Pro-Capitalism, Anti-Socialism March in Washington, D.C.

My wife Anna and I went to the Washington, D.C. march on the Capitol on Saturday, 12 September 2009 to demonstrate in favor of:

• The sovereign Rights of the Individual to his own life, his own liberty and property, and to the pursuit of his own happiness.
• The moral and practical superiority of Capitalism over Socialism.
• To defend and protect the Constitution with its severe limits on the power of the federal government in order to protect the General Welfare served by the Rights of the Individual, the violation of which is Tyranny.
• To oppose the huge Debts destroying the future of our Children.
• To reduce taxes and stop government spending.
  
• To oppose the Chicago Politics of Special Interests and Thieves feeding in a frenzy upon the taxpayers.
• To send the Czars back to Russia.
• To prevent the government takeover of Health Care and allow insurance to be bought across state lines and to implement tort reform.
• To protest the nonsense of Man-Made Global Warming and the Control of Energy Use by government.
• To protest the Bank and Auto Company Bailouts.
• To protest the Loss of Jobs due to the Pursuit of Socialism.
• To protest the government's Anti-Business Bias and the intent to Kill Entire Industries.
• To protest against Class Warfare and Racism.
• To protest Congress's failure to read the bills it passes.
  
• To protest the Arrogance of King Obama, Queen "Let them eat cake" Pelosi, and Jack "Jackal" Harry Reid and their band of power-lusting allies who refuse to listen to their bosses, The People.

I was impressed that so many Americans have come to understand what is going on and have discovered what the basic principles of good American government are. The media is mostly downplaying the number of people who showed up and is, of course, characterizing them in unflattering terms. The Democrat DC authorities apparently estimated the size of the crowd at 60,000 to 70,000 people, but there was a click head count at one portal into the demonstration area which reached 500,000 counted. The demonstration lasted at least 7 hours. I arrived several hours into the demonstration and I believe there were 100,000s there when I worked my way onto the East Capitol lawn. What is more, on the way there, the trash cans were full of many thousands of signs which had already been discarded by people who had left the demonstration before I got there! I am confident that there were at least about 1,000,000 people who attended the demonstration. You should look at the pictures of people there shown here. Most of the MSM reported that 10,000s of demonstrators attended the protest and many simply said 1,000s protested. How unbelievable! How obviously untrustworthy the MSM is!

I encountered people I knew to be from Maryland, Virginia, Texas, Tennessee, Connecticut, Maine, New Jersey, Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, and Michigan. I found that many understood that the global climate is primarily a function of sun cycles rather than man's emissions of CO2 from burning fossil fuels. I found that many understood that the real number of unemployed is much higher than the 9.7% the federal government claims it is. Others understood that the Democrat reform of health care was motivated by a desire to control the People's health and lives, not to improve health care. But most of all, I was impressed that most people understood that our government is one of limited powers given in our Constitution. They also understood that those limitations are primarily so that individuals will be free to manage their own lives, rather than being reduced to dependent slaves by their government.

Hurrah!!!! The American people cannot all be fooled for very long!

July 4th Tea Party in Washington, D.C.

I will be attending the 4th of July Tea Party in Washington, D.C. to make it visually clear that some Americans do still care about defending their sovereign individual rights. Please consider coming yourself or going to one nearer you. Information on the Tea Party in Washington, D.C. is found here.

I suppose the socialists will now call me a Redneck! Or will they ignore the fact that fascists are socialists and call me a Fascist? Maybe that woman CNN reporter will pretend to interview me while casting such insults.

Washington Teachers Union Opposes School Reform

Of course, it is news to no one that the Washington Teachers Union (WTU) opposes the reform of the nation's lowest performing school district. The WTU is the principal reason why this school system which is spending as much or more money per student as any school district in the nation is so miserable in performing the only function that matters: educating students.

New Orleans put most of its 78 public schools into a special Recovery School District after Hurricane Katrina. Now, about half of its schools are charter schools and the district has no union contract. The American Federation of Teachers, which strongly backed Obama, has vigorously opposed the reform efforts in New Orleans. Mayor Adrian Fenty and Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee of Washington, D.C., have become thoroughly fed-up with the WTU opposing school reforms and the elimination of awful teachers. They are considering restoring the school district's power to create nonunionized charter schools. They may declare the school system in a state of emergency in order to end the need to bargain with the WTU.

Obama has praised their efforts, but will be in the middle between them and the teacher's unions to whom he owes his election. It will be very interesting to see if he helps Fenty and Rhee or if he opposes their efforts behind closed doors. Union leaders regard the chances of the district getting a state of emergency ruling from the federal government to be very remote, given what Obama owes them. They do have some concern that the district might be able to regain its power to charter schools, however.

Rhee has proposed that teachers be more directly accountable for student performance and will offer them much higher salaries in exchange for weaker tenure rules. The 4,000 member WTU has refused to bring her contract offer to a vote. Rhee thinks the teachers will vote for it if they are allow to do so. Apparently the WTU also thinks the teachers might vote for the higher salary and more accountability contract also! It is delicious to see these Democrats fighting so much among themselves.

Fenty is the second D.C. mayor to seriously wrestle with school reform. It is good that D.C. voters have come to care about school reform. The District of Columbia is more heavily Democrat than any state. So this sets up conflict between Democrat politicians and the teachers unions. If the reform ever occurs and if D.C. students ever gain enough self-confidence to believe that they are capable of managing their own lives, it will be interesting to see if many of them start to fall away from the dependency offered them by the Democrats.