I posted this video a while ago (here), but have found some good criticism of it.

I hate his implication that this fight for Constitutional rights is racially motivated. The shit you have to put up with when you believe in liberty . . .

Here’s a criticism of the video from blog.tenthamendmentcenter.com:
1. Turley is absolutely correct that “decades of precedent” in the courts oppose the view that the federal government is not authorized to enact a national health care plan. But, what he fails to point out, is that under the original meaning, intention and understanding of the Constitution – these kinds of powers would have been unthinkable. The court is, in plain English, wrong. Learn more here.

2. Neither the host nor Turley seem to have any clue about nullification – or its current efforts. Nullification has nothing to do with getting a positive ruling from the Supreme Court. It’s when a state passes a law simply refusing to implement a federal law. In fact, it has a long history in the American tradition. It’s been used to resist laws against free speech, fugitive slave laws, the use of the militia in war and more. Hardly “right-wing” at all. Learn more here.

3. Nullification has also been used quite recently – and effectively too. Approximately two-dozen states refused to implement the Bush-era Real ID act. And guess what – the courts aren’t needed, and neither is Congress. The law is a dead letter. Null and void.

4. Oh, and that pesky general Welfare clause. It doesn’t mean what they’re implying – at all. In fact, it was meant as a strict limitation on power. Here’s what James Madison had to say about it – “With respect to the words “general welfare,” I have always regarded them as qualified by the detail of powers connected with them. To take them in a literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its creators.”

If my choice is the opinion of James Madision vs Jonathan Turley, I think I’m safe going with Madison.

Here’s what I think is most important…What both Olberman’s stand-in and Professor Turley get wrong is this – the 10th Amendment Movement is not about asking politicians to follow the Constitution. It’s not about getting permission from the Supreme Court to exercise our rights. It’s not about going to the federal government at all. Those are all failed strategies.

This movement is about moving back towards Constitutional governance whether they want us to or not.

Whether it’s 20+ states nullifying real ID, or 2 states nullifying some federal gun regulations, or 13 states nullifying federal marijuana laws, or states nullifying a national health care plan, this is about state-level activism. And, if enough states do it, the feds can’t do anything to stop it. (Read more from blog.tenthamendmentcenter.com)

Chalmers Johnson makes a great point in the interview below. The annual trillion reflected in the pie chart is only part of our military and security related expenditures. For example, our Nuclear Weapons program is in the Dept. of Energy, not defense. Our wounded are treated and cared for by the Dept. of Veterans Affairs. The massive foreign military aid we provide to other countries comes from the State Department’s budget, and the protecting of this country – since our Dept. of Defense is actually our Dept. of Offense – is conducted by the Dept. of Homeland Security.

It’s also important to see through the illusion that military creates jobs. It does not. Every dollar spend on military things represents a dollar taken away from the real economy which produces goods and services that people voluntarily purchase. The public (coercive) sector of the economy feeds off the private (voluntary) sector.

Only three of the 763 “sneak-and-peek” requests in fiscal year 2008 involved terrorism cases, according to a July 2009 report from the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts. Sixty-five percent were drug cases. (Read more from huffingtonpost.com)

More Change we can believe in. . .

By DEVLIN BARRETT (AP) – Sep 15, 2009

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration supports extending three key provisions of the Patriot Act that are due to expire at the end of the year, the Justice Department told Congress in a letter made public Tuesday.

Lawmakers and civil rights groups had been pressing the Democratic administration to say whether it wants to preserve the post-Sept. 11 law’s authority to access business records, as well as monitor so-called “lone wolf” terrorists and conduct roving wiretaps.

The provision on business records was long criticized by rights groups as giving the government access to citizens’ library records, and a coalition of liberal and conservative groups complained that the Patriot Act gives the government too much authority to snoop into Americans’ private lives. (Read more from www.google.com/hostednews/)

Had this happened in Tehran, it’d receive 24/7 coverage for weeks, but sadly, it happened right here in the U.S.S.A..

Frightening arrest:

Cops pose with arrested protester – like trophy hunting:

Find more videos like this on 12.160Mhz

Police dressed as anarchist:

As expressed by Ron Paul:

1. Assuming a “right” to medical care (or a “right” to be given any good or service for free) contradicts liberty, because government must take from one to provide for another.
2. National healthcare requires an authoritarian government.
3. The idea that quality can be achieved only by government force & taxation is an old economic fallacy.
4. Government monopolies always cause higher costs and lower quality. (ahem, post office)
5. Government does have a roll in sticking up for economic ethics and efficiency. (???)
6. Government should do no harm. Repeal the laws against competition in the medical field.
7. The debasement of our currency contributes to high prices. (Shhh! See no money printing, hear no money printing, think no money printing.)
8. Bureaucrats shouldn’t interfere with doctor-patient relationships.
9. Tax credits are a better way to help the sick.
9 1/2. Tort laws push costs higher.
10. Legalize competition. Let insurance competition across state lines.
11. Legalize competition. Long term insurance policies should be available to young.
12. Insurance should measure risk, not cover all costs. (Car insurance doesn’t cover gas.)
13. The relationship between government and medicine needs to end.
14. Imposing fines on uninsured is a huge boon for insurance companies.
15. Legalize competition. End or ease licensing. The 1910 Flexner Report closed medical schools, eliminated doctors, and tipped the field away from homeopathy.
16. Legalize competition. Remove obstacles to holistic medicine – regulations are pushed by drug companies.

See also:
What do doctors say about healthcare?

By Ron Paul
Published 09/19/09

Last Wednesday the nation was riveted to the President’s speech on healthcare reform before Congress. While the President’s concern for the uninsured is no doubt sincere, his plan amounts to a magnanimous gift to the health insurance industry, despite any implications to the contrary.

For decades the insurance industry has been lobbying for mandated coverage for everyone. Imagine if the cell phone industry or the cable TV industry received such a gift from government? If government were to fine individuals simply for not buying a corporation’s product, it would be an incredible and completely unfair boon to that industry, at the expense of freedom and the free market. Yet this is what the current healthcare reform plans intend to do for the very powerful health insurance industry.

The stipulation that pre-existing conditions would have to be covered seems a small price to pay for increasing their client pool to 100% of the American people. A big red flag, however, is that they would also have immunity from lawsuits, should they fail to actually cover what they are supposedly required to cover, so these requirements on them are probably meaningless. Mandates on all citizens to be customers of theirs, however, are enforceable with fines and taxes.

Insurance providers seem to have successfully equated health insurance with health care but this is a relatively new concept. There were doctors and medicine long before there was health insurance. (Read more from campaignforliberty.com)

This is history in the making. The Fed is a monster and (finally) it looks like some sunshine may be cast upon it.

Also, Tom Wood’s testimony from the Sept. 25th hearing:

The parents of slain American activist Rachel Corrie were denied entry into the Gaza Strip Tuesday, following day-long efforts to secure their entry and cheer on teams at the Rachel Corrie Ramadan Soccer Tournament.

The Corries and a delegation accompanying them continue to wait at the Rafah border at Egypt, but have thus far been denied entry. Egyptian crossing authorities have given various reasons for the delegation’s delay, despite the group having previously coordinated with Egyptian authorities, who said they informed crossings officials that the delegation had been cleared for passage.

. . . .

Rachel Corrie was run over by an armored Israeli caterpillar bulldozer as she tried to protect the home of Rafah resident Samir Nasrallah from demolition on 16 March 2003. Corrie went to Gaza as part of the International Solidarity Movement, and was standing alongside six other international activists when the incident occurred. (Read more from aljazeerah.info)

Good!

US President Barack Obama has shelved plans for controversial bases in Poland and the Czech Republic in a major overhaul of missile defence in Europe. (Read more from news.bbc.co.uk)

Embedded in General Stanley McChrystal’s classified assessment of the war in Afghanistan is his conclusion that a successful counterinsurgency strategy will require 500,000 troops over five years. (Read more from huffingtonpost.com)

The US mission in Afghanistan will “likely result in failure” unless troops are increased within a year, the top general there has said in a report.

Gen Stanley McChrystal made his assessment in a confidential report obtained by the Washington Post. (Read more from news.bbc.co.uk)

A dear friend recently send me this article about the Skidmore Historic Society Museum.

Initially, I assumed he was praising their independence, and cited Hillsdale College as another example of an institution refusing to feed at the government trough.

But my friend had sent me the link to ridicule it. I guess he found the museum’s sign and lawn shoddy. He also called Hillsdale College a “creepy, backward college run for and by religious nutbags, and a place where no sane person would send their kids, ever.” Such vitriol is sadly typical among advocates, witting and unwitting, of government power.

My friend’s larger point was illustrating the failure of private institutions to provide a public good, because, he said “it cannot be done profitably.” This, of course, is a combination of economic fallacies.

1) The argument is a version of the “the broken window fallacy,” because it ignores what might have happened if people were allowed to keep their money.

Say, I rob a group of people, and build a decent museum with their money. They scrape together the little bit of money I did not take and manage to build a crappy museum alongside mine. Now, I use the disparity not only to justify the robbery, but to argue for more of it.

2) If a museum is not profitable, i.e. if people do not willingly exchange their wealth for the service a museum provides, then we do not value it. We don’t want it, and shouldn’t be forced to give it money.

In this example and elsewhere, the rhetorical challenge for liberty advocates remains, as Frederic Bastiat put it, comparing the unseen to the seen. My friend sees government museums, but doesn’t see and fails to imagine the goods and services that never came into existence because money was confiscated for the museum’s construction and operation.