LIBERTY: Free to … … watch what you are told to watch!

Friday, May 26, 2006

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/business/271473_echostar25.html

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"Consumers are free to choose to read The New York Times, San Francisco Chronicle or any other newspaper regardless of where in the United States they live," EchoStar said in a statement. "Broadcasters successfully orchestrated passage of special-interest legislation which prohibits consumers from watching network channels originating in other markets."
***End Quote***

I have some first hand experience with this issue. Being half way between NYC and Philly, we "get" both channels over the air. But when you sign up with cable or satellite service, you can't get the Philly NBC affiliate. Now, it just so happened that a show that Frau Reinke wanted to watch on a regular basis was "on" in Philly but not NY. Too bad, Frau Reinke! Your government will dictate what you can and can not watch.

A plague on all their houses.

Copyright law is a joke. Law is a joke. Unfortuantely the joke is on us!

Where is the common sense? If I can get it from an antenna, then why can I get it off the bird or the wire?

That darn gang with the guns making me a serf! 


LIBERTY: The “war on poverty” and the “war on drugs” has had “some” unintended consequences!

Friday, May 26, 2006

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=50377

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I recently learned a shocking statistic. Before 1965, the year in which President Johnson launched his war-on-poverty government handout campaign, 82 percent of black American families were two-parent households. Today, 83 percent of all black children are born out of wedlock and grow up fatherless. This contributes to high crime, poverty, drug abuse and illegitimate births in the black community. What destroyed the black family? Without question, the home wrecker is liberalism. 

***End Quote***

No question that the "war on poverty" and the "war on drugs" has had "some" unintended consequences. Although I'm sure there are conspiricy buffs out there who would claim it was all planned, I think it's just the UI in action! Time to end all these "wars" that do nothing for us but hurt us. imho


UK raises retirement age; Coming here soon?

Thursday, May 25, 2006

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/5015928.stm

Thursday, 25 May 2006, 11:39 GMT 12:39 UK
State pension age to rise to 68
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The state pension age is to rise to 68 from 2044, as part of government proposals to strengthen pension provision in the UK.

The link between the state pension and earnings will also be restored within the next Parliament, Pensions Secretary John Hutton said.

A new savings scheme will be set up with automatic enrolment for staff and compulsory employers' contributions. 
***End Quote***

Well the UK is addressing its Ponzi scheme. Soon it'll be "our" turn. What a joke. Chile can figure it out despite a huge illiteracy rate. BUT, Socialists won't give up on their impractical dreams without a fight.

How will you feel when they tell you the terms of the biggest "bet" of your life has changed?

If an insurance company or a bank did it, then all the execs would be off to prison. Politicians do it and they are lauded for making the "tough choices". See the politicians that made those promises are not around when the bill comes due. And the ones in office now say "We never said that"! And, we get left holding the bag.

And guess what's in the bag. Poop!

Don't even think about what all that "social security insurance" could be worth if it was just put in bank certificates of deposit. It's a sunk cost. The politicians have been taking the contributions and putting an iou in the "lockbox". Lockbox? What a joke!  

Poof, there goes your retirement, sucker! 


a spurious battle against an abstract noun … “war on drugs”

Tuesday, May 23, 2006

http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig7/floyd4.html

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The main engine of this mass incarceration has been the 35-year "war on drugs": a spurious battle against an abstract noun that provides an endless fount of profits, payoffs and power for the politically connected while only worsening the problem it purports to address – just like the "war on terror." The "war on drugs" has in fact been the most effective assault on an underclass since Stalin's campaign against the kulaks. 

***End Quote***

Well, I think we demonstrated the failure of yet another gummamint program.

Unless we don't understand that the "true purpose" of any gummamint program is to give more power to Father State and to get the serfs (what would you call people who have more than half of their earnings stolen by the ruling class?) to run to Mommy Government crying for "protection".

Interesting that the rate of addiction appears to be pretty consistent across human history. Interesting that we have given Father State our tacit approval to "discipline" ourselves. Like we couldn't decide what was in our own best interest. Clearly we didn't learn anything with the national experiment with Prohibition.

And, when it comes right down to destroying "drugs", the FDA has doen a fine job of making drugs expensive, unavailable, and dangerous. ("Dangerous" in that, unless the drug is SO SAFE as to be virtually worthless, it has zero chance of getting thru the regulatory process.) Like you and your doctor are too dumb to figure out what you need? And, the FDA has created a corporate protection welfare scheme that the big drug makers couldn't have created without the gummmint's help.

Note to self, when elected President: (1) End the unconstitutional wars (i.e., drugs, Iraq, Afghanistan, porn, etc. etc. etc. etc.); (2) Pardon all non-violent drug offenders; (3) Close the FDA; (4) Cut the Federal budget and taxes by the amount of the FDA; AND (5) Propose Constitutional Amendment forbidding Federalization of anything based on the mythical interpretation of the "commerce" or "general welfare" clauses.

Shouldn't the Federal Government restrict all of its "doings" to the fifty States? That's its constituents. Why should they interact with individual citizens? The Dead Old White Guys missed an opportunity to put another chain on the beast! Hard for them to imagine how stupid we could be. I can hear the conversation now "Tom (Jefferson), do you think we need to jot down that the Federal Government can't directly legislate to other than the fifty States? Nah, James (Madison), nobody would listen to them anyway. Like that restricting the general welfare clause you were talking about, we can save some ink because nobody would ever think of having everything run form New York (the original capitol)!" Yup, they must be stunned at what a mess we have made of it.


Mayor Bloomberg’s ridiculous ban on cell phones in New York City public schools

Monday, May 22, 2006

http://gearlog.com/blogs/gearlog/archive/2006/05/22/12456.aspx

posted on Monday, May 22, 2006 4:27 PM
When a Cell Phone is Like a Gun
***Begin Quote***

It is pretty safe to assume that as a gadget-lovin' Gearlogger I am going to come down against Mayor Bloomberg's ridiculous ban on cell phones in New York City public schools, but as a step-father with an 11-year-old riding the city bus to school, my opposition borders on outrage. The ban itself has been around a long time (1987, I think), but it has always been enforced with an appropriate amount of laxness. Show it, you lose it. Evidently, that wasn't good enough. Now kids are being patted down for telecommunication devices. Why? According to the Gotham Gazette:

Klein and Bloomberg say cell phones make it easier for kids to cheat on tests, take pictures in locker room and bathrooms, arrange drug deals or call in reinforcements for schoolyard fights. In a radio address, the mayor likened cell phones to guns and knives.

***End Quote***

Well, if you send your child to the gummamint reeducation camps, then why would you be surprised when they are treated like prisioners?

If they can't keep drugs and weapons out of their prisons and skoolz, then you don't have to worry. The lawless will have guns, drugs, AND cell phones.

The socialists didn't learn their lessons from the old Soviet Union. Government can't run "education" any more than it can do anything else.

As the boys at Free Talk Live (http://www.freetalklive.com) ask all the time: "Name ONE government program that works?" Haven't heard one yet.

So I'll sign your petition for all the good that it will do. 


Make a rule. Go ahead I dare you. Now if these guys would apply it to the IRS!

Sunday, May 21, 2006

http://www.start.com.my/blog/maximizing-your-roi-at-pizza-hut/

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Interesting story on how a group of Taiwanese students got together and circumvented the "One salad" rule at pizza hut.
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The pizza at Pizza Hut ain't bad but the universally bad service means it is low on the list. I haven't been there in eons and never heard of the one trip rule. 

These fellows should show us how to do it to the IRS!

The casinos in Vegas and AC better hope that this doens't become popular with the Senior Citizen circuit. While not as good as this, they can do a fair imitation of it. It looks like their last meal or that the food was gonna run out.


Iran inching closer to genocide.

Saturday, May 20, 2006

http://newsbusters.org/node/5436

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A number of Canadian news websites are reporting that the Iranian parliament passed a law this week requiring non-Muslims in the country to wear certain insignia identifying them as such (hat tip to Drudge). As reported by Canada’s National Post: “Human rights groups are raising alarms over a new law passed by the Iranian parliament that would require the country's Jews and Christians to wear coloured badges to identify them and other religious minorities as non-Muslims.” The article continued: “‘This is reminiscent of the Holocaust,’ said Rabbi Marvin Hier, the dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles. ‘Iran is moving closer and closer to the ideology of the Nazis.’" 

***End Quote***

The nut in charge of Iran already denied the Holocaust . Anytime government starts to "identify" its people you have to think GENOCIDE! If one was in Iran, near Iran, or even know an Iranian, then you have to be concerned. I KNEW an elderly Jewish lawyer who escaped Germany when he saw the trend. He was unable to convince his best friends, his family elders, or his friends in his community. They were all wiped out. Some of his friends were Catholic, Christian, Agnostics, or Anything. When the genocide begins, it doesn't matter what you are. You're grist for the mill. Only government can kill in numbers that are worse than a natural disaster. Pop over to http://www.jpfo.org/faq.htm#faq14 and read Paul Harvey's list of atrocities. I'd expect Iran to be next on the list.


Only a old exGI could call the National Guard to the border what it is “political theater”!

Saturday, May 20, 2006

http://www.lewrockwell.com/reese/reese281.html

Guarding the Border
by Charley Reese
***Begin Quote***

Using the National Guard for players in this political theater shows you that the president never thinks a moment about the plight of regular Americans. Young men and women join the National Guard willing to serve their country in an emergency. Our leaky borders are not an emergency. They've been leaking for the past decade. For six years, Bush has ignored this problem. The only emergency is the collapse of Bush's popularity and the Republican Party's fear that it might lose control of Congress this fall. 

*** AND *** 

But overseas personnel are just a drop in the bucket from which the president can draw his 6,000 men for the border. Excluding the National Guard and Reserves, he has 1.4 million full-time active-duty military personnel, and all of them not in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are doing housekeeping chores and running training missions at home and abroad. That's what armies do in peacetime. 

***End Quote***

Only a vet understands how the politicians abuse, overuse, misuse, and turn our military into props. That's on both sides of the duopoly — R and D — D or R — Blue or Red — Red or Blue. There's no difference! Bad polls? Rush the guard to the borders. Impeachment? Bomb an asprin factory. Everytime a Washington president needs to distract, disrupt, or mislead, they use the military to distract us. 

BRING ALL THE TROOPS HOME NOW! FROM EVERYWHERE! NO DELAYS! NO EXCUSES!
Everone is on their own.  We're not the world's policemen. We have our own problems.


Americans today should free “its children” by separating education and state!

Saturday, May 20, 2006

http://www.lewrockwell.com/hornberger/hornberger86.html

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What is amazing is that after so many years of government involvement in education, with all its dismal results, so few people ask basic and fundamental questions about the education of their children, such as:

  • Why shouldn’t families have the same sovereign and independent control over the education of their children as they have over religious matters?
  • Given that the free market produces the best of everything and socialism produces the worst of everything, why are people willing to submit their children to a second-rate product in an area as important as education?
  • Why should providing education to people be considered a legitimate function of government?

***End Quote***

It's all about socialism. Centralized state planning has put us in the mess we are in. The skoolz resemble the state's prisions. Money is wasted; sometimes it's lost, stolen, or misappropriated. Results are a joke.

Here in the People's Republik of New Jersey, we have litany of problems. Here's a few of my personal favorites:

  • Schools are "financed" by property taxes. Regardless, if one has any children, everyone is "assessed" to pay for the gummamint reeducation camps. Too bad if you're a senior living in the same house for 70 years and now on a fixed income, time for you to move to a different state. Too bad if you have multiple properties, you're too rich.
  • Schools are run by the gummamint, teaching the gummamint religion (i.e., Conserve Mother Earth like good little druids and honor the all wise State from whom all benefits flow), and dumbing down the population. I particularly like how the brag on their "achievements" (i.e., number of students going to college) but never mention their failures (i.e., GEDs) and figure out ways to "cook the books". Of course, this is all done for MY benefit (i.e., Good schools mean that people will want to move here and buy your house at a big profit. Ignoring the fact that I have to live somewhere!) by "selfless public servants". Silly me!
  • There is a Political – Educrat – Servicing conspiracy at work as a positive feedback loop. Politicians "save the children" with programs. The Board of Education, School Administrators, Teachers, and Unions all campaign for more money. Custodians, Builders, Service Providers all have lucrative contracts. The School Administrators, Teachers, Unions, Custodians, Builders, and Service Providers contribute to the Politicians with money, labor, and "needs". Politicians raise taxed to "save the children" with new programs. And on and on.

So we have to break the cycle. 

I don't pay to feed, clothe, or entertain your children. Why should I pay to "educate" them?

And, if I do have to pay, which I don't think is fair, why do I have to do it with government?

Could it be that you could not "convince" me to pay for it without the force of government to make me.

Remember the hallmark of a bad idea is that you can't convince people to do it voluntarily.

(I think somebody smart said that, but I don't know who. Do you?) 


llegals granted Social Security?

Friday, May 19, 2006

http://www.washtimes.com/national/20060518-114132-2456r.htm

llegals granted Social Security
By Charles Hurt
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
May 19, 2006

***Begin Quote***

The Senate voted yesterday to allow illegal aliens to collect Social Security benefits based on past illegal employment — even if the job was obtained through forged or stolen documents.  

***End Quote***

Another socialist idea bites the dust. Think "Social Security Insurance", Medicare, and its ilk are broke now. Wait until everybody starts to draw.

Seems to me like we need to end the Ponzi scheme NOW!

Those already collecting continue paid by taxes. Those not yet collecting get a Treasury "Recognition Bond" dated for when they will retire. Those that are not yet in the system are on their own. 

José Piñera did it in Chile. 

http://www.socialsecurity.org/pubs/articles/12-13-04.html

***Begin Quote***

A defined-benefit system is not only hostage to demographic trends, it also has a fatal flaw: it destroys the link between individual contributions and benefits, or, in other words, between personal effort and reward. 

***End Quote***

You think that is harsh? Just remember that when the Titanic went down more First Class Men were saved than Third Class children. It's a tough world out there. Survival of the fitest. We make things harder on ourselves than it has to be when we delude ourselves into thinking Mommy Government will take care of us or Father State will protect us. Want to be secure in your old age? Save your own gold coins. What protection? Protect yourself and your neighbors.

Anything else is delusional! 

We need to get out from under the Socialist Ponzi scheme deliberately misnamed "Social Security Insurance" before it sinks us as a people.