Battling the Amoeba
“No hope, no change” might be the motto. And why? Because (and here’s the metaphor I used in my title) government has become a huge, nearly mindless, pullulating organism whose only real end is its own engorgement. The people rebel in their despairing way because they recognize this fact, that the government is like:
… a colossal amoeba twitching mindlessly in response to tiny pinpricks of pain from an endless army of micro-brained interest groups. The point is not to teach the amoeba nor to guide it, but simply to stay away from the lethal stupidity of its pseudopods.
Sound familiar? Mr. Bowyer is an observant zoologist delineating the character of this imaginary beast and our reaction to its stultifying imperatives:
The amoeba does not get smarter but it does get hungrier and bigger. On the other hand, we get smarter. More and more of our life takes place outside of the amoeba’s reach: in the privacy of our own homes, or in capital accounts in other nations, or in the fastest growing amoeba avoidance zone ever created, cyberspace. We revolt decision by decision, transaction by transaction, because we believe deep down that most of what government tells us to do is at bottom illegitimate.
Indeed. I feel that way. And probably you do, too, if you think about it. It is not a reassuring imbalance of power.
If you are implying that the government has given us citizens dysentery, I’m inclined to agree. And when we “let go” we won’t need a fan.
We simply can’t afford the Progressives or their agenda any more; it is time to let them go.
I suppose one should worry about their general welfare should they be put out of their jobs and pensions, but their longstanding disregard for our liberties precludes sympathy. Frankly, my dears, no one should give a damn.
Sooner or later we will be forced to use the only legal tool we have to clean up this Socialist government and that is Article V of the Constitution. This is where ‘We the Citizens’ rewrite the Constitution with better and more direct wording so that the Federal Government can be better contained within the boundaries where it is supposed to exist.
Is this a dangerous solution, sure, but so is keeping your head in the sand. The only other solution is revolution, and that is not pretty. So I vote for a Constitutional Convention and the sooner the better.
How can it happen? Read Article V and join the Tea Party of you STATE… This is the tool to make it happen….
The Constitution (along with the bill of rights) was very clear what powers government was to have and not have. Our problem has been with the “courts” interpretation of those powers.
We have to find a way that puts some sort of limits on the courts powers. Our Constitution allows for congress to impeach judges – they never use this power. At the very least change the rule that they can serve for life.
We don’t need article V (that could end up being a nightmare), but we DO need some sort of reset to undo all the mess of the last 100 years. Except the amendment to limit the term of president. Roosevelt showed us we need that one.
You are ignoring the fact that the government has imported a new electorate for themselves. Lots of luck with that.
In 1869 Ernest Renan condemned the “the way of conceiving government as a mere public service which one pays for, and to which one owes neither respect nor gratitude, a kind of American impertinence.”
It seems that this impertinence persists. I once asked a tax resolution specialist what percentage of Americans receiving a cash income reported it in full. He supposed the number was in single digits.
It’s been that way for awhile. At the Farmer’s Market, I might trade a skein of my handspun yarn for a couple of steaks, or some eggs from my free range chicken for some broccoli.
I give free spinning lessons – in return I get some free help around the farm at shearing time.
I love you Beth!
I LOVE this! Giving value for value!
This sounds familiar.
Great minds, and all that.
the District of Crime
will stop on a dime
when you’re ready for praxis
and quit paying taxes
You have been reported. Janet Napolitano, one of the most engorged pseudopods on offer, has told us again and again that the biggest terrorist threat to American security is, and I paraphrase, an informed electorate fed up with the Fed.
A recent Rasmussen poll said just 22% believe government has the consent of the governed: http://m.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/general_politics/june_2012/22_believe_government_has_consent_of_governed
That says it all right there.
Ayn Rand was right all along.
And when millions of Americans “Go Galt” all at once (why not schedule John Galt day for August 1?) and stop engaging in any but the minimum economic effort needed to survive until after the election, there will be no doubt whatsoever the game is up.
Collapsed tax revenues and economic activity for three months will probably drive the system to a halt, and force all of the political class to take notice. The implicit threat (get out of our way or we will continue the strike) will cause a sea change in political programs and platforms, but a three month provisional “strike” won’t cause irreversible damage to infrastructure, public saftey or the Armed Forces.
And if the Dems steal this election, they can deal with a four year long John Galt strike….
Yes, indeed, Ayn Rand was right all along. But there were many others who warned us of the dangers of our relentless statist drift toward collectivist totalitarianism; yet they, too, were routinely ignored. The list would include: Von Mises, Hayek, Schumpeter, Hazlitt, Friedman, Rothbard, Orwell, Buckley, Bradbury, Heinlein, Solzhenitsyn, et.al. There really is no excuse for the catastrophe we have brought on ourselves. We wanted this and we got it; good and hard!
Don’t forget Aldous Huxley.
Please pass the soma.
No need to go full Gault. A simple massive, social network coordinated tax revolt will be all that is needed. 10′s of millions of citizens not paying taxes, keeping the money will do 2 things. Boost the economy and show the takers they need to stand up and start pulling their weight. Along the way, the progressives will see they have no power. All the power is in the hands of the makers as it should be.
Big, amorphous, Progressive-style government has corrupted its citizens. Among some young people I know, breaking the law in a small way — say, shop-lifting an inexpensive item — is a sign of personal liberation. Most of them have never heard of “the rule of law.” They are ripe for a tyranny like Barack Hussein Obama.
I don’t know anyone who casually shoplifts – too risky. But I do know lots of people who download music and video without the slightest scruple. And they’ve become completely impervious to cries of “You’re breaking the law!” To me, this is a change. When I was young, an appeal to the law would put a person on the defensive. Now, in this case, people instead are challenging the very right to have a law. The premise itself is no longer accepted. The reasoning goes, “YOU wrote that law, for your own benefit. It didn’t come down from Mount Sinai, it could have been completely different if people had wanted. Copyright law arose in a time when the technology and the economics fitted together – it took big corporations with lots of money and equipment to create movies and records, and it was just assumed that the rights went along with the territory. Now things are different, and you’re trying to keep riding a train that ran out of rails years ago. We’re not playing along, and we don’t care that you can’t get rich out of album sales anymore.”
I think the regular occurance of “Ignoring the law” in American society really started with the 55 MPH speed limit. Basically everyone ignored it, because they KNEW the law was political, vs Technical, Once you get used to disobeying one law, it is a short step to “why should I listen to any law”
No, it really began with the War on Drugs. Or Prohibition, to an earlier generation. That’s when flouting the law became hip.
Once you get used to disobeying one law, it is a short step to “why should I listen to any law”
You’re absolutely right about that. Bad laws have a corrosive effect.
I abolultely respect the law, and my physical deportment is always in strict conformance with it. Of course, I am referring to that set of laws that we call the Newtonian Laws of Physics. In particular, I rigidly obey the laws governing inertia, accelleration, gravity, and friction.
Local speed trap ordinances, not so much.
The laws on the books are a joke today. Law enforcement readily admits there are so, so, SOOOO many laws that it is virtually impossible NOT to go about your daily routine without violating at least a dozen of them without even knowing it.
This is nothing. Wait until cities and counties cascade into multiple bankruptcies. Lots of very angry retirees and disabled retirees will go ballistic like dominos falling. I predict more than twenty “debt ameliorations” in California by year end 2012.
The Domino Theory is alive and well out here in LaLaLand.
I forgot to quote mayor Bloomberg who recently proclaimed: “. . . if government’s purpose isn’t to improve the health and longevity of its citizens, I don’t know what its purpose is.”
Obviously government’s purpose is to make dweebish meddlesome control freaks feel more powerful.
Frederic Bastiat told us a century and a half ago to beware the divergence of law and conscience. For when they part ways, one must prevail and the other must fall — and it is conscience that has the greater power.
There is, nonetheless, a healthful aspect to this: Americans are unlearning their reflexive deference to “because we said so” proclamations of authority, from Washington or elsewhere. They’ve never had innate validity, but it usually takes a cancerous swelling of arrogance-in-power to persuade us of that.
The problem here is that the amoeba eventually fills all spaces. Sure, you can run and you can revolt etc. but only into ever shrinking and impractical spaces. Ask the Romans who “revolted” in this manner against Diocletian’s taxation regime; among other things, they left the Empire because they saw a better deal among the barbarians.
We all know how *that* ended; the fall of the Western Empire and the rise of Christian feudalism in its place. It took us 1300 years before the secular Enlightenment got us out of that one.
You make a good point about Diocletian’s tax regime. His reign was most likely the beginning of the Middle Ages. However I do have to disagree with you about Christian feudalism. It was not a Christian institution at all. Feudalism, not manorialism, was an outgrowth of the need for armed and mounted soldiers in an era when there was very little money in circulation and it was given a big boost by the Viking invasions beginning in the late 700′s. There was simply an overwhelming need for some type of security so agriculture could continue. Manorialism was a continuation of practices that reached their apogee under Diocletian.
“We all know how *that* ended; the fall of the Western Empire and the rise of Christian feudalism in its place. It took us 1300 years before the secular Enlightenment got us out of that one.”
And into ‘this’ one.
We’re enlightened, all right. Why, the zealots of secular enlightenment only need a couple of hundred years more, and we’ll have a rainbow in every garage, a unicorn in every pot, bongs, bimbos, and bastards all over the land!
Wait a minute, I guess we’ve got that now…never mind.
This growing government which causes tiny acts of law-breaking, will lead to a moral decay in the culture. Small acts of dishonesty give way to acceptance of criminal behavior.
The “broken windows theory” of James (O? Q?) Wilson applies to white-collar crime just as much as to blue-collar crime.
Or, in other words, Pogo: “We have met the enemy, and he is us.”
“7. Morton Doodslag
You have been reported. Janet Napolitano, one of the most engorged pseudopods on offer, has told us again and again that the biggest terrorist threat to American security is, and I paraphrase, an informed electorate fed up with the Fed.”
Thanks for the reminder. Perhaps she isn’t as thick as I had thought she was. She might be more evil than I previously suspected. However, if she really was bright she would have kept that thought to herself. She probably felt the need to explain it to her fellow travelers who think us patriotic types are too stupid to do anything but cling to our guns a Bibles.
–right you are. They should be asking themselves why we ‘cling’ –and we should be reminding all around us to ask them why, since all the empirical evidence is showing that private guns dramatically reduce all crime but the white-collar variety, why they so perversely (it IS perverse, on and by their reasons given) insist on carrying on their incessant assault on the “2″.
We should remind others to think about that, and to ask the simple questions “Since no one can measure how much crime is continually being deterred due to criminals’ fear of armed prey, how can you be so certain that restricting the Second Amendment will increase rather than decrease public safety?”
“Okay, since you can’t measure the deterrent effect of the ’2′ on crime, aren’t you being a little cavalier about my life, using it as a social experiment at your whim?”
The answers will be in doubletalk of course –at which point we simply say “You didn’t answer the questions, please allow me to restate them” –and do so, very slowly, excruciatingly slowly this time.
The truth is so large and dark that most of us do not –cannot bear to –even notice it –that it is so stupifyingly obvious that these people detest our guns due to the fact that an armed citizenry is THE thing that prevents democide –and the tyranny and dictatorship made possible by its threat.
That therefore the Democrat party’s attack on the ’2′ must be in order that the party brain-trustees barking these orders into their megaphones and sending their robot lawfare armies to crash through our front doors and into our family life –can finally at-long-last add democide and/or its threat to their own personal political powers.
… and us? Well, SCREW us –we’re just cheap furniture.
“The truth is so large and dark that most of us do not –cannot bear to –even notice it –that it is so stupifyingly obvious that these people detest our guns due to the fact that an armed citizenry is THE thing that prevents democide –and the tyranny and dictatorship made possible by its threat.”
That’s true of the leaders of the radical left. But the motivation of their useful idiots is a bit different–They simply have such a low opinion of the average American’s intelligence and morals that they believe it’s criminal to allow us subhumans to possess lethal weapons. To them, it goes without saying, or thought, that taking our guns will make everyone safer, and facts to the contrary be damned.
“When guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns…” How effective have we been “fighting drugs” on The War on Drugs? If something is desired enough, laws will not stop people from obtaining it. This was true of Prohibition. It is true on “The War on Drugs”. Politicians never learn.
Under capitalism, law exists in order to provide the rich (1%) with a tool to terrorize and brutalize the poor into submission (99%). The article cited is from Forbes, a magazine that tends to be read by the greedy oppressors.
Laws do not apply to these people. Whenever the rich disobey the law, they are merely exercising their priviledge under capitalism.
Nothing the rich do can be considered rebellion. If a rich man is caught running a red light; he can get away with it. If a poor man breaks the same rules, he could be imprisoned for life under the “three strikes” laws. It seems like these scofflaws are so ignorant of their own priviledge they actually belive they are defying an oppressor, when in fact they only oppressors are in the mirror.
Throbbin, I’m not sure I follow the thrust of your story. Are you trying to say “Look at me! I’m as dumb as a box of rocks!”, or are you simply stating that you have no idea what’s going on?
Please, DO let us know, if and when you figure it out. In the meantime, a comment or two germane to the discussion would be nice.
I know exactly what’s going on. These greedy pigs are like Marie Antoinette when she dressed up and played shepherdess. The rich have no obligation to obey any laws they don’t want to–not tax laws, drug laws, traffic laws, or sodomy laws. These acts give them the moral frission of the illusion of shared humanity with the 99% who are brutalized under the iron heel of their tyranny.
If a rich guy runs a red light awhile looking for the cops he imagines himself as being the same as his impoverished servants who risk imprisonment doing the same thing because they must get to work on time or be fired. It’s all about pretending they are one of the people too.
I think that the aptly named Throbbin’ offers us a preview of the professionally aggrieved mindset as the rule of law breaks down. It won’t just be the “Galts,” the producers who withdraw from civil society. The Galts will do it quietly. We will fail to comply. But that is not the takers’ way. His ilk will do what they’ve been doing all along but with renewed viciousness.
That situation has nothing to to with “Capitalism” per se, it is a general condition of humanity. Royals, Communist apparatchiks, fascist party members; the poor will always be with us, as will the rich and powerful scofflaws. In general, however, free-market republics do better than most because the rich and powerful are at least nominally subject to the same laws as the rest of us.
Throbbin’s unstated assumption is that the wrong people have control of the massive power of government to choose the winners and losers. Those of that ilk see the problem to be the crony capitalism that uses the massive power assumed by government to assure being chosen the winner as opposed to becoming the designated loser and labels that “capitalism”. He apparently hasn’t the sense needed to understand that the existence of that illegitimate power in the hands of government elites and their apparatchik is the root cause of it abuse. They cannot abuse and sell the use of power that they don’t have. Throbbin is not opposed the existence of that illegitimate over-reaching power in the hands of an unlimited powerful government. He only demands that people with his agenda be in control of it to choose their preferred winners.
Throbbin,
What do you mean the rich can’t rebel. Haven’t you ever heard of the American Revolution?
Unfortunately, in reality, we are more or less in a police state. We’ve got more people in prison than any other country, our police are armed like the military and basically face no penalty, no sanction for their actions. They can kill, invade our homes, or harass us “civilians” at will. In order to fly on a commercial airline, we must subject ourselves to sexual assault or a dose of radiation.
A police state for whom? The criminal justice system exists to cage Blacks and Hispanics in order to provide jobs for lower class Whites so they will support the corporate plutocracy out of racial solidarity. Similarly, racism against Muslims is thye real root of the antics of the TSA. The corpoarte plutocracy has taken to scapegoating Muslims since 9-11 to distract the people for their evil machinations.
–okay, so ‘due process’ is a racial construct. What now? Level the numerical playing field by any means necessary? Scalp bounty on blondes?
Unless this is intended as satire, the author of these words is someone of truly impressive imbecility.
Amazing! It must be some what of a biological anomaly. It can type and spell, both high order functions, but it is wholly ignorant of all other knowledge. *in your best Spock voice* Fascinating?!
Put down the bong dude, you have reached saturation and further inhalation is of no use. You cannot get any dumber than you are now…
which professor is that a direct quote from??? MORON!
it is up to the states to win this undeclared civil war. the obummer feds/frauds desperately try to block all efforts by states to crack down on voter fraud and illegals as they know that this will trigger mass exodus to “friendlier” states (as happened recently in Alabama where I hear they can’t find illegals to do the jobs that Americans don’t want to do). Add now the ability of states to not participate in the medicaid expansion fed takeover of healthcare and you have the trifecta since the unproductive can and will go to progessive states and get “free” healthcare. Example, Texas exports many on the dole to California where they get free stuff, can vote without id and be “undocumented immigrants” as they please. California exports the productive class and jobs to Texas. No bullets fired. Just further collapse of the progressive states. The progressives metaphorically shooting themselves. Unfortunately, the weeny RINO’s allow them to be propped up and get away with the game, which is to have productive people pay for their fantasies. The more people who join the shrug may bring down the house of cards more quickly, but the big game seems to be state by state.
It’s up to us to persuade our fellow voters to elect people like Palin, who really ticked off a number of people in Alaska who wanted Federal dollars for various projects. We need these people elected at the state level, as well as at the federal level.
Side note: Grants are not grants. They are payment for doing things a particular way, and have to be refunded if things are not done “correctly”.
People think they are getting money for nothing important and at zero risk, and that makes them easy to con.
Re these snippets:
What I’m talking about is not based on hope; in fact, it has given up much hope on social change…
The people rebel in their despairing way…
It is not a reassuring imbalance of power.
Yes, an unsettling idea and, many will agree, often correct. Doubt that? — then hold your nose and linger longer on the defeatist, dispairing, resigned comments vented daily by many who post on this site. Put bluntly, if you’re a reflex Romney drone or down to glancing at the front yard every ten minutes to see if the Rapture rocket’s ready for lift-off, you’re a waste of space and not worthy of respect. More charitably, perhaps, recall Samuel Adams’ frustration: “Go from us in peace. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen!”
As for the rest of us, how to move forward? The start is surely to abandon the couch potatoes, all those with the vegetative reflex to rail at the sky but do nothing. Also to acknowledge that the lumpenproletariat, under any name, are still nothing but canon fodder and will never change. They do, however, have a full set of natural rights, including the right to be left alone.
The imbalance between Mr. Smith and Washington isn’t reassuring, true, but isn’t that always the case? That great government amoeba, seemingly so soul-destroying and unstoppable, is in fact nothing of the kind: it’s single-celled, slow, unresponsive and above all vulnerable. Few of the grandees are known for courage, yet within the ranks you will soon find kindred spirits on your side. Just like the schoolyard bully, the amoeba will follow the line of least resistance — until it’s stopped.
The status quo is unacceptable. If ballot box and soap box fail — now quite possible — then we turn to the ammo box. The road forward, no surprise, will be asymmetric warfare. But how much time is left? No one knows.
Once we dreamed of the shining city on the hill, now the key is to save the village without destroying it. That thought may have crossed Sam Adams’ mind too. The burden is heavy, but we cannot shirk it.
oops! — spell-checker blinked:
despairing … cannon
You can see where we’re headed if you watch the reality show “Chicagoland starring Rahmbo the Magnificent”. New York, with Mayor Giuliani, adopted “broken windows policing” and the crime rate plummeted. Rahmbo adopted “chalk outline policing” and the crime rate is soaring. Congrats Rambo, you tell people that laws don’t matter and they, unexpectedly!, behave as if the law doesn’t matter.
My only encounters with government seem to be very unpleasant. The other day On the way to work around 6am, I earned a $200 fine for driving 68mph in a 50mph zone, a 200 yard stretch of the interstate which otherwise is 65mph. Meanwhile, for six months, I have begged the PD to set up radar in my neighborhood which is full of toddlers and which is the victim of very aggressive teen drivers…and I am only ignored. I feel my experience is the norm for my law abiding citizens, Rightly or wrongly I have little respect for the official authority in my city and I believe they only have contempt for me.
Where a citizenry perceives the law to be fair and equitable the result is voluntary compliance. Such a society is free, orderly, and prosperous. We stop at red lights as a voluntary act because we recognize that everyone gets through the intersection safely and quickly. The protocol is maintained even in the absence of police.
Where the populace views the law as oppressive the opposite is true. The law is obeyed only by threat of enforcement. Such societies tend to be un-free, chaotic, and poor. Mexico and Egypt provide good examples. The state can maintain order only with the heavy boot of authority.
We are losing respect for the rule of law in America. Every act of petty tyranny by an increasingly meddlesome government erodes our confidence. Eventually big government makes criminals of us all. Voluntary compliance disappears. The state must react with heavier enforcement. Think about EPA drones over Nebraska and twenty-thousand new IRS agents for Obamacare.
Our very liberty is now at stake. But it gets worse. Eventually lawbreaking leads to the disintegration of moral standards. We lose trust in our fellow citizens. Cheating becomes a way of life. If you’ve ever experienced life in a low-trust society like Pakistan or Brazil, you’ll know what I mean. Only members of your immediate family can be trusted, and sometimes not even then. National unity disintegrates.
Only small government and a return to civic virtue can save us. That’s what this election is about. If Americans choose poorly, then our experiment in republican government will come to an end. We will be well down the road to tyranny with no exits or turnabouts in sight.
God Save the Republic!
“We revolt decision by decision, transaction by transaction, because we believe deep down that most of what government tells us to do is at bottom illegitimate.”
And yet, how do we revolt against something like Obamacare IF IT REMAINS LAW? Once the government controls literally every aspect of your life, how do you fight against that, except through outright revolution?
Think about it. The government will literally control what medical treatment you get, how much you get, the quality of what you get, and when you get it. The government can also withhold treatment and medicine from you if it thinks you’re not worth the risk or the effort anymore. The government, therefore, literally holds the power of life and death over you. Those Death Panels that Sarah Palin warned against will become a reality and you will not have a thing to say about it because the people on those panels are not elected by ANYBODY. So if Obamacare stands, the government will hold your life in its hands. That is, of course, unless you have some serious money to hire your own doctors on your own dime.
No amount of “cheating” will get you around this fact. You may be able to cheat on your taxes or work around some financial law, but when you don’t have any control over your own medical care, you have few options left open to you when it comes to your health. And THAT is the ultimate tyranny there is. THAT is what is at stake this November. If we lose, there is no turning back from Obamacare. Even if we control Congress, if Obama remains president it will be almost impossible to override a presidential veto on the repeal of Obamacare. So we have one, last, chance at repealing a law that will control your entire life unless it IS repealed. Make your vote count. Your life literally depends on it.
Two ways.
1) become medically educated yourself, do your best to not need advanced medical care, and simply accept that you will either have to forgo hospitalization or put up with the state’s system. Our ancestors did reasonably well without modern medicine, we can do better just by maintaining our own knowledge even if we don’t have access to physicians.
2) There will always be doctors and hospitals that are willing to work “under the counter.” You’ll simply have to pay cash. Given American ingenuity, I foresee quite a bit of this going around.
Addendum to 2)
If Obamacare becomes permanent law we will have to do what people in socialized medicine countries do now, take a “holiday” to somewhere that doesn’t care what your insurance is as long as you have cash. Right now for a lot of folks that place is the U.S. Kill that relationship off, and I see medical islands springing up a short plane ride off the U.S. coast, probably in the Caribbean or Central America.
You oppose ObamaCare / ObamaTax state by state. First by refusing to participate in the Medicare Expansion. Second by refusing to set up state insurance exchanges. Third by collecting all ObamaCare / ObamaTax taxes at the state level and refusing to send them to Washington DC. Somewhere along the line a state of group of states will come up with a state compact inviting the feds completely out of medical care at all levels of government. Another solution would be a constitutional amendment saying the same. Given that there were 26 states party to the NFIB v Sebilius suit, that is 2/3 of the way to ratification of an amendment and certainly enough to get congress to ratify state compact on the same topic. This thing has barely started. It is going to make the libs heads spin the opposition to this travesty. It will be a lot of fun. Cheers -
Contempt for the law is what happens when the law is observed to be unreasonable, oppressive and chaotic. The real problem we have in this nation is that a minority of the citizens, the progressives, are successfully instituting measures to impose their will upon the majority of the citizens. The latest example is the passing of ordinances in Santa Monica, CA that prohibit smoking tobacco in ones own condo, townhouse or apartment but evidently make no reference to smoking marijuana.
I once calculated that in the hour and a half between getting up in the morning and leaving for work, I broke at least five laws: (1) opened my window more than 2 inches (city); (2) mixed biodegradable food waste with biodegradable paper packaging making breakfast (city); (3) idled my old car for more than 30 seconds in 0F degree weather (city); (4) spoke words in prayer that could be considered hate speech (national law, not in USA); (5) checked the fluids in the car and threw the paper towel used for this into the general trash; (6) disconnected the battery in a smoke detector because it went off when I burnt breakfast; (7) in a hurry dried a shirt above the electric burners of the stove using a drying box of my design; (building code); (8) put some old boxes in front of the door to take them out (firecodes); (9) used a proxy connection on the internet to view Fox News, which was blocked in my country of residence.
where are you from?
“what really struck me about the piece WERE its premises.” How can we expect to deliver a cogent argument if we cannot separate ourselves as intellectually more fundamentally superior than our adversary? Rhetorical, of course, but I stopped perusing after that sentence.
It’s a small act of defiance every time I toss a can in the regular garbage.
amen
This is the same thing that happened in Greece and Italy; a contest between avoidance and the greed of gov’t workers and officials for money, power, and relevance (and jobs). The very people who avoid the blood sucking tendrils try to live off the “largess” of big gov’t.
Better to beat gov’t back than to go that route.
Perhaps it is time to “dissolve the political bands” with the DC amoeba. Voting has never been more important in our lifetimes.
It is an increasingly armed amoeba as well.
I had occasion to visit my local Social Security office this spring. The last time I was there back in the 70s, it was an open office with a bunch of desks and a receptionist right by the door, and everyone was friendly, is somewhat on the slow paced end of the spectrum.
Today, there is a wall between a small waiting area and the office, and there is a security door with security card scanner lock, and access to the receptionist is through a security window with heavy glass that has a small hole to make speech easier and a little slot to pass documents through.
You do not actually check in with a receptionist either, there was a desk with a PC and a computerized system where you can click your name to tell them you were there for your appointment. The system was unable to deal with people who just showed up, like me, and I was treated with great suspicion because I wanted to drop a document off with an office worker. I was not allowed to talk to her, but a suspicious drone took my envelope.
The piece de resistance was a guard with an auto pistol holstered on his belt who was quite officious and ordering people about.
The dangerous clients being guarded against were a bunch of old people, some armed with walkers or canes.
And there was a big sign on the door declaring that the Wisconsin Concealed Carry statue did not apply here, no private guns allowed.
I worry that it’s later than we think.
What I have never seen expressed before is the link between that idea and the habit of casual, often semi-conscious, disrespect for the law.
I figured that once a sitting president had lied under oath and (more or less) gotten away with it, I would try the same thing in a court of law.
Eric Holder and his cabal of leftists at the dept. of injustice and all his picking and choosing of what to enforce & what not to enforce have only deepened my disrespect for the process.
When you have bent men and women managing government, the result will be bent government.
…government has become a huge, nearly mindless, pullulating organism whose only real end is its own engorgement
Jabba The Hutt
When you have a government by ambush, you get a citizenry of black marketeers.
When you have a propagandized information stream, you get a citizenry not of believers and disbelievers, but one of only disbelievers.
When tyranny takes on the mask of benevolent dictator, benevolence is tied to obedience and laws are tied to enforcing it.
And when a once free country decides to kick just a few bricks out of the wall separating it from the tyranny of abusive power, it can no longer protect anyone within that wall, it will have sacrificed everything it took to build that wall and everything inside it.
25 years ago, I thought that people in government were all honorable. I scoffed at anybody who looked down on them. I believed that they were public servants and all made great sacrifices to serve the country. I was absolutely confident that they were working in the best interests of the poeple. In fact, I had more respect for Congress than any institution in the country. And I was already a grown man who was successfully supporting a family.
If you’ve read this far, you may know what I think about “public servants” after having observed politics a bit more closely for the last 25 years. To briefly recap, I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that 95% of them are criminals who, if they did have honorable intentions at the beginning, are rapidly corrupted by the wealth and power. I view many of them as being among the worst con artists in human history, specifically, Pelosi, Reid, Schumer and MANY others. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that the president of the United States is actively working to destroy this country, and in other circumstances would be a mafia boss or petty tyrant of a third world country, if he had somehow been able to ride the same magic carpet of domographics and deceipt that allowed him to sliver into his current position of power.
One of the things I’ve discovered about life, is that there aren’t any isolated thoughts. When I was younger, I felt strangely unique, as if nobody could possibly be thinking like I did. Now I know it isn’t even remotely true. If I’m thinking something, lots of people are thinking the same thing. Even if they don’t say it.
So I know that the thesis of this article is absolutely true. Many people, probably a majority of the country, have no respect whatsoever for their government, and even less for the politicians who exploit it to increase their own power and wealth.
The real problem is that self-appointed, pseudo-intellectual, elitist snobs have become obsessed with regulating everyone’s (usually everyone else’s) behavior!
It is tiresome, unwelcome, and eventually will lead to OPEN rebellion.
Great analogy to describe the voracious appetite of government as a self-serving entity if does not submit to and confine itself to the will of the people. It has become clear that the great struggle of the modern era is man vs the state, a state that is ever ready to encroach and envelop all within its reach, to subject them to token participation in public life as minions of revenue. Truely a global phenomenon. Personally when I think of the Dems and their leftist machinations, I think of Lord Vader and the Empire. Thank goodness lefties can’t choke anyone using the force.
The laws and government do not lead us to this disregard for the law. The disregard for the law leads to this kind of government and overbearing laws. We elect these people to represent us, and they do so very ably indeed. Our government is a mirror held up to the face of America.
Our President rules by executive fiat. Our Congress blatantly refuse to do its job and pass a budget. Our Supreme Court thinks the Healthcare Mandate is Constitutional. These are not things inflicted upon us. They are us.
The Moral Majority has become the Moral Minority, and so we get this kind of government. We are not scofflaws because we are rebelling; We are just scofflaws. Thus, do we have a scofflaw government.
Victim-blaming, Submissive nonsense! How backwards of you! We havent become scofflaws simply because we were bored – it’s a state of mind which has been SOLD to us by our sales-masters (including by their governmental sales-puppets)!
The zeitgeist rule of today’s society (and no, I’ve never seen the movie by the same name) is the same, ages old, adversarial greed-creed of:
“Buy (you) Low, to Sell (me as the most) High!
Since the early 60s (at least) the corporazi sales-masters have on TV tried to sell themselves (their ‘values’) to our children, by advertising fear in order to sell the rest of us the ‘greedy’ hope of relief from their own initial threats! (There can be no greedy impulse buying without fear)!
We have been divided and conquered – first, by the false notion that fears differ from hopes, and secondly that rights differ from reponsibilities!
We have been SHOWN that, with enough might, we can earn the right to be irresponsible, while only our powerless victims will have the onerous, fearsome responsibility to be right (as in factually correct)! We have been taught that the ends justify the means.
In reality, though, our only right is to be responsible, and our only responsibility is to be right. Further, the means only define the end results: after all, when you lie, kill and steal to get your way, in the end, you’re not a great success – you’re still really only a lying, murdering thief!
We have become infantile delinquents by imitating “our leaders” and they had become same first, simply because absolute power corrupts absolutely!
Eagle one Fox 2 -Nov 6 2012.
check “6″
What if, when deinied life saving medical care from a government panel, you call the police demanding the panel be arrested for atempted murder. Even better, put some rounds into the panel chairman’s 10 ring and claim self defence because you were in fear for your very life.
Disrespect for the rule of law by those in power does breed that same disrespect amongst those not in the Nomenklatura. This, to a great extent, is a matter of self defense. When the “rules” for any action become so complex that they cannot be understood by any one person, let alone any “reasonable man”; any action by the government is possible against any individual at random. The individual has to lie and conceal from the government in self defense; and the fear of informers means that they must lie and conceal from their fellow citizens.
At this point in our history, one would be hard put to name the leadership, officialdom, or faceless bureaucracy of ANY institution in our society where the individuals who order actions are personally accountable for the consequences of their orders or actions. If anyone knows of such institution, please name it.
This lack of accountability and lack of feedback for their actions reinforces the separation from those not in the Nomenklatura. And de-humanizes them in the eyes of those in power.
When you have the powers of a G-d on earth, you do not acknowledge any higher authority that can call you to account for what you do.
Last night I was at a presentation by Ann Barnhardt, at a Liberty Action Group. That [a Liberty Action Group] in and of itself is something that would not be the norm in a society and culture where the Nomenklatura were under the same rule of law as the population. For those who do not know her, look around on Youtube.
Her presentation had to do with the Vendée region of France [region of Poitiers, Rochelle, and the Loire Valley] during the French Revolution. Short form, before the Revolution, the Vendée was not particularly oppressed, and when the Revolution came, they accepted it … until the Revolutionary government dis-established the Church, voided all Holy Orders and vows, and made priests renounce the Church in favor of allegiance to the State. The Vendée cited the very documents of the Revolution, specifically the “Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen”. The Revolutionary government in return declared literal genocide. Copies of the proclamations still exist where Revolutionary troops were ordered to kill every man, woman, and child in the Vendée. And they tried.
From 1790-1800 400,000 men, women, and children were shot, stabbed, drowned in massive numbers, and burned alive. This in an area the size of Arapahoe County immediately outside Denver. The Revolutionaries were above the law, for they were the law.
Ms. Barnhardt drew parallels between this attitude in the Vendée, and in the Russian Chekisti and successors, and the security organs of the National Socialist state. And our current society. Some day, you might want to compare and contrast “community organizing” with the concept of Gleichschaltung. It does not bode well for our future.
Power – (Responsibility + Accountability) = Tyranny
Subotai Bahadur
Wow, Subotai. I’ve said many times that you’re one of my favorite commenters on the entire internet, and the thought of you and Ann Barnhardt in the same room is mind-blowing. That put a big smile on my face.
Subotai Bahadur: “At this point in our history, one would be hard put to name the leadership, officialdom, or faceless bureaucracy of ANY institution in our society where the individuals who order actions are personally accountable for the consequences of their orders or actions. If anyone knows of such institution, please name it.”
I’m a retired sailor. As far as I know the CO of any ship of our Navy is still personally accountable for their orders or actions. Probably the same for COs in every branch of the service. Beyond that I can’t really name one. It is up to the electorate to hold our representatives responsible. Yeah, it’s hard. So few voters know what is going on because they rely on the MSM for their knowledge. But that is the way things are supposed to work.
Ann Barnhardt is the commodity broker for MFGlobal who took the Corzine robbery so personally she wrote an explosive widely-read essay and quit the industry, saying it was ‘ruined’.
In general, no police are necessary among free citizens who can govern themselves, while the opposite is: no amount of police are enough for a people who CANNOT govern themselves.
When ‘our leaders’ both act like, and so treat all other people like, mewling, infantile delinquents, then (monkey-see, monkey-do) those others will eventually learn to become same. Thus the liberals’ self-sulfilling prophecies mirror islam’s.
Until recently, we have managed to obey the Golden Rule of Law, which, by simply defining all situational morality as: “Do Not Attack First!” enables trust, progress, and Civilization.
(See all “Western” countries)!
They obey the brazen rule of chaos, which embodies immorality as: “Our god says we always have to attack all ‘The Others’ first!” and so inflicts distrust, stagnation, and Barbarism.
(See all ‘moslem’ countries)!
#40 buddy larsen
Slight correction, Buddy. Ann Barnhardt ran Barnhardt Capital Management, Inc. handling cattle and grain futures. She cleared her accounts through a completely different firm than MF Global, but viewed the theft by Corzine, and the lack of reaction to be a sign that the game was hopelessly rigged. She got all her customers out intact. Here is the letter:
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/entire-system-has-been-utterly-destroyed-mf-global-collapse-presenting-first-mf-global-casualty
When she talks about Liberty, she is not a quiet, gentle soul. She is all teeth, and claws, and hair on fire. In person she is dialed up to 11 past what you see on her Youtubes, on that subject. She is widely knowledgeable in history and context. And strong in her faith. And personally modest and self-effacing. When complimented, she looks down and blushes. I don’t think it is an act. I spent my career reading people [felons], looking for lies and deception. Got to be pretty good at it, and it saved my gluteal musculature more than a few times. She reads honest to me. Since we know each other from elsewhere at PJM, I think you know that I am not easily impressed.
Subotai Bahadur
–thanks for the correction, Subotai. I guess i must’ve automatically assumed that she would have had to’ve been personally directly burned in order to’ve sacrificed as she did her own income & prospects.
And no, i’ve been listening to you for years reporting on the culture from the Colorado cop/Chinese-American/mountain Zen perspective, and you never roll for the theater (i don’t want to say ‘cynic’ but –the word never was meant to be pejorative).
Barnhardt’s bridge-burn is (i see now that i’ve looked) a lot less of ordinary disappointment and a lot more of extraordinary leadership.
Which explains the rather nasty ‘oh, the little woman is having a hissy’ reaction that her ‘liberty-or-death’ letter inspired among some brokers and reporters that one would’ve expected to’ve been delivering the Ann-antidote Panglossary with a tad more situational equivocation. Don’t they know that a pitch for optimism backlashes time two if it doesn’t sell?
What’s selling is Barnhardt’s message –tho she clearly would give an arm if it wasn’t. How many headline confirmations of her thesis have we had in the short time since she wrote the letter –a bunch –plenty, and coming on accelerating. 190 days we have –sink or swim pretty much now.
Part of the problem is that there are so MANY laws that it is impossible for a person to know all of them. How many laws do we break every day that we don’t even know about? It seems designed to ensure that authorities can charge anyone, at any time, for violating something – so do your best to stay on the good side of those in power.
What’s disturbing is that this preponderance of intrusive laws coincides with developments in surveillance technology – DHS using full-body scanners and drones, Boston using thermal cameras to ID energy wasting homeowners, smart meters (NILM) that allow the electric company to know which appliances you use & when, DOT interest in tracking your car’s activity in support of a mileage tax, several public schools strapping bracelets on kids to monitor their activity 24×7, and so on.
To me it’s simple: the government holds the law in contempt, so we do too.
Thucydides:
“And if the Dems steal this election, they can deal with a four year long John Galt strike….”
Now there’s an idea!
agreed
What about a government that refuses to even respect or enforce it’s own laws? Examples abound, but how about sueing a state for attempting to enforce Federal law?(Arizona,immigration ) Or Holder dismissing the New Black Panther voter intimidation case, sending the message that some laws will not be enforced? It seems like they want us to revolt, so they can clampdown. FEMA camps, anyone?
Yes, and there were a bunch of people, we often refer to as “Founders” who already knew all this. They have also shown us how to get out of it, we need to heed their words. The power is still is still in the people’s hand via the voting booth. We need to vote these “monarchs” out of office.
Every time I crank my cigarette machine to make a less taxed cig, every time I buy something I need at a yard sale with no sales tax I am voting against the BIG Amoeba.
They’re in a pretty good position –the nation’s best outcome is that what they’re doing to the people through the government will be seen sooner or later as the work of communists rather than the work of the Constitution. IOW, that the amoeba is nurture, not nature. Now that we’ve put these people in office, now that they’ve taken every element of liberty –necessarily open to abuse else it cannot be liberty –and taken despicable liberties with it, the government has become dangerous, ludicrous, and hateful. If they can’t (yet) destroy the Constitution via statute (thank you, 2010 election!), a pretty good result for them, even if they are forced out of office by elections, is to’ve delegitimized the government and to’ve thereby isolated the Constitution as a mere piece of paper rather than the earth fire wind and water of the spiritual and material territory of the USA.
The expansion of government, in the examples the author provides in the first paragraphs, has taken place in the lifetimes of the author, and probably anyone reading this. It’s fancy to imagine the life before these changes, especially if you’re young and healthy, but I don’t know how many would REALLY want to go back, if they gave it a second thought.
In my lifetime, two things more than anything else, seem to set the table for this revulsion of what the Federal Government (and government overall) has become:
1- The “War on Drugs”;
2- The Double-Nickel!
Now, we finally rid ourselves of the “55″, and it took 20+ years of effort (and the Gingrich Revolution) to do so, but the mind-set contained within it still exists as illustrated by the SecTran’s war on “distracted driving”, and the attempts by the Nannies within his (and other) department(s) to take all choice and discretion away from the individual.
I won’t even attempt to list the failures, and the social disintegration resulting from, of the WoD beyond mentioning the tremendous collateral-casualty toll from No-Knock Raids, particularly when they get the address wrong.