free" experience in the market.

The best person to protect you is you. Nobody cares more about your advantage in any given transaction than you do. Nobody has more to gain from that advantage than you. And nobody has more to lose than you. So why should anybody else have to do your homework or guarantee you won't suffer for not having done it yourself?

So the next time someone you know gets — for example — buried by a mountain of high-interest credit card debt, before rushing to blame the "greedy capitalist corporation," consider first the "victim's" greedy insistence on having something without paying for it and the "victim's" willfully becoming — and remaining — a party to a contract involving obscene interest rates. And ask yourself exactly why that "victim" is somehow "entitled" to act with such stupidity and ignorance without having to deal with the consequences.

Then ask yourself whether you would prefer to see that "victim" (and therefore in some measure the whole consumer community) truly learn from his mistake, gaining valuable maturity and wisdom, or the inevitable alternative — a "nanny" government invoked to "protect" him (at the expense of the whole consumer community) from the consequences of his choices — ultimately resulting in a nation of perpetually irresponsible, unaccountable, (and still) stupid babies.

Gun Hysteria from Maryland

I recently sent an article entitled 'Gun Control Claims More Victims' to my distribution list, which elicited the following response from a big-government statist in Maryland:

Oh right... so the next time some one pulls a gun out and starts shooting we should all pull out our guns and start shooting back, of course no one can aim like sh*t so by the time the smoke clears everyone would be dead from all the missed shots... that would just be great! Just like an old John Wayne movie.

These are not rational people who are going to be deterred by fatal consequences.

I got a better idea... all the gun people move to Texas, secede from the states and leave us in peace.

Guns Kill People! Remove me from your list!

Which got me thinking ... then researching...

It's noteworthy that Maryland does not have a policy of granting concealed carry permits to law-abiding citizens except for rare cases approved by the state police.

Texas, on the other hand, is one of 39 states that issue such permits, provided the applicant passes a rigorous background check and undergoes training in safety and the law, which some 289,000 Texans have done.

So taking into account that law-abiding Marylanders are disarmed by their government (supposedly making Marylanders 'safer'), a quick look at The Washington Post's take on gun ownership by state and the FBI's crime stats by state reveals that Texas gun ownership is roughly twice that of Maryland, yet Maryland's violent crime rate nevertheless stands at roughly 30% higher than that of Texas, and the murder rate in Maryland is roughly 60% higher than in Texas.

So Texas has more guns, but less crime, than Maryland.

No wonder the guy resorted to an outburst of irrational hyperbole — that's all he's got, since neither sound logic nor empirical data lend any support to his prejudiced dogma.

Go figure.

(Not that seceding isn't still in Texans' best interest.)

The "Will" Served by the Army is Not "National"

On February 28, 2008, the Associated Press reported that the U.S. Army had just rolled out a new operations manual "putting stability operations - nation-building - on par with combat."

Doubtless it occurs to no one at AP, let alone the U.S. Army, that "nation building" (whether disguised as "stability operations" or anything else) is not a constitutionally permitted function of the federal government, and (therefore) not a constitutionally permitted function of the U.S. Army - no matter what George W. Bush (or any other usurper occupying a public office) may claim (whether via "executive order" or otherwise).

The notion of soldiers occupying foreign countries as "stability" enforcers brings to mind troop deployments of the Roman, British, Nazi, or Soviet empires — each of them a blight on humanity, bloated with depraved arrogance and hypocritical self-righteousness, and subsequently eradicated by men's refusal to live indefinitely under the rule of totalitarian despots.

But exactly when and how did such an enterprise, radically contrary to both the Constitution and the principles of the men who composed it, come to be an accepted role for Americans in uniform? Americans were never asked to vote on whether or not the Armed Services should serve some function besides defending their own country. Nor are taxpayers advised as to what the swelling national debt created by such operations will truly cost them and future generations.

Yet Lt. Gen. William Caldwell IV suggests in the AP article that the Army is an "instrument of national will."

There is no question that the Army has long been an instrument of a will — somebody's will — but much of its deployment in the past century or more (and all the more vividly during the past decade) could hardly be characterized as the carrying out of some American "national will," when the nation was never permitted an informed or expressed will on the matter in the first place.

No expression of a fully-informed American "national will" was behind American military invasions and/or occupations of Korea (1950-present), Vietnam (1964-1973), Cambodia (1970), Lebanon (1982), Grenada (1983), Bosnia (1993), Somalia (1992-1993) and dozens of other constitutionally unauthorized actions.

And no expression of a fully-informed American "national will" currently stands behind the American military's invasion and occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan.

I don't doubt that General Caldwell genuinely believes the Army is an "instrument of national will" any more than I doubt most of the Army's soldiers genuinely believe they are "serving their country," no matter what (or whose) orders they are following.

The truth of the matter is that the Army is an "instrument" of the "will" of "the government" (not to be confused with "the nation" or, more appropriately, "The People"). Likewise, the troops themselves are serving "the government" (again, not to be confused with "their country" or "The People"), and "the government" and its Army are being used unaccountably as "instruments" of a "will" that is actually indifferent (if not wholly contrary) to national (or popular) sentiment.

That American officials (elected and otherwise) and their minions in the military-industrial-congressional-media complex nevertheless persist in pretending an American "national will" is behind their bankrupt misadventures abroad is a grand fraud.

That Americans persist in quietly acquiescing to such fraud is nothing short of a grand tragedy.

Delusions of the 'Christian Right'

It's downright remarkable that so many in America who profess Jesus as their Lord can simultaneously display a measure of indifference (bordering on contempt) for the truth, to whatever extent that it doesn't fit their political ideology. Instead, these believers practice a brand of politics largely rooted in political and historical illiteracy at best, and baldfaced revisionism at worst.

At its core, the traditional Christian faith has historically held the truth in high esteem. He who is worshipped as Savior and Son of God identified Himself as truth incarnate (John 14:6).

Christians are instructed by Scripture to lay aside falsehood and tell truth (Ephesians 4:15, 25) and to rejoice in the truth (I Corinthians 13:6). They are warned that it is the wicked who won't love or believe the truth (II Thessalonians 2:10,12), that failing to embrace truth renders one vulnerable to myths (II Timothy 4:4), and that it is the noble-minded who study to verify what they hear (Acts 17:10-11).

The Savior Himself said "Take care what you listen to. By your standard of measure it will be measured to you..." (Mark 4:24), and warned that "every careless word that people speak, they shall give an accounting for it in the day of judgment" (Matthew 12:36).

Yet each day, professing Christians can be observed unquestioningly embracing — in casual conversation, in print, and on the airwaves — an entire framework of political beliefs based largely on highly questionable (often downright false) statements originally spawned by one 'conservative' pundit or another.

Unwittingly compartmentalizing their professed love for the truth, and spurning subjective critical analysis, these 'Christians' champion the tenets of a political ideology having little more basis in truth than the 'godless Communism' once targeted as the nemesis of the 'Christian Right.'

Among those tenets (but seldom advertised as such) are...

Statism (at home) & Imperialism (abroad)
How exactly is a 'conservative' or 'christian' version of bloated, expansive, fiscally bankrupt, power-hungry, unaccountable government somehow better than a 'liberal' or 'godless' version of bloated, expansive, fiscally bankrupt, power-hungry, unaccountable government?

(Hint: It's not.)

It boggles the mind that the Founders, amidst a culture heavily influenced by Christian principles, had the wisdom to call for severely limited government, especially on the national level, while today's professing Christians glibly acquiesce to the ever expansive federal leviathan, on the grounds that a professing Christian is supposedly at the helm.

Roman worship of both the State and its Caesars was rejected by the early Christians, and they were persecuted as non-conformist rebels. In stark contrast to this, many American Christians today idolize the State and its Caesar, mislabeling it 'patriotism' -- and are quick to unleash a rather unchristian brand of venom on any who disagree.

Christian 'conservatives' once called for government that was fiscally responsible, less intrusive, and (therefore) generally smaller. Today they mindlessly beat the drums of war on terrorism, war on drugs, etc., oblivious to the truth that most of what the federal government is doing (including every 'war' [all of them being lost, incidentally]) plunges ALL Americans further into debt for the sake of a corporate and/or political agenda that has nothing to do with the actual, genuine interests, security, or liberty of the American People or the Constitution.

History and current events only corroborate the truisms that 'power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely' (Acton), and 'that government is best which governs least' (Paine? Jefferson?), yet such truth seems lost on today's Christian 'conservatives' who all but demand that the federal government become bigger and more powerful, both at home and abroad.

The Welfare State
Professing to despise the government-enforced redistribution of their plundered wealth to the poor, minorities, and 'illegal' aliens, American Christians by and large turn a blind eye to the wholesale channeling of the State's booty to huge agricultural and manufacturing corporations in the form of subsidies, government contracts, and import tariffs.

Having recently controlled both the White House and both Houses of Congress for four full years, 'conservative' Christians' party of choice conspicuously failed to enact even a scrap of legislation deconstructing any significant part of the very same socialist welfare system they're unwilling to share with society's dregs. Socialized education, healthcare, and food stamps remained unaffected amidst a cacophony of dissent over hungry (but mostly hard-working) 'invaders' from abroad and a perpetual class of sluggards from within.

(Jesus said, 'You always have the poor with you, and whenever you wish you can do good to them' [Mark 14:7], but today's 'conservative' Christians, by and large, appear content to accept wasteful, inept, and heavily corrupted government 'charity' at the barrel of a gun as a substitute for personally doing good.)

The Warfare State
With a mere shadow of an understanding of the 'just war' concept, most American Christians seem convinced that it's 'just' (not to mention downright normal) to send and expend military hardware and lives throughout the globe for everything BUT defending the country or its Constitution. Whether due to willful ignorance or abject denial, they don't seem to recognize that such activity as the very essence of imperialism — the mere mention of which truth is often rewarded with jerk-o-the-knee derisive epithets like 'unpatriotic,' 'unamerican,' and 'leftist.'

The Founders laid down strict limitations on the use of military force, and plainly advocated a live-and-let-live policy of friendly, free trade made possible by our peacefully minding our own business. Republican presidents have a history of abandoning that policy — to the detriment of The People they presume to govern — beginning as far back as Lincoln himself. The questionable sloganeering traditions of 'support the president!' and 'support the troops!' regardless of the mission is standard fare among American Christians today, much as it was in vogue among the faithful worshippers at Rome's statist altar.

[It's noteworthy, as the 2008 presidential election primaries are ramping up, that among both Democrats and Republicans only a couple of candidates unequivocally advocate a policy of peace and the withdrawal of American military from their present quagmires in the Middle East. Equally noteworthy is the fact that one of them — a professing Christian (with a solid, corroborating track record) — has received more financial contributions from U.S. military personnel than any other candidate.]

"Print" Money?

This week, the so-called "U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services" branch of the so-called "U.S. Department of Homeland Security" announced a new set of "Naturalization Exam" questions and answers.

One of the answers to the new "Naturalization Exam" question number 53 is fraudulent:

53. Name one thing only the federal government can do.

[possible answers]
A: Print money >>FALSE<<
A: Declare war
A: Create an army
A: Make treaties

The federal government is permitted by law only to coin money (U.S. Constitution, Art. I, Section 8, Paragraph 5, [not lawfully repealed or amended]).

The word "coin" does not mean "print" (or even "issue") — it means stamping/pressing metal into coins. In its true and original context, that can only mean real money -- from gold and silver, as otherwise specified in the same Constitution (Section 10, Paragraph 1, [not lawfully repealed or amended]). Constitutional (i.e., lawful) money cannot be "printed" — it can only be coined.

The federal government (including the so-called "U.S. Department of Homeland Security" and so-called "U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services") commits fraud by pretending it has authority to "print money" when it lawfully does not. Answer "A" should be removed from the set of answers for question 53.

The above facts, when presented to the "U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services" and a few of the media mouthpieces which had glibly gushed the contents of the new exam evoked a resounding and unanimous response of ... silence.

Could it be that neither a federal agency nor the (presumedly independent) "media" wishes to face up to the fact that — even today (despite public conditioning to the contrary) — printed paper "notes" do not constitute lawful money?

The implications threaten the very foundation of the monetary house-of-cards foisted on the American public by the "Federal Reserve" bankers nearly a century ago, so the truth simply cannot be allowed to see the light of day.

So untold numbers of Americans (both new and old) continue to be conditioned to believe that government-printed paper "dollars" backed by absolutely no tangible value of any kind constitute "money".

Sad — but sadder still is the prospect of the untold millions who will one day discover that those "dollars" (whether paper or electronic) are ultimately worth no more than the nothing that has "backed" them for decades — outside of whatever crumbs of perceived "value" the bankers have allowed in the interim.

The "Fair Tax" Fraud

Aaron Russo's latest film has been waking a lot of Americans up from the statist-serf slumber that has plagued several generations.

I think that's a good thing.

But the film falls short of informing Americans of what is unquestionably the best solution to the problem.

Of course, I think that's a bad thing.

Russo seems to conclude that both the IRS and the "Federal Reserve" must be dispensed with -- shut down. I couldn't agree with him more on that count. What Russo does not conclude is what is most disconcerting. The supposed vacuum created by the elimination of these two unlawful and corrupt institutions will surely be replenished by the politicians and the bankers who own them, unless Americans realize at least two things not found in Russo's film:

1) The federal government has no lawful (that is, constitutional) authority to "issue" money -- including worthless paper "money" -- or to assign such an authority to any other party or institution (including the so-called "federal reserve"). The only lawful monetary authority the federal government has is to coin money (that is, press silver and gold into coinage), and determine the value of it (that is, determine how many grains of silver or gold must be contained in each coin). That's the law, folks. That's all the Constitution allows. Any "act of Congress" that arbitrarily presumes to ignore or overrule the Constitution is null and void, no matter how long it has been "in effect".

2) The federal government's only lawful (that is, constitutional) funding is from duties and imposts -- not from any taxation of The People or their property or "income". That's the law. And, again, any "act of Congress" that presumes to ignore or overrule the Constitution is null and void, no matter how long it has been "in effect".

In light of the above, only politicians, bankers, and their dim-witted dupes will seriously suggest the so-called "Fair Tax" (or any other illegal scheme contrary to the law of the land) as a substitute for the "federal reserve"/IRS method of funding the federal government.

If Americans really want the Constitution to be honored, now is the time to put The People's proverbial foot down, and just say no to unlawful funding (of any kind) of the federal government. And if all their bloated, meddlesome, self-serving, unaccountable bureaucracies can't survive on lawful funding, well...

I think that'll be a good thing.