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Internet debates

Sometimes, you're wrong.

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More expensive and more expansive

Every government program will be more expensive and more expansive than anything you had in mind when you proposed it. It will be applied in all sorts of ways you never dreamed of.
     — Harry Browne, Principles of Government
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Misused

Power will always be misused. Give good people the power to do good and that power eventually will be in the hands of bad people to do bad.
     — Harry Browne, Principles of Government
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Does not work

Government doesn't work. Because government is force, because government programs are designed to enrich the politically powerful, because you can't control government and make it do what's right, because every new government program soon wanders from its original purpose, and because politicians eventually misuse the power you give them, it is inevitable that no government program will deliver on the promises the politicians make for it.
     — Harry Browne, Principles of Government
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Friday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Limits

Government must be subject to absolute limits. Because politicians have every incentive to expand government, and with it their power, there must be absolute limits on government.
     — Harry Browne, Principles of Government
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Thursday roundup

United Apologizes To Passenger Booted For Congresswoman

also Sheila Jackson Lee’s Long History Of Being An Entitled ‘Queen’

Half of America thinks we’re making it up

And they are not wrong

UK Muslim No-Go Zones ‘Heading Toward Disaster,’ Non-Muslims Scared, Businesses Stoned

Radical Islam is a cancer and still remain so until other Muslims take a stand.

Homeland Security’s Multibillion Dollar Comedy Show

This agency never should have been created

10 times the intel community violated the trust of US citizens, lawmakers and allies

In the words of Claire Wolfe, "Only ten?"

Freedom Necessarily Includes the Freedom to Act Self-Destructively

Don Boudreaux answers his mail.

#MeToo Is Turning Into a Witch-Hunt

What happens when the radical feminists destroy their own goals?

Why Does Blow-Drying Hair in Arizona Require 1,000 Hours of Training?

Occupational licensing has become a bane on American society

Collision with Reality: What Depth Psychology Can Tell us About Victimhood Culture

I despise the politics of victimhood. This goes a long way to describing it.

Sen. Ron Wyden cosponsors bill to legalize marijuana across U.S.

It's amazing to me that marijuana is considered more dangerous than alcohol, despite all evidence to the contrary

H.R. 38: Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act of 2017

A Federal law for gun freedom?

Roy Moore files lawsuit to block Alabama Senate result

Back in 2000, I blasted Al Gore for demanding the courts intervene. Here is a result.

Another Arctic blast poised to usher in 2018

But, but it's global warming climate change…

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Wednesday roundup

The Government Loves to Make Us All Criminals

When the ordinary becomes illegal

Chicago Police Union Trying To Stop New Use-of-Force Policies

Police power beyond constraint

Electric bike crackdown spurs delivery worker concern

"Electric bikes are illegal to operate on city streets and those at the top of the food chain need to be held accountable."

Regulator tells Vermont hospital to dial back surgeries, revenue

“That's a problem for the Green Mountain Care Board, which has come down on Copley for making too much money and doing too many surgeries. Copley's success is seen as a violation of the Board's master plan for managing health care costs in the state.”

Using the Blockchain to Fight Corruption

A promising approach to fight election fraud

ONE-THIRD Of U.S. Homicide Spike Coming From 5 Chicago Neighborhood

Conservatives would point out that Chicago is a victim of liberal polices.

"Wealth Effect" = Widening Wealth Inequality

Not sure I agree, but worth thinking about

Words We Didn't Hear

Interesting

President Trump Cuts Funding to UN After Israel Vote

Actions have consequences> Or at least they should.

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NeoNotes - Real religion

Pardon, I don't think anyone is capable of judging what is and is not a "real" religion. I can't tell you how many times certain Christians have told me that my faith isn't real.

Pauline Christianity is something completely different that what Yeshua Ben Yosef preached. Gnostic Christianity is something completely different yet again. Which is true? Who knows? Who am I to judge what happens between someone else and the Divine?

I think these are the wrong questions. Christians are much nicer when they aren't the only game around. From what little I've seen, the same applies to Muslims.

I think what matters is how we treat others, especially others who do not share our faith and culture. Ramming it down other's throat by force will cause resentment. That's where some monotheists go wrong. It's not that they have the True Faith™, its that no other faith can be allowed. Because of their Greater Understanding and enlightenment, they can break society's rule for the Greater Good. Thou shalt not dissent.

Climate change alarmists stole the game lock, stock, and barrel. It's common for some of the radical feminists too. If anything, I think it indicates a weakness in the argument. Their faith isn't strong enough, they can't convince others, so it must be forced.

Getting back to Christianity, how much would history have changed if Constantine hadn't made it the state faith? How would it have developed if it had stayed one faith among many? How much of the Official® was really about politics and controlling the populace?

Could it be that control is really the issue?
NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.

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Tuesday roundup

Israel to formally announce intent to leave UNESCO

Although I am not a blind supporter of Israel, there is no other nation that has been vilified for so little reason.

University of Minnesota Retracts Restrictions on Christmas Decorations

“In a memo sent by the University of Minnesota earlier this month, staff was told that Santa and Christmas tree decorations were “not appropriate” for campus buildings.”

Santa Calls It Quits

Parody

Cities, volunteers clash over feeding homeless in public

It's not charity unless it's Officially Approved

How Opaque Healthcare Pricing Mechanisms Rip Off Consumers

Or How Government Conspires to Keep Medical Costs High

Wrong-footing the NYPD

Going through the motions without fixing the problems

Christmas 2017: Why I'm Hopeful



Who Regulates Bitcoin Trading? No U.S. Agency Has Jurisdiction

No regulation is not necessarily a bad thing

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Offensive

People get offended by different things, but just because something offends you, doesn't mean the whole world has to change to accommodate you, so I would say please be more tolerant.
     — Mark Wivell, Family asked to remove 'offensive' Jesus sign from their Christmas display because it offended a neighbour
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Jesus is offensive

Family asked to remove 'offensive' Jesus sign from their Christmas display because it offended a neighbour

A family has been asked to take down a sign with the name “Jesus” from their Christmas display, after a neighbour reportedly claimed it was offensive.

Mark and Lynn Wivell said their homeowner’s association had made the request after they put up the display outside their home in Adams County, Pennsylvania.

"As part of our Christmas decoration, we would display the name Jesus to point out to everyone that we in this family believe that the reason for the season is to celebrate the birth of Jesus," Mr Wivell told the FOX43 news channel.
     — Henry Austin
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A good man

Good men don’t need rules. Today is not the day to find out why I have so many.
     — The Doctor, A Good Man Goes to War
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Cutting taxes only makes the problem worse

Cutting taxes only makes the problem worse unless they cut spending.

Personally I don't think Congress should get paid unless they bring spending in under income. I'm also in favor of liens against their homes and seizing their bank accounts.
     — NeoWayland

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Keeping the public safe

“Why legal guns can’t be banned from (Delaware) state parks”

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No roundup for the next few days

Although I do not celebrate Christmas, this will be the last headline roundup until Tuesday. It's almost impossible to find interesting news stories this close to the holiday.
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Friday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Rebuke

U.N. Vote Rebukes U.S. for Jerusalem Move

The United Nations General Assembly voted overwhelmingly Thursday for a resolution effectively rebuking U.S. President Donald Trump for recognizing the disputed city of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and pledging to move the U.S. embassy there.

The vote came despite threats by Mr. Trump and U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley that the U.S. would take punitive measures, such as reducing foreign aid and cutting contributions to the U.N., against countries voting in favor of the resolution.

The General Assembly resolution didn’t explicitly refer to the U.S., instead asserting that unilateral decisions such as Mr. Trump’s have no legal effect and must be rescinded. In the vote, 128 countries voted in favor and 9 against, with 35 abstaining.

“We will remember [the vote], when so many countries come calling on us to pay even more and to use our influence to their benefit,” Ms. Haley said during the General Assembly debate, adding the emergency meeting and the vote were signs of disrespect toward the U.S. for exercising its sovereignty by deciding to move its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. She said the vote wouldn’t affect Mr. Trump’s decision.
     — Farnaz Fassihi

So let's talk about this.

The UN has absolutely no power to interfere with the internal affairs of any member nation.

In the past, the UN has meddled for "humanitarian reasons" or to prevent greater violence. That hasn't worked out well at all.

Most of the money and most of the military might of the UN comes from the United States. Overwhelmingly so. If the US decided to take it's toys and go home, not only would the UN have to move, but it's ability to act would be less than a fifth of what it is now.

Since it's founding, the UN has tried to steer the World towards one world government. American elites have pursued globalization along the lines of the European Union. But centralized unaccountable bureaucracies seldom work. That in turn leads to more government, more technocrats, and even less accountability. For the last thirty years, globalization has be the goal.

Trump is going to disrupt things.
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Moral absolute

Every moral absolute I’ve ever encountered depends on cultural or religious assumptions that probably aren’t shared by all people present.
     — NeoWayland
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Thursday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Principles of Government

Standard Approved Government Solution

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What a piece of work is a man!

What a piece of work is a man! How noble in reason! How infinite in faculties! In form and moving, how express and admirable! In action, how like an angel! In apprehension, how like a God.
     — William Shakespeare
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Adversity toughens manhood

Adversity toughens manhood, and the characteristic of the good or the great man is not that he has been exempt from the evils of life, but that he has surmounted them.
     — Patrick Henry
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A man must become

A woman simply is, but a man must become. Masculinity is risky and elusive. It is achieved by a revolt from woman, and it confirmed only by other men. Manhood coerced into sensitivity is no manhood at all.
     — Camille Paglia
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Stand true

Stand true to your calling to be a man. Real women will always be relieved and grateful when men are willing to be men.
     — Elisabeth Elliott
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Power to abuse

The problem isn't the abuse of power; it's the power to abuse.
     — Michael Cloud
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Giving back

Tea Company Exchanges Fair Trade Status For Giving Back Directly to their Farmers

Tiesta Tea’s co-founders and marketing director just got back from installing a water well for our company’s hibiscus farmers in Nigeria.

Words can hardly describe the feeling of seeing thousands of villagers so genuinely happy to receive one of life’s basic necessities: water. Giving back directly to that community made a life-changing impact, not only for our farmers, but on our entire company.

To summarize our experience, we defied the US travel recommendations and traveled to northern Nigeria (Kano and Jigawa states), an area known for unrest and harsh conditions. With the Boko Haram activity in the region, we knew this would be a risky journey.

Our visas were denied through the typical US process. Driven by our determination to give back, however, we had to work with the Nigerian government directly to receive a visa upon arrival.

As a loose leaf tea company, we get all of our hibiscus from farmers in Jigawa, Nigeria, who produce the best hibiscus in the world. Nigeria is one of the few countries that can produce hibiscus because of the hot, dry climate required to grow it.

Learning that women and children spend up to 5 hours every day walking 2-3km to collect water to use for cooking, cleaning, and drinking, we recognized the opportunity to give back to our hibiscus farmers.
     — Rachel Heinzinger
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Wednesday roundup

Can States Reimpose Net Neutrality?

More importantly, should they? Net neutrality is about something that might happen, not something that has happened. And once government starts regulating, existing firms are protected and new competition is discouraged.

Trump and the NFL Agree: Taxpayers Should Keep Subsidizing Stadiums

The stadium scam is one of the biggest boondoggles ever allowed in America

Rebuilding America First

Major priority shifts

Un-Merry Christmas: The Perverse Incentives to Over-Consume and Over-Spend

If you have enough, why do you need the Brand New Model?

How Activists Took Control of a University: The Case Study of Evergreen State

Social justice displaces education

Massachusetts Adopted Common Core – and It’s Beginning to Show

Another case of education taking a back seat to social objectives.

Would More Infrastructure Spending Have Stopped Yesterday's Derailment?

Politicos still aren't answering the big question. Is mass transit cost effective?

Ben Carson Admits War on Drugs Conflicts with War on Poverty

Major opinion change from the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development.

Matt Damon faces backlash for latest sexual harassment comments

"We're in this watershed moment, and it's great, but I think one thing that's not being talked about is... the preponderance of men I've worked with who don't do this kind of thing."

Dictionaries as Propaganda Tools

Gods, enough of the social justice activism and toxic politics corrupting everything

Swedish Police Warn Rapes ‘Worst They Have Seen in 35 Years’

It's not the native born Swedes who are raping women

German Jews Told To Hide Jewish Symbols To Avoid Attacks By Muslim Migrants…

The first duty of government is to protect citizens. So where are the police and other authorities?

Hillary Clinton campaign, DNC accused of 'corrupt' money scheme in new FEC complaint

The corruption just keeps on coming

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Duty

Duty is the essence of manhood.
     — George Patton
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Lesson taught

The lesson taught at this point by human experience is simply this, that the men who will get up will be helped up; and the man who will not get up will be allowed to stay down. Personal independence is a virtue and it is the soul out of which comes the sturdiest manhood. But there can be no independence without a large share of self-dependence, and this virtue cannot be bestowed. It must be developed from within.
     — Frederick Douglass
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Iron qualities

We need the iron qualities that go with true manhood. We need the positive virtues of resolution, of courage, of indomitable will, of power to do without shirking the rough work that must always be done.
     — Theodore Roosevelt
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“STOP. SEXUALIZING. CHILDREN.”

“This video looks at the concerning trend toward the sexualization of children through shows like Big Mouth, provocative toys like Bratz, and the dangers of advocating acceptance of attraction to children.”

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Tuesday roundup

The Big Con: The Truth Behind Net Neutrality and Why the Sky Is Not Falling

“Net neutrality was the government’s response to an actual problem. As usual, their response ignored the problem completely.”

The Modern Art Of Pervs

Changing mores and the sexualization of children

The secret backstory of how Obama let Hezbollah off the hook

“How Hezbollah turned to trafficking cocaine and laundering money through used cars to finance its expansion.” So Obama let them break the law. I don't agree with the War on Drugs, but the President should uphold the law.

CDC director says there are ‘no banned words’ at the agency

Well, I fell for this one too. I should know by now that the really bad stuff about Trump seldom turns out true. Also No, the CDC did not ban a list of words

Since Feeding the Homeless is Now Illegal, A Group Carried AR15s to Give Out Food—It Worked

Unsanctioned, unofficial charity.

The Other Tech Bubble

The ugliness behind the startup culture.

In Legalizing Marijuana, Uruguay Trips over the Dollar, US Laws, and Global Banks

or “Why Drug Lords Love the Patriot Act.”

3 Reasons Millennials Should Consider Ditching Karl Marx for Ayn Rand

“Karl Marx doesn’t align with what’s important to Millennials.”

Jedi Mind Trick: The Disturbing, Destabilizing Abnormal Is Now Normal

Change means disrupting the system. And there's plenty of disruption.

Is Your Cell Phone Protected by the Constitution?

The Supreme Court will decide, and it doesn't look good.

‘We Made This (Harassment) Law Up From The Beginning And Now We’ve Won’

Deliberately screwing up society.

Comey Should Be Indicted

It was obvious months ago, but now it's a given. It won't happen though. Indicting Comey is one step closer to HRC. And indicting HRC is one step closer to Barack Obama.

Right Wing Extremism vs. Islamic Extremism in the United States: A Look at the Numbers

Debunking the claim that most terrorism in the US is carried out by the right wing.

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Way of the superior man

The way of a superior man is three-fold: virtuous, he is free from anxieties; wise, he is free from perplexities; bold, he is free from fear.
     — Confucius
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Truth and manliness

Private and public life are subject to the same rules—truth and manliness are two qualities that will carry you through this world much better than policy or tact of expediency or other words that were devised to conceal a deviation from a straight line.
     — Robert E. Lee
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Share a photograph

“Marine's wife finds way to include deployed husband in touching Christmas card”

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Monday roundup

Trump to remove ‘climate change’ as a national security threat

It never was a threat. It was an excuse to divert money and resources to a religious cause. Yes, the climate alarmists are a religion. Right down to treating dissenters as heretics.

Miami pulls the plug on its red light camera program

Too many cities have leveraged red light cameras into a revenue source and manipulated the light timing to maximize revenue.

Donald Trump, Lying, and Eroding Social Trust

Good questions. Presidents and politicos lie, it's what they do. The problems is believing one flavor is better than the other.

States Fight Calif. and Mass. over Meddlesome Livestock Law

Why should one state control how farming occurs in another?

Navajo Nation sues Wells Fargo in fake-account scandal

“Vulnerable” needs some explaining. There are cultural assumptions that the Diné have that most of the U.S. doesn't. This puts them at a disadvantage when it comes to legal issues.

‘Internet Service Providers Should Not Be Able To Decide What People Can See Online,’ Says Man Who Decides What People Can See Online

Mark Zuckerberg is a hypocrite.

The #MeToo Movement Is Destroying Trust Between Men And Women

“Demonizing Men Undermines Both Sexes”

Judicial Watch President: "Forget Mueller," The Real Question Is "Do We Need To Shut Down The FBI?"

The Bureau is compromised.

Democrats Can Weaponize the Sexual Assault Allegations Against Trump

It won't work. Trump is better at this game than the press or his political opponents. He won't go quietly when allegations are in the air.

Masterpiece Cakeshop: Are We Free To Disagree?

This nuance is important and often misreported in the media. Jack serves all customers; he does not want to be forced to create all messages.

UN Security Council weighs resolution saying Jerusalem decisions are void

Yeah. The UN has no authority in the affairs between two nations or in the internal affairs of any nation. Nor does the US. Nor should they.

CA Dems Proposing Spending $1 Billion Giving Health Care To Illegal Immigrants

As long as CA pays and not the rest of the country, I've no problem. But they will find a way to shift the costs, just watch.

Trump administration forbids CDC officials from using 7 words and phrases

I'm torn on this one. On the one hand, I don't think the administration should be banning words. On the other hand, I've seen some of the nonsense coming out of the CDC in the last few years.

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In time for Christmas

Funny how that only works if there is a liberal President

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Unhappy

No man is more unhappy than he who never faces adversity, for he is not permitted to prove himself.
     — Seneca
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We do not admire

We do not admire the man of timid peace. We admire the man who embodies victorious effort; the man who never wrongs his neighbor, who is prompt to help a friend, but who has those virile qualities necessary to win in the stern strife of actual life.
     — Theodore Roosevelt
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Money and power

Giving money and power to politicians is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys.
     — P.J. O'Rourke
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Strongest argument for socialism

The strongest argument for socialism is that it sounds good. The strongest argument against socialism is that it doesn't work. But those who live by words will always have a soft spot in their hearts for socialism because it sounds so good.
     — Thomas Sowell
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What we obtain too cheap

What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as freedom should not be highly rated.
     — Thomas Paine
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Does what he must

A man does what he must – in spite of personal consequences, in spite of obstacles and dangers and pressures – and that is the basis of all human morality.
     — Winston Churchill
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Friendship

Demonstrating that certain modern liberals don't understand economics

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Weekend roundup

How Using Eminent Domain to Seize Land for a Border Wall Harms American Property Owners

Your property rights are gone. Also National Butterfly Center Founder: Trump’s Border Wall Prep ‘Trampling on Private Property Rights’

How you can be tracked even with your GPS turned off

Why wouldn't you want to be tracked, Citizen? Are you doing something wrong?

Feds moving quickly to cash in on seized bitcoin, now worth $8.4 million

Seized from a "suspected" Dark Web dealer. Not convicted, but "suspected"

Federal Labor Board Reverses Bad Decision that Made Corporations Responsible for Franchise Decisions

If it's the franchisee that cut's the employee's paycheck, then the franchiser has no responsibility. This was a cash grab pure and simple.

Harlem Shook: Google Is Using Its Immense Power To Censor Content That Doesn’t Fit Its Political Goals. Everyone In America Should Be Concerned About That

For all the talk about net neutrality, it's the service providers who are the real censors. Why is Google filtering results? Why is Facebook manipulating your feed and tracking down everyone you may have talked to since the sixth grade? Why is Twitter monitoring the non-Twitter online activity of it's verified members? If you are not paying for a product, you are the product.

Don’t Blame Big Cable. It’s Local Governments That Choke Broadband Competition

And oldie but still accurate

The Warlock Hunt

#MeToo will destroy everyone, women and men. That's what happens when you raise table stakes.

Big Brother Installing Surveillance Cameras in Places of Worship

Two simple questions. Will surveillance cameras make parishioners safer? How long until an Authority Figure™ decides to monitor the cameras to make sure the worshipers are doing things "correctly?"

Bitcoin futures are about to get another big boost

“TD Ameritrade, the largest futures operation of any online brokerage, is going to allow bitcoin futures trading on its platform starting Monday.” The Federal Reserve is about to get competition.

Residents Outraged as DHS Spraying Town With Chemicals—Using Them as Human Guinea Pigs

Did anyone bother asking the residents what they thought?

Is climate change REALLY the culprit causing California’s wildfires?

More claims without proof

Court Rules Plastic Flamingos Okay But Growing Vegetables in Front Yard Is ILLEGAL

“That’s what government does – interferes in people’s lives.”

Watch: Police body cam of innocent woman clamped in K-9’s jaws. She’s suing.

Even if she wins, the cop won't pay. In many states sovereign immunity and qualified immunity "protect" police officers, even fi the actions of the police are illegal.

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≠ Day To End Violence Against Sex Workers

End Violence, Not Demand

anniversary of the 17Dec2003 sentencing of the Green River Killer

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The free market is more free

What does it say about Bill Maer? - updated

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244th anniversary of the Boston Tea Party

“The Tea Act: The Catalyst of the Boston Tea Party”

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Walk towards the fire

Walk toward the fire. Don’t worry about what they call you. All those things are said against you because they want to stop you in your tracks. But if you keep going, you’re sending a message to people who are rooting for you, who are agreeing with you. The message is that they can do it, too.
     — Andrew Breitbart
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Anything at all

If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.
This is bar none my favorite picture version of this George Orwell quote. The guy's expression sells it. He didn't expect it, and now he has to think about it.

And yes, it influenced me. It's probably my favorite Orwell quote.

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Bill of Rights Day

You should know these rights. You should defend these rights.

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Utopia

If you want to find utopia, take a sharp right on money and a sharp left on sex and it's straight ahead.
     — Penn Jillette

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My mother was amazing

I'm not allowed to share her story while she still lives, but my mother was amazing. While other women were complaining and expecting someone to save them from Terrible Injustice, Mom faced down the obstacles and changed things. Not by protesting, but by quietly demanding the same respect she gave. I learned the aunts and grandmothers theory of history by watching her. She's retired now (for the fifth time) and I am now her caregiver. I'm still terribly proud of her.
     — NeoWayland
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Friday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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NeoNote — Achievement

Odd tactic from the Grand and Glorious Imperious Leader

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“I am an American and a Patriot”

I am an American and a Patriot. I am my country's keeper. The President and Congress report to me. And so - I will stay informed and involved. Ignorance, apathy, and complacency are my enemy. I will make my voice heard and not just at election time. Silence is the same as consent in the face of oppression. I can make a difference. I matter.I am an American and a Patriot.

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“The pathetic legacy of feminism’s Women’s Liberation Movement”

Regular readers know that I've agreed and disagreed with Mrs. Bookworm before. She's one of my daily reads, and I am a semi-regular commenter at her site.

Well, she's done an excellent piece on The pathetic legacy of feminism’s Women’s Liberation Movement, Here's an excerpt.

The Women’s Liberation Movement, that bridge between Second and Third Wave feminism, might be summed up as follows: We are women and, with enough government programs, public service announcements, and Planned Parenthood outlets, we can eventually be invincible!

Except after forty years of this “you are woman, you are strong, you are invincible” yadda, yadda, yadda talk, the daily sex scandals are revealing that the whole empowerment thing has been a sham. It turns out that, when confronted with an unprincipled alpha male, women are weak. Women do not fight back when these brutes sexually bully, humiliate, or assault them. Women are victims not warriors.

The whole piece is worth your valuable time. And if you aren't a regular reader, give her a try. You may not always agree, but she does make you think.

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Forgive

How hate and debate came to a Connecticut mosque

The night of Nov. 14, 2015, was not the first time Ted Hakey, 50, went into his backyard in Meriden, Connecticut, and fired guns to let off some steam. It was the night after a deadly terror attack in Paris, and Hakey was furious.

So he shot his Springfield Armory M1A .308-caliber rifle into the air. Some of those shots hit the Baitul Aman Mosque next door. Luckily, no one was in the building at the time.

“I wanted to scare ’em, but the shots that hit were never supposed to hit,” says Hakey, who admits he harbored significant hate for Muslims back then. His Facebook posts reflect that well enough.

Prosecutors used some of those posts to build their case against him. The shooting got him six months in jail on federal hate crime charges, but leaders of the mosque argued he should be forgiven and not even serve jail time. Dr. Mohammed Qureshi, the mosque president, expressed this feeling to the judge at Hakey’s sentencing.

For 29-year-old Zahir Mannan, the criminal case was an opportunity to show Hakey and anyone else paying attention — which by then included the national media — what Islam is really about.
     — Arthur Nazaryan
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Thursday roundup

Thoughts before election day

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“Freedom to Discriminate? | Wedding Cakes vs. Liberty”

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Syncretism happens even if it offends

Faith and religion don't stay in the nice neat boxes and cabinets we make for them. Syncretism happens, even if it offends the True Believer™.
     — NeoWayland

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Government is not reason

Government is not reason, it is not eloquence — it is force. Like fire it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.
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We are not afraid

We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people.
     — John F. Kennedy

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Take away your liberty

You didn't think they were serious, did you?

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Wednesday roundup

U.S. not granting loan relief to defrauded students: inspector general

A good move I think

Treasury's Tax Reform Analysis Confirms Republicans Don't Give a Damn About the Deficit

Both major parties want to spend more than the government actually has. Not more than it should have, but more than it has.

You Won’t Be Surprised To Hear Who’s Behind Today’s Press Conference By Trump’s Accusers

If you go after Trump with anything less than the absolute truth, expect to fail.

Georgia Lawmaker Introduces Bill To Require Conviction for Asset Forfeiture

A major step. There are 14 other states that already require this.

It's Official: Bitcoin Surpasses "Tulip Mania", Is Now The Biggest Bubble In World History

I don't understand bitcoin. Either this is a really big bubble, or there is a desperate need for an unregulated currency.

So I Just Had An Interesting Email Exchange With The Special Counsel’s Press Office:

Glen Reynolds tries to find out if Lisa Page was involved in approving Peter Strzok’s warrant requests.

America's malls are rotting away

Another sign of the commercial real estate collapse

Alabama election: Democrats defeat Roy Moore, dealing huge blow to Donald Trump

Theocratic Republican defeated

Uber Price-Gouges Millennial Passenger $14,000 For 5-Mile Ride

Uber is a good idea with lousy execution

The FBI’s Perjury Trap of the Century

There was no collusion. The Obama administration spied on the Trump campaign..

Starving polar bears are the fake news face of climate change

Don't fall for it

TSA To Stop Taking Driver’s Licenses from 9 U.S. States

The Real ID legacy

Global Conflicts to Watch in 2018

“The U.S. is now the most unpredictable actor in the world today.”

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Concede the war

Works like a charm.

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“Stossel: The Fight Against Food Trucks”

“Protectionism at play? Politicians say food trucks are "unfair competition" for restaurants.”

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“I’m trying to bring some happiness to people…”

Man Spends Black Friday Paying For $10K Worth Of Toys For Local Kids

A New Jersey man spent this Black Friday putting together a great surprise for dozens of local families.

The man, identified only as Charlie K., told CBS 3 that he woke up Friday morning planning to shop for his son when a bright idea hit him. He went over to the Toys R Us store in the town of Cherry Hill, where he paid for orders that customers had put on layaway.

He wound up paying for more than 60 orders totaling over $10,000, according to WMUR.

“I’m trying to bring some happiness to people, to the community that brought happiness to me and my family,” he told CBS 3. “I love this community and I am trying to provide back to it.”

A Toys R Us spokeswoman confirmed the good deed.

“We love the heartwarming acts of one secret Santa who visited Toys R Us Cherry Hill this morning - Charlie K. paid off more than 62 Layaway orders totaling approximately $10,780,” the spokeswoman told NJ.com.

On top of that, Charlie K. also purchased an additional $2,000 worth of toys for Toys for Tots, a charity run by the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve that brings Christmas gifts to children whose parents can’t afford them.
     — Hilary Hanson
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They say

Conservatives say the government can't end poverty by force, but they believe it can use force to make people moral. Liberals say government can't make people be moral, but they believe it can end poverty. Neither group attempts to explain why government is so clumsy and destructive in one area but a paragon of efficiency and benevolence in the other.
     — Harry Browne
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Tuesday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Disturbing

What is especially disturbing about the political left is that they seem to have no sense of the tragedy of the human condition. Instead, they tend to see the problems of the world as due to other people not being as wise or as noble as themselves.
     — Thomas Sowell
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Force field cloak

This Glowing Blanket Is Designed to Ease Kids' Fear of the Dark

Many kids have a security blanket they bring to bed with them every night, but sometimes, a regular blankie is no match for the monsters that invade their imaginations once the lights are off. Now there’s a glow-in-the-dark blanket designed to make children feel safer in bed, no night light required.

Dubbed the Force Field Cloak, the fleece blanket comes in several colorful, glowing patterns that remain invisible during the day. At night, you leave the blanket under a bright light for about 10 minutes, then the shining design will reveal itself in the dark. The glow lasts 8 to 10 hours, just long enough to get a child through the night.
     — Michele Debczak
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Monday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Talkin' politics in 2017

tip of the hat to reddit/Libertarian
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Friday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Not rights at all

These older blog entries have been reformatted and entered into the current directories.

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NeoNotes — blame game

Great quote that's right on the money

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Thursday roundup

The toy manufacturer was caught by surprise at user's ingenuity

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Revived 06Dec2017

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A place to pray

It's for your own good!

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“Stossel: Deceitful Bias in The NY Times”

A new study blames global warming, but provides almost no information

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Wenesday roundup

Former Dem Congresswoman Sentenced To Five Years In Prison On Corruption Charges

She used both her Congressional membership and a charity.

This Company Will Bring Health Care To Your Door, On Demand

As Obamacare destroys the healthcare system, expect smart people finding ways to make it work

They Don't Give Any Advance Notice When They Change The Narrative

Scapegoating on a massive scale

Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg warns of a “Me Too” backlash against women at work

The backlash is inevitable. The question is how hard and how long.

Facebook Is Banning Women for Calling Men ‘Scum’

And the backlash begins…

12 states ask Supreme Court to block California egg law

This is long past due. California likes to use it's size and power to meddle in the internal affairs of other states. Almost like they learned it from the Federal government.

Judge Halts Indiana Town's Cruel Attempt to Fine Residents Out of their Properties

Not eminent domain, but almost as bad

Moore spokesman calls sex assault accusers ‘criminals’

I'm not surprised given Moore's history. The sex accusations without proof don't bother me. I'm seriously disturbed that a theocratic Republican with a history of ignoring court rulings is about to be elected to the United States Senate.

Can States Compel You to Bake a Cake Against Your Will? The Supreme Court Will Decide.

Most of the pagans and progressives I know think this is a slam dunk. But they don't like it when I ask if that means that the states can force you to do things that violate your beliefs.

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Unspoken fear

Those aren't union members on the picket line

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Destroyed their own brand

When the NFL players are on the field, that's not their time. They're being paid millions to play and put on a good show. That's millions by the fans in the stands and the viewers on TV. The NFL is selling a product, it's not something holy. If the fans and viewers don't like what they see, they will take their money elsewhere. And then where will the players be? Off the field on their own time, who cares what the players think? That's their time. Off the field, they have to prove their ideas just like anyone else. But when the players made their paid time political time, they destroyed their own brand.
     — NeoWayland
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Freedom and responsiblity

A few thoughts on the big summer films and declining box office revenues

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Tuesday roundup

Microsoft's new Chinese web portal censor's words like "freedom" and "democracy"

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The stack is still there

Older headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Charity vending machines

“LDS Church unveils charity vending machines on Temple Square”

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The Last Generator

“Man Who Gave The Last Generator To A Crying Stranger Gets A Free One From Lowe's”

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Molecular Robot

“Scientists Create World’s First ‘Molecular Robot’ Capable Of Building Molecules”

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Monday roundup

Congress has handed Trump a historic presidential victory

Appointing more judges than anytime in the last 40 years.

The next major battle over voting rights in America is based on a lie

Preventing voter fraud

Trevor Noah hits Warren: Native American claims are 'something problematic'

Sen. Elizabeth Warren manipulated the system into giving her more privilege

Have We Been Lied To About The Kate Steinle Case?

It's not so cut and dried. The defense argued it was an accident.

Cops Steal $91,800 From a Musician, Claiming He Gave It to Them

This is highway robbery, even if it did happen in modern day Wyoming.

Chicago’s Debt Dereliction

Chicago keeps playing games and faces insolvency

WATCH: Cops Kill Family’s Dog in Front of Kids, Force Dad to Cut Its Head Off Or Go To Jail

Another example of puppycide

The Last Thing A Suicidal (Or Any) Person Needs

“They’ve already called the cops more than 100 times on their users, with the best of intentions.”

Even a $1 million retirement nest egg isn't enough anymore

Part of this is inflation, but an out-of-control government is a close second

Feds Steal $1.74 Billion in Bitcoin, Kidnap Man for Life for Building Website that Used It

A tale of prohibition and government control

A must read: A Veneer of Certainty Stoking Climate Alarm

Without the alarm, they lose their moral and political power

Where the Government Fear-Porn Propaganda Industry is Headed

They need you afraid so you don't ask questions.

Ravens, NFL scramble as fans stay home

If a business doesn't give customers what they want, they go elsewhere.

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The stack abides

Flyers for Fairness stumps for a modernized ATC system

Because government can't get it done

Calls to punish skeptics rise with links to climate change, hurricanes

Because denying climate change AS THEY DEFINE IT should be a heresy punishable by law

A $150 Billion Misfire: How Disaster Models Got Irma Wrong

Golly gee wilikers Mr. Weatherman, you mean we can't perfectly predict disaster?

B.C. to parents: Please lock up your kids

Maybe government doesn't know better than parents

Blockchain Fix For Voter ID

This makes sense. Which is why the politicos oppose it.

A Hardware Privacy Monitor for iPhones

Because government can't keep your data safe

'I’ll Tell You One Goddamned Thing for Sure. I’m Not Staying at a Motel 6 From Now On.'

Seems this discount chain is a government informant

Legendary Mel Brooks: “Political correctness will be the death of comedy…”

He's right, and it's already showing.

Liberals sick of the alt-left are taking 'the red pill'

Perpetual victimhood can make you very tired

Trump Slams the Brakes on Self-Driving Cars

No regulation prevents innovation? First time I've seen that line.

Jimmy Kimmel Got a Hand From Chuck Schumer in His Fight Against Obamacare Repeal

There's no problem with speaking for the Democrat party AS LONG AS you tell people that is what you are doing

Federal government notifies 21 states of election hacking

Yep, the election was hacked. Just not by the people you've been told

Health Care Costs Are the Reason You're Not Getting a Raise: New at Reason

Some things come full circle. Employers started offering health insurance and other benefits because the government imposed salary caps.

UN solution for a pollution free planet: polluters should pick up the bill

Even the United Nations can be right sometimes

Stanford Study Finds Fake News Didn’t Tip Election Against Clinton

And the truth will set you FREE

Undercover cop, Air Force officer, med student among those police swept up during downtown protest

Leveling

Fool Me Twice: Trojan Horse Democrats Pile into the House of Single-Payer

Obamacare was never designed to provide healthcare. It was designed to screw healthcare up so badly so that people would demand massive permanent government intervention.

It Gets Ugly in Catalonia

Spain can't afford to let Catalonia go

How to Disappear an Activist (Or, Where IS Andy Ostrowski?)

What government can do if they don't like what you say

DiCaprio: History will ‘vilify’ Trump for not fighting climate change

When the facts don't stand up, make it a moral case.

Big Brother Walmart Tries to “Help” You: “It’s Like Magic”

They want access to your house so they can watch you and deliver things

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Celebrate

Celebrate your beliefs and cherish your faith. All I ask is the same. Just don't demand that my beliefs and actions are bound by yours. Live and let live.

What you believe isn't important to me. Your freedom to choose what to believe, that is vital. That is what I will defend.
     — NeoWayland, A Pagan looks at “Christian America”

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❝Are Human Rights Real? | Natural vs. Legal & Positive vs. Negative❞

“What are human rights? Are they universal? This video compares the definition of natural vs. legal rights, and positive vs. negative rights. Locke's Second Treatise of Government was a big inspiration to me in this video, so if you haven't read it yet, you definitely should :)”

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The stack returns

Older headlines that don't merit their own entry

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❝Senator Jon Tester Disparaging Tax Bill❞

“Senator Jon Tester Showing How He Received the Republican "Tax Reform" Bill Just Hours before the Late Night Vote was Scheduled and how it was marked up in a way that made it impossible to read/understand. Is this even legal?”

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NeoNotes — Bad purposes

There are two assumptions implicit in public accommodation laws. First is that there is a class of people who no matter what can never ever do things on their own. Second is that most people no matter what can never ever be trusted to do the right thing.

I think both assumptions are wrong.



Good law has been used for bad purposes since someone bothered to write down the law. The question you should ask is which is more important, freedom or misuse of the law?

It's my old friend, the parity test. If Christians can be barred from living their faith, what's to stop pagans from being barred from living theirs? Or atheists, Muslims, Buddhists, or any of a thousand others?

Just because someone does something you don't like doesn't mean that it should be illegal and that someone should be punished for it. I'd say that the guideline should be measurable harm to someone's person, liberty, and property. Hurting your feelings shouldn't qualify. I deal with the difference between mala in se and mala prohibita laws at my politics blog at www DOT paganvigil DOT com SLASH files SLASH RootsGovPower061204 DOT html.

Incidentally, the right of free association was one of the "understood" rights covered by the Tenth Amendment. After all, the U.S. had just fought a war over it.



Up until that time, it was one of the biggest wars about non-association ever fought.

Freedoms seldom clash with each other. Someone wanting to control others through religion isn't freedom, it's politics. Knowing the difference can be helpful.

I'm not responsible for how someone feels, especially since both the feelings and the standards used to justify those feelings change often. Measurable harm to someone's person, property, and liberty is one of the few objective standards we can agree on. A microaggression is what the victim says it is, and some things become microaggressions that weren't last week. It's privilege. I don't have time or energy to indulge it anymore.
NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.
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More from the stack

New Segregation Signs Pop Up in Leftist Establishments

Perpetuating racism in the name of freedom

Border Agents Seized American Citizen's Truck, Never Charged Him With A Crime

"You have no rights here"

The Senate Is Close To Undermining The Internet By Pretending To 'Protect' The Children

Justifying tyranny

We Didn't Normalize Trump. We Normalized the Left's Violence.

All other things being equal, the side that can't stand dissent is wrong.

Exclusive: US government wiretapped former Trump campaign chairman

So why isn't Obama called to account for this?

I moved from a blue state to a red state and it changed my life

"As I got to know my new Midwest home, I realize how living in a bubble and subscribing to the Middle America stereotypes is truly damaging to this country."

To Combat "Hate," Make Government Weaker

Worth thinking about

James Comey Tried to Discredit Trump’s Wiretapping Assertions That Proved True

Why isn't this man in jail?

Entire Volume of CIA Files On Lee Harvey Oswald, Set to Be Released in October, Has “Gone Missing”

Somebody is still hiding truth.

The Silencing of Dissent

A paranoid take that may be true

Trump: “Venezuela Has FAITHFULLY Implemented Socialism…” The UN Goes SILENT!

Trump is right on this

Hours After Hurricane Irma, Miami-Dade County Tickets Residents for Code Violations

You'd think there would be other priorities. You'd be wrong.

File a FOIA, Get Sued

Why do you want to know, Citizen?

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Not the honor you take with you

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Friday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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More clearing out the stack

Older headlines that don't merit their own entry

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❝I believe in Liberty for all men…❞

I believe in Liberty for all men: the space to stretch their arms and their souls, the right to breathe and the right to vote, the freedom to choose their friends, enjoy the sunshine, and ride on the railroads, uncursed by color; thinking, dreaming, working as they will in a kingdom of beauty and love.
     — W. E. B. Du Bois
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Thusday roundup

Just in case you wanted to know

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Clearing out the stack

Breaking the boundaries of civilization.

"I remember back in the early nineties when as a young man I started copping flack for polite acts of a gentlemanly nature."

Scientists have spiders producing enhanced web that can hold a human

All sorts of possibilities

Canada demands U.S. end ‘right to work’ laws as part of NAFTA talks

Not going to happen

Rex Murphy: 'Antifa' are despicable fascists — call them that, openly, now

Hiding violence behind a mask is cowardice

Antifa has a rapid response team that targets alt-right organizers

Not surprising

The United States of Manufactured Hysteria

Politicos WANT you to panic and not think things through

More than 5,000 out-of-state voters may have tipped New Hampshire against Trump

Potential voter fraud

NBC, AP Publish Article Saying Crooked Democrat Menendez on Trial in New Jersey Is a Republican

Except he isn't

U.S. Virgin Islands spent money intended to help after hurricanes

Another case of politicos diverting money

How a Not-Racist Cop Arrested a Man for ‘Walking While Black,’ Blamed It on Black People and Walked Away With $100,000

Of course he did

The Deep State: How it Came to Be and Why it Fights so Hard

Accountable to none

Civilian Review Board Substantiates Charges Against Policeman in Eric Garner Case

This is why civilian review boards need more power

The mysterious Voynich manuscript has finally been decoded

One less mystery for speculation

98.5 Percent of Federal Crimes Never Approved by Congress

Out of control bureaucracy staffed with self-righteous technocrats

Catalonia mayors sign decree approving independence vote, defying Spanish government

Spain won't let them go

What Happened To "What Happened": Amazon Slashes Hillary's Book Price 40% Before It Hits Shelves

I don't think people care what Hillary thinks anymore

WATCH: Police ‘Protect’ Society by Stealing Man’s Money for Improperly Selling Hot Dogs

Robbery is robbery

Supreme Court temporarily lifts restrictions on Trump travel ban

Why do progressives want to limit the same power every President has had?

Apple and 7-Eleven Are Why Trump’s Threats to Sever Trade With China Are Empty

Trump likes to draw attention to things

Pope Francis: People Have a ‘Moral Responsibility’ to Combat Climate Change

Nope. Not when it's a fraud.

This New Database Is Tracking How Many Cops Are Charged With Crimes

We need this

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❝The New York Times: Propaganda Machine❞

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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❝What Happens When Google Disagrees With You?❞

I know you were waiting breathlessly

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❝Many colleges claim that they develop 'leaders.'❞

What would you do and why would you do it?

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Wednesday roundup - current headlines

Roundup of my link stack

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Unity liberty charity

Unity in things Necessary, Liberty in things Unnecessary, and Charity in all.
     — Richard Baxter
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Revived 29Nov2017

Check out these stories all over the web

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Super oversized roundup - clearing out the old stack

Older headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Irregular

I'm spending time cleaning up and standardizing the code and format of older blog entries.

I'm also transferring entries from the old file structure to the current one and reformatting those pages. Then I'm putting in redirect pages at the old addresses.

I plan on resuming regular blogging around the first of the year. But the occasional new post will probably slip through.

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“A panic is not an answer”

A panic is not an answer: We’re at imminent risk of turning this #metoo moment into a frenzied rush to blame all men

Maybe so. But they could also hurt young women, who need the support and mentorship of male supervisors. In many industries, this means the kind of after-hours collaboration that has always advanced young men.

Unfortunately, a new puritanism seems to be ascendant. Timothy Noah of Politico suggests we could limit sexual harassment by making meetings with anyone behind closed doors a fireable offense.

Suddenly, office Christmas parties and happy hours are under a cloud. There is talk of replacing alcohol with game rooms.

Such suggestions are silly and infantilizing. We need rules to rid ourselves of creeps, not purge every workplace of all interpersonal risk.
     — Christina Hoff Sommers
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Authority banner

Authority progresses and freedom regresses
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Liberty demands

These blog entries have been reformatted and entered into the current directories.

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Plunder

The law of unintended consequences strikes again

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NeoNotes — net neutrality

As it exists right now, local, state, and Federal governments allow and protect area specific telecommunications monopolies.

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Revived 26Nov2017

Taking on the ethanol mythos

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NeoNotes - Hearsay

Moving quotes to individual entries

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What's with all the quotes?

Some of you may have noticed that I tried combining all my self-quotes on one page. It didn't work all that well. I already had a tag called maxims that I was using for the new self-quotes, so I just transferred all the ones from the page to the blog.

One. At. A. Time.

The good news is that it's done and the new quote templates work fine. You can't see it unless I use it, but the quote templates already have A HREF already there so I can attribute the quote.

Anyway, just like Technopagan Yearnings, I'm updating the code. I'm using classes with my copy-paste templates instead of individual copy-paste templates. That's so I can change the class definition in one spot and it will change every use site wide. I won't have to change the individual blog entries. Or the individual elements in the sidebar. Or any of the special pages.

When I get it done, which is going to take a while. The new stuff will have the cleaner code, the stuff that catches my attention and the oldest entries will get the code as I plod through it.
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Tolerance & control

It was never, ever about tolerance.

It was always, always about control.
     — NeoWayland
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Parity

If you won't honor someone's religious choice, why should they honor yours?

If you are not willing to live with those of other faiths, why should they give way and not you?

Parity. The Golden Rule. It's in your own teachings if you look hard enough.
     — NeoWayland
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Common sense

Common sense means ideas that work on their own without constant fiddling and tweaking.
     — NeoWayland
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Echo chamber

If you never leave the echo chamber, you never learn to defend your arguments.

It's a big reason why libertarians are better than average at debating on certain subjects. Nobody agrees with us entirely and we get plenty of practice.
     — NeoWayland
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Begging government

Do you really want pagans and heathens begging government for table scraps that they might give us? If we're really REALLY good and cute enough?
     — NeoWayland
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Taken stands

I've taken stands for gun rights, alternative sexual practices, the value of the family with men and women role models, religious choice, the free market, and good movies.
     — NeoWayland
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Single issue

If I have a single issue, it's less government and more freedom.
     — NeoWayland
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Bind me

If I can be moral without your faith, why do you wish to bind me to your faith?
     — NeoWayland
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What faith

I could care less what faith my neighbor is, but I do care if she lets her dog do it's thing on my lawn.
     — NeoWayland
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Pay attention to laws

The people who pay attention to laws are not the ones you have to worry about.
     — NeoWayland
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Beware

Beware anyone who offers an absolute.
     — NeoWayland
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Dogma

Resist dogma for growth.
     — NeoWayland
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Paradox

Seek paradox for truth.
     — NeoWayland
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Triviality

In the absence of understanding, triviality dominates.
     — NeoWayland
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Competition

Competition breeds progress and encourages honesty.
     — NeoWayland
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Passions

People cherish their passions.
     — NeoWayland
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Colony organism

Humanity is a colony organism.
     — NeoWayland
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Answers & questions

I’ve long since concluded that no one has all the answers or even most of the questions.
     — NeoWayland
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A choice that is imposed is no choice

A choice that is imposed is no choice. Religion imposed in the name of “freedom and decency” will be neither free nor decent.
     — NeoWayland
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Compelled

If you choose to do something, that's freedom. If you're compelled to do something, that's coercion.
     — NeoWayland
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Free speech

Free speech does not mean shutting the other guy up. It means you talk. It means sometimes you yell at each other and wave your fingers in each other's faces. It means you argue. It means you sit down over drinks and try to understand why they won't listen. It means giving the other the same respect you expect for yourself. At least until they show they don't deserve the respect. Even then, they get to talk.
     — NeoWayland
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Monotheisms

Not all monotheisms are alike. Just as one example, I'd rather deal with people trying to deny my rights instead of fanatics trying to kill me and mine.
     — NeoWayland
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Hate crime

I'm still waiting for you to make the case how a hate crime is worse than a non-hate crime for the same “transgression.”
     — NeoWayland
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Polyamorous

Most polyamorous people will tell you that polyamory is based on active, long term relationships. It's not a license to sleep with whoever at the drop of a hat. And it's certainly not the ability to compel sex from another.
     — NeoWayland
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Questionable

Messing with kids, that's perverted.

Demanding that others acknowledge AND celebrate your sexuality, that's questionable.

Actually being lesbian, gay, transgender, or whatever else isn't.

Mixing your sexuality with politics is a pretty good sign that you're corrupt though.
     — NeoWayland
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In terms of minorities

As long as rights are defined in terms of minorities, one person's gain will always be perceived as another's loss. As long as some get exempted from responsibility because they are minorities, they will claim victimhood.
     — NeoWayland
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Minority rights

Many of those making the most noise about minority rights are deliberately perpetuating the situation.
     — NeoWayland
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Climax

I learned a long time ago that it's worth the trouble to make sure she's got at least two climaxes for every one of mine.

Keeps her smiling too.
     — NeoWayland
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Nature of government

Government gets bigger and more oppressive, that is the nature of government.
     — NeoWayland
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Regulating

When government starts defining, it starts regulating.
     — NeoWayland
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Headstone

If someone has served honorably, then they should have whatever they want on their headstone up to and including Mickey Mouse. Government issue or not, it's not about what is “approved.” It's about honoring someone who chose to serve and fulfilled that duty.
     — NeoWayland
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Let people choose

Let people choose and accept responsibility for those choices. It won't be perfect, but it will shed less blood.
     — NeoWayland
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Society is not Christian

A society is not Christian. An individual is.
     — NeoWayland
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Virtue or vice

The virtue or vice is not in the title. It's in the individual.
     — NeoWayland
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American pluralism

As long as there is a rule of law that doesn't raise one faith above all others, we can deal with the mess. That's one reason I'm grateful for sectarianism. When they argue among themselves over truth, they don't have time to take on the rest. American pluralism grew out of the English Civil War and the American colonists trying to practice their faith as they saw fit and not as dictated by another sect or church.
     — NeoWayland
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Path to freedom

Politics is about power over people. Once you understand that government is not your friend and the politico only wants to get re-elected, you’re on the path to freedom.
     — NeoWayland
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Find things we share

We need to find things we share rather than using faith to define the morality of our society. We can agree to outlaw theft and vandalism, we can't agree on marriage. We can agree that people shouldn't drive under the influence, we can't agree to ban all intoxicants. We can agree that people should be free to make their own choices, we can't agree which choices should be eliminated.
     — NeoWayland, United We Stand - Dragging religion into politics
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Eliminating choice

Rather than eliminating choice, we should make sure that the consequences are clear.
     — NeoWayland, United We Stand - Dragging religion into politics
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Measurable damage vs. forbidden

Mala in se means "bad in and of itself." Something is mala in se if and only if it threatens or results in measurable damage to life, liberty, and property. Mala prohibita means "bad because it is prohibited." Something is mala prohibita if and only if the state has forbidden it. I would add regulation as well.

To prove mala in se, you have to show measurable damage. Mala prohibita means that the government will impose morality and ethics by force.
     — NeoWayland, United We Stand - Dragging religion into politics
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Right choice

If you have to make the "right choice" for someone, you're taking away their freedom. You're taking away their right to be wrong. You're taking away their opportunity to learn from their mistakes. You're taking away their judgement. You're saying they aren't fully human. You're saying that they can't be trusted.

And you're saying that your beliefs can't compete.
     — NeoWayland, United We Stand - Dragging religion into politics
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National motto

We should go back to the original national motto. "In God We Trust" is so divisive, and it takes the responsibility away from the individual citizen and puts it in the hands of an unseen overlord. That is a big part of what led to this nonsense. I always preferred the original National Motto. E Pluribus Unum is Latin for "one from many parts" but I prefer another translation.

“United we stand.”
     — NeoWayland, United We Stand - Dragging religion into politics
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Honoring your faith

Honoring your faith is admirable. Demanding that I honor your faith is despicable.
     — NeoWayland, United We Stand - Dragging religion into politics
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Ethics

If ethics have to be forced, that's pretty immoral right there.
     — NeoWayland, United We Stand - Dragging religion into politics
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Choose your beliefs

Free choice. Choose your beliefs, just don't choose mine. And I will do the same. Faith imposed is no faith at all. The only faiths and beliefs worthy of freedom are those freely chosen.
     — NeoWayland, United We Stand - Dragging religion into politics
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Forbid

If someone wants to forbid gay marriage, what would they do if the law only allowed gay marriage? If someone wanted Bible study in schools, what would they do if the law only allowed the Koran in schools? If someone wanted a Christian president, what would they do if the law prohibited a Christian president?
     — NeoWayland, United We Stand - Dragging religion into politics
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Surefire

It's the old parity test again. And it is the surefire method to tell if a law is mala in se or mala prohibita.
     — NeoWayland, United We Stand - Dragging religion into politics
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Live under their beliefs

Why should I be expected to live under their beliefs if they aren't willing to live under mine?
     — NeoWayland, United We Stand - Dragging religion into politics
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We can't agree

We can agree on the mala in se but we can't agree on the mala prohibita.
     — NeoWayland, United We Stand - Dragging religion into politics
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Science doesn't work on consensus

Science doesn't work on consensus. The law of gravity didn't require a majority vote of the High Council of Scientists before working. It described a behavior which could be replicated and measured.
     — NeoWayland
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Religion is the excuse

Religion is the excuse not the reason.
     — NeoWayland
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Recognizing rights

Recognizing the rights of others is pretty much the only thing that keeps us from taking what we want and to hell with the consequences.
     — NeoWayland
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Moral harm

Do you really want politicos deciding what is moral harm?
     — NeoWayland
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Politicos lie

Politicos lie. It's what they do. The mistake is believing that one “flavor” is somehow morally better.
     — NeoWayland
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We're allowing ourselves to be manipulated

The question isn't which politico is better. The question is why we're allowing ourselves to be manipulated into believing that government and Our Elected Officials™ know what's best and will serve us.
     — NeoWayland
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Speak for me

Please don't presume you can speak for me. You do it badly.
     — NeoWayland
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Please do not salt the Earth

Please do not salt the Earth.

Plant flowers and fruit trees in the rubble.
     — NeoWayland
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Distrust government

I distrust the very notion of government. Especially an ever expanding government with no apparent restraints where the only real concern is when “your guys” aren't in charge.
     — NeoWayland
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Consenting adults

Consenting adults.

Nice, simple, solves WAY more problems than it causes.
     — NeoWayland
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We let it happen

We let it happen.

We bought the lie that compassion triumphs practicality. We accepted that “blacks” deserved more privileges because of history. We let generations be victims when they deserved to be heroes.
     — NeoWayland
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Fighting and living

I could say that fighting and living serves better than dying. That, and making the place a little better before you leave.
     — NeoWayland
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Church Militant

A Church Militant with willing martyrs doesn't serve the glory of a god as much as the personal power of princes, potentates, and priests.
     — NeoWayland
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My faith

My faith and beliefs are at least as important to me as yours are to you.
     — NeoWayland
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Seeking power

History shows that politics corrupts faith. It's not the Divine who stirs up politics, it's the priests and priestesses seeking power.
     — NeoWayland
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Politics corrupts faith

We know politics corrupts faith and religion. We've ample evidence what happens when the People of the Book try it.
     — NeoWayland
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People who challenge my thinking

The only worthy faiths and beliefs are those freely chosen

Read More...
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Denying global warming

I'm notorious in online pagan groups for denying global warming and saying that environmentalism is a failed cause that should be replaced with ecology.

I'm rather proud of that.
     — NeoWayland
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Good person

Sometimes I ask Christians if someone can be a good person without being Christian.
     — NeoWayland
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Mark 12:17

One of my professors pointed out that Mark 12:17 could be interpreted to keep politics out of religion and religion out of politics. It's probably not true, but I like the thought. Politics is about controlling others and we know it corrupts almost everything it touches.
     — NeoWayland
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Syncretism happens

I would like to point out that there were vital and influential cultures that existed before Christianity. Syncretism happens.
     — NeoWayland
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Human Choice

I'm certain that these people do not have demonic hordes from realms infernal on speed dial, nor are they in direct contact with your Prince of Lies.

I'm equally certain that there will not be a heavenly host to put right what once was wrong, and that you didn't get marching orders directly from on high.

The manifestation is human.

The problem came from human choice and the solution has to come through human choice.
     — NeoWayland
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Folly

You haven't lived until you have an evangelical Christian and a radical atheist both trying to save you from your “folly” at the same time. After a bit they forget about you and argue with each other.

Great entertainment.
     — NeoWayland
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For Your Own Good

Right, because “For Your Own Good” was such a rousing success with Prohibition, explicit song lyrics, university speech codes, global warming, and Obamacare.
     — NeoWayland
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Tragedy of the “American Century”

That is the tragedy of the “American Century.” We forgot that liberty can't be imposed by the top down, it has to be seized from the bottom up.

As long as our government plays the games of international brinkmanship and global politics, we lose.

We're best when we protect our own freedom and inspire others though our example. People in other nations have to crave freedom and demand their own rights. It's the only way it will take root.

As a nation, we can't take out another government except by invading. Historically, that has not worked out well for America. It certainly destroyed our prestige.

But building trade, private investment in local economies, that delivered wonders.
     — NeoWayland
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Casting stones

Casting stones at another faith seems a little petty.
     — NeoWayland
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Diety

Let's just say that I choose to perceive and acknowledge Deity in a different form than you do and leave it at that.
     — NeoWayland
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Excellent

My favorite version of the Golden Rule is “Be Excellent to Each Other. And Party On!”
     — NeoWayland
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The Bible, tain't mine

The Bible may be a very fine book, but “tain't mine.” I don't expect to follow it's rules any more than I would expect you to follow Sikhism.

It's also not the only source of wisdom, or even the “Golden Rule.”
     — NeoWayland
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Insulting

I'm just saying that if a Christian complains because Christianity is being mocked or attacked, insulting another faith is deluded at best. What's good for the goose should be good for the gander. Or if you prefer, the Golden Rule. Or that bit about casting stones…
     — NeoWayland
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Syncretism

Do you know how many cultures and nations Western Civilization borrowed from? Syncretism, it's not just for religion.

It's not necessary to claim WestCiv as “white.” Just say it's a collection of extraordinarily proven good ideas that have worked time and time again. Claim it as “white” and you're invoking tribalism and rousing people's natural defenses. Claim it as “white” and in a very patronizing way you grant permission to join.

Invite people to join because “they can make it better” works with more people. And it makes your life better too.
     — NeoWayland
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Truthful answers

Occasionally I wandered in where I was not wanted and gave truthful answers.

Sometimes I even did it deliberately. A little disruption now can prevent disaster later.
     — NeoWayland
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Behind the curtain

Invoke science as an unquestionable authority and someone will show the truth behind the curtain. That’s the nature of science.
     — NeoWayland
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NeoNotes —Somebody finally said the C word

Ah, somebody finally said the C word. And that means I can say not all Christians.

I can say something else too. For all of the evidence of Christian bigotry, there's tolerance and pluralism right there beside it. America is the probably the only nation where it could happen. Religious diversity made it happen. And it goes right back to the Civil War. While there were plenty saying (with reason) that the Bible justified slavery, there were others making the case that a human was a human no matter what the color skin. The ones fighting hardest against slavery took their best arguments from their faith. That continued through the woman's rights movement, through the civil rights movement, and on through the gay rights movement. Without Christians speaking and fighting, those movements would have stalled.

As a newbie back in the 80s, I had a lot of baggage. I spoke and wrote against Christians with the best of them. Some of my stuff is probably still floating around there. But I discovered that I didn't like who I was. There were other things too, I was not a nice person. After some serious soul searching and couple of Divine thumps on the head, I came back to a very simple idea. In magickal terms, the energy you put out is the energy you get back. It's the Ethic of Reciprocity, Christians call it the Golden Rule. It's probably the cornerstone of Western civilization. Long story short, if you look for the negative in others, that is precisely what you will find. And that is precisely what you will allow to shape your own life.

But if you look for the positive, "catch them doing right," there will be enough good to overcome the bad.

Christians made marriage legal in the first place. But do you honestly think there would be legal gay marriage without a whole lot of Christians saying, wait, we have to fix this to be fair to everyone.

Because not every Christian, you see. Sometimes in the places you least expect and from the people you'd never consider, there is tolerance and acceptance and even encouragement. Not everyone wraps themselves in the fire and brimstone of the OT. Some really do believe that their god is love.

We need those people badly.

So, not every Christian.
NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.
A class="pvc" HREF="http://www.paganvigil.com
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Politics is not about reform

Politics is not about reform.

Politics is about control.

Politics is never about reform, even when the politicos say that it is.

By definition, reform can't come from within. It almost always splits off into a new thing.
     — NeoWayland
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Perspective

My perspective is just a tad different. Does that make me wrong? Well, that's an interesting question, isn't it?

I'll give you another. If I'm right, does that make you wrong?

Oh, and remember that I prefer not to use either/or situations.
     — NeoWayland
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Societies work best

Societies work best when the moral and legal authorities are separate.
     — NeoWayland
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Legislation and morality

Legislation is not morality, and morality certainly isn't legislation. The distinction must be made. Otherwise politicos wrap themselves in the flag AND hide behind the most convenient faith/moral code they can find. Arguing over morality keeps us honest. We're better when we verbally defend our ideas to people who don't necessarily share our beliefs.
     — NeoWayland
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Illegal

Passing a law saying that a behavior is illegal doesn't stop the behavior. Prohibition is the best known failure. Pick a vice law, any vice law for others.
     — NeoWayland
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Show virtue

An individual can show virtue. At best, a label must borrow virtue. Labels will hold most of the blame, though.
     — NeoWayland
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Label

It's not liberalism, it's the label. And it doesn't matter if the label is progressive, conservative, Christian, atheist, or United States Senator. The label has no virtue or vice, no morality, and no inherent worth. It's the individual that owns the outcome of their thoughts, words, and deeds. It's the individual and the individual alone who can take responsibility.
     — NeoWayland
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Can't give liberty

It's about the liberty, you see. You can't give that to anyone.
     — NeoWayland
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Institutional churches

I think it has a lot to do with how connected someone feels to their church/temple/circle/whatever. I think that big institutional churches appear more interested in putting butts in pews than any genuine mission. The church members just give a little time every week and put some cash in the offering. Easy peasy. I really don't understand how those “megachurches” work. To me, if a normally-sighted person can't see the pulpit clearly from the back row without a huge television screen, then it's not really a church. It's an entertainment palace.

What can I say? My own practice demands personal involvement. Even without that, I've got a bunch of preacher ancestors who would disapprove.
     — NeoWayland
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Collapse

At this point, I don't think anyone can stop the collapse. Nor do I think that's bad. There are how many laws on the books? How many regulations in the Federal Register? We've been conditioned to depend on government to help us. Cut spending, but not national defense. Cut spending, but not aid to Israel or Saudi Arabia. Cut spending, but not Social Security. And some banks and unions are Too Big To Fail.
     — NeoWayland
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Core of Christianity

Exclusivity is not the core of Christianity. How Christians live their life is. That shows in how they touch the lives of others.
     — NeoWayland
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Nicer

Christians are a lot nicer to be around when everyone else doesn't have to defer to them. “One path among many” means Christians usually pay attention to what others say. It means Christians have to defend what they say and do without hiding behind scripture.
     — NeoWayland
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Choice & consequences

Recognizing that the choice AND the consequences are mine and mine alone means I'm a rational adult.
     — NeoWayland
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Meetings and updates

Weekly meetings and daily updates on any major project. Show up unexpectedly to poke around, not once but several times. And as the deadlines get closer, meet more and inspect more. If it is important, you watch it carefully. This is business school 201, this is leadership 101.
     — NeoWayland
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Answers that work

Science isn't about presenting conclusions, it's about finding answers that work.
     — NeoWayland
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Science is a process

Science is an inquiry process. It's not a set of laws carved in stone forever and ever.

Everything you cited above (claims, explanations, proposals) come from people, not science.

Science just shows how well it works. Or if people need to look harder.
     — NeoWayland
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Govern

We've been taught that government is supposed to govern and control the other guy.

That's the guy who is the problem.

Not us. Never us. It's not our fault.
     — NeoWayland
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Reform

I'm obligated to point out that the quickest and easiest way to achieve those reforms is for the "ship of state" to sink.
     — NeoWayland
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Charity

If I choose to give, that is charity and can be celebrated. If I am manipulated or threatened into giving, that is extortion. I don't care how good the cause is, if I am required to give without my consent, that threatens my freedom. I shouldn't be tricked into it “for my own good” or “for the greater good.” I want to know WHY, and I want an honest answer. I demand the choice to walk away.
     — NeoWayland
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Generations

We let generations be victims when they deserved to be heroes.
     — NeoWayland
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Problem

The problem you see is not the problem they see.
     — NeoWayland
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Inspire me

Don't try to shame me with stories of victims, inspire me with the stories of the heroes.
     — NeoWayland
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Entitled because of your pain

You’re not entitled because of your pain. The world is full of pain. You can’t demand charity.

The world needs heroes more than it needs victims.
     — NeoWayland
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Empathy

You're not upset over my lack of empathy. It's that I don't show empathy in the approved fashion for the victim groups you designate.
     — NeoWayland
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Blood of the unbelievers

It's not the gods calling for the blood of the unbelievers. It's the priests. It's the generals. It's the emperors.
     — NeoWayland
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Science is the bastard child of magick

Science grew out of experimenting with things unseen and unknowable. Science is the bastard child of magick.
     — NeoWayland
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Fewer weapons

We could do with fewer weapons and soldiers if our politicos stopped the empire building.
     — NeoWayland
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Self-worth

If your moral self worth is defined by either your victimhood or your compassion, then those will be the things you defend. Even principles will take a back seat if “it's for the greater good.” Taking a stand is less important than reversing current oppression or preventing future oppression.
     — NeoWayland
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Tit for tat

Tit for tat. Long term rules means honor brings advantage. Short term rules mean that honor is a disadvantage.
     — NeoWayland
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Razzle dazzle

Everyone is amazed by the razzle dazzle moment. No one thinks about all the work, study, and experimenting beforehand that made it possible.
     — NeoWayland
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Experience

Experience trumps language every time.
     — NeoWayland
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Do more with less

Elegant simplicity adapts and does more with less. One sure sign of a master.
     — NeoWayland
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Ecology vs. environmentalism

Ecology studies how living systems interact and interconnect with each other. Environmentalism is about teaching and compelling behavior. These words are not synonyms. As both a pagan and a libertarian, I can not support environmentalism.
     — NeoWayland
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Proud

Be proud but don't invite trouble.
     — NeoWayland
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Aunts & grandmothers

“The men may sit in council but the aunts and the grandmothers shape lives.” Measure a culture by the attention it pays to those not a part of the official leadership structure.
     — NeoWayland
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Ask

Ask questions. Question the answers. Question your questions.
     — NeoWayland
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One side

We have one side of the story which isn't enough to judge.
     — NeoWayland
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Conservaties, progressives, & sex

When it comes to sex, conservatives want to deny choice and progressives want to deny responsibility. I want a world with both.
     — NeoWayland
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A person's worth

My grandfather's funeral taught me that a person's worth is found in the lives they touch.
     — NeoWayland
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A woman's sexual behavior

I'm not responsible for a woman's sexual behavior any more than I am responsible for the color of her shoes. It's her choice and her responsibility. It's not her neighbor's responsibility. It's not society's responsibility.
     — NeoWayland
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Responsible

Don’t hold someone responsible unless they were present, of age, and participating.
     — NeoWayland
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Signposts

Books aren't destinations, they're signposts. Like it or not, you still make the journey yourself. You can always go further than the book can carry you.
     — NeoWayland
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Words matter

Words matter. Actions matter more. Intentions don’t.
     — NeoWayland
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Honor expects

Honor expects three warnings before you act.
     — NeoWayland
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Test it thrice

Test it thrice.
     — NeoWayland
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Ease your pain

To ease your pain and shame, share it separately with three people you trust.
     — NeoWayland
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Information on the internet

If you find information on the internet, verify it with three offline, reputable, and independent sources and experiment BEFORE you depend on it.
     — NeoWayland
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Truth

Let people discover truth before you speak. Make sure the truth is necessary before you speak. Judge if the listener is worthy of truth before you speak.
     — NeoWayland
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One thing

Say only one thing for every three things they say.
     — NeoWayland
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Listen

Start by listening. Before you say anything, listen again. Just to make sure you understand, listen again.
     — NeoWayland
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Everyone shares a right

It's one of the simplest human guidelines. Everyone shares a right. You don't have it unless the other does.

Privileges exclude people. Only some get privileges. Privileges are not rights, and rights are not privileges.

It's why there are human rights. Most muddy the waters and call privileges rights. Black rights? Christian rights? Police rights? These do not exist. These are privileges that rule out whole classes of people.
     — NeoWayland
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Fringe

I prefer operating from the fringe. No great recognition, but no glow-in-the-dark targets either.
     — NeoWayland
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Secret of life

What is the secret of life?

Leave the place a little better than how you found it.
     — NeoWayland
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Wrapped in the flag

When a politico wraps himself in the flag, double check your liberty and count on finding brown stains afterwards.
     — NeoWayland
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Pattern in the universe

The patterns we see in the universe may be nothing more than longing and human conceit. But if using those patterns give us a desired result, then the patterns are a useful fiction. The “ultimate reality” or even our belief doesn't necessarily matter, if we behave as if we believe and successfully reach our goals.
     — NeoWayland
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Meddle

People love to meddle. They want to control other people “for their own good.” Public education, foreign policy, sub-prime mortgages, all happened because someone thought they knew better and used force to inflict it on everyone else.
     — NeoWayland
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Heroes

The best heroes are the ones who don't know they are heroes before they are needed and still choose standing between harm and another.
     — NeoWayland
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Paradise

There are reasons why the World is not a paradise. One reason is because we silly humans can't agree on what a paradise should be
     — NeoWayland
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Choice of faith

Faith is nothing without choice.
     — NeoWayland
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Media

Media has every right to exist.

Media does not have the right to be trusted.
     — NeoWayland
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Last, best hope

The internet is the last, best hope for mankind.
     — NeoWayland
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A god of love

Personally I prefer Christians when they aren't spouting hellfire in the name of a god of love.
     — NeoWayland
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❝The world doesn't work this way.❞

The world doesn't work this way.

So change the world.

     — Leverage, The Homecoming Job
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NeoNotes — Roy Moore and the Decalogue monument - updated

You don't demand that others submit to your religion. If I can object when the Islamists do it, if I can object when the climate change crowd does it, I can damn well object when a theocratic Republican passes it off as religious freedom and tells tales of his "oppression" because of his faith.

Read More...
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NeoNotes — Infrastructure

Let's talk about infrastructure. Specifically, let's talk about Puerto Rico's infrastructure that was mismanaged and mostly ignored for decades before Trump took office. We could also mention Chicago, Baltimore, Washington D.C., and a number of other cities. What makes these places unique is that they have massive overspending, crumbling infrastructure, and Democrat leadership for decades.
NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.
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NeoNotes — Lower the cost of medical care

The best thing that government can do to lower the prices of medical care is get out of medical care and medical insurance. There's a lot of reasons, but at it's core politicos and technocrats have no incentive to contain costs, make a profit, and get a bigger market share. Competition means that companies have to make things cheaper, faster, and more available or they will lose business. Today's smart phones have more computing capacity than the Cray 2 did in 1985, they are more reliable, more capable, cheaper, more available, and a lot more profitable. That's what 30 years of the free market and competition without government interference will give you. Government has shielded the medical industry and the medical insurance markets from the very things that would make medicine better.
NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.
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NeoNotes — Tax the rich

OK, taxes. According the the OMB, the top 20% of taxpayers pay 95% of income taxes. In 2015, the WSJ reported that the top 20% paid 84% of income taxes. In 2015, the top .1% (yes, that's one-tenth of one percent) of families paid 39.2% of income taxes. In 2015, all but the top 20% of taxpayers paid more in payroll taxes than they owed in Federal income tax, effectively giving the Federal government an interest free loan. Meanwhile, the bottom 20% of taxpayers have the Earned Income Tax Credit, a negative income tax. The government pays them. The thing is, smart rich people don't stuff their money in mattresses. They put it to work. If their money doesn't earn more than the rate of inflation, they've lost money. So they look for ways to maximize returns. Stocks, bonds, and mutual funds are the most common methods. This pumps money back into the economy. Lower prices, more companies hiring, and better distribution of goods and services are direct results. In other words, cutting taxes at any level gives people more choices and more economic power. It's not cutting taxes for the rich, it's cutting taxes. If you like, I can show how a progressive tax system locks people into income tiers and suppresses the natural movement up in income.
NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.
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Should adjust

There seems to be a growing number of people who think that the world should adjust to them, while they don't have to show concern for anyone.
     — Thomas Sowell
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Purge a belief system

It's never common sense to purge a belief system, especially when you do it in the name of moral superiority.
     — NeoWayland
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Faith & threats

If you had faith, you wouldn't need threats.
     — NeoWayland
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Pick and choose

You do realize that if “the Bible is all one piece,” you can't pick and choose bits and pieces to quote, don't you? If you eat all your veggies and are especially nice, I won't demand that you start following all those bits in Numbers and Leviticus. We won't talk about the deleted texts now.

How do you suppose those disciples did it? They had to work without a New Testament.
     — NeoWayland
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Enlightened

No matter what the belief system, the truly enlightened don't need to call themselves that.

Or justify it either.
     — NeoWayland
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Less government

Always, always, always less government than absolutely necessary.
     — NeoWayland
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Some people I trust

I don't think that a magic set of neurons turns on at age 16, 18, or 25. I've said before there are some people I trust at 14 to make a major decision, and some I don't trust to do the same at 40. That's not including sex.
     — NeoWayland
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Age of consent

Age of consent is tied to taking responsibility for your own actions. It's that simple. If you can't take responsibility, you shouldn't do it.
     — NeoWayland
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Without using the Bible

If you can defend your beliefs without using the Bible, that means that you've embraced those beliefs and thought long and hard about making them a part of your everyday life.
     — NeoWayland
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Keep people from dealing

Trigger warnings, safe spaces, echo chambers, all that does is keep people from dealing with the World as it is
     — NeoWayland
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Equal treatment

When people get used to preferential treatment, equal treatment seems like discrimination.
     — Thomas Sowell
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❝Personal’s not the same as important.❞

Personal’s not the same as important. People just think it is.
     — Terry Pratchett, Lords and Ladies
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Bonfire

I have this mythical construct in my head of a bonfire with people I would like to hang out with, and maybe discuss matters large and small.
     — NeoWayland
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History

I make it a practice to never call it history until a year and a day after the event.
     — NeoWayland
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Laugh at ourselves

We have to laugh at ourselves. No one else would take us seriously enough.
     — NeoWayland
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Bilagáana

I’m one of the few bilagáana born on the Res, it’s shaped my outlook. I’m what happens when Louisiana farming stock takes root in the Four Corners region. The desert and the the sky here call to me. I’m a child of sand and wind.
     — NeoWayland
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Better human

Go tell three really dirty jokes. Share a piece of fruit with someone you can't stand. Cuddle with someone you care deeply about. Leave the place a little nicer than when you found it. And greet the sun when it wakes up.

No, that isn't all that there is to be a pagan, it's just a taste of how to be a better human.
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Change the universe?

Do I think I can change the universe? I already have. Can I make it better? Maybe.
     — NeoWayland
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Free to choose

I am free to choose and free to take responsibility for myself. I am not a child to be threatened into submission. I will not blindly accept your mandates when the Divine and the World beckon.
     — NeoWayland
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White knight

I can't be the white knight. I can only be a friend. I can't be a savior, but I can lend a shoulder and an ear. I can't shield anyone from the cold darkness, but I can share a little body heat under the blanket. I can't bring joy, but I can give a smile.
     — NeoWayland
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Strong women

The really strong women don't depend on government to do it for them.

They don't need to.
     — NeoWayland
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Rights do not emanate

Rights do not emanate from a state, nor do they require state sanction or approval.
     — NeoWayland
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Message & passion

Matching the message to the passion, that's the trick.
     — NeoWayland
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Angry guys

Where would we be if those angry guys hadn't been writing letters to each other for years by 1773?
     — NeoWayland
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American secret

Here is the American secret. You can occasionally be governed, but you can't be ruled.

That means you can't rule others, no matter how much you disagree with them.
     — NeoWayland
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Free market

I believe that the free market is the most potent force for organizing and creating yet discovered by humans. It cannot be managed, predicted, directed, or controlled.

It rests on choice without coercion. And to keep customers happy, you have to at least do as well as your competition, better if you want to expand.
     — NeoWayland
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The goal is freedom

The goal is not the institution of the Federal government.

The goal is freedom.
     — NeoWayland
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Moral people

Oddly enough, the most moral people I know don't have to brag about it.
     — NeoWayland
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Definition of liberty

That's today's quick definition of liberty, folks. It's not a right unless the other guy has it too.
     — NeoWayland
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Just in case

Just in case you misunderstand, I don't answer to you. I am who I am, and you don't need my name to understand what I say.
     — NeoWayland
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Make the rules

Why in the World do you think you get to make the rules?
     — NeoWayland
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I recognize Masculine & Feminine in Divinity.

I recognize Masculine & Feminine in Divinity. I seek the Divine in every woman I meet.
     — NeoWayland
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Influences

Children need strong male and female influences in their life.
     — NeoWayland
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Who I am

I am who I am, not who you wish I was.
     — NeoWayland
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❝What I do is not up to you.❞

What I do is not up to you.
     — Wonder Woman (2017 film)
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Ideology

The problem isn't ideology, it's the urge to meddle backed by the use of force.
     — NeoWayland
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What frustrates you

Perhaps what frustrates you most is that you can't denounce my faith without undermining your own. At the end of the day, we don't have anything but our faith. Mine is just as valid as yours by every “objective” measure you trot out.
     — NeoWayland
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Christian message

I don't think the Christian message was ever intended to be confined to dusty writings.
     — NeoWayland
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Free to choose

It's no secret that I believe that free market ideas apply to any human exchange.

Free to choose. It's not just for economics anymore.
     — NeoWayland
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Progress

Progress never comes from satisfaction.
     — NeoWayland
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Move beyond

Usually what you get out of something is what you bring in to something. Most people do not have the means to move beyond their own shadows.
     — NeoWayland
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Dark forces

You're so determined to struggle nobly against dark forces that you can't see what is casting the shadow.
     — NeoWayland
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Faith cannot be given

Faith cannot be given. Faith cannot be taken. To mean anything at all, faith must be chosen freely.
     — NeoWayland
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❝Is the accuser always holy now?❞

Is the accuser always holy now?
     — Arthur Miller, The Crucible
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NeoNotes — Witch hunts without due process

Sometimes we pagans take our sex way too seriously.

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She died

My beloved companion of eight years has died.

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“Why Are There So Many Mass Shootings Today?”

This was FDR's State of the Union address in January, 1941. It was another speech that changed everything.

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Govern

Your beliefs shouldn't govern my behavior.
     — anonymous
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Coexist

As a free trade supporter, the downside would be the loss of a free trade zone with the rest of Europe, but I am not sure it can be called a "free trade zone" if they are banning toasters.
     —Warren Meyer, Was Brexit About Racism or Tea Kettles?

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Why is this cop not under arrest for assualt?

“Utah Nurse DRAGGED out of Hospital by Police 'This isn't right"”

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“The Four Freedoms”

This was FDR's State of the Union address in January, 1941. It was another speech that changed everything.

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Thursday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Wednesday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Clean water

“Anheuser-Busch Stops Canning Beer To Can Water For Hurricane Harvey Victims”

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Serving up hot meals

“Keep It Simple And Stay Open: The Waffle House Storm Menu”

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Mirror image

“How ‘Antifa’ Mirrors the ‘Alt-Right’”

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NeoNotes - We need our ideas challenged

I believe that competition makes us honest. I believe that the "free market" applies more to just products and services, it applies to ideas and creeds and politics and practically anything else human. I believe that no one person and no one group has all the answers.

And yes, I know I've said all that before. But for me, it's as certain as the Earth beneath my feet and the stars above my head.

We need our ideas challenged. We need to argue with each other and wave our fingers under each others noses.

We don't need violence in the streets.

We don't need scapegoats.

And we don't need people using some undefined Moral Authority to prevent others from speaking.
NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.

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Tuesday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Antifa violence in Berkeley

Masked anarchists violently rout right-wing demonstrators in Berkeley

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Private citizens to the rescue

“Cajun Navy's on the way: South Louisiana springs into action to help Texas amid Harvey floods”

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Civilization

Civilization is an enormous improvement on the lack thereof.
     — P. J. O’Rourke

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Truth from the Federalist - worth your time

“America’s Post-Charlottesville Nervous Breakdown Was Deliberately Induced”

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Monday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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NeoNotes — Racism in response to oppression

My critique wasn't intended to capture the movement.

In the various moments however, I see one group excuse their violence and their racism because of their narrative. This one group gets a pass but others do not. That's certainly privilege and it hurts their case.

I've told people before. You want equality, I'll fight with you. You want privilege, I'll fight against you.

I can't take BLC BLM seriously when I read or hear the trash-talk some of the leadership directs at "whites." I'm not the only one. I'm against injustice, I don't think BLC BLM is.

You know the really ironic thing about this conversation? The motto of my political blog Pagan Vigil is "Because LIBERTY demands more than just black and white."



If group A gets something and groups B, C, and E are not allowed, that's a privilege. If things change and group B gets something and groups A, C, E, and H are not allowed, there is still privilege.

The definition of oppression keeps changing. Arguably things were worse for "blacks" in the 1920s after Woodrow Wilson re-segregated the civil service and the military. Not to mention all the Jim Crow laws that were still on the books. While there are issues today, they are no where near what they once were.

One of the biggest issues today is the prison population. This is usually one key argument about how the US is still a racist society. Before we can really look at that though, we should consider if there are some laws that in and of themselves might be unjust. Personally I think it's stupid to arrest people for being under the influence but not arresting people for being drunk. So if we take out all non-violent drug offenders, that reduces the prison population quite a bit. We're left with the violent offenders.

We know that a strong family, especially one with at least two parents, usually means the kids don't break the law. We also know that "black" inner city children in single mother households used to be about 7%, at one point that rose to well over 70% and is still a majority today. We know that this was made possible by well meaning government programs meant to provide. In other words, "the Man" paid single mothers not to get married and raise kids on their own. Yet any talk of reducing these benefits is immediately called racism. It's privilege, it promotes dependency, and yet it's seen as "compassionate." There's racism and oppression for you, but in popular opinion it's a "right." That doesn't mean that single mothers are evil or wrong. It just means that when a majority of households in a given population are single mothers, the kids (and especially the males) are much more likely to push the boundaries and get into trouble.

These aren't the only two things that put more "blacks" in prison, but they are two of the biggest. Yet instead, we hear how cops are racist. These are also two things that would take years, maybe decades to fix.

There are many other things too. Inner city public schools which are more and more like prisons. Public housing projects that displace neighborhoods and quickly become crime infested. Licensing laws that make it almost impossible for small household businesses to get started. These are real oppressions with absolutely devastating results, and yet we're arguing over who gets a slice of the pie. The oppressed demand action from the government and the institutions that are keeping them down. Star Parker does a much better job explaining this is her book Uncle Sam's Plantation: How Big Government Enslaves America's Poor and What We Can Do About It.

Maybe the pie isn't limited. And maybe the person on the street isn't the oppressor.



Peer review? Then the next question will be if the correct peers reviewed it. And that still doesn't answer the real question: Is Star Parker wrong with either her observations or her conclusions?

Look at what happened here. In one reply you've moved from Black Lives Matter to certain Black Lives Matter more than the ones who have not been politically approved. It's Orwell. “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.”

What critical race theory doesn't tell you is the how and why of institutions, particularly those created to fight one cause or another.

I'm not going to assume the collective guilt. That's not my style, and that's not the way to fix racism.



Critical race theory isn't a part of sociology, it rejects much of sociology. It was designed as a political tool to silence dissent from an approved ideology.

I am not discounting peer review which can be a valuable tool. I just do not think that it should be the only tool, nor do I think that the only certain people should be allowed to do peer review.

I've run into abuse of the latter kind in third wave feminism "scholarship" where ideas aren't even considered for discussion unless the author has been approved.

Those are Star Parker's beliefs, she still has the right to write and talk about them. But she isn't hitting people if they disagree with her.

I was trying to find a quote from Thomas Sowell on critical race theory, but I can't seem to find it.



How widespread is critical race theory outside those who study it? Can it produce predictable models of human behavior? How well does it withstand analysis outside the discipline? These are some of the things that mark a science. At one point I was studying to be a Christian minister, that doesn't make Christianity true. These same things could be said about third wave feminism too. Even more in the case of third wave feminism, how well does it tolerate behavior that goes against what it teaches.

But the people in BLM who aren't hitting people aren't denouncing the people in BLM who are. And there have been pages and pages written about how the leaders of BLM are justified in their racism against "whites" with no one calling them on it.

If BLM is going to denounce the neo-Nazis for being racist and violent, shouldn't they be held to the same standard?



We let generations be victims when they deserved to be heroes.



You seem to want understanding and validation for your sexuality. You won't get that from me. But if you want the right to make your own choices as long as you accept responsibility for those choices, count me in.

Which is more important?

I don't care about BLM's "cause," especially since I think it's only cover for their politics. I care about human rights and making sure everyone has them.

Which is more important?



See, I don't think there are as many oppressors as you do.

Nor do I think that people should take a back seat to talking and solving things because of their skin color, gender, creed, political affiliation, sexuality, gym membership, or the coffee they like. If there is a problem, let's fix it together and figure out who to blame afterwards.



I'm sorry, but this keeps getting more abstract.

What I saw was two groups using violence. One was condemned and the other was not. Both have highly racist members. Both have said and done some despicable things.

Why is the one group that has bigger numbers, much better funding, better political connections called the oppressed and therefore allowed violence without comment?



I don't approve of violence, particularly against bystanders. I said that in the original article.

But if you are going to overlook the violence of one group because they are oppressed, those same standards apply even more against the neo-Nazis. BLM is less oppressed by almost every measure you can name.

You keep excusing BLM and antifa's behavior. I don't. Not because I support the neo-Nazis, but because any excuse for violence is wrong. The fact that many BLM leaders are actively and openly racist and that BLM is constantly involved in violence even without neo-Nazis is enough to tell me that BLM is just another gang demanding tribute. Just as people were wrong to support the KKK in it's heyday, people are wrong to support BLM today.



I'm saying that by the standards that you yourself used, the neo-Nazis are more oppressed than BLM is. Do I agree? No. Do I think that the racism and violence of the neo-Nazis is despicable? Yes. Do I think that the racism and violence of BLM is despicable? Yes.

BLM shouldn't get a free pass. Excusing behavior usually encourages more bad behavior.

In this specific case, I think BLM and antifa came spoiling for a fight and they want moral justification.



Pardon, this conversation was never about white privilege.

It was never about me denying that people are oppressed. It was never about me, period. What we have is two groups that have used violence and racism. Violence and racism are terrible things.

One group gets excused and the other does not.

Yet the bigger group, the better funded group, the group with the better political connections, the group with academic support, blames the other for all the violence and racism **People deliberately excuse them from the consequences.** They get what they want with minimal costs. This leads to further bad behavior. Which is then excused.

I've pointed out that it was good intentions of the FedGov that has kept people trapped in poverty and crime. I can't and won't be responsible for something that happened before I was born. As a libertarian, I won't take responsibility for government failure. Yesterday, today, and tomorrow, that's the history that I can do something about.

It's not about me. It's about the behavior I've seen and experienced.

There's a story about how after the assassination of MLK, Jesse Jackson came out waving a bloody shirt. The shirt didn't belong to Dr. King, it couldn't have given the timing. Yet there was Jackson, waving the shirt, accusing everyone in sight. Because even if they had nothing to do with the shooting, they should have done something. Even if it wasn't possible, they should have done something, faster, louder.

Jackson was aiming to be the new face of civil rights, and unfortunately he mostly succeeded. He turned it into an extortion racket in the 1970s and 1980s. If Jackson said that company X was racially insensitive, the company paid him off and he said the company had mended their ways.

That's how I see BLM, only with more thugs.

In Shelby Steele's White Guilt, he argues that the real problem is not racial oppression but white guilt. There are many people who have gotten power and money exploiting that guilt. I won't be a party to it.

You seem like a nice enough person. You and I are not going to agree on this issue. We can't even agree on what the issue is. I do think your heart is in the right place.

NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.

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“Five Cities That Got F*cked by Hosting the Olympics”

“The smallest minority is the individual…”

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When Trump supporters ask why I don't trust him…

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Individual

“Small Town Gives Dogs Their Own Pool Day”

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Liberty secure

“…guard even his enemy from oppression.”

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For future reference - What Trump first said about Charlottesville

“Trump Defends White-Nationalist Protesters: 'Some Very Fine People on Both Sides'”

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Friday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Thorium is the future

Never slaves & never Nazis

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Busting a move

“Cop Stops to Bust a Move With Senior Dancing Alone on the Street”

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Snuggles

“73% Say Freedom of Speech Worth Dying For”

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NeoNotes — Consider historical context to violence

What is to stop someone else from deciding that it's a good cause to thump you over the head? Once the excuses start, what's to protect you from the politics of the day?

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85% of Americans support free speech over not offending others, says survey

73% Say Freedom of Speech Worth Dying For

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey finds that an overwhelming 85% of American Adults think giving people the right to free speech is more important than making sure no one is offended by what others say. Just eight percent (8%) think it’s more important to make sure no one gets offended.

>snip<

This shows little change from past surveying. Eighty-three percent (83%) think it is more important for the United States to guarantee freedom of speech than it is to make sure nothing is done to offend other nations and cultures.

Seventy-three percent (73%) agree with the famous line by the 18th century French author Voltaire: “I disapprove of what you say but will defend to the death your right to say it.” Only 10% disagree with that statement, but 17% are undecided.

Among Americans who agree with Voltaire, 93% rate freedom of speech as more important than making sure no one is offended. That compares to just 69% of those who disagree with the French author's maxim.

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“John Cena Reacts | Fans Surprise John Cena | John Cena Loves the Internet | Cricket Wireless”

>
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Not going for the win

“The Taliban Tried To Surrender And The U.S. Rebuffed Them. Now Here We Are.”

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Thursday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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“Rocky Balboa Fight For His Boxing License”

You could take the original Rocky and this film and you wouldn't need any of the films between them.

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“It's Trump's fault?”

Never slaves & never Nazis

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☆ Circus of hate

One last piece about the Charlottesville circus. Then on to other things, I promise.

When I first read about Charlottesville, the first thing that flashed in my head was an image of an ex-military type grabbing an antifa and a neo-Nazi by the necks and shaking. There should be an adult right there disciplining the misbehaving children. Except we were told that the antifa were fighting the good fight. We kept hearing about how terrible the neo-Nazis were and how they should be forcibly removed. We didn't hear about how bad the antifa were. And when some of us pointed out that antifa also attacked people, well, that rated an attack right there. “False equivalence!” we heard. Nazi ideas were so very much worse than anything antifa said.

Apparently no one could possibly oppose the neo-Nazi violence and the antifa violence at the same time. If you did criticize the antifa, you were lumped in with the Nazis. Not because of what you said or did, but because you didn't support the struggle against the forces of racism and fascism and marginalization. The antifa were brave despite the institutionalized oppression they dared to fight in the name of victimized people everywhere.

Except the antifa have heavy political support. Some of their funding comes from Soros organizations. Some politicos look the other way when it comes to illegal antifa activities.

Charlottesville specifically looked like a setup. The antifa heavily outnumbered the neo-Nazis. The governor and the mayor didn't seem interested in keeping the peace. Police weren't acting like police. Some officers even said they were ordered to stand down.

It was a Roman circus, a spectacle to distract the crowds. The neo-Nazis looked scary, but the noble antifa would soon dispatch them. Once again the heroic forces of good would triumph over the unenlightened. Blood would flow into the sands.

Yep, it was almost as if it were scripted. A myth for the ages.

Grand spectacle.

For your amusement.

With clearly defined winners and losers.

Morality would win, even if it meant breaking the law in the name of the greater good.

Nahh, I thought. You're imagining things. Even you couldn't be that paranoid and cynical. That would require a level of political manipulation unheard of since…

Since the last presidential election. Since the ongoing media campaign against Donald Trump. Since the astroturf effort to convince Congress that campaign finance was a grassroots demand for change. Since the climate change alarmists. Since the introduction of gender fluidity in public school curriculum.

Well, blistering blue blazes.

I had bought into it. While I had focused on saying that violent protest was unacceptable, the media had established the new Utterly Despicable Villains in American myth.

And if you dared hesitate too long before denouncing the Utterly Despicable Villains and all they stood for, well then, you lost your Moral Authority™ to speak at all.

And like a fool, I walked into it with my eyes wide open.

I had been had.

I'm sure there was no central office planning it. Just a bunch of like-minded opportunists who saw a chance to prove that the American Dream was fatally flawed. That the song of freedom draws on an Unpardonable Sin that persisted to this very day! That the American flag was eternally stained with the blood of the oppressed. There could be no hope in liberty. It was all a lie.

Something stinks.

We still have time to fix this. We can't let this deceit become the prevailing myth.

America still does have a Dream. We can make a better World for ourselves and our children. Sure, we'll make mistakes, but we'll fix them. Nothing is carved in stone except the promise of a better tomorrow if we try hard enough. Our sins and our mistakes are our own. Recognizing those mistakes, fixing those mistakes, learning from those mistakes, that's the foundation we need. We're not locked into the sins of our fathers. Blame does not lead to the future.

Hope and liberty do. Take yours, if you dare.
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Wednesday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Hero brother

“10-year-old boy delivers his baby brother and saves his life”

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Wet dogs

“Small Town Gives Dogs Their Own Pool Day”

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Cured

“Peanut Allergy Cured In Majority Of Children In 'Life-Changing' Immunotherapy Trial”

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Name calling for politics

“Nazi-Hunting Fantasies Have Unhinged The Left”

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Tuesday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Defending scoundrels

The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all.
     — H. L. Mencken

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Violence

“…guard even his enemy from oppression.”

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Statues

“What to do with Confederate Statues?”

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Returning the favor

Wombat at The Other McCain has been nice enough to link my articles in two of the In The Headlines features. I have linked to The Other McCain before and I am a regular commenter there.

Since turnabout is fair play and I appreciate the traffic, I decided that site needs a permanent link. So I've put my daily news reads in the sidebar.

No, these aren't my daily reads, just the regular news ones.
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Dog whistle

Image courtesy of Mrs. Bookworm at Bookworm Room. Used with permission. Click on picture for full size image.

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Electonic Frontier Foundation on hate speech

“Fighting Neo-Nazis and the Future of Free Expression”

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Speech wars

The internet is the last, best hope for freedom.

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No more homework

Florida County Bans Homework, Asks Parents To Read With Their Kids Instead

Students in one Florida county will no longer have to do homework. Instead, parents are being asked to read to their children for at least 20 minutes a night.

Marion County School District Superintendent Heidi Maier issued a "no homework policy" for all 31 elementary schools in the district.

"Kids don't learn the way they used to," says Keven Christian of Marion County Schools. "And making them do meaningless or tedius homework assignments every night just really doesn't contribute to their learning."

Any parents who feel that they might have trouble fulfilling the reading request can receive additional support from school programs and resources.
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A billion trees

In ‘Momentous Milestone’, Pakistan Plants One Billion Trees Ahead of Schedule

Pakistan’s northwestern province, Khyber Pakhtunkhaw (KPK), has planted an unprecedented 1 billion trees in just more than two years and surpassed an international commitment of restoring 350,000 hectares of forests and degraded land.

The massive effort aims to turn the tide on land degradation and loss in the mountainous, formerly forested KPK, which lies in the Hindu Kush mountain range.

Imran Khan, head of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party governing the province, launched the reforestation campaign, dubbed “Billion Tree Tsunami,” in 2015.

The cricket-star-turned politician revealed to VOA that the goal of adding 1 billion trees by planting and natural regeneration has been achieved this month, well ahead of the original deadline of December 2017.

He says his party plans to organize a special event in Islamabad in late August to celebrate the successful completion of the project, and experts as well as foreign diplomats will be invited.

“We will show them by coordinates, on Google map you can go and see where these trees have been planted, 1 billion trees, this is now the model for the rest of Pakistan,” Khan said.
     — Ayaz Gul
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“Brother Offers Support To Sister In Car Wash”

“The brother of a girl hilariously terrified of a car wash comforts her on the backseat as she cries to go home.”

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Monday roundup

China and India are dangerously close to military conflict in the Himalayas

While the rest of the world is fascinated by Brexit and Donald Trump.


We Fight for the Users

Related - The Justice Department Wants to Know if You've Visited an Anti-Trump Resistance Site. This is a direct threat to you.


Charlottesville and Its Aftermath: What if It Was a Setup?

We have no proof, this is all highly speculative rumor. But yeah. Related - Here’s How Virginia State Police Facilitated Violence At Charlottesville, ACLU fires back at Gov. McAuliffe after comments on violence at Charlottesville rally


Noam Chomsky: Antifa is a 'major gift to the Right'

I can't believe I'm agreeing with Chomsky for the fourth time in a week. But he's right. This time.


Change the sheets and kiss the Byrd statue goodbye, West Virginia

If the Confederate general statues should be removed, then what about the memorials to a Senator who was a ranking KKK member?


Is Google Working with Liberal Groups to Snuff Out Conservative Websites?

“In other words, nice website you've got there. It would be a shame if anything happened to it.” Related - Gathering Storms And Threats to Liberty, Leftist “journalist” Lauren Kirchner of ProPublica threatens Jihad Watch, Tech Censorship of White Supremacists Draws Criticism From Within Industry, & Silicon Valley escalates its war on white supremacy despite free speech concerns


Libertarians of Convenience

“People identifying as urban progressives increasingly find their own goals stymied by laws and regulations, and they’re demanding that these restrictions be overturned or limited. In other areas of city policy, though—typically, when they don’t hold a personal stake—they often push aggressively for ever more regulations and a more intrusive government.”

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Conspiracy

Here's what we know so far.

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from crux № 7 — age of consent

I think the age of consent is the best rule anyone has come up with so far.

But let's not kid ourselves.

The whole post WWII extended childhood thing is an artificial American invention.

The biology disagrees.

Before we start talking about the morality, we need to acknowledge that.

If we insist that kids wait until 18, 19, 25, or 37 we need a good reason.



Sometimes the kids do know. Most of the time in fact, if they know they will be held responsible for it.

Sometimes the adults don't know, no matter what the age. Any one going to a bar to hook up isn't being rational.

Sometimes the experience of making mistakes and having to deal with the consequences are the things that make us wise.



I know that for you, marriage and sex should be (ahem) wedded at the hip. I don't think it's a universal one size fits all solution though.

I do like your condition of marriage though.



I wouldn't call it loosening. I would call it changing.

I'd also say that it's necessary. Some of the social mores of the last two centuries needed to be dropped. For example, child labor under terrible conditions and for terrible pay used to be the norm.

The rules that work, we should keep. But you can't do change without testing all the rules constantly.

I started keeping my crux files because I noticed I kept getting into the same discussions in comment threads on other people’s web sites. After a while it just made sense for me to organize my thoughts by topic. These are snippets. It’s not in any particular order, it’s just discussions I have again and again.
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On some issues

On some issues I run deeper than granite and more certain than dawn.
     — NeoWayland
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Results

I don't usually submit my articles to reddit, but I did for This last week in free speech. I cross-posted the article on my politics blog Pagan Vigil and my pagan slice of life blog Technopagan Yearnings.

The libertarian link got hardly any views and quickly moved from the front page to the much deeper.

The pagan link got a couple of hundred views in two days and sparked an interesting conversation.

I was surprised at the insistence on historical and political context for violence. It's also interesting that the article kept moving up and down.

I'm disappointed to see how many people believe that "hate speech isn't free speech" and that certain people don't deserve free speech rights.

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“1970s Cartoon Music Video Black White”


tip of the hat to Maggie McNeill
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On public statues

Why should a city, state, or federal government put statues in public parks? Doing so addresses no plausible market failure, while using taxpayers funds and, as demonstrated tragically over the past few weeks, generates controversy, polarization, and violence. Thus governments should take down all statues, regardless of their political implications.

This is not “erasing” history but instead leaving it where it belongs, in the hands of private actors and mechanisms. Historians, textbook authors, universities, learned societies, the History Channel, and many other individuals and organizations can all present their own views of history and battle for the hearts and minds of the public. Government statues are government putting its thumb on the scale, which is one step down the slippery slope of thought control.
     — Jeffrey Miron, Statues

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“Adam Ruins Everything - The Real Reason Hospitals Are So Expensive”

"American healthcare might not be the best world, but it is the most expensive."

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“I Don't Care About Charlottesville, the KKK, or White Supremacy”

“Black people have scarier things on the horizon than the almost endangeblurb species of white supremacy.”

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☆ This last week in free speech

This article is cross posted at Pagan Vigil and Technopagan Yearnings. Feel free to repost as long as you credit me and one of those two sites.

Let’s talk about the mess that took over my life this last week. I had a hunch I could be in deep on Friday night when I got some phone calls asking me what libertarians had to do with Charlottesville, Virginia.

Some know I don’t like email and a few have my number. If I had company over or if I had been watching a decent movie, I probably wouldn’t have answered the calls. This was the first I had heard of Charlottesville. I thought at first they were talking about Charlotte, North Carolina. I poked around on the internet and found out about a torchlit protest. Hey, I told folks, they have a right to free speech too. As long as they don’t burn anything down or do any other property damage, it was no skin off my nose.

I didn’t agree with what white nationalists and neo-Nazis stood for, but that is what free speech is all about. They could protest all they wanted as long as they followed the law.

But, all my callers said, it’s hate speech.

So? I replied. I threw out the quote (from me) I had been using for a few months.

I am certainly against Nazism, supremacist groups, and misogyny. I just think they SHOULD be heard, if for no other reason than they can be laughed off the stage.

As loudly and as enthusiastically as we can.
I said that no libertarian would support bigotry. I could see the issues about protecting the statues and I thought that deserved a very public discussion. But the racist chants shouldn’t have anything to do with that. It was two different issues and they shouldn’t be mixed.

After the sixth or so call, the landline and the cell were both quiet. “Nice job,” I thought to myself. Another crisis averted. The folks I talked to would know that libertarians and Libertarians weren’t neo-Nazis or white nationalists. I patted myself on the back.

Then came Saturday. And I got flooded with emails. By Saturday night the phones were ringing.

I should explain. About twelve years back someone at Stormfront discovered Pagan Vigil and decided that I was something I am not. Some of my writings were passed around the internet. Worse, I was quoted out of context. Then some of my stuff was rewritten to make it seem that I supported certain causes and certain ideas. That took forever to mostly fix. But there are pockets left.

Then there was the mess from Florida. Long story short, white nationalists tried to co-opt part of the state Libertarian party. They were kicked out.

But here I was, a libertarian with supposed white nationalist ties. And a (scary? sexy? spooky?) pagan to boot. What did I have to say about vehicular homicide at a neo-Nazi rally?

Free speech is acceptable.

Unprovoked violence is not.

And you’d better be damn careful about “provoked” violence. Especially at a public protest.

People have the right to talk about their beliefs. People don’t have the right to impose those beliefs on others.

If you use force so others will listen, you’re doing it wrong.

All of the above went over pretty well. Here’s what didn’t.

I said that if the neo-Nazis were wrong to use violence first and not in self defense, so were the BLM members, the antifa, and the black bloc who had been doing exactly that for years. If you were a member of the right group, the authorities were mostly looking the other way. Mob violence had become part of American political culture again, and it wasn’t the neo-Nazis or the white nationalists who had made that happen.

Or for that matter, the Christian right, the Republicans, or the libertarians.

Violence was being used to shut down political discussion. What’s more, some groups were claiming moral authority because they had been victimized by American society. No one would be allowed to criticize if the proper groups were involved.

This. Was. Wrong.

This lay the groundwork for tyranny.

As you can imagine, those last five paragraphs did not go over well.

BLM, antifa, and the black bloc weren’t allowed to be guilty no matter what they have done or what they will do.

Anyone who says different is a racist. A fascist.

A Nazi.

And they must not be allowed to speak. At all. Under any circumstances. They must be silenced.

That’s when the pagan stuff started hitting the fan. If a pagan did not IMMEDIATELY drop everything and denounce the neo-Nazis and link them AND ONLY THEM to unprovoked violence, why, they were no better than the Nazis.

And therefore they must not be allowed to speak. At all. Under any circumstances. They must be silenced.

Suddenly free speech was only for the Morally Favored.

This made me angry. Not only was paganism getting dragged into a political situation (AGAIN) that favored progressives, but people were literally talking about Those Who Should Have Free Speech and Those Who MUST NOT BE ALLOWED Free Speech. Violence was ACCEPTABLE against Those Who MUST NOT BE ALLOWED Free Speech. The whole mess was pushing my buttons. I’m afraid I wasn’t always polite about it.

So that was my week. It cropped up again and again. Phone calls, face to face talks, internet discussion boards, and gods, the emails. People couldn’t or wouldn’t accept one simple idea. Take away someone else’s free speech today and you will lose yours tomorrow. Not might, will. The only sure way to protect your free speech is to protect other’s free speech. Even if you don’t like what they are saying.

Especially if you don’t like what they are saying.

Noam Chomsky (of all people) said something very similar.

Goebbels was in favor of free speech for views he liked. So was Stalin. If you’re really in favor of free speech, then you’re in favor of freedom of speech for precisely the views you despise. Otherwise, you’re not in favor of free speech.

That’s who I am. That’s where I stand. A right isn’t a right unless the other guy has it too.

     — NeoWayland, pagan philosopher, libertarian, and part time troublemaker

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Without government

310336_421852017873606_697311041_n

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Bannon out

Steve Bannon is out at White House

After watching the last few days, I'm pretty sure he wanted to be fired. I don't know what happened, but someone like Bannon doesn't just give a telephone interview on a lark. Word is he turned in his resignation on August 7th (pre-Charlottesville) effective August 14th, and it was extended to today.

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Free speech



That's what worries me most about this. Once people decide that some labels deserve free speech and others don't, where does it stop?
     — NeoWayland
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Identity in the tribe

They want to be someone other than who they are. That’s the great irony of identity politics: They seek identity in the tribe because they are failed individuals. They are a chain composed exclusively of weak links. What they are engaged in isn’t politics, but theater: play-acting in the hopes of achieving catharsis.
     — Kevin D. Williamson, Angry White Boys
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Remember this anniversary


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For the record, this is facism.

At least learn the definition

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Friday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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NeoNotes — Religion in public schools

I don't think religion belongs in the public schools. Public schools are compulsory, students can't walk away if they do not agree.

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Morality is based on selfish interest

I can make a case that our morality is based on selfish interest. It's the Ethic of Reciprocity. You don't do bad things to others because you don't want them to do bad things to you. You do good things to others because you want them to do good things to you. If they cross the line, you're not bound to tolerance and courtesy.
     — NeoWayland
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Thursday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Control how we touch other people

We can't let our faiths and our creeds control how we touch other people. Faith is between you and the Divine. But we're measured by how we touch the lives of other humans.
     — NeoWayland
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Don't be a sucker

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Wednesday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Governments make lousy banks

Governments make lousy banks. Politicos want re-election and technocrats are unaccountable. Both measure their success by spending taxpayer's money. There's no incentive to contain costs or make a profit.
     — NeoWayland
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“Charlottesville & The Alt-Right: Just Say NO to Identity Politics”

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“John Stossel vs. Noam Chomsky on Venezuela”

Yep, it was almost as if it were scripted. A myth for the ages - revised

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Tuesday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Good neighbor

How a Swimming Pool for Neighborhood Kids Helped Heal a Man After Wife’s Death

Keith Davison got so tired of his solitude following the death of his wife, he decided to do something about it – and things have been going swimmingly ever since.

The 94-year-old retired judge had been married to his wife Evy for 66 years until she passed away from cancer last year.

After dealing with the grief and the silence of his house, he decided to build a pool in his backyard.

But not for himself – he built it for the neighborhood kids to enjoy.
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Monday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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from crux № 22 — law did not create civil rights

No law required people to march in protest. No law demanded a sit-in at Woolworth's lunch counter. The changes were happening before the act was passed.

I'd say that in many ways the 1964 act froze that change. People weren't responsible any more, it was government's job. Add a changing civil rights movement leadership that put guilt politics and special privilege over equal rights, and you get one big gooey mess.

It's been 50 years since the Civil Rights Act was passed. Do we still need it because we locked people into a lower social class? When will those who benefit from the 1964 act not need it anymore?

I started keeping my crux files because I noticed I kept getting into the same discussions in comment threads on other people’s web sites. After a while it just made sense for me to organize my thoughts by topic. These are snippets. It’s not in any particular order, it’s just discussions I have again and again.
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from crux № 8 — rights & revised history

Folks probably already know this, but this brand of revisionism uses hard confrontation with constantly escalating stakes. You can't win against it by being loud, that just makes you the closest and biggest target.



There have been many terrible things done in the name of an absolute, "transcendent" morality. Many by Christians. Many by Christians to Christians. And many by Christians to Christians in the last century alone.

A label doesn't define morality. In the words of Mark Twain, "Action speaks louder than words but not nearly as often."

I'd rather know what someone has done than what they call themselves.



I have defended rights for homosexuals in comment threads on this site.

I want to make a distinction here. What the radical feminists are "fighting" for are not rights, but exclusive and irrevocable privileges backed by the force of law.

Rights do not emanate from a state, nor do they require state sanction or approval.

Most importantly, it's not a right unless the other guy has it too.

I tell people that I am not for Native American rights, homosexual rights, "black" rights, or women's rights.

I'm for human rights.

And you should be too.

I started keeping my crux files because I noticed I kept getting into the same discussions in comment threads on other people’s web sites. After a while it just made sense for me to organize my thoughts by topic. These are snippets. It’s not in any particular order, it’s just discussions I have again and again.
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“What is a Libertarian?”

This is the 1963 speech that Dr. King is best known for. It is the core of the 1960s Civil Rights movement.

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Special rights

Libertarians don't want special rights for certain groups based on their race, gender, age, orientation, or religion.

Libertarians want to protect natural rights for all people simply because they are human beings.
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Friday roundup

The Google Memo: Four Scientists Respond

Google doesn't believe in diversity of thought. Related - The Most Common Error in Media Coverage of the Google Memo, Google Fires Engineer For Noticing Men And Women Are Different, The Google Firing Demonstrates That Identity Politics Is Incoherent and Vicious & Google is more afraid of liberal outrage than federal law


Graphic Video Shows Cops Hold Down Handcuffed Teen, Torture Him With Taser—For Sleeping in Truck

Why haven't these police officers been charged with assault?


The Guy Who Invented Those Annoying Password Rules Now Regrets Wasting Your Time

The rules don't work. Pay attention to the XKCD comic mentioned in the article.


Obama administration knew about North Korea's miniaturized nukes

That Pentagon report that has everyone worried lately? It's from April of 2013. The Obama administration was notorious for released revised news and figures later, usually on Friday when no one was paying attentinon.


Justice Officials Sent Talking Points to FBI on Lynch Tarmac Meeting With Bill Clinton

I'd say this qualifies as suspicious.


Venezuela inflation quickens to 248.6 percent in year to July: opposition

Socialism fails every time it's tried.


A New Report Raises Big Questions About Last Year’s DNC Hack

This one is from The Nation. It's the first major left wing source that even admitted that it may not be the Russians.


The Afghan War Doesn't Need to Be Privatized—It Needs to Be EndedSo when does the perpetual war end?


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Hee hee hee hee


duckduckgo2

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Not really second place

“1st Place Runner Collapses 50m Shy Of Finish Line, Gets Help From 2nd Place Runner”

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Neighbors parade

“Friends surprise woman with parade on her final day of chemo”

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Highway rescue

No law required people to march in protest.

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The message was clear

The message was clear. There are problems but your Government Is Taking Care Of It. You don't have to worry. It's Somebody Else's Problem. You don't have to be responsible. Just put the right people in charge. Give more money. Give more authority. Sacrifice more rights. Repeat until we get it right. And don't ask too many questions.
     — NeoWayland
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Thursday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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“I Have a Dream”

This is the 1963 speech that Dr. King is best known for. It is the core of the 1960s Civil Rights movement.

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When politics are at stake

Truth is subjective when politics are at stake.
     — NeoWayland
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☆ Soundbite politics

Barack Obama is a big reason why Donald Trump was elected President.

But I'll get back to that.

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Dreams seem small

If our dreams seem small, it's up to us to make them greater. We need to make our own, not reach for the dreams of another. We can make it our Journey, or we can live the Story of another. A simple choice but the price is high. Just your faith and trust.
     — NeoWayland
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Wednesday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Getting better

“40 Ways the World Is Getting Better”

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Regrowth

“'Breakthrough' penny-sized nanochip pad is able to regrow organs and heal injuries”

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Escape from debt

“Why We Need Accountable Algorithms”

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Tuesday roundup

As I said, the tax exempt status is a "devil's trade" intended in large part to silence churches.

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NeoNotes — the Johnson amendment

Let me point out that tax exempt status is at best a "devil's trade." In exchange for the tax deduction, the organizations (and sometimes the officers) lose their political voice and the IRS gets itemized lists of what was donated and who donated it.

There's also the small bit that if there are tax deductions, then by definition taxes are too high.

However, Religion cannot be allowed the coercive power of government. Government cannot be allowed the moral justification of religion.



The 1st Amendment doesn't deal with subsets. The incredibly ironic bit is the history of churches in American politics, particularly the abolitionist movement.

I didn't say it was a complete list, I said it was an itemized list. It is enough to find "known associates" though.

Tax deductions are evidence that taxes are too high. It's also evidence of diverting capital, taking it away from unapproved activities and moving it towards approved activities. There's more, but it involves a long examination of progressive tax systems and it won't add anything but noise to our conversation.



Abraham Keteltas, Samuel West, Jonathan Mayhew, Peter Muhlenberg, and Samuel Cooper were just some of the colonial era ministers. In England for a while, the American Revolution was called the Presbyterian Revolution because so many Presbyterian pastors were involved.

But the abolitionist movement and the American Civil War was when things really got going. Look at names like John Todd, Joshua Leavitt, Benjamin Bradford, Luther Lee, and Samuel Salisbury. Without these men and their churches, the abolitionist movement would never have blossomed. Christians aren't perfect and I am certainly a critic. But it took British and American Christians to end the slave trade, they deserve credit for that.

The 1950s-1960s civil rights movement was heavily rooted in churches, especially in the American south.

As I said, the tax exempt status is a "devil's trade" intended in large part to silence churches.



I provided examples which at the very least would have violated the propaganda restrictions of the Johnson amendment if it had been in effect then. Yet those are a valued part of American history and important benchmarks in religious freedom.

A little further examination would have shown that American churches and synagogues have traditionally called politicos out on bad ideas and bad behavior.



It's not about "prophesy of the pulpit." It's about moral authority. Ideas like liberty, revolution, and slavery were talked about during worship. In those days more than anything else including the press, worship is where those ideas were set out in detail by men who made their living communicating well and clearly. I admit it's a part of history that is often overlooked, but it exists none the less.

Take a closer look. The Johnson amendment covers both endorsement and anti-endorsement, intervening in political campaigns is prohibited. It also limits lobbying, propaganda, and other political activity.

Pagans of all people know what a bad idea it is when a politico wraps themselves in the flag and waves holy writ as justification.

BTW, I have to give you points for that phrase "prophesy of the pulpit." It's poetic if not exactly accurate in this case.



You're right, that part of the law is seldom enforced. I was waiting for someone to bring that up.

So here is my next question. If the law as it exists is so potentially prone to abuse even as it is not enforced, why does the Johnson amendment exist?

My theory is that it was one of Johnson's infamous deals. In the early 1950s, the modern civil rights movement was just getting started, but the split was already there. It's a little inaccurate, but I call the two sides the MLK side and the Malcolm X side. Later the Malcolm X side was dominated by the Black Panthers, but that part of the story isn't necessary for our discussion here.

The MLK side wanted to work within the system making sure that existing law was enforced. The Malcolm X side relied on direct confrontation to create radical change and separate from the US if necessary. There was rivalry between the two sides, and at the time no one was sure which side would dominate. Johnson saw the potential need for what today we would call the nuclear option. As long as everything proceeded peacefully, the government would never need to use the stick. Meanwhile, everything was nicely registered and reported to the government, "just in case."

It wasn't the first time the IRS was used to monitor Americans and it wouldn't be the last.



You're right. I should have said existing Constitutional law, that was my mistake.

That wasn't the only operational difference, but it certainly was one of the most important. Bryan Burrough points out in Days of Rage that some "blacks" were disappointed as more moved north and they didn't instantly get more of what they felt had been denied them.

Existing state and local law in the south supported segregation, most Federal law did not. It varied in other states, not so much in the West but heavy in union states. When Truman reversed Wilson's segregation of the armed forces, the writing was on the wall.



Under what part of the 1st Amendment is Congress granted the power to regulate free speech?

Under what part of the 1st Amendment is Congress granted the power to regulate religion?

Yet the Johnson amendment does both.

Which tax argument? The fact that deductions mean that taxes are too high? Or that government uses a progressive tax code to encourage some behaviors and discourage others?

Can you show that either argument is BS?



Actually it does.

The perception in America is that you are not a "real" church unless you have tax exempt certification. Just like a few years back when conservative groups were having problems getting 503 certification, most people don't want to give money unless they know that the IRS is not going to audit them. The easy path is to do what the government tells you to do. That is not necessarily the right thing. Once a group has the certification, they are bound by the regulations if they wish to keep the majority of their donors. Those regulations are subject to change at any time, and have gotten more restrictive since the Johnson amendment was passed.

Every dollar that the government collects in taxes reduces individual purchasing power. Regardless of what some experts will tell you, the economy is driven by the individual buying goods and services and not by government regulation. More money, more purchases (or savings). Less money, more credit, less purchases and less savings.

Even if you think that only the "rich" pay higher taxes, that means less money for things like jobs, equipment, and expansion. That means less economic growth.

The second order effects of special taxes can be even worse. A few decades ago, Congress put out a luxury tax on high end planes, yachts, high end boats, and cars. All those industries took a major hit. Building and storing yachts and high end boats still haven't recovered.

It gets worse. Thanks to payroll withholding and "standard" deductions, the government effectively gives itself no-interest loans from your money. Multiply that by a hundred million or so and you get into some serious cash.

These are examples from taxes. I haven't discussed currency manipulation (inflation) or spending.



"Surely by your argument, there should be no tax exempt organizations at all, because the very existence of them proves taxes are too high."

Yes.

At the very least, no tax exempt organizations would mean fewer bureaucrats to monitor compliance and regulate.

"Government money goes back into the community and absolutely does stimulate economic growth."

It does that by displacing private investment. Private money wants a return on investment, which means maintaining facilities and periodic upgrades. Except for corporatism, companies stay in business by making their products better, cheaper, and more available.

"The rich actually mostly sock money away…"

Um, no they don't. There isn't a money vault or a stuffed mattress, smart people put their money to work. Some buy stocks, some buy bonds, some invest in companies. Unless the money earns a higher yield than the rate of inflation and the tax rate, it's worth less.

"…and pay LOWER taxes than the rest of us…"

According to the National Taxpayer Union Foundation, in 2014 the top ten percent of income earners paid 70.88% of the income tax. The top fifty percent of income earners paid 97.25% of the income tax.

Spending is not the same as taxing. Government at all levels has done a rotten job of maintaining facilities, much less upgrading them. Private ownership does wonders, as things like the Empire State Building show.

Government usually puts money aside for infrastructure and then diverts the money into more "essential" things. It's one of the oldest tricks in government accounting. Then more money is "needed."

What's more, government is a lousy judge of where to spend and what to spend it on. Just as one example, less than a handful of VA hospitals are worth it, but we keep tossing more and more money at the problem.

NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.

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Algorithm

You could take the original Rocky and this film and you wouldn't need any of the films between them.

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“Minimum wage causing issues for businesses in Flagstaff”

“The minimum wage increase is especially hurting businesses in Flagstaff as they deal with increase costs”

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Monday roundup

Molina Healthcare Exits Obamacare Exchanges in Two States, Experiences $230 Million Loss

Remember, the exchanges were never meant to last. And this is another mess that Obama chose to have his successor fix.


Coast Guard Chief Will Disregard Trump’s Ban on Transgenders in Military

He can't, not legally. If the code changes and Trump gives the order, it's a court martial offense.


FBI monitored social media on Election Day for 'fake news' about Hillary Clinton: Report

So who gave the order? And did this really happen?


Venezuela says crushes anti-government attack on military base



BOM scandal: “smart cards” filter out coldest temperatures. Full audit needed ASAP!

Australia's Bureau of Meteorology apparently gooses the numbers before they become Official™.


Immigration Brings Out the Social Engineers

“If we Americans value freedom, we will dismiss the social engineers, open the borders, and liberate ourselves.”


Republican Shadow Campaign for 2020 Takes Shape as Trump Doubts Grow

I don't think it will happen, but you can practically feel the NY Times drool


Dunkirk: A contrary view about a movie everyone else loves

Something I never considered but well worth thinking about.


U.S. job growth surges in July

I'm not sure the growth is stable, but yes, the numbers did surge. And yes, Obama would have killed for those numbers.


1.8 million California acres were set aside for frogs.

Environmentalism is a crusade, ecology is a science studying interconnections and tradeoffs.

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The BA Christmas bonus

When Richard Branson's airline won $945,000 from a lawsuit, he gave it all to his employees

Three decades after after its launch, Virgin Atlantic is the second-largest UK carrier. "But it hasn't always been easy ... during those 33 years," the founder writes in a letter to his employees.

Most notably, when Branson's airline was trying to establish itself in the 1990s, British Airways ran what became known as the "dirty tricks" campaign.

"We had about four planes flying, and [British Airways] went to extraordinary lengths to put us out of business," recalls Branson on an episode of NPR's "How I Built This" podcast. "They had a team of people illegally accessing our computer information and ringing up our passengers and pretending that they were from Virgin, telling them that flights were cancelled and switching them onto BA."

Virgin took British Air to court and won $945,000 in damages, the largest libel settlement in UK history. Branson chose to invest the money back into his Virgin Atlantic team.

"It was Christmas time," he tells Raz. "It became known as the BA Christmas bonus — we distributed it to all our staff equally."
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Serious cuteness

“Artist Brightens Up The Streets By Drawing Adorable Creatures”

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from crux № 13 — Competiton

Competition drives the free market, to keep customers companies have to make things better than their rivals and better than what they themselves did yesterday.

Competition is what the "single payer" eliminates in the name of efficiency, yet over time competition means that products and services will be better, faster, and cheaper.

There is no incentive to improve under a government controlled system. There is overwhelming incentive to pay off legislators and technocrats for favorable treatment.



I'm usually correct.

Except when I'm wrong… *grins*

Jokes aside, you probably agree with me on economics, smaller government and (most) individual rights. We won't agree on religion, personal morality, and sexuality. I hope we can agree on honor.

I hang out here to keep me honest and so I can see how conservatives think. And occasionally to keep you honest *wink* and keep you from taking yourself too seriously.



I just get very tired of watching people who should know better lump all members of a group into a monolithic block who is out to destroy their way of life and must be Stopped for the Good of Humanity™

The ironic thing is many of the people who complain loudest about it being done to them are only too willing to turn around and do it to someone else.

I've seen pagans do it to Christians, "blacks" do it to "Hispanics," Republicans do it to Democrats, and women doing it to men.

And vice versa.

You know what? It's not the label shouting and doing things, it's the individual person. Until you deal them as individuals rather than as a subset of a label, you have walled yourself off.

Not them. You.



Thinking about it just now, that raises a fascinating question.

Which is worth more, a moral code handed to you or one earned through personal experience?



I'm not asking you to follow my code.

I'm not even asking you to allow me to follow my code.

I'm telling you that I won't follow your code just as you would tell me that you won't follow mine.

Now we could find what we agree on and work from there, or you could spend effort telling me why your enlightenment requires my sacrifice.

I think the former would be more productive, but I would enjoy your frustration at the latter too.

I started keeping my crux files because I noticed I kept getting into the same discussions in comment threads on other people’s web sites. After a while it just made sense for me to organize my thoughts by topic. These are snippets. It’s not in any particular order, it’s just discussions I have again and again.

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They should be heard

I am certainly against Nazism, supremacist groups, and misogyny. I just think they SHOULD be heard, if for no other reason than they can be laughed off the stage.

As loudly and as enthusiastically as we can.
     — NeoWayland
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“Why Did the Democratic South Become Republican?” from Prager University

“The south used to vote Democrat. Now it votes Republican. Why the switch? Was it, as some people say, because the GOP decided to appeal to racist whites? Carol Swain, Professor of Political Science at Vanderbilt University, explains.”

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Won't be

t3_6os5zl

h/t Wendy McElroy

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Friday roundup

Somehow I don't believe this.

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Rescued

Good Samaritans Jump In Canal To Rescue Elderly Man Trapped In Truck

Norman LaBarge, 79, of Tremonton, Utah, is grateful for the three good Samaritans that came to his aid Wednesday after he drove his truck into a canal on state Route 30.

LaBarge is diabetic and said his blood sugar had gotten a little low, which caused him to lose control of his vehicle.

"I remember bouncing off the guard rails, and I remember going over toward the canal, and then the next thing I knew is there was water coming in," LaBarge said.

Several people stopped to help, including Adam Blanchard, a Fire Department volunteer who was about a mile away when he heard there was a vehicle that had gone off the road into the canal. He, along with Utah Highway Patrol trooper Justin Zilles and a third man ran into the canal.

The good Samaritans were able to pull him out of the truck through the passenger side.
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NeoNotes — Civil Rights acts - updated

If the Civil Rights Act of 1866 had worked, there would have been a need for another in 1871, in 1875, in 1957, in 1964, a Voting Rights Act of 1965, the Fair Housing Act of 1968, the Civil Rights Restoration Act of 1987, and the Civil Rights Act of 1991.

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Beware

You should beware the politician who wraps himself in faith and the minister who wraps himself with the flag.
     — NeoWayland, personal journal
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Final Speech from “The Great Dictator”

"We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery we need humanity. More than cleverness we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost…"

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Thursday roundup

Whatever Is On Imran Awan’s Smashed Hard Drives Likely Can Be Recovered

This will be interesting.


Danish 17-year-old girl who used a pepper spray to fight off a rapist near migrant asylum centre is told SHE will be prosecuted for carrying the weapon

It's headlines like this that make me wonder if Europe has a future.


Scientists Still Seek A Reliable DUI Test For Marijuana



How Civil Asset Forfeiture Reduces Economic Mobility

Related - Policing for Profit: Jeff Sessions & Co.’s Thinly Veiled Plot to Rob Us Blind. Someone please explain why civil asset forfeiture is not legalized highway robbery.


Maduro’s Stranglehold On Disarmed Venezuelans

Related - Venezuela's Price Inflation Hits an Annual Rate of 952%Venezuelan Opposition Leaders Detained at Gunpoint in RaidsVenezuelans killing flamingos and anteaters to stave off hunger amid mounting food crisisDeadly election day in Venezuela as protesters clash with troopsHungry Venezuelans Flee in Boats to Escape Economic Collapse — The elites and politicos are building a case for intervening in Venezuela. It's a bad idea.


Pulitzer-Prize Winning Reporter: FBI Report Shows It Was Seth Rich – Not Russians – Who Gave DNC Emails to Wikileaks

Related - Lawsuit says Fox knowingly faked Seth Rich story


“No Please Stop!” Dash Cam Shows Cop Fire 21 Shots as Unarmed Teens Beg for Their Lives

When will Americans start holding police officers accountable for breaking the law?


Commercial Crabber Of 50 Years Tells Gore Sea Level Hasn’t Changed Since At Least 1970

Take away the adjusted numbers and there is no climate change.


Navajo Nation Purchases Colorado Land

This has been in the works for a while. It gives the Diné a place close to the last of their sacred mountains.

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Only religious activities

Palo Alto Cracks Down On Neighborhood Churches

The city of Palo Alto is cracking down on churches that are trying to cut costs by subletting their space.

The clock is ticking for one church, which has been told all its tenants have to get out in a few weeks, or face severe fines.

The First Baptist Church has been on the same street corner in Palo Alto, serving the poor and needy, for 125 years.

But after a brief, informal meeting with city code enforcement officers earlier this year, Pastor Rick Mixon suddenly got a sternly worded letter from the city, telling him he must cease all non-religious activities, and that his tenants, which include a music school, a psychologist, and the Peninsula Peace and Justice Center, to get out by August 17 or face severe fines.

Mixon said, “In order to operate here, to keep it looking good, looking nice in a nice neighborhood, we need to rent the space. It represents about a third of our budget right now.”

For years, the church has rented the space on the second floor to music classes, choirs, dance clubs, and hosted dinners and weddings.
     — Kiet Do

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Oh really?

Somehow I don't believe this.

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☆ Other people's property

People look for better value if it's their own money at stake.

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One thing I wish I could literally pound into Christian heads

If there is one thing I wish I could literally pound into Christian heads, it's this: Christianity is not the source of all that is good and righteous in our society. Other cultures and other faiths have contributed heavily. It's amazing that I even have to mention this where one house of the national legislature is called the Senate and the other has a ceremonial fasces. Even The Magnificent Seven was a remake.
     — NeoWayland
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“Stossel: Stop! You Need a License To Do that Job!”

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Wednesday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Changing

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Age is just a number

“8-Year-Old Becomes Youngest Girl To Climb Mount Kilimanjaro”

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Sharing the extra

This Mom Has Donated 5,000 Pints Of Breast Milk To Help Feed Premature Babies

Elisabeth Anderson-Sierra has donated 5,000 pints of breast milk to help premature babies.

The 29-year-old mom from Beaverton, Oregon, spends an incredible 10 hours a day pumping around 1.75 gallons of milk - ten times the average woman.

Elizabeth has hyperlactation syndrome, which means she produces masses more milk than what is considered average. But she still manages to squeeze in feeding time for her own six-month-old daughter before generously giving the rest to those more needy than herself.

The milk goes to a milk bank for micro preemies, so 1oz can feed three or four babies. Elizabeth's milk has fed thousands of babies.
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Reaction

Government is reactive. What individuals choose is much more important than the credit that politicos claim. Lasting change only happens when enough people got angry enough to demand change.
     — NeoWayland
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Morality & character

Our problem is that we excuse people from the consequences.

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Tuesday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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“The War On Cars”

“There is a war against cars in America. Regulators want Americans out of cars and onto trains, buses, and bicycles. Why? Because of what cars represent -- freedom. Automotive expert Lauren Fix ("The Car Coach") explains.”

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from crux № 18 — choice and consequence

Our problem is that we excuse people from the consequences.

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Treehouse

“35 Fellow Cops Finish the Treehouse a Slain Officer Was Building For Daughter”

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NeoNotes — ban it

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Monday roundup

Shock Poll Shows Kid Rock WIth A Huge Lead In The Michigan GOP Senate Primary

He's the leading GOP candidate without doing anything and he's within striking distance of the incumbent. Just like Trump, this isn't because of anything he has done. It's because People. Are. Pissed. Off.


A Demagogic Bully

The Southern Poverty Law Center has long since lost any connection to reality.


Amazon is thinking about using its delivery drones to scan your house to sell you more stuff

I'm pretty sure that this is in the active planning stage.


Markets Relax Merrily on a Powerful Time Bomb

The bill always comes due.


Judge Slams ‘Incompetent’ Cops After SWAT Raids Innocent Family for Growing Tomato Plants

Police powers need to be put in check.


California Lawmakers Passes 400% Gas Tax Increase then Give Themselves FREE Gasoline and Cars!

Beware the exceptions!


It’s time for single-payer … the consumer to provider

Eliminate the middlemen, government and the insurance companies. Then watch the prices drop.


Federal Gun Prosecutions Up 23 Percent Under Trump, DOJ Says

This is not a good thing. Notice how there is no context. The main use of the 2nd Amendment is so citizens can protect themselves against government.

British Climate Minister Boasts About Bypassing the US Federal Government

Remember it's not about saving the planet. It's about shifting massive amounts of cash and power.

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“Thomas Sowell - Misconceptions About Slavery”

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“Penn Jillette on Libertarianism, Taxes, Trump, Clinton and Weed”

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Government

“America's Media Meltdown”

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NeoNotes — enabling racism

My mom's family is Louisiana farming stock. My natural father was not around long enough for me to know his family. I was born in Ganado, one of the few bilagáana born on the Navajo reservation. I've lived my entire life in the four state region, and I've lived with casual racism from the very first.

Without exception, the worst racism I've seen has been enabled by government. It could be keeping inner city mothers pregnant and unmarried. It could be hiring "tokens" when they weren't qualified. It could be stealing mineral rights while keeping tribal governments from hiring capable attorneys. But mostly it's keeping certain groups of people dependent on government daily. Always, they're told how they are victims. Always, they are told that only government can give them a fair shake. Always, they are told that Nasty People want to keep them down. And as long as they stay dependent, things never get better for them.

That's the tyranny that is rooted in progressivism and other forms of statism.

NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.

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Friday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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“13 Reasons Jeff Sessions is a @$#/!” by ReasonTV

“Jeff Sessions is on the ropes with Donald Trump. Good.

The president is pissed because Sessions recused himself from the investigation of Russian attempts to influence the 2016 election. But here are a baker's dozen of reasons to hate the attorney general, including his obsession with restarting the war on pot, his call to jack up mandatory minimums, and his support for civil asset forfeiture. Then there's his lack of interest in due process, willingness to subvert state's rights when they conflict with his desiblurb outcome, and desire to lengthen prison terms for non-violent criminals. Also, he might be some kind of statist elf.”

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NeoNotes — public accommodation law is wrong - updated

I wonder too.

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Thursday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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“Ain't I a Woman?”

Ain't I a Woman?

by Sojourner Truth
Well, children, where there is so much racket there must be something out of kilter. I think that 'twixt the negroes of the South and the women at the North, all talking about rights, the white men will be in a fix pretty soon. But what's all this here talking about?

That man over there says that women need to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches, and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody ever helps me into carriages, or over mud-puddles, or gives me any best place! And ain't I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm! I have ploughed and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain't I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man - when I could get it - and bear the lash as well! And ain't I a woman? I have borne thirteen children, and seen most all sold off to slavery, and when I cried out with my mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me! And ain't I a woman?

Then they talk about this thing in the head; what's this they call it? [member of audience whispers, "intellect"] That's it, honey. What's that got to do with women's rights or negroes' rights? If my cup won't hold but a pint, and yours holds a quart, wouldn't you be mean not to let me have my little half measure full?

Then that little man in black there, he says women can't have as much rights as men, 'cause Christ wasn't a woman! Where did your Christ come from? Where did your Christ come from? From God and a woman! Man had nothing to do with Him.

If the first woman God ever made was strong enough to turn the world upside down all alone, these women together ought to be able to turn it back , and get it right side up again! And now they is asking to do it, the men better let them.

Obliged to you for hearing me, and now old Sojourner ain't got nothing more to say.
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Offering a hand

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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That's what buddies are for

“8-Year-old Helps Buy New Wheelchair For His Best Buddy When Insurance Fails”

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Wednesday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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“Who said I don't believe in gods?”

Who said I don't believe in gods?

If anything, I don't believe in your beliefs. But that's okay, you don't believe in mine either. I could qualify it and say more specifically I don't believe in your understanding of your beliefs (and I'm pretty sure you don't either), but that is complicating things far beyond what is needed for the conversation here. Not to mention being incredibly self-referential.
     — NeoWayland

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NeoNotes — Parity is the keystone

If I don't share your faith, I shouldn't be bound by it. If you don't share my faith, you shouldn't be bound by it.

This is parity. It can be derived from what Christians call the Golden Rule. It's also called the Ethic of Reciprocity and is arguably the keystone of Western Civilization besides being found in nearly every culture on Earth. Behavioral studies show that a rudimentary form exists in higher mammals. Fair is fair.

One of my "party tricks" is showing that you can build an entire moral, ethical, and legal system based on nothing but the Ethic of Reciprocity. No "Higher Law." No use of force except in defense. No one faith and no one group raised above all others never to be questioned.

Just treating each other as we would want to be treated. Nothing more, nothing less. Live and let live.

NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.

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“Why Social Justice is CANCER ” by Roaming Millennial

“Yes, social justice is cancer, and here's why. This video explains what social justice is & breaks down the problem with identity politics & the concept of justice vs. equality. Also SJWs are commies. Yeah.”

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Tuesday roundup

I wonder too.

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Association

People look for better value if it's their own money at stake.

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Won't knife you in the back

In my experience, conservatives won't knife you in the back. They'll scream in your face, they'll tell you that you're wrong, but they're usually facing you.

Certain progressives will trot you out for the dog-&-pony show, drape an arm over your shoulder, smile for the cameras, and then slide the knife in so smoothly you never feel it until after you start bleeding and they've moved away.
     — NeoWayland
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Thou shalt not dissent

One rule of thumb is that all things being equal (which they usually aren't), the side working to control who gets to speak is the one you should worry about.

"Thou shalt not dissent" should a be red flag with a siren.
     — NeoWayland

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Before I've eaten breakfast

I've read enough of your stuff to understand why you misuse Science as a Higher Authority, One That Must Not Be Questioned. I can advocate science without being "scientific." I don't need test tubes, a microscope, or a Geiger counter to lend credibility.

I can defend human rights without being gay, a woman, Navajo, disabled, or a money-grubbing politico.

I can promote religious freedom without being Jewish, Catholic, Muslim, Protestant, Buddhist, or atheist.

I can even type a few replies before I've eaten breakfast. Not before my tea though, I'm good but not that good.
     — NeoWayland

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The label tells me almost nothing

I've met bad Pagans and good Christians, rotten agnostics and good atheists, decent Satanists and iffy heathens. The label tells me almost nothing, but the individual behavior tells me almost everything.
     — NeoWayland

There's no virtue or vice in the label. It's our words and deeds that define us.
     — NeoWayland
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NeoNotes — Marriage revisted

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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A trillion dollar industry

“Commentary: Can the NOAA, NASA, EPA, Met Office, and British academia all be wrong about climate change?”

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Competion keeps companies honest

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Monday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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NeoNotes — Religion enshrined in law

Simple questions.

Why should any religion be enshrined in law? Raised above all others as THE Moral Standard?

Perhaps more importantly, would you accept it if it were not your religion?

Or at least something calling itself your religion.



Pardon, but that isn't the question.

Why should any religion be enshrined in law?

Shouldn't faith be between you and the Divine?

Shouldn't religion be your choice and not imposed on you by some government functionary?

Coke may be less disagreeable than Pepsi, but I don't want armed special agents making sure I drink it.



Only if you think government must be predicated on or derived from religion.

Which, thankfully, the Founders did not.



But it's not about if religions are "equal" or not.

It's about if a single religion should be enshrined in law. And what happens if you are not a member of the religion that is made part of law.

Should you be bound by a religion you are not a part of?



Yep, I did. And for very good reason.

I also said this:

Perhaps more importantly, would you accept it if it were not your religion?



I've really tried to be polite on this board, but believe when I say I've seen more than enough Christian intolerance to last me several lifetimes. It's not every Christian, but it is there. Nor are Christians alone in their intolerance.

What I am trying to say is that by making religion a part of government you're setting the grounds for much more intolerance.

Even if you stuck to Christians, you'd be asking for trouble. Should Catholics have precedence over Baptists? What about the Mormons and the Methodists?



Yep, that happens too.

But when someone defines intolerance as everyone else not putting that someone's religion over every thing else, well, the someone crossed the line and they are fair game.



No, that isn't what I said.

Look at what Moore said in the article. He's talking about defending Christianity in the law. And creating more law that incorporates "Christian principles."

"Do not murder." That's a good idea. It also predates Christianity by quite a bit and is shared by many cultures and faiths.

"Do not murder because of the Ten Commandments and what Jesus said." That's not the same thing and it adds baggage to something that should be simple.



Pardon, but that is an opinion.

My gods prefer that people work it out for themselves.

That's an opinion too.



You mean other than Roy Moore up there in the original post?

You’re talking about overturning God’s natural order ….

That's certainly a religious point of view.



Nondenominational? Ah, I see.

It's only the Christians that need apply? You don't need the Jews.

I live next to the Navajo reservation. Will you exclude the Sky People?

One of my neighbors three doors down is a Buddhist. Doesn't she get a say?

One of my companions is an atheist. She's also one of the wisest women I know. Should she get a say?

Why or why not?



And I've answered it several times, twice directly.

When you assume that government is based on a religion you are imposing and enshrining that religion.

When it comes to religion becoming the law of the land, the devout don't need it, the non-believers don't want it, and the politicos will corrupt it.



Then why is Roy Moore making so much noise?



I'm not demanding that you give up your faith.

I'm asking why religion should be enshrined in law.

Faith is between you and the Divine, no other person can change that. It's up to you and your choices.

I'm asking for no sacrifice unless you believe that your religion should govern the faith and religion of others.

And if that's the case, I'm asking why.



No, actually we weren't.

The U.S. Constitution doesn't mention the Christian God except in the date.

It's wholly remarkable in that it may well be the first document in history that didn't claim government power derived from the Divine.

Men of faith and men of reason deliberately chose not to make a public declaration of religion even as they acknowledged it's role in individual action.

They knew that faith must be chosen, not compelled.



Talk about timing…

I always find it amazing when I have to point out the U.S. was not founded as a "Christian nation" when one house of the national legislature is called the Senate.

I've written about this many times before. But please don't take my word for it.

http://www.usconstitution.net

That's a site created to explore and explain the Constitution. Look for yourself. Try to find any mention of the Bible or the Divine.



Considering the custom of the times, omitting "those words" was even more revolutionary than the Declaration of Independence and the battles that followed.

Again, that doesn't mean that the Founders weren't devout. It does mean that they knew about the English Civil War and the problems caused by some colonies and their religious restrictions.

I'd like to think that each of the Founders decided that if his church wasn't going to be "top dog," no one else's would be either.

And that is why Roy Moore is wrong.



Can you show where I'm wrong?



The question you should be asking yourself is not if the Founders were religious or if the U.S. was founded as a "Christian nation."

No, the question is why the Founders, among the best educated men of their time, chose not to make the Constitution dependent on any faith.

I'll give you a hint. Too many people are in religion for the politics.



I am, and it relates to the question in the title of the post.

If anyone thinks their religion needs the force of law to back it up, then they are doing it wrong.

The law should neither help nor hinder religion. But no religion should rely on force either.



If it's a straw man, then why did Roy Moore say what he did?

There's a difference between personal faith and public policy.



Pardon, but I think that's wrong.

It's not that the American people hate the Divine. And I don't think they may object because it is a Christian policy.

I think they object because it is a religious rule made policy.

NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.

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What Obama did

America's Media Meltdown

In the 2008 campaign, reporters ignored the close and disturbing relationships between the mostly unknown Obama and a cast of unsavory characters: his racist and anti-Semitic pastor Rev. Jeremiah Wright, the neighborhood confidant and former terrorist Bill Ayers, and the wheeler-dealer and soon-to-be felon Tony Rezko.

Instead, journalists quickly started worshipping candidate Obama in a manner never quite seen before, not even in the days of the iconic liberal presidents like Franklin Delano Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy. Newsweek editor Evan Thomas declared Obama to be a deity (“Obama's standing above the country, above the world, he’s sort of God.”) His very words were able to make the leg of MSNBC’s Chris Matthews “tingle.” His pants’ crease proved for David Brooks a talisman of his future greatness, along with the fact that the mellifluent Obama “talks like us.”

While a few journalists were aware of their cult-like worship, most were hooked and competed to outdo one another with embarrassing hagiographic praise. Upon election, Obama was summarily declared by one presidential historian and television pundit to the smartest man with the highest IQ ever to have been president.

Obama himself channeled the veneration, variously promising in god-like fashion to cool the planet and lower the seas, remarking that his own multifaceted expertise was greater than that of all of the various specialists who ran his campaign. For the next eight years, the media largely ignored what might charitably be called an historic overextension of presidential power and scandal not seen since the days of Richard Nixon’s presidency. A clique of journalists set up a private chat group, JournoList, through which they could channel ideas to promote the Obama progressive agenda.
     — Victor Davis Hanson

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from crux № 19 — Free market

Our heroes are defined by what they have done and how they inspire us.

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Cash means freedom

“The End of Cash; The End of Freedom”

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Last $40

Teen Who Lost Everything In Fire Spends His Last $40 On Firefighters

An Alabama mom can't help but brag about her 15-year-old son Kenneth.

"In general, teenagers get a bad rap," Casie Bennett told AL.com. "My son is a good kid. He really is."

Earlier this month the Bennett family's house burned down and they lost everything. On the night of the fire, Kenneth returned from a friend's house to find volunteer firefighters battling to put out the blaze that had consumed his home.

Shockingly, the high school sophomore thought not of himself or his possessions, but of the firefighters. Their cooler, he noticed, was near empty.

Around 1am, after the fire was out, Kenneth went to a nearby gas station to buy a root beer. There he noticed some cases of water, so he handed the clerk $40, and took the water straight to the fire department.

That $40 was all Kenneth had left.

"He had been saving that money for his anniversary, the day after the fire," Casie explained to AL.com. "He wanted to take his girlfriend, Bailey, to Ruth's Chris."
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Magical adoption

Watch Mickey Mouse share magical news of adoption with these foster kids

Tom and Courtney Gilmour had long planned for two big events: the adoption of their two foster children, and a trip to Disney World. By coincidence, just three days before leaving for Orlando, Florida, this past spring, a Pennsylvania court confirmed the Gilmours' adoption date.

Suddenly, their Disney vacation took on an extra-magical quality.

Janielle, 12, and Elijah, 10, had bounced around different foster homes their whole lives. Three years ago, they landed in the Gilmours' Portland home in eastern Pennsylvania.

Courtney Gilmour, 36, knew she wanted to adopt the brother and sister as soon as she met them. “We instantly connected," she told TODAY. "We blended as a family. It didn’t feel weird for a second. It felt natural."

But, as Gilmour explained, “the adoption system doesn’t work as fast as your heart does.” So the couple waited.

Finally, on April 7, the Pennsylvania court offered the Gilmours an official adoption date: May 24, 2017. Three days later, the family set off for Disney World.

The couple could barely contain their excitement, but they decided to wait until they arrived at the Magic Kingdom to share the wonderful news with the kids.
     — Julia Curley
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Annie mode

Congress is permanently in “Annie” mode. It will deal with its war responsibilities, like its myriad other forfeited powers, tomorrow, which is always a day away.
     — George Will, Congress is fleeing its warmaking responsibilities

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Promise

“…against the law…”

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Olympic committee

The Olympic Games lose money for the host city. I think the International Olympics Committee may have started the stadium scam, where the local government is on the hook for the bills and the sports team gets most of the revenue with no risk.
     — NeoWayland

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Exits

Remember where the exits are. Be willing to walk away.
     — NeoWayland

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❝The Sinister Reason Weed is Illegal❞ by Adam Ruins Everything

“The End of Cash; The End of Freedom”

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Ehrlichman on drugs

You understand what I'm saying? We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin. And then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities, We could arrest their leaders. raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.
     — John Ehrlichman

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Clash of ideas

clashOFideas

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Private property

Private property is the the foundation of prosperity, as explained in Hernando de Soto's The Mystery of Capital: Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and Fails Everywhere Else. Without private property, there can be no free market. Without a free market, the economy is screwed. The climate alarmist movement exists to redistribute wealth "for the greater good."
     — NeoWayland

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Friday roundup 21Jul2017

Seismic Shift In Syria: Trump Ends Covert Obama-era CIA Program Which Sent Arms To Jihadists

Of course the media covered this, right?


Trump threatens to gut Obamacare markets

If you can't repeal, then just let it collapse. Smart move. The Washington elite keep underestimating Trump.


Fmr. U.N. Amb. Power Emerges As Central Figure In Obama Unmasking Investigation

Does anyone doubt that the Obama administration tried to fix the 2016 election anymore?


Warren's consumer 'protection' agency sets dangerous precedent

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) should be abolished as quickly as possible. It does not answer to anyone, and yet has tremendous power over business and consumers.


Mueller Expands Probe to Trump Business Transactions

From the first, the really interesting stuff has been excluded. The entire 2016 election, including the efforts of the Obama administration and the Clinton campaign, should be investigated.


Mueller’s Investigation Must Be Limited and Accountable

Notice how Robert Mueller is staying away from investigating the Obama administration and the Clinton campaign. This investigation is not about possible crimes or justice. It's not even about the 2016 election. It's an open ended, unlimited, and unaccountable taxpayer funded effort to bring down the legally elected President. I don't like Trump, I don't trust Trump, BUT he was legally elected. Why isn't this called what it is, a coup d'état?


Trump Eliminates More Than 800 Obama Regulations

For a man who is incompetent and unfit to be President, he seems to be doing quite a bit.


Clarence Thomas vs. Jeff Sessions on Civil Asset Forfeiture

I would love to see a civil asset forfeiture case hit the Supreme Court. Right now I think there's an excellent chance it could be overthrown.

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Itemized deductions

Itemized deductions are extortion. Government takes your money. You beg for it back. Government might give it to you.

If you are especially nice and if you do as you are told.
     — NeoWayland

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Supervillian territory

George Soros wants to disrupt society so government steps in and he can profit. The man is a secret lair away from supervillian territory.
     — NeoWayland

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❝One True Islam? | The Moderate Imam & Westernization❞ by Roaming Millennia

“In light of my interview with Imam Tawhidi, this video looks at whether Islam a religion of peace & compatible with the West, why the left always defends it, & whether moderate Muslims exist.”

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Martial arts for Middle Eastern women

“The First Self-Defense Studio in the Middle East that Teaches Women to Fight Back”

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Man builds stairs in park

“Man Hires Homeless Man And Builds Park Stairs For $550 After City Estimates $65,000-$150,000 For The Project”

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Long haired boy

Boy grows his hair out to help kids with cancer — despite bullies who teased him

An 11-year-old boy from Wales is on a mission to help people with cancer after meeting a young girl who had lost her hair due to chemotherapy.

Joshua Scott-Hill of Llanelli, a town on the country's southern coast, grew his hair for a year and a half so that it could be donated to make wigs for children with cancer. He was inspired after running into a girl with cancer, a daughter of one of his mother's friends, at a grocery store early last year, he and his mother told TODAY.

"He asked where her eyebrows were, and I was like, 'Oh no!'" his mom, Samantha Scott, 35, said.

"I was curious, so I asked her, and she said she was going through chemotherapy and that's why she lost her hair," Josh told TODAY.

Later, after talking to his mother, he decided to grow his hair long to help other children who have cancer.

Eighteen months later, Josh's hair had grown 10 inches. And on Saturday, he buzzed it all off, and donated the locks to an organization called Little Princess Trust, which makes real-hair wigs for boys and girls in the U.K. who have lost their hair due to cancer treatment.
     — Rheana Murray

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Another exception

Are there any type of calls that are exempt from the robocall rules issued by the FCC or the FTC?

There are several exemptions. Calls made for debt collection, charitable solicitation, political causes or campaigns and surveys are all exempt from these rules.
     — Marguerite Reardon, Why am I getting so many robocalls?

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🚀 ❝The Eagle has landed.❞

“The video of the very first moon landing of the apollo 11 mission in 1969! Neil Armstrong was the first man to set foot on the moon with his now legenday words "One small step for man, a giant leap for mankind." This is a truly amazing video and it was in 1969!!! If you think about it, you have orders of magnitude more processing power in your mobile phone than they did in the whole space craft!! Incblurbible!”

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❝On the 150th Anniversary of the Declaration of Independence❞

“Silent Cal” is one of the underestimated presidents and is probably in the top ten. Or he would have been if Hoover didn't undo most of his work. This is one of Calvin Coolidge's better speeches and is a great American work.

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☆ Sins of the skin

I'm behind this week. I had issues with my blogging program..

Why is it that everyone is allowed to be proud of their ethnic heritage unless you're "white?"

And then there's "white privilege."

"If you can't see it, you've got it."

Guess what. That's racist.

Yes, you read that right. It's racist. People are being blamed because of their skin color. No matter what they say, no matter what they do, They Are Guilty and Can Not Be Redeemed. You can't get more racist than that.

They are not only guilty, but they are responsible for the actions and attitudes of people long dead.

Well, isn't that a kick in the pants. I can only speak for me.

I won't humble myself and acknowledge the sins of my skin color.

I won't abase myself.

I won't sacrifice my pride and power before their “need.”


Why not? Because I didn't do anything. You want to be a victim? Fine. Go do it somewhere else.

You want some help so you can stop being a victim? Then let's talk. Let's see what we can do.

Yes, the United States was not perfect when it was founded. There were a bunch of rich, "white" men running around controlling everything. Things got better. The US helped destroy the international slave trade. Women got the vote. Some of our greatest today aren't rich, "white", or male. Things got better. It's not perfect now. But we're getting better. That's the promise.

If you are not responsible for the sins of your ancestors, then neither is anyone else. Neither am I.

If you take pride in your ancestry, then so can anyone else. So can I.

Why?

Because I am not guilty for my ancestors.

My skin color doesn't make me racist.

Can you say the same?

We're human. Let's build on that. Let's start with today. Let's limit our judgement to what the individual has said and done.

Let's not blame the skin color. Or privilege. Or what we think they think.

Just what is said. Just what is done.

Can you live with that?

I can. Do we have a deal?

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NeoNotes — internet tactics

I pointed out before that dismissing arguments unheard and without even a cursory search to see if there is any validity just makes you look foolish and uninformed.

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Standard deduction

If there is a “standard deduction,” then by definition taxes are too high.
     — NeoWayland

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☥ ▽ ❝Obey the principles without being bound by them.❞

Bruce Lee • Before passing day

Lived 27Nov1940 to 20July1973 (32). Cultural icon. filmmaker, martial arts instructor, philosopher, and founder of Jeet Kune Do. Notable Chinese American when there were hardly any positive Asians in Western popular culture. The most influential martial artist of modern times.

Obey the principles without being bound by them.
     — Bruce Lee

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Know

Know yourself. Know what you can do. Know what you're willing to do. Know the price you're willing to pay.
     — NeoWayland

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Biggest and hardest lesson

The biggest and hardest lesson that I've had to learn is that no one group has THE answer, and no group that says it has THE answer can be fully trusted.
     — NeoWayland
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❝Government Can't Fix Healthcare❞ by Prager University

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Thursday roundup 20Jul2017

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Token doctor? - revised

Our heroes are defined by what they have done and how they inspire us.

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Sometimes you need a hero

“Ex-Con Skips Job Interview, Jumps Off Bus And Saves The Life Of Car Crash Victim”

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“Solving” net neutrality

“Net Neutrality Supporters Should Actually Hate the Regulations They're Endorsing”

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Wednesday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Seen as equal

We may not all be equal in terms of ability or potential, but in the eyes of the law, we must absolutely be seen as equal, and nobody gets special favors because of the color of their skin.
     — David Cole, Beneath the Fold

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NeoNotes — scapegoating "whites"

And yet scapegoating is alive and well.



Pardon, but for all the talk about what Trump and his supporters did against "minorities," there was much more done against Trump's supporters.



I am not conservative. I am also not a liberal.

I am a writer.

I'm the guy who wrote “We need solutions that don't exile people politically.”

And “When it comes to religion becoming the law of the land, the devout don't need it, the non-believers don't want it, and the politicos will corrupt it.”

And I wrote this:

You are not entitled



I didn't say anyone here now shamed me, I said I wrote that.

I don't know what you did or did not do as an editor, I have only your say so for that. Until I have reason to disbelieve, I'll take your word for it. What I do know is that you were lecturing about the failures of "Whites" above. I am not defending anyone. No one group and certainly no "race" is without scoundrels, and no group is composed of saints.

As it happens, I believe in many American ideals and I think on the whole we get more right than we get wrong. I don't need to defend those ideas, they speak for themselves. I will say that not all ideas labeled "American" have much to do with liberty.

I started on this thread by writing about scapegoating. From what I see, this article does that.



"Control of the system" IS the problem. Fighting for "control of the system" is also the problem. The only known practical solution is to make government smaller than absolutely necessary.

Zinn's book is seriously flawed and way overhyped.



I'm not complaining about skin color. I'm complaining about being blamed for things that happened to people long dead long before I was born because of skin color. And I am complaining about the "sins" of one skin color used to explain All That Is Truly Wrong In The World.

I've said it before and I will stand by it. There's only one "race" and it's human.

I've got something I call the Practical Grudge Limit. It’s not practical to hold someone responsible unless they were there, of age, and participating. I'm responsible for what I've done and what I've said. No more, no less.



“…we have to create a system that is not about trying to control things and keep the controlling the hands of the wealthy and powerful.”

You can't have a system that is about not controlling and controlling. You want to make the distinction between the rich and the poor, but in the past it's been skin color, gender, religion, and ancestry.

Any system that sets up an inequality will always be exploited. And I am not talking about the inequality between rich and poor. You spoke of payback before. Any exploitive system will be about control and payback.

Unless it's inherited, one acquires wealth by exploiting people OR providing value to one's neighbors. There are other ways, but they are minute examples. If someone earned wealth by providing value to neighbors, that means they are doing something right. Especially if happens over time. You don't want to use a plumber who cheats you, or a grocer who sells spoiled food, or a bank that charges negative interest on your accounts.

That's when wealth can reflect character and commitment and honor.

If someone is in business, if they provide what was promised at a fair price, if they pay for their purchases as expected, if they treat people well, all of that makes a pretty decent measure of character.

That's what the Founders were interested in. Not a government of the rich for the rich, but a society of people with proven character.

Let's take a modern example. Before the law was changed, you could only finance a house by coming up with a down payment, usually ten percent of the price. This wasn't done to keep the poor unhoused. It was because you wanted people buying houses if they could afford it and were willing to work for it. The down payment also represented character and commitment.

When the law was changed for "compassionate" reasons, people could buy a house without "skin in the game." If someone couldn't pay their mortgage, the bank would take it back without any risk to the buyer. Since the mortgage payments were usually less than rent, there was no incentive to keep the house if that someone couldn't pay.

Meanwhile, banks and loan companies couldn't profit. People didn't put in down payments and walked away. Housing prices skyrocketed even as there was a glut of housing. So their solution (made with government encouragement) was to split the loans into what was paid and what was owed. Whoever got stuck with what was owed without any income lost big time. But banks got "too big to fail."

So a change in law to benefit the poor actually made things worse for nearly everyone. All because the rule of law was no longer uniform. It could be exploited. And it was.

It wasn't because of the divide between rich and poor. It was because politicos saw something they could tell voters was a Major Problem. It was because the changed law no longer rewarded character and hard work.



I have to point out that many of the people screaming about race relations are profiting either in terms of money or power. Not all and not most, but a significant number are making noise because they benefit from the problem and can't allow it to be solved.

I really don't want to start another long involved conversation about guns. I will say that libertarians call gun control victim disarmament and leave it at that.

Did you know that many housing projects were a direct result of Great Society programs? Those same programs encouraged the destruction of existing buildings (with low crime rates) so the projects could be built. Most of these projects were dilapidated and crime ridden within a decade or so. Some were rebuilt two or three times with the same results. I have to wonder how many of those problems were caused by the projects and the public housing policies that made them possible. Differences and problems may have been made worse by government action.

It wasn't skin color that gave the ghettos their reputation. It was crime. And the crimes may have had roots in government compassion.
NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.
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Free to be bigots

Individuals are free to be bigots. Just as they are free to be heroes.
     — NeoWayland
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Amazing police officer

“Police Officer Talks Down Knife-Wielding Man And HUGS Him”

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Threat

A choice made under the threat of force is no choice.
     — NeoWayland
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Hungary vs. Soros

Hungarian Gov’t Steps Up Fight Against George Soros

The campaign follows a series of moves to halt Soros’ operations in the country. The government argues that Soros is pushing for a one million migrant influx to Europe per year. It is now trying to impose legislation that would force NGOs in the country to reveal where their funding originates and the purpose for which the money was received.

“In Hungarian public life there is a single important element which is not transparent: Soros’s mafia-style network and its agent organizations,” Orban’s spokesman Zoltan Kovacs told The Daily Caller News Foundation. “This is why the government insisted that [the] parliament decide on making these organizations transparent, as the Hungarian people have the right to know who represents what and for what purpose.”

The frosty relationship between Orban and Soros reached an all-time low after Hungary passed education reforms in March that could threaten the future of the Soros-funded Central European University in Budapest. Soros lashed out at Orban, describing his “mafia state” as “one which maintains a facade of democracy.”
     — Jacob Bojesson

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Fix health care

Taxing Hospitals Is a Lousy Way to Fix Health Care

But if that’s the case, then the best solution is probably to stop subsidizing it, not to make the subsidy more complex. A lot of the current mess in the American health-care system can be traced back to the thicket of hidden subsidies and fiddling regulations we’ve enacted over the years, trying to fine-tune the system into some platonic ideal where nothing ever goes wrong and no one ever makes an unseemly amount of money. But fine tuning has not delivered us the platonic ideal of anything, except perhaps the word “dysfunction.” It might be time to step back and rethink our approach.

We might start by asking ourselves, “Why are hospitals tax exempt in the first place?” When the income tax was first levied, giving hospitals nonprofit status made sense, because these organizations did largely act as charities. Over the succeeding decades, however, the government decided that it didn’t want to rely on charities for charity care, and enacted a series of programs that financed such care with government dollars.

In an ideal world, perhaps hospitals would have gratefully accepted those dollars, and redirected the money they’d been spending on treating patients to cover gaps in the system, like dental care (woefully underprovided either by charity or government fiat). But we do not live in the ideal world. The difference between a charity hospital and its for-profit brethren has shrunk smaller and smaller, and by now, seems too small to justify treating them as charities.
     — Megan McArdle

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Tuesday Roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Moral responsibility

The simple answer is that moral responsibility is always a personal choice. You can't compel virtue or it ceases to be virtue.
     — NeoWayland

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Health care tied to your job

You can't get more racist than that.

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“The Truth About Net Neutrality” by Stefan Molyneux

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NeoNotes — George Soros

George Soros is one of the most dangerous men alive.

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That's the excuse, not the reason

Here's the dirty little secret that you're avoiding. The evil is not in a belief system. That's the excuse, not the reason. No book has ever committed genocide. No song has ever burned someone alive. No long lost chant has ever raped.

It's people who speak and people who act. It's people who do good, and people who do evil.
     — NeoWayland
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I can't stress this enough

I can't stress this enough.

The state is not a moral entity. Government is not your friend, at best it is a bad servant.

Religion can not be allowed the coercive power of the state and the state can not be allowed the moral justification of faith.

You can't trust law to do the right thing. You have to watch it. You have to argue with it. And sometimes you have to fight it.
     — NeoWayland

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Monday roundup

House Advances Bill That Would Expand the DEA's Power to Make Legal Highs Illegal

Government can't keep up with regulating new products, so you have to loose freedom.


How Trump Can Avoid Impeachment: Order NSA to Declassify All Intel On Democratic Email Leaks

This is a Really REALLY good idea!


Why Middle America Doesn't Care About The Trump Jr. Narrative: Reuters Explains

Maybe the mainstream media should pay attention to what their audience wants


Tens of Thousands of Muslims Gather to Denounce Islamist Terror – Mainstream Media Ignores It

This is important. The Islamists will never be defeated until most Muslims decide to defeat the extremists. It can't be done from the outside.


VISA takes its War on Cash to US Retailers

“We’re focused on putting cash out of business.”


5 Cities That Won't Be Hosting the 2024 Olympics, and Why That Makes Them Winners

The Olympic Games lose money for the host city. I think the International Olympics Committee may have started the stadium scam, where the local government is on the hook for the bills and the sports team gets most of the revenue with no risk.


Congress is fleeing its warmaking responsibilities

“Congress is permanently in “Annie” mode. It will deal with its war responsibilities, like its myriad other forfeited powers, tomorrow, which is always a day away.” — George Will


Phoenix Taxpayers Lose $200 Million on Sale of Largest Hotel in Arizona

Government should NEVER finance private enterprise. Government is so bad at it that it never ends well for taxpayers.


Can property survive the great climate transition?

Here we get to the nub. Private property is the the foundation of prosperity, as explained in Hernando de Soto's The Mystery of Capital: Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and Fails Everywhere Else. Without private property, there can be no free market. Without a free market, the economy is screwed. The climate alarmist movement exists to redistribute wealth "for the greater good."


L.A. County sheriff can't give prosecutors the names of problem deputies, appeals court rules

So even if they lie, falsifiy reports, and stolen, the deputies are ABOVE THE LAW.


Is Russiagate Really Hillarygate?

The most important question of the 2016 election.

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Faith & religion

I believe that faith and religion can be a tremendous source of individual morality and a dangerous tyranny in society.
     — NeoWayland

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“What About America Are You Grateful For?” by SoulPancake

And yet scapegoating is alive and well.

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New Monona Mura

Business owner fights back against vandals using the same tool

But now, the racial slurs and symbols are gone from the building. What left behind is what Wadsworth now calls the new Monona Mural. It's a beautiful and bright piece of artwork that's permanently spray painted on the same walls that were once tagged by the vandals. It's a project both Wadsworth and her colleague decided to do after a lot of thought.

"I called my landlord (and said), do you mind if I paint the door? I started out with the door," Wadsworth said as she laughed.

Her landlord gave her permission, so she went to the store and bought $94 worth of spray paint, went back to her shop, grabbed her colleague and had some fun.
     — Hunter Saenz

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Highway robbery

Authorities in Utah Seized Nearly $3 Million in Cash and Assets From Citizens Last Year

In one case highlighted by the Salt Lake Tribune, cops seized cars and other property—including "a $25 flashlight…a $4,000 mountain bike, a $2,500 motorcycle and a guitar autographed by Led Zeppelin worth $3,000"— and charged several people after a methamphetamine bust, prosecutors say.

Cops like to publicize such busts because it feeds a narrative that asset forfeiture is used primarily against big-time drug dealers. But they're rather out of the ordinary, the report shows.

Most forfeitures (69 percent) take place during traffic stops and most of the time only money is seized. According to the state report, cash was taken in 99 percent of forfeitures during 2016, with the median seizure amounting to only $1,031.

That means, in many cases, the amount seized was considerably less than four-figures. In one instance, the report shows, police took $16 from a motorist.
     — Eric Boehm

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from crux № 11 — Ultimate truth

I've seen the arguments in enough other contexts to distrust anyone who claims rationality prevents any opposing view. Even more so when they dismiss any other possibility unheard because they have the Ultimate Truth That Must Not Be Questioned.
     — NeoWayland
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Damage

A spate of recent articles corroborate what I already suspected, that holding elected office is the neurological equivalent of getting kicked in the head by a donkey.
     — Andrew Heaton, Science: Power Causes Brain Damage
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Make it better

Make it better today. Keep polishing.
     — NeoWayland
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Buy their meals

“Anonymous Woman Treats 25 Firefighters To Dinner”

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Millionth passenger

“Southwest Pilot Showers His Millionth Passenger With Gifts, Pays For Her Ticket”

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The heart knows

George Soros is one of the most dangerous men alive.

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Friday roundup

DOJ let Russian lawyer into US before she met with Trump team

Something else about the 2016 election that traces straight back to the Obama administration. Gee, what are the chances?


De Facto Federal Legislation of Cryptocurrency is Nigh

“An upcoming meeting of the Uniform Law Commission (ULC) is likely to change how law enforcement across the U.S. approaches bitcoin. Right now, the meeting is under the radar, but its fallout could soon make a pivotal debate flare on a state-by-state level.”


Which Campaign Truly Colluded With Russia?

Many questions about Russian influence if people looked harder at the Obama administration and the Hillary Clinton campaign.


The Basic Formula For Every Shocking Russia/Trump Revelation

Thirteen steps that the media has used every time so far.


The crisis in America’s crime labs

No one person and no one agency has all the answers. No one is beyond criticism. No one is beyond question.


Illinois' Fiscal Problems Won't Stay in Illinois

“Wisconsin's budget takes a $51 million hit as The Land of Lincoln tries to extract more revenue from its residents, including those who work or live elsewhere.”


Jeff Sessions Wants More Mandatory Minimums, Less Justice

Mandatory miniumum sentences have seriously warped the justice system.


Damning New Report Shows How Oakland Cops Covered Up Their Sexual Exploitation of a Minor

Cops must be held accountable if they have powers. If proven true, this should result in immediate dismissal, arrest, and a fast trial.


Trump Jr. Entrapped by Obama White House to Obtain FISA Warrant and Spy on Campaign

Very interesting, but it's mostly speculation.


Kid Rock for Senate

I am not sure it's really happening or if it's a stunt. He'd be better than most of the serving Senators.


Radical Dem Worked For Russian Lawyer Who Met With Trump, Jr.

Odd how Democrats have the most Russian connections, isn't it?

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Nobody's business

It's nobody's business if nobody gets hurt.
     Nobody's Business blog (defunct)

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“Black, Millennial, Female and… Conservative” from Prager University

“Antonia Okafor, a young, single, black woman, recently discoveblurb that's she's a racist, sexist, misogynist. How in the world did this happen? None other than Antonia Okafor explains.”

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NeoNotes — government requires

There's a very real question why there should be any government grants, but I will leave that for another time.

Assume for a moment that you ran a bookstore. Should you be required by law to carry the Bible even though you were not Christian and did not believe Christianity was a valid faith? What if someone complained because you didn't have it?

Should a vegan restaurant be required to sell pulled pork BBQ?

Should a health food store be required to sell pipe tobacco?



Except we know that government does mandate that some products and services be sold or provided.

Let's take another example or two, shall we?

Imagine you are a lawyer or accountant. You know a specific businessman is crooked and can't be trusted. Should you be required to provided services?

Imagine you are an employer. Should you be required to verify the immigration status of each of your employees?

Most importantly, why should prior marginalization get a higher priority when it comes to the rule of law? Doesn't that lead to abuse of it's own when the formerly victimized class games the system?



Ah, so you are going to stick to "class of people." That's the problem. People aren't their labels. Or at least they shouldn't be.

Someone doesn't have higher moral authority because their group has been marginalized in the past.

And just in case you hadn't noticed, "American identity politics" is all about oppressing everyone else. All of which is predicated on the guilt of the former oppressor.



Black Lives Matter. All too ready to go after "white" cops, but doesn't want to address the problem of "black on black" crime. Nor does it want to address the major underlying problem, single parent families. Something that was encouraged by government, effectively relegating inner city families to poverty. Nor do they accept any criticism of their movement.

Much of third and fourth wave feminism. Apparently feminism is no longer about equality, it's about forcing men to sit down and shut up. And if a man complains, he's accused of rape.

The recent kerfuffle over the "redesigned" rainbow flag that put black and brown stripes at the top so that "people of color" had "representation." Literally "my victimhood is more important than your victimhood."

Identity politics is built on a carefully maintained hierarchy of victimhood. You're not allowed to speak unless you rank high enough with your victimhood or have demonstrated sufficient "compassion," usually by drawing attention to the "problem." But never actually solving anything.

And you are not allowed to question the victimhood.



Stop.

Step back. You are excusing their behavior.

Look at what has been done, not at the justifications.

Look at what is allowed within the groups.

Your enabling is just one example of what has locked people into their victimhood.



What you've given is excuses why people can't be held accountable.

Black Lives Matter is pushing a narrative that all police interactions with minorities but especially with "blacks" are racist. That's not true. And as I said, they overlook "black" on "black" crime that does not fit with the narrative.

It's victimhood I don't like, especially when perpetuated by bad government policy and "community outreach" that exploits the victims by keeping them victims.



And the courts were wrong.

Not because interracial marriages were wrong (they aren't). But because government can't be trusted to make individual moral decisions for you.

If you didn't choose your morality and if you do not commit to your morality, is it really yours?

Or did it just get sacrificed for the greater good?



Remember, most of the complaints against the current President are because he is doing the wrong moral things. Or at least, according to some people. Such as pulling out of the Paris accord.

Frankly there are people I want to discriminate against. There are evangelical Christians I want nothing to do with. There are radical feminists that I also don't want anything to do with. My list also includes some of the climate alarmists, the man-boy love crowd, anyone associated with a child beauty pageant, the extra-devout followers of Silver Ravenwolf, pretty much any organized political party, and a few dozen others.

Should government protect those people from my discrimination?



Actually we don't know that pulling out of the Paris accord is dangerous for the planet.

Here's what we do know. The "debate" about climate change has been heavily weighed on one side. A recent study has some of the most prominent climate alarmists admitting that the predictions didn't match the reality. President Obama committed the US, but the G20 and Obama didn't call it a treaty so it wouldn't have to go to the US Senate for approval. These aren't exactly moral actions.

Commerce is based on voluntary economic transactions between consenting adults. There's no “public service” about it. A company improves it's product or service (and lowers the price) because it wants to keep business from the competition. The "moral good" is based on pure greed. Nothing government demands from a business won't impose greater costs on the customer. Government relies on force. When government acts against people, it distorts the economy and morality.

It's not about public service, and commerce shouldn't answer to corrupt politicos.



The data was fudged. The people who fudged it knew it. The people who sought to make it a political issue beyond the control of any single government knew it.

If it's not about "saving the planet," then you have to ask what it is about. Especially when there is an everchanging deadline and No One Is Allowed To Question the failed predictions.

The entire movement is built on computer models, not science. I can't emphasize that enough. Models, not science. If the models have bad assumptions and/or if the data has been changed, the models aren't accurate.

But, "the science is settled." So you aren't allowed to dissent. You wouldn't accept that from a Creationist, why accept it from people who benefit financially and politically from forcing their agenda?



That wasn't what I said.

The models haven't been accurate in more than a dozen years. Even before that, the models had to be "goosed" to show a link between the past and the present.

I've said before that I can create a spreadsheet that makes me a millionaire in a week. That doesn't mean that the spreadsheet is accurate. And it sure doesn't mean I should wave cash around.

If the model isn't accurate, if we know it's not accurate, and if the people pushing the model hardest know that it's not accurate, don't you think it's time to ask why we should use the model?



No, that is what you have been told that the model is.

I strongly urge you to take a closer look. And I would remind you that there is no science in history that has ever been considered holy writ and beyond criticism.

For example, if I wanted to know the average global temperature right now this very minute, I'd have to accept that most land based measuring stations are in developed areas, many in highly urban areas that influence the readings. Satillite measurements are better, but don't go back further than about sixty years. And most of the ocean is a mystery below a mile deep.

So what exactly is the global average temperature?



I'm not shy about it. I don't approve of their life choices. I especially don't approve when *insert group name here* demands that it is not enough for to acknowledge their words and actions, it must be celebrated as the only accepted truth.

I don't want them on the ballot. I don't want to do business with them. I don't want them in my town.

And I think they are corrupting society.

Again, should government protect them from my discrimination?



I may not be a pure libertarian when it comes to the Zero Aggression Principle, but I don't usually initiate force. It's sloppy and takes too much energy.

“How many NAMBLA neighbors do you have, anyway?”

One.

Once.



I've been a corporate VP and I've run my own business.

Can you point to the spot in the Constitution where it defines the powers of the Federal government to control who I can and can't do business with? How about the spot where it defines that I must do business with everyone who wants to do business with me? Because under the Tenth Amendment, there isn't one.

If government isn't defending my ability to choose as long as I accept the consequences, then government has failed.

Even if my neighbors don't approve of my choice.

Especially if my neighbors don't approve of my choice.

If I am not free to discriminate as I choose, then government is discriminating against me. And that is what we see now. Some choices are more equal than others.



Not really.

That clause is the most abused in the Constitution, largely because it does not place significant restrictions on the Federal government. By some interpretations, the government can do what it wants when it wants and despite what people want. When you consider that everything from FDA approval to requiring transgender bathrooms is shoved through that loophole, it's a wonder that there is anything left of the rest of the Constitution.

Even in your flawed interpretation, public accommodation only applies in certain cases. Some are more victimized than others, remember?



Volumes have also been written against it. For generations in fact, right back to to the Anti-Federalist Papers

And then there is always the practical common sense approach. Here's the clause straight from Article 1 Section 8.

“To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;”

I can tell you know many Diné, Hopi, Havasupai, and White Mountain Apache who think that "Great White Father speaks with forked tongue." Just look at what the Interior Department did when it came to mineral rights.

You've tried to tell me what the consensus says, but you haven't disputed my conclusions. The commerce clause has been used to expand Federal power far beyond the scope of the rest of the Constitution. The only other comparable Federal power grab in American history has been the USA PATRIOT Act and the open-ended declaration of hostilities that happened after 9-11.



Or we could just stop handing out government grants and do something radically different like lower taxes, reduce government spending, and let people decide what to do with their own money.



Church playgrounds aren't national religious issues unless government is funding them.

The First Amendment is very clear: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…”

Neither help nor hinder. It's the only way to win this particular battle. Otherwise you have things like a Faith Based Initiative (for certain faiths approved by law) and school prayer.



I think we do. And it's right there in the First Amendment.

Don't.

If there is one thing worse than a politico wrapping themselves in the flag, it's a politico standing on religion wrapping themselves in a flag.
NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.
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Sharing is caring

Rescue Pup Melts Hearts by Sharing its Good Fortune With Homeless Dog

Lana the rescue dog may have a loving home to call her own, but she hasn’t forgotten what it’s like to live on the streets.

So when she saw a nearby homeless pup outside of her family’s home in Brazil, she decided to share her wealth with the foreign hound.
     — McKinley Corbley

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“We’re going to get them out.”

Rip currents swept away a Florida family. Then beachgoers formed a human chain..

When Jessica and Derek Simmons first saw the beachgoers pausing to stare toward the water, the young couple just assumed someone had spotted a shark.

It was Saturday evening, after all, peak summer season in Panama City Beach for overheated Florida tourists to cross paths with curious marine life. Then they noticed flashing lights by the boardwalk, a police truck on the sand and nearly a dozen bobbing heads about 100 yards beyond the beach, crying desperately for help.

Six members of a single family — four adults and two young boys — and four other swimmers had been swept away by powerful and deceptive rip currents churning below the water’s surface.

“These people are not drowning today,” Jessica Simmons thought, she told the Panama City News Herald. “It’s not happening. We’re going to get them out.”
     — Katie Mettler

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THE Berlin speech

This June 1963 speech rocked the world

“Freedom is indivisible, and when one man is enslaved, all are not free.”

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Worthless

Government is the only institution that can take a valuable commodity like paper, and make it worthless by applying ink.
     — Ludwig von Mises

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❝What are your questions?❞

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Thursday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Language of force

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Tragedy from incentives

“The Tragedy of the Commons in the American Prison System”

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Histories

As a certified armchair historian, I can tell you there are three types of history. There's the Official History™, there's the stories that people tell, and there's what really happened. These types don't usually agree.
     — NeoWayland
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Details, details…

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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☆ The special asterisk is a multiplier

Keep law simple and absolute.

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Why the site changes?

This blog will run Monday through Friday. For a while at least, on Mondays I'll publish my crux files. Wednesdays I will publish a weekly original article. Thursdays I'll publish the American classics. I'll put up news clippings as I run across them. I'll put up NeoNotes entries as I have them ready. Expect a headline roundup every weekday. And quotes. Many, many quotes.

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Value is not intrinsic

Value is not intrinsic, it is not in things. It is within us; it is the way in which man reacts to the conditions of his environment. Neither is value in words and doctrines, it is reflected in human conduct. It is not what a man or groups of men say about value that counts, but how they act.
     — Ludwig von Mises

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Wednesday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Always right

I don't think I'm always right, I just don't think anyone is absolutely right. And that is why there is more to life than black and white.
     — NeoWayland

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Complain

If you choose to be a sheep, then don't complain about the shepherd.
     — NeoWayland
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Tuesday roundup

Newspaper Publishers Want Congress to Bail Them Out of Bad Investments

Let them fail.


Amazon Prime does more for northern food security than federal subsidies, say Iqaluit residents

This is working now, but Amazon may pull out.


What happened when Walmart left

When the economy collapses, not even Walmart can save you.


John McCain faces questions in Trump-Russia dossier case

John McCain can not be trusted.


Once Again, NY Times Attempts to Create Trump/Russia Collusion Where There's No Evidence

The New York TImes pioneered fake news and they still do it better than anyone else.


The U.S. Media’s Murky Coverage of Putin and Trump

It seems the Russian press doesn't think the U.S. media is misreading what is happening.


Cash for Clunkers Was a Complete Failure

We suspected and now we know. Nothing government demands from a business won't impose greater costs on the customer.


Liberals target the Rust Belt: ‘Democrats should be able to win in all these places’

Not after writing them off for sixteen years they can't.


California Looking to Give Unions Private Workers' Phone Numbers, Addresses

Now you know who the legislators really work for.


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Difference

What is the difference between pickpocketing and taxes?

Taxes are legal.
     — NeoWayland
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Talking about the common good

Sierra Club: The Big Problem With Environmentalism Is ‘Unsustainable Whiteness’

Claims that environmentalism is racist and needs to embrace social justice by appointing “people of color” as leaders have become increasingly common in the modern green movement.

“Simply put, NGOs [non-government organization] and foundations in the green space are still overwhelmingly white at all levels, especially top leadership — and that’s limiting their effectiveness, especially in addressing issues that affect frontline communities,” Swaminathan wrote. “Still, nearly three-quarters of staffers are white. And the numbers indicate less inclusiveness as you move to higher rungs in those outfits: Only 15 percent of the leaders are people of color.”

“White privilege and racism within the broader environmental movement is existent and pervasive,” Aaron Mair, the Sierra Club’s first black president, told Grist. “The current is not maintainable — we’re becoming a brown nation. It’s not about a one-off. It’s about sustainability.”

“That’s where the internalized racism and oppression is, and if I can help shift that Mount Everest and change its direction,” Mair said. “It becomes harder for other environmental organizations to maintain their way.”
     — Andrew Follet

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Laissez faire

We could do more for addiction and to stop violence and corruption by stopping the war on drugs.

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Monday roundup

Feds Turn Burning Man Into a Police State, Announce Drug Tests for Attendees and Mass Spying

The more weird attention you draw, the bigger example the authorities will try to make you.


Maine's state legislature shot down a bill that would criminalize female genital mutilation

They are afraid it might offend Muslims. No word about how not passing the law might offend the women who are targeted.


Religious leaders get high on magic mushrooms ingredient – for science

There's long been evidence that certain psychodelics have psycological and spiritual benefits.


Point: Trump’s War on Junk Science

Junk science has been part of American policy.


People Over Process: Why Democracy Doesn’t Justify Exclusion

I've said before that freedom is the goal, not democracy.


You’re Asking the Wrong Questions

Free speech in the days of Trump.

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Climate - truth will come out

“July 4, 2017 : Coldest July Temperature Ever Recorded In The Northern Hemisphere”

“Study Finds Temperature Adjustments Account For ‘Nearly All Of The Warming’ In Climate Data”

“Groups see climate science review as chance to undercut regulation”

“Since 2014, 400 Scientific Papers Affirm A Strong Sun-Climate Link”

“New Insights on the Physical Nature of the Atmospheric Greenhouse Effect Deduced from an Empirical Planetary Temperature Model”

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Winning?

Winning? Is that what you think this is about? I’m not trying to win. I’m not doing this because I want to beat someone, because I hate someone, or because, because I want to blame someone. It’s not because it’s fun. God knows it’s not because it’s easy. It’s not even because it works because it hardly ever does. I do what I do because it’s right! Because it’s decent! And above all, it’s kind! It’s just that… Just kind.

If I run away today, good people will die. If I stand and fight, some of them might live. Maybe not many, maybe not for long. Hey, you know, maybe there’s no point in any of this at all. But it’s the best I can do. So I’m going to do it. And I’m going to stand here doing it until it kills me. You’re going to die too! Some day… How will that be? Have you thought about it? What would you die for?

Who I am is where I stand. Where I stand is where I fall.
     — the Doctor, The Doctor Falls

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from crux № 16 — My beliefs

I want a government that is smaller than absolutely necessary.

I believe that people are perfectly capable of making their own choices and that society is the better if people do exactly that.

I believe that faith and religion can be a tremendous source of individual morality and a dangerous tyranny in society.

There is more but that will do for a start.



And there you go, presuming to speak for the Divine in regards to my fate.

I'm sure that makes you feel important. Worthy. Superior.

Do you think you would take offense if I did the same thing to you?

Or do you think your faith supersedes mine?

Just in case you've forgotten:

It always seems to come down to whose belief comes first, who presumes to speak for the Divine, and what happens when someone disagrees.



I think you're the first one here who asked me what I believe. You deserve a good answer. But this really isn't about me, it's about us finding common ground.

So to start with:

I call myself pagan because I don't have a better term. I'm polytheistic and pantheistic. On alternate Thursdays and every third Tuesday I might admit to being panetheistic with an animism bent as well. On the 13th of the month, I'll tell you (truthfully) that the label isn't really all that important, only the manifestation.

====================
My path involves recognizing and celebrating the natural cycles in ourselves, in the world around us, and in the worlds we touch in our dreams. I seek the Divine in human, Nature, and machine. I want to find the synthesis between mankind and ideas, between faith and technology, between what was and what will be.

I believe that all things have a Divine nature. Life is the universe's attempt to understand itself. I know that the totality of the universe is too vast for me to comprehend. So there are godmasks that I turn to for understanding, guidance, and strength when mine is not enough. I know that these godmasks are only representations and gateways to Divinity, not Divinity themselves.



I'll let you in on a secret.

I try to treat people online as they have treated me. I'm nice until someone shows they don't deserve it.

For life in general, I have three rules.

THE GOLDEN RULE - Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

THE SILVER RULE - Do for yourself at least as much as you do for others.

THE IRON RULE - Don't do for others what they can do for themselves.



I am totally for live and let live. It's the core of my most deeply held beliefs.

I really don't care about someone else's beliefs or politics unless they want to impose those on everyone else.

Going back to my original post on this thread, if the choice is between the absolute on the left side or the absolute on the right, I am going to pick freedom despite both.

I respectfully disagree with you on that.



There is a technopagan addendum to that.

"Any sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology."

Personally I don't think the two are as far removed as it would seem.

I started keeping my crux files because I noticed I kept getting into the same discussions in comment threads on other people’s web sites. After a while it just made sense for me to organize my thoughts by topic. These are snippets. It’s not in any particular order, it’s just discussions I have again and again.

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Worthy

The worthy choices are never the easy ones.
     — NeoWayland
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☥ ▽ Heinlein Day

Robert A. Heinlein • Before birthday

Lived 07Jul1907 to 08May1988 (80). Author, libertarian, philosopher, "dean of science fiction writers."

The Heinlein Society

Robert Heinlein - Fantastic Fiction

Robert A. Heinlein Quotes

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Friday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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How many?

“How Many Federal Agencies Exist? We Can't Drain The Swamp Until We Know”

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Our best

It's only when we're challenged that we show our best.

Or worst.
     — NeoWayland
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❝The Amazing History of the Statue Of Liberty - National TV Documentary❞

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And a pony

“In Congress, July 4, 1776”

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Hits the fan

When the stuff hits the fan (and it will), do the least damage possible to get out.
     — NeoWayland

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Politicos disconnect from reality

UW study finds Seattle’s minimum wage is costing jobs

The team concluded that the second jump had a far greater impact, boosting pay in low-wage jobs by about 3 percent since 2014 but also resulting in a 9 percent reduction in hours worked in such jobs. That resulted in a 6 percent drop in what employers collectively pay — and what workers earn — for those low-wage jobs.

>snip<

Seattle Mayor Ed Murray defended the minimum wage law, saying that “businesses across the city are competing for employees and our city is in the midst of a period of nearly unprecedented growth. Raising the minimum wage helps ensure more people who live and work in Seattle can share in our city’s success, and helps fight income inequality.”
     — Janet I. Tu
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NeoNotes — Costs of the drug war

We could do more for addiction and to stop violence and corruption by stopping the war on drugs.

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☆ Our permission society

Everything not forbidden is compulsory.
     — T. H. White, The Once and Future King

Once upon a time, the old saying applied. “Everything which is not forbidden is allowed” illustrated the freedom of the English citizen while “Everything which is not allowed is forbidden” applied to English authorities.

Today I want to recognize two societies, the liberty society and the permission society.

The liberty society assumes that people take responsibility for their choices. Unless it harms someone or their property, you are free to do what you choose, when you choose, and how you choose. You choose.

But you are responsible for the consequences.

The permission society forbids people from acting without permission. Or license. Or approval.

Sadly, America has moved well into being a permission society. And our politicos want to move us further.

Your income must be reported under penalty of law. Spend too much, and it is reported. Save too much and it is reported. Take it out in cash and cross state lines and it is confiscated.

You're free to take what drugs you need as long as you have a doctor's permission. Except some drugs can't be legally sold. And some you must sign for because government assumes you might be making other not so legal drugs.

You can buy alcoholic beverages usually. But some states require that you buy from the government. And some wines and beers can't be sold across state lines.

You can buy insurance if your state government has approved the policy in advance. Don't like what's offered in your state? Sorry, you don't have permission to buy anything else.

You can carry a gun or not as your state decides. You might or might not need a license. You might or might not be able to carry a concealed weapon. Oh, and just because you can do it in your state doesn't mean you can do it in another.

You can start your own business. If you get the proper permits and occupational licensing. And sometimes, if your would be competition doesn't object.

You can rent out your house. If the local hotels and motels don't raise a fuss.

You can use your car to drive people. As long as you don't charge them if you don't have a taxi medallion.

How is this freedom?

Where is the harm?

Why do you stand for this?

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Something's rotten in Syria

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Inspire not require

It's better to inspire rather than require.
     — NeoWayland
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Declaration of Independence

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 Legislature, 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 and 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 attention 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.



John Hancock

Button Gwinnett
Lyman Hall
Geo. Walton

Wm. Hooper
Joseph Hewes
John Penn
Edward Rutledge
Thos. Heyward, Junr.
Thomas Lynch, Junr.
Arthur Middleton

Samuel Chase
Wm. Paca
Thos. Stone
Charles Carroll of Carrollton
George Wythe
Richard Henry Lee
Th. Jefferson
Benja. Harrison
Thos. Nelson, Jr.
Francis Lightfoot Lee
Carter Braxton

Robt. Morris
Benjamin Rush
Benja. Franklin
John Morton
Geo. Clymer
Jas. Smith
Geo. Taylor
James Wilson
Geo. Ross
Caesar Rodney
Geo. Read
Tho. Mckean

Wm. Floyd
Phil. Livingston
Frans. Lewis
Lewis Morris
Richd. Stockton
Jno. Witherspoon
Fras. Hopkinson
John Hart
Abra. Clark

Josiah Bartlett
Wm. Whipple
Saml. Adams
John Adams
Robt. Treat Paine
Elbridge Gerry
Step. Hopkins
William Ellery
Roger Sherman
Samuel Huntington
Wm. Williams
Oliver Wolcott
Matthew Thornton


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❝Let us dare to read, think, speak and write.❞

John Adams passing day

Lived 30Oct1735 to 04Jul1826 (91). 2nd President of the United States, historian, diplomat, political theorist.

Let us dare to read, think, speak and write.
     — John Adams

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☥ ▽ ❝We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal…❞

Thomas Jefferson • Before passing day

Lived 13Apr1743 to 04Jul1826. Author of the Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom, third president of the United States, and founder of the University of Virginia.

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.
     — Thomas Jefferson

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Allies not servants

I want allies not servants.
     — NeoWayland
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Age of Wonders

Today is the Age of Wonders, the most amazing time in human history, with marvels and miracles far beyond any other time.
     — NeoWayland

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from crux № 3 — Shame & sex

“How The EU’s Data Grab Could Affect You”

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Worthy of freedom

The only faiths worthy of freedom are those freely chosen.
     — NeoWayland
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Wisdom of government

I do not trust in the wisdom of government.
     — NeoWayland
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Trust you

If government doesn’t trust you, why should you trust government?
     — NeoWayland
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Friday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Global Warming NOT

Which raises the question why should care be publicly funded?

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Shrinkflation

“Shrinkflation – Real Inflation Much Higher Than Reported”

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Fight for equality

You want equality, I'll fight with you.

You want privilege, I'll fight against you.
     — NeoWayland
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“American Pravda”

“Project Veritas' new video showing CNN Producer John Bonifield admitting that CNN's Russia narrative is "bullsh*t" and all about ratings”

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Faking it

“Ten Basic Forms Of Fake News Used By Major Media”

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“What is Fake News?”

“What is fake news? Is Donald Trump correct when he says CNN, The New York Times, and other mainstream outlets report fake news? Commentator and bestselling author Andrew Klavan explains.”

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Roaming Millenial on the Project Veritas video and student debt

“In this Weekly Rundown, we take a look at the current state of American student loan debt and the newly released Project Veritas John Bonifield CNN tapes that address the media's coverage of Trump and Russia. Fake news confirmed.”

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Disneyland Goes To The World's Fair - "Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln"

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One thing he would not be

If Christ himself were alive, one thing he would not be would be is a Christian.
     — Mark Twain

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“It's 100% failure rate.”

“Sam Seaborn's take on terrorism in 'Isaac and Ishmael' (special episode after 9/11) of The West Wing.”

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NeoNotes — Health care funding

Which raises the question why should care be publicly funded?

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Making the law-abiding criminal

Government exists to protect freedom.

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Black Guns Matter

Black Guns Matter Preaches A Pro-Second Amendment Message in Minnesota

MINNEAPOLIS — “I’m a reformed scumbag from North Philly that tryin’ to do the right thing,” was a powerful statement that quieted a small conference room in Hotel Minneapolis.

Maj Toure, the founder of Black Guns Matter, made his way to the Twin Cities for a long weekend to spread his message to black communities.

Appearing on the Twin Cities radio show, “Black Republican Black Democrat,” Toure said that he created Black Guns Matter because he was “tired” of seeing his friends die at the hands of police officers and the hands of one another.

His message is simple. Educating everyone, but especially people of color, about their second amendment rights, gun safety, and encouraging a community stigmatized by gun violence to own guns to protect themselves.
     — Preya Samsundar

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☆ Government should be governed

Last week I took on the press. This week I take on the politicos.

Government exists for one reason and one reason only. Government exists to protect freedom. Not to govern, but to protect.

That's a different way of looking at things, isn't it?

Take education. There is not one blessed thing in the Constitution about the Federal government controlling or influencing education. Which means under the Tenth Admendment, it isn't allowed to do so.

Marriage? Not one thing.

Approving of medicines and medical devices? Not one thing.

Yet our legislatures and our President think that it is within government's power.

There were 115 Public Laws passed by Congress in 2016. Do you know what they are? I don't. And by the way, "Ignorance of the law is no excuse."

I know that under Obama, there were more than 21,000 regulations added to the Federal Register. That's not pages, that's actual regulations. I don't know what more than a fraction of those are.

Do you think we might have just a little bit too much government?

According to politicos, every problem has a government solution. Including the problems caused by government. Yes, the Official® Solution to government power is More Government. More law! More rules! More technocrats!

Less liberty.

That's how it really works. Every time government acts, you are less free. Every time that government acts, it costs you money. Every time that government acts, government grows.

Every time. Every single time.

And when someone comes along and says government should be smaller, why, that is a Threat to the American Way of Life!

Except, when did more government become the American Way of Life?

Shouldn't we have smaller government?

Shouldn't we have more freedom?

Shouldn't we have more personal responsibility?

Your choice.


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Watching you

How The EU’s Data Grab Could Affect You

The EU is poised to grab personal data in a way that could impact people around the globe. Information is power; it is power over your life and almost always includes a raid upon your wealth. The control of information is particularly important to cryptocurrencies because, unlike cash, they leave a transaction trail that makes privacy more difficult and imperative. Without privacy, it is not clear how liberating bitcoin can be for the individual.

A headline in New Europe (June 12) captures the purpose of the upcoming data grab in the EU: “The office of the European Public Prosecutor [EPPO] promises a new era has dawned in the EU for fighting financial crime.” Financial crime refers to the movement of wealth upon which a government frowns. It includes wealth rescued from confiscatory areas like Greece and the purchase of ‘unapproved’ services like sex. Financial crimes that do not involve theft or fraud are simply people who take control of their own financial choices.

The New Europe article further explains, “Every year, at least 50 billion euros of revenues from VAT are lost for national budgets all over Europe through cross-border fraud.” Taxes. The article could not be clearer about the EPPO being a tax grab. The word “terrorism” may be thrown into every second sentence but, in this content, it is a synonym of “tax collection.” The EU states do not want money to flow over borders and away from their reach. And, since nothing flows quite so smoothly as cryptocurrency, it will be targeted.
     — Wendy McElroy

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Problem

It's not me you have a problem with, it's dissent.
     — NeoWayland
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Victim hierarchy

Behold the victim hierarchy, “my victimhood is more important than yours.”
     — NeoWayland
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Shame game

I won't play your shame game. I won't abase myself before your demands. I didn't do anything wrong. Maybe I offended you, but I didn't harm you.
     — NeoWayland
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“Unsustainable Whiteness”

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Gilt

They think that gilt on the facade will solve the dry rot and termite damage.
     — NeoWayland
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Thank the CIA for your drugs

“Nothing To Be Proud Of”

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Getting away from the bankers and Feds

“How I missed the point of bitcoin”



“Congress considers bill greatly expanding feds’ power to seize your money, Bitcoin, and property”

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Not for thee

“Nothing To Be Proud Of”

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from crux № 6 — Homosexuality does NOT equal pedophilia

There was nothing except comments from readers like you to link that to pedophilia or homosexuality.

To me, it's immoral and perverse that you've taken it on yourself to pass judgement when there is nothing to show that these people did the things you say that you oppose.

Would you accept them passing judgement on you?



Ah, I see.

Let me look this over. I'm meeting someone for coffee in a bit, and I may not get back to the computer until this afternoon.

One quick thing though, if you don't mind.

Going by the bit you quoted,

86% of pedophiles described themselves as homosexual or bisexual

Doesn't that tie into what I said above about using homosexuality as an excuse?



Homosexuality does not equal pedophilia, any more than deer hunting equals school shooting sprees. These are different behaviors, one does not indicate the other. Just because you don't approve of lesbians or pedophiles doesn't mean they are one and the same. Just as not every straight man is a rapist, or every Republican racist.

That doesn't mean that there aren't child molesters using homosexuality as an excuse.

I'll stand with you against sex with kids. But until and unless you can show that every homosexual (or even most homosexuals) target kids, I'll tell you that lumping all gays in with the child molesters is wrong.



Should I tell you the things I have seen passed off as the Republican agenda or the Christian agenda?

Do you have any idea the things that are regularly attributed to these groups? The hateful accusations that always seem to end with the downfall of freedom and the enslavement of humanity?

I will tell you what I've told the accusers in other forums.

Show me where everyone or even a simple majority has signed off on this agenda, and I'll look at your accusations again.

p.s. It was done better in The Protocols of Zion. And I didn't believe that one for an instant.



"No one is claiming every person with a homosexual problem target kids. Many target adults for sexual harassment, inappropriate behavior, disease spreading, domestic violence, porn, prostitution and murder."

One paragraph and you accuse all homosexuals of Horrors Too Terrible To Mention™. According to you if they don't target kids, they do something else wrong to other people because that is what homosexuals do. If someone can't see it, that someone must dig just a little harder because something ghastly will surely turn up. And if that doesn't work, why, you'll invent something.

There is still not much point in talking to you about it, is there?



You really do like to overcomplicate things.

Are there pedophiles who are not homosexual?

Yes.

Are there homosexuals who are not pedophiles?

Yes.

Therefore, homosexuality does not equal pedophilia.

Now, shall we discuss your obsessions?



It's not all "queers."

Any more than the exploits of Ted Bundy and John Wayne Gacy make all men serial killers.

The individual is guilty, not the group.



A very wise man said "You can't childproof the world. The best you can do is world proof your children."



No, it doesn't.

First, lesbians aren't male and aren't banging boys.

Second, most homosexual men aren't banging boys either.



No, not really.

For example, if I were to point out (again) that homosexuality does not mean pedophilia, several folks here would chime in that I was all for sex with children.

In another place, if I were to disagree (again) with the notion that Christians should be locked away on general principle, several folks there would chime in that I was all for religious oppression.

The biggest and hardest lesson that I've had to learn is that no one group has THE answer, and no group that says it has THE answer can be fully trusted.



You know, people keep acting as if there were some sort of golden age where adults didn't sexually molest children.

Guess what? It happened twenty years ago, it happened forty years ago, it happened sixty years ago, and it happened eighty years ago.

It is not something new, not some sign of the times, not some terrible symptom of a philosophy you do not agree with.

Now, you can spend time lamenting for a time that never was, denouncing all life paths you don't follow, or you can do something today.

If you want to denounce libertarianism for "enabling" behavior you don't like, how is that different from the progressives denouncing conservatives for behavior they don't like?



That's not the question and you know it.

Look, it's very simple. I stand for the rights of the individual. He's not guilty because of skin color, sexual preference, religious choice, or net worth.

A person is guilty because of what he has done.

Not because a given label has this "tendency" or because the "common wisdom" says that "his kind" does that sort of thing. That's what progressives do. They do proclaim guilt based on skin color, sexual preference, religious choice, and net worth.


And yet we still have innocent people accused of crimes because you don't approve of their life style.

It's not because they have committed a crime, it's because you think there is an outside chance that they may.

You seem to think I am defending homosexuality. I'm not.

I'm taking a stand against slander. Well, technically in this case it's libel. Let's settle for defamation.

Prove that every homosexual is a pedophile. Prove that every pedophile is a homosexual.

If you can't do that, then the rule of law has no meaning.



It's not moral equivalence.

It's a matter of injustice to claim people are guilty before they've committed a crime just because of a label.

Innocent until proven guilty.

If you can't show that every gay is a pedophile, then you have no authority to treat them as if they were guilty.

Anymore than the RadFems have to the authority to treat every man as a rapist.



The percentages don't matter.

All that matters here is that someone can be gay without being a pedophile and someone can be a pedophile without being a gay.

That means that homosexuality does not equal pedophilia. People can be one or the other but not both.

ETA: That last sentence is missing a word. It should be

"People can be one or the other but not necessarily both."

Sometimes my fingers don't work. Sorry.



Again, if there are homosexuals who are not pedophiles and pedophiles who are not homosexuals, that's beside the point.

Do all Baptists eat chicken? Are there non-Baptists who eat chicken? Is chicken uniquely Baptist?

That's the same silly game that you're playing.

You don't like homosexuals. I understand that. But if you "associate" them with a crime BECAUSE they are homosexual, you do no honor to yourself or your cause.

I started keeping my crux files because I noticed I kept getting into the same discussions in comment threads on other people’s web sites. After a while it just made sense for me to organize my thoughts by topic. These are snippets. It’s not in any particular order, it’s just discussions I have again and again.

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Freedom demands

Because freedom demands more than just black and white.
     — NeoWayland
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Fool

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Authority

Government authority tends to be used against those least likely to resist.
     — NeoWayland

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Defend the inoffensive

It’s not freedom if you only defend the inoffensive.
     — NeoWayland


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Return the favor

I’m willing to live and let live. Why won’t they return the favor?
     — NeoWayland
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All it will cost

“For you own good,” and all it will cost is your liberty.
     — NeoWayland
Comments

Politicos want problems

Politicos want problems they can stage manage.
     — NeoWayland
Comments

Ask your banks for permission

“Cashless society” is a euphemism for the "ask-your-banks-for-permission-to-pay society." Rather than an exchange occurring directly between the hotel and me, it takes the form of a "have your people talk to my people" affair.
     — Brett Scott
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NeoNotes — Who gets to call the shots

The argument is not over sexual practices but over who gets to call the shots. I disagree with you on this one.

Let’s leave aside the fact that “Judeo-Christian” excludes every person who is not a Jew or a Christian. Let’s leave aside the face that many Jews are offended by the notion of being lumped in with the Christians. Let’s even leave aside the point that “Christians” includes faiths such as Baptists, Mormons, and Catholics who are barely even on speaking terms with each other.

The real question is why should any group be in charge? Why should one morality have the force of law while others do not?

Competition keeps us honest. If you can’t convince people that your morality works without being backed by law, then you’re doing it wrong. “Do it our way or we’ll force you.” “Do it our way or The Officially Sanctioned Authority Figures will point guns at you.” “Do it our way or you’ll be tossed in jail.”

If you don’t like what they are doing, fine. They shouldn’t force you. But that means you shouldn’t force them either.

I’m a big believer in the family. That’s one reason I support the age of consent. I’m from my mom’s first marriage, and I have stepsibs including one from my stepdad’s first wife’s first marriage. I think that the family is the strongest thing is a society.

But people have to make the choice of their own free will and without coercion or it counts for nothing.

Virtue under threat is not virtue, it’s slavery.



I realize you and I are using atheist in different ways. I am no more an atheist because I don’t worship your god than you are an atheist because you don’t worship mine.

If I am reading this right, you want me to rally to your banner and fight in the name of your faith to establish your morality over all in a glorious victory. And then we’ll haggle over my crumbs later.

To which I reply KYFHO.

I think it was yesterday I was reading Limbaugh’s site. He tried to make the point that just because the Republican leadership were a bunch of wimps, that wasn’t a reason to vote Democrat to spite them. He was wrong. Either/or is not a choice, it’s a trap.

Freedom is what matters. If all we fight for is who gets to call the shots, then freedom has lost.

I will not exchange one overlord for another.



And if folks weren't pushing a "Judeo-Christian" rule system for everybody, it wouldn't matter.

We can agree on a public morality without making personal religion the governing factor.



This nation was founded by Christians, Deists, and others, but not on a Judeo-Christian basis. They borrowed from anything and everything they thought would work. And then they argued over it. For years and years they argued. They still goofed some things up. Slavery is the obvious example.



I didn't say anything about the worth of Judeo-Christians values, I just said that they weren't the paramount source of all that is good in our society.

If you reread everything I have said on this thread, you will not find one place where I criticized Judeo-Christian values.

I did say that people should choose for themselves whether to put Judeo-Christian values at the center of their lives. And I objected to anyone choosing those values for everyone else.



Again, my objections are not about Christianity.

It's about Christianity being the "default" choice.

As I said above, either/or is not a choice, it's a trap.

Tell me, what would you do if someone insisted you had to abide by the morality of Confucianism? Would you not speak loudly and say that wasn't your choice?



I of course live in the United States where freedom of religion is the law of the land.

Not freedom of Judeo-Christian religion, not Judeo-Christian religion placed first, but freedom of religion.

The Founders were among the best educated and enlightened men of their time. Why do you supposed they chose to make it like that?



They did accept it.

It took a Civil War to stop it. And even then, Lincoln didn't begin the war with the idea to end slavery.

That came later.



Must have been some Brits.

The Treaty of Paris was signed in 1783. The Continental Congress adopted the Constitution in 1788.



First, I wasn't the one who started with the "Judeo-Christian" phrase, that was RSM in the original article. It's what started this.

Second (and this is the Really Important Bit), the Founders deliberately did not put religion in the Constitution. It's not because they did not have faith, it's because they believed one man should not dictate the faith of another. It has nothing to do with the merits of Christianity and everything to do with personal choice and responsiblity.

BTW, I don't read either Zinn or Maher. I think the last history book I read was Churchill's autobiography.



Still doesn't change the point.

You wouldn't want to live under the rules of another belief system even if it was a good system and was for everybody.



C'mon.

Your insistence that the Judeo-Christian basis is the only possible choice has made that point very clear.



DING!

I answered which makes it responsive.

You might ask yourself why you feel threatened by the merest possibility.

(P.S. I insist on better sound effects)



Pardon, but that's the point. If you put law a rung or two below your religion, you'll expect others to defer to your religion. Even if they don't share that religion.



Would you defer to my religion?



Should any nation embody a religion?



It doesn't matter. Under the terms that people on this thread have set, the religion is immaterial. It only matters if the nation has a basis in that religion.

No matter what yours may be, you must submit.



Most importantly, my religion doesn't require you to submit.

Neither does Christianity, despite what some say.

Even here on this thread, I'm not denouncing Christianity. I'm just telling Christians they can't use the precepts of their faith to rule another.



Some of them are good rules. Some of them are not.

My point is that one religion should never be considered The Moral Authority for a society. Morality is too important. We need to argue over it. Competition keeps us honest.

Once we say that The Moral Authority Religion is what tells the society that murder and theft are morally wrong, it's way too easy to say that TMAR says that this sexual partner is wrong, or that this fabric should never be sewn to that fabric, or that we should only eat from religiously approved diet.



I am totally for live and let live. It's the core of my most deeply held beliefs.

I really don't care about someone else's beliefs or politics unless they want to impose those on everyone else.

Going back to my original post on this thread, if the choice is between the absolute on the left side or the absolute on the right, I am going to pick freedom despite both.

I respectfully disagree with you on that.



I disagree. I think "free to choose" applies to more than just economics. I think ideas work best in a "free market" too.



"Given that, for example, I like the morality embodied in Judeo-Christian law…" But not everyone does.

"…and that we also know that other people would gladly choose anarchy by their own free will…" Oh? All others, or did you have a specific group in mind?

"it seems to me as if a stable culture does need to have reasonable, enforceable codified laws." I agree with the conclusion but not your reasoning.

"Which means that somebody's standard of morality has to set the bar." Yes.

"And I think that if you put to the vote which system of law would people prefer, Sharia law, Judeo-Christian or anarchy…" Why are these the only choices on the menu?

"…most Americans would say Judeo-Christian (given that a large component of that is "don't screw with me and I won't screw with you.")" I wish more people accepted "live and let live," I really do. I think Americans would accept it. But I don't think that's a substantial part of Christianity, especially as it is practiced today.



"Also, I think you confuse the practice of true Christianity with the practices of lying liars who lyingly claim to be Christian because it suits their lying agenda." Some are liars, yes. Some are devout Christians with the best of intentions.

"…the (Judeo-Christian based) Constitutional law as implemented originally for this Republic…" I'm sorry, but I have to stop you right there. It wasn't Judeo-Christian based. Look at the Constitution. Other than the date, there is not a single mention of Christianity. This was very unusual for any government document at the time. This was deliberate.

Christianity was only one of many influences. It's amazing I even have to mention this when one house of the national legislature is called the Senate and the other has a ceremonial mace based on a Roman fasces.

E pluribus unum. The original motto of the United States, roughly translated into "one from many." Or as I prefer, "united we stand." It's not just the people, it's the ideas.

And it is not specifically or even mostly Christian.



And the first question is why didn't the Founders see fit to put it in the Constitution?

The second question is why are people offended when I point out that Christianity may not be the sole source of goodness in Western Civilization?



And would that Christian belief system be the Protestants or the Catholics? Perhaps the Quakers?

Since the idea of democracy predated the "Judeo-Christian" basis we might have to consider a few other things.

Your problem is that I won't acknowledge the "fact" that Christianity is primary source of Western Civilization and of the United States.

Which pretty much brings us full circle to my first post on this thread.



You know, since we've spent so much time on this thread about the Founders, I can't help but wonder if the Brits thought they were being "willfully obtuse."

I know people thought Bill Gates was "willfully obtuse" when he had this crazy idea about copyrighting software and building a company on it.

So it really depends on your point of view, doesn't it?



I'll let you in on a secret.

I try to treat people online as they have treated me. I'm nice until someone shows they don't deserve it.

For life in general, I have three rules.

THE GOLDEN RULE - Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

THE SILVER RULE - Do for yourself at least as much as you do for others.

THE IRON RULE - Don't do for others what they can do for themselves.



I think the Founders made a wise choice. They didn't want an official religion but they didn't want to interfere with personal religion.

It ties into individual choice and responsibility. It's bottom up. The Founders wanted individuals to draw from their faith and influence the nation, not the faith to shape national law and policy and so rule the individual.

Most importantly they wanted people of faith to watch government closely.



I didn't say no codified laws.

I just said that I thought we could do public morality without enshrining a religious system as The Moral Authority.

While I agree that religion can be an excellent source of personal morality, I don't think it works on a cultural level if there are multiple faiths in that culture.

So we have to start from another basis.



But not Judeo-Christianity alone.

BTW, many Jews are really offended by that term.



And a lot aren't.

And they are still offended.

Are you accusing the Jews who dissent from your views of being anti-Christian and unAmerican?



I said,

"BTW, many Jews are really offended by that term."

I don't have to be a spokesman for the Jews to know that many resent the term "Judeo-Christian." It implies a continuity which is not recognized by their religion.



So apparently it's either/or. I have to accept that law only has a Judeo-Christian bias or we do without law?

We couldn't just sit down, find out what we and others agree on, and make laws based on that?



So if I disagree that American society had a "Judeo-Christian" basis and that all that is good and wonderful comes from the actions of enlightened Christians, I can take a hike?

It's not me you have a problem with, it's dissent.

You might want to think about that.



Take Daylight Savings Time, that's not moral, just annoying.

Why does a nearly microscopic flake of cannabis on the passenger seat cost someone their car but three "suitcases" of beer in the trunk doesn't?

Why can't you legally buy a high flow toilet?



Laws are not moral.

We should be arguing over them.



"And, like it or not, 51% of the humans will impose its vision of society and its morality on the remainder." Actually I'd argue that most of the Bill of Rights specifically forbids the Federal government from doing exactly that. Not to mention the other checks and balances built into the system. Originally when Senators were chosen by the state legislatures, it was supposed to balance the populism of the House of Represenatives.

"Like it or not, Judeo-Christian ethics and morality have stood Western Civilization and indeed the world in good stead for a long time." Except Western Civilization was never just Judeo-Christian. Nor were it's ideals and morality.

"Personal liberty is more than putting whatever you want into your mouth or finding some new way to excite your genitals." Except I was talking about freedom which implies responsibility. Especially in an American context.

"Again, I defy anyone to demonstrate a social system better at doing that while protecting the dignity of the individual better than those based upon a Judeo-Christian foundation." You mean other than the American one that I already showed was not based solely on that Judeo-Christian foundation?

ETA: Sorry, I missed an important one.

"You say, such choices should be made "individually" and without societal influence," Except I said without coercion, as in no use of force.

But if you adopt a religion's moral code into the law, we can't do that. It's not up to the people. It's up to the leaders of that religion.



Not a weasel word.

Just a point again that Western Civilization did not begin and end with Christianity and Christian thought.

Some laws are not moral. For example, right now many police departments are partially funded by civil forfeiture laws.

Something like 40% of the Export-Import Bank's loans have gone to support one company, Boeing.

Not so very long ago, the Federal government decided that the U.S. should be forced to switch to the metric system.



"That immoral people have taken advantage of it doesn't discount the original intent."

Yeah, it kinda does. Your own religion has some interesting things to say about good intentions.

And no one has yet addressed my macro argument. The real question is why should any group be in charge?

You've all been so busy telling me how much the U.S. has a "Judeo-Christian" basis, not one of you has bothered to say why Christianity is a superior system.

I'm willing to work with people to get an acceptable set of laws. But the second you tell me it's Judeo-Christian based I will walk away. Not because I hate Christianity, but because I do want ANY religion given the force of law.

We need people of faith questioning government.

ETA: Pardon, that is my goof. that should read "…but because I do not want ANY religion given the force of law."

You two had me typing so fast last night that my hands couldn't keep up with my brain.



Thank you. I was waiting for someone to introduce the Ten Commandments.

Number One on the Hits List there doesn't apply to anyone not a part of that religion.

Unless you want to point a gun at my head until I put your god first?

Don't you see? I'm not attacking the Christian faith. I'm just saying you can't use the law to impose it on anyone else. Your choice is your choice, their choice is theirs.



Please tell me again how the Ten Commandments are the "fundamental principles of America."

Please tell me again how me NOT putting the "Judeo-Christian" morality above and beyond my own morality rejects American principles "because of their ethical monotheist origin."

It certainly seems that you have issues with every single American who does not embrace Christianity immediately and on your say so.



And you honestly believe that the Judeo-Christian basis is the only possible source of morality for the Founders?

How curiously limiting.



I called the Founders among the best educated men of their time. I pointed out that the deliberate omission of ANY god in the Constitution. And I told you they argued and debated for years to do the "right" thing even as they made the occasional mistake.



You're right. I'd walk away from the group. I wouldn't walk away from the issue.

You see, I have this thing about freedom…



" You wish to have morality without any consequence." I do not. If you'll check some of my previous posts on other threads, I usually stress choice with consequences.

"Western values have a Judeo-Christian foundation…" Among other things.

You did see the bit above where I stressed how important family was, didn't you?



I never said all systems are equal.

I said people should make their own choices. And if you can't convince people that your system is a good one except by using force, then you're doing it wrong.



No, it's a matter of agreeing on morality instead of saying "the Bible tells me this is good SO THIS IS WHAT WE WILL DO or else!!"



Then why isn't the Christian God specifically mentioned in the U.S. Constitution?

Why did it take a Cold War to (mistakenly) change the national motto to "In God We Trust?"

Why does the Constitution specifically forbid a religious test as a qualification for office?

Do you get the picture yet? You can be as Christian as you choose.

You just can't choose that OR any other faith for another.



Because government documents of the time routinely did put it in.

I keep telling people. This was not an accident. It was a deliberate choice. It was shocking. It stirred debate in the Continental Congress. It was unheard of.



Articles of Confederation.

You can find a copy at www.usconstitution.net, a very good reference site.



But it wasn't adopted as the national motto until 1956.

The Founders didn't do "givens," they liked to nail things down. If you don't believe me, take a look at the Federalist Papers and the Anti-Federalist Papers.



Yep, I knew that. That's why I mentioned the Anti-Federalist Papers.

Actually if you examine the Constitution you'll find that broad framework has some very specific anchors.

Which makes the omissions all the more important.



Speaking of coinage, have you heard of the Fugio cent?

Designed by Franklin, one face had "We Are One" and the other face had "Mind Your Business."



Whole wars have been fought by Christians on both sides over that "objective morality."

Whatever the Divine perspective, human understanding is limited and very subjective. class="ghoster">

NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.

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Friday roundup

Report Says DEA Doesn't Even Know If The Billions In Cash It Seizes Is Having Any Impact On Criminal Activity

So if seizing cash doesn't work, why do it?

Poor Neighborhoods Hit Hardest by Asset Forfeiture in Chicago, Data Shows

Another of my maxims applies here. “Government authority tends to be used against those least likely to resist.”

Redesigned pride flag recognizes LGBT people of color

Behold the victim hierarchy, “my victimhood is more important than yours.” They took something that was inclusive and made it about race. What's more, the black and brown stripes are on top. Do you really think that just happens to be the way it turned out? See also There's Controversy Over The Addition Of Two New Colors To The Gay Pride Flag

The Progressive Tea Party that Never Was

Why can't progressives build effective groups from the ground up?

What to do with a broken Illinois: Dissolve the Land of Lincoln

Utter catastrophe is not strong enough for what Illinois faces. This may well be the only way out.

Good riddance to the Russia myth — and blame Team Obama for promoting it

I'd say Team Hillary, but at least they are calling it a myth.

Fifteen Lawyers in Search of a Crime

There's no evidence that the Russians helped the Trump campaign, but that doesn't stop the government lawyers.

Carrier Will Move Jobs to Mexico, Despite Trump’s Promise to Keep Them in Indiana

It's still crony capitalism, an unholy alliance between a company and government.


Comments

“Blockstack: A New Internet That Brings Privacy & Property Rights to Cyberspace”

So if you wanted to stay ahead of the curve, you'd read those three papers every day you could.

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“Isaiah's Job”

Isaiah's Job

by Albert Jay Nock
One evening last autumn, I sat long hours with a European acquaintance while he expounded a political-economic doctrine which seemed sound as a nut and in which I could find no defect. At the end, he said with great earnestness: “I have a mission to the masses. I feel that I am called to get the ear of the people. I shall devote the rest of my life to spreading my doctrine far and wide among the population. What do you think?”

An embarrassing question in any case, and doubly so under the circumstances, because my acquaintance is a very learned man, one of the three or four really first-class minds that Europe produced in his generation; and naturally I, as one of the unlearned, was inclined to regard his lightest word with reverence amounting to awe. Still, I reflected, even the greatest mind can not possibly know everything, and I was pretty sure he had not had my opportunities for observing the masses of mankind, and that therefore I probably knew them better than he did. So I mustered courage to say that he had no such mission and would do well to get the idea out of his head at once; he would find that the masses would not care two pins for his doctrine, and still less for himself, since in such circumstances the popular favourite is generally some Barabbas. I even went so far as to say (he is a Jew) that his idea seemed to show that he was not very well up on his own native literature. He smiled at my jest, and asked what I meant by it; and I referred him to the story of the prophet Isaiah.

It occurred to me then that this story is much worth recalling just now when so many wise men and soothsayers appear to be burdened with a message to the masses. Dr. Townsend has a message, Father Coughlin has one, Mr. Upton Sinclair, Mr. Lippmann, Mr.Chase and the planned economy brethren, Mr. Tugwell and the New Dealers, Mr. Smith and Liberty Leaguers — the list is endless. I can not remember a time when so many energumens were so variously proclaiming the Word to the multitude and telling them what they must do to be saved. This being so, it occurred to me, as I say, that the story of Isaiah might have something in it to steady and compose the human spirit until this tyranny of windiness is overpast. I shall paraphrase the story in our common speech, since it has to be pieced out from various sources; and insasmuch as respectable scholars have thought fit to put out a whole new version of the Bible in the American vernacular, I shall take shelter behind them, if need be, against the charge of dealing irreverently with the Sacred Scriptures.

The prophet's career began at the end of King Uzziah's reign, say about 740 B.C. This reign was uncommonly long, almost half a century, and apparently prosperous. It was one of those prosperous reigns, however — like the reign of Marcus Aurelius at Rome, or the administration of Eubulus at Athens, or of Mr. Coolidge at Washington — where at the end the prosperity suddenly peters out and things go by the board with a resounding crash.

In the year of Uzziah's death, the Lord commissioned the prophet to go out and warn the people of the wrath to come. “Tell them what a worthless lot they are.” He said, “Tell them what is wrong, and why and what is going to happen unless they have a change of heart and straighten up. Don't mince matters. Make it clear that they are positively down to their last chance. Give it to them good and strong and keep on giving it to them. I suppose perhaps I ought to tell you,” He added, “that it won't do any good. The official class and their intelligentsia will turn up their noses at you and the masses will not even listen. They will all keep on in their own ways until they carry everything down to destruction, and you will probably be lucky if you get out with your life.”

Isaiah had been very willing to take on the job — in fact, he had asked for it — but the prospect put a new face on the situation. It raised the obvious question: Why, if all that were so — if the enterprise were to be a failure from the start — was there any sense in starting it? “Ah,” the Lord said, “you do not get the point. There is a Remnant there that you know nothing about. They are obscure, unorganized, inarticulate, each one rubbing along as best he can. They need to be encouraged and braced up because when everything has gone completely to the dogs, they are the ones who will come back and build up a new society; and meanwhile, your preaching will reassure them and keep them hanging on. Your job is to take care of the Remnant, so be off now and set about it.”

Apparently, then, if the Lord's word is good for anything, — I do not offer any opinion about that, — the only element in Judean society that was particularly worth bothering about was the Remnant. Isaiah seems finally to have got it through his head that this was the case; that nothing was to be expected from the masses, but that if anything substantial were ever to be done in Judea, the Remnant would have to do it. This is a very striking and suggestive idea; but before going on to explore it, we need to be quite clear about our terms. What do we mean by the masses, and what by the Remnant?

As the word masses is commonly used, it suggests agglomerations of poor and underprivileged people, labouring people, proletarians, and it means nothing like that; it means simply the majority. The mass-man is one who has neither the force of intellect to apprehend the principles issuing in what we know as the humane life, nor the force of character to adhere to those principles steadily and strictly as laws of conduct; and because such people make up the great and overwhelming majority of mankind, they are called collectively the masses. The line of differentiation between the masses and the Remnant is set invariably by quality, not by circumstance. The Remnant are those who by force of intellect are able to apprehend these principles, and by force of character are able, at least measurably, to cleave to them. The masses are those who are unable to do either.

The picture which Isaiah presents of the Judean masses is most unfavorable, In his view, the mass-man — be he high or be he lowly, rich or poor, prince or pauper — gets off very badly. He appears as not only weak-minded and weak-willed, but as by consequence knavish, arrogant, grasping, dissipated, unprincipled, unscrupulous. The mass-woman also gets off badly, as sharing all the mass-man's untoward qualities, and contributing a few of her own in the way of vanity and laziness, extravagance and foible.The list of luxury-products that she patronized is interesting; it calls to mind the women's page of a Sunday newspaper in 1928, orthe display set forth in one of our professedly “smart” periodicals. In another place, Isaiah even recalls the affectations that we used to know by the name “flapper gait” andthe “debutante slouch.” It may be fair to discount Isaiah's vivacity a little for prophetic fervour; after all, since his real job was not to convert the masses but to brace and reassure the Remnant, he probably felt that he might lay it on indiscriminately and as thick as he liked — in fact, that he was expected to do so. But even so, the Judean mass-man must have been a most objectionable individual, and the mass-woman utterly odious.

If the modern spirit, whatever that may be, is disinclined towards taking the Lord's word at its face value (as I hear is the case), we may observe that Isaiah's testimony to the character of the masses has strong collateral support from respectable Gentile authority. Plato lived into the administration of Eubulus, when Athens was at the peak of its jazz-and-paper era, and he speaks of the Athenian masses with all Isaiah's fervency, even comparing them to a herd of ravenous wild beasts. Curiously, too, he applies Isaiah's own word remnant to the worthier portion of Athenian society; "there is but a very small remnant," he says, of those who possess a saving force of intellect and force of character — too small, preciously as to Judea, to be of any avail against the ignorant and vicious preponderance of the masses.

But Isaiah was a preacher and Plato a philosopher; and we tend to regard preachers and philosophers rather as passive observers of the drama of life than as active participants. Hence in a matter of this kind their judgment might be suspected of being a little uncompromising, a little acrid, or as the French say, saugrenu. We may therefore bring forward another witness who was preeminently a man of affairs, and whose judgment can not lie under this suspicion. Marcus Aurelius was ruler of the greatest of empires, and in that capacity he not only had the Roman mass-man under observation, but he had him on his hands twenty-four hours a day for eighteen years. What he did not know about him was not worth knowing and what he thought of him is abundantly attested on almost every page of the little book of jottings which he scribbled offhand from day to day, and which he meant for no eye but his own ever to see.

This view of the masses is the one that we find prevailing at large among the ancient authorities whose writings have come down to us. In the eighteenth century, however, certain European philosophers spread the notion that the mass-man, in his natural state, is not at all the kind of person that earlier authorities made him out to be, but on the contrary, that he is a worthy object of interest. His untowardness is the effect of environment, an effect for which “society” is somehow responsible. If only his environment permitted him to live according to his lights, he would undoubtedly show himself to be quite a fellow; and the best way to secure a more favourable environment for him would be to let him arrange it for himself. The French Revolution acted powerfully as a springboard for this idea, projecting its influence in all directions throughout Europe.

On this side of the ocean a whole new continent stood ready for a large-scale experiment with this theory. It afforded every conceivable resource whereby the masses might develop a civilization made in their own likeness and after their own image. There was no force of tradition to disturb them in their preponderance, or to check them in a thoroughgoing disparagement of the Remnant. Immense natural wealth, unquestioned predominance, virtual isolation, freedom from external interference and the fear of it, and, finally, a century and a half of time — such are the advantages which the mass-man has had in bringing forth a civilization which should set the earlier preachers and philosophers at naught in their belief that nothing substantial can be expected from the masses, but only from the Remnant.

His success is unimpressive. On the evidence so far presented one must say, I think, that the mass-man's conception of what life has to offer, and his choice of what to ask from life, seem now to be pretty well what they were in the times of Isaiah and Plato; and so too seem the catastrophic social conflicts and convulsions in which his views of life and his demands on life involve him. I do not wish to dwell on this, however, but merely to observe that the monstrously inflated importance of the masses has apparently put all thought of a possible mission to the Remnant out of the modern prophet's head. This is obviously quite as it should be, provided that the earlier preachers and philosophers were actually wrong, and that all final hope of the human race is actually centred in the masses. If, on the other hand, it should turn out that the Lord and Isaiah and Plato and Marcus Aurelius were right in their estimate of the relative social value of the masses and the Remnant, the case is somewhat different. Moreover, since with everything in their favour the masses have so far given such an extremely discouraging account of themselves, it would seem that the question at issue between these two bodies of opinion might most profitably be reopened.

But without following up this suggestion, I wish only, as I said, to remark the fact that as things now stand Isaiah's job seems rather to go begging. Everyone with a message nowadays is, like my venerable European friend, eager to take it to the masses. His first, last and only thought is of mass-acceptance and mass-approval. His great care is to put his doctrine in such shape as will capture the masses' attention and interest. This attitude towards the masses is so exclusive, so devout, that one is reminded of the troglodytic monster described by Plato, and the assiduous crowd at the entrance to its cave, trying obsequiously to placate it and win its favour, trying to interpret its inarticulate noises, trying to find out what it wants, and eagerly offering it all sorts of things that they think might strike its fancy.

The main trouble with all this is its reaction upon the mission itself. It necessitates an opportunist sophistication of one's doctrine, which profoundly alters its character and reduces it to a mere placebo. If, say, you are a preacher, you wish to attract as large a congregation as you can, which means an appeal to the masses; and this, in turn, means adapting the terms of your message to the order of intellect and character that the masses exhibit. If you are an educator, say with a college on your hands, you wish to get as many students as possible, and you whittle down your requirements accordingly. If a writer, you aim at getting many readers; if a publisher, many purchasers; if a philosopher, many disciples; if a reformer, many converts; if a musician, many auditors; and so on. But as we see on all sides, in the realization of these several desires, the prophetic message is so heavily adulterated with trivialities, in every instance, that its effect on the masses is merely to harden them in their sins. Meanwhile, the Remnant, aware of this adulteration and of the desires that prompt it, turn their backs on the prophet and will have nothing to do with him or his message.

Isaiah, on the other hand, worked under no such disabilities. He preached to the masses only in the sense that he preached publicly. Anyone who liked might listen; anyone who liked might pass by. He knew that the Remnant would listen; and knowing also that nothing was to be expected of the masses under any circumstances, he made no specific appeal to them, did not accommodate his message to their measure in any way, and did not care two straws whether they heeded it or not. As a modern publisher might put it, he was not worrying about circulation or about advertising. Hence, with all such obsessions quite out of the way, he was in a position to do his level best, without fear or favour, and answerable only to his august Boss.

If a prophet were not too particular about making money out of his mission or getting a dubious sort of notoriety out of it, the foregoing considerations would lead one to say that serving the Remnant looks like a good job. An assignment that you can really put your back into, and do your best without thinking about results, is a real job; whereas serving the masses is at best only half a job, considering the inexorable conditions that the masses impose upon their servants. They ask you to give them what they want, they insist upon it, and will take nothing else; and following their whims, their irrational changes of fancy, their hot and cold fits, is a tedius business, to say nothing of the fact that what they want at any time makes very little call on one's resources of prophesy. The Remnant, on the other hand, want only the best you have, whatever that may be. Give them that, and they are satisfied; you have nothing more to worry about. The prophet of the American masses must aim consciously at the lowest common denominator of intellect, taste and character among 120,000,000 people; and this is a distressing task. The prophet of the Remnant, on the contrary, is in the enviable position of Papa Haydn in the household of Prince Esterhazy. All Haydn had to do was keep forking out the very best music he knew how to produce, knowing it would be understood and appreciated by those for whom he produced it, and caring not a button what anyone else thought of it; and that makes a good job.

In a sense, nevertheless, as I have said, it is not a rewarding job. If you can tough the fancy of the masses, and have the sagacity to keep always one jump ahead of their vagaries and vacillations, you can get good returns in money from serving the masses, and good returns also in a mouth-to-ear type of notoriety:

Digito monstrari et dicier, Hic est!

We all know innumerable politicians, journalists, dramatists, novelists and the like, who have done extremely well by themselves in these ways. Taking care of the Remnant, on the contrary, holds little promise of any such rewards. A prophet of the Remnant will not grow purse-proud on the financial returns from his work, nor is it likely that he will get any great reknown out of it. Isaiah's case was exceptional to this second rule, and there are others, but not many.

It may be thought, then, that while taking care of the Remnant is no doubt a good job, it is not an especially interesting job because it is as a rule so poorly paid. I have my doubts about this. There are other compensations to be got out of a job besides money and notoriety, and some of them seem substantial enough to be attractive. Many jobs which do not pay well are yet profoundly interesting, as, for instance, the job of research student in the sciences is said to be; and the job of looking after the Remnant seems to me, as I have surveyed it for many years from my seat in the grandstand, to be as interesting as any that can be found int he world.

What chiefly makes it so, I think, is that in any given society the Remnant are always so largely an unknown quantity. You do not know, and will never know, more than two things about them. You can be sure of those — dead sure, as our phrase is — but you will never be able to make even a respectable guess at anything else.You do not know, and will never know, who the Remnant are, nor what they are doing or will do. Two things you do know, and no more: First, that they exist; second, that they will find you.Except for these two certainties, working for the Remnant means working in impenetrable darkness; and this, I should say, is just the condition calculated most effectively to pique the interest of any prophet who is properly gifted with the imagination, insight and intellectual curiosity necessary to a successful pursuit of his trade.

The fascination and the despair of the historian, as he looks back upon Isaiah's Jewry, upon Plato's Athens, or upon Rome of theAntonines, is the hope of discovering and laying bare the"substratum of right-thinking and well-doing" which he knows must have existed somewhere in those societies because no kind of collective life can possibly go on without it. He finds tantalizing intimations of it here and there in many places, as in the Greek Anthology, in the scrapbook of Aulus Gellius, in the poems of Ausonius, and in the brief and touching tribute, Bene merenti, bestowed upon the unknown occupants of Roman tombs. But these are vague and fragmentary; they lead him nowhere in his search for some kind of measure on this substratum, but merely testify to what he already knew a priori — that the substratum did somewhere exist. Where it was, how substantial it was, what its power of self-assertion and resistance was — of all this they tell him nothing.

Similarly, when the historian of two thousand years hence, or two hundred years, looks over the available testimony to the quality of our civilization and tries to get any kind of clear, competent evidence concerning the substratum of right-thinking and well-doing which he knows must have been here, he will have a devil of a time finding it. When he has assembled all he can and has made even a minimum allowance for speciousness, vagueness, and confusion of motive, he will sadly acknowledge that his net result is simply nothing. A Remnant were here, building a substratum like coral insects; so much he knows, but he will find nothing to put him on the track of who and where and how many they were and what their work was like.

Concerning all this, too, the prophet of the present knows precisely as much and as little as the historian of the future; and that, I repeat, is what makes his job seem to me so profoundly interesting. One of the most suggestive episodes recounted in the Bible is that of prophet's attempt — the only attempt of the kind on the record, I believe — to count up the Remnant. Elijah had fled from persecution into the desert, where the Lord presently overhauled him and asked what he was doing so far away from his job. He said that he was running away, not because he was a coward, but because all the Remnant had been killed off except himself. He had got away only by the skin of his teeth, and, he being now all the Remnant there was, if he were killed the True Faith would go flat. The Lord replied that he need not worry about that, for even without him the True Faith could probably manage to squeeze along somehow if it had to; “and as for your figures on the Remnant,” He said, “I don't mind telling you that there are seven thousand of them back there in Israel whom it seems you have not heard of, but you may take My word for it that there they are.”

At that time, probably the population of Israel could not run to much more than a million or so; and a Remnant of seven thousand out of a million is a highly encouraging percentage for any prophet. With seven thousand of the boys on his side, there was no great reason for Elijah to feel lonesome; and incidentally, that would be something for the modern prophet of the Remnant to think of when he has a touch of the blues. But the main point is that if Elijah the Prophet could not make a closer guess on the number of of the Remnant than he made when he missed it by seven thousand, anyone else who tackled the problem would only waste his time.

The other certainty which the prophet of the Remnant may always have is that the Remnant will find him. He may rely on that with absolute assurance. They will find him without his doing anything about it; in fact, if he tries to do anything about it, he is pretty sure to put them off. He does not need to advertise for them nor resort to any schemes of publicity to get their attention. If he is a preacher or a public speaker, for example, he may be quite indifferent to going on show at receptions, getting his picture printed in the newspapers, or furnishing autobiographical material for publication on the side of “human interest”. If a writer, he need not make a point of attending any pink teas, autographing books at wholesale, nor entering into any specious freemasonry with reviewers. All this and much more of the same order lies in the regular and necessary routine laid down for the prophet of the masses; it is, and must be, part of the great general technique of getting the mass-man's ear — or as our vigorous and excellent publicist, Mr. H. L. Mencken, puts it, the technique of boob-bumping. The prophet of the Remnant is not bound to this technique. He may be quite sure that the Remnant will make their own way to him without any adventitious aids; and not only so, but if they find him employing any such aids, as I said, it is ten to one that they will smell a rat in them and will sheer off.

The certainty that the Remnant will find him, however, leaves the prophet as much in the dark as ever, as helpless as ever in the matter of putting any estimate of any kind upon the Remnant; for, as appears in the case of Elijah, he remains ignorant of who they are that have found him or where they are or how many. They did not write in and tell him about it, after the manner of those who admire the vedettes of Hollywood, nor yet do they seek him out and attach themselves to his person. They are not that kind. They take his message much as drivers take the directions on a roadside signboard — that is, with very little thought about the signboard, beyond being gratefully glad that it happened to be there, but with every thought about the directions.

This impersonal attitude of the Remnant wonderfully enhances the interest of the imaginative prophet's job. Once in a while, just about often enough to keep his intellectual curiosity in good working order, he will quite accidentally come upon some distinct reflection of his own message in an unsuspected quarter. This enables him to entertain himself in his leisure moments with agreeable speculations about the course his message may have taken in reaching that particular quarter, and about what came of it after it got there. Most interesting of all are those instances, if one could only run them down (but one may always speculate about them), where the recipient himself no longer knows where nor when nor from whom he got the message — or even where, as sometimes happens, he has forgotten that he got it anywhere and imagines that it is all a self-sprung idea of his own.

Such instances as these are probably not infrequent, for, without presuming to enroll ourselves among the Remnant, we can all no doubt remember having found ourselves suddenly under the influence of an idea, the source of which we cannot possibly identify. “It came to us afterward,” as we say; that is, we are aware of it only after it has shot up full-grown in our minds, leaving us quite ignorant of how and when and by what agency it was planted there and left to germinate. It seems highly probable that the prophet's message often takes some such course with the Remnant.

If, for example, you are a writer or a speaker or a preacher, you put forth an idea which lodges in the Unbewusstsein of a casual member of the Remnant and sticks fast there. For some time it is inert; then it begins to fret and fester until presently it invades the man's conscious mind and, as one might say, corrupts it. Meanwhile, he has quite forgotten how he came by the idea in the first instance, and even perhaps thinks he has invented it; and in those circumstances, the most interesting thing of all is that you never know what the pressure of that idea will make him do.

For these reasons it appears to me that Isaiah's job is not only good but also extremely interesting; and especially so at the present time when nobody is doing it. If I were young and had the notion of embarking in the prophetical line, I would certainly take up this branch of the business; and therefore I have no hesitation about recommending it as a career for anyone in that position. It offers an open field, with no competition; our civilization so completely neglects and disallows the Remnant that anyone going in with an eye single to their service might pretty well count on getting all the trade there is.

Even assuming that there is some social salvage to be screened out of the masses, even assuming that the testimony of history to their social value is a little too sweeping, that it depresses hopelessness a little too far, one must yet perceive, I think, that the masses have prophets enough and to spare. Even admitting that in the teeth of history that hope of the human race may not be quite exclusively centred in the Remnant, one must perceive that they have social value enough to entitle them to some measure of prophetic encouragement and consolation, and that our civilization allows them none whatever. Every prophetic voice is addressed to the masses, and to them alone; the voice of the pulpit, the voice of education, the voice of politics, of literature, drama, journalism — all these are directed towards the masses exclusively, and they marshal the masses in the way that they are going.

One might suggest, therefore, that aspiring prophetical talent may well turn to another field. Sat patriae Priamoque datum — whatever obligation of the kind may be due the masses is already monstrously overpaid. So long as the masses are taking up the tabernacle of Moloch and Chiun, their images, and following the star of their god Buncombe, they will have no lack of prophets to point the way that leadeth to the More Abundant Life; and hence a few of those who feel the prophetic afflatus might do better to apply themselves to serving the Remnant. It is a good job, an interesting job, much more interesting than serving the masses; and moreover it is the only job in our whole civilization, as far as I know, that offers a virgin field.

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☆ Media utopia

When I was a kid, I delivered newspapers. After school I read them. Oh not cover to cover, I'd skip the ads and the sports and usually most of the “lifestyles” stuff. It wasn't hard to spot a pattern. What appeared in the newspapers usually appeared on the local news within a day or so. By the time I hit high school, I had discovered the local and school libraries with their out-of-state newspapers. Once again, there was a pattern. Three papers would usually have the “important” stories first, the next day or so the major papers would have the stories, and then within a week or so the other papers and the local television news.

It wouldn't be every story. But it would be the big stories, the ones that everyone would be talking about. So if you wanted to stay ahead of the curve, you'd read those three papers every day you could. The three papers were The New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Wall Street Journal. Oh, The Economist was good too, but I couldn't always find that.

These papers set the agenda that the rest of the nation's press followed. Not always the opinion, but definitely Which Stories Were Worthy. Even newsweeklies and the television news magazines followed the stories that these three newspapers had pointed out.

Telling people what has happened, that's reporting. But the best reporters went beyond that, they put it into context. If the President rapped his knuckles on the desk, they'd tell you what his predecessors did, when, and why. You'd understood how it fit.

There never was journalistic objectivity, but that was okay. As long as some differing opinions made it to press, the public would learn what happened. Reporting was the priority.

Over the years, the Washington Post grew convinced that it had taken down a President. Maybe setting the agenda wasn't enough. Maybe they could shape world events with their reporting. If they said it happened, maybe enough people would believe and the Elected Leadership would react. It worked kinda-sorta with Ronald Reagan, and it worked well with George H. W. Bush.

Then came Bill Clinton who wanted to change the world. So he cultivated and seduced the press. He convinced them that his administration together with the press could change the world if they only tried hard enough. And before the press admitted that there were all sorts of juicy tidbits in Clinton's background, it worked out pretty well. It also cemented belief that the press had a Higher Calling, and it was up to them to turn ignorance into enlightenment.

After Billy-boy came George W. Bush, Bush the Younger. Or Bush League as I eventually called him. Bush the Younger would have been a tolerable President, but then we had 9-11. And the press didn't want a war. Or at least, they didn't want an Official War® with heroes and patriotism and Amazing America riding to the rescue. So they decided to control the agenda. Most of the heroism coming out of 9-11 and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan never made the headlines. The failures, real and imagined, did.

Yeah, about that imagined bit. It was the Higher Calling. American ideas couldn't be allowed to succeed, especially on a world stage. America had to have more failures if only because America had more success. For most of his administration, George W. Bush could do no right according to the popular press.

And then came Barack Obama, the Imperious Leader, He Who Could Do No Wrong. The press loved this guy. For the first time ever, a president mostly played along with what the press said. The press didn't have to report it, they could create reality. That's what happened for eight years.

By 2016, the press had forgotten that their primary job was reporting what happened. No one realized that while the Grand Vision was put in place, they were losing Democrat lawmakers and elected officials to keep it into place. Meanwhile many people resented being dragged into a Utopia without their consent. Especially when Utopia was more expensive and more tyrannical.

So Donald Trump happened.

The press completely missed it. What happened wasn't nearly as important as what was supposed to happen.

The truth was a prison. The answer was to do what had worked for eight marvelous years. Reality had to change. Legality didn't matter. Morality didn't matter. Only the Utopia.

The untruths came fast. No one was going on record but it was obvious that Trump would fail if he got pushed. He couldn't hope to succeed. So stories of high-level meetings that never happened came out. Stories about sex orgies and golden showers in Russia. Stories about Trump hoarding the White House ice cream. None of these stories could be verified. The answer was to accelerate the news cycle. That was easy enough with the internet. Literally hours after each story was released came the debunking, new stories followed minutes after that.

We've reached the point where most of the “news” about President Donald Trump and his administration can't be trusted. The newspapers and news sources I used to trust can't be trusted.

I hate admitting it, but Trump is right about the press. And it's because the press won't report the news. The press wants the Utopia.

Truth doesn't matter.
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John and Cindy McCain's shaky foundation

Soros, Clinton-Linked Teneo Among Donors to McCain Institute

Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain in 2012 turned over nearly $9 million in unspent funds from his failed 2008 presidential campaign to a new foundation bearing his name, the McCain Institute for International Leadership.

The institute is intended to serve as a “legacy” for McCain and “is dedicated to advancing human rights, dignity, democracy and freedom.” It is a tax-exempt non-profit foundation with assets valued at $8.1 million and associated with Arizona State University.

>snip<

Critics worry that the institute’s donors and McCain’s personal leadership in the organization’s exclusive “Sedona Forum” bear an uncanny resemblance to the glitzy Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) that annually co-mingled special interests and powerful political players in alleged pay-to-play schemes.

The institute has accepted contributions of as much as $100,000 from billionaire liberal activist-funder George Soros and from Teneo, a for-profit company co-founded by Doug Band, former President Bill Clinton’s “bag man.” Teneo has long helped enrich Clinton through lucrative speaking and business deals.


Cindy McCain: Crony Philanthropist

It turns out the "freedom, democracy, and human rights" institute launched by Cindy and Sen. John McCain is supported by large donations from entities known for persistent rights violations, including Saudi Arabia, a U.S. defense contractor selling smart bombs to the Saudis, and a Moroccan mining company occupying land in Northwest Africa.

In fact, examining McCain's philanthropic record reveals a long history of personal abuse of nonprofit resources, shady connections, and shoddy work. For years, McCain has been playing the role of crony philanthropist, and now she is poised to bring her dubious advocacy to the highest levels of government.

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Headline roundup

Single-payer health care would have an astonishingly high price tag

Some of us already knew that. When we tried to tell people, we were told to shut up because obviously we were wrong.

Harvard: California minimum wage hikes have led to major restaurant closings

More expenses and the same price means less profit and fewer business. It also means fewer jobs.

City trees are dying early because they are struggling to sleep due to streetlights

I didn't see that one coming.

Victory!: Governor Abbott signs Texas “Bowie Bill”

Bowie knives are illegal? In Texas?

Advances in apathy

Claire Wolfe says it's long past time to tune out.

Whistleblower Banker: “All Misery on Earth is a Business Model”

Wondering what happend to the free market?

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Bilingual futility

I can tell you the second I realized the utter futility of mandated bilingual communication. I was at an ATM in San Francisco and the only two language choices were English and Spanish.

In Chinatown.
     — NeoWayland
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KYFHO

Keep your freakin' hands off!
     — NeoWayland, FAQ - KYFHO: Keep Your Freakin' Hands OFF!
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Progresses

Authority progresses and freedom regresses
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Question

If you don't question what a book or Authority Figure™ tells you, you aren't doing your part.
     — NeoWayland
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Absolutely

As a rule, absolutes don't.
     — NeoWayland
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Acknowledge

Acknowledge but do not celebrate.
     — NeoWayland

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Right choices

I want to talk about the curious restrictions of Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

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Enlightenment

Why does your enlightenment demand that I sacrifice?
     — NeoWayland, Why does your enlightenment demand that I sacrifice?
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☆ Selective

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Nullify this!

“Juries Can Acquit the Guilty, 9th Circuit Says, but 'There Is No Right to Nullification'”

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None of my business

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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FINALLY!!   It's about damn time!

Speech may not be banned on the ground that it expresses ideas that offend.


A law found to discriminate based on viewpoint is an “egregious form of content discrimination,” which is “presumptively unconstitutional.” … A law that can be directed against speech found offensive to some portion of the public can be turned against minority and dissenting views to the detriment of all. The First Amendment does not entrust that power to the government’s benevolence. Instead, our reliance must be on the substantial safeguards of free and open discussion in a democratic society.
     — Justice Anthony Kennedy

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Demand

You demand bondage, I choose liberty.
     — NeoWayland
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Headline roundup

Net Neutrality Supporters Want to ‘Ban Drudge’

One of my maxims applies here. “Ever notice that when someone starts talking about the common good, they try to take something away from you?”

Judge: Lois Lerner’s tea party-targeting testimony can stay secret — for now

So what are they hiding?

How Team Obama tried to hack the election

We know it happened. Why isn't it being investigated?

Inside Obama’s Secret Outreach to Russia

Again, we know it happened. Why isn't it being investigated?

Get Congress Back to Legislating, Not Just Budgeting

Another example of unintended consequences.

CNN’s Kathy Griffin and the Face of Tolerant Democrats

Griffin doesn't want to face the consequences.

Flashback: Obama Admin. Offers to Share Syria Intel on Terrorists With Russia

Yep. We know it happened. Why isn't it being investigated?


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“How to save the USA in six words”

Stop making everything a moral issue.
     — Don Surber, How to save the USA in six words

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Freedom of religion

Freedom of religion does not mean deferring to Christianity.
     — NeoWayland
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Absolute morality

Absolute morality serves those in power and those in fear.
     — NeoWayland
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Not your friend

Government is not your friend. Even when the "right" people are in charge.
     — NeoWayland
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Sympathy

Sympathy is not part of my nature. Fellow-feeling is a gift that I have to work at, so I do. I consider it as restitution for the person I once was.
     — NeoWayland
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Headline roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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NeoNotes — You're the product

Heinlein was right. "There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch."

There's an internet adage that has popped up in recent years. "If it's free, you're not the customer, you're the product."

And finally there's the old reliable. "Follow the money."
NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.
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from crux № 9 — Testing ideas

“People of Color: You Are Not Oppressed”

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“Five Clichés Used to Attack Free Speech” from ReasonTV

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Destroyed

America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.
     — Abraham Lincoln
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Hate the truth

The truth is hate speech to those that hate the truth.
     — anonymous
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☥ ▽ ❝Ain't Nobody's Business If You Do❞

Peter McWilliams • Before passing day

Lived 05Aug1949 to 14Jun2000 (50). Small "L" libertarian, drug war martyr and author of Ain't Nobody's Business If You Do. Died choking on his own vomit because he could not legally get medical marijuana.

Ain't Nobody's Business If You Do
     — Peter McWilliams

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Washington's Farewell Address

Washington's Farewell Address

President George Washington's Farewell Address — 1796
Friends and Fellow Citizens:

The period for a new election of a citizen to administer the executive government of the United States being not far distant, and the time actually arrived when your thoughts must be employed in designating the person who is to be clothed with that important trust, it appears to me proper, especially as it may conduce to a more distinct expression of the public voice, that I should now apprise you of the resolution I have formed, to decline being considered among the number of those out of whom a choice is to be made.

I beg you, at the same time, to do me the justice to be assured that this resolution has not been taken without a strict regard to all the considerations appertaining to the relation which binds a dutiful citizen to his country; and that in withdrawing the tender of service, which silence in my situation might imply, I am influenced by no diminution of zeal for your future interest, no deficiency of grateful respect for your past kindness, but am supported by a full conviction that the step is compatible with both.

The acceptance of, and continuance hitherto in, the office to which your suffrages have twice called me have been a uniform sacrifice of inclination to the opinion of duty and to a deference for what appeared to be your desire. I constantly hoped that it would have been much earlier in my power, consistently with motives which I was not at liberty to disregard, to return to that retirement from which I had been reluctantly drawn. The strength of my inclination to do this, previous to the last election, had even led to the preparation of an address to declare it to you; but mature reflection on the then perplexed and critical posture of our affairs with foreign nations, and the unanimous advice of persons entitled to my confidence, impelled me to abandon the idea.

I rejoice that the state of your concerns, external as well as internal, no longer renders the pursuit of inclination incompatible with the sentiment of duty or propriety, and am persuaded, whatever partiality may be retained for my services, that, in the present circumstances of our country, you will not disapprove my determination to retire.

The impressions with which I first undertook the arduous trust were explained on the proper occasion. In the discharge of this trust, I will only say that I have, with good intentions, contributed towards the organization and administration of the government the best exertions of which a very fallible judgment was capable. Not unconscious in the outset of the inferiority of my qualifications, experience in my own eyes, perhaps still more in the eyes of others, has strengthened the motives to diffidence of myself; and every day the increasing weight of years admonishes me more and more that the shade of retirement is as necessary to me as it will be welcome. Satisfied that if any circumstances have given peculiar value to my services, they were temporary, I have the consolation to believe that, while choice and prudence invite me to quit the political scene, patriotism does not forbid it.

In looking forward to the moment which is intended to terminate the career of my public life, my feelings do not permit me to suspend the deep acknowledgment of that debt of gratitude which I owe to my beloved country for the many honors it has conferred upon me; still more for the steadfast confidence with which it has supported me; and for the opportunities I have thence enjoyed of manifesting my inviolable attachment, by services faithful and persevering, though in usefulness unequal to my zeal. If benefits have resulted to our country from these services, let it always be remembered to your praise, and as an instructive example in our annals, that under circumstances in which the passions, agitated in every direction, were liable to mislead, amidst appearances sometimes dubious, vicissitudes of fortune often discouraging, in situations in which not unfrequently want of success has countenanced the spirit of criticism, the constancy of your support was the essential prop of the efforts, and a guarantee of the plans by which they were effected. Profoundly penetrated with this idea, I shall carry it with me to my grave, as a strong incitement to unceasing vows that heaven may continue to you the choicest tokens of its beneficence; that your union and brotherly affection may be perpetual; that the free Constitution, which is the work of your hands, may be sacredly maintained; that its administration in every department may be stamped with wisdom and virtue; that, in fine, the happiness of the people of these States, under the auspices of liberty, may be made complete by so careful a preservation and so prudent a use of this blessing as will acquire to them the glory of recommending it to the applause, the affection, and adoption of every nation which is yet a stranger to it.

Here, perhaps, I ought to stop. But a solicitude for your welfare, which cannot end but with my life, and the apprehension of danger, natural to that solicitude, urge me, on an occasion like the present, to offer to your solemn contemplation, and to recommend to your frequent review, some sentiments which are the result of much reflection, of no inconsiderable observation, and which appear to me all-important to the permanency of your felicity as a people. These will be offered to you with the more freedom, as you can only see in them the disinterested warnings of a parting friend, who can possibly have no personal motive to bias his counsel. Nor can I forget, as an encouragement to it, your indulgent reception of my sentiments on a former and not dissimilar occasion.

Interwoven as is the love of liberty with every ligament of your hearts, no recommendation of mine is necessary to fortify or confirm the attachment.

The unity of government which constitutes you one people is also now dear to you. It is justly so, for it is a main pillar in the edifice of your real independence, the support of your tranquility at home, your peace abroad; of your safety; of your prosperity; of that very liberty which you so highly prize. But as it is easy to foresee that, from different causes and from different quarters, much pains will be taken, many artifices employed to weaken in your minds the conviction of this truth; as this is the point in your political fortress against which the batteries of internal and external enemies will be most constantly and actively (though often covertly and insidiously) directed, it is of infinite moment that you should properly estimate the immense value of your national union to your collective and individual happiness; that you should cherish a cordial, habitual, and immovable attachment to it; accustoming yourselves to think and speak of it as of the palladium of your political safety and prosperity; watching for its preservation with jealous anxiety; discountenancing whatever may suggest even a suspicion that it can in any event be abandoned; and indignantly frowning upon the first dawning of every attempt to alienate any portion of our country from the rest, or to enfeeble the sacred ties which now link together the various parts.

For this you have every inducement of sympathy and interest. Citizens, by birth or choice, of a common country, that country has a right to concentrate your affections. The name of American, which belongs to you in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of patriotism more than any appellation derived from local discriminations. With slight shades of difference, you have the same religion, manners, habits, and political principles. You have in a common cause fought and triumphed together; the independence and liberty you possess are the work of joint counsels, and joint efforts of common dangers, sufferings, and successes.

But these considerations, however powerfully they address themselves to your sensibility, are greatly outweighed by those which apply more immediately to your interest. Here every portion of our country finds the most commanding motives for carefully guarding and preserving the union of the whole.

The North, in an unrestrained intercourse with the South, protected by the equal laws of a common government, finds in the productions of the latter great additional resources of maritime and commercial enterprise and precious materials of manufacturing industry. The South, in the same intercourse, benefiting by the agency of the North, sees its agriculture grow and its commerce expand. Turning partly into its own channels the seamen of the North, it finds its particular navigation invigorated; and, while it contributes, in different ways, to nourish and increase the general mass of the national navigation, it looks forward to the protection of a maritime strength, to which itself is unequally adapted. The East, in a like intercourse with the West, already finds, and in the progressive improvement of interior communications by land and water, will more and more find a valuable vent for the commodities which it brings from abroad, or manufactures at home. The West derives from the East supplies requisite to its growth and comfort, and, what is perhaps of still greater consequence, it must of necessity owe the secure enjoyment of indispensable outlets for its own productions to the weight, influence, and the future maritime strength of the Atlantic side of the Union, directed by an indissoluble community of interest as one nation. Any other tenure by which the West can hold this essential advantage, whether derived from its own separate strength, or from an apostate and unnatural connection with any foreign power, must be intrinsically precarious.

While, then, every part of our country thus feels an immediate and particular interest in union, all the parts combined cannot fail to find in the united mass of means and efforts greater strength, greater resource, proportionably greater security from external danger, a less frequent interruption of their peace by foreign nations; and, what is of inestimable value, they must derive from union an exemption from those broils and wars between themselves, which so frequently afflict neighboring countries not tied together by the same governments, which their own rival ships alone would be sufficient to produce, but which opposite foreign alliances, attachments, and intrigues would stimulate and embitter. Hence, likewise, they will avoid the necessity of those overgrown military establishments which, under any form of government, are inauspicious to liberty, and which are to be regarded as particularly hostile to republican liberty. In this sense it is that your union ought to be considered as a main prop of your liberty, and that the love of the one ought to endear to you the preservation of the other.

These considerations speak a persuasive language to every reflecting and virtuous mind, and exhibit the continuance of the Union as a primary object of patriotic desire. Is there a doubt whether a common government can embrace so large a sphere? Let experience solve it. To listen to mere speculation in such a case were criminal. We are authorized to hope that a proper organization of the whole with the auxiliary agency of governments for the respective subdivisions, will afford a happy issue to the experiment. It is well worth a fair and full experiment. With such powerful and obvious motives to union, affecting all parts of our country, while experience shall not have demonstrated its impracticability, there will always be reason to distrust the patriotism of those who in any quarter may endeavor to weaken its bands.

In contemplating the causes which may disturb our Union, it occurs as matter of serious concern that any ground should have been furnished for characterizing parties by geographical discriminations, Northern and Southern, Atlantic and Western; whence designing men may endeavor to excite a belief that there is a real difference of local interests and views. One of the expedients of party to acquire influence within particular districts is to misrepresent the opinions and aims of other districts. You cannot shield yourselves too much against the jealousies and heartburnings which spring from these misrepresentations; they tend to render alien to each other those who ought to be bound together by fraternal affection. The inhabitants of our Western country have lately had a useful lesson on this head; they have seen, in the negotiation by the Executive, and in the unanimous ratification by the Senate, of the treaty with Spain, and in the universal satisfaction at that event, throughout the United States, a decisive proof how unfounded were the suspicions propagated among them of a policy in the General Government and in the Atlantic States unfriendly to their interests in regard to the Mississippi; they have been witnesses to the formation of two treaties, that with Great Britain, and that with Spain, which secure to them everything they could desire, in respect to our foreign relations, towards confirming their prosperity. Will it not be their wisdom to rely for the preservation of these advantages on the Union by which they were procured ? Will they not henceforth be deaf to those advisers, if such there are, who would sever them from their brethren and connect them with aliens?

To the efficacy and permanency of your Union, a government for the whole is indispensable. No alliance, however strict, between the parts can be an adequate substitute; they must inevitably experience the infractions and interruptions which all alliances in all times have experienced. Sensible of this momentous truth, you have improved upon your first essay, by the adoption of a constitution of government better calculated than your former for an intimate union, and for the efficacious management of your common concerns. This government, the offspring of our own choice, uninfluenced and unawed, adopted upon full investigation and mature deliberation, completely free in its principles, in the distribution of its powers, uniting security with energy, and containing within itself a provision for its own amendment, has a just claim to your confidence and your support. Respect for its authority, compliance with its laws, acquiescence in its measures, are duties enjoined by the fundamental maxims of true liberty. The basis of our political systems is the right of the people to make and to alter their constitutions of government. But the Constitution which at any time exists, till changed by an explicit and authentic act of the whole people, is sacredly obligatory upon all. The very idea of the power and the right of the people to establish government presupposes the duty of every individual to obey the established government.

All obstructions to the execution of the laws, all combinations and associations, under whatever plausible character, with the real design to direct, control, counteract, or awe the regular deliberation and action of the constituted authorities, are destructive of this fundamental principle, and of fatal tendency. They serve to organize faction, to give it an artificial and extraordinary force; to put, in the place of the delegated will of the nation the will of a party, often a small but artful and enterprising minority of the community; and, according to the alternate triumphs of different parties, to make the public administration the mirror of the ill-concerted and incongruous projects of faction, rather than the organ of consistent and wholesome plans digested by common counsels and modified by mutual interests.

However combinations or associations of the above description may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely, in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.

Towards the preservation of your government, and the permanency of your present happy state, it is requisite, not only that you steadily discountenance irregular oppositions to its acknowledged authority, but also that you resist with care the spirit of innovation upon its principles, however specious the pretexts. One method of assault may be to effect, in the forms of the Constitution, alterations which will impair the energy of the system, and thus to undermine what cannot be directly overthrown. In all the changes to which you may be invited, remember that time and habit are at least as necessary to fix the true character of governments as of other human institutions; that experience is the surest standard by which to test the real tendency of the existing constitution of a country; that facility in changes, upon the credit of mere hypothesis and opinion, exposes to perpetual change, from the endless variety of hypothesis and opinion; and remember, especially, that for the efficient management of your common interests, in a country so extensive as ours, a government of as much vigor as is consistent with the perfect security of liberty is indispensable. Liberty itself will find in such a government, with powers properly distributed and adjusted, its surest guardian. It is, indeed, little else than a name, where the government is too feeble to withstand the enterprises of faction, to confine each member of the society within the limits prescribed by the laws, and to maintain all in the secure and tranquil enjoyment of the rights of person and property.

I have already intimated to you the danger of parties in the State, with particular reference to the founding of them on geographical discriminations. Let me now take a more comprehensive view, and warn you in the most solemn manner against the baneful effects of the spirit of party generally.

This spirit, unfortunately, is inseparable from our nature, having its root in the strongest passions of the human mind. It exists under different shapes in all governments, more or less stifled, controlled, or repressed; but, in those of the popular form, it is seen in its greatest rankness, and is truly their worst enemy.

The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge, natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism. The disorders and miseries which result gradually incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual; and sooner or later the chief of some prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors, turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation, on the ruins of public liberty.

Without looking forward to an extremity of this kind (which nevertheless ought not to be entirely out of sight), the common and continual mischiefs of the spirit of party are sufficient to make it the interest and duty of a wise people to discourage and restrain it.

It serves always to distract the public councils and enfeeble the public administration. It agitates the community with ill-founded jealousies and false alarms, kindles the animosity of one part against another, foments occasionally riot and insurrection. It opens the door to foreign influence and corruption, which finds a facilitated access to the government itself through the channels of party passions. Thus the policy and the will of one country are subjected to the policy and will of another.

There is an opinion that parties in free countries are useful checks upon the administration of the government and serve to keep alive the spirit of liberty. This within certain limits is probably true; and in governments of a monarchical cast, patriotism may look with indulgence, if not with favor, upon the spirit of party. But in those of the popular character, in governments purely elective, it is a spirit not to be encouraged. From their natural tendency, it is certain there will always be enough of that spirit for every salutary purpose. And there being constant danger of excess, the effort ought to be by force of public opinion, to mitigate and assuage it. A fire not to be quenched, it demands a uniform vigilance to prevent its bursting into a flame, lest, instead of warming, it should consume.

It is important, likewise, that the habits of thinking in a free country should inspire caution in those entrusted with its administration, to confine themselves within their respective constitutional spheres, avoiding in the exercise of the powers of one department to encroach upon another. The spirit of encroachment tends to consolidate the powers of all the departments in one, and thus to create, whatever the form of government, a real despotism. A just estimate of that love of power, and proneness to abuse it, which predominates in the human heart, is sufficient to satisfy us of the truth of this position. The necessity of reciprocal checks in the exercise of political power, by dividing and distributing it into different depositaries, and constituting each the guardian of the public weal against invasions by the others, has been evinced by experiments ancient and modern; some of them in our country and under our own eyes. To preserve them must be as necessary as to institute them. If, in the opinion of the people, the distribution or modification of the constitutional powers be in any particular wrong, let it be corrected by an amendment in the way which the Constitution designates. But let there be no change by usurpation; for though this, in one instance, may be the instrument of good, it is the customary weapon by which free governments are destroyed. The precedent must always greatly overbalance in permanent evil any partial or transient benefit, which the use can at any time yield.

Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens. The mere politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume could not trace all their connections with private and public felicity. Let it simply be asked: Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice ? And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.

It is substantially true that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government. The rule, indeed, extends with more or less force to every species of free government. Who that is a sincere friend to it can look with indifference upon attempts to shake the foundation of the fabric?

Promote then, as an object of primary importance, institutions for the general diffusion of knowledge. In proportion as the structure of a government gives force to public opinion, it is essential that public opinion should be enlightened.

As a very important source of strength and security, cherish public credit. One method of preserving it is to use it as sparingly as possible, avoiding occasions of expense by cultivating peace, but remembering also that timely disbursements to prepare for danger frequently prevent much greater disbursements to repel it, avoiding likewise the accumulation of debt, not only by shunning occasions of expense, but by vigorous exertion in time of peace to discharge the debts which unavoidable wars may have occasioned, not ungenerously throwing upon posterity the burden which we ourselves ought to bear. The execution of these maxims belongs to your representatives, but it is necessary that public opinion should co-operate. To facilitate to them the performance of their duty, it is essential that you should practically bear in mind that towards the payment of debts there must be revenue; that to have revenue there must be taxes; that no taxes can be devised which are not more or less inconvenient and unpleasant; that the intrinsic embarrassment, inseparable from the selection of the proper objects (which is always a choice of difficulties), ought to be a decisive motive for a candid construction of the conduct of the government in making it, and for a spirit of acquiescence in the measures for obtaining revenue, which the public exigencies may at any time dictate.

Observe good faith and justice towards all nations; cultivate peace and harmony with all. Religion and morality enjoin this conduct; and can it be, that good policy does not equally enjoin it 7 It will be worthy of a free, enlightened, and at no distant period, a great nation, to give to mankind the magnanimous and too novel example of a people always guided by an exalted justice and benevolence. Who can doubt that, in the course of time and things, the fruits of such a plan would richly repay any temporary advantages which might be lost by a steady adherence to it ? Can it be that Providence has not connected the permanent felicity of a nation with its virtue ? The experiment, at least, is recommended by every sentiment which ennobles human nature. Alas! is it rendered impossible by its vices?

In the execution of such a plan, nothing is more essential than that permanent, inveterate antipathies against particular nations, and passionate attachments for others, should be excluded; and that, in place of them, just and amicable feelings towards all should be cultivated. The nation which indulges towards another a habitual hatred or a habitual fondness is in some degree a slave. It is a slave to its animosity or to its affection, either of which is sufficient to lead it astray from its duty and its interest. Antipathy in one nation against another disposes each more readily to offer insult and injury, to lay hold of slight causes of umbrage, and to be haughty and intractable, when accidental or trifling occasions of dispute occur. Hence, frequent collisions, obstinate, envenomed, and bloody contests. The nation, prompted by ill-will and resentment, sometimes impels to war the government, contrary to the best calculations of policy. The government sometimes participates in the national propensity, and adopts through passion what reason would reject; at other times it makes the animosity of the nation subservient to projects of hostility instigated by pride, ambition, and other sinister and pernicious motives. The peace often, sometimes perhaps the liberty, of nations, has been the victim.

So likewise, a passionate attachment of one nation for another produces a variety of evils. Sympathy for the favorite nation, facilitating the illusion of an imaginary common interest in cases where no real common interest exists, and infusing into one the enmities of the other, betrays the former into a participation in the quarrels and wars of the latter without adequate inducement or justification. It leads also to concessions to the favorite nation of privileges denied to others which is apt doubly to injure the nation making the concessions; by unnecessarily parting with what ought to have been retained, and by exciting jealousy, ill-will, and a disposition to retaliate, in the parties from whom equal privileges are withheld. And it gives to ambitious, corrupted, or deluded citizens (who devote themselves to the favorite nation), facility to betray or sacrifice the interests of their own country, without odium, sometimes even with popularity; gilding, with the appearances of a virtuous sense of obligation, a commendable deference for public opinion, or a laudable zeal for public good, the base or foolish compliances of ambition, corruption, or infatuation.

As avenues to foreign influence in innumerable ways, such attachments are particularly alarming to the truly enlightened and independent patriot. How many opportunities do they afford to tamper with domestic factions, to practice the arts of seduction, to mislead public opinion, to influence or awe the public councils 7 Such an attachment of a small or weak towards a great and powerful nation dooms the former to be the satellite of the latter.

Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence (I conjure you to believe me, fellow-citizens) the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake, since history and experience prove that foreign influence is one of the most baneful foes of republican government. But that jealousy to be useful must be impartial; else it becomes the instrument of the very influence to be avoided, instead of a defense against it. Excessive partiality for one foreign nation and excessive dislike of another cause those whom they actuate to see danger only on one side, and serve to veil and even second the arts of influence on the other. Real patriots who may resist the intrigues of the favorite are liable to become suspected and odious, while its tools and dupes usurp the applause and confidence of the people, to surrender their interests.

The great rule of conduct for us in regard to foreign nations is in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection as possible. So far as we have already formed engagements, let them be fulfilled with perfect good faith. Here let us stop. Europe has a set of primary interests which to us have none; or a very remote relation. Hence she must be engaged in frequent controversies, the causes of which are essentially foreign to our concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be unwise in us to implicate ourselves by artificial ties in the ordinary vicissitudes of her politics, or the ordinary combinations and collisions of her friendships or enmities.

Our detached and distant situation invites and enables us to pursue a different course. If we remain one people under an efficient government. the period is not far off when we may defy material injury from external annoyance; when we may take such an attitude as will cause the neutrality we may at any time resolve upon to be scrupulously respected; when belligerent nations, under the impossibility of making acquisitions upon us, will not lightly hazard the giving us provocation; when we may choose peace or war, as our interest, guided by justice, shall counsel.

Why forego the advantages of so peculiar a situation? Why quit our own to stand upon foreign ground? Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humor or caprice?

It is our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of the foreign world; so far, I mean, as we are now at liberty to do it; for let me not be understood as capable of patronizing infidelity to existing engagements. I hold the maxim no less applicable to public than to private affairs, that honesty is always the best policy. I repeat it, therefore, let those engagements be observed in their genuine sense. But, in my opinion, it is unnecessary and would be unwise to extend them.

Taking care always to keep ourselves by suitable establishments on a respectable defensive posture, we may safely trust to temporary alliances for extraordinary emergencies.

Harmony, liberal intercourse with all nations, are recommended by policy, humanity, and interest. But even our commercial policy should hold an equal and impartial hand; neither seeking nor granting exclusive favors or preferences; consulting the natural course of things; diffusing and diversifying by gentle means the streams of commerce, but forcing nothing; establishing (with powers so disposed, in order to give trade a stable course, to define the rights of our merchants, and to enable the government to support them) conventional rules of intercourse, the best that present circumstances and mutual opinion will permit, but temporary, and liable to be from time to time abandoned or varied, as experience and circumstances shall dictate; constantly keeping in view that it is folly in one nation to look for disinterested favors from another; that it must pay with a portion of its independence for whatever it may accept under that character; that, by such acceptance, it may place itself in the condition of having given equivalents for nominal favors, and yet of being reproached with ingratitude for not giving more. There can be no greater error than to expect or calculate upon real favors from nation to nation. It is an illusion, which experience must cure, which a just pride ought to discard.

In offering to you, my countrymen, these counsels of an old and affectionate friend, I dare not hope they will make the strong and lasting impression I could wish; that they will control the usual current of the passions, or prevent our nation from running the course which has hitherto marked the destiny of nations. But, if I may even flatter myself that they may be productive of some partial benefit, some occasional good; that they may now and then recur to moderate the fury of party spirit, to warn against the mischiefs of foreign intrigue, to guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism; this hope will be a full recompense for the solicitude for your welfare, by which they have been dictated.

How far in the discharge of my official duties I have been guided by the principles which have been delineated, the public records and other evidences of my conduct must witness to you and to the world. To myself, the assurance of my own conscience is, that I have at least believed myself to be guided by them.

In relation to the still subsisting war in Europe, my proclamation of the twenty-second of April, I793, is the index of my plan. Sanctioned by your approving voice, and by that of your representatives in both houses of Congress, the spirit of that measure has continually governed me, uninfluenced by any attempts to deter or divert me from it.

After deliberate examination, with the aid of the best lights I could obtain, I was well satisfied that our country, under all the circumstances of the case, had a right to take, and was bound in duty and interest to take, a neutral position. Having taken it, I determined, as far as should depend upon me, to maintain it, with moderation, perseverance, and firmness.

The considerations which respect the right to hold this conduct, it is not necessary on this occasion to detail. I will only observe that, according to my understanding of the matter, that right, so far from being denied by any of the belligerent powers, has been virtually admitted by all.

The duty of holding a neutral conduct may be inferred, without anything more, from the obligation which justice and humanity impose on every nation, in cases in which it is free to act, to maintain inviolate the relations of peace and amity towards other nations.

The inducements of interest for observing that conduct will best be referred to your own reflections and experience. With me a predominant motive has been to endeavor to gain time to our country to settle and mature its yet recent institutions, and to progress without interruption to that degree of strength and consistency which is necessary to give it, humanly speaking, the command of its own fortunes.

Though, in reviewing the incidents of my administration, I am unconscious of intentional error, I am nevertheless too sensible of my defects not to think it probable that I may have committed many errors. Whatever they may be, I fervently beseech the Almighty to avert or mitigate the evils to which they may tend. I shall also carry with me the hope that my country will never cease to view them with indulgence; and that, after forty five years of my life dedicated to its service with an upright zeal, the faults of incompetent abilities will be consigned to oblivion, as myself must soon be to the mansions of rest.

Relying on its kindness in this as in other things, and actuated by that fervent love towards it, which is so natural to a man who views in it the native soil of himself and his progenitors for several generations, I anticipate with pleasing expectation that retreat in which I promise myself to realize, without alloy, the sweet enjoyment of partaking, in the midst of my fellow-citizens, the benign influence of good laws under a free government, the ever-favorite object of my heart, and the happy reward, as I trust, of our mutual cares, labors, and dangers.

United States 19th September, 1796

Geo. Washington
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NeoNotes — Deserved to be heroes

For length reasons, this entry appears on it's own page.

“We let generations be victims when they deserved to be heroes.”

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Roaming Millennial on Oppression

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from crux № 15 — make it better

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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NeoNotes — Subjective morality

For length reasons, this entry appears on it's own page.

“The law should be limited to punishing direct, measurable harm.”

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❝I will offer a choice, not an echo.❞

Barry Goldwater passing day

Lived 01Jan1909 to 29May1998 (89 years). U.S. Senator, politician, statesman, conservative, libertarian.

I will offer a choice, not an echo.
     — Barry Goldwater

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hiatus

Due to unforseen circumstances, I'm taking a break from blogging until June 5, 2017.
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Just a bit biased

“Before Lois Lerner Targeted The Tea Party, She Helped The Clinton Foundation”

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Fake news from the Washington Post

”Deep State Leaks Highly Classified Info to Washington Post to Smear President Trump”

“Trump: I had ‘absolute right’ to share ‘facts’ with Russia”

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from crux № 1 — hate crimes

I've never agreed with the “hate crime" nonsense.

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Friday roundup

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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❝Shut up. You have no rights.❞

“Detroit Cops Raid an Innocent Family's Home at Gunpoint on Bogus Sex-Trafficking Tip”

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Innocent but imprisioned

“Jury renders not guilty verdict in gun crime, but defendant still imprisoned”

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“What Is an American?”

This 1998 classic was published by the Cato Institute

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❝Do nothing with us!❞

Everybody has asked the question, 'What shall we do with the Negro?' I have had but one answer from the beginning. Do nothing with us! Your doing with us has already played the mischief with us. Do nothing with us! If the apples will not remain on the tree of their own strength, if they are worm-eaten at the core, if they are early ripe and disposed to fall, let them fall! I am not for tying or fastening them on the tree in any way, except by nature’s plan, and if they will not stay there, let them fall. And if the Negro cannot stand on his own legs, let him fall also. All I ask is, give him a chance to stand on his own legs! Let him alone!
      — Frederick Douglass

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Greatest crimes of our times

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Filed for future reference

Ice Age Britain: River Thames will freeze over on 'this date' – and could kill millions

Experts told Daily Star Online planet Earth is on course for a “Little Age Ice” within the next three years thanks to a cocktail of climate change and low solar activity.

Research shows a natural cooling cycle that occurs every 230 years began in 2014 and will send temperatures plummeting even further by 2019.

Scientists are also expecting a “huge reduction” in solar activity for 33 years between 2020 and 2053 that will cause thermometers to crash.

Both cycles suggest Earth is entering a global cooling cycle that could have devastating consequences for global economy, human life and society as we know it.
     — Joshua Nevett
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Guilty until proven innocent

This 1998 classic was published by the Cato Institute

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from crux № 10 — the system

Another classic that I've used in the sidebar for years.

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Friday Roundup

Solar and wind power are not practical. The sun doesn't always shine and the wind doesn't always blow.

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“It's a Wonderful Loaf” by Russ Roberts

“A whimsical animated short film based on Russ Roberts's poem about emergent order and the supply of bread”

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NeoNotes — Conversation - updated

“Climate is changing Because it's HUMANITY'S FAULT and WE'RE SCREWING UP THE PLANET!!!!!"

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“Me Is Mine, You Is Yours”
by Nick Sibley

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“The Philosophy of Liberty”
by the International Society for Individual Liberty

“Climate of Complete Certainty”

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Columnist criticized for climate dissent

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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Demanding

Claiming total certainty about the science traduces the spirit of science and creates openings for doubt whenever a climate claim proves wrong. Demanding abrupt and expensive changes in public policy raises fair questions about ideological intentions. Censoriously asserting one’s moral superiority and treating skeptics as imbeciles and deplorables wins few converts.
     — Bret Stephens, Climate of Complete Certainty
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Certainty

Climate of Complete Certainty

Well, not entirely. As Andrew Revkin wrote last year about his storied career as an environmental reporter at The Times, “I saw a widening gap between what scientists had been learning about global warming and what advocates were claiming as they pushed ever harder to pass climate legislation.” The science was generally scrupulous. The boosters who claimed its authority weren’t.

Anyone who has read the 2014 report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change knows that, while the modest (0.85 degrees Celsius, or about 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit) warming of the Northern Hemisphere since 1880 is indisputable, as is the human influence on that warming, much else that passes as accepted fact is really a matter of probabilities. That’s especially true of the sophisticated but fallible models and simulations by which scientists attempt to peer into the climate future. To say this isn’t to deny science. It’s to acknowledge it honestly.

By now I can almost hear the heads exploding. They shouldn’t, because there’s another lesson here — this one for anyone who wants to advance the cause of good climate policy. As Revkin wisely noted, hyperbole about climate “not only didn’t fit the science at the time but could even be counterproductive if the hope was to engage a distracted public.”

Let me put it another way. Claiming total certainty about the science traduces the spirit of science and creates openings for doubt whenever a climate claim proves wrong. Demanding abrupt and expensive changes in public policy raises fair questions about ideological intentions. Censoriously asserting one’s moral superiority and treating skeptics as imbeciles and deplorables wins few converts.
     — Bret Stephens
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Not about the science

And this would be a bad thing how?

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Choose between

“The Bad Manners of the Campus Left”

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Friday roundup

“DaddyOFive Faking It? + Berkeley Lies!”

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NeoNotes — Green doesn't work

Solar and wind power are not practical. The sun doesn't always shine and the wind doesn't always blow.

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“Self-Reliance”

“A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adoblurb by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.”

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Government shutdown

And this would be a bad thing how?

I know what CNN is saying.

But realistically, why would a government shutdown be bad?

We know what Milton Friedman said.
Pretty much everything else could be done better by the states or the private sector.

If your local grocery store closed because they forgot to order, you'd go somewhere else. If the plumber you called couldn't come because his truck got repossessed, you'd call another. If your favorite coffee place had no one to work and was closed, well, there are other options.

But with government services, there aren't options.

Government doesn't like competition.

Every year, statists tell you How Important Government Is and how the "other party" is about to screw up your life.

It's political theater.

There isn't even a budget.

The last time there was officially a budget was 2009. But it was pretty much a budget in name only. Even if there was a budget, it would be several thousand pages long, incredibly detailed on some things and disturbingly vague on others. It's meant to be abused. I don't want to examine the Federal budget process here but I will tell you that even if Congress makes no changes, each agency gets the same amount it had the previous year plus an automatic increase. This is the so-called discretionary spending.

That's right. It takes an act of Congress to keep spending at the same level it was in the previous year.

The default setting is more government and more spending.

Then there is the mandatory spending which isn't part of the budget process. Congress may revisit the rules every few years on mandatory spending qualifications, but it usually rolls along on it's own. Mandatory spending is about two-thirds of the budget, Social Security alone is about one-third.

And I haven't even gotten to earmarks.

Government doesn't like competition so it locks private interests out of the services it provides. It manipulates you into blaming the other party so it can tax and spend more of your money. And it expects thanks for it's hard work.

Government shutdown.

This would be a bad thing how?


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Silence

The Bad Manners of the Campus Left

What the hooligans last Thursday at my lecture in Colorado were objecting to was a very different kind of invasion—a peaceful, voluntary offering of ideas they were unaware of, didn’t want to hear, and thought it was their right to prevent others from hearing. Their intent was to intimidate, to harass, to silence, to dominate. This is not conduct that a citadel of education should tolerate for an instant.

Interesting, isn’t it, that what some go to college for, others find “offensive.” As I watched the incident occur, I thought to myself, “I’m standing in a taxpayer-funded institution of supposedly ‘higher’ education, not a Khmer Rouge re-education camp, for crying out loud!”
     — Lawrence W. Reed

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“Why They Attack Us & Why We Let Them” by Roaming Millennial

“What do the Paris, London, Brussels, Berlin and Stockholm attacks all have in common? Not a dang thing according to apologists.”

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Newspeak devours free speech

What ‘Snowflakes’ Get Right About Free Speech

Instead of defining freedom of expression as guaranteeing the robust debate from which the truth emerges, Lyotard focused on the asymmetry of different positions when personal experience is challenged by abstract arguments. His extreme example was Holocaust denial, where invidious but often well-publicized cranks confronted survivors with the absurd challenge to produce incontrovertible eyewitness evidence of their experience of the killing machines set up by the Nazis to exterminate the Jews of Europe. Not only was such evidence unavailable, but it also challenged the Jewish survivors to produce evidence of their own legitimacy in a discourse that had systematically denied their humanity.

Lyotard shifted attention away from the content of free speech to the way certain topics restrict speech as a public good. Some things are unmentionable and undebatable, but not because they offend the sensibilities of the sheltered young. Some topics, such as claims that some human beings are by definition inferior to others, or illegal or unworthy of legal standing, are not open to debate because such people cannot debate them on the same terms.

The recent student demonstrations at Auburn against Spencer’s visit — as well as protests on other campuses against Charles Murray, Milo Yiannopoulos and others — should be understood as an attempt to ensure the conditions of free speech for a greater group of people, rather than censorship. Liberal free-speech advocates rush to point out that the views of these individuals must be heard first to be rejected. But this is not the case. Universities invite speakers not chiefly to present otherwise unavailable discoveries, but to present to the public views they have presented elsewhere. When those views invalidate the humanity of some people, they restrict speech as a public good.
     — Ulrich Baer

h/t Bookworm Room

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Newspeak

propagandistic language marked by euphemism, circumlocution, and the inversion of customary meanings
     — Merriam-Webster


Newspeak is the language of Oceania, a fictional totalitarian state ruled by the Party, who created the language to meet the ideological requirements of English Socialism (Ingsoc).In George Orwell's world of Nineteen Eighty-Four, Newspeak is a controlled language, of restricted grammar and limited vocabulary, a linguistic design meant to limit the freedom of thought—personal identity, self-expression, free will—that ideologically threatens the régime of Big Brother and the Party, who thus criminalised such concepts as thoughtcrime, contradictions of Ingsoc orthodoxy.
     — Wikipedia
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NeoNotes — “Adding CO2 to the atmosphere is bad” - updated

We know that most climate models use a “carbon cascade effect" that has never been measublurb or even observed.

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Official Solution®

The problem is that the best intentions can lead to the worst results.

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What a liberal university used to mean

“In defense of the offensive“ & “A microcosm of the maddening mix of Progressive hate, ignorance, and nonsense at an American college”

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“American Indians Are Still Getting a Raw Deal” by PragerU

“American Indians are the poorest of all of America's ethnic groups. Why?”

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NeoNotes — Best intentions - updated

Headlines that don't merit their own entry

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“Your Brain On Drug Policy” featuring Rachael Leigh Cook

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Somebody KNEW

Feds knew of 700 Wells Fargo whistleblower cases in 2010

America's chief federal banking regulator admits it failed to act on numerous "red flags" at Wells Fargo that could have stopped the fake account scandal years earlier.

One particularly alarming red flag that went unheeded: In January 2010, the regulator was aware of "700 cases of whistleblower complaints" about Wells Fargo's sales tactics.

An internal review published on Wednesday by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency found that the regulator didn't live up to its responsibilities. The report found that oversight of Wells Fargo (WFC) was "untimely and ineffective" and federal examiners overseeing the bank "missed" several opportunities to uncover the problems that led to the creation of millions of fake accounts
     — Matt Egan
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Roaming Millennial on Berkeley Lies!

“DaddyOFive Faking It? + Berkeley Lies!”

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☥ ▽ ❝Action speaks louder…❞

Samuel Clemens • Before passing day.

Lived 30Nov1835 to 21Apr1910 (74). Author, humorist, satirist, philosopher. Father of the American novel.

Action speaks louder than words but not nearly as often.
     — Mark Twain

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“Resistance to Civil Government”
(“Civil Disobedience”)

Thoreau wrote in protest of slavery and the Mexican-American War to reveal great truths. He places the individual over the state.

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Trump

r/libertarian vs r/socialism

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Secret demands

“Court Rules Facebook Can’t Challenge Demands for User Data (and Can’t Tell Users)”

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DEA pushing drugs

r/libertarian vs r/socialism

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“On Women's Right to Vote”

After she was arrested, Susan B. Anthony showed just what a woman could do.

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See truth with your own eyes

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Yeah, he kinda does

Rand Paul: Trump needs Congress to authorize military action in Syria

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) said Thursday night that President Trump needs congressional authorization for military action in Syria after Trump ordered an airstrike in retaliation for a deadly chemical attack earlier this week.

"While we all condemn the atrocities in Syria, the United States was not attacked," Paul said in a statement shortly after reports that the U.S. had launched more than 50 Tomahawk cruise missiles against an airfield in Syria.

"The President needs congressional authorization for military action as required by the Constitution, and I call on him to come to Congress for a proper debate," Paul said. "Our prior interventions in this region have done nothing to make us safer, and Syria will be no different."
     — Brooke Seipel

This is what I was talking about.

While Democrats are muddying the water with the "Russian connection" and judicial filibusters, President Trump just ordered attacks on another sovereign nation
without Congressional authorization.

Why is this legal? Well, part of it is because of Bush the Younger and Obama. They too launched military strikes without Congressional approval.

All the nonsense that is being thrown at Trump, and when he does do something that is morally wrong, no one cares.

It gets lost in the noise.

Hey Democrats, you own that one too.
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All other things being equal, the side that can't stand dissent is wrong

“Democrats Ask Teachers To Destroy Books Written By ‘Climate Deniers’”

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I agree

Anything government touches turns to crap. Good thing government won't touch liberty with a 10-foot pole!
     — Kent McManigal, "Diversity"

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Still think libertarians are paranoid?

NSA selfies

The question isn't if the NSA watches everything. We now know that they do.

Libertarians have been watching this for a very long time. Ever since the
Inslaw affair we've known. Rumors have been flying since the days of minicomputers that certain machines were modified to report to the various spy agencies.

So let's talk about the story headlines from yesterday.

Donald Trump and his associates were under surveillance, but not directly. They were incidentally surveilled because of active surveillance on other parties. This may have been taking place for up to a year before the 2016 election. At least one source dates the surveillance to 2011.

This is where we start getting into legalisms. Because Trump and associates were not the direct targets of surveillance, intelligence officials say that Trump was not under surveillance. Technically true and absolutely false.

By American law, the names of American citizens are "masked" in surveillance reports unless they too are under investigation. Or unless an authorized government official orders the names unmasked.

So the NSA spies on everyone but Americans are supposedly shielded and protected by a legal process. Even there the names would have only have been unmasked for that one official. Except President Obama had recently changed the regulations, some intelligence would be shared among 16 different agencies.

Washington is a political town, gossip rivals actual intelligence as trade goods. While it was illegal to share those unmasked names with those who did not have clearence, that's also business as usual.

And so far no one is asking what Hillary Clinton and her associates were doing for the same time period.

So the NSA spies on everyone on the planet.

One government official can unmask the American names in intelligence reports, even if those Americans had done nothing wrong.

And it all could be denied because the denial is technically true while absolutely false.

Your government. Working to protect you.

I'm going to tell you some secrets now.

The NSA can't monitor everything on the internet. They may record it to batch examine later, but there's no computing power that can watch everything in real time.

Despite all the enhanced algorithms, despite the focus on encrypted data streams, and despite the probability matrices, the system is half blind.

I don't remember which one, but when I was a teenager I read a novel about WWII spies. There was a bookstore in the novel, and every couple of hours a certain book was moved. From the noon position to the two o'clock, from the two to the four o'clock, and so on. The first thing that the spy ring did was check the window, if the book wasn't in the right spot they knew their cover had been blown.

So imagine a Facebook page and the picture on the top is a border collie. One day the picture changes to a pinto mare. Two hours later something blows up.

Imagine a reddit about French cooking. One day a newbie signs in and asks about substitutes for heavy cream. The next day a newspaper gets a tip about the L.A. water supply being contaminated.

Do you see?

All this spying can't reliably predict what might happen except by blind chance. It's amazingly good about putting all the pieces together after.

All these intelligence agencies are subject to political corruption.

So, does all this spying really protect you?

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Theft by any other name

IRS Seized $17 Million From Innocent Business Owners Using Asset Forfeiture

The IRS seized more than $17 million from innocent business owners over a two-year period using obscure anti-money laundering rules and civil asset forfeiture, compromising the rights of individuals and their businesses, a government watchdog has found.

The Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) released a report Tuesday detailing how, between 2012 and 2014, IRS investigators seized hundreds of bank accounts from business owners based on nothing but a suspicious pattern of deposits. In more than 90 percent of those cases, the money was completely legal. The report also found that investigators violated internal policies when conducting interviews, failed to notify individuals of their rights, and improperly bargained to resolve civil cases.
     — C.J. Ciaramella

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Illegal spying on legal phone calls

“Former US Attorney: Susan Rice Ordeblurb Spy Agencies To Produce ‘Detailed Spreadsheets’ Involving Trump”

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Follow that trail

There is no evidence of any wrongdoing by President Trump.

But plenty of evidence points to Barack Obama's abuse of power. Let us follow that trail.
     — Don Sruber, Investigate Obamagate
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Susan Rice unmasked

“CNN Goes On Rampage Against Susan Rice Bombshell, Instructs Viewers To Ignore Story”

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I've nothing more to add to this headline

Black Lives Matter Philly Bans White People From Its Meetings

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NeoNotes — Prostitution

Do you really want politicos deciding what is moral harm?

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Minority rights

I don't think there are minority rights. I believe we have human rights and that it's not a right unless the other guy has it too. Which other guy? All other humans. At least all other humans in our culture and our society.

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Professor says studies don't use science

J Scott Armstrong: Fewer Than 1 Percent Of Papers in Scientific Journals Follow Scientific Method

According to Armstrong, very little of the forecasting in climate change debate adheres to these criteria. “For example, for disclosure, we were working on polar bear [population] forecasts, and we were asked to review the government’s polar bear forecast. We asked, ‘could you send us the data’ and they said ‘No’… So we had to do it without knowing what the data were.”

According to Armstrong, forecasts from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) violate all eight criteria.

“Why is this all happening? Nobody asks them!” said Armstrong, who says that people who submit papers to journals are not required to follow the scientific method. “You send something to a journal and they don’t tell you what you have to do. They don’t say ‘here’s what science is, here’s how to do it.'”

Digging deeper into their motivations, Armstrong pointed to the wealth of incentives for publishing papers with politically convenient rather than scientific conclusions.

“They’re rewarded for doing non-scientific research. One of my favourite examples is testing statistical significance – that’s invalid. It’s been over 100 years we’ve been fighting the fight against that. Even its inventor thought it wasn’t going to amount to anything. You can be rewarded then, for following an invalid [method].”

“They cheat. If you don’t get statistically significant results, then you throw out variables, add variables, [and] eventually you get what you want.”

“My big thing is advocacy. People are asked to come up with certain answers, and in our whole field that’s been a general movement ever since I’ve been here, and it just gets worse every year. And the reason is funded research.”
     — Allum Bokhari

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NeoNotes — Fertility religion

Yes, my path is a fertility religion. What of it? I could just as easily disparage you for the false division between soul and body. Mind, body, and spirit are unified in LIFE and it's a particularly fine thing. One connects to the others. You can't touch one without touching all three. That is the human experience.

Neither of my companions share my beliefs. But I enjoy them and each of them enjoys me. Sex is a big part of that. But so is thinking about what the other says and feels. So is sharing experiences. So is remembering.

I can't think of a better place to do that than pressed up against each other in the afterglow.

Can you?

NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.

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Real & impossible rights

Since the Women's March in January I've been talking to and emailing people. I've been trying to find out exactly what "women's rights" are and which ones have been threatened by Donald Trump.

In the United States, women have more rights than any where else in the World. Period. This cannot be disputed. The
Fourteenth and Nineteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution pretty much took care of that. It's not perfect by any means, and yes, some males can be total a*holes about it. But (and this is a darn important but), American women enjoy rights that are impossible for other women in much of the World.

To start with, American women are secure in their persons and that is protected by law. They are not usually forced into radical surgical modification such as
female genital mutilation. They can not be forcibly married. They can't legally be forced into sex. They can't be required to provide body parts, organs, or blood on demand.

American women can AND usually do own property. They can exchange their labor for cash. They can have bank accounts (even if there were problems with that until well into the 1970s). Their property is protected by law just as any man's property is.

Third and most importantly, American women have the right to vote. As citizens, they have every right to try changing government within the system if they don't like it. And if they and enough of their fellow citizens agree, they have the right to abolish the government and start again.

There are other rights, freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of association, the right to bear arms, and so on. Somehow these other rights are never under discussion, even though they do not exist for women elsewhere on the planet.

These are the very same rights that every American citizen possesses.

Then there are four sets of rights that some women want that are not guaranteed by the Constitution and law.

The first set concerns equal pay. This can be confusing. Some jobs are inherently more dangerous and pay more. Some jobs require much more than the normal time and a near obsession with the job itself, these often pay more. Jobs are like anything else, there are tradeoffs.

The 23-cent gender pay gap is simply the difference between the average earnings of all men and women working full-time. It does not account for differences in occupations, positions, education, job tenure, or hours worked per week. When all these relevant factors are taken into consideration, the wage gap narrows to about five cents. And no one knows if the five cents is a result of discrimination or some other subtle, hard-to-measure difference between male and female workers.
     — Christina Hoff Sommers, No, Women Don’t Make Less Money Than Men

The second set concerns the sexualization of women. Some describe it as the hyper-sexualization of women.

Yeah.

Well, I have news for you. Humans are sexual creatures. Men are going to pay attention to women. Yes, even homosexual men. It's hardwired into the biology. The fact that the overwhelming majority of men do not have sex all the time with every female in sight at every opportunity is a credit to morals and Western Civilization. You're going to get speculative looks and appreciative looks. Sometimes you may get comments.

And you know what? Not all ladies are offended by that. Please don't act as if women are a monolithic block who all speak and act as one.

Sometimes women dress to get attention. Men are going to respond.

But since America is not a rape culture, women are still secure in their person. Or they should be anyway.

There's a difference between admiration and forced sex.

The third set concerns privileges for women because of past wrongs done against the gender by men. These aren't rights because everyone (men and women) share rights. These are special privileges that apply only to women because they are women.

That's not going to work.

In my case, I'm not going to take responsibility for something I didn't do. If the guy three streets over did it, I'm not responsible. If it happened in my grandfather's time, I'm not responsible. If my brother did it, I'm probably not responsible, but we'll talk it over and see.

Guilting someone into giving you privilege means the privilege will only last as long as the guilt.

That brings us to the fourth set. Somehow this set gets more attention than the rest, it concerns reproductive rights. As nearly as I can tell, this is reduced-cost and/or free contraception and abortion.

Going back to the first right I discussed in this post, American women are secure in their persons.

This means that sex is a voluntary activity. I'm going to say that again.

Sex is a voluntary activity.

I'm not responsible for a woman's sexual behavior any more than I am responsible for the color of her shoes. It's her choice and her responsibility. It's not her neighbor's responsibility. It's not society's responsibility.

Unless it's with me, who you have sex with, how you have sex, and how many times you have sex is frankly none of my business. Likewise, unless it is sex with me, I'm not responsible for the consequences.

So that is four sets of impossible "rights" that some women call "women's rights." These rights can't be granted. And the only set that President Trump threatens is the last set, the "reproductive rights."

I can't support these "women's rights."

I can support American rights as I discussed in the first part of this post.

Those are actually rights and worth defending.

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Legal theft

Maine is poised to make it a lot harder for police to steal your stuff

Civil asset forfeiture is a national problem, and a big one. In 2014, for the first time in recorded history, police in the United States seized more money and property through civil asset forfeiture than all burglars and thieves combined. Making matters worse, civil asset forfeiture has been known to disproportionately impact African Americans and Latinos, creating significant barriers to opportunity in their communities. According to a study in Oklahoma, nearly two thirds of seizures come from racial minorities, representing a significant disparity.
     — Payton Alexander

Emphasis added. H/T reddit

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Black & Blue & hate crimes

Louisiana and Kentucky have both passed laws that add police and emergency responders to the hate crime laws.

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Repeal Obamacare with just one sentence

Rep. Mo Brooks files bill to repeal Obamacare

Effective as of Dec. 31, 2017, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is repealed, and the provisions of law amended or repealed by such Act are restored or revived as if such Act had not been enacted.
     — U.S. Congressman Mo Brooks

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NeoNotes — The New Deal and the free market

All evidence shows that the New Deal prolonged what should have been a short term correction. Not to mention that government actions created the crash to begin with. Things like manipulating the price of gold, restricting the amount of currency, and messing with import/export taxes.

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NeoNotes — The screws

Almost nobody bothers to ask if the screws should exist in the first place.

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NeoNotes — Which god?

With government interference, one side exploits the others.

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Roaming Millenial on Trump's Ties to Russia

What We Know So Far

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Emma Watson on feminism - “I really don't know what my tits have to do with it.”

We pagans have become the worst that we saw in the People of the Book.

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NeoNotes — Make Your Choice

Are people better if they are more free or more controlled?

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NeoNotes — Free markets mean liberty

Which means under the 10th Amendment, Obamacare is illegal.

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Signs

We pagans have become the worst that we saw in the People of the Book.

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Damn it

The problem is government

. Read More...
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NeoNotes — Pardon…

It would not honor my faith, and it dishonors the Divine as I perceive it. It would require me to break oaths & promises that are at least as important to me as yours are to you.

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NeoNotes — Harder and harder

Which means under the 10th Amendment, Obamacare is illegal.

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