Politics from Hamlin

A simple reminder: one heartbeat

Posted by admin - 28/04/08 at 03:04:18 am

Friday Flickr Tag Fun: 9 “Alaska” Photos

Posted by admin - 24/04/08 at 09:04:23 am

I’ve decided we need more recurring posts on the site, so I’m starting a new feature called Friday Flickr Tag Fun, and will find a popular term for the week, do a search in the Flickr Creative Commons pool, and post the top 9 images with the popular tag.

This week’s word/tag is Alaska. Why? Well, today we learned that McCain has chosen Sarah Palin as his VP running mate. Turns out, Sarah is from Wallin (?), Alaska. These are the first 9 “Alaska” photos.

Photo by Timothy K. Hamilton

Photo by B Mully

Photo by B Mully

Photo by B Mully

Photo by Wally G

Photo by Timothy K. Hamilton

Photo by AlaskaPodshow.com

Photo by Timothy K. Hamilton

Photo by rickz

For more info on each picture, just click the image, and you’ll be taken to its page on Flickr.

I’d also like to know what you think of this idea. I plan to add captions to each image, but don’t have time to do it today. Is this something you’d like to see more of? Is there anything I should include to make it better? Let me know in the comments.

Thesis Demo Page
Check out the Thesis live demo here.

Memorial Day - War Sucks Edition

Posted by admin - 21/04/08 at 10:04:59 am

Memorial Day

by hilzoy

The New York Times has a horribly sad article today, which is unfortunately all TimesSelect. Excerpt:

    “The sniper fired. It was a clean shot, if there is such a thing. And down for good fell another American soldier.

    His name was Sergeant James Dean, but everyone called him Jamie. He was the farm boy who fished, hunted and tossed a horseshoe like nobody else. He was the guy at the end of Toots Bar, nursing a Bud and talking Nascar. He was the driver of that blue Silverado at the red light, his hands on the wheel, his mind on combat horrors that made him moody, angry, withdrawn.

    Now here he was, another American soldier, dead. Only Sergeant Dean was killed at the front door of his childhood home, the day after Christmas and three weeks before his redeployment, shot by a sniper representing the government for whom he had already risked his life in Afghanistan. His wife and parents received the news not by a knock on the door, but by gunfire in the neighborhood.

    “If they had just left him alone,” says his wife, Muriel.”

More below the fold.

    “In the summer of 2001, weeks before Sept. 11, Jamie stunned his family by enlisting in the Army; he was 23. A woman had just broken his heart, yes, but he explained that he wanted to experience life beyond installing air conditioners in confining St. Mary’s County. And his younger sister, an Air Force medic, had been talking up the military.

    From April 2004 to April 2005, Jamie served in Afghanistan, far from the Chesapeake Bay. Now and then he’d talk to family members by telephone. “Just, ‘Hi, I’m fine,’ ” his mother, Elaine, says. “Or, ‘It sucks here.’ “

    Jamie came back quieter in the summer of 2005, with “DEAN” tattooed on his upper back and a cobra tattooed on his muscle-defined arm. But he kept private any changes beneath the skin, his mother says. ” ‘You don’t want to know, Mom,’ he would always say.”

    One night at Toots, while drinking a beer, he met a woman named Muriel whose bluish-green eyes entranced him. The couple became inseparable, cobbling together a family that included her two children, three dogs and a cat. Muriel’s good for Jamie, people said, even without knowing how she was nudging him to get counseling for nightmares so bad they would both wake up soaked in sweat.”

He got into counseling, was put on medication, and things began to get better. Until this:

    “A few days after Thanksgiving, a FedEx truck delivered an envelope to the Dean farm just as Jamie was about to go hunting. It was a form letter of redeployment, as impersonal as a bank statement.

    “It was downhill after that,” Muriel says.

    He withdrew from the present, it seemed. He drank more, and took his medication less. Finally, on Christmas Day, he and Muriel returned from a family gathering with plans to watch his favorite football team, the Dallas Cowboys, on television. He went out to buy some beer - but went to Toots Bar instead.

    She called him, and he came home, livid. He smashed some glasses, said something about winding up in a body bag, and sped away in his Silverado. He wound up at the family home, alone, talking on a cellphone with his sister, Kelly, saying things like: “I just can’t do it anymore.”

    When his sister heard a gunshot, she called 911. The deputy sheriffs arrived at the isolated farmhouse around 10 p.m. and quickly determined that Jamie was drunk, agitated and carrying a shotgun. He told the deputies to back off. (…)

    Based on something a family member had said, the police knew that Jamie had other shotguns in the house, but they mistakenly believed he was an Army Ranger. “Rambo,” his mother says ruefully.

    At 4:19 in the morning, the police shot dozens of tear-gas canisters, smashing the windows in front of Jamie’s horseshoe trophies, piercing walls decorated with garland. Several minutes later, Jamie fired shotgun pellets in the general direction of a police car parked at least 50 yards away. Then he sat down on the back porch.

    A situation in which an armed man was in his own house, alone and a threat to no one but himself, had now escalated into a military action. On the ground, men with guns; in the sky, the whop-whop of helicopters. Now and then, Jamie would respond to some movement or sound with a shot into the ground or into the air. (…)

    At 12:25, a negotiator talked briefly by telephone to Jamie, who indicated he might come out; “I’m going home,” he said. Then the police cellphone’s battery died.

    At 12:34, Jamie was reached again by telephone, but the volume was low and the negotiator could not make out what was being said.

    At 12:45, the police cut power to the house and began shooting more tear gas through the front and the back of the house.

    At 12:47, an armored vehicle called a Peace Keeper pulled up to the house. Jamie opened the front door and, according to the police, pointed his 20-gauge shotgun at the vehicle. A state police sniper, positioned in a garage 70 yards away, took aim.”

The soldiers killed in battle are never the only people whose lives are taken by war. Happy Memorial Day.

Radio Debate with a Socialist (& photos from Venezuela)

Posted by admin - 17/04/08 at 07:04:35 am

(photos and captions/translations throughout my article were taken by a friend of mine on a recent trip to Venezuela - a picture is worth a thousand words - so I share these photos of socialism in action)

The mural says ‘working with the people must be every revolutionary’s principle’.

Radio Debate with a Socialist by Christine Smith

Several days ago I participated in a live radio debate with a socialist (he identified himself as a socialist, both in his political affiliation, philosophy, and activism, and has been for many years). I perceive the debate not over an economic system, but over the fundamental issue: freedom versus no freedom.

Never before have I engaged in such a lengthy debate with a socialist. I’ve often (as we all do) strike conversations with Americans who’ve accepted the many socialistic programs the U.S. government has made (only, ironically, many Americans seem to regard them as part of a capitalistic society). In such talks, I have found areas of agreement, and areas of confusion, making the dialog productive and often at least causing those in the discussion to question the premise of legal theft since at least they identify it as such after a discussion. But never had I, till now, spoken/debated someone whose fundamental premise differed so from mine of free enterprise - this man wholeheartedly openly defended theft from the American people and our corporations in order to create his fantasy utopia where everyone is promised to be equally cared for.

The debate was most interesting, so I share my recollection: A libertarian versus a socialist. We were both respectful of one another, though diametrically opposed on every issue discussed save for the wrongness of the empire building of the U.S. government and unjust wars of aggression and greed. But even on this point, we fundamentally disagreed on the culprit of such military action, with he vehemently blaming corporations, and I identifying the U.S. federal government as the one responsible for all the ills of this society and the evils of our foreign policy. He also espoused positive things about Cuba’s system, but conveniently ignored the oppressive policies and lack of freedoms.

Frog being lynched has to do with a decree that Chavez put out, but had to withdraw, revamping the intelligence & counter intelligence services. In Venezuela a toad is a snitch, the new law would have required people to snitch on everybody else, therefore the lynching of snitches in effigy. They called it the Get sapo law. Instead of Gestapo. Sapo meaning toad in Spanish.

For example, the man spoke about poor education in our nation and its brainwashing of our youth into accepting imperialism (he was much opposed to military recruitment in schools), he also lamented the high cost of healthcare, and a few other areas - all of which he said the American people are terrorized by corporations. In fact, he went so far as to say something to the effect that corporations were responsible for the unjust wars and that without corporations there would be no war.

These points were easily decimated with facts about our educational system and how the very things he complained of would be immediately removed if we had true free education (free from government control). “Public education” is government controlled education with the expected results of centralized planning: bureaucracy, propaganda, rewarding of incompetence, a blind eye to historical fact - and paid for by everyone - even those without children. Same with healthcare, I pointed out we once had not only the best in medical care but it was affordable for all (and for those who were indigent, clinics existed), and the sole change making healthcare and pharmaceuticals expensive (and which ended clinics) occurred when the U.S. government ventured into its socialistic programs of Medicare and Medicaid.

Our economic hardship is directly caused by the degree this country has adopted socialism.

‘with Chavez the people are the government’ on a sign on the Metro. In Spanish, small letters to the right, ’con Chavez el pueblo es el gobierno’.

But regardless of the facts presented, no matter the issue being discussed, the socialist returned to his assertion that healthcare, education, retirement, electricity, food, etc. should be given equally to all and that everyone should earn the exact same amount of money. He said all should be guaranteed jobs, so all will have a life of security.

Black sticker in a mall says “no more FARC, milk now!”.

He was obviously intelligent, articulate, and well versed and believing in the socialist philosophy, but ready with only facts about people’s difficulties in our nation - blaming such difficulties and suffering firmly upon capitalism and corporations. At one point, I told him (and our audience) that every grievance, every one of his examples of suffering and I named several as he had, were caused solely by the federal government, buttressing each with a few facts. Corporations may exploit the situation in which they are given military contracts, subsidies, bail-outs, and protectionism from the government, but they, corporations and capitalism, are not the cause.

The blame for our economic and social ills is with the federal government.

Without the government forming unconstitutional alliances with what should be a free-market and truly free enterprises, none of the problems he mentioned would even exist. I provided a few examples of how it is capitalism which has always given us greater choice, lower prices, and resulted in higher standards of living wherever it is applied in the world. It also brings greater peace among nations that trade as their interdependence develops.

Then we again moved into the basic necessities of life discussion, with he saying no person should ever be without their needs being met, and that everyone has a responsibility to take care of everyone else. I challenged this on a couple points, with his saying that government does waste and that it must be reformed to work more efficiently.

When I pointed out it’s the federal government who is the robber, the thief…and no matter what it says it will do with the money, it’s wrong to take from one to give to another, he could not understand the analogy (the hold-up at gunpoint example in which the robber takes your wallet and gives it to some good cause afterward-posing the question was it wrong for the man to steal your money?) The government threatens all citizens with fines and incarceration unless they pay up. All he could say was “No, no.”

Also in the airport were pamphlets about the 2 plans Zero contraband & Zero evasion (tax evasion).

On the topic of charity, the truth of his doubt and lack of faith in the American people and our generosity became apparent - he truly believes that people must be forced to help others and sees nothing wrong with forcing people to do so.

When I posed the rhetorical question of imagining how much more suffering would be eased, (or for that matter how much more the arts would be supported, and how much more research would be done into areas of science and medical cures, and how the very people who are in need in each of our communities would be helped) if only the American people were able to keep all the money they earned so they could choose to spend (and give) it as they chose, he immediately replied that some people would be discriminated against. To this, I said each individual should have the freedom to help others or not, and the freedom to choose whom they help.

Compulsory benevolence is not charity, but Americans (even despite so much of their money being exploited) have always sought to care for the poor, the aged, and the ill. He again responded he didn’t think Americans would care for everyone, to which I simply replied, “Then, I have more faith in the American people. We are generous. And we’ll be even more so when we’re able to keep and spend or donate our money as we see fit.”

From the U.S. government’s (CIA) operations of regime changes, protectionism of U.S. corporate interests in foreign nations, torture, and other similar matters, we were both in agreement as to the wrongness of, and we discussed together several examples in South America…only he blamed the corporations for all of it and I went to the root: unconstitutional programs/policies of the U.S. government. I could not begin to understand (nor will I waste time trying) to make sense of how this socialist could see the suffering and yet refuse to trace the cause to its origin - the federal government. One point on which we agreed was the wrongness of government subsidizing of businesses.

“The words on the left mean “response center - Of the sovereign” ; on the right it reads “With Chavez - one united government”

The debate ended with a final assertion on his part saying something like libertarians would defend the use of military force to protect U.S. corporations stationed in Saudi Arabia if they were threatened (hypothetically) to be taken over by the Saudi Arabian government. I immediately stated that he not presume to speak for libertarians, as he clearly was wrong. So, he posed the question to me: What would you, as a libertarian, do? I replied I don’t care where corporations go, but that they should be on their own be it in Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran, South America, just as I couldn’t care less where an individual goes or who they do business with…but that all protection whatever form it takes, all protection including the use of U.S. military forces and U.S. taxpayer money, should be absent. If someone wants the profit, they take the risks. No longer should private corporations receive the protection of the intimidation and threat of force from our nation to protect their interests. I said “They can go anywhere, they can get killed, they can defend themselves, but they shouldn’t be protected with taxpayer’s money or the lives of our military.”

To this he seemed appalled, asking me if I was saying that private corporations could defend themselves if they were set up in a foreign nations, and I said, yes, I do not care what they do - they should be on their own without any government help. To this, he replied “Corporations would then rule the world,” and he then went further stating all assets of corporations should be taken and given to the people. I replied, “That’s theft. It’s no different than stealing from your neighbor down the street to help some other neighbor out.” At this point, he said “Lines drawn.” We thanked each other for participating and announced our websites (I encouraging the radio audience to read the online version of Bastiat’s The Law.)

I’ve been told by the show host the man enjoyed our on-air debate, and the radio audience was vocal in expressing how interesting it was. I’ve been asked if I might do it again, and, I said yes, that another debate sounds interesting…only next time I want us to choose one topic to be debated, with a moderator timing answers so that we have equal on-air time to answer each question.

From this experience, I can see how such an articulate knowledgeable socialist could easily influence listeners if not challenged point by point. The tactic of identifying people’s lack is powerful, and each time he went back to his primary theme: Capitalism causes all the suffering. Socialism will solve it all. Though his premise is false, Americans who have been well programmed since childhood to accept the basic immorality of taking from one to give to another, and Americans who find themselves suffering economically, are especially vulnerable to such rhetoric.

The only barrier the people have to such a political activist espousing socialism, is the American knee-jerk reaction to the term “socialism.” But the message of providing everything for everyone (no matter how immoral, unjust, burdensome and impractical) is attractive to those who are suffering hardship. They seem to care nothing about the immorality, they can’t rationally accept the fact that they (or their grandchildren and their children) will pay for the debt later, or that the promises will never be met - that those in power will promise the world for their own advantage and agendas.

Therein is the reason for the gullibility of millions of Americans as they take seriously the upcoming presidential election and the major candidates they’ve been provided to choose between. Not one candidate proposes that they’d like to see an end to Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid. Not one proposes an end to government favoring some corporations over others with their bail-outs. Not one proposes ending the widespread socialism we already suffer under. No. Each, in their own deceitful style give lip service to smaller or more efficient government and/or promise changes accomplished only by larger more intrusive government and greater taxation, but none would actually do anything about it. And they never focus on the cost to liberty for all that they promise. They play to people’s desire for security. Do the American people even remember how self-sufficiency and independence once created wonderful ingenuity and thus the wealth of this nation? Don’t they see the world around us where government provided security has always come at the greatest cost of all - letting go of liberty?

Socialism weakens people; it morally debilitates them; and economically destroys them.

The message I heard repeatedly during my debate with the socialist, is the identical message the major candidates give the American people, only the major candidates have the advantage: they promise benefits to millions through socialism but always they avoid the word “socialism” replacing it with words of change, hope, and compassion. They know what they’re doing, only their motives aren’t as pure as the man I debated. They are going for the power and control, he is simply, in my opinion, a compassionate peace-loving individual who truly (and mistakenly) believes socialism will help America.

Our major presidential candidates care nothing about helping the American people, but they know the great things to promise while never telling Americans what they’ll loose: freedom.

Ironically, as people worldwide abandon socialism having suffered its dark economic and societal repercussions, Americans - once the symbol of freedom, prosperity, and generosity - are forging only deeper into its dark abyss.

For as Edmund Burke, a British philosopher and statesman, said of socialism,”A perfect equality will indeed be produced. That is to say equal wretchedness, equal beggary, and on the part of the petitioners, a woeful, helpless, and desperate disappointment, such is the event of all compulsory equalizations. They pull down what is above, they never raise what is below and they depress high and low together beneath the level of what was originally the lowest.”

4 t-shirts were for sale in the airport.

Permalink for Radio Debate with a Socialist (& Photos from Venezuala)

Bush’s “Mission Accomplished” Speech - another view…

Posted by admin - 16/04/08 at 01:04:13 am

An Open Letter to Democrats and the Liberal Media.

By Ger Spaulding, CAPT, USN (Retired)

Yesterday, 1 May 2006, you had a field day marking the third anniversary of President Bush’s landing on USS Abraham Lincoln to deliver what you relish in mischaracterizing as his “Mission Accomplished Speech.”

First, he never said “mission accomplished.” What he said was, “Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed. And now our coalition is engaged in securing and reconstructing that country.”

For you uninitiated media twerps and so-called leaders of the Democrat Party, the phrase “major combat operations” means army on army, tank on tank, air force on air force, etc. That’s what the phrase has always meant. Bush was exactly correct when he said “major combat operations have ended,” because the Iraqi military had been utterly defeated and — on their own — disbanded and went into hiding among the general population. He was also correct in saying, “…now our coalition is engaged in securing and reconstructing that country.” He was defining the next mission, one in which we are still engaged and one in which we are succeeding dramatically despite the best efforts of the insurgents, the liberal media and the Democrat Party.

Now, about that “Mission Accomplished” sign. Surely you recall that the Lincoln was on her way home from a long deployment at the time the war started, was turned around before reaching port and sent back out on a lengthy, unscheduled second deployment in support of the war. When the president landed on her deck, she was finally on her way home from that unscheduled second deployment and was very proud of the fact that she had accomplished the additional mission laid on her even as Lincoln families had been anticipating the imminent return of their loved ones. And as you know, when they learned the president would be making a speech from the flight deck of their ship, the crew of the Lincoln asked permission to hang that sign to let their families and the world share in their pride. Every time you idiots politicize the “Mission Accomplished” banner, you denigrate not only the crew of the Abe Lincoln, but every military unit that feels pride in accomplishing its mission on behalf of its country. Shame on you! Shame on you!

So, here’s a message to you liberal media and Democrat leaders: you can take your mischaracterizations and outright lies about what you call the “Mission Accomplished speech” and shove them right up your collective, traitorous asses until you choke on them.

Ger Spaulding
CAPT, USN (Ret)
Colorado Springs, CO

http://850koa.com/pages/shows_rosen.html?feed=119739&article=471917

Taliban Militants Take Over Afghan Villages

Posted by admin - 08/04/08 at 08:04:25 pm

From Fox News:

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan — Hundreds of Taliban fighters took over several villages in southern Afghanistan on Monday just outside the region’s largest city, and NATO and Afghan forces were redeploying to meet the threat, officials said.

Mohammad Farooq, the government leader in the Arghandab district of Kandahar province, said around 500 Taliban fighters moved into his district and took over several villages.

Arghandab lies just north of Kandahar city — the Taliban’s former stronghold — and a tribal leader from the region warned that the militants could use the cover from Arghandab’s grape and pomegranate orchards to mount an attack on Kandahar itself.

read more…

Hot damn

Posted by admin - 06/04/08 at 07:04:29 pm

Obama has gained 10.5 delegates in the past five hours. Montana and South Dakota aren’t even closed yet.

Of course the vultures are swirling over Hillary more and more all day.

democracy isn’t about making law

Posted by admin - 04/04/08 at 01:04:11 am

Posner on Faith Based Morality and Public Policy

“Modern representative democracy isn’t about making law the outcome of discussion. It is not about modeling politics on the academic seminar. It is about forcing officials to stand for election at short intervals, and about letting ordinary people express their political preferences without having to defend them in debate with their intellectual superiors.” Link

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