Now this entry is less of a sociopolitical commentary, and more of a news update. Today I received an e-mail about ABC's decision to air news from the White House. I don't know its original source, but it can be found all over the internet. There are at least 20 sites with this same article, but I'd like to post it again. Please see the article below:
ABC TURNS PROGRAMMING OVER TO OBAMA; NEWS TO BE ANCHORED FROM INSIDE WHITE HOUSE
Tue Jun 16 2009 08:45:10 ET
On the night of June 24, the media and government become one, when ABC turns its programming over to President Obama and White House officials to push government run health care -- a move that has ignited an ethical firestorm!
Highlights on the agenda:
ABCNEWS anchor Charlie Gibson will deliver WORLD NEWS from the Blue Room of the White House.
The network plans a primetime special -- 'Prescription for America' -- originating from the East Room, exclude opposing voices on the debate.
MORE
Late Monday night, Republican National Committee Chief of Staff Ken McKay fired off a complaint to the head of ABCNEWS:
Dear Mr. Westin:
As the national debate on health care reform intensifies, I am deeply concerned and disappointed with ABC's astonishing decision to exclude opposing voices on this critical issue on June 24, 2009. Next Wednesday, ABC News will air a primetime health care reform “town hall” at the White House with President Barack Obama. In addition, according to an ABC News report, GOOD MORNING AMERICA, WORLD NEWS, NIGHTLINE and ABC’s web news “will all feature special programming on the president’s health care agenda.” This does not include the promotion, over the next 9 days, the president’s health care agenda will receive on ABC News programming.
Today, the Republican National Committee requested an opportunity to add our Party's views to those of the President's to ensure that all sides of the health care reform debate are presented. Our request was rejected. I believe that the President should have the ability to speak directly to the America people. However, I find it outrageous that ABC would prohibit our Party's opposing thoughts and ideas from this national debate, which affects millions of ABC viewers.
In the absence of opposition, I am concerned this event will become a glorified infomercial to promote the Democrat agenda. If that is the case, this primetime infomercial should be paid for out of the DNC coffers. President Obama does not hold a monopoly on health care reform ideas or on free airtime. The President has stated time and time again that he wants a bipartisan debate. Therefore, the Republican Party should be included in this primetime event, or the DNC should pay for your airtime.
Respectfully,
Ken McKay
Republican National Committee
Chief of Staff
MORE
ABCNEWS Senior Vice President Kerry Smith on Tuesday responded to the RNC complaint, saying it contained 'false premises':
"ABCNEWS prides itself on covering all sides of important issues and asking direct questions of all newsmakers -- of all political persuasions -- even when others have taken a more partisan approach and even in the face of criticism from extremes on both ends of the political spectrum. ABCNEWS is looking for the most thoughtful and diverse voices on this issue.
"ABCNEWS alone will select those who will be in the audience asking questions of the president. Like any programs we broadcast, ABC News will have complete editorial control. To suggest otherwise is quite unfair to both our journalists and our audience."
Friday, June 19, 2009
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
The Fed Says Recession is Ending!!
Well, if you click the title of this blog, you will find a freshly-written article from the Minneapolis Star Tribune about how the recession is coming to an end.
According to a survey but on by the Federal Reserve, "five of the Fed's 12 regions said the downward trend is showing signs of moderating," (StarTribune.com).
But what does that language even mean?
It means that according to our (non-transparent, monopolized) money and banking supply, the recession might be not falling quite as fast in a little less than half of the country. And this is making news.
People are of course going to attribute this to the bail-outs and our current government's savvy economics, but let me take a minute to compare our nation to a family of four:
Lets say that the Johnson family is having hard times. Mr. Johnson just had his paycheck slashed in half and his wife has lost her job, so things are pretty hard on their small family. But their family isn't the only family on the block (much like how the United States is not the only nation).
Now the Johnsons, hypothetically speaking, might have two options. One, they can borrow hundreds of thousands of dollars from their neighbors while they are having tough times, or they can do some penny pinching.
Realistically, the Johnsons don't need three cars, or a membership to the local country club, or 675 channels on satellite TV. (much like our government doesn't need so many of its programs, or unreasonable benefits to employees -such as private jets, etc-)
But the Johnsons don't want to give up their cushy lifestyle, so instead of admitting defeat, saying that perhaps they were a bit unruly with their spending, they borrow the money. Well, after they borrow the money, they aren't going to notice the hard times they had just been having, are they? They are going to be able to make their payments with the money that isn't theirs. They can still go to the country club, even if it is on the dime of a neighbor, who they will eventually have to pay back. With interest.
This is more or less the situation our nation is in. We have printed up money, tried to get China and other countries to back it, and decided we were going to take the easy way out of this recession.
Of course things seem to be easing up. But we should be warned that we aren't preventing a decline in our economy, we are post-poning it, and probably making it worse.
(This is what happened to Germany in between the World Wars; they borrowed money from the U.S., but when the U.S. hit the great depression, they called in those loans and the German economy went to hell.)
However, with the gaining momentum of HR1207 (Thats the bill to audit the Fed, if you weren't aware) the Fed has gone so far as to hire a publicist. Thats right, our Federal Reserve is worried about its public image, and rightfully so.
So, the Fed says the recession is getting better. As a skeptic, I don't know if they are saying this because signs point to yes, and the bailout money is keeping us afloat; or if its because their new publicist is helping them try to clear their name and get some weight off their shoulders (and attention away from HR1207).
My guess? Both.
According to a survey but on by the Federal Reserve, "five of the Fed's 12 regions said the downward trend is showing signs of moderating," (StarTribune.com).
But what does that language even mean?
It means that according to our (non-transparent, monopolized) money and banking supply, the recession might be not falling quite as fast in a little less than half of the country. And this is making news.
People are of course going to attribute this to the bail-outs and our current government's savvy economics, but let me take a minute to compare our nation to a family of four:
Lets say that the Johnson family is having hard times. Mr. Johnson just had his paycheck slashed in half and his wife has lost her job, so things are pretty hard on their small family. But their family isn't the only family on the block (much like how the United States is not the only nation).
Now the Johnsons, hypothetically speaking, might have two options. One, they can borrow hundreds of thousands of dollars from their neighbors while they are having tough times, or they can do some penny pinching.
Realistically, the Johnsons don't need three cars, or a membership to the local country club, or 675 channels on satellite TV. (much like our government doesn't need so many of its programs, or unreasonable benefits to employees -such as private jets, etc-)
But the Johnsons don't want to give up their cushy lifestyle, so instead of admitting defeat, saying that perhaps they were a bit unruly with their spending, they borrow the money. Well, after they borrow the money, they aren't going to notice the hard times they had just been having, are they? They are going to be able to make their payments with the money that isn't theirs. They can still go to the country club, even if it is on the dime of a neighbor, who they will eventually have to pay back. With interest.
This is more or less the situation our nation is in. We have printed up money, tried to get China and other countries to back it, and decided we were going to take the easy way out of this recession.
Of course things seem to be easing up. But we should be warned that we aren't preventing a decline in our economy, we are post-poning it, and probably making it worse.
(This is what happened to Germany in between the World Wars; they borrowed money from the U.S., but when the U.S. hit the great depression, they called in those loans and the German economy went to hell.)
However, with the gaining momentum of HR1207 (Thats the bill to audit the Fed, if you weren't aware) the Fed has gone so far as to hire a publicist. Thats right, our Federal Reserve is worried about its public image, and rightfully so.
So, the Fed says the recession is getting better. As a skeptic, I don't know if they are saying this because signs point to yes, and the bailout money is keeping us afloat; or if its because their new publicist is helping them try to clear their name and get some weight off their shoulders (and attention away from HR1207).
My guess? Both.
Good People Violate the Law
I'm probably not writing anything out of the box today, especially considering most of you probably have heard about the recent "Nice People Take Drugs" campaign in the United Kingdom, but I'll go on anyway.
This campaign is brilliant because it aims at killing the Reefer-Madness-like stereotype that people who take drugs are evil, violent, uneducated, or otherwise harmful/useless to society. This is a myth that has been proven wrong several times throughout history. When we take into account that more than 40% of the United State's adult population has admitted to trying cannabis, a substance which seems to be the government's priority when it comes to drug prohibition, we realize that calling 40% of the United State's worthless would be simply misanthropic.
A woman studying at the same university as I started talking to me about this online. I tend to publish many links and videos on Facebook to raise awareness and launch discussion, so this was an expected outcome and I was glad she confronted me on this. According to the woman, who is a fervent supporter of the Democratic Party and a Roman Catholic, "people who take drugs should be put in jail because they have done something wrong and they should be punished for them to not repeat the same mistakes." She went on to say that "people who use harder drugs [than just pot] should be in jail for at least several years because it is very bad for themselves, and society can't let people destroy themselves like this."
Those are very interesting points. Naturally, I disagree with them, and I'll explain why. In this woman's head lies the idea that there are "good drugs" and "bad drugs." Those "good drugs" are those you get from your pharmacist, those you take when your body isn't feeling quite right; the bad ones are those that your government tells you are forbidden. I told her that people use hard drugs legally everyday, and do suffer from addiction from it. I told her the meds that doctors prescribe are sometimes extremely harmful to the mental and physical health of patients, and are sometimes unpredictable because of their relative novelty. On the other hand, cannabis has a rather predictable set of effects that have been observed for several thousand years, and does not have the physically addictive properties of the many painkillers that doctors prescribe to their patients.
Long story short, I told her that the concept of drugs remains the same whether it is over-the-counter, requires prescription, or included in Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act. You use a substance in order to launch a set of expected effects in your body and/or your mind. Let's take caffeine, for example. I've probably ranted a little bit about this before, but caffeine is a drug that basically has the same effects as some illegal stimulants. Provided you take high doses of it, you will be physically addicted, go through withdrawal symptoms, and crave for that same rush of mental and physical energy provided by the substance. My point is : if even the "good drugs" can be bad for you, then why make a distinction?
She told me that "the people who take caffeine generally aren't addicted, contrarily to the illegal drugs which people take which changes their life forever and they can never go back." If you've taken a critical reasoning class, you will notice the slippery slope informal fallacy in the last part of the woman's argument. But the information in the argument is equally wrong. As I told the woman, people who consume cannabis generally aren't addicted either, and they do so in a very similar manner as that of one who drinks a beer while watching the baseball game after a day of hard work. I think she understood her argument was flawed in many, many ways, which is why she moved on to her final argument.
According to her, "maybe pot isn't that big a deal, but drugs like cocaine or oxycontin will lead to addiction, and from that point on, they will never be able to lead a productive life again. We need someone to do something to prevent people from taking bad drugs!" I could've gone on and on about how her appeal to prohibition and incarceration was not a good approach. Instead, I told her that a cocaine user won't necessarily be an unproductive drug addict, and that (quoting the campaign) "good people take drugs." To mark my point, I reminded her that her beloved President, Barack Obama, had consumed cocaine on several occasions. Did that stop him from leading a successful life? Whether or not you agree with his politics, you know the answer is no.
I don't think the woman was inherently stupid. I don't think she is an evil prohibitionist motivated by profits and greed. I don't even think she was being a hypocrite about this. What I do think is that she is, like many people all over the world, a good-faith American that thought that listening to her government was the right thing to do. Unfortunately for many, she is not the only one who is willing to blindly follow her government in order to do what she thinks is the right thing. What we need is to revive the political audacity within this nation.
A close friend of mine wrote a note on Facebook regarding trust in government in America. His argument is that many Americans believe that in order to be a good American, one must listen and follow his/her government. However, when looking at the values that the founding fathers had in mind during the development of the United States, we can see that there is nothing more American than not trusting the government. In his words : "This country was formed on the idea of not trusting the government, nothing screams American more than not trusting the government!"
So to close up, I'm going to expand the "Nice People Take Drugs" motto and say "Good People Violate the Law". Indeed, since the government does not have authority on what is morally right and what is morally wrong, we can conclude that there will be a significant portion of criminals who aren't inherently bad people. What you believe is right or wrong is for you to decide, not the government. What drugs you choose to take is for you to decide, not the government. How you choose to live your life, provided you do not harm anyone else or their liberties, should be your decision, and not anybody else's.
This campaign is brilliant because it aims at killing the Reefer-Madness-like stereotype that people who take drugs are evil, violent, uneducated, or otherwise harmful/useless to society. This is a myth that has been proven wrong several times throughout history. When we take into account that more than 40% of the United State's adult population has admitted to trying cannabis, a substance which seems to be the government's priority when it comes to drug prohibition, we realize that calling 40% of the United State's worthless would be simply misanthropic.
A woman studying at the same university as I started talking to me about this online. I tend to publish many links and videos on Facebook to raise awareness and launch discussion, so this was an expected outcome and I was glad she confronted me on this. According to the woman, who is a fervent supporter of the Democratic Party and a Roman Catholic, "people who take drugs should be put in jail because they have done something wrong and they should be punished for them to not repeat the same mistakes." She went on to say that "people who use harder drugs [than just pot] should be in jail for at least several years because it is very bad for themselves, and society can't let people destroy themselves like this."
Those are very interesting points. Naturally, I disagree with them, and I'll explain why. In this woman's head lies the idea that there are "good drugs" and "bad drugs." Those "good drugs" are those you get from your pharmacist, those you take when your body isn't feeling quite right; the bad ones are those that your government tells you are forbidden. I told her that people use hard drugs legally everyday, and do suffer from addiction from it. I told her the meds that doctors prescribe are sometimes extremely harmful to the mental and physical health of patients, and are sometimes unpredictable because of their relative novelty. On the other hand, cannabis has a rather predictable set of effects that have been observed for several thousand years, and does not have the physically addictive properties of the many painkillers that doctors prescribe to their patients.
Long story short, I told her that the concept of drugs remains the same whether it is over-the-counter, requires prescription, or included in Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act. You use a substance in order to launch a set of expected effects in your body and/or your mind. Let's take caffeine, for example. I've probably ranted a little bit about this before, but caffeine is a drug that basically has the same effects as some illegal stimulants. Provided you take high doses of it, you will be physically addicted, go through withdrawal symptoms, and crave for that same rush of mental and physical energy provided by the substance. My point is : if even the "good drugs" can be bad for you, then why make a distinction?
She told me that "the people who take caffeine generally aren't addicted, contrarily to the illegal drugs which people take which changes their life forever and they can never go back." If you've taken a critical reasoning class, you will notice the slippery slope informal fallacy in the last part of the woman's argument. But the information in the argument is equally wrong. As I told the woman, people who consume cannabis generally aren't addicted either, and they do so in a very similar manner as that of one who drinks a beer while watching the baseball game after a day of hard work. I think she understood her argument was flawed in many, many ways, which is why she moved on to her final argument.
According to her, "maybe pot isn't that big a deal, but drugs like cocaine or oxycontin will lead to addiction, and from that point on, they will never be able to lead a productive life again. We need someone to do something to prevent people from taking bad drugs!" I could've gone on and on about how her appeal to prohibition and incarceration was not a good approach. Instead, I told her that a cocaine user won't necessarily be an unproductive drug addict, and that (quoting the campaign) "good people take drugs." To mark my point, I reminded her that her beloved President, Barack Obama, had consumed cocaine on several occasions. Did that stop him from leading a successful life? Whether or not you agree with his politics, you know the answer is no.
I don't think the woman was inherently stupid. I don't think she is an evil prohibitionist motivated by profits and greed. I don't even think she was being a hypocrite about this. What I do think is that she is, like many people all over the world, a good-faith American that thought that listening to her government was the right thing to do. Unfortunately for many, she is not the only one who is willing to blindly follow her government in order to do what she thinks is the right thing. What we need is to revive the political audacity within this nation.
A close friend of mine wrote a note on Facebook regarding trust in government in America. His argument is that many Americans believe that in order to be a good American, one must listen and follow his/her government. However, when looking at the values that the founding fathers had in mind during the development of the United States, we can see that there is nothing more American than not trusting the government. In his words : "This country was formed on the idea of not trusting the government, nothing screams American more than not trusting the government!"
So to close up, I'm going to expand the "Nice People Take Drugs" motto and say "Good People Violate the Law". Indeed, since the government does not have authority on what is morally right and what is morally wrong, we can conclude that there will be a significant portion of criminals who aren't inherently bad people. What you believe is right or wrong is for you to decide, not the government. What drugs you choose to take is for you to decide, not the government. How you choose to live your life, provided you do not harm anyone else or their liberties, should be your decision, and not anybody else's.
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Mom says, "Buckle Up!"
When I got my license at age 16, my first drive on my own was a disaster. My friend, my sister and I piled into my dad's Jeep to drop the friend off at his house. It was March, and in the peak of rainy season, and for about a hundred yards, my dad's car became a boat, borderlining on submarine status.
But before I left on that drive, my parents gave me warnings, "Drive carefully!"; "Don't speed!"; "Buckle up!" Their reminders rang in my ears the way they always do. Other favorite reminders they like to call after me include, "Don't forget your lunch!"; "Make good choices!"; and "Go to bed!" And like so many other teenagers, I took all of these reminders with a grain of salt. Once I hit age 16 I started to find the incessant reminders almost insulting, like my parents didn't think I was mature enough to remember to do something as simple as eat lunch or go to bed.
Perhaps I found this insulting because I enjoy my independence. I like to pay my own bills and work hard and pave my own path, and I definitely don't want anyone to tell me how to do it or do it for me.
But does the rest of the nation feel this way?
Our newest President of the United States has put an emphasis on personal responsibility. On March 10th, 2009, while addressing the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, he was quoted as saying, "Of course, no matter how innovative our schools or how effective our teachers, America cannot succeed unless our students take responsibility for their own education. That means showing up for school on time, paying attention in class, seeking out extra tutoring if it's needed, and staying out of trouble." (Emphasis added by myself.)
If students need to take responsibility for themselves, then why don't drivers?
The state of Minnesota enacts a new law today that will benefit drivers. This new law is "empowering law enforcement officers to pull over and ticket motorists for no other reason than failure to wear a restraint while driving. They can tack on extra pain for those drivers with unbuckled passengers under the age of 15," according to Kare11.com.
While on my way to work today, I listened to a local radio station, KS95, discuss what a great law this is. They discussed all the good things that can come of wearing your seat belt: helping you stay in control when you swerve, save your life in accidents, even keeping you more focused on what you're doing behind the wheel.
What bothers me is that no one seems to notice that this is a common sense law.
Why should the government have to make wearing a seat belt a law?
Why are there restrictions on the healthy content of our food? Why are there restrictions on smoking?
In our public school science courses, we learn about survival of the fittest. If my own person, not hurting anyone else, wants to smoke at age 17, eat trans fats, and drive around without a seat belt on, why can't I? All of those things don't sound like the greatest ideas, of course, but have we really reached the point where our parents aren't enough supervision?
Have we reached the point where the citizens of the United States won't ever really reach adulthood, because under the rule of our government, we will forever remain children? Is there suddenly a new glass ceiling, a ceiling of adulthood, which all citizens who don't create law will never be able to advance beyond?
I'm not saying that wearing your seat belt isn't a great idea, because it is. It is a personal responsibility, like brushing your teeth or taking a shower.
I appreciate the reminder from my family and friends to buckle up, and even from my car, which makes obnoxious dinging sounds until I'm secured to my seat, but my qualm remains that perhaps the government is overstepping its boundaries, from ruling body to parent.
But before I left on that drive, my parents gave me warnings, "Drive carefully!"; "Don't speed!"; "Buckle up!" Their reminders rang in my ears the way they always do. Other favorite reminders they like to call after me include, "Don't forget your lunch!"; "Make good choices!"; and "Go to bed!" And like so many other teenagers, I took all of these reminders with a grain of salt. Once I hit age 16 I started to find the incessant reminders almost insulting, like my parents didn't think I was mature enough to remember to do something as simple as eat lunch or go to bed.
Perhaps I found this insulting because I enjoy my independence. I like to pay my own bills and work hard and pave my own path, and I definitely don't want anyone to tell me how to do it or do it for me.
But does the rest of the nation feel this way?
Our newest President of the United States has put an emphasis on personal responsibility. On March 10th, 2009, while addressing the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, he was quoted as saying, "Of course, no matter how innovative our schools or how effective our teachers, America cannot succeed unless our students take responsibility for their own education. That means showing up for school on time, paying attention in class, seeking out extra tutoring if it's needed, and staying out of trouble." (Emphasis added by myself.)
If students need to take responsibility for themselves, then why don't drivers?
The state of Minnesota enacts a new law today that will benefit drivers. This new law is "empowering law enforcement officers to pull over and ticket motorists for no other reason than failure to wear a restraint while driving. They can tack on extra pain for those drivers with unbuckled passengers under the age of 15," according to Kare11.com.
While on my way to work today, I listened to a local radio station, KS95, discuss what a great law this is. They discussed all the good things that can come of wearing your seat belt: helping you stay in control when you swerve, save your life in accidents, even keeping you more focused on what you're doing behind the wheel.
What bothers me is that no one seems to notice that this is a common sense law.
Why should the government have to make wearing a seat belt a law?
Why are there restrictions on the healthy content of our food? Why are there restrictions on smoking?
In our public school science courses, we learn about survival of the fittest. If my own person, not hurting anyone else, wants to smoke at age 17, eat trans fats, and drive around without a seat belt on, why can't I? All of those things don't sound like the greatest ideas, of course, but have we really reached the point where our parents aren't enough supervision?
Have we reached the point where the citizens of the United States won't ever really reach adulthood, because under the rule of our government, we will forever remain children? Is there suddenly a new glass ceiling, a ceiling of adulthood, which all citizens who don't create law will never be able to advance beyond?
I'm not saying that wearing your seat belt isn't a great idea, because it is. It is a personal responsibility, like brushing your teeth or taking a shower.
I appreciate the reminder from my family and friends to buckle up, and even from my car, which makes obnoxious dinging sounds until I'm secured to my seat, but my qualm remains that perhaps the government is overstepping its boundaries, from ruling body to parent.
Monday, June 8, 2009
Thesaurusing & Social Networking
This morning, I came across a link put up by Pete Eyre, one of my favorite liberty activists.
If you know me, you know that I have spent a fair amount of time on Bureaucrash, and that when I first realized I was a Libertarian, I frequented it often. Pete was Crasher-in-Chief up until April-ish. Apparently, since he stepped down, his successor has not been running the site in the same manner that it had been run for so long.
This is leaving those of us who registered for Bureaucrash Social and used it without a social network for freedom minded individuals. Homeless, if you will. Someone at After BureauCrash Action (ABC Action) has decided to do something about this:
Check it out!
The blog doesn't have an author listed, so I don't know who is behind writing it, but since both Pete Eyre and Adam Mueller posted it via twitter this morning, and they are both members of the Motorhome Diaries crew, I would guess they have something to do with it.
Anyway, I was going to leave a comment about what the title of the new network could be, and used my computer thesaurus to help me out. Have you ever entered the word liberty into a thesaurus? If you're ever down, this might cheer you up. Personally, it inspired me.
Synonyms include: freedom, independence, free-reign, self-determination, autonomy, sovereignty, civil liberties.
Antonyms? Even better: Constraint, slavery, tyranny, constraint.
Today I am reminded why I am so proud to be a Libertarian.
If you know me, you know that I have spent a fair amount of time on Bureaucrash, and that when I first realized I was a Libertarian, I frequented it often. Pete was Crasher-in-Chief up until April-ish. Apparently, since he stepped down, his successor has not been running the site in the same manner that it had been run for so long.
This is leaving those of us who registered for Bureaucrash Social and used it without a social network for freedom minded individuals. Homeless, if you will. Someone at After BureauCrash Action (ABC Action) has decided to do something about this:
Check it out!
The blog doesn't have an author listed, so I don't know who is behind writing it, but since both Pete Eyre and Adam Mueller posted it via twitter this morning, and they are both members of the Motorhome Diaries crew, I would guess they have something to do with it.
Anyway, I was going to leave a comment about what the title of the new network could be, and used my computer thesaurus to help me out. Have you ever entered the word liberty into a thesaurus? If you're ever down, this might cheer you up. Personally, it inspired me.
Synonyms include: freedom, independence, free-reign, self-determination, autonomy, sovereignty, civil liberties.
Antonyms? Even better: Constraint, slavery, tyranny, constraint.
Today I am reminded why I am so proud to be a Libertarian.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)