A brief word on committees....

The only hope for America is the Libertarian Party.  We're the only ones truly standing up for economic and personal freedom.  (The Republicrats and Demoblicans talk about both, but don't make much progress.) 

We're the party in favor of LESS REGULATION. 

I'm in a State Libertarian Executive Committee meeting.  It's mostly about regulations and rules. 

All I'm gonna say is God help us all. 

But since Obama has daughters, they look a lot like....

A Question About "Quantitative Easing"

Ben Bernanke and the boys at the Federal Reserve have been printing an extra 85 billion dollars per month.  All in the name of "stimulus". 

North Korea has been printing a couple of million dollars per month.  In their case, it is called "counterfeiting". 

Both sets of printing press owners, Bernanke's and North Korea's, are churning out bills for themselves and their buddies - the people who get to spend them first. 

But let's assume that "stimulus" of this sort is a good thing. 

Does it matter where the stimulus is printed? 

The Monica Perez Libertarian Glossary

Several months ago I started getting hits from the Monica Perez website.  Ms. Perez has a lively talk radio show based in Atlanta. 
Go here for videos and livestreams.  It's good stuff. 

This is the Monica Perez glossary of Libertarian terminology, shamelessly copied from here.  We should all be grateful that we live on the same planet as this lady.  Here's Ms. Perez:

There are a few expressions and references I like to use on the air that are not (yet!) in common usage. For your convenience, I define them here. For additional color on the expression, click on the term itself and you will be directed to an outside source.

If you heard me say something on the air you don’t understand or if you know an expression you think I might like, please send me an email so I can define it for you and the other listeners.

Anarcho-CapitalismLibertarian and individualist anarchist political philosophy (also known as “libertarian anarchy” or “market anarchism” or “free market anarchism”) that advocates the elimination of the state in favor of individual sovereignty in a free market.

Austrian EconomicsEmphasizes the spontaneous organizing power of the price mechanism and holds that the complexity of subjective human choices makes mathematical modeling of the evolving market practically impossible. Its proponents tend to advocate the strong protection of private property rights and the strict enforcement of voluntary contractual agreements between economic agents, but otherwise advocate a laissez-faire approach to the economy.

Barry Goldwater Conservative
A traditional American conservative in the model of Senator Barry Goldwater, “Mr. Conservative,” who led the conservative movement in his 1964 Republican Presidential Campaign against incumbent Lyndon Johnson. A traditional conservative believes in fiscal conservatism, personal liberty, respect for the Constitution, strong defense and non-interventionism. This differs strongly from a neo-conservative, defined below.

The Blue Pill
From the movie The Matrix, the blue pill allows you to “believe what you want to believe,” while the red pill opens your mind to reality.

Boiling Frogs
The idea that if you put a frog in unheated water and heat it VERY slowly, it will boil to death before it has the sense to jump out. In the political context, it refers to the genius of incrementalism, whereby policies that could not otherwise be adopted wholesale are adopted little by little until the original goal is accomplished.

Conspiranoid
Seeming paranoid because you believe in a conspiracy theory.

Conspiranoid Mind-Vitamin
A small idea, or seed for your brain, that sounds like a conspiracy theory, but may be true and in any case will get you thinking about something from a different angle.

Controlled Opposition
From Lenin‘s theory that “The best way to control the opposition is to lead it ourselves.” The idea is that people like Alex Jones and Ron Paul who warn us of the power elite and lead movements of dissent are doing so at the behest of the very power elite they denounce. According to this theory, establishment operatives lead protest movements in order to direct the actions of those who would change the system, either by keeping them in line or by breaking them up into factions in order to neutralize them.

Crapitalism
Crony capitalism.

Crony Capitalism
A system in which the dominant force is the mutual relationship between the state and politically well-connected businesses in a mixed economy. As social power is increasingly replaced by state power, collusion between the political class and well-connected business leaders occurs with greater frequency and to a much higher degree.

Deep StateA deep state, or a state-within-a-state, is a political situation in a country when an internal organ, generally from the armed forces, intelligence agencies, or police, does not respond to the civilian leadership. The NSA scandal hints at the existence of a deep state.

Drinking the Fluoride
A popular conspiracy theory holds that fluoride in the water alters people’s brains and increases their docility and susceptibility to control. I use the expression “drinking the fluoride” when I’m trying to explain why someone might accept what is a clearly false or irrational explanation for a political event or position.

False Flag
In modern usage, a government operation that is made to look like it is done by an outside party in order to justify otherwise unpopular government action. For example, “9/11 Truthers” think the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, were a false flag operation conducted by the United States government to justify a more intrusive federal government. There is some evidence that the “Underwear Bomber” incident was a false flag operation.

The Full Rothbard
Many Libertarians are minarchists, which are akin to Classical Liberals, meaning they believe government should be limited to courts, police and national defense. Murray Rothbard claims that this can never happen because government, which is a monopoly, will never in practice limit itself, therefore government itself needs to be a function of competing institutions. Rothbard’s political philosophy is called anarcho-capitalism and arguments based on this theory go The Full Rothbard.

Fusion Center
State, local and regional institutions originally created to improve the sharing of anti-terrorism intelligence among different state, local and federal law enforcement agencies. Their mission has quickly expanded – with the support and encouragement of the federal government – to cover “all crimes and all hazards.” The types of information they seek for analysis has also broadened over time to include not just criminal intelligence, but public and private sector data, and participation in these centers has grown to include not just law enforcement, but other government entities, the military and even select members of the private sector.

Going Galt
Referring to the main character, John Galt, in Ayn Rand‘s novel Atlas Shrugged, “going Galt” refers to the phenomenon whereby the smartest, most productive people get fed up with the injustice and corruption of the existing system and refuse further to contribute to it.

Hippies of the Right
The pejorative expression used by Ayn Rand to describe libertarians, the political philosophy of whom she disapproved.

Internet Reformation
The phenomenon by which the Internet allows users to develop ideas that hone in on the true structure of society similar to the manner in which the Gutenberg press, by allowing a new and powerful form of communication among the masses, spurred the Reformation.

Keynesian Economics
The economic theory established by John Maynard Keynes in his magnum opus The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money. This theory is the foundation of current government-run economic policy and in my view serves to justify central economic intervention by using specious arguments. In the Twentieth Century, this theory won out over The Austrian School of Economics much to the detriment of our economic stability.

Liberal Fascist Center
When I lived in California in the early 1990s, I noticed that the liberal politicians were all for the Welfare State as all modern liberals are, but that they had abandoned social liberalism as evidenced by one-time Mayor of San Francisco Dianne Feinstein’s war on the Mitchell Brothers O’Farrell Theatre. Now of course the left has even abandoned it’s anti-war stance as evidenced by Obama’s unilateral decision to bomb Libya. Similarly, the right abandoned its principled opposition to the Welfare State and also abandoned Constitutionally-defined liberty. The parties had become essentially the same, both incorporating the worst of each side (welfare and warfare) and abandoning the best (peace and liberty). I dubbed this compromise position the liberal-fascist center. Later a book came out called Liberal Fascism that focused only on the left, but I believe it is the position of the entire Republocrat Oligarchy (see below).

Limited HangoutA limited hangout, or partial hangout, is a public relations or propaganda technique that involves the release of previously hidden information in order to prevent a greater exposure of more important details. It is possible that NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden was actually part of a limited hangout.

Neo-Con or Neo-Conservative
The traditional conservative movement was largely displaced by the self-named Neo-Conservative Movement in the 1980s. Unlike traditional conservatives, neo-conservatives do not eschew the welfare state but wish to make it more efficient; advocate legislating social issues; and wish to actively influence other countries using both economic and military means.

New World Order or NWO
Widely considered a conspiracy theory, the term New World Order or NWO refers to the emergence of a totalitarian one-world government through which the power elite aims to rule the world. Many politicians have referred to the New World Order over the past 40 years and have also used the word “Globalism” to indicate the same. Radio host Alex Jones is probably the most outspoken opponent of the New World Order.

Open Your Mind
From the movie Total Recall, a mutant named Kuato allows the main character Quade, played by Arnold Schwarzenegger, to understand the underlying reality of his world.

Paulbot
An often pejorative expression used to describe a follower of Ron Paul.

Paulbot Next Door
A segment on The Monica Perez Show in which we play a voicemail from a normal person who likes Ron Paul to dispel the myth that only fringe people can be libertarians.

Permission Living
An expression I coined to describe the phenomenon by which the government conditions you to ask them permission to do things you have every right to do: May I drive a car? May I get on this plane? May I take this job? May I buy a gun? Permits, licensing, registries, universal IDs, security check-points, e-verify are all ways in which the government has us ask permission to do basic things in our everyday lives. For now the government does not usually withhold permission unreasonably, but if they wish to they will have the apparatus and social conditioning in place to control the basic moves of law-abiding citizens.

Power Elite
A closely knit alliance of military, government, and corporate officials perceived as the center of wealth and political power in the West.

Prohibition Drugs
Drugs that arise in response to the incentives of the black market for drugs created by the Drug War. During alcohol prohibition moonshine took the place of softer, safer alcohol like beer and wine because whiskey was more concentrated and moonshine could be made locally. Similarly, meth and crack arise to replace cocaine because they are more powerful and pack more of a punch in a smaller quantity allowing for a higher price for any given quantity transported. Recently synthetic marijuana has been added to the list of prohibition drugs.

Proxy War
A proxy war is a war that results when opposing powers use third parties as substitutes for fighting each other directly. While powers have sometimes used governments as proxies, violent non-state actors, mercenaries, or other third parties are more often employed. If Saudi Arabia attacks Iran or Syria it will be a proxy war.

Red Herring
A clue or piece of information which is intended to be misleading or distracting from the actual issue.

The Red Pill
From the movie The Matrix, the blue pill allows you to “believe what you want to believe,” while the red pill opens your mind to reality.

Republocrat Oligarchy
Voting in the two-party system is like deciding between whether the Gambinos or the Genoveses are going to run your neighborhood–it’s not going to make much of a difference! The Iron Law of Oligarchy states that this is the inevitable consequence of democracy, according to Robert Michels, who posits that democracy is a façade legitimizing the rule of a particular elite, and that elite rule, which he refers to as oligarchy, is inevitable.

Shamocracy
I use this term specifically to refer to the false choice offered by the oligopoly of the Republican and Democratic Parties in the United States. The two sides appear to offer different philosophies and policies but in the end the march toward an overreaching government that operates above the rule of law at the expense of the citizen continues regardless of who wins a particular election.

Smoking the Kool-Aid
Drinking the Kool-Aid refers to the tragedy at Jonestown where cult followers of Jim Jones, and Jones himself, drank poison-laced Kool-Aid in a mass suicide. I say smoking the Kool-Aid to describe a combination of seeming too high and too fuzzy headed to see the truth combined with a blind willingness to believe propaganda.

Social Engineering
Efforts to influence social behaviors and the social structure on a large scale.

Social Conditioning
A sociological process of training individuals in a society to think, act or respond in a manner generally approved by society overall or forces within society that benefit from the populace being so trained.

Statist
Someone, especially a politician, who promotes the power of the state above all; this transcends any apparent loyalty to left or right, Democrat or Republican.

Stepping off the Grid
Technically, living without dependence on the power grid. Figuratively, this means not being subject to the controls of mainstream society but having to forfeit the conveniences that society has to offer.

Voluntarist/Voluntaryist
The philosophy which holds that all forms of human association should be voluntary. One of the moral principles frequently used to support this philosophy is the non-aggression principle, which prohibits the initiation of aggression or coercion.

Hit the links up top for the Perez website and livestreams.  This is good, good stuff !!! 

Never Let A Non-Crisis Go To Waste

Ok, this is some good stuff.  Please hang with me through the preliminary throat-clearing....

Here's The Economist magazine, formerly a cheerleader for Anthropogenic Global Warming, but now drifting toward well-founded skepticism for the second time in the last few months:

GLOBAL warming has slowed. The rate of warming of over the past 15 years has been lower than that of the preceding 20 years. There is no serious doubt that our planet continues to heat, but it has heated less than most climate scientists had predicted. Nate Cohn of the New Republic reports: "Since 1998, the warmest year of the twentieth century, temperatures have not kept up with computer models that seemed to project steady warming; they’re perilously close to falling beneath even the lowest projections".

Mr Cohn does his best to affirm that the urgent necessity of acting to retard warming has not abated, as does Brad Plumer of the Washington Post, as does this newspaper. But there's no way around the fact that this reprieve for the planet is bad news for proponents of policies, such as carbon taxes and emissions treaties, meant to slow warming by moderating the release of greenhouse gases. The reality is that the already meagre prospects of these policies, in America at least, will be devastated if temperatures do fall outside the lower bound of the projections that environmentalists have used to create a panicked sense of emergency. Whether or not dramatic climate-policy interventions remain advisable, they will become harder, if not impossible, to sell to the public, which will feel, not unreasonably, that the scientific and media establishment has cried wolf.

Read the whole thing if time permits, and remember the key sentence in that 2nd paragraph.  The reality is that the already meagre prospects of these policies, in America at least, will be devastated if temperatures do fall outside the lower bound of the projections that environmentalists have used to create a panicked sense of emergency.

Now we take you to Barack H. Obama, in full-blown Chicken Little mode. .   

President Obama will announce Tuesday in a speech at Georgetown University that he plans to regulate greenhouse-gas emissions from existing power plants, according to individuals who have been briefed on the plan but asked not to be identified.


In a statement Saturday afternoon sent via the White House Twitter feed, Obama said that he plans to fulfill the pledge he made in his second inaugural address to “respond to the growing threat of climate change for the sake of our children and future generations.”


“This Tuesday, I’ll lay out my vision for where I believe we need to go — a national plan to reduce carbon pollution, prepare our country for the impacts of climate change, and lead global efforts to fight it,” the president said. “This is a serious challenge — but it’s one uniquely suited to America’s strengths.”

Remember this, children.  Please, please, please remember this one thing.  The damn weather isn't cooperating with the models.  Climate isn't changing as predicted.  Obama knows that if he's going to get in another expensive boondoggle for supporters, he has to act fast. 

Here's some more of his statement.  For "economic opportunities", you can safely substitute the word "graft".  Or perhaps "kickbacks". 

In Saturday’s statement, Obama emphasized the economic opportunities that could come from tackling carbon emissions.


“We’ll need scientists to design new fuels, and farmers to grow them,” he said. “We’ll need engineers to devise new sources of energy, and businesses to make and sell them.”

Ok, enough of that damn fool.  Let's move on to another one, a senator from Hawaii. 

Senator Brian Schatz’s (D-HI) filed an amendment for the immigration bill Wednesday that would allow stateless people in the U.S. to seek conditional lawful status if their nations have been made uninhabitable by climate change.

I'll believe that I contribute to Climate Change when senator Brian Schatz’s (D-HI) starts travelling from Hawaii to D.C. in a canoe carved from a coconut tree.  Christ Almighty, do these people have no sense of shame?  At all? 
Here's more.....

Again, let me be clear about what this amendment does. It simply recognizes that climate change, like war, is one of the most significant contributors to homelessness in the world. And like with states torn apart and made uninhabitable by war, we have an obligation not to deport people back to a country made uninhabitable by sea level rise and other extreme environmental changes that render these states desolate.

The sky isn't falling, people.  It simply isn't.  We have weather.  Good, bad, and normal. 

There is no crisis.  But we're not going to let the non-crisis go to waste.