The Fear of Freedom

   I  think I have finally figured it out, why Republicans and Democrats think the way they do; it's the fear of freedom.  Not their own, but of others.  Of course they want all the freedoms they can handle, but they are afraid of giving freedom to others.

   Republicans fear the repeal of drug prohibition because they fear that everyone else will just be high all the time and driving around selling drugs to kids.  They fear gay marriage because they think it will lead to people doing crazy things like marrying horses (no kidding, this is what my dad actually says).

   Democrats fear guns, and think if guns are banned that people will run around shooting everything in sight.  They fear small government because they think people can't take care of themselves.

   How can anyone walk around being this afraid of things?  I mean, I have generalized anxiety disorder, I have days where I stay in my house because I'm afraid to go outside.  My biggest fear in all the world is puppets.  I'm usually convinced people are doing things just to spite me.  But even I think it is paranoid to be as afraid of freedom as Republicans and Democrats.

   To want freedoms for yourself because those are the freedoms you like, and to deny people other freedoms because you don't like them is not acting in self-interest.  If only everyone acted in self-interest (do unto others as you would have them do unto you type stuff)  then there would be no problem, and I think if we spent half as much time teaching our children how to properly behave as we dosending them to public schools which teach a horrbly skewed socialist pallet of half-truths and useless nonsense, then we'd be ok.

Counting Blue Cars

   In a few of my posts I have spoken about how religious I tend to be.  At this moment I would wish to refine what I have meant by such statements.   I do not believe in organized religion, it leaves nothing to the individual.  I also do not believe in atheism, it ignores certain evidence, and for the most part asserts as fact something which it may never know.

  Organized religion tells people how to think based on what god they follow, and what the church higherarchy decrees.  To me, this is absence of thought.  To believe what another tells you simply because they claim a closer relationship with God means you abandon your own thought.   I bow to no man, and no man shall tell me fables which ignore the facts of this world and tell me they give him power over.

   Atheists (the majority anyway)  protest to know the unknowable, that there is no God.  To know something means one must have concrete undisputed evidence that it is true.  Of course, in the case of God, you cannot prove something unprovalbe, and neither can you disprove something unprovable.   Iy they were to say, they think or believe there is no God, I could maybe agree.

  I, myself am a Deist Catholic (Catholic in a cultural sense not spiritual).  I look at the world through the lens of logic.  I believe the big bang, and most all other theories.  The big bang; there was a cosmic egg of all of existence existing in a singularity.  But what created that egg, surely, the laws of nature tells us something cannot come from nothing.  And for all that mess to end up creating humans, a life form capable to concieve os such things, the chances are far against it.  The universe acts in predictable, describable means.   My logic tells me that there is a god of some sort, I don't think it interacts with humans through prophecy.

  I don't care what you believe; just don't try and say it is fact.  Facts are backed up by real world experimenst.  There are no such experiments for God.  In practicality, you believe or you don't, you don't know or or know it is not.

Back to the title- Counting Blue Cars by Dishwalla.

Self Interest V Selfishness

   It seems this is a distinction which needs to be made.  Self interest is not the same as selfishness.  It is out of selfishness a man demotes those under him to the idea of lesser beings.  It is out of self interest a man treats each as his equal.  

   It seems that the so called "liberals" in america (lower cased for purpose) can not distinguish between the two.   To them, the man who cheats his employees out of selfishness is the same as the man who treats his employees well out of self interest.   To them; both are in need of compulsitory compliance.  

   There is a difference.  The man who acts in selfishness does not worry about future consequences.  The man who acts in self interest does.

   If one were to steal a loaf of bread out of selfishness, they would only be worrying about survival.  If one were to steal a loaf of bread out of self interest they would consider everything, if they were in the position of the bread seller woud they wish to have thier bread stolen?

   Self interest is based on the ideal "do unto others as you would have done to you"  Selfishness is based onto the ideal "what is good for me is good for me."

   A man working on selfishness would steal from another to aquire as much material wealth as possible.

   A man working on self interest would aquire goods as he wished them to aquired from him.

   In short, a man working out of selfishness is a danger to society.  A man working out of self interest is a benefit to society.  A man working for an ideal is a parasite.  A man working for himself is reality.

Patrick Henry Is Dead

   On March 23, 1775, Patrick Henry gave a speech which ended in the the amazing quote,"give me liberty or give me death!"  Since that day, we citizens of the united states have slowly let that quote deteriorate. 

  Today; we have given into the quote, "give me liberty or give me a comfortable life at the expence of those who have more money than I."  Slowly, our country is fading around us; and for the last 100yrs we have done nothing.  We have been fed guilt and hatred, and we have accepted it.  

  Do you wish to know what has spurred me into action, this very blog, into being?  It is the idea that it seems we would rather die as slaves than to fail as individuals.   Mid-last year; when I saw this very thing begin to happen is when I could take no more.   

   I never wished to speak out.  My entire political philosiphy is modeled around being left alone.   But, for my own self interest; yes I do this out of self interest, I could no longer let my voice go unheard.  Someday I wish to have children, and I can not allow anyone to be brought into such a failure of intelligence as this world now is.  My hope is that this world will be set on a path of reform before any such point children of mine are maturing.  

   I would rather fail a free nation than succeed as a nation of slaves.

The Age of Entitlement

   One of my favorite periods to study in history is the Age of Enlightenment.  At this time many philosophers, scientists and political theorists began to stress the importance of reason and inquiry, to use rational ideas to explain the world around them.  Thomas Paine referred to it as the Age of Reason.  This period gave us Adam Smith's explanation of free market economics, John Locke's explanation for the nature of rights, and the united states Constitution.  To me, this is the most intellectually exciting period other than Greco-Roman.  I understand how these men thought. This is the way I think.

   The world I live in today, I don't understand.  I don't understand how people think today.  It's not the way I think.   It seems to me that people today think only about immediate results, and only the good immediate results.   People want more for themselves right now, without thinking what that means for later.  It seems people don't use reason, they use emotion.  When they rebut a point, they don't talk about how logical or illogical it is; they talk about how bad or mean or good it is.   It seems everyone wants to gain, but no one wants to lose.  Which is contrary to reason that that can occur; but it feels like a good idea.  People seem to feel as though they don't want to earn anything, just have it, then and there.  

   Except meaning the loss of my modern conveniences, I think I would be more at home in the Age of Enlightenment.  But it seems like I'm living in the Age of Entitlement.

Just Some Thoughts; WWI

   So much is taught about German involvment in WWI and the consequences which led to Hitler gaining power. But not much is ever mentioned about the involvment of the Ottoman Empire in the war.  I would venture to guess most poeple, at least not in America, know what the Ottoman Empire was, much less know it was involved in WWI.

   This seems an odd vaccuum of knowledge.  Maybe it is the fact that much of US public school teaching is geared towards European history.  Or maybe it makes some people feel less guilt ridden, since Germans are white and the Ottoman Empire was largely middle eastern.  I'm not sure.  

   It is odd; given that I was in a public school during the Gulf War, that they had not already begun to teach about the affects of the fall of the Ottoman Empire after WWI, given US trouble in the region had begun more than 15 years prior.  From what I know, public schools still aren't talking about this.  Almost everything I know on the subject is self taught.

   These were just some thoughts I had.  I had planned on discussing ethics V morality; but I guess that will be another post.

Property Tax

   As I stated in my last post; I think property tax is the worst of all the taxes.  Capitalism is supposed to be a voluntary system.  If you do not wish to make capitalist transactions, you should not be forced to.  However, paying a tax on land which one already owns means that after they acquired title to that land they are forced to participate in capitalism; in order to make the money to pay the taxes.

   If I were to give a good piece of land to a poor family, and on that land was everything they needed to live (food, water, lumber), they could not simply live off that land.  They would be forced to participate in capitalism to just pay the taxes.

   To take a voluntary system and force one to participate is a horrific thing.  The only taxes, if any, which should be levied, should be based on voluntary capitalist transactions.  Not on property already owned.