Here is my take on a number of issues. I believe myself to be a patriot and a Constitutional Libertarian. I am not a Republican or a Democrat. As a matter of fact, neither party would have me as my beliefs do not line up with theirs. The following is a list, although not all inclusive, of what I believe and why.
1. For every choice there is a consequence. No matter what we as a nation or as individuals choose, there are consequences. Some good, some bad, depending on the choice. The problem with America today is that there are too many out there who want the consequences of individual choice to be collective. If someone makes bad choices, then it is the responsibility of the people to pay the consequences. THIS IS WRONG!!! If we give up freedom, then we will give up consequences. If we want freedom, we must take responsibility for our choices.
2. There are no entitlements in the Constitution. When the founding fathers came together to create the foundation of a free nation, they did not intend or presume any entitlements in the design of our government. There was no social security, no medicare, no aid to dependent children, no national student loan program, no medicaid, nothing. Everyone was responsible for themselves and their families. Ultimately, this is where it should return if we want to continue to be a free nation. Entitlements breed dependence and dependence breeds laziness. Lazy people are ultimately, like all others in history, overtaken and conquered.
3. Freedom means Freedom. In other words, you can't have it both ways. I don't morally support prostitution or pornography. I am not in support of elecit drug use. I think people with ideas that are different than mine should shut up. HOWEVER.... I believe in true free speech and I cannot suppose to dictate morality without also sacrificing liberty in its purest form. When an ADULT chooses to do something to or with their body, they should be left to make that choice. See number 1 also because choices have consequences and they are to be bourne by the person who makes the choice.
4. Regulatory agencies aren't good for America. Examples including the EPA and FDA are symptomatic of the problems that can arise from too much government. In this country we pay tobacco farmers NOT to grow tobacco. We regulate food, drugs, gas, air, just about everything. I propose that without these agencies, that a society, given time would self-regulate poor performers out of business. This is capitalism and freedom as it should be.
Ultimately, This is only 4 of my beliefs. There are so many more but all of them can be found written in the centuries old documents that formed the foundation of our country. The Constitution, the federalist papers, Common Sense by Thomas Paine and many other documents and literature from the time. If you don't believe the founders had considered what we are facing today, read thier writings. They knew and lived through what we are seeing today. They revolted against it and formed this great nation. Do not repeat the history that we are clearly starting to forget.
Don
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Why immigration reform is good but the plan is bad...
Let me start by saying that there is a tremendous need for immigration reform in the US. There should be a system in place for the people who want to immigrate to this great nation to be able to do that when they are able to make their own way financially. There are many stories of immigrant families that have started with nearly nothing and made a prosperous life for themselves in the US. This stories are the ones that make immigration a good thing for America.
On the other hand, there is the illegal immigrants that sneak into our country and once here expect that the US will take care of them. There are hundreds of babies born in border states because illegals have come across the border, knowing that when born in the US, their children become automatic citizens. These are the people who will work in the fields for thirty cents an hour and rely on the welfare of the American people to take care of them.
By allowing this illegal migration to take place, the US is implicit in the slavery of these same people. There is no excuse and there is no exception. The illegal immigrants that pick the food that you eat are slaves, modern day slaves. There is concern that if they were paid fairly, the cost of food would become too high and people would stop buying it. This is a great argument for slavery but I am pretty sure the Civil War took care of that issue.
Amnesty is not the answer either. We can not absorb the impact on our infrastructure that amnesty would cause. The answer is securing our borders against illegal immigration and welcoming all who would come here legally. Immigration is the backbone of the melting pot that we call America. We need to continue to invite others to become a productive member of our country. But, we must stop illegal immigration by whatever means possible to protect our way of life.
Don
On the other hand, there is the illegal immigrants that sneak into our country and once here expect that the US will take care of them. There are hundreds of babies born in border states because illegals have come across the border, knowing that when born in the US, their children become automatic citizens. These are the people who will work in the fields for thirty cents an hour and rely on the welfare of the American people to take care of them.
By allowing this illegal migration to take place, the US is implicit in the slavery of these same people. There is no excuse and there is no exception. The illegal immigrants that pick the food that you eat are slaves, modern day slaves. There is concern that if they were paid fairly, the cost of food would become too high and people would stop buying it. This is a great argument for slavery but I am pretty sure the Civil War took care of that issue.
Amnesty is not the answer either. We can not absorb the impact on our infrastructure that amnesty would cause. The answer is securing our borders against illegal immigration and welcoming all who would come here legally. Immigration is the backbone of the melting pot that we call America. We need to continue to invite others to become a productive member of our country. But, we must stop illegal immigration by whatever means possible to protect our way of life.
Don
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
My official response to the healthcare bill....
I decided that the only way that I can address this issue is in a single comprehensive statement. I thought it best to not focus on the things that I cannot change but rather, determine what I can. After two days of listening to the pundits on both sides of the issue, looking at the bill myself and thinking about the foundation of the issues, I have determined that my issue is not with health care, but with government in general.
Anyone can make a 2000+ page bill sound bad or good depending on their perspective. So the bill will not be the focus of my response. Simply, I detest the entire process. The bill is only a symptom of what is appearing more and more to be a festering, terminal disease on the back of the American people. There is no basis for this kind of government involvement in individual lives and this is not the first but just another entitlement that is designed to relieve the people of not just their responsibility but their freedom as well.
Beginning with the earliest regulatory agencies, the government took more and more liberty from the people. In the guise of protecting people from evil profiteers, the EPA, the FDA, and thousands of other agencies were formed. The argument that we must be protected from these people assumes that we would not ultimately protect ourselves. This argument is based on the fact that the government essentially believes that the average person is too stupid to know that they are being taken advantage of.
I would pose that there is some degree of truth to that assumption. In all the time leading up to the rise of the American empire, species survived and became extinct based on their adaptation to the surroundings they were placed into. Only in the last several hundred years and much more in the last 50 years has it been the goal of government to protect and reward the weakest of the species. Is this the best thing to do is the question that is posed today as we are looking at the newest and largest entitlement program in the history of the world.
You can argue that it is inhuman to allow failures to fail. That companies that fail have to be protected because of all the workers that would be misplaced if they weren't bailed out. What about the children, they can't go without food and shelter. To some of these issues, I agree totally. However, not all and the ones I do agree on are not the responsibility of the government to manage. We should be responsible for our actions both good and bad.
So my answer to the health care bill is that I am not for it, not because I don't believe that people don't need health care but because I don't believe in the level of government we have become indentured to. The will of the people will be vetted in the mid-term elections and hopefully this huge advance in the size of government will be reversed by a clear voice from the people.
Life is about choices and consequences. Good choices result in good consequences, bad choices in bad consequences. At least that is how it should be. In America today, people who make good choices are punished by higher tax rates and a smaller percentage of earned income than those who make bad choices. Sometimes, the bad choices are even rewarded through one of thousands of government entitlement programs. Someday this has to stop. One way or another, either the redistribution has to stop or in time the lack of reward for the industrious will result in the lack of industry. There is no sustainability to our current path.
Please vote in November to remove the Washington insiders, both Democrat and Republican and replace them with people who believe that America can still be the land of the free and the home of the brave.
Don
Anyone can make a 2000+ page bill sound bad or good depending on their perspective. So the bill will not be the focus of my response. Simply, I detest the entire process. The bill is only a symptom of what is appearing more and more to be a festering, terminal disease on the back of the American people. There is no basis for this kind of government involvement in individual lives and this is not the first but just another entitlement that is designed to relieve the people of not just their responsibility but their freedom as well.
Beginning with the earliest regulatory agencies, the government took more and more liberty from the people. In the guise of protecting people from evil profiteers, the EPA, the FDA, and thousands of other agencies were formed. The argument that we must be protected from these people assumes that we would not ultimately protect ourselves. This argument is based on the fact that the government essentially believes that the average person is too stupid to know that they are being taken advantage of.
I would pose that there is some degree of truth to that assumption. In all the time leading up to the rise of the American empire, species survived and became extinct based on their adaptation to the surroundings they were placed into. Only in the last several hundred years and much more in the last 50 years has it been the goal of government to protect and reward the weakest of the species. Is this the best thing to do is the question that is posed today as we are looking at the newest and largest entitlement program in the history of the world.
You can argue that it is inhuman to allow failures to fail. That companies that fail have to be protected because of all the workers that would be misplaced if they weren't bailed out. What about the children, they can't go without food and shelter. To some of these issues, I agree totally. However, not all and the ones I do agree on are not the responsibility of the government to manage. We should be responsible for our actions both good and bad.
So my answer to the health care bill is that I am not for it, not because I don't believe that people don't need health care but because I don't believe in the level of government we have become indentured to. The will of the people will be vetted in the mid-term elections and hopefully this huge advance in the size of government will be reversed by a clear voice from the people.
Life is about choices and consequences. Good choices result in good consequences, bad choices in bad consequences. At least that is how it should be. In America today, people who make good choices are punished by higher tax rates and a smaller percentage of earned income than those who make bad choices. Sometimes, the bad choices are even rewarded through one of thousands of government entitlement programs. Someday this has to stop. One way or another, either the redistribution has to stop or in time the lack of reward for the industrious will result in the lack of industry. There is no sustainability to our current path.
Please vote in November to remove the Washington insiders, both Democrat and Republican and replace them with people who believe that America can still be the land of the free and the home of the brave.
Don
Friday, March 19, 2010
Robin Williams NYC Speech... Priceless
'I see a lot of people yelling for peace but I have not heard of a plan for peace. So, here's one plan.'
1) 'The US / UK / AUSTRALIA will apologise to the world for our 'interference' in their affairs, past & present. You know, Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Tojo, Noriega, Milosevic, Hussein, and the rest of those 'good 'ole' boys', we will never 'interfere' again.
2) We will withdraw our troops from all over the world, starting with Germany, South Korea, the Middle East, and the Philippines. They don't want us there. We would station troops at our borders. No one allowed sneaking through holes in the fence.
3) All illegal aliens have 90 days to get their affairs together and leave We'll give them a free trip home. After 90 days the remainder will be gathered up and deported immediately, regardless of whom or where they are from. They're illegal!!! France will welcome them..
4) All future visitors will be thoroughly checked and limited to 90 days unless given a special permit!!!! No one from a terrorist nation will be allowed in. If you don't like it there, change it yourself and don't hide here. Asylum would never be available to anyone. We don't need any more cab drivers or 7-11 cashiers.
5) No foreign 'students' over age 21. The older ones are the bombers. If they don't attend classes, they get a 'D' and it's back home baby.
6) The US /UK/ Australia will make a strong effort to become self-sufficient energy wise. This will include developing non-polluting sources of energy but will require a temporary drilling of oil in the Alaskan wilderness. The caribou will have to cope for a while.
7) Offer Saudi Arabia and other oil producing countries $10 a barrel for their oil. If they don't like it, we go someplace else. They can go somewhere else to sell their production. (About a week of the wells filling up the storage sites would be enough.)
8) If there is a famine or other natural catastrophe in the world, we will not 'interfere.' They can pray to Allah or whomever, for seeds, rain, cement or whatever they need. Besides most of what we give them is stolen or given to the army. The people who need it most get very little, if anything.
9) Ship the UN Headquarters to an isolated island someplace. We don't need the spies and fair weather friends here. Besides, the building would make a good homeless shelter or lockup for illegal aliens.
10) All Americans must go to charm and beauty school. That way, no one can call us 'Ugly Americans' any longer. The Language we speak is ENGLISH, learn it, or LEAVE...Now, isn't that a winner of a plan?
'The Statue of Liberty is no longer saying 'Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses.' She's got a baseball bat and she's yelling, 'you want a piece of me?' '
Saturday, March 13, 2010
Texas sets textbook standards for all... or most anyway
The Texas school board took the first step this week to fundamentally change the content of the nation's textbooks. For background, the number of textbooks purchased in Texas make them the state that predominately decides the content. This is not a good thing at all. Unfortunately, the injection of party politics and individual beliefs are forming the social studies, economics and history that our children will be taught.
It is my belief that personal convictions are the responsibility of the parents to teach their children. The purpose of school textbooks is the fundamental transfer of FACTUAL information to students. The interpretation of these facts are the responsibility of the child's parents. The nature of our countries history is NOT the issue at hand. The issue is what components of that history the politicians will ALLOW in the textbooks.
It is my belief that personal convictions are the responsibility of the parents to teach their children. The purpose of school textbooks is the fundamental transfer of FACTUAL information to students. The interpretation of these facts are the responsibility of the child's parents. The nature of our countries history is NOT the issue at hand. The issue is what components of that history the politicians will ALLOW in the textbooks.
There are good and bad components to the history of our great nation. There are things that we have learned because of the lessons that our predecessors did. If we whitewash that information, we, or our children are bound to make the same mistakes and pay the same price that has already been paid on lessons already learned.
I say to let the facts remain. Remove the political left and right influences. Let the interpretation of the good, bad, right and wrong be the responsibility of the parents. This is yet another way for the government to indoctrinate our children to a particular and prescribed way of thinking. We must act to protect our children from ANY politically motivated changes to our history. We are the country we are because of our history, NOT in spite of it as some would like us to believe.
Don
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
National ID card... good or horribly bad?
The senate is proposing a national biometric ID card to ensure that those who are working in our country are both legal and paying taxes. Both Lou Dobbs and Bill O'Rielly are supportive of this new program. Funny that I am at times confused with a "right-winger" but as you will see, I am very much opposite of the conservatives on this issue.
A national ID card is yet another mechanism for the country to gather personal information about the citizenry. The gathering of this information is NOT harmless. There are many reasons this is not a positive move for the people of the United States. In the guise of safety and security you are being sold a bill of goods. This is what I see happening in the future as this issue proceeds. Again, all in the guise of protecting you, your identity and your property.
First is the ID card, this makes everyone who earns even a single dollar register a biometric identifier with the federal government. This could be a fingerprint or even a DNA sample. Then, in an effort to protect your identity, you will not be able to use credit cards or other methods of payment besides cash without producing this ID. Ultimately, in order to reduce strong arm robbery and crime, there will no longer be a need for cash as all of your financial information could easily be tied to your ID card.
So, now you are paid by your employer through your national ID card, you may only purchase goods and services with your national ID card, even your credit is managed through your national ID card. You and your identity are very safe now. But wait there is MORE !!!
People are very good at identifying ways to work around the system and criminally obtain things they have no right to. This is going to be true about national ID cards, even with biometrics. Ultimately, again, in order to protect your security and safety, the only way to ensure that no one can steal or forge your identity and money would be to implant the national ID inside your body.
You decide if this sounds possible, probable or even likely. Remember what Thomas Jefferson said "people who are willing to sacrifice liberty for security will eventually lose both."
Nevermind what other ways the government could use your information... I'm just saying...
Don
A national ID card is yet another mechanism for the country to gather personal information about the citizenry. The gathering of this information is NOT harmless. There are many reasons this is not a positive move for the people of the United States. In the guise of safety and security you are being sold a bill of goods. This is what I see happening in the future as this issue proceeds. Again, all in the guise of protecting you, your identity and your property.
First is the ID card, this makes everyone who earns even a single dollar register a biometric identifier with the federal government. This could be a fingerprint or even a DNA sample. Then, in an effort to protect your identity, you will not be able to use credit cards or other methods of payment besides cash without producing this ID. Ultimately, in order to reduce strong arm robbery and crime, there will no longer be a need for cash as all of your financial information could easily be tied to your ID card.
So, now you are paid by your employer through your national ID card, you may only purchase goods and services with your national ID card, even your credit is managed through your national ID card. You and your identity are very safe now. But wait there is MORE !!!
People are very good at identifying ways to work around the system and criminally obtain things they have no right to. This is going to be true about national ID cards, even with biometrics. Ultimately, again, in order to protect your security and safety, the only way to ensure that no one can steal or forge your identity and money would be to implant the national ID inside your body.
You decide if this sounds possible, probable or even likely. Remember what Thomas Jefferson said "people who are willing to sacrifice liberty for security will eventually lose both."
Nevermind what other ways the government could use your information... I'm just saying...
Don
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
When is enough, enough?
What will the American people tolerate? I believe that we are in a time that will allow us to see just that. This president and congress are moving in directions that will fundamentally change America. What happens in November will speak volumes about the will of the people. If there is anything less than a complete upheaval of incumbents, we will prove that this path is of our choosing. I. for one, pray that there is a clear message.
There was a clear message in 2008 that the American people want change. I don't believe that this change is anything like what the people thought it would be. I don't believe anyone knew that our national debt would get worse, that we would own two auto makers or that the entire countries financial future would depend on what bank was getting bailed out next. If we knew then what we know now, we would have all voted for Ron Paul.
There is not one single improvement that has come about because of the "change" that came with Obama. Factually, the Country has only gotten worse. Unemployment is up, consumer confidence is down, the borders are as permeable as ever and our reputation as a military super power is in serious jeopardy. There were not many good decisions under Bush either. He increased the national debt as well, put us into a war we had no business in but at least we had a reputation as tough on terror.
I don't know the answer, except to say that if we do not return to the foundational principles of the constitution, we are only going to see the ultimate downfall of our Country.
Pray for us
Don
Monday, March 1, 2010
What does the 2nd Amendment REALLY mean?
The exact words of the 2nd amendment are as follows:
State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be
infringed.
This simple language has been interpreted in many ways by many people. Most of these people are highly educated and well meaning but, they have missed the entire point of the amendment. Thomas Jefferson said "No Free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms". In its simplest form, the words of the amendment say all that needs to be said. Beyond that, there are arguments as to what that freedom entails.
I suggest that the right to keep and bear arms is expressly for the purpose of protecting the citizenry from the tyranny of an over-reaching government. This is complicit with the following statement by James Madison "Americans have the right and advantage of being armed - unlike the citizens of other countries whose governments are afraid to trust the people with arms." This is the foundation of the right to bear arms. With gun ownership legal, there remains laws that restrict the rights of free men to keep arms.
Consider for a moment, if the federal government decided to move in a direction that was in direct contrast of the will of the people. If then martial law is imposed upon the people and there is a declaration to obtain all registered firearms from the citizenry, who then would have control of all of the weapons in the US. I submit that only the military and the criminals would then be armed. Who then is protected from tyranny or criminal mischief?
Surely the founding fathers knew what it was like to live in such a time as this, when there were no protections, when the government controlled everything and there only way out was to declare independence. These are the protections that the founders put in place to insure "We the People" would never have to face the same tribulations.
Ask yourself what gun registration really does. Are there fewer guns in the hands of criminals or in the hands of law abiding citizens? Would restricting firearm sales reduce the number of guns on the street? Are there less drugs available because they are illegal or are they simply more expensive? Simply, by restricting firearm ownership, those who would own them legally are only at a disadvantage to those who obtain them illegally.
Please share your opinions in the comment section as I am interested to hear the debate on this issue.
Don
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