Liberty

The individual and the collective: ‘the difference’

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The always great Baldilocks has written a short but incisive essay about the importance of the individual in families. Read “The Difference.”

[…] But what made a Ben Carson or a Steve Jobs different from the children in the second video? What makes the children who grew up in the early 60s and prior without one or more parents different from the menaces to society we’ve seen all too often in the past four decades?

It’s this: individuals–individuals who step into the breach that mother and/or father vacate voluntarily or involuntarily. Grandparents, aunts and uncles, stepparents, adoptive parents. And the individual biological parents, like Sonya Carson, who step up to the task appointed to them. People like her shape a Dr. Ben Carson, neurosurgeon and leader of the surgical team who first successfully separated conjoined twins. People like the tasered woman–and the man–shape drug-dealers, gang members, welfare mothers and prisoners.

Such people like the latter know nothing of hard work, true education, order, responsibility. The reason this is so? Because neither they nor the other parent(s) of their offspring care about their children being better than they are. They don’t have to care about this because they know that the government will subsidize all of their “needs” and the “needs” of their offspring.

When individuals are the parents, the child will most likely do well. When government is the parent, the child will most likely do poorly and become dependent on government as well–either taking on government as one parent (illegitimate children) or both parents (going to prison). This isn’t rocket science or neurosurgery. From time immemorial, children, with some exceptions, follow in the footsteps of their parents. […]

Cruz Control and Powerless DiFi

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Have you heard about how that horribly ignorant, misogynist upstart freshman Sen. Ted Cruz made veteran Sen. Dianne Feinstein feel patronized during their exchange yesterday in the Senate on her current attempt to take away our right to own guns by picking, choosing, and chipping away at the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution…

Allahpundit at HotAir points out the video viral exchange between the two senators is only a small part of what went on, and that there is far more to this story than the “rude” Ted Cruz, ‘who knows not of the cited Heller case‘, the liberal MSM (MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough in this instance) is now trying to project … and here it is:

KrisAnne Hall is an attorney and former prosecutor. The following video excerpts (below) are from a recent townhall meeting on future gun control held in Pensacola. Here she addresses the pure and clear meaning of the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, and the now unbalanced thinking of the federal government on their balance of power vs. the U.S. Constitution. She points out the US Supreme Court does not have the power to grant power to the federal government outside the Constitution. THAT, according to Jay Norlander of NRO, is exactly how Sen. Dianne Feinstein (the White House and the democrats in the Congress) is operating on this matter…

In the matter of Ted Cruz versus Dianne Feinstein, I’d like to make one point … I believe that Feinstein believes what a lot of people believe, in error: Congress and the president can do basically whatever they want. And if it’s unconstitutional, well, the Supreme Court will say so, and all will be well. That’s what a system of checks and balances is all about.

Here is DiFi: “Congress is in the business of making the law. The Supreme Court interprets the law. If they strike down the law, they strike down the law.”

We can go wild and crazy, here in Congress, and if we overstep constitutional boundaries, the Supreme Court can strike us down. We’ll go whatever speed we want on the highway, and if a copper should happen to catch us, so be it.

Thing is, congressmen and the president swear an oath to the Constitution too. The justices of the Supreme Court are not the only arbiters of the Constitution. They might be the ultimate arbiters, but others have a responsibility too. Members of the legislative and executive branches have a custodial role. A black robe does not confer a unique constitutional burden on you, and the absence of such a robe does not exempt you from a burden, or a responsibility.

This should be elementary. In my observation, however, it is the erroneous view that is widespread, and well entrenched…

Get it? The thinking of DiFi and the democrats is, We’ll just pass the law, they can see what’s in it, and then take it to court. Dr. Ben Carson is correct. We need far fewer lawyers in the U.S. Congress.

Here KrisAnne backs up her government overreach warning regarding disarming the American people with the recent example of the Obama administration’s usurping of powers in their DOJ “white paper” admission of assumed power and ability to use drones to kill American citizens anywhere on the globe, including in the USA, without due process…

So, if the White House and the DOJ believe they can do that without cause or court, what is to stop them from banning citizens from owning guns? Perhaps Sen. Feinstein isn’t smarter than a sixth grader after all.

BTW, I too am growing quite fond of fearless GOP freshmen such as Sen. Ted Cruz.

You can find more videos of this townhall and hear more of what this woman has to say, especially in the face of the liberal lawyer on the panel.

‘Stand on Principle’

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Isn’t it refreshing to hear a Republican — a Senator, no less! — echoing my mantra of “balls and principles” to a receptive audience? If conservatism is to survive, we need the cloning machines to start working right now: Rubio, Cruz, Rand. We need thirty three clones of each…

On Wednesday night, Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) electrified the crowd at the Coalitions for America’s Weyrich Awards Dinner, named after founder Paul Weyrich. He led off his speech with a dismissive reference to Senator John McCain’s characterization of him as a “wacko bird.” Looking at the crowd, Cruz said, “Birds of a feather flock together.”

Cruz led off with a full-on critique of the President’s public relations blitz over sequestration. “2.4 percent cuts were made from your meals,” he joked. He referenced the “emaciated face” of conservative megadonor Foster Friess. Thanks to the dinner sequester, said Cruz, Friess looked like “Anne Hathaway in Les Miserables.”

Walking back and forth across the stage in his patented style, Cruz delivered body blows to both establishment Republicans and to the Obama administration. Urging conservatives to “stand for principle,” he said, “I think 2014 has the potential to be a very, very good year, but the number one way we can screw it up is if we fail to stand on principle.”

As an example of standing on principle, he mentioned Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) filibustering over President Obama’s drone policy. “We have an administration that seems to recognize no limits on its power,” said Cruz. Paul pointed that out with his filibuster – and more than that, Cruz pointed out, he made the constitution the issue. Holder, Cruz continued, seemed confused by all the talk about constitutionalism versus what was “appropriate” when it came to drone use, as though he expected Americans to simply trust the administration without reference to the appropriate scope of presidential power. But, said Cruz, “the entire premise of the US constitution is that we don’t trust you.”

It wasn’t just the Obama administration that opposed the filibuster, Cruz continued. “There were more than a few Republicans who didn’t show up, who held their manhoods accursed and cheapened,” Cruz said, paraphrasing Henry V.

Cruz saved heavy criticism for the media as well. Laughing at MSNBC’s attempt to offer advice to Republicans, Cruz said, “MSNBC on how to save the Republican Party is like Typhoid Mary giving the keys to good health.”

Most of Cruz’s speech was directed at the Obama administration’s regulatory and fiscal policy. Regulators and administrators, he said, were multiplying and occupying America like locusts. After seeing a picture of locusts descending on Egypt on the Drudge Report, he said, “I thought we’d sent the EPA.”

The biggest surprise about the US Senate, Cruz explained, was the “widespread sense of defeatism … It’s maddening.” But he said that he and his Tea Party colleagues “ain’t gonna stop … A lot of good things happen when you stand for principle.”

March 8, 1983

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The “evil empire” is still with us to this day…

More from Paul Kengor at American Spectator:

Today, Ronald Reagan’s Evil Empire speech turns 30 years old. It stands as one of the most memorable orations of the last three decades. It coined a phrase, a tag, a label — one that utterly fit. If the shoe fits, wear it. Well, this jackboot fit the Soviet ogre’s foot.

It was a searing speech, not merely because it was so provocative, which it was, or incendiary or controversial, which it also was, but because it was such an obvious truth that so desperately needed to be said by someone at the presidential level. Ronald Reagan cut through the clutter, and the moral equivalency and accommodation, and spoke loudly and boldly, with the uncompromising courage and confidence that was so uniquely Ronald Reagan.

Why did Reagan say what he said? Here’s his later explanation: “Although a lot of liberal pundits jumped on my speech … and said it showed I was a rhetorical hip-shooter who was recklessly and unconsciously provoking the Soviets into war, I made the ‘Evil Empire’ speech and others like it with malice aforethought.”

What malice aforethought?

The speech must be viewed from two crucial perspectives: 1) Reagan’s personal/spiritual motivation; and 2) his larger international/geo-strategic motivation. Both of these two contexts came together as part of a broader Reagan intention to try to undermine atheistic Soviet communism and peacefully win and end the Cold War. […]

Black Flag

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For Andrew

I have writer’s block.

It’s not that I can’t find stuff to write about, but rather that everything that I write ends up in the recycle bin when I proof it. It ends up there not because it lacks substance or the delivery is less than what I set up as a standard for myself, but because I read it and realize that it is a meaningless exercise.

My blog, Boiling Frogs, is the space where I organize my thoughts, where I put down ideas (some complex, many rather simple) in as intelligent a fashion as I can.

Idea … supporting argument/facts … conclusion.

Simple enough.

Right?

That format isn’t working any more.

Sure enough, I can dutifully follow it and an entry appears, but then I proof it, and “delete” just follows naturally. I delete it at that point in the proof reading process where having stopped trying to identify all my spelling and grammatical errors, I read my work and ask myself “does it matter that you wrote this?”

The response these last few weeks has come back “not in the slightest,” ten times out of ten.

I’ve lost my mojo.

Here’s the next thing that has me out of sorts: I don’t read anything that remotely resembles news or political commentary. I don’t watch TV news any longer, and my satellite radio has been pretty solidly stuck on “The Pulse,” with occasional excursions into “Little Steven’s Underground Garage,” “Siriously Sinatra”, “BB King’s Bluesville,” and when the day calls for it, “Lithium.”

I just want to shut everything out.

I am so absolutely disgusted with the current state of affairs in this nation, and in the world at large, that I want to stay as far away from both as I possibly can, and when they simply refuse to stay away, I have SiriusXM, one Hell of an audio system in my car, and “Lithium.”

Hello, hello, hello, how low?
Hello, hello, hello, how low?
Hello, hello, hello, how low?
Hello, hello, hello!

With the lights out, it’s less dangerous
Here we are now, entertain us
I feel stupid and contagious
Here we are now, entertain us!

That song’s opening line is the best…

Load up on guns and bring your friends
It’s fun to lose and to pretend…

I don’t want to fucking pretend.

THAT is probably the root of my writer’s block … I no longer want to fucking pretend that intelligent debate, logical arguments and opinions grounded on facts and history have any meaning at all.

They don’t, or at least not to people who lack both intelligence and the ability to grasp logic, and who couldn’t give less of a shit about facts and history.

Those people don’t read my blog because reading it probably gives them a headache.

Now, I know that there are a few people out there who do read my blog and Babalu, and I must apologize to you. I appreciate your support and your loyalty, but you need to understand what I’ve come to understand.

We are a small echo chamber of logic and substance trapped inside an insane massive bell tower cacophony of fucking stupid, and the stupid is growing by the day.

Listen, I know what’s supposed to be going on right now: Bloggers and the alternative media are supposed to be leading the fight against stupid, we are supposed to take up the forgotten standard of unbiased journalism, wipe the shit off the canton of intelligent reporting, and lead America back to a place where sanity reigns and “good night and good luck” meant that you had just been enlightened about the world around you, not indoctrinated.

But I don’t think that’s going to happen. It may happen some day in the future, but not right now.

Not the way things stand.

Today we live in a nation divided. A three way split of the entitled, the disinterested and the chattel that pay for it all

We live in a nation where condoms to be used for premarital sex are an entitlement, and should you forget to use them, abortion on demand is a right, but the exercise of our unalienable rights protected by the Second Amendment are subject to the approval of people far too stupid to understand that you cannot possibly be safer by giving up the most effective way to defend yourself from someone who doesn’t give a shit about laws to begin with.

For the record, I would be willing to personally pay for a college to menopause supply of condoms for Sandra Fluke, if that was a guarantee that doing so would mean that she wouldn’t bear children and add to the legions of stupid that we are being overrun by.

We live in a nation where a growing segment of the population wants to label health care and a college education as “rights” to be made available to all for free. Not being able to think sufficiently clear to figure out that the most basic definition of slavery is one person claiming a right to the fruit of another person’s labor, they demand as a right the fruit of the labor of those who must bear the cost of that which they wish to receive for free.

We are a nation divided, shouting at each other from behind our respective barricades, not hearing a thing the other one is saying, and to be fair, not giving any more of a shit about their opinions than they do about ours.

The time for dialogue is over. It’s time for something else.

I remember the day, many years ago, when I had the first of my many political epiphanies. The day when I ran across something so elemental, so damned politically organic and centered that it moved me off the shifting ideological hill where I stood with uncertain footing, and transported me to this mountain of hard-as-granite, indisputable political logic where I still stand today.

You and I are told we must choose between a left or right, but I suggest there is no such thing as a left or right. There is only an up or down. Up to man’s age-old dream-the maximum of individual freedom consistent with order or down to the ant heap of totalitarianism. Regardless of their sincerity, their humanitarian motives, those who would sacrifice freedom for security have embarked on this downward path. Plutarch warned, ‘The real destroyer of the liberties of the people is he who spreads among them bounties, donations and benefits.’

Shuttered windows clouding my vision flew open, preconceived notions lay shattered and scattered across the landscape of my juvenile perception of the role of government in the lives of citizens, and understanding assaulted my eyes with the brightness of a midday sun.

It was my time for choosing, and choose I did.

They say the world has become too complex for simple answers. They are wrong. There are no easy answers, but there are simple answers. We must have the courage to do what we know is morally right. Winston Churchill said that ‘the destiny of man is not measured by material computation. When great forces are on the move in the world, we learn we are spirits-not animals.’ And he said, ‘There is something going on in time and space, and beyond time and space, which, whether we like it or not, spells duty.’

“You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We will preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth, or we will sentence them to take the first step into a thousand years of darkness. If we fail, at least let our children and our children’s children say of us we justified our brief moment here. We did all that could be done.

***

That was then, but this is now. We’ve taken more than just the first step into the darkness, and I don’t want to pretend that there is choosing left to be done by anyone

The time for choosing is done.

Look around you, everything is politicized.

I don’t listen to music I used to love to listen to because the musicians I used to follow are mostly leftist assholes.

I don’t watch movies because so are most actors and directors.

I don’t speak to a significant number of people who I used to be “friendly” with, because they are fucking blind leftists who look at me with their fucking condescension-filled eyes, as if I were some sort of fucking monkey boy just rescued from the deep jungles of Borneo that needs to be taught how to act around civilized people, when we discuss politics.

The time for choosing is done… it’s time for something else now.

I have absolutely nothing in common with the morons who seem to think that they are in charge in this nation at this time, so I choose whatever side it is that they are not on.

H. L. Mencken once said that “every normal man must be tempted at times to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin to slit throats.”

I don’t know about the throat slitting part of that, but I am all about hoisting the black flag. I am all about spitting on my hands and getting to it with these fucking morons.

The time for intelligent debate is no more. I don’t give any more of a shit about what they think, than they do about what I think.

We’ve chosen, sides. There are very, very few undecided, and they have labeled themselves insignificant via their indecisiveness.

It’s time to get to it. Time to hoist the black flag, fling the grappling hooks and board their ship.

The time for choosing is done.

The time for “fuck you” has begun.

tattered CJ.1

Andrew Breitbart
February 1, 1969 – March 1, 2012

Another magnificent rant

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I come across a large amount of reading material every day thanks to my RSS reader and Twitter. Form time to time I discover beautiful little gems of punditry. Such is case today from a blog called The Sacred Cow Slaughterhouse. It is a brilliant piece that, in 1,735 words, dissects and exposes the rotten internal organs of liberalism/”progressivism”:

“The Post in Which I Piss Off EVERYBODY” by Michael Z. Williamson

Or, How I Learned To Stop Caring.

By way of introduction, I’d like to explain some of my former positions. Please do not reply and tell me why I’m wrong. That’s not relevant to this post. These WERE my positions, for right or wrong.

I used to believe women had a right to reproductive choice. As a male, I will obviously never have an abortion. I supported access because birth control is cheaper than abortions, abortions are cheaper than welfare, welfare is cheaper than jail. And I don’t believe the government is capable of legislating for every circumstance. Most of the time, a woman and her doctor will make a decision that works for the situation, and until a baby is an independent organism, it’s a parasite. This was also important to me because my wife was warned that a further pregnancy could kill her. That’s been surgically remedied and is no longer a problem.

I used to believe gays were entitled to relate as they wished, including marriage. What two people do together doesn’t affect me unless I’m one of them.

I used to believe it was wrong to treat people differently based on their skin color. Even if a few people fit a stereotype, millions of others do not.

I used to believe there should be a strong division between church and state, that any support of a religious entity using property of the state constituted endorsement and was wrong.

I used to believe people had a right to protest, campaign, rant and create non-violent incidents to express themselves and their positions. I also believed they had a right to publish as they chose. I believed they were entitled to burn the Flag in protest, to make a statement.

I have obviously been at odds with conservatives over these positions. There have been loud arguments, heated discussions and occasional insults.

Read the rest below the fold. It’s worth your time…

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Dr. Benjamin Carson Is In The House

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Thankfully a fresh new voice is getting recognition in a swamp of one-sided opinion in this country. Dr. Benjamin Carson’s speech at the National Prayer Breakfast the other morning has hit a nerve on both the right and the left, and they have even claimed he was out of line and his speech was inappropriate at a prayer breakfast, willfully ignoring the scathing previous anti Iraq war speeches made at these breakfasts directly aimed at the Bush administration during his years in office. The left is outraged this accomplished man, Dr. Carson, dared speak his mind in front of Obama. I even read a comment stating ‘the guy is all guts and no brains’.

Really? I responded. When was the last time Obama separated conjoined at the brain babies and had both survive when it was hoped at least one would? Please point out to me where Obama has risked anything of personal value to do anything on the level of what Dr. Carson has done. The man wouldn’t even give an order to try and save four American lives in Benghazi. That didn’t go over too well.

Anyhow, Dr. Carson was on Sean Hannity’s show last night and here is that interview…

The more Dr. Benjamin Carson is exposed to the American public look for the attacks on him to increase.

These are the people this nation now is desperate for to come forward and speak their minds and share their wisdom. There are far more Dr. Benjamin Carsons in this country than there are Barack Obamas. We need them to have the courage Dr. Carson has shown and stand up and speak up. He is generations closer to our Founding Fathers’ idea of leadership in this nation than most of those currently occupying seats of leadership within this country. Dr. Carson is scheduled to appear on FOX tomorrow morning. I am not certain, but I am beginning to think this man is removing his shoe and sock to perhaps stick a toe in the water of running for office … God willing.

I’d call them something a little less diplomatic than ‘kept’

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This guy is way too nice…

We’ve had a wide variety of conservative: the neo-cons, the paleo-cons and most recently the crunchy cons. Have you ever noticed how many of the most prominent conservative voices in America sound more like liberals? I have, and I believe they are in class all their own: they have a special mission and fit a particular profile.

They are what I like to call ‘kept cons.’ They are ‘kept’ by liberals in that kept cons generally work for liberal institutions and seem to fill the role of token conservative; they write conservative columns for national liberal newspapers or appear as conservative hosts or commentators on CNN or MSNBC or CNBC; but they don’t sound all that conservative. You can spot them slamming Sarah Palin or tamping down on the Tea Party. Their usual message is always something like, “I’m a conservative but these other people, these gun owners/southerners/TEA Partiers/Tax Cutters/Randians/Supply-siders/Pro-lifers/Climate Change Deniers/Libertarians/Gun Nuts/ Gold Bugs, etc., are beyond the pale.”

The kept conservative’s announced job is to represent the conservative point of view, but their real job is to give the illusion of balance without really challenging any of the core tenets of liberalism. They spend lots of time ‘reinventing’ the Republican Party, and the new invention is always the same: more liberal. They live among liberals, their friends are liberals, and, of course, they are paid by liberals.

They don’t actually have to work for the New York Times Company or NBC Universal. Some of these kept cons work for think tanks funded by conservatives, when they can’t get government work. They might be employed by the American Enterprise Institute where they can collect steady paychecks between gigs working for government, or for campaigns for people who want to run governments, or running lobbying and public relations firms when the GOP is not in power. […]

Gun Control Mentality: Mental Illness vs The Irrational

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irrational

When the Second Amendment supporters begin to win the heated gun control debate the insatiable gun control opposition throws down the “mental illness” card. Fine and good. I agree. People diagnosed with mental illness or mental deficiencies should not have guns. We can argue all day how if a person is determined mentally ill enough to do harm to themselves or to others they will find a way. It is an imperfect world, and unless the State controls everybody with a magic little pill everyday, lobotomizing the population’s individual free thought, it will not be any closer to being the safe world utopia imagined. This is where mental illness becomes cyclical and conditional with the liberals/left. Those who are resisting the attempts to have their rights and freedoms taken from them are mentally ill. (This was and is done in communist countries, as you know.) So, given the older generations’ bitterly clinging to our common sense and our Constitutional rights, where do they (everybody asks, “Who are they?” Well, if you don’t know by now…) start their re-education and reconstruction of control?

Before I point out the obvious, let me remind everyone that in the last 30-40 years the liberals in this country have successfully phased out shame. Don’t shame a child for doing something wrong. This country’s entertainment industry obviously has no shame. Our MSM has no shame at all … MSNBC, by the way, has been caught creatively editing yet another video/audio in order to fit their crazy gun rights narrative:

No stranger to selectively edited video clips, MSNBC on Monday aired a misleading and incomplete clip of testimony given by the father of a Sandy Hook victim at a hearing before the Connecticut Legislature. The edited version of his remarks, aired on Martin Bashir’s show, make it appear as if pro-gun advocates maliciously interrupted (or “heckled” as many have said) the dad for no reason as he calmly argued against civilians owning semi-automatic rifles and high-capacity magazines. In fact, the edit was so subtle not even we picked up on it in our original story.

“It’s not a good feeling to look at your child laying in a casket. Or looking at your child with a bullet wound to the forehead. It’s a real sad day,” Neil Heslin, father of Sandy Hook victim Jesse Lewis, said during Monday’s hearing.

“I ask if there is anyone who is in this room that can give me one reason or challenge this question: Why anybody in this room needs to have done of these assault-style weapons or military weapons or high capacity clips?” he asked rhetorically. He paused and then said, “Not one person can answer the question.”

It was at this point that a few members of the audience voiced their support for the Second Amendment. “The Second Amendment shall not be infringed,” one man yelled, appearing to try and answer Heslin’s question.

As the presiding official pointed out, comments were not permitted during the testimony, however. And Bashir was quick to hop on that point.

Get it? Neil Heslin asked a question of those attending the hearing. When, after a pause, he did not receive an answer he asked his question again, and then some broke their polite silence to give him one. MSNBC’s hacking-out of this area shows they believe that answer to be the wrong answer in this emotionally-driven issue. THAT answer pulls the public opinion emotional runaway train off the track and back onto the reality track, and cannot be. Remember? And if anyone dares go against this effort they will be whipsawed (nods to Limbaugh) … shamed in front of the masses. They used Neil Heslin in their own agenda, and continue to do so even though they have been found to be conniving, dishonest, and manipulative. Joseph Goebbels is smiling from Hell.

“If you repeat a lie often enough, it becomes the truth … It would not be impossible to prove with sufficient repetition and a psychological understanding of the people concerned that a square is in fact a circle. They are mere words, and words can be molded until they clothe ideas and disguise.”

With all the thought and techno-work MSNBC put into editing that first parent’s testimony to create demons and devils, they did not have much time at all to cover this parent’s statements who dared to speak factual truth to his own emotional loss and devastation context…

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