The Son Prepares To Carry The Heavy Torch of Liberty

From the very beginning of American politics, there have been families to make politics their family business. Our second president, John Adams, would see his son reach the presidency. Then, of course, there are the Eisenhowers, Kennedys, Clintons and Bushes. Now the Pauls?!? Anyone who pays any attention to American politics or who watched the republican debates and results from our last election will know, Dr. Ron Paul has become an icon in libertarian and conservative circles. Dr. Paul was laughed at by republican candidates such as Rudy Giuliani until he won debate after debate, and finished ahead of candidates like Giuliani state after state. Those in power began to fear Paul and kept him out of the later debates. Dr. Ron Paul has been a mainstay of Texas' 14th and 22rd Districts since 1976. Holding seats from both districts in the US congress. Now, Rand Paul, the son of the great Dr. Ron Paul is considering throwing his hat into the ring of the 2010 senate race from the state of KY.

Dr. Randall "Rand" Paul is an eye surgeon in Bowling Green KY and has been raised learning the ways of Ludwig von Mises and John Locke from his father. He would be the most liberty oriented senator since another member of a famous family, Robert Taft. While i would lovet o see Rand move toward an executive position, having 2 Pauls in the US congress would be a huge step toward returning liberty to the US. The power the Pauliticians could give to the modern libertarian revolution is immeasurable. The power and dedication of the Ron paul supporters would be a very powerful ally for a Rand Paul campaign. Already, the internet is abuzz with planning and preparation for the possible Paul Senate run. Rand Paul has rousing speaking style and a depth of knowledge with which no candidate could compete.

As a Kentuckian, nothing would make me prouder than to see a liberty lover elected from out state to the US congress. Well, except maybe for one to be elected Governer or President. I am pleased to be able to say i will be volunteering and supporting Paul on 2010.

A Season for Service

I went to an Ash Wednesday service at my church tonight and was reminded that during the season in which Christians remember Jesus' time spent in the wilderness we are called to reflect on our own path and look for ways to serve.

Last night Barack Obama spoke to a joint session of Congress and told the nation that in the wake of the stimulus package being passed it is each American's time to look for ways to serve while we all go through a tough economy.

The two messages, though from different sources, have the same meaning: we must each look into ourselves, find our skill, and use it for the betterment of all around us.  Even a little bit helps.  While you may not have joined me in fasting today, certainly you have joined me in my concern for the future.  As Gov. Jindal correctly said last night, "Americans can do anything."

If we all do our part we can not only pull through this tough time, but we will look back at this and say, "What depression?"

A Lesson For Schools

I have personally argued since its inception that No Child Left Behind is the worst piece of legislation outside of the Patriot Act.  While the Patriot Act can be seen as responsible for breaking most constitutional standards of privacy or due process, NCLB is just badly put together.  The idea is great: get the kids who are doing the worst to do better.  Anybody can agree with that.  Education is society's equalizer, goes the saying.  With an education anybody can do anything.  Unless the economy goes into the biggest recession since '29, butI'm going to leave my diary out of this.

Here's the problem: local schools are run by local districts who are elected at the local level and are paid for by local school district and property taxes.  Anytime a person starts talking about a national educational standard, Parents and educators across the country are up in arms about losing the control of their schools.  This act of Congress, however, neither leaves control of local schools in the hands of local school boards nor creates a national standard of education.

Proficient in Mississippi is failing in Maryland.  Schools are told by a federal agency that they have to get certain numbers on their tests or else they don't get funding.  Now kids' performance on tests is directly linked with the school's ability to buy books.  If a school falls behind, they get less funding.  This would be fine if they were like any other business.  Unfortunately, Wall Street is getting tons of cash for not being able to keep their business together and children are told that if they just did better they'd be fine.  So what's a state to do?  Ah, the wonderful teacher's union will tell you.  Lower the standards and then it becomes easier for the teachers to bring all children up to the standard.  I'm glad we're so worried about the kids at the bottom.  What about all the wasted talent at the top?

I already wrote a post about W.E.B. DuBois and his theory of the talented tenth.  I'm not going to mention it again for the fear of sounding redundant.  Now Ohio wants to make a child's score on the ACT part of graduation requirements.  Anybody else see anything wrong with this?

I have tried for years to express the problems with our educational system.  Unfortunately, everybody's too worried about the kid next to me who can't spell to talk to me.  Tying school funding to test performance is not the appropriate method for teaching children about work and rewards.  That's what jobs are for. 

In an era that recognizes the existence of different learning styles, the value of different assessment techniques, and the relationship between school funding and school performance, I would have thought we would understand that giving every student across the country the same test but having different standards set at the state level by people who haven't taken a test in 20 years and making the results of that test make the difference between firing teachers and buying computers is not acceptable.  Maybe Congress missed that day in class.  I hope it's not on the test...

Economic Policy

I have noticed a significant drop in readership since the last post on drugs, but that has not affected my decision to write on the topic.  I would like to begin the article by stating plainly that I am discussing the economic argument for legalizing not just pot but all drugs.  I do not really want to hear about the health issues or the safety issues because we do not know them.  Everybody knows someone who uses drugs.  I do too.  A lot of my friends know how to control their habits and are perfectly normal, some are not.  However, since tobacco and alcohol are legal I don't want to hear about safety or health.  Thanks.  On to economics.

Have you ever stopped to think about what this country was really founded for?  This country was founded on the principle that free men can make their own choices and their own money and that as long as they have the right to voice their opinions in government they didn't mind paying taxes on any and all goods.  Now the government tells us what we can and can't eat, drink, inhale, inject, own, and marry.  Doesn't sound very free to me.

If Congress legalized drugs there would be several ECONOMIC benefits.  I'm going to start at the production phase and move on through the line.  First you have people growing or otherwise manufacturing drugs.  They have to own land to grow the plants that drugs come from, there's both land purchasing and property tax.  They have to sell their raw materials to processers, there's sales tax and income tax.  The processers have to own buildings to use as factories, there's even more land purchasing and property tax.  The processers sell the finished product to stores, once again you have sales tax and income tax.  The stores sell the product, and we have a third round of sales and income taxes.

Now that we've looked at taxes, let's look at jobs.  You now need farmers, construction workers for the processing facilities, processing plant owners, processing plant workers, store owners, and store employees.  That's a whole lot of jobs whose taxes have already been discussed.

Now that you have people using any drugs they want, you have to think about what happens after they use them.  Police have to keep our streets safe from those people who break the regulations and go out driving, or stealing, or breaking other existing laws (sounds like alcohol).  Drug rehabilitation facilities will have to be built and staffed.  Research into the actual affects of many newer drugs will have to be built and staffed.  New companies selling 'the patch' or 'the gum' for whatever drug you want will have to be created after research finds ways to glean people off these now legal drugs (sounds like tobacco).  That's a whole lot more jobs, property taxes, and income taxes.  Also, for people who break the regulations that are to be set up, they have to pay the fines and court fees.  There's even more money coming in.

Okay, I think I've covered all of the possible government incomes from legalizing drugs, how about the savings?  Half, yes one in two, of all federal prisoners are in prison because of NONVIOLENT drug-related crimes.  They all get let out.  Wow, we don't need nearly as many jails do we?  Tax money doesn't get wasted on the unfortunate enough to get caught doing something studies have shown 8 in 10 young people try does it?  The 7 BILLION dollars that have been spent year to date in the war on drugs is now unnecessary.  That's to date, it's only February.  In 2003, the government spent 19 BILLION dollars on the war on drugs.  That's one year.  How much money have they spent all time?  Go look it up, it's more than Iraq and Afghanistan combined, and I think it's probably greater than the new stimulus bill.  We also lower the case load for public defenders, jailers, bailiffs, judges, and police who can now focus on murderers, rapists, and other VIOLENT offenders.

Wow, more money coming in, less money going out, can this get any better?  Yes it can.  We also can improve trade relations with Mexico, Brazil, Afghanistan, and most if not all of Central America.  Now all of the money that we're getting in income and taxes is spread to these other nations as well.  Sounds great doesn't it?  What's the only drawback?  The government has less control on the private lives of its citizenry.

Long and Winding

The United States is walking down the road to the future.  While many leaders have the vision to see the ending, I'll let them argue what end will come, few have the sight to see what the next step is.  In the Christmas classic movie, 'Santa Claus is Coming to Town,' the Winter Warlock sings a song about putting one foot in front of the other.  We as a nation must do that now.

We must start developing our own skills and marketing them.  If you're good at sewing, make your own shirts and sell them to your neighbors.  You'll get extra income and they'll get cheaper shirts than they would at the store.  If you're good with computers, tell your friends you'll do technical repairs so that they don't have to spend the money on a new machine.  Yes this hurts big business.  Yes this hurts the economy.  Big businesses are getting government money and are being run badly.  The economy is too big for its own britches.  Big businesses need to fail and the economy needs to shrink to a maintainable level.  It's going to hurt, but if each of us work hard to make ends meet they will meet.  That's called free market.

We must all recognize that other people are not always at fault for their problems.  If a friend lost their job, invite him over to dinner.  If a coworker can't afford his car payments, offer him a ride.  If someone you have never met says he lost his job, give him five bucks to shovel your driveway.  That's called generosity.

Those are the left foot and right foot that each of us must use to tread forward while our leaders look forward.  They can afford to look at how he economy will function in two years or four years or ten years.  We can't.  We have to live day to day and month to month.

I have a lot of material saved about how the economy should change and how the government should change, but I think we've all heard enough of stimulus and foreign policy.  I heard of a woman at my church who turned 50 this year.  She told her friends not to get her lavish gifts or plan a wild party, she asked them to instead plan 50 acts of kindness.  By the time her birthday came around, 57 acts had been completed.  This is what makes America strong.  We must all come together as a nation and work together.  There's a reason that this nation didn't survive as a confederacy in the first 4 years after the end of the war of independence.  Bickering and blame plagued the first confederacies and the Second Continental Congress were able to see what we need to see now.  There's only one way this nation of states can survive:

United.

WOW! What a citizen!

I have long had a theory about MMO Games ability to make people more open minded because of the diverse environment they play in. While many people regard gamers as geeks and outcasts of society that provide no benefit, it seems more information is coming out that the opposite is actually true.

Gamers are better citizens.

The games make people adapt to a very diverse climate, interacting with people from all over the world in different regions and countries with very different ideals and beliefs and research is showing that is making them, for lack of a better term, better people.

Here is an article analyzing one such research area:

“For the uninitiated, she showed some of the "chaotic and complicated" World of Warcraft, which even has its own virtual economy dealing with the things necessary to succeed in the game.She explained how game players she studied collaboratively use scientific problem-solving techniques to succeed in World of Warcraft.”

She continues on to say:

“Her work included analysis of message boards where World of Warcraft players get together. She found 86 percent of the talk was "productive," featuring very detailed questions and serious discussion, with players exchanging ideas and making counter-arguments using data and reasoning and building on each others' ideas.”

But that’s not all, just read about the civic flexibility the players showed:

“She found that 65 percent of the discussion was "evaluative" vs. 30 percent "absolutist" -- "My idea is right and not open to discussion" -- and 5 percent "relative" -- it's just opinion and no one is right.

In contrast, she said studies have found that the U.S. population is only 15 percent evaluative, 50 percent absolutist and 35 percent relativist.”

Those figures are incredibly statistically significant, people in games actively debate over 4 times as often as those in the United States general population and the absolutist attitude is almost half as likely to occur in game as in reality.

You have to wonder how games are really opening the eyes to the fact that there is no “right way” of doing things.

Maybe the people labeling gamers as outcasts should take a lesson from the open-minded.

Paper Bull

After World War II, China referred to the United States as a paper tiger, meaning that we looked threatening but were actually very weak.  Nobody gave the thought any real credit because we seemed to do pretty well for 60 years, but I think that we have to give that sentiment another look with the realization of recent events.

For sixty years we were the dominant economy on the globe, in fact our money was in many ways more powerful than our military.  Then we started borrowing to afford a military occupation.  It seems that while our military is being given a bad name overseas our economy is being given over to other hands.  The power of the United States during the Second World War came from our ability to mobilize the entire economy for war and our unified belief that our cause was in good faith.  Now the money comes from China and I think we can agree that most people don't think the military is doing the right thing.

I don't mean that individual soldiers are acting improperly by serving their country.  I mean that the leadership is making poor decisions on how to use the military.  Get off me.  God.  You people and your patriotism.

Back to what I was saying.  Our hard power has crumpled like a cheap piece of paper and the tiger of our influence has been declawed.

China on the other hand, is the third largest growing economy behind us and Japan.  In a couple years they expect to pass Japan.  They are working hard with Russia to improve a relationship that has been rocky at best.  They are working with Iran to give them nuclear power, if not also weaponry, because they recognize that Iran is a power in the making.  China is also making sure that they don't allow territories like Tibet or Taiwan out of their grasp because it allows them to feel the power of their permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council.  They are buying up United States debt to make their economy powerful over ours.  They have been a bull in the market of debt.  They have been optimistic that we would be able to pay off our debts.  Unfrtunately, just as banks are realizing that many people they gave mortgages to are unable to pay them off, China will learn that we are currently unable to pay them off.  Their economic prowess is merely a show.  They are no more certain than we are but their authoritarian control allows them to seem united regardless of fact.

We are more of a paper tiger than anyone in the government wants to allow for, but China is also a paper bull.  The only problem with everyone being made of paper is that inflation can be a real pain in the ass.

Dr. Paul's Walls II - Taft on the Draft

Ron Paul from Texas details why the United States should never return to a draft system.

They Can Do What?

Technology is constantly evolving and finding new ways to improve, or at least change, our lives.  I'd like to bring your attention to a few articles I've seen that show just a few of the things that people are working on to bring us new technology or new uses for old stuff.

A baby was born in the UK that was screened for a breast cancer gene.  The parents went to a fertility doctor and he looked at sets of fertilized embryos and picked one out that didn't have the gene that carries an %80 chance of breast cancer with it and put it in the mother.  Ever seen Gattaca?  Go see it if you haven't.  While that film does paint qa frightening picture, at the preliminary stages of this process I think it is really cool that science is trying to save lives.  We should place heavy limits on what scientists can screen for though.  Otherwise Uma Therman and Ethan Hawke will have to do a sequel.

Clothing may soon change color in sunlight.  A certain string of algae changes color in different light settings because of something to do with how it stores energy.  Scientists are trying to integrate the algae into textiles and make suits that have real flair.

The guy that made items cloaked from microwaves is developing a cloak of invisibility.  It has something to do with using heat to bend light.  They are a long way from anything seen in Harry Potter, but they sure are trying.

High schools aren't giving out snow days anymore.  Sure the building is closed and the busses aren't running, but the students aren't getting a free pass from learning even for a day.  Something familiar to me in the college environment was a classroom management system, like WebCT.  Now they are using it in high schools.  It'd be nice if they would use electronic lerning aides even when school is in session not just when they are closed for bad weather.

Isn't it cool that even in this economic environment people are still trying out weird stuff?

Legislating Morality

Michael Phelps made news this week for the wrong reasons. After his previously unimaginable run at an armful of gold medals, he had a photo taken at a party of him taking a hit from a bong. Suddenly people are ready to condemn him and he has to apologize to save face. 

Why? Marijuana is relatively harmless, in fact less harmful than alcohol according to almost any independent study, and far less harmful than regular tobacco cigarettes. 

This example is just another example of the United States legislating morality instead of ethics. Why is alcohol legal while marijuana is illegal? 

The major question is why is the government keeping activities illegal where there is no victim? Where is the victim in marijuana? Where is the victim in regulated prostitution? 

Could you imagine how well the economy would skyrocket if there were marijuana companies, similar to all the alcohol and tobacco companies now? What about if someone had a bad day at work and could drop a c-note for a prostitute at his local brothel? And add to that the government giving out licenses for registered prostitutes, and the money they would have to spend on regular examinations to keep their status. 

All around, a lot more money would be changing hands, which would help out everyone. Added to the fact that we would save money by not having to prosecute the vast majority of non-violent drug offenders, most of which deal exclusively with marijuana. While unlicensed prostitution would still be prosecuted, it would still cut down on the spread of diseases if prostitutes were handled nationally the same way they are in Nevada with weekly STD tests and background checks to make sure the workers are not being coerced or forced into that lifestyle.

The economy benefits, and the citizens benefit. 

The unusual thing about these laws is it’s the government trying to protect citizens from themselves, but no one is being hurt – except by the laws themselves.

Obama so far

Today, I think I will give short run on what i think of the Obama administration thus far. Right off the bat Obama capped salaries for his top advisers. Good move! Then he signed an executive order to close Gitmo. Great! He changed the tone of the administration to the ideas of conservation in things like what constitutes a stream. WHOO HOO! Then he said we have to push though this stimulus. Okay, in the immortal words of Meatloaf, 2 out of 3 ain't bad. Then Obama says we have to push through all these bailouts. At least he wants accountability for the money. That one is kind of a wash but more on the negative side. With this sampling Obama gets about a 45%. Not that good. But, as a sociologist I understand this sample is far too small to get a reliable result. That is the glory of being a political blogger, facts don't matter! If you don't believe me, ask Bill O'Reilly. I say Obama is running at about 60% positive so far. I don't expect that number to hold out. This is in line with his current approval rating of about 68%. Hey Obama, look on the bright side, Bush left office at 25%. Oh well, Maybe he will at least loosen pot laws. yea right! To all those like my friends at the New Hampshire Coilition for Common Sense Marijuana Policy who though Obama would be softer on the green stuff, sorry, no go. Obama nipped this question in the bud before he even took the oath. check out that story here.

Obama already started breaking promises. He signed his first bill without 5 days of public debate. If you remember he said, "will not sign any non-emergency bill without giving the American public an opportunity to review and comment on the White House website for five days." Obama is already acting like a typical Dem too. You know, no basic understanding of economics. He is working on extending the unemployment insurance and cutting taxes on those benefits. You can track what promises Obama keeps and breaks on the Obameter here. So, spend more while bringing in less? So, thats how you get out of debt. Wow, the answer was right there all along. i changed my mind i give Obama a negative 4%. Okay, that's enough snark for one day.

The New Face of the Internet

From the Taipei Times in Thailand comes the following headline: Facebook wants to make money from user details.  But Facebook, I trusted you!  I added all my friends and didn't delete them during that one week I could have gotten 62 free whoppers! (I can't believe I have that many friends, either)  Every time I wanted to add one of those applications it asked if I wanted to allow the invasion of my privacy, now you're going two-faced, oh mighty book of faces!

Surely this not only goes against the principles of Facebook, a site with no purpose other than the linking of old friends, but also invades the privacy of the users.  Why wasn't this on the front page of the New York Times?  Surely the American youth will flee away from Facebook to the last refuge for scandilous pictures and other assorted things you don't want your parents seeing.  What?  Myspace has been used as a tool for child molestation and such severe emotional anguish to cause suicide?  Where am I going to passive-aggressively rebel against my parents now?  Check my twitter for the answer!

When Bigger Isn't Better

I know I just blogged about the economy and I know I said how we need to fix it.  I didn't say how we shouldn't fix it.  Libertyhound has mentioned that free money isn't the way to go.  I'd like to bring up two other policies that will have a negative effect on the global economy.

The first is allowing the International Monetary Fund to grow in power.  We have heard about the ails of inflation in one country or another.  While it would be true that if the IMF gave the same amount of money to every country then every currency would inflate at the same rate and therefore not at all, would that actually happen?  The International Monetary Fund Managing Director, Dominique Straus-Kahn, said that it was shameful how the major economies weren't looking at the global nature of the crisis.  This lends to the thought that the IMG would work hard to make sure that the developing economies are able to stay level-headed.  Thus the dollar would inflate so that other nations would improve while we suffer.  Unfortunately for Ms. Straus-Kahn, the US practically dictates IMF policy, to the detriment of many Middle East leaders.  Making the IMF bigger would not only help smaller countries (who we already help) to the detriment of our economy, it would take the power to fix it out of our hands.  Corruption doesn't go away the higher up you go.  In fact, political and governmental corruption grosses $1 trillion a year globally.

The other way to hurt our economy is to reinstate policies similar to Smoot-Hawley.  We cannot begin to start focusing solely on our own country's problems in this crisis.  I know that sounds hypocritical, but give me a minute to explain.  We cannot say 'Buy American' and expect that to fix everything.  The reasons are two fold: our products are not made here and our consumerism drives the global economy.  If we stop spending money on foreign goods then the push to strengthen the IMF will grow and then China will take all financial control away from us since they own us.  After years of outsourcing, we should know that formerly American brands are now made overseas and companies like Toyota are putting plants here.

So how do these two seemingly opposed concepts work together?  By changing the mindset of American politics and economics.  We must take a step back from the policies embodied by George W. Bush.  We are not the sheriff of the world.  We must work with other nations, developed and developing, peaceful and beligerent, secular and religious, to pull out of this crisis.  Roosevelt didn't save the global economy because he started WWII (he didn't, it's a joke), he joined with world leaders to fight the threat of Nazism and while the entire world was joined in a common cause we were able to then, and only then, face the challenges of that age.  We must allow other countries to share their good ideas and we must force ourselves to admit when we are wrong.  We cannot do this alone and we cannot allow one group tell us how to fix this.  United we stand.