The Critical Factor in American Politics: Who Owns Your Body and Mind?

The critical question whose answer determines the balance of power in American politics today is: Who owns your body and mind?

There are three answers to this question which are given by significant numbers of Americans.  They are:

1) I own my own body and mind.

2) God owns my body and mind.

3) The collective, effectively the government, owns my body and mind.

The idea that an individual owned their own body and mind was essentially a cornerstone idea of the Enlightenment and one which played a critical role in the thinking of the minds of the Founders of the United States of America and the Framers of the Constitution.  The purpose of government was to protect the individual rights of  the people.  Only if an individual owned their own mind and body did such an idea make sense.  Only then could a person have a sovereign right to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of his own happiness.

Yes, some of them thought that God also owned their minds and bodies, but that even then an individual had a right to acknowledge that or to deny that ownership.  The individual, in their minds, could either freely give themselves to God or they could sin.  They believed in free will.

Some who believed that God owned their minds and bodies believed the state must help God assert this ownership.  Many a nation had established a religion and was all too committed to using government power to force others to make value choices these people believed God wanted them to make.  In America, the early Pilgrims were such an example.  Later many Calvinists in New England had similar ideas.  The colony of Virginia had an established religion, The Church of England, which was funded by the colonial government.  In addition to establishing churches, the colonies frequently codified many of their religious beliefs into laws.  By the time of the American Revolution and in the decade that followed, many of the thinking Americans came to the conclusion that government should not play this role of trying to force people to act within the confines of religious beliefs.  The need for a broader freedom of conscience was becoming widely recognized by thinking Americans.

The idea that the collective owned one's mind and body has been around probably as long as people have associated in bands or tribes.  Medieval European city and nation states used this idea to build hierarchical societies in which the serf served the local aristocratic lord and that lord served the King.  The King pretended to serve God, built and protected the state, and pretended to be the caretaker for the poor, dumb serfs.  The serfs were to devote their lives to the nation, the King, and God. 

The socialists extended this ancient idea to the state alone with no particular pretense that they depended upon God's authority to take control of the masses of the people.  As socialists became more and more common, thanks largely to government controlled education, the demands of the state based on collectivist ownership increased.  The Prussian government began such an expansion of the state based on socialist ideas of collective ownership of the people's minds and bodies.  It provided schools, medical care, and retirement benefits to the people in exchange for fairly complete control of their lives.  The Marxists advanced their version of such claims, as did the fascists and the National Socialist German Workers Party.  The Progressives in America borrowed the idea of the socialist government-run state schools, heavy regulation of productive labor, control of medical care and retirement benefits, and have created their own socialist variant.

As I have noted many times, ObamaCare is based on the assertion that the collective owns every individual's body and mind.  There can be no other basis for a governmental demand that each American must care for the maintenance of his or her mind and body in accordance with rules established by the government.  The government is claiming the right to have its property maintained.  It is telling Americans what medical care they must pay for coverage on in their insurance whether any particular individual has any need for that coverage or not.  The government is doing this very explicitly on a collectivist basis.  Someone needs that coverage and therefore every individual will pay for it.  This requirement is so important to the government that ObamaCare will actually cause many millions of individuals to lose the insurance they have and were happy with.  After all, there is nothing so important to the socialist as the principle of collective ownership and its assertion.  This is not actually being done for the sake of the welfare of each American individual.  No, it is being done to create a strengthened mandate that every individual's mind and body belongs to the government.

Of course this idea was asserted already in many other laws.  For instance, Progressive governments have long asserted that almost any activity that earns income or salary comes under its powers of regulation, control, and taxation.  American governments also believe they have the right to dictate minimum wages, which means they assert that they have the right to prevent individuals from earning a living at all.  Progressive governments have long levied taxes on an individual's pay from their own labor.  These are very blatant claims that an individual's labor belongs to the government.  Now what is your labor but one of the most critical ways you use your mind and body to support and maintain your own life.  Yet, these same governments pretend they are not violating anyone's right to life.  Controlling and taxing your labor is effectively a claim of ownership of your mind and body.

The balance of power in America today is the result of a two-party system in which one party, the Democratic Party, is wholly of the belief that every individual's mind and body belongs to the collective, or effectively to the government.  The other party, the Republican party, is more disparate in its parts.  It is composed of three major factions, which either hold that:

1) An individual's body is only self-owned.

2) One nominally owns one's own body and mind, but ought to give them to God of one's free will.

3) God owns everyone's body and mind, but God is too weak or lazy to force everyone Himself to obey his will and acknowledge his ownership, so the government must perform this task of forcing obedience for Him.

As far as the use of government power through its monopoly on the use of force is concerned, there is little friction and little difference between Factions 1 and 2.  The consequences on the use of force by government of Faction 3, however, are profound.  The most critical and common issues affected are government policies with respect to sex and procreation.  The portions of our society most directly affected are women and those who are lesbians, gay, bisexual, or transgender.  Many American women and LGBTs find the use of force by Faction 3 of the Republican Party to be extremely threatening.  More often than not, these groups find this threat more frightening than the broader and more equally applied, by gender and sexuality at least, threats to self-ownership of the Democratic Party.

I am fully in agreement that the use of government by Faction 3 for its purposes is highly immoral and highly irrational.  It is threatening.  But, I see the claim of collective ownership by the Democrat Party as even worse.

First, the collectivist agenda of the Progressives, in full control of the Democratic Party, has been very successful in getting the government to control our daily lives in many ways.  It dictates what values we are free to pursue and it takes many hours of our time and effort from each of us by force.  The amount of our labor it commands has steadily increased, but for secondary fluctuations such as major wars.

Second, more and more Americans, especially younger Americans, find the claims of Faction 3 to be wrongheaded, even as many of them embrace the idea of collective ownership of our minds and bodies.  Faction 3 has poor prospects of controlling the government to do its will on a national level, because many Republicans oppose them, as do all of the Democrats.  Only a very few states are so dominated by Faction 3 that there is a practical likelihood of their enacting their program.  At the national level, even when the Republicans controlled the House, the Senate, and the presidency, this faction was never able to accomplish much of anything toward their agenda.

Third, the range of those aspects of human life claimed as the purview of government control by force is much larger on the part of the Progressive collectivist agenda of Democrat Party.  It applies to everyone and to almost anything we do.  It is without any real boundaries at all.

Most Americans say they want smaller government, yet the dominion of government keeps growing.  The Republican Party is clearly the party of at least less massive government, though it is not really the party of smaller government as it ought to be.  Yet most Americans favor the Democratic Party in Generic Congressional Polls.  The reason is primarily due to the fear of many women and almost all LGBTs of the agenda of Faction 3 of the Republican Party.  If this agenda were to be put into effect, that fear would be well-justified, but it has almost no chance of being put into effect.  Yet because so many women and LGBTs vote for the Democratic Party out of this exaggerated fear, the less massive Republican Party is unable to attain enough offices to prevent the Progressive collectivist attack upon our individual rights which has been very successful in many ways.

At this time, the biggest issue of government is the repeal of ObamaCare with its takeover of 16 to 18% of the US economy, its many harmful effects on medical care and its cost to individuals, and its blatant claim of government ownership of our bodies and minds.  Most Americans recognize that ObamaCare is a massively troublesome program, even if most underestimate its harms.  Yet, we have seen anti-ObamaCare candidates for the Senate defeated by Democrat collectivists who favored ObamaCare and the rest of the Progressive collectivist agenda because women, young people, and LGBTs found the ideas of Faction 3 Republicans abhorrent.  And even though Ken Cuccinelli, a Republican candidate for Governor in Virginia, has vowed that he will not try as Governor to implement his previous Faction 3 agenda as required by his support from the Tea Party, he is likely to lose that election to a highly corrupt collectivist, Terry McAuliffe.

There are many who believe that the Tea Party is a movement of Faction 3 Republican types.  It is not so.  It is primarily people more aligned with Factions 1 and 2.  There are also a few Faction 3 types who have agreed that the threat of the Progressive collectivist agenda has become so great in America that they will give up trying to codify their religious beliefs in the law at least until the collectivist threat is defeated.  Ken Cuccinelli is a man who has made this pledge.  He has fought ObamaCare with more determination and effect than almost any politician.  He is strong in his support that we each own our own labor and should be free to cooperate with others to our mutual benefit in the private sector.  He understands that government should be smaller.  It should be dictating fewer of our values to us and less involved in our lives.  He is a strong Tea Party promoter and candidate who has agreed to live by the rules of the Tea Party to leave his religious beliefs in the private sector and not use the force of government to promote them.

It is a serious mistake to allow the Progressive collectivist Terry McAuliffe to become governor of Virginia.  His strong support of ObamaCare and all things collectivist will do serious harm to the people of the state of Virginia.  If you value your rights and you are voting in this election, it is a serious mistake to vote for McAuliffe or even to vote for the Libertarian candidate.  The Democrat will bring nothing but evil accomplices into the state government, while Ken Cuccinelli will bring in many Faction 1 and Faction 2 Republicans instead.  This will be very good for the people of the state of Virginia.

Are Americans Looney Tunes?

How can people be so unthinking and irrational as to hold this collection of beliefs at one time?  Some of these beliefs are rational, but others are highly irrational and contradictory.

From the most recent Rasmussen poll findings:

64% of Likely U.S. Voters now view the federal government unfavorably, with 34% who have a Very Unfavorable opinion of it.

Voters overwhelmingly want to scrap or change the new health care law, with 43% who want to repeal it entirely and start over and 35% who would prefer Congress go through the law piece by piece to improve it. Just 18% want to leave the law as is.

Just 25% of voters believe the United States is heading in the right direction. 

Voters are evenly divided at 42% apiece when asked whether they agree more politically with the president or with the average member of the Tea Party.

Democrats hold a six-point lead over Republicans – 43% to 37% - on the latest Generic Congressional Ballot. 

Most consumers and investors believe the country is still in a recession. 

Only 33% of Americans believe the U.S. economy will be stronger in a year's time, while 41% think it will grow weaker by then. 

Fewer than half (47%) of Americans believe it’s still possible for anyone in this country looking for work to find a job.  

OK, so 64% have no trust in government, yet 35% + 18% = 53% want it to run the entire medical industry and health insurance industry either with the ObamaCare law as it is or after Congress has re-worked this entirely wrongheaded law.  What on earth makes them think Congress can do a rework and make something rational and beneficial out of a government-controlled medical care system?

Only 25% believe the US is headed in the right direction, yet 42% side with Obama and the continued growth of government and the emasculation of the private sector.  They are in opposition to the 42% who want a change in direction, namely those who agree more with the Tea Party movement.

Most consumers and investors believe the US is still in recession, which it clearly is in terms that matter, namely the real per capita private sector GDP.  Only 33% believe it will be stronger in a year, yet 43% believe in the anti-business and anti-jobs notions of the Democrat Socialist Party over the more business and jobs friendly Republicans who can only muster 37% support in the Generic Congressional Ballot.  Note also the disconnect with the 42% who believe more like the Tea Party than with Obama.  Based on that, the Republicans should be equal with the Democrats in the Generic Congressional Ballot.  Based on the economy and jobs prospects and opposition to ObamaCare, the Republicans should be favored.

But no, Americans while right not to trust government, still favor the party of bigger government which has so completely bollixed things up.  Go figure.  They really are Looney Tunes.

A Democrat Wants to Know, Sort Of

A young Democrat of my acquaintance, who was educated as an engineer at Georgia Institute of Technology and has a Wharton School of Business MBA, sent me the following note:

Again the GOP strikes with the Govt shutdown. It all stinks of politics, and the unfortunately for the GOP, they are not very likeable right now, so the American people don't buy what they are selling. How childish was Cruz the other day?? If every politician threw a tantrum every time they didn't get what they wanted or believed in, where would we as a country be? 

Simple questions. Why is there no leadership in the GOP? Why is the Tea Party effectively blocking the everything? This GOP is frankly a shitshow (excuse my french), and there is no site in end. It is a shame, I am starting to think that an independent may have just as good a chance as the GOP in the next presidential elections, because almost everyone there is either useless, or has to flip flop numerous times just to get the party nomination (a la Romney - a good candidate). I know how you feel about the Affordable Care Act, but I don't think it is a bad idea to ask people to chip in when it is health related. America needs to go away from the "every man for himself" motto when it comes to basic fundamentals like health. The Affordable Care Act does not make America a socialist country.

Now despite this thinking, this young man is of considerable importance to me.  As a consequence, I have had several discussions with him, though as is usually the case when talking to a Democrat, there has been no change of his opinions despite my sterling reason!  There is always the sense that a Democrat simply lives in a different universe and all the laws of physics and economics are different there and they cannot imagine what those laws are on Earth.

Here is my reply:

When government spends 24 to 25% of the entire GDP and has a couple of hundred thousand pages of regulations that impose restrictions on the actions of individuals and many cost and time requirements on individuals in addition to its actual spending, then passions will run high on political issues.  And contrary to the pretense of those who believe wholeheartedly in Big Government, government is all about the use of force.  With our democratic pretense, we suppose that 50.1% of the voters have the right to use that force to make 49.9% do anything they please.  This is not the case.  It does make every government act of the legislature and of the President a matter of politics.

The purpose of legitimate government is to protect the rights of the individual.  These rights are very broad with respect to freedom of conscience, freedom of association, and the freedom to take all actions which support your own life and happiness without the use of force against others.  Those broad freedoms are only partially spelled out as a few particulars in the Bill of Rights.  The 9th Amendment which might protect the full scope of our individual rights is ignored and this is not surprising because too few people have thought out the complete scope of our individual rights.
 
The Constitution listed the few powers of the government and the list was short.  Had the government and many special interests not long fought to ignore the limits of that list, most individual rights would not be violated by the government.  In fact, many of the Framers of the Constitution made this very argument against a Bill of Rights, noting that a Bill of Rights would be too narrow a protection and just protect a portion of one's individual rights.  They argued that this would be taken as a reason to say the government can do anything to anyone which is not then denied by the Bill of Rights.  This is what has happened and then some.  Now even rights explicit in the Bill of Rights are violated, such as Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Religion, Freedom to Assemble, Freedom to Petition the Government, and the right to own and bear arms.
 

Let us return to the problems of unfettered democracy with a big government.  This creates a society in which on issue after issue a slim majority (in the ideal case, in actuality, special interests very often control such a government and the beliefs of the people be damned) uses force to impose their will on a minority.  The minority is enraged both by having to do something they think is wrong and by the fact that they are forced to do it by force-wielding thugs, agents of the government.  There is the wrongness of the thing itself and there is the wrongness of the force itself.

Even if you are on the majority side in many cases, you will inevitably be on the minority side many times also.  This is an awful way to live life.  It is very stressful and very confrontational.  But, it is the nature of unfettered democracy and is a substantial part of the reason such democracies soon collapse.  They destroy the society and replace a natural tendency to cooperate with one another in the private sector with a mob or gang mentality striving to control the use of government force to their advantage.  They also make laws to cover many activities they simply do not understand.  This really gums up the works by removing the specialists in the private sector from the decision process.
 
If a minority and a number of special interests combine with a socialist President, they can even impose a monster system such as ObamaCare, despite most of the People opposing it.  Most of the things that big government does have some special interest group wanting it and most of the People are actually remarkably uninformed about it.  They are also generally victims of that action and do not understand that.

Big Government is all about every faction for itself.  It is not about the welfare of the People.  That is the pretense and it is very clear these days that it is a very hollow pretense.  Contrary to your statement, the private sector is not properly characterized as "every man for himself."  The private sector is characterized by people cooperating with one another for a multitude of purposes of their own choosing and helping one another to achieve the goals that each has chosen of his own free will.  The private sector, unlike the government sector, does not live by the use of force and does not allow some to impose their will on others.  It is the government sector that refuses to allow us to work out mutually agreeable contracts and associations with others in many, many ways.  The government limits our activities mostly in interactions with others and thereby forces us to go it alone in many cases where we would have sought out a mutually beneficial cooperative enterprise with others.

Such effects are very clear with such laws as the Minimum Wage Law.  If I wish to hire an under-educated and inexperienced young person and he wishes to take the job I may be able to give him, we are not allowed to negotiate any wage lower than the minimum wage.  I never get to evaluate his work ethic and ability to do productive work and he never gets to prove he can do the job and move on to a higher pay grade.  I have to go it without his potentially good production and he gets to turn to a life of crime.

Or take the fact that ObamaCare is forcing employers to stop hiring before they grow to 50 employees and it pushes them to reduce the hours worked in a week to fewer than 30 hours.  In effect, ObamaCare is forcing the employer to go it alone.  His ability to cooperate with others for their mutual benefit is restricted.  Then there are many, many medical providers who are now being laid off because their employers cannot make enough money to survive under ObamaCare.  Once again, Big Government is making people go it alone.

You say you do not think it is a bad idea to ask people to chip in to provide health care to others.  I do not much care whether you ask them to do so or not.  Go ahead and ask all you want, provided you are not being terribly dishonest and are not actually using force to make them contribute their hard-earned income to provide for the health of others.  But you are being dishonest here.  There is nothing that gives you the right to make others do this.  This is nothing but your particular wish.  Unfortunately, others wish that everyone had the same income.  Others wish that everyone has a nice home.  Others want everyone to eat well.  There is no end to what people wish with respect to others.  Imagine how awful a society would be if everyone got to use force to make everyone else live according to their wishes.

By and large, the Republican Party is for a slightly smaller government than is the Democrat Party.  To have a slightly smaller Big Government, such a party will often say no to the Party that is constantly proposing a new government program.  Some of the People actually want a substantially smaller government.  Many of these people are in the Tea Party movement, which I associate with myself.  They generally are Republicans, though not very happy Republicans.  Some are in the Libertarian Party.  But, naturally they are not going to join the party most enthusiastic about Big Government.  So, they have become a fractious element in the Republican Party.  They want that party to stand up for something closer to a constitutional government.  Naturally, they are opposed to most programs that would make the government still bigger and still more intrusive in our lives.

You bemoan the lack of Republican leaders holding the membership in an iron grip of control.  Well, what do you really expect of people who want to manage their own lives and choose their own values.  Those who want government to do this for them are naturally inclined to follow leaders.  Those who like to think independently and control their own decisions in life do not naturally turn to a leader to tell them what to do.  Traditionally, Americans never did, but after 100 years of growing Progressive Elitist effort and influence in the government-run or bribed schools, there are many people now well-conditioned to do as they are told.  I am of the old school and never allowed myself to be so conditioned.

The iron grip of control of the Democrat Party line is actually very exposed as it forces them to maintain beliefs obviously contrary to reality.  They still maintain that Americans will have better healthcare under ObamaCare at a lower cost and that enough medical care providers will be available.  This is clearly not going to be the case.  Many employers are dropping health insurance plans, many people will find that their doctor is no longer available, most people will find their costs will go up and that much of the cost provides them with care they do not want.  Many young people especially will not be able to get jobs because they would cost the employer more under ObamaCare than they used to.  It used to be that if you hired a young person, the average age in your insurance pool dropped so your health insurance cost went down and gave you some incentive to train the young hire.  Now you add a young person and his affordable plan cost at 9.5% of his pay is likely to force the company to reduce the coverage offered to its longer time employees to keep the young hire's health insurance below 9.5% or cost you a $3000 penalty tax.  Or you do not hire the young person.  It is so simple.  More and more Americans are realizing how ridiculous the Democrat Party claims are and the lock-step adherence to the party line will be deadly to the Democrats.

Another clear example of the inability of the Democrats to think rationally and independently is the adherence to the claim that man's emissions of CO2 will cause catastrophic global warming.  After 17 years of no surface temperature increase and rising CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere, this claim has become entirely laughable.  Yet Obama just recently made the claim that 97% of scientists support the catastrophic man-made global warming hypothesis, which is also a very untrue statement.  So his EPA is putting out a new regulation to keep anyone from building a coal-fired power plant and he still has not approved the Keystone XL Pipeline using this specious argument as the justification.  It is imposing many uneconomic mandates such as for the use of ethanol in gasoline, an increase in vehicle gasoline efficiency, electric vehicle programs, and programs pushing solar and wind energy generation that are very much hurting the economy and helping to raise the unemployment rate.  Despite these obvious deleterious effects, few Democrats have departed from the party line.

No X, I prefer to think for myself and be a member of the Republican Party that at least sometimes acts to slow down or stop the growth of society-destroying government.  I will remain in the libertarian and the Tea Party wing which is most determined to keep the iron hob-nailed boot of government off of our necks.  However many people want to be dependents of the government, I will not be one who wants that.  I want to be left alone by gangs of thugs to establish my own cooperative agreements with others to work toward our mutually chosen goals.  It really matters to me both that I am able to pursue my goals and that they are able to pursue theirs.

Please give what I am saying some real thought X.

Maryland Gun Control Infringement of the Right to Self-Defense

Oh, the many pleasures of corresponding with one's representatives in the state legislature and the federal government as an exercise in the right to petition one's grievances ends only in frustration.  One can always count on a Progressive Elitist standard viewpoint from these representatives, at least in the most un-free state of Maryland, known most erroneously as the Free State.  This state, long ago, provided perhaps the best unit to fight in the American Revolutionary War.  At that time, there sure was no prohibition against owning a military-style weapon.

The Progressive Elitists of Maryland are most united in the belief that while one may have a right not have one's hunting rifle prohibited, a weapon designed for self-defense is to be absolutely prohibited.  In this Progressive Elitist viewpoint, no infringement means only that any barrier an individual should have to overcome to exercise a right must not amount to an absolute prohibition, except in some cases.

This is the response I received to my letter in opposition to the latest effort of the state of Maryland to infringe the right to bear arms from my delegate Anne Kaiser in the Maryland House of Delegates:

Thank you for writing to my office and voicing your opposition to SB281:  Firearm Safety Act of 2013, introduced by Senate President Mike Miller on behalf of Governor Martin O’Malley.  This legislation provides a comprehensive plan of reforms to make people safer and reduce preventable gun violence.  It includes provisions regarding gun licensing and fingerprinting; gun safety; and mental health safeguards and services.

Specifically, the provisions of SB 281 bans the sale of military-style assault weapons; limits magazine capacity to 10 rounds (the previous limit was 20) and requires licensing, fingerprinting, and safety training to purchase a handgun.  These provisions should reduce “straw purchases” (where someone with a record gets a friend to buy a gun on their behalf) of both assault style weapons and handguns which over time should reduce the number of illegal guns on our streets while also promoting sensible, responsible gun ownership.

Further, this initiative creates safeguards to keep guns away from people who may be a danger to themselves or others due to mental illness, while also facilitating unprecedented levels of information sharing among federal and state partners for background checks.  This bill improves mental health services in Maryland by establishing a Center for Excellence on Early Intervention for serious mental illness and expands Maryland’s Crisis Intervention Teams, Crisis Response Services, and Mental Health First Aid.  Also, this bill establishes a Department of Health and Mental Hygiene led Task Force to Improve Continuity of Care for Individuals in the Community Mental Health System.

Despite characterizations of this bill and those of us who voted for it, I fully support our 2^nd amendment rights.  I place our right to bear arms right alongside our freedom of speech, of a free press and our freedom of religion.  With each of these guaranteed freedoms comes rights and with each right comes responsibility.  And with each responsibility, comes reasonable regulations.

I believe that this bill crystallizes that responsibility in important, meaningful and manageable ways.  Crucially, the new law does not do the following:  it does not prohibit lawful citizens from obtaining or owning a handgun and it does not require additional licensing procedures for hunting rifles and shotguns.  The new law does not force citizens who lawfully possessed an assault weapon prior to the bill’s passage to surrender their weapon or to register it.  Furthermore, it does not require current lawful gun owners to retroactively obtain a license.

Your views are important to me and I appreciate that you have taken the time to write to me.  Please do not hesitate to contact me during the session should any other concerns arise.

 Very truly yours,

 Anne R. Kaiser

The exercise of a right comes with only the responsibility not to violate the equal sovereign rights of other individuals.  It does not come with a responsibility to expend time and effort to prove that one has such character as may be in popular approval by the government.  I should not have to prove that I will not somehow and at some future date violate the rights of others.  As for gun safety, if I already know that (as a veteran), why should I have to take a course from some state-licensed safety instructor at great expense and at the cost of valuable time?  This is an example of the state very much infringing my right to self-defense.

The 2nd Amendment clearly says the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.  Note that no infringement means that there shall be no barriers.  It does not mean that the barriers are such that they can be overcome and are not absolute prohibitions.

Furthermore, the prohibition on military style weapons makes no sense whatever.  The most essential reason one has a right to arm oneself for is self-defense.  Both the prohibition against so-called military style weapons and the limit to 10-round magazines are fundamental infringements on the right to self-defense.  The military uses the weapons it uses for defense.  I would use any weapon I might have for defense.  The reason we have a military is simply as an extension of our individual right to self-defense and the fact we have a military does not deprive us of any part of our right to self-defense.  Note also that this is an explicit prohibition and not a barrier which can be overcome with sufficient effort.

It is noteworthy that Anne Kaiser claims that she holds the right to bear arms as dearly as freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of religion.  Logically this means that the exercise of these critical freedoms can also be infringed by the requirement to be fingerprinted, forced to take lessons in their safe use, and that many statements and beliefs can be prohibited so long as some are allowed with due licensing of the individual.  In fact, Kaiser explicitly claims that the state can regulate freedom of speech, press, and religion.  Perhaps initially only the mentally ill and felons will be denied the license to exercise freedom of speech, the press, and religion, but I am sure we can count on the Progressive Elitists to expand the class of people denied these rights with time.

Of course, in the eyes of the Progressive Elitist, a person of the Tea Party persuasion is mentally ill.  Many of them have said this explicitly.  Since most psychiatrists seem to be Progressive Elitists, the state will have no problem finding one who will attest that someone who challenges the power of unlimited government is suffering a mental problem.

According to the National Institute of Mental Health, 26.2% of the U.S. population has a diagnosable mental disorder in a given year.  Does this mean that the state of Maryland will deny licenses to 26.2% of the applicants because they are claimed to have a mental illness?  Probably not, since most such cases have not been diagnosed, but given the infringements of this bill, will one have to have extensive testing for mental illness before being licensed in the near future.  After all, a precedent will have been established.  How extreme and of what type must the mental illness be before one is denied a license?  Yes, she talks of being a threat to oneself or others, but this is pretty speculative stuff and does not the Precautionary Principle so beloved by the Progressive Elitists require a very low bound on the possibility of danger?  If one were ever diagnosed as having a mental illness, would one be forever denied a license to bear arms?  Given how dear the right to bear arms is for Anne Kaiser, how long before the same problems arise to get that license for the exercise of freedom of speech?  You must have much more faith in the goodwill of government than I do to feel at all comfortable with these issues.  Ignorance of history or total irrationality would be a precondition for such faith.

As for the new mental health bureaucracy this law will set up in the state of Maryland, I can only imagine the horrors to come.

It is comforting to know that more than half the number of votes needed to pass this bill in the Maryland House of Delegates may have been cast by the 26.2% of the delegate population with diagnosable mental illnesses.  The remainder of those for this bill may have been voted into office with most of the votes from the 26.2% of Maryland voters who are estimated by the very Progressive Elitist National Institute of Mental Health to have diagnosable mental illnesses.  To be sure, such mental illnesses may be far more common among the Maryland Delegates than among the population at large.

The violation of individual rights by the state of Maryland and by the federal government has become a habit.  There is nothing one can trade one's basic individual rights for that is worth the trade.  You should note that the Declaration of Independence informs us that the only legitimate function of government is the protection of individual rights.  Governments that violate those rights become morally illegitimate no matter how many popular votes the politicians may collect.   Evil thrives in the state of Maryland because collectivist politicians here collect hordes of votes.

The Maryland House of Delegates is coming to help us exercise our responsibilities.  Be afraid ...  no, be terrified!

American Thinker Article Quoting Me on Principled vs. Pragmatic Government

While this is not new news, I just became aware of an American Thinker article called Government of the Elites, by the Elites and for the Elites by Monty Pelerin with a significant quote from my post entitled Principled Versus Pragmatic Government.  I recommend that you read the Monty Pelerin article and re-read my article and think about them prior to this election.

I am not quite convinced that a collapse of government is required to re-set government as principled, limited government as Monty Pelerin concludes, but given the bias toward pragmatic government and against principled government now thoroughly imbuing our education system and most of the media, the road back to principled government is a very difficult and perhaps even an unlikely one.  Aspects of the Tea Party Movement and the increased awareness of the thinking of Ayn Rand offer us some hope that a revival of demand for principled and limited government might be eventually embraced by the majority of the People.  I hope we can avoid that very painful collapse of government yet, but we very well may not.

Socialized Medicine and a Doctor's Moral Obligation

A friend asked this question:

One of the arguments I have heard from proponents of socialized medicine is that it is immoral to stand by while someone dies, and therefore society is obligated to help when someone is facing a life threatening illness but can't afford the treatment. Although there is much to refute in this type of statement, I am wondering about the more difficult refutation. As a personal decision of each doctor, is it rational to make the decision to deny treatment based upon the fact of a patient's inability to pay?

The moral argument against socialized medicine, or ObamaCare in particular, is based on our equal, sovereign individual rights. It is not dependent upon whether a particular doctor decides that he must act to save a life independent of remuneration or not. It is an important moral principle that he is free to either be benevolent or not be benevolent. Now, I do believe benevolence is an important virtue, but benevolence is virtuous in the context that the person helped has value to the doctor.  Benevolence is not about self-sacrifice, since that would hardly be benevolent to oneself. 

If the person has an entitlement mentality, then the doctor generally has no rational reason to help that person without remuneration. It is perfectly moral for him to walk away. In the context of a society of largely productive and benevolent people, a doctor may be rationally inclined to provide help to those who cannot afford to pay for their care, especially if they have become ill or hurt through no great fault of their own. But, even that depends on context, such as the expense the doctor will have in helping him and whether his helping the unfortunate person means that he is not able to help someone else who can pay. He is not obliged to save the poor man, while letting the financially prepared man die! If he gives too much of his time to helping the poor, he may not be able to generate enough income to buy the medical equipment that will enable him to save many lives in the future or he may simply go out of business. The doctor must make difficult moral decisions based on a very complex context. Some may appear to make a greater effort in benevolent acts than others, but still may not be saving the most lives possible.

Rational men are going to balance these difficult decisions differently and we should be careful in our appraisals of their morality.  A doctor may be willing to give his services free in a given case, but he may be unable to convince a nurse and other assistants to give their time free.  Or the hospital may be unwilling to make an operating room available.  Now the proponent of socialized medicine will want to use force to make all of these needed experts and facilities available, but this is a violation of everyone's rights and cannot be tolerated in a civilized society.

My grandfather was a physician in the Great Depression. He was a surgeon who operated in the Mayo Clinic and all of the hospitals of Minneapolis and St. Paul. He did a very unusual number of operations on people who could not pay for them. But, people were different back then. A farmer might not have any money, but he would give Harry Christianson a chicken, which to the farmer was his fortune. Then very likely for 20 years after, when he could, he would stop by grandpa's home and leave a bag of potatoes or a bushel of corn. This was very welcome when rationing was going on in WWII for instance. Harry and his wife Bess always had free food and there was so much that Bess and her daughter Betty organized ways to get it into the hands of those in need in the city. One man decided he would paint grandpa's house in payment for an operation, but while he was painting the upper part of the exterior, union thugs knocked him off the ladder and shattered his leg. The man was not a union painter. He was just a farmer who wanted to pay a debt he believed he had. Harry and Bess put him up in one of their rooms until he was healed. The union later burned down their home because they did this.

So this is another important issue of context. There is value in helping people who put value on the help they receive. There is value in helping people who fundamentally believe that one should trade values for value.

There is little value in helping the ungrateful, however. Any deserving person, any person whose welfare one has reason to care about, will recognize the value they have received and will not presume that they have the rights of a master, while the doctor who worked so hard to develop his healing skills and knowledge is treated as his slave.  A doctor or any other service provider has the right to choose his own values and to pursue his own happiness in terms of his values.

The need of a poor person does not deprive him of this equal individual right to pursue his happiness.  Every man, whether poor or rich, whether a professional or a low-skilled worker, has this magnificent right to pursue his happiness.  No one has the right to dictate the values or the moral code which will define what his happiness will be.  All that can be required of another is that they are not allowed to initiate the use of force as a means to pursue their happiness.

This is very adequate for each of us when we exercise our freedoms and act within the private sector of our society.  In the private sector we have a wealth of potential opportunities to cooperate with others whose values are sufficiently similar to ours or in some way complementary so that each of us can pursue our goals defined by our individually chosen values.  When our values are not approved of by others, they are free to choose not to associate with us.  This is the realm of the voluntary and is relished by those who want rich choices and who abhor being forced to bend to the will of others.

In contrast to this natural realm of freedom, we have the realm of the government.  The principal property of government is its monopoly on the use of force in a society.  Because a wise society seeks to minimize the use of force and seeks to maximize individual freedom of choice and association with others, such a society has a minimal government.  Such a limited and legitimate government uses force only for the purpose of protecting the equal, sovereign rights of the individual to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

When government attempts to do more, it must necessarily do violence to the rights of the individual as it imposes values and moral codes upon the People.  With this loss of freedom to choose one's values, one loses many of the freedoms to use one's own mind.  One loses the choice of one's own goals.  With the loss of one's own goals, one loses all hope.  It is no accident that unfree societies become depressed societies with large increases in drug use, excessive alcohol use, and increased numbers of suicides.  Big governments do much harm to individuals and are notable in the brutally of their violence against their people should any insist on exercising their sovereign rights.  We see the party of biggest government verging close to a desire to let loose the hounds of hell upon the Tea Party people for just this reason.  Over and over they have tried to label the Tea Party people who simply want to preserve some of their individual rights as terrorists and subversives.  This makes the brutal nature of unlimited government all the more clear in our time.

Democrats Want to Pass DISCLOSE Act Again

Having failed once to pass the DISCLOSE Act, which is designed to suppress political ideas prior to elections and to intimidate Americans who oppose those in power, the Democrats in control of Congress are trying to revive this nefarious act.  It is designed to help incumbents, mostly Democrats, stay in office by preventing the opposition from revealing and discussing their voting record at election time.  It is designed to replace the McCain-Feingold Bipartisan Reform Act which the Supreme Court rightly found unconstitutional.

This act passed the House of Representatives in June, but it could not get enough votes in the Senate to bring it up for a vote at that time.  It is only the Senate which needs to act on it now.  Tomorrow, there is to be a provisional vote to end debate on the act.  If the Democrats succeed on that, they will vote it through, despite it obviously being unconstitutional.  It will take years to go to the Supreme Court for a decision, which the Democrats are counting on to help reduce their losses in the November election.  It might even reduce their losses in the 2012 election.

The DISCLOSE Act is also anti-business in that it puts all of its restrictions upon businesses and special purpose political corporate entities.  Labor unions, the NRA, the AARP, and the Humane Society are exempted.  Note that all of the exempted groups are long-time Democrat allies, except the NRA.

The NRA's opposition to the law was bought off with their exemption.  So, while the NRA has done good work in protecting our Second Amendment rights, it has proved a traitor on this fundamental issue of our freedom of speech.  The AARP has long supported ageist warfare and advocated the redistribution of wealth from the poorer young to older and wealthier Americans.  Of course, the labor unions, who spend incredible sums influencing elections in favor of the Democrats as their most-favored special interest group, are exempted.

On the other hand, the DISCLOSE Act discriminates against business and special purpose political groups that incorporate.  They have to spend valuable air time having their CEOs explain who funded the ad.  The CEO also has to invest valuable time in the making of the ad.  Some incorporated Tea Party or other political groups will have their freedom of speech suppressed.  The idea is clearly to make it harder for the opposition of those now in power, who are mostly Democrats, to effectively influence the People during the upcoming election in November.

The Progressives believe the People are stupid and foolish.  They need to be controlled by the college educated elite who are properly indoctrinated in their elite qualifications to choose the People's values and to micro-manage their lives in accordance with Progressive rules.  Sunstein, Obama and friends know how to nudge us in the right direction, but they need to cut us off from the opposing storyline.  We are so dumb, we might believe much of what the evil corporations or Tea Party groups tell us.  Yes, only the Progressive message of the labor unions, the AARP, and the Humane Society should be allowed to reach our so-susceptible ears.  This is the political correctness of the government-run schools written large across the entire country.  The People cannot be expected to evaluate information on their own.  No, only that information shifted and selected by the Progressives should be allowed to reach the ignorant and dumb People.

When the People are seen as ignorant and dumb, they are also seen as the servants of their masters.  The Democrat elitist Progressives are supposed to be our masters and they will not brook any opposition voices, such as businesses and Tea Party incorporated groups.

It is sweet to observe that one of the two Republicans who voted for this measure in the House was Mike Castle of Delaware.  Mike Castle expected to fill out the remaining four years on Joe Biden's Senate term, but was beaten by the Tea Party candidate, Christine O'Donnell.  That was a great act of justice, since Castle really is a Progressive control freak.

Meanwhile, O'Donnell is strongly opposed to ObamaCare, the financial control bill, the incredible deficit spending, labor union card check, renewable energy subsidies and mandates, and the nonsense that CO2 emissions are causing a global warming catastrophe.  She has some considerable conservative lifestyle and "family values" nonsensical baggage, but in the present context, it is important to get her into the Senate.  If she goes awry too much on promoting that "family value" nonsense, she can be replaced in 2014, after much of the Progressive program for governmental controls has been derailed.

9/12 Demonstrators Strike Terror in Progressive Elitists

On Sunday, 12 September 2010, I and my wife Anna joined the 9/12 demonstrators before the Capitol to protest against big government, wild, insane spending, and massive violations of the rights of the individual.  The crowd, on a rainy, wet day, was large, but not so large as at the 9/12 demonstration of a one year ago.  I suspect that many people stayed home to work to get Tea Party candidates elected to office.  Others, most likely learned from their earlier attempts that the current politicians in Washington, few of whom were there due to the election coming up in November, are so contemptuous of the people they rule, that they have no interest in the people's thoughts and concerns.  Therefore, it is wisest simply to toss them out of office.  Still, the crowd was large and I observed it from about 1 PM to about 4:30 PM.  I took 246 photos of demonstrators and will present some of those here.

Of course, we have from the good authority of the socialist media that such people as these demonstrators are racists, ignorant rednecks, neo-Nazis, all radical, intolerant Christian bullies, homophobes, immigrant haters, and violent beyond belief.  Let us examine some pictures of these people who would strike terror in the hearts of any civilized human being:

"Our Founding Fathers Warned Against National Debt," hmmm.... is that a well-known Nazi saying or what?  "We Can't Afford You."  Perhaps being too poor to be a good Nazi socialist is just a redneck thing.  Notice the many military-like uniforms, the blackjacks, the hobnailed boots, and the raised arms.  We would see the fangs, except everyone is looking in the direction of a speaker, probably a Hitler-like harranger and demagogue.

This gray-haired woman under an umbrella looks mighty threatening.  Quite interesting that on a rainy day she had the creativity to use her umbrella as a protest sign.  If she gets her hands on the controls of government, we had better watch out.  She will be a formidable foe to the Progressive agenda.  ObamaCare = Slavery and Got Personal Responsibility?  How could you be more threatening?

This smiling lady did not look sufficiently threatening to be holding such a subversive sign.  Imagine someone sending the message that people should read Ayn Rand and Atlas Shrugged.  Imagine telling people it is OK to be concerned about their own self-interest and to act on it.  Then there is all that horrible stuff about legitimate government from the American Declaration of Independence and even a notion that people have rights not granted to them by a beneficent government in the Bill of Rights.  Imagine calling our Mommy Dearest government a tyranny and illegitimate!  That it spends 70% of its expenditures unconstitutionally.  So, I investigated and found that she was simply holding the sign for a husband who was running around the demonstration taking pictures.  He is, no doubt, the evil one.  Then note also that the umbrella lady has also enjoined you to Work Harder: Millions on Welfare are Depending on You.

Here we have someone scaring the children, babies even, with the idea that their debt is huge.  How much kinder it would be to leave the baby in innocence until it discovers how much debt it owes, say, after graduating from college.  At least we know the government-run schools and the progressive colleges will not scare them with such hoary facts!  They are so kind and thoughtful, but not these wicked people!

How uncouth to imply that a Congressional Democrat is a socialist?  How can anyone complain about the government pulling money out of their wallets when they are doing so much good with while paying off Obama's supporters and enlisting them as special interests so they will support socialist policies?  Oops, I meant to say so they would support forward-thinking Progressive policies with central planning by the Mommy State to take care of those many, many Americans who are so helpless and pitifully in need.

Oh, another Uncle Tom.  Ahh.... maybe not.  He is probably a poor homeless, uneducated man who can't even read the sign he is holding.  Those nasty protesters probably paid him so much to hold that sign that he just couldn't resist.  This just demonstrates once again how right the Progressives are in knowing very well that black Americans are incapable of choosing their own values and living their own lives.  Look how they are just so vulnerable to the manipulations of the worst elements in our society.  We elitists must remember it is not his fault.  This is why we have a very, very big government:  To take care of him and to manipulate his vote before the nasty people do.

The woman in the wheelchair stood up briefly.  This proves she is probably an assassin waiting for a black Congressman to pass by.  You have to watch carefully for these sleeper terrorists that fill the ranks of the right-wing wingnuts.

Note the women with a young girl in the lower left.  She is holding a baby.  Is she just really, really irresponsible bringing these vulnerable innocents into the midst of these raving lunatic neo-Nazis?  Or is she an even more cleverly disguised assassin?  Note the sign quotes John Adams, that regressive firebrand of old, that claims that the Constitution is inadequate to a People who are not moral and religious.  You know, he almost got that right.  If he had said it is inadequate to a people who not moral, as we Progressives know no one is, and had left out the religious characteristic, he would have been a Progressive!  Of course, we Progressive do welcome religious people if they subscribe to the Progressive social program and if they understand that the Constitution is inadequate.

"Stop Convolutin' our Constitution."  My, she is even trying to sound like a redneck.  Doesn't she understand even that the Constitution is a living instrument of the Progressive Program?  What kind of education did she have?  Surely, not one in a quality school such as all of our union and government controlled schools are!  "Clean out Congress."  That sounds as though she intends to attack Congress with an assault weapon!

Wow, these neo-Nazis sure are effective in recruiting women.  This one is quite good-looking too, but I am sure her heart is black with evil.  Because she hates her black heart, she probably hates her black President.  Yes, that sounds like the right Progressive spin to put on this.

"Oust the Marxist Usurper! ...His Czars and Thugs!  Honduras did it!"  Wow, how extreme can you get.  These people have probably been reading too much of the radical Charles Anderson!  Why can't they understand that socialism will make everyone equal and provide for all their wants?  Why can't they understand that the State has to use Force to Make People do the Right Thing?  Why can't they understand the collective love of taking your neighbor's income and property and of making him give his time to community service.  Sure, sometimes we have to send someone sort of rough around to take his income or his property.  Sometimes we have to haul his retrograde ass off to jail because he would not obey the great will of the collective.  Sometimes we have to shoot someone.  But, mostly they get with the program and it is so good for everyone to be equally poor, except the elite leaders, who of course need to have more goodies than the rest so they can comfortably lead.  The President should have fine suits, while the people are more moral if they wear rags.

Oh no.  Apparently these three wandered into the midst of this dangerous, black-hating crowd by horrible accident.  It is unlikely that they made it out alive.  The wolves surely devoured them.  Do you suppose that pink jug is full of acid?  Gee, their bodies were probably not even found.  Their bones were probably even dissolved.  The werewolves probably drank all of their blood first.  How awful.  See why you blacks must always vote Democrat?  We give you the best police protection and the best educations.  We really take care of you.  And you owe us.  Never forget how much you owe us, the white Progressive elitists who put Obama into the symbolic Presidency.  The real power is in Congress.

Well, enough of this Progressivist commentary.  I saw no acts of violence and no angry arguments.  There were a few sentiments that this is a Christian nation, one sign against abortion, but not really very much of that even.  Mostly, the signs wanted less government, a constitutional government.  I only saw one sign opposing the Victory Mosque at Ground Zero.  As usual, the police were not needed, but the Progressive DC government and the Democrat Congress needed to pretend that they were.  The people there were a cross-section of America with people of all races there.  Yes, black Americans are in such thralldom to the Democrats, that they are underrepresented.  But, I get the impression that more black Americans are beginning to think for themselves.  There were rich and poor people.  There were grandparents, parents, young adults, and children.  You know, just your everyday group of terrorists.  Well, actually that is what they are, because they are terrifying the Democrat, socialist Congress and their minion politicians all across America.  Good for them.  The People have Awakened and Risen.  They want to cast off tyrannical government and replace it with a more constitutional, limited-power government, which respects their individual rights.

Slavery Resurrection Plan by Democrat Congress

HR5741 requires every American between the ages of 18 and 42 to serve the federal government for two years as the President sees fit.  Uniformed armed services, Homeland Security, and civilian community service are covered.  Every American of the age range from 18 to 42 will be medically and mentally evaluated for suitability for service.  This measure is being pushed by Democrats, including Charles Rangel.

I find myself wondering if this is the means by which some Democrats wish to hold onto power in the face of the rising opposition to the socialist program of the Democrats, many of whom greatly admire the power of thugs such as Hugo Chavez and the Communist Party in China to get their way with the people by the simple expedient of using force to quell their individual rights.  Suppose the Tea Party movement actually succeeds in voting the socialists out of power, will they step down or will they declare a national emergency while calling the Tea Party enthusiasts racists and terrorists?  Will they call those enthusiasts to service and use military discipline to control them?  Will they use Democrat and socialist enthusiasts called to service to quell the demands of the Tea Party enthusiasts that the federal government obey the Constitution?  One has to wonder why voluntary service is not recognized as serving our rational national security interests very well.

Once again, there is good reason to wonder why some people wish to ignore the 13th Amendment of the Constitution outlawing slavery and involuntary servitude.  This is just another step of the sort that ObamaCare took in claiming implicitly that no individual owns his own body.  Our bodies have already been claimed by the federal government and now many in the ruling socialist cabal want to claim two years of our lives as theirs to dispose of.  Worse yet, Congress wants to assign that power to the President.  This bill must be defeated and the ObamaCare expropriation of our bodies must be repealed.  It will never make sense to say that each American has an equal and sovereign individual right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness if we do not.

The Real Party of NO!!! or really of HELL NO!!!!

The Economist endorsed Obama prior to the election.  The most recent issue of The Economist, of 12 - 18 June 2010, has a cover article called The risks of "Hell, no!" and an editorial called What's wrong with America's right - Too much anger and too few ideas.  America needs a better alternative to Barack Obama.  The editorial goes on to say this:  "Many of America's most prominent business leaders are privately as disappointed by the right as they are by the statist Obama."  The editorial bemoans the fact that there is a civil war going on in the Republican party and the wrong side is generally winning.  It makes it clear that the editors detest the Tea Party movement and its affect upon the Republican party.  They are cheering for the Republican moderates, those same establishment types who just want a slower, but steady movement toward socialism, rather than the abrupt revolt and transformation of Obama and his socialist hordes.

The main article complains that not a single House Republican voted for the stimulus package in January 2009.  This was apparently a bad thing, even though it is now clear that the stimulus package was in fact just the left's wish list of new government programs designed to undermine the private sector, not to stimulate it.  It is clear that the stimulus bill discouraged the private sector from hiring.  The paltry few jobs saved or added due to that bill were almost all government jobs.  Late in the article it notes that: "Massive stimulus spending has barely dented the jobless numbers and has pushed the deficit to vertiginous heights."  One wonders where they found a dent at all.

The article complains that not a single Republican in the House or Senate voted in favor of health reform.  Apparently, the assumption is that ObamaCare, despised by most Americans, should have been supported by the opposition party, irrespective of its myriad problems, including its unconstitutionality and the fact that it did not actually even spell out a plan, having delegated much of that task to 137 executive branch departments and panels.

The article bemoans the fact that Bobby Jindal, the governor of Louisiana, says the Republican opposition is not just No, but Hell No!  It complains:

Even mainstream Republican politicians now portray themselves as the thin red line defending America's constitution, liberties and moral values from an arrogant president who is determined to appease America's enemies, drown future generations in debt and turn God's own country over to a godless socialism.

Well, yes, and this is a good thing that they have finally been forced to actually oppose socialism and to actually defend the Constitution, as those who have been in federal office or in the military previously have sworn to do.

Basically, the assumption of The Economist is, just as it is with American socialists, that doing something is a matter of giving the government a new power and having it decide what values will be allowed to be pursued and what the rules for pursuing them will be.  This is another example of the Stolen Concept.  The assumption is that nothing is being done if the government is not doing it.  The fact is that when the government takes on new powers and mandates certain actions while using force to deny other actions, it denies many more actions and choices than it enables.  Government itself is the primary agent of NO!!!!! 

When an American demands, angrily or not, that the government be legitimate and fulfill its constitutionally limited role, this is not metaphysically a fundamental statement of NO!!!  Instead, it is metaphysically and basically a statement that:

• We the People need values in order to live our own individual lives.
• We the People are capable of rationally choosing our own values.
• We the People, having freedom of conscience and the right to think for ourselves, have the right and the responsibility to choose our own values.
• We the People, each and everyone of us, has an individual character and have individual values and needs, which we assert the equal right to explore, develop, exercise, and pursue for our individual happiness.
• The individual American asserts the positive declaration that he will manage his own life.
• The individual American will cooperate with others of his own choosing in a free market of ideas, goods, services, and relationships to pursue his values for the sake of his own happiness.

Now let's examine how this positive assertion of life-living individual effort is transformed by the socialist (Democrat, Progressive, Liberal, Fascist, or Communist).   We find them making these very negative statements with strong limits on individual choice and actions.  We find that the socialist, or even The Economists moderate, is the agent of NO!!!!, or even of Hell, NO!!!!  The equivalent statements are:

• A society needs some values so that the basic needs of many can be achieved, though many of the needs of many of the people will be ignored as unimportant.
• The people are mostly ignorant and evil, so an elite of college-educated and properly indoctrinated Progressive people will determine which values the government will indoctrinate the masses in and how that government will discourage any other values the ignorant and stubborn masses may choose.
• Only society has rights and those rights are determined by the government.  Individuals are not sovereign and should not try to think for themselves, but should instead accept the indoctrinated values of the state.
• What is all this individual stuff and nonsense?  You are a Social Security number and a member of various groups.  The group of your race, the group of your gender, and the group of your income define you fully and adequately.  The state will, based on these few parameters, decide what the course of your life will be.
• The government will micromanage your life with rules too complex for you to understand, but much too simple to deal with your individual natures.
• The government will severely limit the freedom of the individual to associate with others and to trade with others in a free market of ideas, goods, services, and relationships.

The real party of NO!!!! or really of HELL NO!!!! is the party that will not allow individuals the choice of their own values, which will not allow them to explore, develop, and exercise their individual natures, which will not allow them to pursue the many rich variations of their values in free associations with others, and will not allow them the hope of individual happiness.

In life, the assertion of "YES, I can and will" requires that we act to reign in the desire of governments and our representatives in the government to expand its powers and to hold it back within its constitutionally few enumerated powers.  Thus, politically, the People must be constantly saying "NO, HELL NO!!!!!" to those many who wish to expand government and rule the People more firmly and with many more constraints.  But more fundamentally, and more metaphysically, we say that NO to government in order to preserve our individual control of our choice of values and of the many actions we will need to take to pursue those values and our individual happiness.  Living human life as self-directed individuals, is a massive assertion of YES, we are capable of living our own lives and it is our own responsibility to choose our individual values and the principles upon which we will manage our own lives.  We must throw off the excessive limits of big government in order to assert the value of our individual lives in all the richness and complexity of our choices and actions in free associations with other highly individuated people.

We must never tire of asserting that we are committed to that most fundamentally and metaphysically important recognition of the critical role and the sovereignty of the individual human being in all political discussion and decision making.  Each individual has the equal right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness and socialism cannot recognize the nature of the individual, his importance, or his equal rights.  Socialism is necessarily the Party of NO because it denies individuality, the values of the individual, individual rights to thought and actions, and the importance of individual happiness.