On the reference to the castration of state governments
Step 1: If have not read the previous two posts, skim them at the least.
Step 2: If you are uncertain how the 17th and 14th altered the federal structure, read this post.
Wyatt Earp, “You gonna do somethin'? Or are you just gonna stand there and bleed? You skin that smoke wagon and we'll see what happens!” SLAP.
Jonny Tyler ran the Faro table at the oriental until Wyatt yanked him out by the ear. Apparently he didn’t go heels. Wyatt now runs the table and in the same way, the national government now runs the internal affairs of states.
The original federal structure was meant to check government power through competition, via principles comparable to those in Federalist 10. The liberty of Americans is not guaranteed by Old English calligraphy on parchment from the late 1700’s, but by good old fashion shootouts. The lines dividing power between the three branches, and particularly, between the National Government and the State Governments are not meant to impenetrable force fields. If anything, they were projected to function like the Mexican border. Mexicans swim, dig, and crawl across while Border patrol ferrets them out and sends them back.
In the beginning, the founders created a national government to manage issues that required the cooperation of all states- national defense, foreign affairs, and interstate commerce. Everything else was reserved to the states. Formerly, state citizens were represented through direct election by the House. State governments were represented by the Senate, as senators were elected by the state legislatures. In an attempt to secure fair representation and curb corruption in the state legislature, America adopted the 17th amendment. From then on, senators as well as representatives were elected directly by the people, effectively declawing state governments.
The 17th is no daisy, no daisy at all.
Let us think:
If you wonder why your senator has not consulted you, the state citizen, to gather your opinions on new legislation- it’s because instead, he is the lady of the evening for whatever booming corporation provided him with the funding to become your state senator. Needless to say, these corporations’ interests likely don’t align with yours.
Conversely, had Mr. Senator been elected by the state legislature, his campaign would be modest and his fidelity would be to the body of people who actually create your state laws. He would be accountable to you.
Obama recently proposed the creation of a Federal Office of National Insurance to regulate the private insurance industry that has long been overseen by individual state governments. The proposed action is designed to protect against “systemic risks” inherent to the state controlled system, though the administration concedes that “…we can’t anticipate what those systemic risks might be.” Furthermore, the CEO of the National Association of Insurance Commissioners fully supports the proposal but notes that, “I cannot point to a single insurance company that I believe is systemically risky”.
Don’t be down hearted though, if not efficacious, government run programs are at the least, easily foreseeable- out of touch, with a real rate of return that is certain to be negative.
And when your senator votes in favor of the proposal, don’t be shocked. You divorced him in 1913. He’s been faloozing about with big money ever since.
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Monday, June 22, 2009
A Series of Unfortunate Events- The Playboy Mansion
Step 1: In the event that you have not read “The Lady’s not for Burning”, go back, read it, and then proceed to read this post.
When I had journeyed half our life’s way, I found myself within a shadowed forest, for I had lost the path that does not stray.
I invite you to chat with Alexander Tyler- Democracy is not an American invention. Its course can be easily charted. Religious and political bondage provoke courage and audacity, compelling men to assert their liberty. Liberty gives birth to affluence, and affluence invites complacency. If unchecked, complacency leads to dependency, and listless reliance will deliver the same men back into bondage. A generation of Americans has awakened to find that they are no longer sprinting toward freedom or autonomy, but groping about blindly, having lost the true path.
In reclaiming the right path, the steps of American democracy must be retraced, so as to illuminate the decisions that brought it to this present quandary. America is a nation of aggregate interests- but by and large, all want freedom, and all want security. The founders did not put in place several individual mechanisms to protect the many ends of liberty- economic freedom, secure investments, privacy, and personal and religious freedoms. Primarily, they expected that property rights would secure freedom, and they trusted the constitutional structure and the common law to protect property rights.
Property rights allow Americans to live without government interference: to take ownership of land, businesses, and ideas, to raise a family behind closed doors and watch their own television channels. It means that when Americans own something, it is truly theirs and not Uncle Sam’s.
The connection between property rights and liberty is not obscure. We have all witnessed it.
Case in point: American Boy has his own room. The boy reaches puberty and tapes pictures of busty naked women on his door. Subsequently, the boy’s father tears down the pornographic pictures, hits the boy with a belt, and delivers a stern lecture about lust and sexual depravity. (The father promptly confiscates the pictures and relocates them to his own nightstand, stowing them under a pile of taxes for a night when his wife is gone). But the point is clear- the father controls the décor in the boy’s room because, while the boy resides in the room, it does not truly belong to him.
This is America’s true treasure. Thanks to property rights, the boy grows to adulthood and purchases his own home, where he is free to wallpaper every room with luscious breasts. Finding a shortage of perfect breasts in the world, the boy re-decorates with more supple silicone breasts. In fact, by the impotent age of 80, the American boy owns a mansion bursting with licentious, surgically altered females that were previously available only in smut magazines and viewable only in the pseudo-seclusion of a public restroom stall. Furthermore, he broadcasts a television show documenting his salacious escapades with the playmates, so that all sexually frustrated men can share in the glorious ecstasy of his sex life.
And as is he who unwills what he willed, and because of new thoughts changes his design, so that he quite withdraws from beginning, such I became on that dark hillside: wherefore in my thought I abandoned the enterprise which had been so hasty in the beginning
Subsequently, American men, apparently lost in this languorous bliss, forgot that it was the responsibility of ownership- of paying for and managing their own property, that afforded them such pleasures to begin with.
Early American contract law was eviscerated. The state governments, who protected the property rights of their citizens, were castrated by the 17th amendment- and thus the National Government usurped much of their power. The 14th amendment gave the Congress room to preempt the states at virtually any time- for the good of state citizens. Oliver Wendell Holmes flipped the common law on its head, removing its roots in natural law and ensuring that it no longer served to protect life, liberty, and property. Americans decided that it would be convenient to let the National Government carry private burdens and manage private investments. Why not let the government ensure that our economy stays afloat? Why not let the Government ensure that we have money to retire on?
Is there a shortage of real men in America?
Imagine for a moment that after reaching the age of thirty, the American boy returned to his father and said, “Dad, it appears that I am a sexual savant, but a poor economist. Suppose I give all my money to you, and you give me an allowance. That way I’ll save enough money for the important things in life- you know: higher education, healthcare, prescription medication, retirement…”
The boy is pleased at first, but his vision begins to fade. Upon asking his father for money for see the optometrist, he finds that his father withheld only enough funds for the podiatrist. The boy complains that he has never had a foot problem and asks why the father invested his money there instead of buying a policy that covered optometry. He goes blind, but prances about gleefully on his Dr. Scholl’s inserts, discovering that deep down, he had always fostered a burning desire to be gellin’ like a felon. When the boy wishes to retire, he returns to his father but collects only a meager portion. He asks where the rest of his money went and the father replies that he did not have time to manage the boy’s money on his own. Instead, he hired a financial advisor to manage it. He explains that the bulk of the boy’s money was spent paying the salary of this financial advisor. The financial advisor places the boy in a retirement home, but to the boy's dismay, he finds that the home has put a ban on sexually explicit materials. The administrators declared that "states of intense sexual arousal could be detrimental to the cardiac health of elderly men." The boy asks to be transferred. Three months later, he recieves an email from his father's financial advisor's secretary's office assisant- promising to look into it.
In a final act, the government siezed the Mansion, offered minimal compensation to the father, and replaced it with government-subsidized housing. Finding that they had no other marketable skills, the displaced Playmates moved into the housing development. From then on, their rent payments and expenses were afforded by the other taxpayers of the state, in the form of welfare payments.
Fear not, for no one can take from us our onward way, by Such an one it is given to us.
This is not the American way. Americans take pride in responsibility because responsibility is power. There is no other interpretation. So in the words of Dante,
Consider well the seed that gave you birth: you were not made to live your lives as brutes, but to be followers of worth and knowledge...
When I had journeyed half our life’s way, I found myself within a shadowed forest, for I had lost the path that does not stray.
I invite you to chat with Alexander Tyler- Democracy is not an American invention. Its course can be easily charted. Religious and political bondage provoke courage and audacity, compelling men to assert their liberty. Liberty gives birth to affluence, and affluence invites complacency. If unchecked, complacency leads to dependency, and listless reliance will deliver the same men back into bondage. A generation of Americans has awakened to find that they are no longer sprinting toward freedom or autonomy, but groping about blindly, having lost the true path.
In reclaiming the right path, the steps of American democracy must be retraced, so as to illuminate the decisions that brought it to this present quandary. America is a nation of aggregate interests- but by and large, all want freedom, and all want security. The founders did not put in place several individual mechanisms to protect the many ends of liberty- economic freedom, secure investments, privacy, and personal and religious freedoms. Primarily, they expected that property rights would secure freedom, and they trusted the constitutional structure and the common law to protect property rights.
Property rights allow Americans to live without government interference: to take ownership of land, businesses, and ideas, to raise a family behind closed doors and watch their own television channels. It means that when Americans own something, it is truly theirs and not Uncle Sam’s.
The connection between property rights and liberty is not obscure. We have all witnessed it.
Case in point: American Boy has his own room. The boy reaches puberty and tapes pictures of busty naked women on his door. Subsequently, the boy’s father tears down the pornographic pictures, hits the boy with a belt, and delivers a stern lecture about lust and sexual depravity. (The father promptly confiscates the pictures and relocates them to his own nightstand, stowing them under a pile of taxes for a night when his wife is gone). But the point is clear- the father controls the décor in the boy’s room because, while the boy resides in the room, it does not truly belong to him.
This is America’s true treasure. Thanks to property rights, the boy grows to adulthood and purchases his own home, where he is free to wallpaper every room with luscious breasts. Finding a shortage of perfect breasts in the world, the boy re-decorates with more supple silicone breasts. In fact, by the impotent age of 80, the American boy owns a mansion bursting with licentious, surgically altered females that were previously available only in smut magazines and viewable only in the pseudo-seclusion of a public restroom stall. Furthermore, he broadcasts a television show documenting his salacious escapades with the playmates, so that all sexually frustrated men can share in the glorious ecstasy of his sex life.
And as is he who unwills what he willed, and because of new thoughts changes his design, so that he quite withdraws from beginning, such I became on that dark hillside: wherefore in my thought I abandoned the enterprise which had been so hasty in the beginning
Subsequently, American men, apparently lost in this languorous bliss, forgot that it was the responsibility of ownership- of paying for and managing their own property, that afforded them such pleasures to begin with.
Early American contract law was eviscerated. The state governments, who protected the property rights of their citizens, were castrated by the 17th amendment- and thus the National Government usurped much of their power. The 14th amendment gave the Congress room to preempt the states at virtually any time- for the good of state citizens. Oliver Wendell Holmes flipped the common law on its head, removing its roots in natural law and ensuring that it no longer served to protect life, liberty, and property. Americans decided that it would be convenient to let the National Government carry private burdens and manage private investments. Why not let the government ensure that our economy stays afloat? Why not let the Government ensure that we have money to retire on?
Is there a shortage of real men in America?
Imagine for a moment that after reaching the age of thirty, the American boy returned to his father and said, “Dad, it appears that I am a sexual savant, but a poor economist. Suppose I give all my money to you, and you give me an allowance. That way I’ll save enough money for the important things in life- you know: higher education, healthcare, prescription medication, retirement…”
The boy is pleased at first, but his vision begins to fade. Upon asking his father for money for see the optometrist, he finds that his father withheld only enough funds for the podiatrist. The boy complains that he has never had a foot problem and asks why the father invested his money there instead of buying a policy that covered optometry. He goes blind, but prances about gleefully on his Dr. Scholl’s inserts, discovering that deep down, he had always fostered a burning desire to be gellin’ like a felon. When the boy wishes to retire, he returns to his father but collects only a meager portion. He asks where the rest of his money went and the father replies that he did not have time to manage the boy’s money on his own. Instead, he hired a financial advisor to manage it. He explains that the bulk of the boy’s money was spent paying the salary of this financial advisor. The financial advisor places the boy in a retirement home, but to the boy's dismay, he finds that the home has put a ban on sexually explicit materials. The administrators declared that "states of intense sexual arousal could be detrimental to the cardiac health of elderly men." The boy asks to be transferred. Three months later, he recieves an email from his father's financial advisor's secretary's office assisant- promising to look into it.
In a final act, the government siezed the Mansion, offered minimal compensation to the father, and replaced it with government-subsidized housing. Finding that they had no other marketable skills, the displaced Playmates moved into the housing development. From then on, their rent payments and expenses were afforded by the other taxpayers of the state, in the form of welfare payments.
Fear not, for no one can take from us our onward way, by Such an one it is given to us.
This is not the American way. Americans take pride in responsibility because responsibility is power. There is no other interpretation. So in the words of Dante,
Consider well the seed that gave you birth: you were not made to live your lives as brutes, but to be followers of worth and knowledge...
The Lady's not for Burning
Amy Birk, an American citizen, called to serve this illustrious nation and preserve its august stature— the vision set forth by our founders, who, in exercising their knowledge of human nature, bestowed on our people a governing structure that sought to exalt the individual, to enable him to prosper by his own means: his ingenuity, his thrift and his rational self interest. In subscribing to this vision, generations of Americans plumbed the depths of their spirit and ascended to the highest tiers of success, dripping sweat and blood until they had achieved the American dream. And you are the sons and daughters of this tradition- of prevailing intellect, dogged grit, and shrewd capitalist economics.
To you who fall heir to this fortune: Beware, the dogs are prowling in the garden and Orwell’s boars have long been scheming in the barn under the cover of darkness.
I shall write to address this threat, even if only for my own benefit, albeit with the natural hope that others have seen, or will presently come to see the dire risk that faces us.
Springing forth from the industrial revolution, our maternal body, Great Britain, took root and maturated- eclipsing the whole of Europe- a majestic island of prosperity and individual merit. But all seasons wane, and by the 1970’s, Britain was but a squalid shadow of its former self. Their strife was born of an arduous war and while they were not prophets, they were gazing into a crystal ball- their predicament was a chilling snapshot of present day America. Inflation rose to 27 percent and unemployment followed; unions had put a chokehold on the private sector and the government had fingered every crevasse of the market, skewing the real value of investments. The government stretched itself thin, making gallant promises to afford social services to Tiny Tim and every similarly deprived proletariat. Finding the entitlement system inefficient, the same administration came up gasping for air, praying that the now financially encumbered laborer would haul it back on to dry land.
It is here we arrive at Britain’s ultimatum, and what would be their most triumphant sacrifice. The Labour party squealed its assurances that the government's meddling arm could provide more dependable guidance than the invisible hand of the free market. Standing tall, the sum of the British people chose not this short-sighted utopian promise, but the Iron Lady.
Thatcher did the only thing that could be done- she curb stomped every socialist tendency in the market. In lieu of implementing public work projects, she privatized every government controlled industry and deregulated the market. She focused wholly on supply-side economics, lowering taxes and fueling competition. The Tories kicked trade unions in the teeth; they employed every possible means to halt inflation. The British welcomed her in and British cities blazed like Gehenna. Stiff -arming inflation led to record unemployment and crushing economic conditions. But DC comics prove oracular; the night is always darkest just before the dawn.
Thatcher’s monetarism restored British products to their real market value. The turmoil gave birth to a resurging ingenuity. Those who were formerly employed in government subsidized industries left to find truly prosperous industries: industries that could stand their own ground because they met real market demands. The mass displacement of workers was a blessing in disguise. They migrated from dying coal industries to newer technologies, and gradually, unemployment was replaced by modern entrepreneurialism. The Pound surged ahead of both the Dollar and the European currencies. 30 years later, it has never slipped back.
History should be a siren call. If we do not heed its warning, we will be given over to a shameful fate. Commendable though it made be, that we have all participated in our treasured electoral process, it is a process that confers responsibility. Obama controls the banks and the auto industry and do not be naïve- “Government Motors” is not an American revolution. If unchecked, he will control the insurance industry and the health care industry next. He will not stop unless we reclaim our power. When cash is tight, it is natural to shirk individual responsibility. Don’t be foolish. America is a nation of people and the sum of its parts will always be worth more than the whole. If a man cannot scrounge up enough money to walk into the grocery and purchase bread, it is most unreasonable to assume that he will produce enough cash to hire the government to walk into the grocery, purchase the bread, and deliver it to his dinner table. Americans feed their own families and furnish their own homes. It has always been so; Americans have never been weak.
The tide of socialism will crush America under its feet if we do not stand to face it. So in the spirit of Paul, Greet one another with a Holy Kiss, however the custom manifests itself in our postmodern world- and know beyond a shadow of a doubt that your protestant work ethic is being underwritten at every turn.
To you who fall heir to this fortune: Beware, the dogs are prowling in the garden and Orwell’s boars have long been scheming in the barn under the cover of darkness.
I shall write to address this threat, even if only for my own benefit, albeit with the natural hope that others have seen, or will presently come to see the dire risk that faces us.
Springing forth from the industrial revolution, our maternal body, Great Britain, took root and maturated- eclipsing the whole of Europe- a majestic island of prosperity and individual merit. But all seasons wane, and by the 1970’s, Britain was but a squalid shadow of its former self. Their strife was born of an arduous war and while they were not prophets, they were gazing into a crystal ball- their predicament was a chilling snapshot of present day America. Inflation rose to 27 percent and unemployment followed; unions had put a chokehold on the private sector and the government had fingered every crevasse of the market, skewing the real value of investments. The government stretched itself thin, making gallant promises to afford social services to Tiny Tim and every similarly deprived proletariat. Finding the entitlement system inefficient, the same administration came up gasping for air, praying that the now financially encumbered laborer would haul it back on to dry land.
It is here we arrive at Britain’s ultimatum, and what would be their most triumphant sacrifice. The Labour party squealed its assurances that the government's meddling arm could provide more dependable guidance than the invisible hand of the free market. Standing tall, the sum of the British people chose not this short-sighted utopian promise, but the Iron Lady.
Thatcher did the only thing that could be done- she curb stomped every socialist tendency in the market. In lieu of implementing public work projects, she privatized every government controlled industry and deregulated the market. She focused wholly on supply-side economics, lowering taxes and fueling competition. The Tories kicked trade unions in the teeth; they employed every possible means to halt inflation. The British welcomed her in and British cities blazed like Gehenna. Stiff -arming inflation led to record unemployment and crushing economic conditions. But DC comics prove oracular; the night is always darkest just before the dawn.
Thatcher’s monetarism restored British products to their real market value. The turmoil gave birth to a resurging ingenuity. Those who were formerly employed in government subsidized industries left to find truly prosperous industries: industries that could stand their own ground because they met real market demands. The mass displacement of workers was a blessing in disguise. They migrated from dying coal industries to newer technologies, and gradually, unemployment was replaced by modern entrepreneurialism. The Pound surged ahead of both the Dollar and the European currencies. 30 years later, it has never slipped back.
History should be a siren call. If we do not heed its warning, we will be given over to a shameful fate. Commendable though it made be, that we have all participated in our treasured electoral process, it is a process that confers responsibility. Obama controls the banks and the auto industry and do not be naïve- “Government Motors” is not an American revolution. If unchecked, he will control the insurance industry and the health care industry next. He will not stop unless we reclaim our power. When cash is tight, it is natural to shirk individual responsibility. Don’t be foolish. America is a nation of people and the sum of its parts will always be worth more than the whole. If a man cannot scrounge up enough money to walk into the grocery and purchase bread, it is most unreasonable to assume that he will produce enough cash to hire the government to walk into the grocery, purchase the bread, and deliver it to his dinner table. Americans feed their own families and furnish their own homes. It has always been so; Americans have never been weak.
The tide of socialism will crush America under its feet if we do not stand to face it. So in the spirit of Paul, Greet one another with a Holy Kiss, however the custom manifests itself in our postmodern world- and know beyond a shadow of a doubt that your protestant work ethic is being underwritten at every turn.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)