Saturday, May 22, 2010

Liberty Song Saturday: Pendulum


Here is a cover of Pendulum by Jordan Page with a video that includes numerous quotes from the Articles of Freedom. It was originally put together as an ad for the Articles of Freedom Delivery Day--Patriot's Day, April 19, 2010. The Articles of Freedom were delivered to certain officials at every state capitol on that day.

The song, Pendulum, expresses the singer/songwriter Jordan Page's frustration with the false left-right paradigm:

". . . and the pendulum swings from the left to the right,
the momentum increases, the weight and the height,
But if nobody's listening, is anyone right?
And I can't find the key to the middle . . ."

This song is also about Page's personal observations of what is happening to his country and its Constitution:

"I saw a president blind to the needs of his people,
I saw a camel that passed through the eye of a needle,
I saw a group of old men whose money was evil . . ."

"I saw beggars and cripples dying in squalor,
I a saw a son whose sins has exceeded his father's,
I saw a nation of sleepers whose dreams were forgotten,
and a bushel of apples from a tree that was rotten. . ."

And finally, this is a song about Page's personal journey to the R3volution:

"I met a young woman with a baby inside her,
I looked but there wasn't a safe place to hide her;
I met an old man with a face like a mirror,
he showed me his sadness so I could see clearer . . ."





The quotes from the Articles of Freedom are special in their own right, and here they go together with the song. The Articles of Freedom document how our government has abrogated the Constitution, and how the actions of our elected officials in all three branches of government have destroyed Liberty. The Articles of Freedom are also a powerful call to action on the part of we, the people, to restore our Liberty by requiring our government to obey the Constitution.



Although the Articles of Freedom have been delivered to government officials in every state capitol already, it is still imperative that we join together to take the peaceful but forceful actions necessary to withdraw our support from a government bent on tyranny and the destruction of our Liberty.

If you love Liberty, go to the link above and sign the pledge.

It is our right and our duty to change a government that has become an instrument of tyranny.



Thursday, May 20, 2010

Wednesday, May 19, 2010

Update: "For It"


Note: I have been "gone fishing", but I interrupt my week of field work to update last week's post. Alert blog-friend Christine MM noticed that that the video I embedded in the post below was removed from YouTube by the user. Here is another version from You Tube:



Back to fishing! Check out my FB for short updates on the Silvery Minnow Project, and I'll blog that this coming weekend!



Thursday, May 13, 2010

"For It": Jihad Against Jews Comes to Campus



Some things need to be seen to be believed.
See the video below. In it, a vicious, freedom-hating, terrorist-loving young student supports the rounding up and killing of Jews worldwide. This the face of hatred on American campuses. This is real hate-speech and it is sanctioned by the leftists who are allowed to spread their hatred of American values to our children at tax-payer supported institutions.


The radical Muslim Student Association (MSA) at University of California San Diego sponsors an entire week devoted to the hatred of Israel and Jews. It also apparently sponsors a "Hitler Youth Week," at least according to a young terrorist 'wanna be' woman who supports Hamas, Hizbollah and the rounding up and murder of Jews worldwide.





I have a few questions:
1) Why are students on American campuses not allowed to discuss the genetics of general intelligence in private e-mails without being sanctioned, but certain members of privileged groups are allowed to openly advocate genocide in a public forum? Is it that some animals are more equal than others?

2) Is this MSA organization supported in part by student fees that every student is forced to pay? That is, is UCSD forcing its students to pay for Hitler Youth Week? Isn't it time for students to rebel against forced fees?
3) Isn't it interesting that I found this at Caroline Glick's site from the Jerusalem Post? Will the MSM cover this? I mean it doesn't rise to the level of Tea Party grandmothers toting folding chairs who voice their love for America on their own dime in Quincy, IL., so it obviously isn't news.



This is the intellectual level that the Progressives have brought our universities to; places where hatred is sanctioned as long as it is hatred of the right groups. Places where students and taxpayers are forced to pony up and pay for those who advocate the destruction of our own values. This video should go viral and serve as a wake-up call to the leftists who control our educational institutions that we will no longer pay for nor tolerate them teaching our children to hate the liberty that is their heritage.

To my fellow Jews: We'd better wake up! The collectivists have never had any love for us. They use us when we're convenient and murder us when we're not.




Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Dogs: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly


I haven't blogged on family life for a while--there has been so much going on around here that was hard to sort through what to blog and what should never see the light of day. I have been meaning to blog about the dogs for a while, but it was to be about the good, the good and the good. Until Sunday evening . . .





But I want to start with the GOOD:
Umbrae is now just over seven months old, and the vet thinks he's a Newfie/Husky cross based on size and some other characteristics. We know the mom, but not the dad, so . . . could be.

Umbrae has passed his Puppy Kindergarten and his Intermediate training courses with flying colors. He is very attentive to us when we are working with him, and so we just began a 16 week Advanced class that teaches the skills he needs to test and be certified by Therapy Dog International.

Because he is already bigger than both of our other dogs, and he is going to be bigger still, we have decided that the more training the better--and if he is a certified Therapy Dog--we can take him to lots of places. Since he is so smart and so willing (and as the Engineering Geek says--"so treat motivated"), this is becoming fun for us as well as for him.

At home, he is our happy-go-lucky Baby Huey, and he now obligingly fetches the newspaper from the top of the driveway for us.



The BAD (or at least the misbehaving): As Umbrae has grown up, Lily has grudgingly accepted him, but for some reason in the past few weeks a new rivalry has begun between Lily and Shayna, and Lily has been the agressor. I had noticed that Lily has begun to encroach on my territory as well.
It all culminated Sunday night when I went to bed early and fell asleep. Apparently, Lily got up on the bed with me, and when the EG moved her off later, Shayna was standing beside the bed. Lily went for her and cornered her. She did not go for the throat, so the trainer is pretty certain she was not going for the kill, but it still meant another trip to the vet, and another round with the trainer. Lily has been the only dog who is not crated. We got Shayna a crate last year when I noticed that she crawled under the rocker to sleep, and she uses it frequently. We started Umbrae on crate training right away and it has kept him calm and happy. So yesterday I finally got Lily a crate, expecting she'd be unhappy, but she took to it pretty well last night.




The UGLY: Poor Shayna, she was standing by the bed and maybe there was a look exchanged, and I was awakened by the serious growling of a dog fight, and the Engineering Geek breaking it up. Although it lasted no more than a minute, Shayna ended up with a gouge in her back. She hid in her crate that night, so I found the bleeding wound yesterday morning.

She came home from the vet with two shaved spots, five staples, and a desire to stay in her crate. Last night she did not want to come out at all, but this morning thirst and bribery got her to come out for a walk and to get her meds. She's now lying on the floor by my chair, but still she's quiet and more submissive than usual.

Yesterday I had a good discussion with the vet about Lily. Although she had a routine shot update in February, we are going to take her in for a full physical to make sure there is not an organic basis for her irritibility. It could be as simply as allergies. We also talked about structuring her days more carefully, and the use of a crate. Although Lily is not supposed to be on the bed, she was, and both the vet and trainer think this fight started as a dominance move on her part. But there has also been a lot of stress around here for a variety of reasons, and Lily is a reactive dog. So we have been told that renewing structure and routine, asserting our leadership equally over all three dogs, and crating Lily are all likely to make Lily and Shayna feel more secure and prevent further badness and ugliness.

From the start, Lily has taken on the function of showing me where my dog skills are wanting, and when our routines have been upset and need resetting. She's been the most challenging dog I've ever had. And yet we have become better dog owners one step at a time as we have dealt with her. She is getting older and has become calmer, she doesn't like strangers, but she no longer fears them, and now in her middle years, we have to keep her feeling safe and secure by providing structure for her. She is our household barometer.

And that's the good, the bad and the ugly dog story for the quarter.




Saturday, May 8, 2010

Introducing Liberty Song Saturday . . .



Somewhere there's a picture of one of my ancestors in some little town in Poland or Lithuania carrying the black flag of anarchy while singing the Anti-Fascist March.

The word Anarchy means "no ruler" and the idea that my anarchist ancestor espoused was that each person is sovereign over his own life.

Anarchy does not mean "no law", although those who fight for their individual rights are often accused of lawlessness when they oppose oppressive governments.

Anarchy does not mean "no morality." A thoughtful anarchist understands that the nature that endows a human being with individual rights requires the most rigorous of morality--not one of tradition or convenience--but an objective requirement that the individual rights of all must be respected, and that all morality springs from that.


Many anarchists believe in a kind of stateless communism in which all property is held in common.

Other anarchists are radical libertarians who dream of a "libertopia" that is stateless capitalism, in which each person possesses complete sovereignty over herself and her property.

Today's liberty song is called Justice Day and the lyrics are by Claire Wolfe of Jews for the Protection of Firearms Ownership. These lyrics have an anarchist bent, promoting the idea that when the lawmakers become lawless (rule of men rather than laws), then the outlaw becomes the champion of justice.

"When the criminals, criminals make all the laws,
then anyone breaking them fight just cause . . ."

The song begins with the immortal image from 1984: "You're the boot stomping on the human face--forever - -"

More anarchist imagery is heard with phrases like: " . . .Then out of the darkness the rebels arise, on that day, on that day the outlaw will rise . . ."




Even the person who posted this to YouTube thought it was "leftist", but JPFO is libertarian--and the most radical libertarians are anarchists in the spirit of Lysander Spooner. However, there are those libertarians who think of anarchy as an ideal to be dreamed, but as a matter of policy support minarchy--the concept of a state with very little power--and follow the spirit of the American Founders.

I am a libertarian who has dreamed the anarchist dream, but I also realize that restoring the Constitution, which provides us with a very limited government, is work enough for one lifetime.





Thursday, May 6, 2010

Lieberman's Citizenship Bill: An Attack on American Justice


"Those who would give up Essential Liberty
to purchase a little Temporary Safety,
Deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
--Ben Franklin, 1759


Jumping on bandwagons in response to events rather than dealing with issues according to principle is the MO of a venal politician. We have many venal politicians in Washington and in our State Houses. The Progressive Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., has recently indicated how little he cares for the basic principles of American Justice in his proposed bill that would allow the federal government to strip a person of his US Citizenship without a trial and conviction, simply because the government believes that he has "ties" to a terrorist organization. Here is Lieberman, breaking his Oath of Office by proposing a clearly unconstitutional bill:






This bill is one those act now, think later political moves that come in response to an incident--in this case, the failed car-bomb attack in Times Square last weekend. Since the accused car-bomber, Faisel Shahzad, is a naturalized American citizen, he has certain rights that are protected by the US Constitution. When he was arrested, he was given his Miranda Warning, which is familar to every avid watcher of TV cop shows from Dragnet to CSI. The Miranda Warning is a statement from the arresting officer(s) to the detainee, that explicates his due process rights during police investigation and interrogation. We've all heard it:

"You have the right to remain silent. Anything you do say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed to you. Do you understand these rights as they have been read to you?"



When Shahzad was arrested a firestorm of controversy erupted over the fact that the Miranda Warning was read to him. And so Lieberman, supported by the Scott Brown of Massachusetts proposed that any US citizen who has been accused of "having ties" to a terrorist organization, should be stripped of his citizenship immediately--presumably so that the United States can interrogate him without telling him his rights.

This is wrong on principle, and pernicious as well, and since non-citizens also have certain due process rights in US Courts, it's useless as well.



On principle, the problem is that the United States Constitution guarantees that the rights of any person cannot be removed from him by the United States without due process of law:

"No person shall . . . be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law. . ." (Amendment V)

Note that it says "no person"--it applies to all human beings, not only to American citizens. However, in the Lieberman Bill, a citizen on the mere suspicion of undefined "connections" to terrorist organizations could be deprived of his citizenship and the rights and privileges thereof, without being even suspected of a crime, let alone actually tried and convicted for one. This is an outrageous violation of the liberty (at least) of American citizens. The due process rights in the Bill of Rights includes the right to presentment or indictment by a grand jury for capital and infamous crimes, the right to be free from double-jeopardy, the right to a speedy trial decided by a jury of one's peers, the right to be informed of the charges to be tried, the right to the assistance of counsel, and the right to be confronted by the accusers and witnesses. The Lieberman bill would make a person guilty by mere association, and strip him of his rights on suspicion of such, rendering punishment before he is tried and convicted.



I suppose this is the logical result of the years of trial by media which has culminated in the popular sentiment that a person who is forced to do the "perp walk" before TV cameras is guilty unless he proves himself innocent. And maybe not even then.



This proposed bill is pernicious because it gives the government unprecedented power to violate the rights of any person that it chooses not to like. How hard would it be to fabricate "ties" to some group or organization that the government decides is terrorist? Gentle Reader, if you think this is far-fetched consider the MIAC Fusion Center Report that placed ties with Ron Paul, the Libertarian Party, the use of the Gadsen Flag, and discussion of the US Constitution on par with domestic terrorism. Talking Idiots Heads on MSNBC have all but accused Talk Radio personalities such as Glenn Beck of commiting sedition ( something that should NEVER be a crime in a free country--but that's another blog).

This bill goes far beyond the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798 that caused mass protest across the United States, and even beyond Woodrow Wilson's persecution of those who spoke against US involvement in WWI. Under those equally unconstitutional laws, at the least the accused had to be indicted, tried and convicted prior to being stripped of any rights. Joe Lieberman would strip a person of rights before any trial could occur, and even without suspicion of any "crime."



The passage of this law could and would lead to the worst kind of terrorism: terrorism against the people by their own government and the ongoing repression of speech and thought by the state, and the outright suppression and persecution of dissent upon those opposed to specific policies.



Joe Lieberman wants to keep you safe by stripping you of your rights. He claims that this power would be very limited in scope. I remind you that never in history has a government arrogated to itself power that it did not use. In the immortal words of Judge Andrew Napolitano: "It is not government's job to keep you safe. It is government's job to keep you free!"