Chronicling the depravities of the State.
Of all the currently standing Republican presidential candidates Rick Santorum is easily the one I hate the most. While Romney and Gingrich at least pay lip service to the idea of individual liberty Santorum firmly believes that the government has the right to control the actions of the people. But don’t take my word for it, ask the idiot himself:
It must be fun viewing one’s self as a king among men.
I’m not even sure what to say about this most recent screwup by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA):
- TSA screener finds two pipes in passenger’s bags.
- Screener determines that they’re not a threat.
- Screener confiscates them anyway, because of their “material and appearance.”
- Because they’re not actually a threat, screener leaves them at the checkpoint.
- Everyone forgets about them.
- Six hours later, the next shift of TSA screeners notices the pipes and — not being able to explain how they got there and, presumably, because of their “material and appearance” — calls the police bomb squad to remove the pipes.
- TSA does not evacuate the airport, or even close the checkpoint, because — well, we don’t know why.
I don’t even feel the need to add a witty remark, the stupidity of the TSA speaks for itself.
It’s my birthday today and all I wanted was to see Ron Paul’s victory in Iowa, instead I got this:
Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney has narrowly won the first vote by US Republican party supporters in the process to choose a presidential candidate for this year’s election.
He finished just eight votes ahead of former senator Rick Santorum in the rural Midwest state of Iowa.
It’s not too late though because those of you in Iowa who voted for Santorum can make it up to me by killing yourselves.
Between demanding the Middle East be nuked and gays be rounded up and shipped to Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) camps I thought it would be difficult for Santorum to find the time to be even more of a dick. Apparently that man strives for perfection because also found time to hate on blacks:
Speaking to Republicans in Iowa on Monday, former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA) said his administration would reform welfare to the point that it would offer no welfare at all.
After suggesting that an expansion of Medicare is really just a plot to make voters more “dependent” on Washington, Santorum added: ”I don’t want to make black people’s lives better by giving them other people’s money.”
I guess he only wants to make white people’s lives better by giving them other people’s money. Of course Santorum, being a perfectionist, isn’t done until his foot is fully inserted into his mouth:
“I want to give them the opportunity to go out and earn their money and provide for themselves and their families,” he added. “The best way to do that is to get the manufacturing sector of the economy rolling.”
Thankfully all the white people have jobs being government cronies on Wall Street and lobbyists in Washington D.C. so they’re set.
Just so we’re all on the same page let’s run through the Rick Santorum Plan for American Success:
If this is the road to American success I don’t want to live here anymore.
I’ve already explained that the increased use in cellular phones is not responsible for automobile accident rates in the United States as cellular phone usage has increased drastically while the rate of accidents has decreased. Now the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety are brining up the fact cell phone bans accomplish nothing (except increase revenue for police departments of course):
Cell phone bans, such as those recently recommended by the National Transportation Safety Board, have so far proven useless when it comes to actually reducing car crashes, according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety.
The Insurance Institute is a private group financed by auto insurers. The National Transportation Safety Board recently recommended that states adopt strict rules banning all non-driving-related use of hand-held devices such as cell phones — even hands-free — while driving.
Many states already have bans on hand-held cell phone use and on texting while driving. The Insurance Institute has studied crash rates before and after bans were enacted in various states and also compared them to crash rates in nearby states with no such bans.
While the bans have resulted in actual reductions in phone use, they have not resulted in any reduction in crash rates, according to the Institute.
Since insurance companies are the ones who end up paying out when automobile crashes occur I would say their best interest lies in advocating any restriction that reduces the rate of crashes. In other words it would be in their best interest to find the exact opposite of these results so any accusations about these results being skewed because of the “evil greedy corporations” need to be backed by some pretty hard evidence.
Seeing these results we’re forced to consider there is a different cause for auto accidents. Perhaps some people are just bad drivers and if they’re not distracted by their phone they’ll find something else to distract themselves with. Of course this study will be entirely ignored by various state government and our overreaching federal government because, damn it, we have to do something!
Since the presidential campaign is next year everybody is on the war path. In the case of Republican presidential hopefuls there is a strong desire to blame anything and everything on Barack Obama. Romney is not happy with the United States “withdrawal” from Iraq:
He called the withdrawal “precipitous” and said the president should have left some US forces behind.
Apparently Romney is unaware of our Vatican City sized embassy in Iraq, you know, the one that houses some 15,000 personell. The place is a fortress and qualifies as a military base unto itself. There is no way to claim the United States has entirely withdrawn from Iraq unless you take into consideration the technicality that the embassy counts as United States sovereign soil.
I’m just brining it up because it’s a rather large thing to note.
Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) may have had noble intentions when the organization was founded in 1980 but today they are nothing but a group of neo-prohibitionists. Instead of concerning themselves only with the problem of drink driving they’ve been expanding their focus to target anything related to alcohol. I stumbled across an interview with MADD California’s Executive Director Gary McDonald (how can he be a mother by the way) that demonstrates how idiotic this organization truly is:
GJEL: But you must be happy with the work California has done to prevent drunk driving.
MADD: Yes! I think the Office of Traffic Safety is doing an excellent job with the number of sobriety check points they’re holding–500 checkpoints in the last year, which far surpasses any other state. California is doing an excellent job and of course we thank and recognize our law enforcement in this effort and provide support to them with volunteer at D.U.I. checkpoints.
I will grant some leniency to Gary as checkpoints can be seen by authoritarians as a valid means of preventing drunk driving. Believing such malarkey can only be accomplished through willful ignorance though.
GJEL: What are some of the other long-term projects you’re working on?
MADD: We get involved with a lot of different legislation, some we’re for, some we’re against. For example, we were a sponsor of AB183, which requires face-to-face interaction for alcohol sales. That begins January 31, and that’s something we were behind and it passed.
Let me give a tip of the old hat to the author of this article for including links to the legislation mentioned in this interview. Now let me express my contempt of MADD’s support of this legislation. What does requiring face-to-face interaction to purchase alcohol accomplish? How will it prevent people from driving under the influence? The answer to both questions is nothing.
Let’s consider a simple fact, people often buy alcohol while sober so they can get drunk later. The chances of somebody driving to the liquor store already tanked out of their mind seems fairly low but we’ll humor that idea that it’s very common. In a case where such a scenario is common you’re basically putting the responsibility of enforcement onto the people selling liquor. How is the clerk at a liquor store supposed to determine whether or not a customer is above the legal limit? If the clerk has determined this what are they supposed to do? The answer to the first question is simple: they can’t, not legally at least. Were the clerk required to perform a breathalyzer test on everybody buying liquor then they may be able to determine such matters so long as they had the equipment and proper training on its use. Even if the clerk is able to determine a buyer is drunk they are unable to do anything more than call the purchaser’s license plate number into the police.
Requiring liquor store clerks to enforce drunk driving laws is just as idiotic as requiring gun store owners to enforce gun laws.
There’s also been some recent legislation that’s very concerning: AB353. This bill basically allows people without driver’s licenses to pass through D.U.I. checkpoints so that their car is not impounded. The car is moved over to the side until a licensed driver picks up the car and moves it.
It used to be that person could be impounded for up to 30 days, just held for safe keeping. So now they’re going to get their car back sooner and that starts January 31st.
What the hell does this have to do with drunk driving laws? Whether a person has a valid license or not holds no bearing that person’s level of intoxication. Ignoring the whole “papers please” aspect of these checkpoints we are still left with the fact that impounding vehicles because the peaceful driver being harassed lacks a valid license is nothing more than mission creep meant to increase funds for the local police department (anybody who has had to retrieve a vehicle from a police impound lot knows how much money departments make off of confiscating vehicles).
Stepping back and looking at the situation brings us to the fact that the act of impounding a vehicle at a sobriety checkpoint required the officer to first assume the innocent driver guilty of a crime. Everybody being checked at one of these checkpoints is assumed to be guilty of driving under the influence, which is the exact opposite of how our “guilty until proven innocent” justice system is supposed to work. Does MADD support officers randomly entering people’s homes without warrant or probably cause as well? If not then they shouldn’t support these checkpoints where officers interrogate drivers without warrant or probably cause.
GJEL: If the drunk person isn’t driving, why is that such a big deal?
MADD: Because people who don’t have drivers licenses are five times more likely to kill someone in a crash! It’s not just drunk driving, we’re also concerned with drugged driving and we’re also concerned with people without driver’s licenses. We don’t want people drunk on bikes or drunk pedestrians because people get killed.
In other words the name Mothers Against Drunk Driving is a deceptive name for the organization and it should be checked to something like Mothers Against Driving. Since they also have issue with drunk cyclists and drunk pedestrians they should further refine their name to Mothers Against…, and leave the reader to fill in the blank with whatever pet peeve they happen to have.
I get people’s opposition to drunk driving, it’s a valid and notable issue (one that could be better solved were the roads privatized I might add) but if you’re going to make it illegal to walk home under the influence you’re not giving people any options. I would much rather drunks walk home than drive home myself since it’s far less likely they’re going to hurt me. Sure they may hurt themselves but that’s a consequence of a choice they made and therefore isn’t my concern. Have these neo-prohibitionists ever read a history book about Prohibition in the United States? The amendment was repealed because it lead to nothing be a huge spike in violent crime rates and did nothing to combat alcohol production and consumption.
The bottom line is people are going to drink so you need to allow them options of getting from the bar back to their home. If you make driving and walking drunk illegal what do you think will happen? Drunks will most likely run risk benefits ratio through their heads and drive as they will get into trouble either way but driving gets them home sooner and therefore reduces the time they’re exposed to potential police interaction.
GJEL: That’s quite the statistic. So you guys are working on issues that go beyond drunk driving.
MADD: We’re concerned about human life. It’s important that people use common sense. Of course our mission is to stop drop drunk driving and support the victims of this violent crime and stop under-aged drinking. But it’s a broader spectrum than people realize with Mothers Against Drunk Driving.
That’s a broader spectrum than your name implies as well.
GJEL: Any special advice for the Holidays?
MADD: Well there will be more D.U.I. checkpoints during this time, which is one of the best drunk driving deterrents out there.
The previous link I posted shows this to be entirely false. Salt Lake City police reported that over 2,000 drivers were harassed at sobriety checkpoints and they managed to arrest zero, that’s right zero, drunk drivers.
We don’t really target any particular demo during this time. It’s more don’t drink and drive during the holidays. Don’t drive drunk. Make arrangements. The easiest one is to designate a driver.
So you guys are OK with designated drivers? How is a drunk person supposed to walk from the bar to the designated driver’s vehicle if it becomes illegal to walk while intoxicated? You idiots should think your ideas through more thoroughly before making statements about what you support and oppose.
MADD is so bat shit crazy that their founder, who had noble intentions, left the organization due to their movement away from fighting drunk driving to fighting alcohol consumption in general:
Candy Lightner, MADD’s founder, says she disassociated herself from the movement in 1985 because she believed the organization was headed in the wrong direction.
“It has become far more neo-prohibitionist than I had ever wanted or envisioned,” said Mrs. Lightner, who founded MADD after her daughter was killed by a drunk driver. “I didn’t start MADD to deal with alcohol. I started MADD to deal with the issue of drunk driving.”
When you can’t convince your founder, a mother who lost her daughter in an auto accident caused by a drunk driver, to stay on board then you’ve truly lost your way.
Behold an idiot standing in front of a Soviet flag babbling on about capitalism being a religion:
Why do I link to this video? Because I feel like decimating an idiot Maxist for personal amusement. First let me say that the advertisement that plays before this video is a great way to make some quick cash… you know like a dirty capitalist (but hey you have to fund that capitalist produced video camera somehow). Next let me urge the videographer to iron his Soviet flag, those creases are distracting and show a complete lack of professionalism. I’m also going to throw out the obvious point that having a flag of a country that killed millions of its own citizens hanging in the background doesn’t send a very positive message. At least most Marxists I talk to have the decency of disavowing the Soviet Union for the violent acts it unleashed upon the people unfortunate enough to live within its borders.
Honestly those are just petty complaints and avoid the message he’s trying to portray, which is the idea that capitalism is a religion. I’ve not actually heard the argument that Marxism is a religion before. In fact that seems a bit odd considering Marx was a self-proclaimed atheist and considered religion to be “the opiat of the people.” Still I will humor this accusation for the sake of quality argumentative decimation.
The videographer, who I’ll now refer to as Marxy Marxist, is claiming that capitalism is a religion because its proponents believe that some “magical” thing call the market will fix all ills in the world. This right here demonstrates Marxy Marxists’s complete ignorance on the capitalism economic system. Namely proponents of capitalism do not believe the free market will fix all ills in the world. For instance Marxy Marxist mentions inequality, a phenomenon the free market makes no attempt to correct.
The free market is nothing more than a system that allows individuals to compete in the providing of goods and services to consumers. Those who properly fulfill the needs of consumers are rewarded for their efforts, usually with money. Their reward is then reinvested to provide for additional consumer wants. Thus those who properly fulfill the wants of society are granted control of more resources as they have demonstrated a socially desirable use of those resources. The only problem a free market attempts to solve is providing consumers with the products and services they want.
It is true that free markets can have a hand in solving other social issues such as racism. For example a businessman who refused to sell his goods or services to a hispanic person loses out on their money. In addition to that many other people will boycot the person’s business because he’s being a racism asshole. Strictly speaking though, voluntary association dictates any person may chose to or not to interact with any other person. While the free market does punish an individual who refuses to do business with a specific group it does not force them to associate with anybody.
Marxy Marxist also brought up the name Adam Smith. Smith was an important early figure in free market economic theory but certainly wasn’t the be all end all. Smith, and later Menger, both missed a crucial piece of the free market puzzle, which is the understanding that value is subjective. Unfortunately Smith followed the labor theory of value limiting the potential of his works. It was Ludwig von Mises who first articulated the idea of subjective value so I would argue if you’re going to talk about capitalism it would be best to use Mises as the poster child as he was the one who provided the crucial missing piece of the puzzle. Again this demonstrates Marxy Marxist’s ignorance of the development of free market economic theory.
Marxy Marxist continues to refer to the free market as a magical being that can not be controlled. I can see how a Marxist would have a difficult time grasping the concept of something not tyrannically controlled. Truth be told the free market is controlled by the consumers. As stated above producers who fulfill the wants of consumers are rewarded. There is another side of the coin, producers who do not make products or provide services consumers want will fail. We as consumers control the market and producers are at our mercy (unless of course a violent state intervenes on the producer’s behalf, but that is not capitalism).
Right around the 2:10 mark Marxy Marxist makes his most ignorant claim, that those of us calling ourselves capitalist really aren’t because we don’t own any means of production. Guess what I’m writing this post on? A fucking computer. Guess what I, as a programmer, use to produce? A fucking computer. Holy shit I own means of production! Marxy Marxist is also a capitalist because he owns a video camera and a computer, which he uses to make money by producing advertisement supported videos on YouTube. Even a so-called Marxist can make money in a capitalist system.
Finally Marxy Marxist closes by accusing capitalists of not wanting to fix society’s problems but to profit from them. Interestingly enough by profiting off of society’s problems capitalists solve them. Case in point medical technology used to save millions of lives every year is developed by medical companies to generate profit. Automobiles solved a problem of personal transportation over long distances than horse drawn buggies could not and Henry Ford was certainly in the business to make money. Computers, a device that have helped solved an almost uncountable number of social issues, are built by profit seeking companies. Profiting off of society’s ills is not mutually exclusive to solving them regardless of what Marxy Marxist claims.
In closing I leave you with a question: why do all these Marxists wear military fatigues? If I was going to go on camera to preach about something I’d have the decency to wear a suit and tie because people are more apt to listen to a well dressed individual than a tactic-cool Internet commando.
The Letters to the Editor section of the Star Tribune is a source of near infinite entertainment for me. Seldom can I read through the section without finding at least two stupid letters penned by persons ignorant on the subject they’re expressing an opinion about. This is one of those letters:
The U.S. Post Office is vital to the economic and cultural health of our country and should not be treated as a for-profit business.
Actually the United States Post OFfice isn’t all that vital. With the exception of first class letter delivery, which the government maintains a monopoly on, the functions of the Post Office are also performed but numerous parcel deliver services including UPS, FedEx, and DHL. Our economy would suffer little, if any, were the Post Office shut down. Even most of the jobs lost by this move would likely be picked up by private parcel delivery services to cope with the additional surge of business that would have previously went to the Post Office.
It should be subsidized sufficiently so that closures or delayed deliveries are unnecessary. It is an honored and respected department of our government.
Emphasis mine. There isn’t a single department of our government that has one shred of honor not deserves any respect.
A history of the department shows it was responsible for keeping members of the Constitutional Convention informed on a daily basis no matter where they were.
Because of what the Post Office did way back when we should continue to subsidize it now? Should our government have subsidize the horse and buggy industry when Ford came in and stomped that market into practical extinction?
In furtherance of its charter, in 1848 the Post Office Department awarded a contract to the Pacific Mail Steamship Co. to carry mail to California. Under this contract, mail traveled by ship from New York to Panama, moved across Panama by rail, then went on to San Francisco by ship.
Emphasis mine once again. What one man called a contract I call a monopoly. Whenever government contracts with a company to provide a good or service that company receives a de facto monopoly in the government market. Because Pacific Mail Steamship Co. was granted the contract they received an increase in business that was denied to other potential shipping companies. Because of this large surge in business they would have gained more money and therefore would have been better positioned to buy out or otherwise eliminate their competition. It is never good news when the government grants a monopoly contract to a private firm for something.
It was supposed to take three to four weeks to receive a letter from the East, but this goal was seldom achieved. The Pony Express was very competitive in time, but the mail was limited to 20 pounds.
NEIL CLARK, MINNEAPOLIS
Do you know what other company was very competitive with the United States Post Office? Lysander Spooner’s American Letter Mail Company. Of coure the government didn’t have any control over that mail provider so they killed it through costly (to Spooner, not the government as they control the courts) court battles.
We need to face the fact that the United States Postal Service needs to be entirely privatized (not this stupid hybrid of private and public they currently suffer) and made to compete on the free market. Their monopoly on first class letter delivery needs to be revoked and they must be forced to innovate and improve their service just like UPS and FedEx.
Libertarians believe all should be equal in the eyes of the law. That is to say if you break a law all factors involving gender, race, and religion should be entirely ignored. While governments around the world claim to subscribe to this fact, in truth they rarely act on it because doing so would be politically incorrect, politically inconvenient, or would grant arguments for political opponents to use in the next election cycle. Those who have read my site long enough know I have no problem with Islam, Christianity, Judaism, atheism, or any other religion or lack thereof. Knowing this you should know that this story would still disgust me whether the attackers were Muslim, Christian, or atheist:
The four women – three sisters and their cousin – were told the charge of actual bodily harm, which carries a maximum sentence of five years, against 22-year-old care worker Rhea Page would normally land them in custody.
However, the judge handed the women suspended sentences after hearing that they were not used to alcohol because their religion does not allow it.
Miss Page said Ambaro Maxamed, 24, Ayan Maxamed, 28, and Hibo Maxamed, 24, and their 28-year-old cousin Ifrah Nur screamed “Kill the white slag” while kicking her in the head as she lay motionless on the ground.
The support worker from Leicester was left “black and blue” with bruises and needed hospital treatment following the attack which came as she walked to a taxi rank with her boyfriend.
[…]
Sentencing, Judge Robert Brown said: “This was ugly and reflects very badly on all four of you. Those who knock someone to the floor and kick them in the head can expect to go inside, but I’m going to suspend the sentence.”
[…]
He said: “Although Miss Page’s partner used violence, it doesn’t justify their behaviour.
“They’re Somalian Muslims and alcohol or drugs isn’t something they’re used to.”
It looks like you can get away with beating somebody to the point of hospitalization in the United Kingdom (UK) so long as you are of a religion that detests the consumption of alcohol and have consumed some alcohol. I hereby declare a new religion, of which I’m a follower, called Odinism. Odinism does not support the consumption of alcohol in any way, it views such acts as being damnable. Now if I ever want to get into a fight with somebody in the UK all I need to do is drink a beer or two before starting the fight.
I’m just glad I live in a country where I can legally have a means of defending myself against four assailants.