This is Terrifying

Stand by for the Future Crimes Division. Why does science fiction seem to only be right about the scary shit?.. And where is my flying car?

Tanner on Baucus' Health Care

Michael D. Tanner over at the Cato Institute addresses Sen. Max Baucus' plan for the demise of health care in America. Here's hoping Baucus fails as it seems he would like to take down small business and the Insurance Industry as well.

"Businesses will almost inevitably respond by reducing hiring or cutting back on wages or other benefits. Any proposal that is likely to make business less likely to hire workers is a particularly bad idea right now with the economy sliding into a recession."

Read the Article Here

Not all Bad Things are Bad Things

It has been brought to my attention that I have, of late, perhaps been slightly negative regarding the winner of the presidential election. Some have expressed concern that I may only be seeing the bad side of having an immensely popular and charismatic communist with no reasonable congressional opposition as the leader of the free world. I will, therefor attempt to assuage the concerns of my readers with a small break from my alarmist railings. I present to you a list of potentially positive things that could result from the election of President Elect Obama.

1. John McCain isn't the President of the United States. While I'm not convinced he was the greater of two evils, he was and is most certainly evil. It must be said that the inevitable positive in dueling scoundrels is that in the end there is one less scoundrel.

2. The Republican party of the last twelve years has most assuredly reached it's demise and not a moment too soon. For those of us with Liberty in our veins the steady swing of the Grand Old Party away from limited government and free people and towards backwoods religious idiocy has been a painful one. Now the party and those of us that left it can look for opportunities to re-think, re-shape, re-build the Freedom Movement in America. The Republican party can choose to come with us or it can go the way of countless other long forgotten parties in American History. This election and a government entirely run by the Left has the potential of freeing a great many people who had feared that a bad Republican party was still worth supporting. Now we can all clearly see that the left is firmly in charge and the bloated ignorant pig that is today's Republican party was impotent in stopping them.

3. Racism? In America? Nah. Not even the French will have the gall to continue to call America a racist nation. Lets see how long it takes them to get a black President.

4. The difference between a big government loving Republican party, and a big government loving Democrat party is that at least the Liberty Movement has a clear and obvious opponent now. The current administration can't do much more to destroy individual liberty than their predecessors and this way we can still pick up support from those that were previously unwilling to abandon the Republicans while they held the reins.

5. If President Obama turns out to not be as bad as I think he is, well then that's good news all around. If he does turn out to be that bad, then an iconic figure is just as effective for his opposition as he is for his supporters. The Democrats can tell you it's easy to raise money and support when you have one central figure to rally against. Where would they have been if Bush had been a fantastic guy?

6. The media loved Obama but I doubt it was for political reasons. The media love anything that makes people pay attention to them. The very least that can be said for this election and it's results. I'll have no shortage of things about which to write.

7. Maybe the results of this presidential election and the passage of Measure 8 in California will finally wake the Gay Community up to the fact that the Democrats just plain don't like them. The Liberty Movement has plenty of room for them and following the Democratic party has once again left them out in the cold.

Beware Obama Minions

I choose to be wary of those that fight fights that are either un-winnable or ill-defined. They always seem to start of with the best of intentions and they never seem to end. Things that don't end, that don't have a logical conclusion, are generally trouble. Take the war in Iraq for example, we freed a troubled nation from a murdering tyrant, but what then? Now we are wading through a quagmire if ever there was one. Look at the 'war on drugs' no real goals there but we have miles of legislation every year, billions of dollars in funding, rampant and wild increases in violent crime, but no real progress in reducing the use and abuse of drugs. What about the 'war on poverty'? How's poverty doing? William Ayers and the Weather Underground declared war on Capitalism; Capitalism seems to be doing alright, just ask Bill who is about to re-release his book in the wake of his new found fame. He's working on another book too. Seems he's not so anti-capitalism after all. I wonder how the families of those cops and security guards he helped kill feel about his change of heart.

We talk a lot about big ideas in this country. Though some say not enough. We seem to be awash with crises, financial crises, terrorism crises, fiscal spending crises here in California. Every where you look there's a crisis. Each and every one calling for immediate action. But are we solving anything? We had a terrorism seven years ago, are we any less scared now? Or are we just less likely to fly?

The thing about ill-defined fights is that you never really know when they are over. If they never end then you never know when to stop funding them. It's a long held belief of those in the government that everything will be alright (unlike how it is now) if only we give them enough money. But what happens to a movement when all the original goals, stated or otherwise, have been met? Seems to me the movement would declare victory and disband. When was the last time you saw that happen? Is it wrong of me to wonder how the same people who stood next to Martin Luther King Jr., who helped in the fight to establish voting rights and to de-segregate the schools, are still working the same jobs they were then? Why is the Reverend Jesse Jackson still fighting the civil rights movement? He won didn't he? We have a black president, what could the civil rights movement possible have left to do? Of course Rainbow Push brings in millions of dollars annually it would be hard to fire all those people. I guess they'll have to find something to do.

That's the thing about political movements, when you drastically swell the number of people working for what looks like temporary gigs. Pretty soon they want job security. Job security is a tough thing in fights that can be won.

Power is an interesting thing. Get a group of people together to fight for something they think is really important and when they get it, they'll want to know what's next. The more they win, the more they think whatever the leadership tells them must be good. The danger is in the baby steps. First your candidate, he's an ok guy. Next this bill, or that bill. Next comes the revocation of one or two little rights. No big deal, we trust in the movement. At this point you are wondering if I'm wearing a tin-foil hat. But it happens, more often than not. People throughout history have engaged in all kinds of vile things when brought to them a little bit at a time. Specifically when a movement, bigger than those leading it, brought them there. Movements have a way taking on a life of their own. Game shows are like this. Many of the most popular game-shows today ask contestants to risk huge sums of money, they would never have bet, for just one more step up the ladder of success. If you can win $10,000, why not risk it for $100,000. It all looks good from inside the movement.

Just keep in mind that in the days ahead clear goals, clear boundaries, and clear stated intentions are the keys to success in any project, business, personal pursuit, or government action. Ill-defined fights are far more dangerous than anything this or that government has in mind. Ill-defined fights will stick around and be run by the enemies of us all. This president for better or worse will be gone in no more than eight years, what happens to his policies depends entirely on who is left to play with the tools he puts in place. So far 'Hope' and 'Change' are the plan. It's time to tie that down to specifics.

Obama Win Causes Obsessive Supporters To See How Empty Lives Are

An Open Letter to House Republicans

Are you feeling a bit lonely, sad. Does it feel like no one around understands you? When you walk those long dim hallways with nothing to do, does it feel like you don't have any friends anymore? Do your days not fill up with legislative work like they used to? Are lobbyists not knocking down your door as they once did?

It may seem like the whole world has passed you by. Just remember the sagely advice that has long carried people in your position.

Quit your whining, you brought this on yourselves. And furthermore you brought it on the rest of us. Count yourselves lucky you still get a paycheck. Get to work thinking of ways you can apologize for the shameful behavior that got you into this mess and start reading the founding principles of your party.

You increased the size and scope of non-military government spending more than any Democrat led government in your lifetimes.

You voted to encroach on the civil liberties of your constituents over and over again.

You caved to environmental extremists when you knew the science didn't support them.

You allowed the whims of those environmental extremists to increase already bloated corn subsidies while driving UP the cost of corn and therefor almost all food products.

You waged a wildly unpopular war without international support, and even if it was the right choice... You lied to us to get into it.

You voted for almost a trillion dollars in bailouts to rich bankers who as expected didn't loosen credit markets with it at all. You knew it wouldn't work and you knew the citizens were against it.

But you did spend the better part of the last 8 years worrying about whether Jill and Sarah might want to do insidious creepy things, like visit each other in the hospital, and leave things to each other should they die unexpectedly.

You did spend the better part of the last 8 years worrying about steroids in baseball, and Terry Schiavo, and where we can and can't display symbols of our religions.

Don't even think about blaming anyone but yourselves. We gave you all the tools to do good things and you pissed them away. You did this, you made this bed, you put yourself in this position and you should be thankful for every day you have left in office.

America: Halfway to a Black President