The Smallest Minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities. – Ayn Rand
“You are evil thieving bastards.”
Dvorak (mentioned below) also had this video posted (he’s not a complete jerk), and I’m going to help spread it around:
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGC1mCS4OVo&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0&w=640&h=505]
If I recall correctly, RobertaX has been having similar problems with BofA and her mortgage, too.
It’s about time BofA got their asses handed to them.
For Stingray:
From Mostly Cajun‘s “Random Thoughts”:
51. As a driver I hate pedestrians, and as a pedestrian I hate drivers, but no matter what the mode of transportation, I always hate cyclists.
Back to loading . . .
Idio-Seconds and Darwin Awards
Gerard reports via Exurban League. Wincingly humorous.
From a link in LabRat’s Parasite memes and monkeyspheres, David Wong’s Cracked.com piece What is the Monkeysphere?:
(S)ome people in the distant past naively thought they could sit all of the millions of monkeys down and say, “Okay, everybody go pick the bananas, then bring them here, and we’ll distribute them with a complex formula determining banana need! Now go gather bananas for the good of society!” For the monkeys it was a confused, comical, tree-humping disaster.
Later, a far more realistic man sat the monkeys down and said, “You want bananas? Each of you go get your own. I’m taking a nap.” That man, of course, was German philosopher Hans Capitalism.As long as everybody gets their own bananas and shares with the few in their Monkeysphere, the system will thrive even though nobody is even trying to make the system thrive. This is perhaps how Ayn Rand would have put it, had she not been such a hateful bitch.
Monday’s scoop of free ice cream has drawn some traffic, some links, and some comments, and last night’s gun blogger roundtable at Gun Nuts Radio has provided another spark of inspiration. Unfortunately, twelve-hour days and 2:30AM cat fights in the kitchen are conspiring to smother that spark, so I’m afraid this piece isn’t going to be quite the quality I’d prefer, but I want to keep up with Rule of Blogging #1 as best I can.
One of the comments left at Restoring the Lost Constitution was this one:
“Thus perish all compromise with tyranny!”
(William Lloyd Garrison, setting fire to the constitution on Framingham Green, Massachusetts, July 4, 1854)
Word.
Billy Beck
Immediately followed by this one:
The Necronstitution.
Why try to restore a thing so instrumental in the death of America?
“The American Revolution in fact died with the ratification of the US Constitution.”
It was only a matter of time to arrive at this point. That was clear before the ink was even dry on that thing.
Matt
Obviously neither Beck nor Matt are particular fans of the Constitution, but the fact of the matter remains that there are a significant number of us who want what we believe that document promised us restored. We far outnumber those of the Anarchist bent, but (as I have been cataloging here at TSM for the last six years) we’re both overrun by people who have been fed Rousseau (the overwhelming majority unknowingly) for their entire lives.
And that feeding has been deliberate. I strongly recommend you watch Bill Whittle’s 13 minute piece on “The Great Liberal Narrative”. As commenter “jb” put it in his linking post,
Gramsci saw it correctly, although he was a minor marxist of his time. Jailbirds rarely get recognition.
“Gramsci rejected the state-worship that results from identifying political society with civil society, as was done by the Jacobins and Fascists. He believes the proletariat’s historical task is to create a ‘regulated society’ and defines the ‘withering away of the state’ as the full development of civil society’s ability to regulate itself.” (Wikipedia)
He was a communist’s communist–he kept the end goal in sight at all times. Lenin and Stalin were more deadly, but Gramsci was more consistent. Give the proletariat the essentials of life, or even a bit better and they (the proletariat) will let the marxist masters do what they wish.
So what about that inspiration from the Roundtable discussion last night? Hold on just a bit longer.
Back in October of 2006 I wrote an überpost, hoping to conclude my series on “What is a Right?” entitled The United Federation of Planets. If you’ve got an hour or two, you might want to go peruse that piece, but the key relating to this post is that what people believe drives the cultures they live in. At one time, the vast majority of this society believed that the Constitution protected our rights and our property. Many of us want that protection back. Apparently most people think they do, but honestly don’t understand that what they’re agitating for is its exact opposite. Those who do understand it are (IMHO) evil.
Last night, one of the questions we bloggers were asked was “what was our favorite or most popular post?” LabRat said one of hers was Parasite memes and monkeyspheres. It’s one of my favorites as well, and it starts out with this:
It was as if even the most intelligent person had this little blank spot in their heads where someone had written: “Kings. What a good idea.” Whoever had created humanity had left in a major design flaw. — Terry Pratchett, from Feet of Clay
She goes on to argue a convincing case that human evolution prewires us to hate rich people, and embrace “from each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs.”
So if LabRat is even half right, it’s not really surprising that socialism is so seductive to so much of the population, and that the ideology laid down in the Declaration of Independence very well may have had the seeds of its destruction sown with the ratification of the Constitution of the United States.
Entropy happens, and it generally only goes one way without a huge influx of carefully directed power from outside the observed system: downhill. Our Constitutionally-oriented belief system has survived, mostly intact, for over 200 years – which is a pretty damned good run, historically. What the people of this nation have accomplished in that period is more than exceptional, it’s quite literally so extraordinary as to seem almost impossible.
But it’s not enough, apparently, to overcome the siren song of “we’ll take care of you!”
That major design flaw, it seems, is catching up to us.
Good night. I hope you sleep better than I probably will.
Those Who Can, Do
The old saying is “Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach. Those who can’t teach, criticize.”
There’s a new addition: “The completely incompetent go to work for the government.”
Read the tale that Mostly Cajun tells.
And remember – we’re supposed to want government oversight of our health care?
READ THIS:
You don’t really “arrive” in Germany, as much as you are born there: naked, bleeding, in pain, unsure of your surroundings, not knowing anyone and wondering what in the hell just happened.
— Maj. Chuck Zeigenfuss, From My Position… On the Way!: “He has no personal effects…”
Then read this:
British officers in his unit, 2 Rifles, wanted to track their man every step of the way, and to ensure that his family was informed and supported in this time of high stress. Yet having their soldier suddenly in the American system caused a temporary glitch in communications with folks in Germany. The British leadership in Sangin could have worked through the glitch within some hours, but that would have been hours wasted, and they wanted to know the status of their soldier now. So a British officer in Sangin – thinking creatively –asked if I knew any shortcuts to open communications. The right people were only an email away: Soldiers Angels. And so within about two minutes, these fingers typed an email with this subject heading: CALLING ALL ANGELS.
Soldiers’ Angels Shelle Michaels and MaryAnn Phillips moved into action. Day by day British officers mentioned how Soldiers Angels were proving to be incredibly helpful. The soldiers expressed deep and sincere appreciation. Yet again, the Angels arrived during a time of need.
— Michael Yon, Do Americans Care about British Soldiers?
Maj. Zeigenfuss concludes his piece with this:
If you’ve not joined soldiers angels yet, please do so. There are many ways you can help, either through time, monetarily, visiting, writing a letter, or adopting one of over a thousand soldiers who have asked
* Donate a backpack
* Donate items for a backpack
* Make a Blanket of Hope
See why the Gun Blogger Rendezvous supports Soldiers’ Angels and Project Valour IT? And why you should, too?
Quote of the Day
I stole this one from my boss’s blog:
I will add as a fifth circumstance in the situation of the House of Representatives, restraining them from oppressive measures, that they can make no law which will not have its full operation on themselves and their friends, as well as on the great mass of the society. This has always been deemed one of the strongest bonds by which human policy can connect the rulers and the people together. It creates between them that communion of interests and sympathy of sentiments of which few governments have furnished examples; but without which every government degenerates into tyranny. If it be asked what is to restrain the House of Representatives from making legal discriminations in favor of themselves and a particular class of the society? I answer, the genius of the whole system, the nature of just and constitutional laws, and above all the vigilant and manly spirit which actuates the people of America, a spirit which nourishes freedom, and in return is nourished by it.
If this spirit shall ever be so far debased as to tolerate a law not obligatory on the Legislature as well as on the people, the people will be prepared to tolerate anything but liberty.
James Madison as “Publius”, Federalist No. 57, February 19, 1788
“. . . the people will be prepared to tolerate anything but liberty.”
We certainly seem to be.
A couple of weeks ago I wrote Malice vs. Stupidity, a post in part about the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA) – a piece of self-congratulatory legislation overwhelmingly passed by our Congresscritters in the wake of lead-contaminated toys from China. While listening to the Vicious Circle #15 podcast this afternoon, I heard Alan say that he fully expected to see someone get prosecuted and convicted for selling a children’s book in violation of that Act, and TD (I think) said the book probably wouldn’t even be contaminated – thus someone would go to jail for selling a legal product.
Then this evening Instapundit links to a story about the Feds going after garage sales:
Seller, beware: Feds cracking down on garage sales
If you’re planning a garage sale or organizing a church bazaar, you’d best beware: You could be breaking a new federal law. As part of a campaign called Resale Roundup, the federal government is cracking down on the secondhand sales of dangerous and defective products.
The initiative, which targets toys and other products for children, enforces a new provision that makes it a crime to resell anything that’s been recalled by its manufacturer.
“Those who resell recalled children’s products are not only breaking the law, they are putting children’s lives at risk,” said Inez Tenenbaum, the recently confirmed chairwoman of the Consumer Product Safety Commission.
The crackdown affects sellers ranging from major thrift-store operators such as Goodwill and the Salvation Army to everyday Americans cleaning out their attics for yard sales, church bazaars or — increasingly — digital hawking on eBay, Craigslist and other Web sites.
Secondhand sellers now must keep abreast of recalls for thousands of products, some of them stretching back more than a decade, to stay within the bounds of the law.
Keep reading and you’ll see that the Federal agents charged with enforcement of these laws are also given the responsibility to enforce the CPSIA restrictions as well.
Is there anything the Federal government isn’t responsible for regulating or enforcing anymore?
Oh. Damn.
That is viciously truthful.
Found at From My Position . . . On the Way!
And you might want to read this, too.
Who needs “death panels”?