Barackalypse vs. Bushwhacked: half a dozen of one, 6 of the other…

I am soooo tired of the anti-Obama “jokes”; it’s over people so I think you should get over it, but if you insist then I too, am having a bit of a rant.

I don't believe that "But Bush did it too!" is a valid defense of anything. I do, however, believe that it's a perfectly valid response to people whose perception of reality is completely skewed.

Look, I get that you don't like taxes. Personally, I’m not a huge fan of them either; I think they’re too high, but I also think spending is too high. I understand that you oppose many of Obama's proposals. I don’t agree with everything the guy says either so I can empathize to a certain extent; however, I am baffled that you could go through the past 8 years completely care-free, not the least bit worried about the exorbitant deficit spending and obscene expansion of state power going on until now. I suppose that contrary to what I said in my last blog, color does matter. There are some people that only seem to care if there’s a boot squashing a face if it comes in blue instead of red.

So yes, Bush cut your taxes. He did, however, raise the taxes that your children (someone’s children) will pay. In general people claim to care about children, and I’d go so far as to say that given the pro-life stance of the people I am referring to (not that I think there’s anything wrong with that) I’d think you should care about children a lot. Surely you must oppose any policy that basically guarantees that your kids will pay massive taxes to some Chinese creditors, yes?

A tiny recap on the things you either missed while blinking or that simply didn’t faze you enough to even solicit a blink. The Bush administration:

- Borrowed an obscene amount of money to start a war that will bite us and future generations in the ass. (Please note that I retain the utmost respect for members of the armed forces and am grateful for their service).
- Borrowed vast sums for insane domestic security policies.
- Openly instituted a policy of torture, detention without trial and warrantless surveillance.
- Consolidated federal power over public schools.
- Instituted a massive and expensive program of free pills for the elderly.
- Borrowed another ridiculous sum to bail out Wall Street.
- Acquired equity stakes in various banks, basically nationalizing a key industry, the sort of thing that would cause you to pack your bags and move to Argentina if Obama did it.

None of that scared you in the least. You even voted repeatedly for the party doing these things.

You're only scared NOW? Really? Does anyone else recall the Chicken Littleing of Newt Gingrinch in the early 90s? His nonsense is one of the first things I can really remember from the contemporary political sector (admittedly, it was his name that drew my attention). The man said there would be soup kitchen lines, and then we had the longest peacetime economic expansion in our history.

Yes, I am hopeful for a better future, but I am also a bit cynical on it all so that should give you haters hope. I'm predicting that many of Obama's proposals will come to naught, and we'll basically get the status quo that didn't cause you to so much as bat an eyelash anyway.

Oh, except that the bill for this status quo might be paid by you instead of by future voters. The change I wanted never came to fruition either; that’s life.

*sigh* I feel better now. I was just getting so irritated that I had to rant a bit.

De Bait! De Bait!

Wow, a few months ago I was completely jaded and had completely lost all interest in this presidential election; my how the tides have turned! First, there were the VP picks; both of which piqued my interest and renewed some faith in the whole process for me. Now, we have the seasoned Senator actually calling to cancel…er, ahem, I mean, postpone the first of three presidential debates (not to mention the canceling of the VP debate altogether, but I’m not even touching that mess). It’s all crazy right?

Well, I don’t know. In my humble opinion, it might just be genius. Really, if McCain can convince the American public that he is genuinely taking an “above politics” approach then he might just reel in a new crop of supporters; I’m just not sure how many Americans are biting on this tactic. I fear for the old man, that many will view it with complete derision. It’s a lovely sentiment and whatnot, but really I think the majority of Americans want a President that is capable of a little multi-tasking.

Anyway, I know I’ve been a negligent blogger, and I have so much more churning on this one as well as the bailout / economic situation disaster that we’re in; however, I’ve just too much to do in too little of time these days. Ugh, okay, I can’t sign off without saying a little more…It’s unlikely that the calamitous state of our economy is going to improve through hurried legislation. This bailout biz is a train wreck for the general public. Actually, perhaps there’s an even more applicable analogy; it’s a band-aid for a situation that needs a far more in-depth treatment plan. I don’t know about the rest of you (I certainly welcome your thoughts on it all), but I don’t trust such an exorbitant amount of money in so few hands.

I implore everyone to be actively involved in your political choices though. Read the news. Watch the debates (when they happen). Etc. With regard to the bailout I urge you to read a little something from the Campaign for Liberty peeps.

On a friendly note, I also wish you all a fantastic weekend!

Stupid is as stupid does

So, I wasn’t even sure that I was going to share the following little convo and my thoughts, but then as I was perusing the news articles on Yahoo’s homepage yesterday this one prompted me to go ahead and write about it. Upon finishing, I think it’s only fair to hop back up here and offer a little fair warning of wandering and turning a tad tangential…nothing out of the ordinary there ;)

As I’m sitting with someone she says to me, “You know what I’m sick of?”

I presume this is rhetorical, but the pause is actually a tad too long so I say, “Stupid people?” This is usually what I am ‘sick of’ so I assume it’s a decent guess. It’s not that I think I’m a genius per se, quite to the contrary really; however I am confident that a fair number of the people I come into contact with on any given day are intellectually lacking, and that I actually fair well-enough. I recently read somewhere that with regard to national average IQ the U.S. ranks 18th. I suppose that isn’t too terrible, but really given our purported measures toward educational success and higher learning it seems a less-than-impressive ranking.

Anyway, I digress…it turns out that was exactly what she was sick of; however, she was using a rather biased means to identify said “stupid people”. She said (and maybe I shouldn’t be using quotes because this may not be verbatim – close though), “YuhhYES! I am sooo sick of stupid people. These idiots that live near me have a ton of election signs in their yard, but the only reason they have them is because they are the most “Christian” candidates. Ask them about their platforms, and they know nothing. I don’t understand why it is that religious people vote for someone just because they share the same religion? It’s stupid.”

Me, “Ouch, wow! You realize that’s a rather judgmental remark that not only implies that people with a belief system are stupid, but it also implies that it is somehow wrong or stupid for their beliefs to impact the way that they vote?” Her response was something like, “Well, you know I don’t get the belief thing, and honestly it is a bit stupid to let it decide your vote…separation of church and state...”

Me? Well, I just rolled my eyes. “Church and state” – I’ll get back to that. For now let me offer the following reminder: I think that everyone that knows me also knows that I’m not really sure what I believe with regard to an omniscient, omnipotent, omnibenevolent, eternal creator. I can tell you that what I do believe in is the practice of respect for other people’s faith and practices, and that is what I said to her. To discredit someone based on their faith is just as bad as discounting them because of their race or gender. Now people that present as pseudo-religious? The ones that are lacking compassion, good works…the ones that purport a commitment to their faith but really never live it? Those are the people that I find difficulty in acknowledging or respecting their belief system, but I wouldn’t really expect them to vote for anything or anyone simply out of religious allegiance; however the people in possession of a full-on commitment to their faith? Well, that I can respect, and those are the people that I presume will allot for their religious beliefs to have some influence when making their political decisions. To do so isn’t “stupid”.

Faith is about the spiritual, the way we live our lives, treat each other, etc. Politics are about the temporal, taxes, legalities, etc. It is altogether asinine to think that, for a devout religious practitioner, there is no intersection between faith and politics. If religious faith functions as a means to delineate what is right or wrong, to clarify what goodness is how could someone in possession of a truly meaningful communion with God completely divorce Him from his/her voting decisions? The person could not.

Where is that line though? The one she mentioned as separating church and state? Well, don’t you think that when developing our government, the U.S. looked at the troubled history of Europe and her religious wars as a warning? I think that while it was expected that politicians would be religious and religious philosophy would inform their decisions, the Founders’ view was also such that we would be a nation that had faith but one that kept doctrinal disputes out of the political sphere. I don’t know…My knowledge is limited, but it seems people that are almost anti-religion fall back on that “Church and State” thing without really knowing anything about the Founders’ intent for our nation.

So (“so” the fall-back segue of a tired and lazy writer – forgiveness asked), ultimately I think it's far from “stupid” for a person to consider their faith when deciding what policies to favor, provided that when considering policies that are going to apply to everyone, to figure out how to justify those policies to people with different faiths or none. My partner in conversation was fairly adamant that there was not a way to interweave the two and still be within appropriate political “rights” or limits. She was insistent that in allowing one’s faith to impact one’s politics that the person of faith was forcing a personal religious agenda onto others. I had to disagree, and I think that it disappointed her. You see, people both atheists as well as those that have a strong belief system, are often quick to make assumptions about a person such as myself. They assume that because I do not attend a church or profess my commitment to a specific religion that I am simply an atheist; the soul, the heart, the mind, the spiritual, et. Al. is not so simple, and you should never assume unless you are prepared to listen to me drone on and on. I certainly don’t think she was prepared, but I addressed the following anyway (what can I say I get a little indignant when anyone is being attacked?):

If we’re talking about Christianity, the truest message there is one of love, forgiveness, compassion, intended to be spread through witnessing, not force. I like to think of witnessing as different than proselytizing, even more so since reading a book my friend recently loaned me. The authors, in addition, to presenting a thorough, fact-based and quite convincing argument for the resurrection of Christ also address the appropriate means to share His message. Again I can respect the person of faith that attempts to share his/her beliefs in a way that is also respectful of others, one that is free of coercion, force, trickery or disrespect. When shared and acted upon correctly the person of faith is also then still recognizing our free will. And isn’t free will, a preservation of our liberty what we’re really making our political decisions for? Even the believer of an omniscient, omnipotent, omnibenevolent, eternal God should vote contrary to anything that would demolish the freedom of individuals to live under the umbrella of liberty so if they are in keeping with this mindset I don’t see how a little intersection of faith and politics is “stupid” or a problem.

Enjoy the weekend peeps! I intend to :-)

Ricky Bobby Kerry Billie Jo Elvis????

And I thought our government was far too involved in our lives! Check out this article about a recent lawsuit in Sweden:

Elvis no name for a girl
Published: 4 Jun 08 09:05 CETOnline: http://www.thelocal.se/12214/

Swedish tax authorities have informed a couple in Stockholm that they may not keep the name Elvis for their five-month old daughter.

Forbidden names: identity and the law (26 Nov 07)
Couple 'will divorce' if son can't take mother's name (16 Oct 07)
Baby Metallica allowed to keep her name (19 Apr 07)

The girl's parents have appealed the decision, Metro reports.

"We talked about lots of names and then Elvis popped up. We thought it was a name that was both pretty and gender-neutral. We're not Elvis Presley fans at all," the infant's mother, Linda, told the newspaper.

The most important factor for the couple, who do not own any of The King's records, was for the name to be "gender-neutral".

But not everyone agreed with their assessment that Elvis fit the bill. In its ruling, the tax board wrote:"It is the National Tax Board's view that Elvis is a first name of a masculine type and as such may, in light of standard practice, be considered clearly inappropriate as a first name for a woman."

The girl's mother however believes that her appeal will be successful and has vowed to continue calling her daughter Elvis whatever the eventual outcome. The family can also take heart from the experience last year of the Tomaro family, whose daughter was eventually allowed to keep the name Metallica after a protracted battle with the authorities.

Blech! While I think Elvis is an awful name for a little girl, I certainly don't think it's government business to decide whether or not parents can use it for their baby.

Leave it to socialist Sweden to actually use tax dollars on an appellative committee.

Thinking on socialism quite a bit lately, and now with this article I think it's my official cue to read Hayek's Road to Serfdom in its entirety vs. just the small excerpts I had in class circa '99.

Ah, Dr. Hayek, 'tis true what you say, socialism is contrary to freedom.

(sigh) Or well...now what?

This was originally posted on my MySpace April 7, 2008. Look for a brand new blog tomorrow (maybe not until the evening.) I'm thinking the new one's title is: How I Came to Love Ron Paul: The Story of a Self-proclaimed Libertarocrat Turned Republican Supporter…well, at least of one Republican anyway

I’m alone and bored friends so sorry for another lengthy one (I also wasn’t sure how many of you were already familiar so had to give the details too.)

A new law expanding the government’s spying powers gives the Bush Administration a six-month window to install possibly permanent back doors in the nation’s communication networks. The legislation was passed hurriedly by Congress over the weekend and signed into law Sunday by President Bush.

The bill, in keeping with the typical "slap a pretty name on it, and the people will go for it" is known as the Protect America Act, and removes the prohibition on warrantless spying on Americans abroad and gives the government wide powers to order communication service providers such as cell phone companies and ISPs to make their networks available to government eavesdroppers.

The Administration pushed for passage of the changes to close what it called a "surveillance gap," referring to a long-standing feature of the nation’s surveillance laws that required the government to get court approval to capture communications inside the United States.

While the nation’s spy laws have been continually loosened since 9/11, the Administration never pushed for the right to tap the nation’s domestic communication networks until a secret court recently struck down a key pillar of the government’s secret spying program.

The Administration argues that the world’s communication networks now route many foreign to foreign calls and emails through switches in the U.S.

Prior to the law’s passage, the nation’s spy agencies, such as the National Security Agency and the Defense Intelligence Agency, didn’t need any court approval to spy on foreign people so long as the wiretaps were outside the U.S.

Now, those agencies are free to order services like Skype, cell phone companies and arguably even search engines to comply with secret spy orders to create back doors in domestic communication networks for the nation’s spooks. While it’s unclear whether the wiretapping can be used for domestic purposes, the law only requires that the programs that give rise to such orders have a "significant purpose" of foreign intelligence gathering.

The law:

• Defines the act of reading and listening into Americans’ phone calls and internet communications when they are "reasonably believed" to be outside the country as not surveillance.
• Gives the government 6 months of extended powers to issue orders to "communication service providers," to help with spying that "concerns persons reasonably believed to be outside the United States." The language doesn’t require the surveillance to only target people outside the United States, only that some of it does.
• Forces Communication Service providers to comply secretly, though they can challenge the orders to the secret Foreign Intelligence Court. Individuals or companies given such orders will be paid for their cooperation and can not be sued for complying.
• Makes any program or orders launched in the next six months last for a year after being authorized.
• Grandfathers in the current secret surveillance program (sometimes referred to as the Terrorist Surveillance Program) and any others that have been blessed by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.
• Requires the Attorney General to submit to the secret surveillance court its reasons why these programs aren’t considered domestic spying programs, but the court can only throw out those reasons if it finds that they are "clearly erroneous."
• Requires the Attorney General to tell Congress twice a year about any incidents of surveillance abuse and give statistics about how many surveillance programs were started and how many directives were issued.
• Makes no mention of the Inspector General, who uncovered abuses of the Patriot Act by the FBI after being ordered by Congress to audit the use of powerful self-issued subpoenas, is not mentioned in the bill.

In short, the law gives the Administration the power to order the nation’s communication service providers (which range from Gmail, AOL IM, Twitter, Skype, traditional phone companies, ISPs, internet backbone providers, Federal Express, and social networks) to create possibly permanent spying outposts for the federal government.

These outposts need only to have a "significant" purpose of spying on foreign people, would be nearly immune to challenge by lawsuit, and have no court supervision over their extent or implementation.

Abuses of the outposts will be monitored only by the Justice Department, which has already been found to have underreported abuses of other surveillance powers to Congress.

In related international news, Zimbabwe’s repressive dictator Robert Mugabe also won passage of a law allowing the government to turn that nation’s communication infrastructure into a gigantic, secret microphone.

So, hey America, we’re not the only ones being screwed by our government? We can start a club with Zimbabwe…maybe get t-shirts made up, maybe with a somewhat gruesome image on the front of a corpse face up in a coffin and on the back the corpse face down with a tagline, "Orwell turning in his grave as we speak and they listen." Or maybe something more direct: just the number 4 with the big NO symbol over it because really who needs the 4^th amendment anyway? Whatever, we can vote; it’s not like I want to be president of the club or anything.

Be outraged with me people! This is direct undermining of the Constitution, of our rights and has very little to do with what the politicians purport it to. It’s retroactive ass-covering for those involved in illegal spying. It’s future permission to spy. It’s crap. Anyway, while I doubt it’s happening, I suppose it’s possible…GW if you’re reading this, I’d like to apologize now for any words you didn’t understand.

In closing I leave you with a little Benjamin Franklin: "Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both."

I know...ouch...

Not completely rasa today

This was originally posted on my MySpace April 5, 2008.

I am so bored. Reread some Locke last night and today. Because we’ve been looking at real estate, and I have a friend that’s stressed over moving I decided a good focal point in the reading would be private property. Mr. Locke sure did have a lot to say so let’s see if I can’t share what he proposes ;)

The survival of each person requires that he be able to use material objects to sustain his life. Because God wants each individual person to live and prosper, he instituted the right to property as a corollary to the right to life. Locke’s supposition is that God gave the earth and its fruits to all men (sorry sir, but I like to think if there is a God giving it is to all humans not just men so that’s how I’ll be putting it peeps – I mean, come on it’s 2008 not the 1600s) in common. It follows that in the state of nature property was common in that every person had the right to gain subsistence from whatever nature provided. Originally, nobody had a private domain exclusive of the rest of humankind. God not only gave the world to humans in common, he also gave them reason to make use of it. The problem that Locke faced was to explain how commonly available resources can become legitimate private property to the exclusion of the right of other people. Locke employs the principle of individuation in the world to explain how collective property can become individual private property. He says that a person transfers his or her individuality into matter through his or her own labor. This individuates and decommunalizes property.

Private property does not and cannot come about by universal consent. According to Locke, natural man/woman enjoys property in his/her own person which is the foundation of all other property. This concept of self-ownership is the cornerstone of individualism and personal freedom. Every man/woman owns not only his/her own person but also his/her own labor. It follows that people can legitimately turn common property into private property by mixing their labor with it thereby using and improving it. Because individuals mixed their bodies in the form of their labor with unowned (free) resources, they created something new that was their property. What a person does when he/she applies his/her labor to a natural object is to endow it with certain attributes belonging to one’s own mode of existence. The Lockean view is that the quality of the owner’s very personality is embodied in his property. The right to private property arises because by labor man/woman can extend his/her own personality into the objects created (those of you that have been in my house know all too well that my personality is quite abundant in my property.) This natural right to private property exists even in the primitive society of the state of nature. The right to private property precedes civil law and is grounded in natural moral law.

Nature itself severely limits property in the state of nature. The natural fact of spoilage drastically limits property in the state of nature and acts as a type of rule to maintain a fair distribution of goods in the state of nature. This leads Locke to proclaim that spoilage limits the right of clear and exclusive acquisition in the state of nature. Private property is thus limited to as much as anyone can make use of before it spoils. People should not allow things to go to waste in the state of nature. We could say that nature has put both a moral and a practical limit on the amount of property that anyone can accumulate. The limit is not defined by the amount of what is owned but only by the consequences of the ownership. As long as nothing spoils in one’s possession, it makes no difference how much property he/she owns (I’m about sick of "owning" two pieces of property right now.) Property ownership is thus qualified to as much as anyone can make use of to any advantages of life before it spoils. This is known as the "Lockean proviso."

Locke believed that greater productivity of some would raise the general standard of living. He says that a person is wrong to think that another person deprives others by enclosing land and cultivating it for his/her own use. It follows that all his/her neighbors benefit because cultivated land is more productive. The poor frequently gain as an unintended consequence of the acquisitive actions of others. Because the productive use of resources by one person tends to enrich everyone, we could say that people’s interests are not in conflict and that wealth is not a static quantity – one person’s gain is also everyone else’s gain.

Locke recognized that spoilage is a necessary, applicable and effective means toward fair distribution only in the case of a scarcity of perishable goods. The invention of money renders the accumulation of property essentially harmless and avoids the disadvantages inherent in the original natural limits to property ownership in the state of nature. The invention of money, which does not spoil (ha!), made it desirable and reasonable for a person to produce more than was required for his/her family’s immediate needs (i.e., more than they could consume before it spoiled). People could exchange money for perishable and other goods. There would be no limit to the private acquisition of wealth if held in the form of money. Without money, a person had no incentive to expand his/her holdings and produce a surplus.

Money came into existence through a natural mutual consent process in the state of nature. Through this process the most durable and easily tradable commodity ultimately becomes acceptable as a money commodity. Locke’s theory of the origins of social institutions provided the framework for his consent theory of money. Money allows the more talented, rational, and industrious to create more, to accumulate the products of their labor, and to increase their wealth relative to others. According to Locke, money makes possible a benevolent form of property accumulation that enriches some without making others poorer.

Locke thought that labor was the major creator of economic value but that the market or relative value or the price of an object depended upon its usefulness and scarcity rather than the amount of labor embodied in it. In Locke’s system one earned property through his/her own efforts, but the value of that property was determined by the market. It follows that Locke’s writings implied no theory of labor exploitation. There is no evidence that Locke believed there would be a relationship between the amount of labor that goes into a product and its market price.

Locke explains that money so transformed the conditions of the state of nature that it was no longer desirable for people to live together without greater protection for their possessions. Lockean human therefore quits the state of nature and forms into civil society for the protection of his/her life, liberty, and estate. Locke sees the economy as logically prior to government and explains that government arises to remedy inconveniences that occur in the state of nature. The purposes of the government are to protect property, to keep order, and to provide a peaceful environment in which each person can freely pursue his/her own ends (sorry just had to make that point abundantly clear). Locke says that some government regulation of trade is necessary to protect and foster commercial interests. Here he is talking about procedural rather than substantive regulation. Permissible regulation for Locke includes contract enforcement, dispute adjudication, and the registration of deeds and titles. As an advocate of free markets, he is against the regulation of interest rates on both economic and moral grounds.

So anyway, it was entertaining and a nice break from the current news I started out reading. Basically, Locke states we have rights to life, liberty, health and property. These are natural rights, that is, they are rights that we have in a state of nature before the introduction of civil government, and all people have these rights equally. Just some old school thinking to feed your thoughts that left me wondering how it is then that we as a society have become the children of a mother (government) with Munchausen by Proxy Syndrome? Don’t ask me why this crap comes into my head at 2:00 in the morning or why I find it imperative to write it down to share with you thirteen hours later; it just does, and I just do.

Off to soak up the sunshine on my deck and to read something funny and light. Mr. Sedaris, I believe that means you and I have a date.