Why I Favor Capitalism Above All Others

I think I should take some time to explain why I favor capitalism instead of Socialism, communism, fascism, and all other economic models that have been proposed throughout history.  The challenge of the past few centuries in civilized Western society has been to determine the ultimate role of government in its own nations economy.  I believe that capitalism is the best economic policy a government can take.
First of all, I must define capitalism as I see it.  I do this because there are so many technical definitions out there and because the way I define it will definitely contradict some political science professor who claims to be an authority on economics.  Capitalism is an economic policy where the government seeks to minimize its intrusion into the market as much as it can.  Basically, the government can only do certain things, like uphold the law, protect individual’s property against other individuals, and protect its nation from a foreign power.
Given that definition, anyone with half a brain will realize that the United States is anything but a capitalist nation.  Truth be told, I believe that the turning point was the Sherman Act of 1890, although the Federal government’s support of the railroad system predates this.  In any case, the United States government holds a statist policy when it comes to economics, more specifically, a fascist economic policy.  This is where individuals are allowed to own private property, but are not 100% able to do with the property as they see fit.
So why do I favor a system that not even my grandparents lived under?
Because capitalism is the only economic policy that works with the United States Constitution, rather than against.  The United States Constitution provides for very specific functions for the three distinct branches of government.  Capitalism is the only logical economic policy if one were to apply the founder’s intent with the text of the constitution to the United States government.
Capitalism recognizes that while all men are created equal, by whatever means, not all men (and women) are capable of the same things.  It states that only in a free society does is a person able to meet his or her fullest potential in life.  In a statist system, where government intervenes in some fashion, there are always roadblocks and government force in the way for many fields of interest.  But in a capitalist system, where government only intervenes in order to preserve justice and maintain order, the individual is free to succeed or fail.  In essence, capitalism provides equal opportunity to all people, regardless of class, gender, race, or ideology.
Capitalism does not, however, provide equality.  Equality is an ambiguous term used by statists to advance their elitist agenda.  After all, since everyone is unique, how can we be 100% equal.  If humanity is a diverse species, equality cannot exist and cannot be measured.  The statist generally uses things like income or personal equity to measure equality and claim that no one is equal unless we all have the same income or equity.  Frankly, I would rather have my own property that uniquely defines me as I have different tastes than my fellow man.
Is this a cruel system to live under?  Not really.  It is, however, a hard system to live under.  At the end of the day, the person who thrives the most in capitalism is the one who works above and beyond the expectations he or she is given.  Those who consistently do this over a long period of time in a capitalist system may come into a significant amount of wealth, provided they attained it through honorable means.
Capitalism is also self-correcting.  When a person gains wealth through dishonorable means, he will not keep it long with few exceptions.  And even those exceptions end up getting caught down the line.  Reputation is everything when you are trying to sell a product or service in the free market.  If your reputation is that of a thief or scam artist, you will probably find yourself bankrupt in short order.
Capitalism is also self-correcting in terms of changing times.  The tastes and desires of a society will shift as new technologies, trends, and acceptable cultural practices shift.  The free market corrects this by either forcing the producers to shift their own business model or letting them go out of business.  Losses are always painful, but they are a simple fact of life.  In a capitalist system, the correction made to the market after losses occur will be swift and quick.  After all, people always want to make money and the free market system that capitalism provides for will always allow producers to change focus without too much coercion from the government.  Indeed, many of the dying industries in America today are largely propped up by the United States government.
Capitalism is a policy that maximizes liberty.  With minimal government intrusion, individuals are free to act as they see fit, provided it is honest and peaceful.  It also discourages war as a businessperson will not see a profit in war.  War tends to be detrimental to profits for any industry in the long term since it destroys scarce resources that have alternative uses.  And the government can only pay for so much before it starts to lose the economic infrastructure that supports war.  After all, the government, by its very nature, produces nothing of value but merely maintains law and order.
Lastly, capitalism maximizes the use of scarce resources to fit the needs of a society, given any circumstance.  If there is a famine in one area, food will be distributed at higher prices, but the net result is that more people will receive it.  If a natural disaster destroys homes, hotels and other forms of shelter will be available at a higher price, but the end result is more people will have a roof over their heads until they can rebuild their own homes.  And while the higher prices seem cruel to the individual, they actually benefit society as a whole without government coercion through planning or regulation.
Despite emergency situations, scarce resources will be diverted in other situations as well.  One example might be if there was no petroleum left on the planet.  In that case, the free market would allow individuals to seek out alternatives.  Since the process of using up one resource would take a lot of time, the problem would be addressed long before it becomes a reality.  Capitalism sees to it that innovation and invention are maximized and the maximum human potential is reached.
Capitalism is the most beneficial economic policy that a government can embrace.  It allows the government to focus on matters of justice and law and minimizes its coercive influence on its citizens.  As such, it maximizes liberty, innovation, and scarce resources to their fullest potential.  This is why I consider capitalism to be the only moral choice for a government to take when it comes to policy matters and why I favor capitalism above all others.

Not Really Christians After All

I read through this study done by the Barna Group and the result were not incredibly surprising to me.  Basically, a solid majority of Christians polled did not believe in the existence of Satan and a huge chunk believed did not believe in the existence of the Holy Spirit.
As a true believer in the living God, I am really not at all surprised by this study.  Too many Christians in America have let the secular and postmodern influences creep into their lives and let it corrupt their ideas and thinking.
If you are Catholic or Anglican, you are sure to recite the Nicene Creed every Sunday.  It is a very simple, straightforward statement of faith and is probably the foundation of Christian faith.
You cannot claim to be a Christian simply because you were raised in a Christian family.  God does not have grandchildren, only children.  Attending church is also not an indicator that you are a Christian.  Simply praying the sinner’s prayer does not mean much either.  Baptism does not save you from damnation either.
The only way to become a true believer is to accept Jesus, God’s only Son, as the savior of your life.  And you must do it within your heart because words and deeds mean nothing without the heart behind it.  God judges based on your heart and nothing else.
Although the results of the study run by the Barna Group does not surprise me all that much, I am saddened that probably many people who claim to be Christians are nothing more than misguided fools.  It makes the whole experience, the whole lifestyle appear to be trite and pointless.
When you do not believe the foundational doctrines of your religion, then what good is it really?  You may as well abandon your faith in favor of worldly things because God does not appreciate lukewarm Christianity.  He has stated that he would rather see you fall to this world than try and have it both ways.
As someone who is a member of struggling church that left the Episcopal Church over these very fundamental doctrines, I take this very seriously.
I would like to call all true believing pastors to elaborate the fundamental truths of their beliefs to their congregation, especially those who are leaders.  Everyone attending any Christian church needs to know and understand what the truth is, even if they do not like it (and there are many).  If you lose members, let them go.  Their life is not your responsibility, spiritual or otherwise.  Your job is to keep them on track in their faith as best you can.
And for everyone who is not a Christian, please understand that many of those in America who claim to be Christian are really not.  It is very obvious among those who are, provided you fully understand the fundamental beliefs of the Christianity.

The Stupidity of the Paradox of Thrift

John Maynard Keynes is probably the biggest economic buffoon of our time.  Not only are many of his ideas utter crap, as they were proven to have not worked while they were being implemented in the 1930s, they can easily be disproven by simple reasoning.
Case in point: the paradox of thrift.  Basically this idea states that:

If everyone saves more money during times of recession, then aggregate demand will fall and will in turn lower total savings in the population because of the decrease in consumption and economic growth.

In simple English, this means that if everyone saves during a recession, then consumption will go down and economic growth will stagnate or fall.
Now, I do not have an economics degree, nor did I take any formal economic courses in high school or college.  I’ve read a few books and articles written by prominent economists, but that is about it.  Given my lack of an educational background in economics, I am still fairly confident I can deconstruct the theory using only simple common sense.
First of all, this paradox is purely theoretical.  I’m sure that Keynes made that point in his various published media because in all practicality, such a feat is impossible in a free society.  So it while it makes sense in theory, it will never happen in reality.  At any given time, people are spending, saving, or giving with their money in some fashion or another.  It does not matter what state the economy is in.  You will buy things, whether you need it or not, because that is how humans interact in the marketplace and because of your own rational self-interest.
Secondly, the paradox theory itself seems to be very shortsighted and limited in perspective.  The premise assumes that people are simply saving money as a means to insure themselves from the future.  It does not factor in other personal finance issues, such as debt.  If you are living more thrifty today than you were during good economic times, this is more likely due to the fact that you have a lot of debt to clear up.  For the past two and a half years, my wife and I have limited our spending and saving in order to pay off our debts.  In essence, thrift does not necessarily mean that people are hoarding or saving money.
Thirdly, it assumes that savings increases through economic growth.  I am assuming that Keynes meant the interest rate on savings would decrease because the economy is contracting during a recession.  At face value, this is true, but only until you address the source of the interest rates.  If the interest comes directly from a bank through savings account, then it is based on the what the Federal Reserve does with its own base interest rate, at least in the United States.  Therefore, saving has nothing to do with economic growth, but the whim of the Federal Reserve.
Saving does get tied directly to economic growth only through long-term investing products, such as mutual funds, stocks, and bonds.  If such saving goes up during a recession, would that not mean people are confident in the economic future of a country?  So while the theory may hold weight with this kind of saving, it breaks down when you consider that long-term investing is a good sign of consumer confidence.
Lastly, this theory assumes that people will always save until they die and that people will not take out portions of that savings to buy things.  Once a huge portion of the populace is out of debt and has a sizable amount of savings, I am sure that consumer spending will go up again.  And whatever savings they do not remove will grow much more once the economy gets rolling again.
So Keynes did not know what he was talking about when it comes to the relationships between thrift, savings, and economic growth.  The only reason such theories have any credibility these days is largely because of the late President Franklin Delano Roosevelt and his “New Deal.”  Both former President Bush and President Obama rely on this economic model to dictate government policy.
Already, however, many people are beginning to see the fallacy of Keynesian economics.  It really does not take much effort to demonstrate how foolish it is to utilize Keynesian economics to dictate government policy, as shown here.

The Origin of the Third Party

So today Rush Limbaugh made a point on his radio show that voting in a third party President does not help because Congress would still be composed of opposing parties on both sides.  The net result would be Congressional gridlock (something which I approve of since the bureaucratic machine pretty much works with or without Congress).
Putting aside that notion, I think it is funny how so many people dismiss the concerns of third party voters and tend to label them as kooks and wackos.  But when those voters cause one of the main parties to lose, then look out.  Suddenly third party voters cause the downfall of society because they clung to their worthless ideals and refused to compromise.
Instead of blaming the third-party for the woes of the current state of any particular mainstream party, maybe that mainstream party should look inward.  If a third party causes enough of a disruption to cause a mainstream party to lose its election rounds, perhaps the mainstream party should rethink its own policies and representatives.  After all, enough people who have voted for your party in the past now believe that there is something wrong with it, right?
Take Ross Perot in the 1992 election year.  He rose up largely because the elder President Bush abandoned the Reagan conservative movement and instead governed from the center-right.  The Republican party made the correct response and brought out the Contract for America.  It is unfortunate that such a collection of ideals was quickly abandoned within a few years of Republican control.
Ralph Nadar is another example.  He grew in popularity largely because Al Gore was viewed as a center-leftist and not radical enough for the 5 percent or so who were radically left-wing.  It can be argued that Nader’s presence in the election cycle contributed to Gore losing enough votes to lose out to Bush Junior.  As a result, the Democratic party moved more left-wing than they usually were, supporting the radical anti-war protestors and disrupting everything that George Bush did, unless it was a left-wing policy, like prescription drug benefits or education reform.
Now this past year the Republicans suffered huge losses in Congress and lost the Presidency.  A huge factor in this loss was a large number of dissatisfied conservatives who were tired of the Republican party’s misbehavior and the nomination of John McCain, who was not a conservative.  I count myself among that group of individuals who was able to look past the immediate fear of an Obama administration (even as he now classifies me as a potential terrorist) and vote for someone that would not leave me feel like I compromised my ideals.
I remember Rush Limbaugh commenting last week on how the charges against Ted Stevens had been dropped and how we always through “our” own under the bus.  I am sorry to burst your bubble Mr. Limbaugh, but Ted Stevens was not one of us, which is why he was thrown under the bus in the first place.  If Rush Limbaugh does not understand this simple fact, I very much doubt the Republican has learned its lesson from the past election.
I have yet to hear of any significant Republican leader in Congress or from the RNC coming out and acknowledging the concerns of the TEA party protestors.  This is a bad sign for a party that once held up the ideals of Ronald Reagan and actually lived them as well.

Paul Begala is a Liar

I just read this commentary from Paul Begala.  Not only is it one of the dumbest things I’ve ever read, it is also perfectly illustrates how devious and treacherous the statists are.

To sum it up, Begala talks about how April 15th, the deadline for filing tax returns, should be Patriots’ Day and that it is “the one day a year when our country asks something of us -- or at least the vast majority of us.”

Talk about unbelievable bull crap (at about mountain height).  Let me ask Begala something: have you ever tried not filing your tax returns?  Have you ever tried not paying your taxes?

I don’t know about a Clinton agent, but in the real world, when you do the first thing you will end up in federal-pound-me-in-the-butt prison.  And if you ignore the latter, you will end up with your wages garnishes without a court appearance.

A sacrifice is freely given by an individual.  Taxes are confiscated under the threat of prison time or massive debt.  There is no possible way to defend yourself if you make money and not pay your taxes.  The IRS will come after you with the full fury of Hell (or at least tons of men with guns).

The rest of the article features this Democrat strategist, whose livelihood depends on the success of the Democratic party, claiming that the TEA parties going on all around the nation are funded by rich people.  I could probably spend a whole other blog on this, but it wouldn’t be anything you couldn’t find elsewhere.  Let’s just say that it was OK for George Soros to buy the Democratic party through MoveOn.org and start various extreme  left-wing “grassroots” movements of his own.

Paul Begala knows very well the implications of refusing to pay your taxes.  He knows very well what a real sacrifice is.  What he is doing is intentionally distorting the facts using clever spin and buzzwords to make it all look OK.  He cites only the necessary functions of government as the reasons for paying taxes, all of which could be completely funded at, at most, one-fourth of the current federal budget.

In short, he is lying about what taxes are and what they are all about.  He is distorting the facts in order to advance a political agenda.  He is unafraid to blatantly lie about it as well.

On one final note, just to show how dangerous the Democratic party is, he says toward the end, “Patriotism is putting your country ahead of yourself.”  This is the fascist at work.  No one ever conquers a nation without appealing to your altruism.  In short, he placing country ahead of the individual, just like Lenin, Stalin, Hitler, Mao, Pinochet, Franco, and all those other dictators in the past century.

Patriot’s Day happens every year on July 4th.  Today is nothing more than a reminder that the government will get your money the hard way or the easy way.

Illegal Aliens: So What is the Real Problem?

A few weeks ago, John Stossel did a report on illegal immigration and the huge amount of taxpayer dollars that flow into dealing with it. Today, he’s posted a column where he summarizes the report.

While the overall report is a fair assessment of the waste of the use of taxpayer dollars when dealing with illegal aliens, he does not address the source of the problem that causes illegal aliens in the first place. There are many reasons for illegal aliens coming to this great nation, but I think the primary reason is because the government has put up way too many roadblocks and procedures for becoming a legal resident.

At my last job, a Russian immigrant was hired to work for use shortly before I left. The company I worked for promised to pay for his legal fees associated with acquiring permanent residency here. It was somewhere in the neighborhood of $4000. This is because it takes a legal firm to fill out the application that is submitted to the State department or whatever agency deals with this kind of thing (there’s so many, no one but lawyers really know).

This is the crux of the matter. Government agencies have put so many rules and regulations with regard to immigration, that most illiterate Mexican laborers would rather just simply cross the border and risk starvation in the desert than go through bureaucratic red tape. And yes, many of them are illiterate or at least cannot sign their own name. I know this because I’ve seen them in a bank “signing” with a fingerprint when depositing money at their bank.

So what should be done? I really think that we should simplify the immigration checks and make it more efficient. Unfortunately, that isn’t going to happen because there are so many interest groups who want to have their piece of the pie when it comes to immigration. For one thing, a lot of companies don’t want highly skilled workers coming here and working in white collar jobs. This is because they’ll have to pay them more than if they simply outsourced the projects. Another group would be the lawyers themselves who prepare the applications for the various visas.

There is very little that can be done with regards to immigration in terms of background checks. Most of the time, foreign government information can be unreliable. The best we can do with that is to let them report to us their most wanted criminals, regardless of the circumstance, and honor their wishes. Sure, we can have asylum proceedings in some cases, especially when the crime is more political, but those will probably be rare. In most cases, we’ll just have to deny whole regions based on their government’s hostility to us. This is unfortunate, but at the same it is necessary to prevent terrorism. It would also encourage people from those areas to fix their own country.

The only other consideration is the spread of diseases, which is not checked out enough from what I understand. Blood samples should be taken from every candidate and tested for various diseases. We cannot allow people with serious diseases come here and infect everyone else. It’s a serious public hazard.

Lastly, we need to seriously enforce visa expirations. If the FBI contributed to this, we would get a lot done. Legal residents need to be given a 60-day notice that their Visa is going to expire in two months and they need to renew it or leave the country. If they don’t leave, we’ll track them down and deport them back to their nation.

This is a great nation. I have no qualms with foreigners coming here and contributing to the nation, regardless of what they end up doing (from working railroads to building decks to writing software). But I have problems with how our government has handled immigration and the dangerous environment they have created as a result. Many of the people I work with are immigrants (I think) and they are law-abiding citizens. I am sure that this applies to the majority of legal US residents and naturalized citizens. I’m fairly positive that besides coming here or staying here illegally, many illegal aliens are decent people as well. But we need a government that enforces the law rather than allows criminals to run free.

I do not expect Obama to do anything meaningful about this however.

The Paradox of Happiness

There’s a funny thing about happiness: it never really comes when you try to obtain it.  At least that’s been my own personal experience.  I can honestly say that my happiest moments in my life have just come to me without force or a whole lot of effort.
I’ve heard it said that happiness is where you are, not in the near future.  While I have often succumbed to the lie that if I just do this or buy that I’ll be happy, I have recently been finding myself much more ready to accept the circumstances I find myself in and to work with what I have.
I am happy when I am with my wife and enjoying her company.  I am happy when I have something to work on while I am at my job.  I am happy when I am blogging.  I am happy when I am summoning skeletons to defeat the hordes of Diablo, Lord of Terror.
It has been a bit of struggle, though, because there is always something in my life that needs work.  And it usually is a few things, some really big, and many really small and annoying.
For example, I currently am paying off a substantial student loan that’s going to need a lot of attention in order to pay it off early.  That’s a big thing.  And I often find myself obsessed over the idea of being rid of it in order to be happy.  I know that is an lie, but at the time it seems logical.  After all, debt could easily be said to be a form of slavery.
That would be a big thing.  A small thing would be like the Mountain Dew I had this past Sunday in celebration of giving up soda for Lent.  Since it was Easter Sunday, I went out and got one after Church but I didn’t find happiness in drinking it.  I enjoy it, but I didn’t have some kind of refreshing commercial moment with it.
So happiness doesn’t come with stuff or with accomplishments, but with your own contentment with the situation you are in.  This is probably the most important aspect of happiness that most people misunderstand.  Finding happiness in your own life means you have to find contentment with your life.  Sure you can still have ambition and desire, but without a contented life, ambition and desire can easily be corrupted.  I suspect this is what happened to those who were scammed by Madoff.  They all got so caught up in searching for happiness in money, that they didn’t see it in their own life.  A con artist is only successful with greedy people.
So that’s the paradox.  In order to obtain the things you desire and look for to make you happy, you have to be content with your life as it stands.  No one’s life is perfect, otherwise capitalism probably wouldn’t work.  But that doesn’t mean you can’t be content with your own life.
Those who are completely unhappy with their own lives and who seek to make it happy through their own desire and ambition often become statist politicians.  Beware of these people and their lies.  Find contentment with where you are and you will truly live life.

The Cowards of YouTube

A young 12-year-old child posted a video on YouTube about his views on gay marriage. It drew in a lot of criticism and scathing remarks, to say the least, about it. Frankly, I am not surprised by all this nor am I shocked by the comments made to this young child (ranging from being a bigot to demanding his suicide).

The Internet is a great resource and tool to our society. I love it and I use it everyday. But it also has given rise to people saying what they probably wouldn't say to anyone in real life. This youtube kid is a classic example of jerkwads who wouldn't say these things to the kid's face.

A few weeks ago, I was getting off a ramp on I-395 here in the DC area. The lane I was in would continue to get back on a ramp that would go on I-395 in the opposite direction. Naturally, drivers would need to get in the lane I was in and I needed to get in their lane. At the particular time of day that I was driving, it was really crowded in the lane next to me, so I was looking for a gap and had my signal on to merge over. I saw a gap and merged as soon as I could because I knew that many people would not let me over simply because they wanted to go their own way.

Immediately the guy I moved in front of honked his horn. I guess there wasn't as much gap as I thought, but I was pretty sure there was and I moved over without any trouble. In any case, he proceeded to pull over into the lane I had just left and pull alongside me. He shouted at me and I looked over and he flicked me off and called me a fucking prick.

I just smiled at him and kept going. I'll bet he was having a horrible day and I doubt it got any better for him. I was upset at him and it did hurt, but at the same time, I wondered why I was compelled to accept the opinion of some jerk on the road who hardly knows me. But I came to the conclusion that he was a coward and I'm sure he would have called the police on me the moment he felt he was in danger, had I followed him menacingly.

I have other stories I could tell of people behaving like jerks for no reason other than the fact that they are jerks. But this World Net Daily story illustrates perfectly what people will do when they have no expectation of being identified and can take potshots anonymously.

The respondents who called the 12-year-old kid names and demanded that he die are nothing more than evil cowards. They wouldn't say such things to the kid's face (although some might) and they probably would be more reasonable in a face to face discussion. But here on the Internet, where being anonymous is easy, name-calling and hate-filled rhetoric are the order of the day.

This is the enemy that we Christians face. These people are saying exactly what they're thinking. Otherwise they would not have said a damn thing. When we express our beliefs in a higher moral authority than ourselves and do so in public, we are hated by many. There is no sense in debating these immoral, irrational hatemongers.

They have already expressed their desire to see a 12-year-old die only because he opposed gay marriage and believed, as I do, that homosexuality is a sin. There is nothing to say to them. There is only prayer and there is only God's vengeance, which He will unleash when He sees fit, not when I or this 12-year-old witness sees fit.

I pity them and what will happen to those who would rather murder a child than question their own beliefs.

That's My King

Capitalism vs. Socialism: What Do They Know?

While I abhor polling data, largely for reasons previously described, I found a recent Rasmussen Report on capitalism vs. Socialism to be interesting. Apparently, 53% of the people polled believed that capitalism was better than Socialism and that about 27% were not sure.

What I found interesting was that the capitalists still have a majority, at least according to the poll. But honestly, do those 53% really know what true capitalism is all about or have they spent their days watching shows like "Mad Money" and believe that this is true capitalism.

Capitalism as an economic policy has not been a staple of any particular administration for decades now and it's not a particular favorite topic of discussion in Presidential debates. Both candidates called for blatantly statist polices in the last election. This time the most statist candidate won and has a very high majority in both houses of Congress.

Yet despite this, for some reason a majority of people in this nation believe that capitalism is the way to go with a huge chunk just not sure if either political philosophy is viable. Oddly enough, I doubt this poll will have a huge impact on the behavior of Congress. This is because when the banking bailouts were proposed, polling data indicated that all of use never wanted it, but Congress decided they knew better than us.

I am still wondering, however, if most people truly understand the fundamental concepts of capitalism and that the United States really isn't a capitalist country.

Another thing that concerns me is how the people's vote doesn't seem to involve much rational thinking if we are to believe this poll.

Think about it.

Neither candidate was the poster child for capitalism. People voted for Obama because he brought "Change" and "Hope" and "Government Waste." People voted for McCain primarily because he wasn't a racist and because he was anti-unborn-baby-brain-scrambling (my wife hates it when I put it that way). So really, when people vote, they vote because they either feel good or they feel fear.

But when you call them to task on their intellect, suddenly they're well-rounded people who truly seem to understand how things really work, at least according the poll.

I guess that's what happens when you base you executive power on a mandate from the masses. You end up resorting to the lowest common denominator and appealing to emotions rather than reason.

Emotionalism is killing this nation.

Free Speech for the Dumb

Well, it seems that a bunch of horny students at the University of Maryland plan on showing a XXX movie as part of a University-sponsored event:

University of Maryland students said they plan to screen a pornographic movie that was canceled after state lawmakers threatened to withhold funding, prompting another funding threat from one legislator.

Students at the university's flagship College Park campus have reserved a campus facility to show the film Monday night, while students at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County said they also hoped to show the film -- "Pirates II: Stagnetti's Revenge."

Kenton Stalder, a College Park junior who is organizing the screening, said he was inviting professors to moderate a discussion on free speech issues before the screening.

This goes back to an earlier blog post I wrote where I questioned the nature of freedom of speech with regard to private property rights.

The college campus is at least partially owned by the government, as it receives taxpayer dollars from the state (and most likely federal) government to support it. As such, the Maryland legislatures are well within their rights to dictate the policies of the campus. I am a firm believer that once the government subsidizes anything it, it effectively owns it. GM found that out the hard way last week and several small banks are finding it out now.

My solution to this mess? Privatize colleges. Privatize all of them and make them dependent on the tuition of the students and donations of the alumni. Eliminate tenure as well, as it will make the professor actually have to teach students rather than showing pornography in class. That way, the campus becomes owned by private entities and allows for deans to reject such ridiculous and perverse student activities without the whole freedom of speech debate.

And let's be honest: what does watching pornography on a college campus have to do with freedom of speech? From what I understand about the first amendment, it's about preventing Congress from silencing peaceful dissent. This blog, on occasion, is an example of me exercising my free speech rights.

Freedom of speech has be perverted as a concept in this nation, largely by the college campus university culture that seeps through to the rest of us via activist groups and left-wing, secular political movements. It's high time we made a concentrated effort to devalue college education (which is doing a fairly good job on its own) and focused instead on meaningful education for the next generation.

And let's all agree that this student activity is not freedom of speech, but a bunch of horny young men with no shame trying to get their favorite porn movie on the UMD campus' big screen.

The Only Way to Deal With Bullies

Now that former Alaska Senator Ted Stevens has had all his felony charges dropped, it seems that the Republicans in Alaska are calling for the current Senator to step down. Apparently, the Republican party there feels that the few thousand voters who voted against Stevens did so because he was an apparent felon.

Despite what I've said in the past about Stevens, which I still stand by, I actually applaud the efforts of Randy Ruedrich and Sarah Palin to fight back against an obvious injustice. Now that the charges have been dropped due to prosecutorial misconduct, it's pretty clear to anyone with half a brain that the charges were trumped up so that Democrats could win an election.

For years now, ever since at least when Clinton was in office actually, the Democrats have used the Justice Department as their own political tool. I would say that the DOJ is nothing but a bunch of toolbags for the Democrat party whose sole purpose is to make political prosecutions rather than actual criminal investigations. But that would probably be too nice a thing to say.

The Democrat Party is nothing but a bunch of bullies and thugs at the national level. They use whatever power they obtain to further their own ambitions and bring up false charges against their political enemies and tarnish their good name. Curt Weldon is a great example of what happens to you when you mess with the Washington elite.

But it's about time that the Republicans started fighting back. I don't expect this complaint to go very far nor do I expect Mark Begich to step down from his Senate seat. It is heartening, however, to see a new tone coming from various Republican leaders.

When Elwin Ransom beat Dr. Weston (or, at least, the demons possessing Dr. Weston), it wasn't through reason or talking. Dr. Weston had intelligence as a weapon. But he had the body of an overweight, middle-aged man while Ransom had a much leaner, more in-shape body. He also was a good boxer. And even though their fight lasted for a long while (probably a day or so), Ransom persevered and destroyed the demonic vessel that called itself Weston. (Read C.S. Lewis' Perelandra if you don't know what I'm referencing here)

While I am not calling for the deaths of the Democrat leaders, it's high time we started to really fight them. This means that we accuse them of lying, cheating, stealing, and we call for investigations and public hearings. We tell everyone that these people are thugs and not decent upstanding citizens.

I am not asking anyone to lie either. This is the blunt truth of the matter. The Democrat Party is being run by thugs, tax cheats, liars, thieves, and scoundrels. Many of the top leaders are some combination of those things. The only reason I have no sympathy for Ted Stevens himself is because he was ranked among that group. This is one of the reasons he didn't get any sympathy for the charges brought against because a lot of people figured they were true, given his history with pork-barrel legislation.

The conservative movement, which embodies the principles of the Republican Party, has always had reason on its side. But that reason has not gotten any wins lately. It is high time that we all fight back with ferocity that makes the dirtiest of mudslingers look clean. And we can do it honestly and with integrity. Being humble and being a human doormat is not the same thing. Do not expect your enemy to extend to you the same courtesy that you would extend to them.

The only way to deal with a bully is to bloody his nose. Then he'll back off like the coward he truly is.