It is Time to Drop the Word Conservative

Let me start by saying first-of-all that I am not claiming that we abandon the 'conservative' principles we hold dear. So do not reply telling me that I have given up, threw in the towel, betrayed the movement, etc... I also am not saying that we begin trying our hand at the liberals game and try to 'control the language'. What I am saying though is that we need to stop letting ourselves be branded or that we cease to hold on to a term we have held for long and that we simply begin to call ourselves and the people we oppose by their correct names.

The word "Conservative" refers to someone who wishes to retain, to 'conserve' the current order of the world. In simpler terms, a conservative seeks to ensure that things remain the same. Let me be clear, under this definition, we are no longer 'conservatives'. This is an obvious point as we no longer wish to conserve our current position in the world.

On the off chance you do not believe me, consider:

• We have sought, not the continuation of things as they are, but of things as they were.
• To this end we have sought not our current government, but a smaller one. i.e. different government.
• We have argued for lower spending, not our current budget, but a smaller different one.
• We have argued against the high taxes we have had repeatedly imposed upon us, and argued against this continued practice. i.e. we have argued for an end to the current system.
• We wish our government to be held accountable to the people, and held in check by its laws and restrictions, especially its limits on power. In other words, we want our system to be governed differently from the way it is now.
• We seek an end to government handouts and demand a return to self-reliance.

This list could go on, but the point is obvious. Even arguing that the things that we want were in the past, it cannot be argued that these things persist still. We do not live under a constitutional republic any longer, we wish to impose it and make it permanent. We do not live in a free-market system any longer, but wish to create it so that the forces natural to it can take over. We no longer have individual freedoms that are protected by our government, but we instead have freedoms that are routinely violated by the same government we wish to reform.

Simply put, the very system we are said to want to protect and 'conserve' no longer exists. Today, to be a conservative is to want government intervention, to desire handouts, and to accept taxation as a necessity for the common good. In other words, to be a conservative today, is simply to be a slightly less radical liberal. This is because the beliefs held by the people that call themselves conservatives are no longer in place. The things that are in place are the very government programs that we want to end, the taxes we want removed, the bureaucracies we want dissolved, the regulations we want lifted, the practices we want ended. Nothing in our current government is left to us to conserve. Even our founding document is now more of a decoration than a document to be enforced. It would be simpler to find a genie to grant wishes than to find things we wish to conserve.

In short, we are now the radicals. If you do not believe me then read the tenth amendment to someone who calls themselves a liberal. If you are not hounded for being 'crazy' then I am truly amazed. We are now the crazies. This sounds insane to think, but consider the crazy ideas many people now accept without question. We now live in the world that gives credence to the remark that "the lunatics are running the asylum." When it is the lunatics who run the world, is it not logical to assume that it is the sane who are called crazy? Insane? Radical?

The term conservative no longer applies to us anymore and so it seems we need a new word to identify ourselves with. This term already exists. That term is "Classical Liberal". A word from which Progressives originally snaked the term 'Liberal' in order to change their colors for a time. The simple fact is that we have always been Classical Liberals. We simply have allowed the Progressive movement to re-brand us as conservatives in order to make us sound old and dusty. This no longer has to be.

That term is our term and many already identify with it. As long as we allow ourselves to be called conservatives, the progressive movement will always be able to tell the world how it seeks to change the world. As the very word conservative contains within it the meanings they need to place the blame on our shoulders, our possessing it, even reveling in it will simply be a hindrance.

In order for us to win this battle, we must educate everyone and tell them what it is we mean. The word conservative cannot be tolerated anymore as confusion can only be created by such a word. In preaching a change of government, we must not also incorporate words that confuse our intent. We cannot preach change as the "Conservative Party" or as the "Grand Ole Party". We must leave behind us our tendency to cling to things that possess a certain tenacity for it is this tendency toward the present that people wish to avoid.

This world can still be won with ideas as long as their exists one person's mind which is not yet made up. These minds however do ask for consistency in message, and it is best that we choose even our words carefully so that we do not get confused with the current set of ideals.

Individualism and Collectivism

In UNLV, I am a Psychology major and a Philosophy minor (undeclared). I have been spending a lot of time trying to prove, in a philosophical manner, a central tenet of individualism. If you read my previous posts I have made, my obvious bias toward individualism can be seen. When I was little, I thought that it was an undeniable fact that I was right, and that if logic were followed, everything I believed in would be proven. I now know this was naive and ignorant of me. This is because I had accepted, as an absolute, an axiom that I now seek to prove should be accepted by everyone. I said I would focus more on theory now that news is calming down, or to be more precise, is becoming more repetitive. (You can only do so many “Obama's taking away our rights, or violating our constitution” posts in a row) I shall focus on two axioms that most people seem to take for granted as being correct. I shall try to make this sound as non-philosophical as possible because, well, most people hate philosophy for that reason. So I will tone down the language so as to not bore the crap out of my > .01 reader per day. If someone happens to come across this and mistake it for an intelligent conversation, then feel free to post objections to me or my argument.

A crap load of people call themselves individualists or claim at some point that individual rights are important. This is probably the reason I began to believe my axiom was absolute. Alas, natural law theories like that are easily destroyed. I realized this when I was talking to a guy on campus at UNLV. He was an Obama stumper and naturally we got into a heated argument. Eventually I tried to get him to tell me what premise is his argument must be based of off for what he was telling me to be acceptable. Naturally the reaction I got was the question repeated back at me to which I gave the often used reply, “I believe that individual liberty and responsibility are the most sacred things in this world.” I was rebuffed with the reply “but how could we build a society?” Though memory may not serve me well enough for that to be an exact quote, his reply allows me to begin describing what believe, what I think everyone believes or should believe if they are conservatives or libertarians, and what I have begun to learn about the opposing ideology of the man I had that argument with.

Consider what I was saying first of all. Essentially I was explaining that I believed in liberty; which, in this case, is defined as freedom to choose. This is a central tenet of a philosophy called individualism. This is primarily a political philosophy, but I am trying to extend this to ethical debates as well. On the political side, this states that the smallest unit that possess its own rights and therefore must be respected in its own opinions and choices with regard to itself is an individual. To be more clear, every person must be respected and counted as far as their voice, opinions, beliefs, desires, and freedoms go. To be even more clear about this, it is an accepted fact that every individual possesses their own rights and these rights cannot be determined from an outside source without their own consent. This means that there is no reason that is good enough to deny any individual's rights unless that right is freely given. I am making the assumption that the word 'freely' leaves out all forms of coercion.

In this respect, I was making a statement about what I believe is right. That being that I have rights that cannot be taken from me, as Jefferson would put it, rights that are inalienable. If you are a conservative or a libertarian then you likely already believe, or think you believe this whole heartedly. The man I was talking to made a statement that spoke to the heart of the opposite belief. This belief is the negation of individualism, or that 'It is not a fact of the world that any individual has a right that cannot be violated under any circumstances.' In other words, if it serves some purpose that is deemed worthy, then an individuals rights may be violated if it serves that purpose. This is the axiom that a collectivist must take as being true to be considered a collectivist. (It could be argued that a collectivist must also believe that these violations must be for the 'collective good', but this is not integral to my argument. If it does bother you, then simply note that a collectivist is an anti-individualist and that my arguments would apply to all anti-individualists as well.)

Let me put this into context. If I were a politician who was also an individualist, and say there were people starving in Calcutta that I wanted to save, then I could do anything that I wanted so long as I never violated another person's rights. For instance, it would be wrong obviously to kill a man and feed him to the children in Calcutta as that would probably violate his right to make choices with regard to his own life. Pretty simple huh? It would also be wrong to steal money from people, or otherwise compel them through force to give their money to the people of Calcutta. This is because I would be violating their own individual rights to choose what they should do with their possessions. I personally do believe in charity, but this belief does not grant me the right to violate others rights. A collectivist on the other hand would have no qualms about doing any of this if he or she decided it was a good thing.

That is the difference between individualism and collectivism, it is that simple. However, both have extreme consequences as well that I have been wrestling with. Starting with collectivism, some people may not yet have a problem with this yet. After all, the collectivist could argue, what is wrong about taking some small percentage of everyone's income if it ends world hunger. Peter Singer actually makes several claims and even alludes to the idea that someone ought to do just that in “Famine, Affluence and Morality”, though to be fair, this is mostly a result of his argument pattern. Who could argue that famine is a worthy cause? Most religions actually state that it is a moral obligation of all their followers that they be generous. Ignoring that, could it be hard to accept that people's lives are unimportant?

This line of thinking may get you jumping on the bandwagon a little too early though. Note that I could use the same sort of logic to argue that all children in the world must be given education. After all, would it not be a crime to allow a single child to go without this benefit? Imagine being unable to get a job somewhere that does not include saying “pull up to the next window please”. In fact, if it could be argued that any cause imaginable could be undertaken in this manner given the proper argument. If the cause is good, then the collectivist must agree that an individuals rights can be violated to achieve it. This is dangerous. Take Obama for example. No one will doubt that he believes that we must strive to help the working poor and so he supports all sorts of programs and taxes to do so. Consider though the possibility of an ideological shift. Now it is considered true that it is in the best interest of the population to be taught a certain thing. Maybe this thing could be argued to help the working poor as well if everyone was taught and and believed this thing. Imagine now this thing was that certain people or groups of people should be made infertile. Margret Sanger believed that “the idiots and morons should not be allowed to reproduce” and see sought funds for her crusade, successfully might I add.
The collectivist might argue now “That is obviously wrong and should not be allowed.” I could argue back though, “consider how much food is being wasted on the useless. If the useless could no longer reproduce, then there would be more food left over for the poor. Also production would likely increase faster ending poverty on a planet wide scale. Is it not more right to save the lives of millions over the mere ability to reproduce? In order to avoid this type of trap, the collectivist would now be forced to add qualifiers to his original axiom; qualifiers like “unless it leads to personal mutilation” or “unless it leads to death”. These qualifiers are just arbitrations and therefore up to arbitration. Could I not argue that back then we thought it wrong to castrate people on the basis of who they are, but now we no longer think that. Unless a rule is an absolute by virtue of being itself or being based upon something that is based upon itself, then there is no foundation strong enough to keep an arbitrary rule like that from being violated.

This may make collectivists run to become individualists now. I myself am an individualist and I have done a great deal of thinking about what it means to be an individualist. As I believe there is no circumstance that justifies violating someone else's rights, then I must also believe that even if it meant the death of children in Calcutta, I cannot choose to take someone else's rights to help another no matter the circumstances. This is an obvious point and almost all conservatives and libertarians will agree with this. This goes much further too. For instance, take a hypothetical many people have encountered. Suppose you are the president and you are kidnapped by strange terrorists who take you to a secluded room. In this room you are confronted with your grandmother who is bound and gagged. You are told that you have only two choices, either shoot your grandmother or blow up a city in your country. What is the right choice? A lot of people would answer “the first one” and this is used often to prove what is called Utilitarianism. However in this case I would say that neither choice is right by the strict definition of it. Pretty simple and agreeable right? That fact that shooting your grandmother might not be as bad as nuking a city, does not make killing your grandmother a good thing. Further, as an individualist, you would be forced to try for the 'third option' so many action stars try in movies. This is because the other two choices violated someones rights and this option, though its success rate is probably very low, does not.

Even the last point I made could be accepted by conservatives and libertarians, though it would be remarked as being impractical and so could not be exercised in the way I described it. I would not disagree with such a statement; though we should strive to create that perfect world where no one ever needs to have their rights violated. Now I find it necessary though to point our some places where conservatives and some libertarians cease to follow the logic of the axiom. The first point is at torture. Obviously torture is wrong if your are torturing for the hell of it, but it is applauded if it is done for what is considered good. Obviously, if you believe that an individual has certain inalienable rights, then barring the possibility that you would argue the person being tortured lacks these rights for some reason, you must agree that torture is wrong. I am probably hated at this moment but read on for a second. Torture is wrong, but the same argument regarding grandma and the terrorists could be used to argue for torture. Note though that this still means that torture is still wrong, not that it is right. What is we had our hands on a terrorist and discovered through some reliable source that he possessed information that could stop a nuclear bomb from going off. Would it not be right to get the information by any means necessary? No, it would not be right, but it may be unavoidable. This argument sounds pretty impotent if I were trying to stop torture. My real purpose is not to stop that though. My point is to make apparent the fact that torture is not a good thing, or even an okay thing. As such, it should never be regarded as such and should be used as a last resort at all times. This attack is more an attack against the attitude about torture than an attack against torture itself.

Maybe most people could come to terms with the above. However, this is not the only problem I have come across. Consider gay marriage. It is my opinion that both sides have the proper solution wrong. The left overwhelmingly believe it is our duty to legalize gay marriage both on the state and federal level as no one has a right to say no to anyone regarding who they love or who they can marry. Many people who call themselves conservatives believe that gay marriage should be banned to protect the sanctity of marriage. Here is the simple truth with regard to individualism, both sides are wrong! The left tends to first make the correct point that we have no say in other peoples marriage practices, but then they throw that away by continuing to use the government. This behavior implicitly acknowledges the government's (and therefore everyone else's) say in what they do. A lovely way to contradict yourself. Of course any conservative that preaches for smaller and less intrusive governments is also contradicting him or herself when they then insist on regulating away a kind of marriage. In reality, government intervention must be removed entirely to avoid this problem. Note that I am not saying we must accept what anyone else does, lets face it, I am not pro-gay. I personally believe that a homosexual lifestyle is a stupid choice of lifestyle. However, if you grant the right to regulate marriage from one group, you have also implicitly given permission to have the same done to yourself. For this reason, and the fact that it is plain wrong, you cannot regulate marriage. For more information on this argument, read my previous post on marriage.

Individualism is obviously very anti-government control and regulation. In fact, if the logic is followed well, then it would seem that the best form of government the world ought to exist under, is the government that most closely comes to Anarchy as possible, while still holding enough power to prevent people from violating each other's individual rights. If ever it were no longer necessary to use government intervention to prevent murder, theft or rape, then it would follow that it was no longer necessary to have a government. This may seem insane but consider what government was used for in the first place. It was created with the sole purpose to prevent chaos and rampant crime, it was also created to protect its citizens from enemies both at home and abroad. If none of these problems existed then what would be the use of such a construct? It would be like keeping a can opener when cans have been discontinued. This once again comes down to practicality. I do not think for a second the Utopian world described above will ever exist, but it is imperative according to individualism that only those rights should be taken that are absolutely necessary for people to live around each other and that the individual gives his or her explicit or implicit permission for all violations of his or her rights.

It is finally time to consider objections to Strong Individualism. I could argue that Individualism is self-contradicting. Imagine a serial-killer decided to use individualism. He claims that he has the right to choose whether or not he can stab a poor woman on the street. This woman would obviously not want this and so would claim that she has the right to choose to live. It seems then individualism protects both people and so contradicts itself. This is so only if you agree that all choices must be respected. If it instead reads something like “An action is wrong if and only if it violates another persons choice intentionally...” then this is no longer self contradicting in this way. This is because the serial-killer never possessed the right to kill the woman and so his rights are not diminished if he is disallowed.

One last objection is that individualism does not prevent fraud or consensual child molestation. To this individualism need to be modifies in a small way. Simply make it wrong to intentionally use information, restrict information, or in some way reduce the number of options the individual is aware of so as to undermine their ability to make a choice. So in the case of fraud, it is obviously wrong to misinform someone to trick them into a certain condition. In the case of consensual child molestation, even if the child were told before hand what was going to happen to him or her, it would be difficult to say the least, to prove that the child understood what was being described. Because of this, it seems that under the age of fifteen, it would be almost impossible to prove the individual had the ability to understand what was going on or the consequences of his or her actions.

I will be the first to admit that this is radical. It is insanely radical. I must point out though that most conservative and libertarians hold these truths to be fact. It would be dishonest to not follow them to their conclusions. While I do not expect most of what I have written here to ever be enacted in full, I do believe that we must at least always move in that direction. It is the right thing to do.

You wanted it and now you have it.

Well there you have it; Obama won. If you’re a lib I am sure your happy, which if your like me, is just plain strange when you think about it. It is like watching a guy with schizophrenia cut off his arm to stop it from hurting him. If you are a lib I am sure your thinking “Oh just another republican ticked off he lost. GET OVER IT. (loser)” My favorite gloating comment came from a guy yesterday night who told me “Get over it and work with us.” No doubt he is all for unity. I, on the other hand, care only about ideology, conservative ideology that is (with some libertarianism thrown in to boot). This means that if Barrack keeps his promises then I could never “work with him”. Sorry, it does not work that way. If I disagree I will straight up tell you. “Working with him” would require going against everything I believe in.

This post isn’t about me being angry. As the title suggests, this is about what you want. You voted for Barrack and now he will be our president on January 20. I will merely be informative about what you have done to yourself. I am sure you won’t believe any of this but keep reading and remember. I told you this will happen. I will state a position you voted for and then show you precisely how you will get it. Enjoy.

“I voted for him because he will finally stop working for the rich and help out the middle class/working poor.”

Certainly he will tax the rich, and every conservative will howl at the idea. Not because we ourselves our rich (technically with my current income I would fall under Obama’s money giveaway), but because it simply is wrong, period. That is right, even if it screws me I don’t believe in taxes above and beyond what it takes to run the country (note: I am only including constitutional duties, not money givaways).

The problem is that he wants to kill the Bush tax cuts which, when implemented, decreased taxes for everyone with taxable income above 6k dollars. The cuts in the 2001 cuts were 3% for anyone in the 28% tax bracket and above and a tax cut of 4.6% on the highest bracket. (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_Growth_and_Tax_Relief_Reconciliation_Act_of_2001 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_Growth_and_Tax_Relief_Reconciliation_Act_of_2001 numbers for individuals, brackets are higher for all other statuses. You can also read the actual document posted by the IRS, though if you have a life (lucky) then you will want to skip it. http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-soi/01taxsh.pdf. That is a lot more in depth. Enjoy.)

“The bush tax cuts helped the middle class?” Yes, we have been telling you this for five years. What? You think we are going to lie? Why wouldn’t you make the same assumption about the other side? I don’t have a history of lying to others and most conservatives I know don’t either. To late though so this is what you get if this was your mistake.

Now taxes will increase on everyone. Certainly this will affect the ‘rich’ more but never-the-less it will hit everyone. He is a problem though. The rich can take a hit. If I had 200k and lost ten percent then, well that sucks. If you an the other hand have 35k and lose ten percent then that is the difference between buying a new TV and taking your child out of that jumpstart program for elementary. So say goodbye to your child’s college aspirations, hello McDonalds. It gets worse of course.

The ‘rich’ will want their 10% back. Since they tend to be the class that runs businesses then they will increase prices. For those of you who don’t read economics, that means inflation. Further, they cannot just raise prices forever to combat high costs. No one will by a three dollar banana. So they must reduce costs. If Obama didn’t already say he was going to mandate healthcare insurance then that would probably go. A pay cut would make sense but won’t happen because that too is locked out for any minimum wage job. So if your Richie rich then you will fire people. This means job losses.

“That can’t be true, Obama said he would create jobs.” The fact that you believe that is why people like me are shaking our heads in shame. Taxes NEVER create jobs. “But Obama said he will give tax breaks to those corporations that provide jobs.” Even if he does that it will not be sufficient to counter Obama’s progressive tax that is more then 50%. The tax break would have to be a fifty percent cut on Obama’s own proposed tax increase. This means that even if we were all lying about the Bush tax cuts then the middle class would not do well under Obama. Further people who pay no net taxes (i.e. receive rebates equal to their taxed income) will receive additional checks. Good news if you make less then 25k per year (till the inflation gets them anyway), but everyone else is stuck will the check. Have you figured it out yet?

“I voted for Barrack Obama because the republicans screwed up the economy.”

This is an example of a half-truth. Yes, Bush allowed several measures that increased the national debt to pass. This irritates me as well, but this has little to do with the economy. Why bring it up then? Because libs often do, usually using this as a reason against the Iraq war (front). Although this increase in debt does exist remember, article I section VII states “All Bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives”. So this includes budgets. If you think this doesn’t clear the republicans then remember this. During the entire six years of republican congresses the debt increased 2,947,308,345,232.84 but under the last two years of democratic congress the debt has increased 1,891,061,112,953.10. This equates to 490 billion per year for the republicans and 945 billion per year for the democrats. That is nearly double. Even if the Iraq war had never happened the deficit per year would be only 100 billion less. (source http://www.treasurydirect.gov/NP/NPGateway)

This really does not matter though since this has little to do with the economy until the printing presses start. However the Community Reinvestment Act is a big cause of our problems. It is the bill that created Fannie and Freddy, and during the Clinton administration they both were told to give out sub-prime loans en mass. Loans to people who cannot pay? Seems to me to be a bad idea but hey, who am I to judge Clinton’s economic ideas? This was forseen for years and ignored by the democratic congress. So now capital is running dry. Combine this with the taxes Obama will increase and we are screwed. (see a pattern?)

“I voted for Barrack Obama because he is pro choice/gay rights/environment etc…”

At least in this case you are voting for an ideology. In the case of abortion I think it is abominable and gay rights (i.e. marrage) I think the solution is a poor one. In fact I have already provided arguments against these so read those then come back.

“I voted for Barrack Obama because he is black and we need a black president.”

The argument for this is always retarded. Either we need to make up for past wrongs or we need to make history. The first one is easy to defeat because if that one is true then we should also elect Kim Jung Il for putting him through all the trouble we put him through with our sanctions. It would also make sense to elect an Islamic, an Indian, an Irishman, a Russian immigrant… see where this goes? Even though we have enslaved an entire people, that is not a sufficient reason to have one as president.

The history making argument goes awry as well. If this is your argument then understand it goes both ways. If Obama becomes a great president (a laughable idea), then he will go down in history books as a great man. You could continue this and say things like “our past wrongs would be righted” (see last paragraph) “Our world and our country will be more diverse” or any other ideas. The ones you choose don’t really matter. If however he is a bad president then he will be infamous. Even if he is a sort of bad president the world will remember him as a disappointment. This taken to its conclusion suggests that all we have done if force every black guy after him to live under his shadow. If he is a good president then hurray, but if he is even a little bad then it will be harder for every successor to get out. So by this logic I would say you only wanted to make it harder on them all. That is a bad idea.

The major point I am trying to raise on the last reason is that you need to pick someone based on their ideology not some superficial trait. It would be as if I picked Paris Hilton. Granted that isn’t entirely as bad a Barrack, after all, she does have a better energy plan the Obama.

Oh well. In two years we can take back congress and in the meantime filibustering is still a slight possibility. Barrack is safe though I have no doubt. Now that the election is over I think I will focus on theory a lot. The big challenge for conservatives will be to educate their friends and family. This isn’t just a war of people, it is a war of ideas, and I think in the grand scheme of things our ideas are better.

Even crazy glue can't keep his trap shut.

I bet Obama’s campaign advisors are searching for a gag that will effectively muffle his speaking. I don’t think it would help in this case though. If you haven’t heard, then let me be the first to tell you about Obama’s latest gaff. This one is about seven years old.

In 2001 Obama gave an interview with the local NPR station WBEZ in Chicago. This of course being before he was planning to run for US senator or president, he spoke his mind as liberally as he could. There were many wonderful quotes from this. A few examples are such as these.

“the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth, and of more basic issues such as political and economic justice in society.”

“It didn’t break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution, at least as its been interpreted, and Warren Court interpreted in the same way, that generally the Constitution is a charter of negative liberties. Says what the states can’t do to you. Says what the Federal government can’t do to you, but doesn’t say what the Federal government or State government must do on your behalf”

“one of the, I think, tragedies of the civil rights movement was, um, because the civil rights movement became so court focused I think there was a tendency to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalition of powers through which you bring about redistributive change. In some ways we still suffer from that.”

Each of these quotes by themselves is scary. The second is my favorite though. Obama there was trying to state that the constitution does not define what the government is supposed to do for you. I think this is proof positive that Obama has ADHD. He was a professor of constitutional law in Chicago and he couldn’t even bother to read a couple pages in to see Article I section VIII? Maybe he skipped that, and Article II section III. This is somewhat amazing at first but take a look at the rest of this tape that surfaced on Youtube and other sites and it becomes apparent what he means.

The first quote was his reasons for believing that the Warren court was not really that radical. This was the same court that banned prayer in school but hey, who am I to judge. Those evil Christians had it coming. Naturally this is a very important quote as of late. After all, he has been speaking of redistributing the wealth. Some claim this means nothing, but in reality context is everything, and the context is his belief that we should re-interpret the constitution. If you do not believe that then just read quote number two.

Later in the tape he was asked about how to bring about this change. (Do you understand now why change isn’t always good?) He stated that he did not feel optimistic about these types of changes being made at the court level. (i.e. he doesn’t think anyone could get away with it.) However he never said it couldn’t be done legislatively. Of course it could be done legislatively; if you read the constitution then you will know that. The question is should it be done, and unfortunately he seems to answer that question for us today and in that interview.

This certainly came at a bad time for Obama. It has been only a few weeks after Joe the Plummer reared his head and the ripple was still going. Now this causes even more people to look at him and see that dreaded S word on his head. He is already considered foreign. The only thing he really had going for him was that many people falsely believe that McCain would just be more Bush. This fear is now being combated with a bigger fear; the fear of socialism and all other forms of totalitarianism.

To this I ask the question who is really surprised that Barrack believes this? Ideas of socialism permeate his speeches, radicalism drips from every word he spews from his mouth. Are people really this blind or do they want so bad to teach the Republican Party a lesson that they are willing to destroy the country?

His pastor subscribes to black liberation theology, a philosophy derived largely from socialism. William Ares (known lovingly as the fireworks specialist. He is available for parties and insurrections) is a radical from the 60s. Normally that would be all you need to know to know Ayres is bad but it is worth noting that he was also a bomber and a self described communist. These comments are unfair though. After all, lots of us detonate bombs in our capital. It’s a game we play called “guess what kind of timer I used this time.”

“But these are all past associations, they mean nothing.” Even allowing that, doesn’t Obama tie in really well with Obama? I think that association works great. People are starting to wake up and figure out what is going on. Unfortunately early voting has been going on for a bit so this revelation will have a reduced effect.

His third quote that I pulled was by far the scariest. Sure, the first one smacks of socialism and the second one shows just how little he knows about the constitution, but the third one calls for action “on the ground”. If you substituted “political and community organizing and activities” with “Proletariat organizing and activities” then you have a near verbatim quote of Marx and Engels. Revolution is what that one is about, specifically with regard to “redistributive change.” His own website tells you that you must ask not about what change he can bring but the change you can bring. That is as fascist/socialist as you can get without wearing the colors.

“Your being paranoid.” Maybe, then again there is a reason we have more then one country in shambles because of these ideas. Countries like the USSR, Cuba, Italy, and Germany don’t convince people to help them out by promising gulags. It is always some form of Utopia that is promised. Barrack wants us to believe that if we vote for him then the middle class will prosper and the ‘evil’ rich will be brought under the reins of the government. Health care will be affordable (‘free’) and everyone will be given a fair shake. He doesn’t mention that we will also be under his thumb and that the fairness of our shake is entirely up to him, congress and bureaucrats. If you believe that he would never abuse his power like that then look at Russia under Lenin. Even if he were incorruptible then would you want to bet that the next guy will be also?

The fact is that the people are starting to see him for what he is. This is a problem because his real self is just plain scary. The polls are beginning to reflect this as the AP shows McCain just one point behind, well within the 2.5% margin of error. Well Halloween is on Friday so maybe Obama will go as himself. That might scare the children though.

The ACORN dosn't fall far from the tree.

We have more talk of voter fraud this election, and this time it is the dems who are involved. I am not saying that the dems don’t usually commit voter fraud, (after all, I need to give them their due) just that this one is definitely them. ACORN, which stands for Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, has been singled out for a fraud investigation in which several states, including my own, have been seeing enormous amounts of fake registrations. These states include Wisconsin, New Mexico, Indiana and Nevada. I have also heard of Ohio being yet another state in this laundry list of targeted fraud.

Targeted I say? Well I would say that when immense voter fraud ‘happens’ to be rampant in swing states, and this fraud can be traced to a single group, then we have sufficient evidence of a group of people trying to sway an election. I thought it was us republicans who tried to steal elections. Everyone still talks about the alleged voter fraud in Florida in 2000. You know, boxes falling off trucks and polling machines being tampered with in heavy democrat counties. (Of course since this all happened in Florida we could chock all that up to, well, Florida. No offense to Floridians of course. It isn’t your fault that your bureaucracy is filled with incompetence.)

In reality this isn’t a surprise to anyone. Even in 2000, the election had numerous attempts to steal the election including not counting the votes of absentee military votes, and this was perpetrated by the dems. In 2004, ACORN was suspected of voter fraud, again. (Source: http://www.epionline.org/news_detail.cfm?rid=171) And no in 2008 we have yet more ACORN buisness. (Vegas source: http://elections.foxnews.com/2008/10/07/acorn-vegas-office-raided-voter-fraud-investigation/ CNN secondary source: http://hotair.com/archives/2008/10/10/cnn-acorn-fraud-and-ties-to-obama/)

As that last source indicates, Obama is tied with ACORN. It appears that he has donated $800,000 for voter drives. I find it interesting that he claims that he had nothing to do with this at all, yet the same voter drives he donated money for are the same ones committing fraud. Obama, however, claims that he had nothing to do with this. He isn’t even president yet and he already has Nixon beat for corrupting politics. Perhaps I am wrong though. Maybe dead people really are rising from the dead and voting for him; he is called the messiah after all.

Of course an ACORN lawyer had this to say. “We believe their purpose is to attack ACORN and suppress votes.” (also from the hotair.com source) No…. we don’t want to do that. We want to encourage as many people as possible to vote as many times as they like. We, after all, strive for the same kind of accuracy that internet polls give us. He continued “We think that by attacking ACORN that they are going to discourage people who have may have registered with ACORN from voting.” This seems like a laughable claim since half the votes turned in are from ACORN employees. The GOP scare tactics are dazzlingly effective it seems to me. My god, what will we think of next. “Vote McCain or else we will cover your with pet dander!” God help you if your allergic to cats.

Bertha Lewis of ACORN has stated “We immediately dismiss employees we suspect of submitting fraudulent registrations” (foxnews.com) I am not certain if she meant any fraudulent registrations or just very bad fraudulent registrations. After all, if I was paying a guy to steal an election and he registered the Dallas Cowboys starting lineup, I would probably fire him too. I live in Nevada, trust me, Terrell Owens doesn’t. Things like this almost make me wonder if they wanted to get caught.

But none of this matters. We all know democrats don’t steal elections, republicans do. At least that is what I am told. I seem to be out of touch with my branch of the right wing conspiracy. I have forgotten what horrible plans we have come up with.

No, this is just the normal strategy of the left wing. I wonder if one day they will make powdered instant voter. Obama will be pleased and trust me, if he wins, all will be forgiven for ACORN. It is, after all, what he wants.

Where is the self-destruct button?

I am an idiot. I must be because when I saw the House shoot down the bailout I honestly thought that those representatives were standing on principle. Turns out all they really wanted was some more pork. It was kind of like a Jambalaya from hell. Don’t believe me? Look at the bill yourself. http://banking.senate.gov/public/_files/latestversionAYO08C32_xml.pdf

I look at this crap; The Mental health Parity Act, The Hurricane Ike Disaster Relief, The Secure Rural School and Community Self-determination Plan? No it turns out the real reason we didn’t pass the bailout the first time is because several House members needed an excuse to usurp several banks and loans. “I didn’t vote for the bailout, I voted for the disaster relief.” “No, you see, I really voted on the Mental Health Parity Act. Do you hate the mentally challenged?” I am sick and tired of these creeps covering their own behinds. A well trained sniper would have a hard time taking a shot at their butts. Where are the courageous representatives who stand up and say “No, I will not tolerate this. I will stop you from going beyond your enumerated power and stop this bill.”

If you look at the votes on this bill on congress.org, then you will see those that, hopefully, did just that. Unfortunately only the few seemed to pay attention to those pesky words in that irritating document our founders mistakenly wrote. I don’t doubt that if our founders had another go at it John Adams would have said “Hey, you know what we should add in here? We should add something like ‘and the congress shall have power to impose their will upon the markets in times that shall be determined my congress.’” On the bright side, Jefferson’s spinning body could be harnessed for some green energy.

If they were not so isolationist, I just might switch my registration to Libertarian. Unfortunately the Republican party has been taken over by cowards and moderates. (Moderate is liberal speak for a Democrat who is quite fond of elephants.) Most people at the grass roots are happy for the mere existence of Sarah Palin. Unfortunately her existence does me little good if McCain insists on her reading from scripts.

However do not get me wrong. Our ideas are not dead. The fact that I am posting this up here on the internet proves that. Trickledown theory is still popular, collectivism is still opposed harshly and the peaceniks still tick most people off. Conservatives are not dead, Conservatism is not dead. The party though, it is crashing. Politics have taken over and instead of standing up for what we believe in, the politicians stand up for what will get them re-elected.

These people are starting to disappoint me. It seems that there is little chance of people like me just getting rid of these guys the old fashioned way. So join me and let’s find that self-destruct button. Maybe we could start all over again, but most likely not. Until the Republican party grows a backbone we wont be able to do this our most sacred duty, which is get these guys out of office.

Fannie Pack-age

Congratulations, you are eligible to lose about 1.5 to 5k dollars. With the numbers still rising on the Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac bailouts we can be rest assured that we will be paying the bill. Let’s forget for a moment the ignorance required to believe this is a good idea; let’s ask the question "How is this even constitutional?”

There is nothing, nothing in the constitution that allows this. What is this you ask? Well literally buying three companies (Fannie Mae, Freddy Mac and AIG). The government will get the stock majority of these three companies and essentially run them into the ground. Apparently a bunch of House Dems took us seriously when we told them to “try running their own company”. The federal government is supposed to dismantle the failed corporations once the bailout is complete but this assumes the government actually does what it is supposed to do. Sorry if I don’t believe their sincerity, but then again this same government said Social Security is to be used only for Social Security.

Understand that when the government says you will bailout Fannie and Freddie (no I did mean you); it means the debt incurred by the “inevitable” bailout. I wonder what Biden would say about this. Whether or not he supports this is probably determined by how it affects Amtrak. No this is a problem for Barrack Obama. He has received the second largest amount from PACs and individuals associated with Fanny and Freddy totaling $126,349. (individuals includes employees of those two companies. Data courtesy of OpenSecrets.org)

This debt incurred will start as half a trillion to, some say, as high as 1.8 trillion dollars but we have to pay interest on that sum too. In the end we will all bite this big one. Not because we have to or even should, but because the government has once again started playing SimCity with the market. Somehow throwing money at the problem seems like the opposite of what we need to do.

Don’t get me wrong either, this once again is a bi-partisan effort to screw us all. G.W. himself said we ‘need’ to do this. Seems like every time I can start to be happy again about him being in office he says something stupid. McCain has also bought into this dogma. God save us all.

I suggest we forget this all. Let every company that is going to fail do just that, fail. Sure, the stock market will take one hell of a hit. Many people will find themselves in trouble but in the end the stock market will strike back strong and most people will get their assets in order. However if we go down this path, which believe me we will, then the entire U.S. economy will suffer for it. The corporations will suffer from higher taxes and our countries credit will crumble further. Inflation will definitely occur and in the end someone will make millions writing a book about how we might have made a mistake. Well someone has to benefit from this.

Back To School Obama

It has been almost a month since my last post. The reason is that I am currently dealing with the massive preparations involved in getting set up for my next two semesters at college. However, just because I am busy in my little bubble does not mean that the world has stood still.

Last week McCain and Obama had their first debate of sorts. It isn't a debate really, but more of a series of questions asked to both of them in two hours. Barak Obama, trying to prove he isn't a radical as the "Vicious Right" says he is, gave nothing but noncommittal answers the whole interview. This made him appear, well, noncommittal. This isn't good, as it is only a short step away from weak and can even worsen the flip flopping accusation he is already suffering from.

Later when McCain answered the same questions, McCain was more direct with every answer. This at best (for Obama) does not cause McCain to suffer the same problems Barrack is suffering from. At worst, it even can make McCain look strong.

(For those who did not watch this you may still find the unedited video on C-Span. If you prefer edited versions with snarky commentary then I am sure You Tube has more than enough to satisfy.)

I do not often relish in helping out competition and really am not fond of doing the same for someone as socialistic as Obama but here are a few tips for not doing this again.

1. Keep to your issues or, at the very least state, your false positions on your issues. You may be called a flip-flopper but that is eternally preferable to being called weak.

2. Give straight answers. If the ground you stand on is wishy-washy, then your ground may very well crumble into a vast landslide.

3. Stop pissing off your base and this goes for McCain, too. The more you stop talking the talk, the less likely your base will support the undecideds you might get.

4. Stand on your principles. A lie is still a lie and the American people are not stupid enough to simply accept anything you tell them as being the truth. The more you stray away from your positions in the primary the more people are going to resent you.

Also on another note, Stop Playing the Race Card, Obama! No one buys it. In a day and age when I would have to literally go look for a single racist, I am not going to buy that. There is this vast swath of voters and Republicans who want nothing more than to stop you from becoming president for many other reasons. Unless, of course, by racist you are including anti-socialists as well.

I don't expect anyone in the Obama campaign to read this or even anyone to read this, but I had to say it. Even if someone from the Obama campaign did read this, I doubt they would take heed. They know their ideas are unpopular. An idiot would take just a moment of thought to arrive to the conclusion that their ideas ultimately lead to dictator ships or as Jonah Goldberg argues, Fascism. Democrats know this, so their ideas are either prettied up or hidden completely. Just as well, I certainly hope Obama loses, then we only have Hillary to deal with in four years. Although I hate to say it, I think Hillary would make a less destructive president then Obama. Now if you excuse me, that last comment makes me want to take a shower.

Iraq, A war gone right.

Imagine if after WWII we had only lost three thousand soldiers (not including the attack on Pearl Harbor) or if it used only one fifth of our national budget instead of the 3/4 it did use. Iraq, a war whose statistics are exactly these has been waged for over five years now. Let me first correct myself and a common misconception. This isn't a war as in the Iraq war, but a front in the War on Terror. This includes our front in Afganistan. Regardless of this trivial point many people have become disillusioned about this particular battle. Many beleive that this distracts from our true goal of finding and hopefully executeing Osama Bin Laden. This is the first thing that is wrong. We are not there to kill Osama, we are there to stop terrorism wherever it exists. This means fighting the terror orginaizations and the countries who harbor them. Sorry to disappoint the war for oil crowd but well... your wrong, and I am certain that some if not most of you know on some level that you are wrong, either in logic or in actuality.

In the beguinning George Bush Jr., with intel from MI6 (the british version of our CIA) stated that Iraq was looking for nuclear weapon materials. Where are these WMDs? Well first he said "looking" and also stated that they "might" already have them. Well how do we know this isn't a lie? Well as the times online reports the Butler committee agreed with this assesment based on data known at the time (source http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article457472.ece). Not only were they looking for WMDs but already possesed some in the form of Nerve gas. (Source http://www.defensetech.org/archives/000915.html) Along with this they also possessed: 500 tons of yellow cake uranium (left over since after Desert Storm, why it wasn't confiscated by the UN inspectors is beyond me and just another reason we shouldn't even trust them to sell girl scout cookies.) and approxamately 500 chemical weapons including Sarin and Mustard gas (http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,200499,00.html note: weapons were partially degraded due to their storage). Ya right, we lied, I admit it.

The yellow cake is under dispute as it "could not be used in a nuclear weapon" And sulfur makes a very bad propellent by itself but with salt peter it goes boom. "They did not have the ability to refine it themselves". Strange assertion since I could refine it myself. It is very easy actully. The only problem is that someone as unskilled as me would have a very large loss ratio. This isn't to say that it is exceedingly difficult to build a centerfuge though. "They didn't have enough to make a bomb." It takes 8 kilograms of uranium 235 to make a gun or implosion type of atomic bomb. 500 metric tons is literally thousands of times that. If their refining was poor and produced only one gram of U 235 for every kilogram of yellow cake then they would have enough for atleast one bomb. Assuming, as is could be true, that U 238 made up most of the material a breeder reactor could still be constructed to change it from U 238 to Plutonium. Safe, right.

Bush didn't lie and wasn't even wrong about Iraq but that dosn't mean we shouldn't have been there. Accepting this poor line of reasoning we could of course point to the depravity of his regieme but we went in there under the War on Terror. Although some may disagree with that statement I made it and will now have to defend it. What if I told you Saddam himself was rather friendly to terror orginizations?

"Many terrorist movements and Saddam found a common enemy in the United States," This is from a report regarding the link between the dictator and and multiple terror groups including Al-qaeda (he was not involved in 9/11 however). (source http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2008/mar/21/saddam-friendly-to-terror-groups/) Multiple contacts andconections? Sounds bad if you ask me.

So there were 'other' reasons for the war? Oil had to be the real reason though. No, it wasn't. I doubt it was more then an after thought. Remember, conservatives and moderates want local oil, not foreign. The Democrats may be open to this but in general the american people are not. How could I know? Well, it wouldn't even be a logical place to go for oil. Think about the fuel spent to get there. If we did infact go to war for oil then a more logical step would be to invade Mexico or even better Venezuela. Both have oil reserves and both would be vastly cheaper to wage a war against.

The war is costing too much. This is intresting to hear since the dems are not known for fiscal responsibility but lets play along. Often when refering to this arguement people talk about our nine trillion dollar national debt and how the Iraq war is the cause. Then in a quizzical yet intresting display of self defeat they also spout off that the war has cost 500 billion dollars right now. 9 trillion minus 500 billion is 8.5 trillion dollars so if the Iraq war never existed then we would be 8.5 trillion dollars in debt still. Ahh, what would they bitch about then? How bout the social programs that cost our government hundreds of billions of dollars a year? It is like a little cute Iraq war in every one of them. Only alot of the money invested in Iraq goes to American contractors to buy American steel and American made parts. Those social programs go to paying people not to work. Ya, this one doesn't float either. Glad to see them talk the talk though; it is half the job after all.

No fiscal responsibility is the reason. "But we are loseing the war!!!!" We are doing so well that their own prime minister now thinks it is time for a time table. I must say he is doing a good job as since Al-Maliki has taken office we have fullfilled 15 out of 17 benchmarks we have set upon placing there. Iraq will be stable given just a few more years (I would wager no more than 5). Unfortunately credit for victory may be given to the protesters this time. If the dems win then it is no doubt they will pull out. Id I was asked three months ago I would tell you it would be a massacre, today I would say it wouls be a gamble. If Iraq manages to stand on its own then it will be to Iraq and Al-Maliki's own credit and not the democratic party, not Nancy Pelosi and definately not Harry Reid.

Iraq was not for oil, Bush didn't lie, WMDs were found and the war is not being lost. But hey, don't listen to me. I am just one of the brainwashed sheeple. I will just sit back and wait for this to end for the better or for the worse.

I am back.

I have taken A haiatus of almost a year. I decided for no particular reason to change the name of my blog and deleted my previous posts. To sum up what this is, it is sufficient to say that I am a conservative and this is where I go to vent my frustrations. Why the name? Well... I dont know, just seemed nice.

Making the incorrect assuption that you care, I am a psy student at UNLV. I am currently an honors student. Origonally I was home schooled and later started college at the age of sixteen. Now I am a Jr. with a psy major and a math minor. (Strange combination huh?) Knowing as much about psycology as I do, I think I know now that I should be institutionalized.

My mother is a political consultant, as such I know how the system works. I am a sort of idealist in that I truly beleive that given the right information, people will come to a correct conclusion. Often I am confounded in this belief as people continue to fail to learn from the past. Yes that is right... history is important.

Most of my beliefs I hold come from my family although I do not think I would hold them today if I thought there was anything wrong with them. To give an idea of what I mean it would be easiest to say that I am a big fan of Spock. When I was little, about twelve to thriteen, I watched the origonal series and fell in love with Spock. He seemed smart and was always right so I modeled my thought after him. Thats right, logic is my forte. I tend to ignore feelings and go for things that make the most sense. That, of course, is a requirement of logical thinking. Yes I know what you may be thinking, I am souless and care about no one. Not true. I just will not subject my intellegence to rule under feelings.

I am done talking about myself though and want to get back into talking about political events so Let us begin shall we?