Quote of the Day – W.H. Chamberlain Edition

One of the most insidious consequences of the present burden of personal income tax is that it strips many middle class families of financial reserves & seems to lend support to campaigns for socialized medicine, socialized housing, socialized food, socialized every thing. The personal income tax has made the individual vastly more dependent on the State & more avid for state hand-outs. It has shifted the balance in America from an individual-centered to a State-centered economic & social system.

Found here. I am convinced that the nation’s current path began with the “Progressive” movement that brought us the 16th and 17th Amendments, and for that matter, the 18th.

Quelle Suprise

111th Congress Added More Debt Than First 100 Congresses Combined: $10,429 Per Person in U.S.

The federal government has accumulated more new debt–$3.22 trillion ($3,220,103,625,307.29)—during the tenure of the 111th Congress than it did during the first 100 Congresses combined, according to official debt figures published by the U.S. Treasury.
That equals $10,429.64 in new debt for each and every one of the 308,745,538 people counted in the United States by the 2010 Census.
The total national debt of $13,858,529,371,601.09 (or $13.859 trillion), as recorded by the U.S. Treasury at the close of business on Dec. 22, now equals $44,886.57 for every man, woman and child in the United States.
In fact, the 111th Congress not only has set the record as the most debt-accumulating Congress in U.S. history, but also has out-stripped its nearest competitor, the 110th, by an astounding $1.262 trillion in new debt.

No pitchforks, no torches, not even any tar and feathers.

I am reminded once again of Thomas Jefferson’s letter to William Stephens Smith in which he said:

The people cannot be all, and always, well informed. The part which is wrong will be discontented, in proportion to the importance of the facts they misconceive. If they remain quiet under such misconceptions, it is lethargy, the forerunner of death to the public liberty. … What country before ever existed a century and half without a rebellion? And what country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.

We have lethargy even when we’re informed.

Quote of the Day – Parenthood Edition

This one comes from Cybrus over at Lost and Found:

Listen up people – raising safe kids isn’t done by waiting until they’ve hit puberty to let them touch anything fun. It’s done by TEACHING them how to think and how to play and then by letting them try and, sometimes, fail. Hell, minor injuries as a child end up being good lessons – if they’re not getting the occasional bruise or risking a broken bone, they’re not really playing! And I’m not talking about sore thumbs from 12 hour XBox sessions. Get your kids outside and playing. What they play is not as important as the fact that they ARE playing.
At the end of the day, bubble-wrapping kids isn’t about making THEM safer – it’s about making YOUR life easier by not having to do your job as a parent.

GBC Secret Santas

Those of us who spend time over at the Gunblogger Conspiracy chat room got the opportunity this year to do the “Secret Santa” thing.  Each of us who volunteered was assigned to send a gift (of restricted value) to one other member, and we would receive a gift from someone else.  I won’t say who I was assigned, but I will say that I’m very pleased and grateful for the 100 rounds of Winchester .38 Super unprimed brass I received from Top of the Chain!  Thanks!

Quote of the Day – Globular Warmering Edition

No doubt the warmist crowd will be quick to express outrage at this blatant confusion of global climate with local weather, but that won’t wash. The Met makes its short-term forecasts on the basis of the same brand of massive computer power and Rube Goldberg modelling used to project the global climate. The suggestion that forecasting the climate is easier than forecasting the weather comes into the same category as acknowledging that governments couldn’t run a lemonade stand, but then believing that they can “manage” an economy.

Red Faces at the Met Office,The Global Warming Policy Foundation

Via Vanderleun