"In a democracy (‘rule by mob’), those who refuse to learn from history will be the majority and will dictate that everyone else suffer for their ignorance."
Lovely Daughter sent me the photo below (modified to obscure personal information of both student and teacher). If I had been grading the pictured test, the student would have been credited with 100% correct answers and the test designer with a big fat zero for amphibolous (equivocal) wording. Just sayin’.
*It’s IMPORTANT to stamp out vote fraud, Mr. Fraudulent Attorney General, so listen to this Comic-Con advice and let States do their job:
“…avoid awkward moments by having proof that you are the guy whose name is on the badge.”
Get the Department of INjustice OUT of enforcing Vote Fraud and into aiding the enforcement of legitimate polls!
I shun the idea of typical contemporary elitism derived from heredity, attendance at the “right” schools, big bucks in the bank (or under one’s thumb) or association with political power for its own sake. But, in The Revolt of the Masses (1930?), Jose Ortega y Gasset presents a strong argument in favor of a genuine elite. A brief sample:
“…we distinguished the excellent man from the common man by saying that the former is the one who makes great demands on himself, and the latter the one who makes no demands on himself, but contents himself with what he is, and is delighted with himself. Contrary to what is usually thought, it is the man of excellence, and not the common man who lives in essential servitude. Life has no savour for him unless he makes it consist in service to something transcendental. Hence he does not look upon the necessity of serving as an oppression. When, by chance, such necessity is lacking, he grows restless and invents some new standard, more difficult, more exigent, with which to coerce himself. This is life lived as a discipline — the noble life. Nobility is defined by the demands it makes on us — by obligations, not by rights. Noblesse oblige. ‘To live as one likes is plebeian; the noble man aspires to order and law.’ (Goethe)” – Ortega y Gasset
Much of Ortega’s description of genuine elitism evokes echoes of Viktor Frankl’s humbly transcendent “pursuit of meaning” found in “From Death Camp to Existentialism” (later revised and expanded as “Man’s Search for Meaning”) wherein he describes an existentialism counter to that common to such as Sartre, filled with hope and even joy in the midst of terrible circumstances.
Just do: read it aloud and then ask yourself, “How did we allow ourselves to come to these straits–again?”
The Declaration of Independence
IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.–Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.
The 56 signatures on the Declaration appear in the positions indicated:
Column 1
Georgia:
Button Gwinnett
Lyman Hall
George WaltonColumn 2
North Carolina:
William Hooper
Joseph Hewes
John Penn
South Carolina:
Edward Rutledge
Thomas Heyward, Jr.
Thomas Lynch, Jr.
Arthur MiddletonColumn 3
Massachusetts:
John Hancock
Maryland:
Samuel Chase
William Paca
Thomas Stone
Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia:
George Wythe
Richard Henry Lee
Thomas Jefferson
Benjamin Harrison
Thomas Nelson, Jr.
Francis Lightfoot Lee
Carter BraxtonColumn 4
Pennsylvania:
Robert Morris
Benjamin Rush
Benjamin Franklin
John Morton
George Clymer
James Smith
George Taylor
James Wilson
George Ross
Delaware:
Caesar Rodney
George Read
Thomas McKeanColumn 5
New York:
William Floyd
Philip Livingston
Francis Lewis
Lewis Morris
New Jersey:
Richard Stockton
John Witherspoon
Francis Hopkinson
John Hart
Abraham ClarkColumn 6
New Hampshire:
Josiah Bartlett
William Whipple
Massachusetts:
Samuel Adams
John Adams
Robert Treat Paine
Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island:
Stephen Hopkins
William Ellery
Connecticut:
Roger Sherman
Samuel Huntington
William Williams
Oliver Wolcott
New Hampshire:
Matthew Thornton
[SEE THE FOOT OF THE POST–in the “more” section–FOR AN UPDATE FROM FAIRTAX.ORG]
This post will be pinned to the top of the blog for a week or so. Newer posts will appear below this one.
It seems to me that “individual mandates” as delineated by Justice Roberts’ majority opinion in National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius [pdf file] (the “Obamacare” decision) have long been with us. The “feddle gummint’s” taxation power, exercised through the IRS, has long treated different people differently, taxing some more than others, excluding some from taxation because of behaviors the “feddle gummint” wants to encourage, while taxing those “others” more because they don’t do something the “feddle gummint” wants them to.
It seems to me that the two Very Good Lessons we can draw from this decision are
1. ALL the Dhimmicraps (The Zero and his co-conspirators and the Mass MEdia Podpeople Hivemind and all the Academia Nut Fruitcakes, et al) who promoted Obamacare deliberately, maliciously and wittingly LIED THPOUGH THEIR TEETH to get the thing passed.
2. Justice Roberts very wisely (Niccolò Machiavelli would’ve handed him a gold star) didn’t leave it at obliquely pointing out what liars the Obamacare supporters are but placed the responsibility for fixing the mess where it belongs when he said of the Court:
It is not our job to protect the people from the consequences of their political choices.
Bingo!
My exegesis? If you abhor this law as much as you should, then get up off your fat lazy asses and WORK to elect representatives who will overturn it, and in the future pay more attention to electing representatives who genuinely have the republic’s interests at heart.
Continue reading “Individual Mandate Picking On Individuals to Tax: UPDATED”
The stupid ideas one sees on the interwebs…
*gag*
Target practice.
Both the dead whom we honor today and the living. The best way, far better than a day of flags and barbecues and parades and watching sports, a “holiday” merchandizing opportunity and other such activities: always spend your vote in the cause of liberty. Work to advance candidates who are committed to protecting REAL human rights (not the phony “rights” so loudly shouted by the left nowadays) and REAL, responsible liberty (not the licentiousness and freedom to steal from others promoted by the left nowadays).
Exercise your citizenship for the good of your grandchildren and great grandchildren and generations yet undreamed of, instead of simply for the short term benefit of self-annointed “elites” and the Balkanized special interest groups they milk for power. Then, live your life as a FREE citizen, unshackled from the tyranny of the State while upholding your genuine duties as a citizen.
THAT’S the best way to honor those who have died to purchase your liberties and protect your human rights.
“other such activities”: There’s nothing wrong with flying flags, parades and barbecues and buying and selling stuff and suchlike. In fact, all those things can be outgrowths of free citizens simply living their lives as they see fit, without imposing themselves on others. But those things aren’t in and of themselves worthy expressions of honoring those who have given their lives to defend our liberties, our rights.
Phony “rights”: see this article at LewRockwell.Com for a starting place. It’s a list of the fake “rights” Franklin Roosevelt promoted that have been expanded into the current litany of the left.
“genuine duties”: defend your own rights and honor the rights of others (“Your rights end where my nose begins” and vice versa), and require government to do the same and no more. What are some of those legitimate rights we have a duty to defend and to require our government to defend? A good place to start:
Life
Liberty
The pursuit of happiness
But when one considers a “pursuit of happiness” as denoted by the Declaration of Independence one really ought to ask what that phrase meant to those who signed their names affirming that right. That’s an easy task, since the discussions of that document are themselves well-documented. The “happiness” considered a right to pursue included, but was not limited to another word that was considered for inclusion: property. The right to own and control the use of one’s own private property was included in the Founders’ thinking in “happiness”. Don’t take my word for it. Do your own homework.
Then, among other rights “reserved to the people”, we have some denoted by the Bill of Rights such as the right to free exercise of religion, the right to criticize the government, in speech and print, seeking a redress of grievances, the right of self-defense (and self-defense against government tyranny at that), the right to tell government trolls to f* off at one’s door, if they lack a duly executed search or arrest warrant, etc.
Defense of these liberties and basic human rights is ultimately the responsibility of citizens under our formal polity. REQUIRING of our governments (local, state, federal) that they uphold these rights and enforce these liberties against the outlaws (including those “feddle gummint bureaucraps” and “law enfArcement ossifers” and politicians *gag-spew* who manufacture tyrannical laws and regulations that subvert the law of the land purely for their own benefit) is a major part of our duties as citizens, and absent honest attempts to fulfill these duties, any “honor” we pay those who died in defense of these rights and liberties is hypocritical at best.
Just sayin’. Of course, Moina Michaels said it better back not long after WWI:
We Shall Keep the Faith
by Moina Michael, November 1918
Oh! you who sleep in Flanders Fields,
Sleep sweet – to rise anew!
We caught the torch you threw
And holding high, we keep the Faith
With All who died.We cherish, too, the poppy red
That grows on fields where valor led;
It seems to signal to the skies
That blood of heroes never dies,
But lends a lustre to the red
Of the flower that blooms above the dead
In Flanders Fields.And now the Torch and Poppy Red
We wear in honor of our dead.
Fear not that ye have died for naught;
We’ll teach the lesson that ye wrought
In Flanders Fields.
I’ll not explain the “Flanders Fields” reference. If you’re not already well familiar with the John McCrae poem, then shame on you.
Typical of recent libtards, Barbara Streisand and other libtards have apparently provided substantial financial support to convicted serial bomber, legal system abuser and perjurer, Brett Kimberlin.
If you’ve not been living under a rock on the Moon, you probably already have some awareness of how this apparently soulless creep has been harassing people who simply mention his publicly available record. If you have been living under a rock on the Moon and as a result your Internet connection just hasn’t been working too well, a simple search will turn up all you need to know about this turd.
Really. Take just one data point:
Each year, the United States spends $65,000 per poor family to “fight poverty” – in a country in which the average family income is just under $50,000. Meanwhile, most of that money goes to middle-class and upper-middle-class families, and the current U.S. poverty rate is higher than it was before the government began spending trillions of dollars on anti-poverty programs.
Now, I’m all for extending a helping hand to folks in genuine need. I’ve done it myself, as a personal choice. I’ve worked in food banks, homeless shelters and more. But who is the “feddle gummint” really “helping” with its disingenuously-named “war on poverty”? As far as I can see, it’s mostly a full employment program for federal and state bureaucraps, with the rest going to a mix of lazy bums and a few truly needy.
Apart from the very few who really are poor who are the “poor” in America? According to the “feddle gummint’s” own data, they’re part of the figurative “1%”–viewed as against the rest of the world.
According to the government’s own survey data, in 2005, the average household defined as poor by the government lived in a house or apartment equipped with air conditioning and cable TV. The family had a car (a third of the poor have two or more cars). For entertainment, the household had two color televisions, a DVD player, and a VCR.
If there were children in the home (especially boys), the family had a game system, such as an Xbox or PlayStation. In the kitchen, the household had a microwave, refrigerator, and an oven and stove. Other household conveniences included a washer and dryer, ceiling fans, a cordless phone, and a coffee maker.
The home of the average poor family was in good repair and not overcrowded. In fact, the typical poor American had more living space than the average European. (Note: That’s average European, not poor European.) The average poor family was able to obtain medical care when needed. When asked, most poor families stated they had had sufficient funds during the past year to meet all essential needs.
By its own report, the family was not hungry. The average intake of protein, vitamins, and minerals by poor children is indistinguishable from children in the upper middle class and, in most cases, is well above recommended norms. Poor boys today at ages 18 and 19 are actually taller and heavier than middle-class boys of similar age in the late 1950s and are a full one inch taller and 10 pounds heavier than American soldiers who fought in World War II. The major dietary problem facing poor Americans is eating too much, not too little; the majority of poor adults, like most Americans, are overweight.
We Americans, on average, have it pretty good in the worldly goods category. But what about “poor” Americans? How do they fare n the worldly goods scale?
Right. Notalotadifference, eh? And that doesn’t even take into account the often–usually–transitional nature of the so-called “poverty” as designated by the “feddle gummint”.
Do note that I know full well that there are folks who are genuinely struggling to meets family needs for food, clothing and shelter, but those folks are vanishingly few compared to the numbers of folks who are really just sucking at the government teat… and assuring paychecks for “gummint bureaucraps” (I refuse to say most government bureaucraps are really doing jobs, although there are some worth having around I’m sure).
Just sayin’.
Honestly, if I were to drop acid (see: “subjunctive mood” ;-)) and report my trips, I couldn’t make up anything this stupid:
*Democratic?