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Milton J. Madison - An American Refugee Now Living in China, Where Liberty is Ascending

Federalism, Free Markets and the Liberty To Let One's Mind Wander. I Am Very Worried About the Fate of Liberty in the USA, Where Government is Taking people's Lives ____________________________________________________________________________________________ "Extremism in defense of liberty is no vice. Tolerance in the face of tyranny is no virtue." -Barry Goldwater-

Saturday, February 27, 2010

As you may know, theres been lots of snow in New York this winter......

And again over the last several days, there has been antoher 2 feet of snow!


Friday, February 26, 2010

Bumper sticker of the day.....

“It’s a good thing Obama doesn’t know what comes after ‘trillion.’ ”

Some quotes considering the French......

"France has neither winter nor summer nor morals. Apart from these drawbacks it is a fine country. France has usually been governed by prostitutes."
~~~Mark Twain~~~

"I would rather have a German division in front of me, than a French one behind me."
~~~General George S. Patton~~~

"Going to war without France is like going deer hunting without your accordion."
~~~General Norman Schwartzkopf~~~

"We can stand here like the French, or we can do something about it."
~~~Marge Simpson~~~

"As far as I'm concerned, war always means failure."
~~~Jacques Chirac, President of France ~~~

"The only time France wants us to go to war, is when the German Army is sitting in Paris sipping coffee."
~~~Regis Philbin~~~

"You know, the French remind me a little bit of an aging actress of the 1940s who was still trying to dine out on her looks but doesn't have the face for it."
~~~ John McCain , U.S. Senator from Arizona ~~~

"The last time the French asked for 'more proof' it came marching into Paris under a German flag.."
~~~David Letterman~~~

"Only thing worse than a Frenchman, is a Frenchman who lives in Canada ."
~~~Ted Nugent~~~

"War without France would be like .. World War II."
~~~Unknown~~~

"The favorite bumper sticker in Washington D.C. right now is one that says 'First Iraq , then France ."
~~~Tom Brokaw~~~

"What do you expect from a culture and a nation that exerted more of its national will fighting against Disney World and Big Macs ,than the Nazis?"
~~~Dennis Miller~~~

"It is important to remember that the French have always been there when they needed us."
~~~Alan Kent~~~

"They've taken their own precautions against al-Qa'ida. To prepare for an attack, each Frenchman is urged to keep duct tape, a white flag, and a three-day supply of hirsuit mistresses in the house."
~~~Argus Hamilton ~~~

"Somebody was telling me about the French Army rifle that was being advertised on eBay the other day --the description was, 'Never shot. Dropped once."
~~~Rep. Roy Blunt, MO~~~

"The French will only agree to go to war when we've proven we've found truffles in Iraq ."
~~~Dennis Miller~~~

Q. What did the mayor of Paris say to the German Army as they entered the city in WWII?
A. "Table for 100,000 m'sieur?"

Passage of the day.....

As the US heads down the path towards socialism and Americans become nothing more than objects that the government "cares" for, Americans will find that they are not really being cared for but controlled as the whims of the political class dictate who gets what in tomorrow's world. Just keep these following words in mind when the opiate of something-for-nothing government, particularly healthcare, is drilled into your head by Democrats....
The problems we face in healthcare today are not caused by doctors, insurance companies, drug companies, or medical device makers. The problems we face are caused by politicians creating more and more big government regulation, more and more government intrusion into the patient-doctor relationship. Their solution is a political one, but it is not in patients’ best interests. We must get the politicians OUT of healthcare.

Ronald Reagan warned in 1961: “Socialism begins with government control of medicine.” Reagan also said, “Socialized medicine is always presented as a great emergency, and if you challenge it, you are attacked with accusations that you lack compassion.” This is exactly what we are hearing from progressive Democrats today.
From here (more worrisome although I think a little too reactionary for me).

As scarce resources become subject to government control, you will see influence peddling enter a whole new era in the US. Need a procedure done and paid for under your new government mandated program? Well, you should hope that the company or doctors have lobbied to have that included under the mandated insurance coverage. Otherwise, you could fly to Thailand and go to Bumrungrad Hospital to get it done since it probably will not be offered in the US.

Everyone will suffer in one form or another but it will probably be the middle class that will suffer the most as government mandated costs will rise for the insurance plans that YOU HAVE to buy (mandated) and quality or availability of service will decrease (natural market forces).

Best of luck USA, you have no idea what you are getting into.

Thursday, February 25, 2010

Quote of the day.....

It's a lovely idea, to get out of this stupid, Fairtrade, Brown-stained, Mandelson-skewed, equal-opportunities, multicultural, carbon-neutral, trendily left, regionally assembled, big-government, trilingual, mosque-drenched, all-the-pigs-are-equal, property-is-theft hellhole and set up shop somewhere else. But where?

-Jeremy Clarkson, an English broadcaster and journalist who specialises in motoring. He is best known for his role on the BBC TV show Top Gear along with co-presenters Richard Hammond and James May. He also writes weekly columns for The Sunday Times and The Sun-

Why the financial problems in Greece are so important to contemplate......

As the developed world layers on social safety nets designed to 'protect' middle class people from the normal responsibilities and challenges of everyday life, these nations are finding that the costs to these plans are not static but robust.

As early legislation intended, since the demographics were favorable, they have become popular entitlements to the people of a nation. The indulgence of adopting these plans was that it relied upon continued strong growth in population so that many working people support those that decide to not work anymore. However, as the demographics of Western nations have changed, the methods of paying for these plans have not. Most of these entitlement programs collect payments in the form of payroll taxes and redistribute them to others that are entitled to collect this entitlement.

But there are several problems with this;
1. Relies upon a robust and growing economy
2. Relies on growing or stable populations of workers relative to people that collect benefits
3. Discourages workers from savings since these entitlements are viewed as savings by people that are being done through the central government
4. Discourages workers from savings for potential health problems since others will take care of that
5. Government entitlement programs do not actually save money for these benefits but solely relying upon taxing power of current working people
So, we are seeing the early stages now of a collapse of the socialist systems that have infected Western Europe and the US over the past several decades. AS this writer thinks, this is just the beginning of a collapse of these Utopian income redistribution plans....
The meaning of Greece transcends high finance.

Every advanced society, including the United States, has a welfare state. Though details differ, their purposes are similar: to support the unemployed, poor, disabled and aged. All welfare states face similar problems: burgeoning costs as populations age; an over-reliance on debt financing; and pressures to reduce borrowing that create pressures to cut welfare spending. High debt and the welfare state are at odds. It's an open question whether the collision will cause social and economic turmoil.

Greece is the opening act in this drama; already, its budget problems have spawned street protests. By the numbers, Greece's plight is acute. In 2009, its government debt -- basically, the sum of past annual deficits -- was 113 percent of its economy (gross domestic product, or GDP). The budget deficit for 2009 was 12.7 percent of GDP. Two-thirds of the debt is owed to foreigners, reports the Institute of International Finance.
From here. Similar problems face the United States government as it runs deficits of over 10% of GDP and this will mean that the US will be heading into territory where other nations have had very difficult problems. If nominal GDP grows at 5% a year, and deficits are 3-5% of GDP, a nation can sustain a stable debt level. Yes, from a nominal basis, these numbers look bigger and bigger over the years as GDP grows, but it is most relevant to look at these as a percent of GDP.

As debt balloons in the nations and finances weaken, lenders become less-and-less inclined to offer new funds as governments become more risky as a credit. This will also affect the rest of the economy as this tightening of credit and the potential for higher taxes reduces the rewards to investors within that jurisdiction. Companies and investors become less certain, on the margin reduce investment and hiring and this weakening of the real economy will lead to a relative decline in economic activity and tax revenues leading further government funding problems.

It will all end badly. And what is so amazing about this, is the US is engaging on increasing these entitlements and government intervention under the disguise of social protection and providing healthcare for all. Its a Utopian dream. IT will never work and it will cost every American dearly going down this path.

Wednesday, February 24, 2010

The day the country died.....

The white folks at MSNBC are now playing the race card......

Why do they think that they deserve to play the race card? Because they are Democrats? So, the people that are against big government are a all white racists? Then so be it. We are all white racists, then......



Why would anyone trust the media ever again? Or why should they? They have proved that they are unworthy of our time and attention.

Tuesday, February 23, 2010

More of the same nonsense from the Obamessiah.....

So, after the stunning defeat of the Democrats by themselves in their Pelosi/Reid government grab and attempted socialization of the American healthcare system, the empty suit and seeming empty-headed Obamessiah foists another silly government centered healthcare system upon the American people....
US President Barack Obama has unveiled new plans to reform healthcare and revive stalled legislation on the issue.

One of the key proposals gives the US government power to block health insurers from imposing excessive premium increases.

Mr Obama will hold bipartisan talks at the White House on the issue on Thursday.

The Obama plan aims to cover 31 million uninsured US and crack down on exorbitant premium hikes by insurers.
From here. So, the movement towards Marxism in America continues. After the Obamessiah failed with the last 'plan' after stupidly outsourcing all the heavy lifting and tough work to the socialists in the House and the Senate, the campaigner-in-chief finally offers his own Marxist plans for America. Price controls on healthcare plans? Stunning. Will lead to less supply of healthcare insurance plans offered by private insurers. Insurers will only be in the business if they can make money on it and the only solution will be to offer a government plan. Slick Marxism.

However, one of the more heinous aspects of this 'plan' is his proposed Medicare taxes on capital gains. The US Government is broke and will try to raise taxes everywhere that they think that they can get away with it. Medicare is bankrupt too since it was completely a demographic indulgence as is all European socialized medical systems and is doomed to fail miserably.

What is a demographic indulgence? When the bulk of the people living in a nation are of working age, as we have seen in the US when the baby boomers were of working age, pay into a system that covers the healthcare of a much smaller population of people. However, as these boomers reach retirement age, they will overwhelm the system when they demand and need the services that they think that they paid for and were promised for the 40 or 50 years that they paid government taxes for Medicare. The failure of Socialized government programs is not that far away!

Of course, the Democrats only solution to a problem is more socialization, more taxes and the Obamessiah has proposed Medicare taxes on Capital gains to temporarily support the sinking Medicare ship. Ah ha! A tax on capital gains. So, higher taxes on capital gains reduces the rewards to investment and therefore again will depress savings relative to consumption. More tax policy that discourages savings relative to consumption. Less savings means less capital available for investment in plants, buildings, R&d and other critical investments. Means fewer jobs, leads to the encouragement of debt relative to equity and results in more volatility in economic growth.

Good luck! The US elected a feckless Marxist and it will not work out well for that nation.

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Quote of an era.....

"Thank God - whatever time it is, I always have an engagement."

-Attributed to the Comtesse de Fontaine-Martel, hostess and friend to Voltaire, whom upon her deathbed inquired as the time that is was. The quote above just prior to her succumbing to her illness was in response to being told that it was 2 AM.

Quote of the day.....

"The better I know men the more I admire dogs."
-Source Unknown-
Actually, this quote that is generally considered to be unsourced, but is was used and attributed to Madame de Sevigne in one of Voltaire's works.

Monday, February 08, 2010

Why are liberals so condescending? Because they are so much smarter than the rest of us, that is why!!!!

Every political community includes some members who insist that their side has all the answers and that their adversaries are idiots. But American liberals, to a degree far surpassing conservatives, appear committed to the proposition that their views are correct, self-evident, and based on fact and reason, while conservative positions are not just wrong but illegitimate, ideological and unworthy of serious consideration. Indeed, all the appeals to bipartisanship notwithstanding, President Obama and other leading liberal voices have joined in a chorus of intellectual condescension.
I have written previously, that all kinds of liberals think that they know so much better what is good for us than we do. An academic, say that has a Phd in the "Geometric designs of 18th Century Pygmy Penis Sheathes and their impact on 19th Century British Society" feels that due to his or her fine academic pedigree that they have the mandate to delve into other subjects and inject themselves into such debates as the climate-global warming, socialization of medicine and a raft of other completely unrelated topics. Thanks for showing up you brilliant people and solving all of our problems. Without you, and your special insights gained from a lifetime of studying such academic pursuits, we would never survive. Gag.

American Liberals think that somehow, that since their ideas are so much more worthy than those of others, particularly from us genetically mutant stupid conservatives, that they have the only true path. Therefore, the vision within the cloistered world of academia where even as the recent scientific fudge coming out surrounding climate 'science' allows for these people to think that they are entitled to decide what is better for us and that somehow we must be incapable to think for ourselves on a whole host of subjects.

This intervention by the academic elite, comes from the thinking of anti-materialist Liebniz and his 'Philosophy of Mind' where thinking heads towards the line that since this is the only possible world, that it is the best of all possible worlds. These sheltered individuals that live in a echo chamber of positive Liberal feedback with the University structure head towards the same intolerance that they accuse of conservatives of being. As Voltaire wrote....
It begins with a young man, Candide, who is living a sheltered life in an Edenic paradise and being indoctrinated with Leibnizian optimism (or simply optimism) by his mentor, Pangloss. The work describes the abrupt cessation of this lifestyle, followed by Candide's slow, painful disillusionment as he witnesses and experiences great hardships in the world. Voltaire concludes with Candide, if not outright rejecting optimism, advocating an enigmatic precept, "we must cultivate our garden", in lieu of the Leibnizian mantra of Pangloss, "all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds".
As some of people understand, despite good intentions, those prescriptions that go against nature, particularly human nature are destine to fail and sometimes will fail miserably and disastrously.

So, here we have the Modern Liberal, one who knows better what is good for us than we do but this recipe since it forces humans to behave differently than would normally do will never ever work and will probably lead to worse outcomes.

As I have written before when considering the Liberal and their simplistic and juvenile approach to the world.....
So, I have been considering the Modern Liberal's approach to life and I have come up with this easy to follow process:
1. Liberals see themselves as intellectuals, many of them have important degrees and other higher level credentials that give them the authority to consider today problems.
2. The Modern Liberal is adept at identifying problems. Uninsured Americans, high drug and healthcare costs, global warming (now called climate change since this would also include global cooling or global weather redistribution)and a host of other 'problems' facing Americans that they think need government intervention.
3. The Modern Liberal is also adept at figuring out solutions to problems particularly after having a conference or some brain dead celebrity spew some nonsense on the issue.
4. The modern Liberal also knows how to pay for all of this largess. Its so very very easy. Tax the rich. Yessssssssssssss. A simple solution to the problem of how pay for all of these problems. Do not tax the people that actually need this stuff, but a small proportion of the population. So the receiver of the benefit thinks that they are getting something for nothing. Easier to sell the idea then.
So the Modern Liberal defines the problem, formulates a solution, makes someone else pay for it and gets the Federal Government to administer it. See, they don't do the hard work themselves, they get others to do the heavy lifting for them. I see this as laziness. That is why when I lived in Africa I rarely came across any of these Modern Liberals there doing the actual work. They were too busy figuring out big government solutions to be bothered with actually doing anything constructive.
From here.

And remember this when considering all of these great Liberal plans, we will suffer in multiple portfolios or rights since.....
...freedom and property are closely linked: separate property from private possession, and Leviathan becomes master of all.

-Russell Kirk, political philosopher-
Best of luck as Liberals try to force square pegged humanity into their round pegged holes.

Why are liberals so condescending? - washingtonpost.com

Friday, February 05, 2010

Dems haunted by stereotypes as seen by Ronald Reagan 20 years ago....

Election Day 1988 was only days away. Ronald Reagan was headlining a rally in Nevada. He said the options were the same as "when I stood before you." Reagan framed the Democratic "choice" as one for "liberal policies of tax and spend, economic stagnation, international weakness, accommodation, and always, always blame America first."
Yikes. Reagan seemed to have known exactly what the Obamessiah is all about. Democratic defeatism. Seems like most Democrats are like this even the supposedly moderate ones. Things haven't changed much in 20 years.

Dems Haunted by Revived Stereotypes

Thursday, February 04, 2010

The feckless Obamessiah and the money addicted central government wants more-and-more of your money.....

Here is just the start, $2 trillion is $200 billion a year in new higher taxes. And there will be more 'necessary' tax hikes on the wealthy and all the rest of you too. The money addiction of the central leviathan will absorb everything that it can till it is stopped by us.....
Look out, America: President Obama is coming for your money. And this time, almost no one is safe.

The budget he proposed Monday sucks a mind-blowing $2 trillion in new taxes from hard-working Americans -- of practically all stripes -- over the next decade.

You'd think that the president might have taken pause after Bay State voters last month handed Ted Kennedy's Senate seat to an avowed tax-cutter, Scott Brown.

Wrong.

Clearly, Obama isn't letting a little thing like that stop him.

Under his plan, Uncle Sam's cut of US output would rise by nearly half a trillion dollars in the next two years alone. That's a 13.5 percent jump (from 14.8 percent to 16.8 percent).

Who gets socked?

Almost everyone, one way or another.
From here. The clueless Obamessiah and the Axelrod administration will never get it.

Tuesday, February 02, 2010

The feckless Obamessiah....

The silliness of the words that come out of the Campaigner-in-chief's pie hole, are just mystifying. 'We need to be more responsible' with our national spending.....next year. Its sad to see the nation-ship in the bright light of day heading inexorably towards the iceberg of national ruin, and people still hope that the bozo elected as president even cares to avoid the collision. One day when the ship is sinking some will say where did that big gash come from. They will think Bush.