The Absurdity of the System

The level of corruption in governments around the world (both State and Federal) is reaching a boiling point.  This isn't the first time, and it certainly won't be the last.  Unless, that is, we decide we've had enough.  And I don't mean enough of the current team in power, I mean the government-by-force paradigm in its entirety.

While their intentions may (or may not) have been noble, the Framers of the Constitution created the potential that has led to the absurdity we see today.  The only thing worse than being made into a criminal for owning a previously legal high capacity magazine is being made into a criminal for refusing to purchase health insurance.  As if to add insult to injury, President Obama is showing his true colors by celebrating his great "victory" of forcing millions of people at the barrel of a gun to buy health insurance.  This kind of celebratory behavior is what you might expect from a dictator looking down on those he has subjugated.  Then again, if you consider how Obama crassly jokes about murdering people with predator drones, this type of celebration seems right in line with his personality.

Only in a system as absurd as this do hundreds of millions of dollars per year get funneled into combating a drug which has never killed anyone in all of Human history while the pharmaceutical industry produces one pill after another that regularly kill over 38,000 people per year in the US alone.  In fact, roughly 50% of people in our overloaded prison system (which is largely private and for-profit) are there for non-violent drug related offenses.  Related: The legal alcohol and tobacco industry kill a cumulative 518,000 people per year in the US.

Only in a system as nonsensically absurd as this does the government spend untold billions on fighting a faceless "War on Terror" while leaving the Southern border of the country wide open to potential terrorists and illegal immigrants.  Mind you, I don't have any problem at all with people freely traveling this planet, so long as they do so in peace.  What is absurd is that the United States government would have you terrified of some shadowy threat they can't really define so that they can keep taking your money and limiting your growth.  In short, so that you never have time to stop and question the validity of their claims, or the validity of the fact that they exist at all in the capacity in which you think they do.

Only in a system as patently absurd as ours does Congress abdicate its responsibility to create money to a private bank, then borrow from that bank at interest.  The debt our government owes to the Federal Reserve has grown so far out of control that virtually every penny of your Federal income taxes go directly to paying the interest alone.  That's right: Your income taxes do not pay for the services you expect.  Instead, they pay for the interest on a debt our government only owes because it gave up its duty to create its own money.

Only in a system as absurdly corrupt as this do the same people creating genetically modified foods also get to set the safety regulations for those foods.  These same people are also authoring legislation that prevents any sort of cease-and-desist order being filed against them even if it is found that their "foods" are causing harm to humans or the environment.

Only in a system as ridiculously absurd as America's can you be sent to prison for not paying taxes - where you can't earn more to pay off your "obligations" even while costing taxpayer money for your stay - without absolving you of your tax debt.  If tax collection were about revenue generation, the last thing the government would do is lock you in a cage at the expense of tax dollars.  But taxation isn't about revenue.  It's about control at the barrel of a gun.  The situation is literally no different than when a common street thug holds a gun to your head and demands "Your money or your life."  The number of thugs and caliber of the gun being held is of no relevance to this scenario - they are identical.

While we are on this topic, it is worth revisiting a heavily self-evident fact: The initiation of aggression is inherently illegitimate.  Even if you believe your friend should behave a certain way, you know it is unacceptable for you to threaten violence against them to illicit the behavior you want.  You also know that if you choose to initiate violence anyway, your friend is fully justified in using violence against you in their own self-defense.  You live by this Non-Aggression Principle every day you interact with others without harming them.  If this is the standard applied to individual people, should it not also be applied to governing bodies?  Anything that must be done at the barrel of a gun - taxation, drug law enforcement, Obamacare - should be seen by all as inherently illegitimate because it removes the element of voluntary interaction.

It's time for everyone to see government for what it is - a concentration of force which uses threats of violence and ultimately the promise of death to obtain compliance.  Having "slightly less stealing and threats of violence" isn't good enough.  If Liberty is truly to thrive, we must remove the ability of any single person to legalize whatever brand of aggression they see fit.

Reading words like these might make you feel uncomfortable.  They seem to be calling you out to you directly to change some subtle thing in your life, something you know would work towards making our existence what it could be.  And I wonder - will you answer this call?  Or will you continue to live your life as if there is nothing wrong?  Because as Grant says in The Iron Web, "Some of us are done trying to help you.  If you crave servitude and can't live without it, by all means, keep it.  But leave us the hell alone."

"When the government's boot is on your throat, whether it is a left boot or a right boot is of no consequence."

It's Not a Democracy, Stupid!

In recent discussions about liberty, self-ownership, and non-aggression, a common misconception has been rearing its head: "We live in a democracy, so you're ruled by your fellow voters."  Democracy, as pointed out by the photo on the left, is like two wolves and a sheep voting on what's for dinner.

What we are really supposed live in is a Constitutional Republic with a democratic election process.  The idea is supposed to be the protection of individual rights - the slight majority cannot vote itself the rights and property of the vast minority.

• Because of my First Amendment, a home-owner's association cannot legally forbid me from flying an American flag in my front yard, nor can an entity like the IRS restrict my ability to share my message with the rest of the country.  Similarly, the government cannot force me to forsake my religious beliefs in the name of health care.
• Because of my Second Amendment, my right to protect myself and my family with firearms is not up for discussion, no matter how much fear and propaganda people want to believe.
• Because of my Fourth Amendment, my property cannot legally be permanently removed from my possession on mere suspicion of wrongdoing, nor can my vehicle be stopped and searched at a police checkpoint without probable cause.
• Because of my Fifth Amendment, I cannot legally be required to provide information that could incriminate myself.
• Because of my Sixth Amendment, I cannot legally be thrown in a cage without ever being given a trial by a jury of my peers.

These (and many other) examples hold true no matter what vote the majority makes.  Inevitably, people argue that "this is the way things are."  After all, HOAs frequently violate free speech.  To this day, the IRS is restricting certain groups with dissenting political ideologies from participating in the debate.  Gun rights have been under relentless assault on both the state and Federal level, particularly with the overused cry of "For the children!"  The NSA is spying on every single American's phone calls, emails, and social media posts.  The IRS requires you to submit a document each year that could land you in prison if you make even one mistake.  And people are indefinitely detained without a trial by our own government all the time, often merely on the suspicion of "terrorist" involvement.

It's true.  This is the way things are today.  And that is exactly the problem.

We still have some semblance of the freedoms our forefathers paid for in blood, but they're diminishing every day.  When you shrug your shoulders and dismiss the person trying to get you to question this reality, you are doing exactly what we have all been bred to do.  From the moment you hit the public school system, you've been taught to sit down, shut up, and blindly obey authority figures.  Blind obedience is rewarded while any questioning that challenges the status quo is punished.  You have no right to free speech and no right to privacy.  It is in this environment of intense indoctrination that we spend our most impressionable years.  And it is because of this indoctrination that so many Americans choose to sit idly on the sidelines while their freedoms are systematically removed.  It was Adolph Hitler who said "The best way to take control over a people and control them utterly is to take a little of their freedom at a time, to erode rights by a thousand tiny and almost imperceptible reductions.  In this way, the people will not see those rights and freedoms being removed until past the point at which these changes cannot be reversed."

So if you choose to sit on the sidelines, that unfortunate choice is yours to make.  This fight truly needs you in it.  I only ask you do the rest of us a favor: When you see people like me fighting to reclaim the freedoms we are losing, continue to sit on the sidelines.  Don't hand us over to your masters with hope of praise or table scraps.

The Collapse of The American Dream Explained in Animation

This is absolutely critical educational material for any American citizen to be appropriately informed.

A Legacy of Lawlessness

Why is it that officials in government can declare some laws "the immutable law of the land" while arbitrarily choosing not to enforce others?  I can't count the number of times I've heard people (not just government officials) trumpet "Obamacare is the law of the land!" with a smirk on their face.

Well, so are our immigration laws, which aren't being enforced.  Marijuana is still (erroneously) illegal, yet Attorney General Eric Holder is choosing not to pursue legal action against banks who take deposits from admitted marijuana businesspeople.

The last time I checked, it was illegal for you or I to sell firearms to known criminals, and we'd be charged as an accomplice to murder if those guns were used to kill people.  But the government doesn't even bat an eyelash at the botched Fast and Furious operation which ended up doing just that.

On a larger scale, it is illegal for me to forcibly take your money from you, yet the IRS has been directly (and illegally) taxing us into oblivion since 1913.  I would be charged with violating your God-given and Constitutionally recognized right to privacy if I were collecting all of your phone calls, social media posts, and emails, but the NSA does these things to us all.  I would be charged with false imprisonment and violating your Sixth Amendment rights if I were to lock you in a room indefinitely without giving you a jury trial, but the government claims this very "right" of indefinite detention.  What's more, the government is now claiming and has executed the "right" to assassinate any person (even American citizens), anywhere in the world, for the crime of being "suspected of terrorism."  This alone should send chills down every Freedom-loving person's spine: Either we all have the right to a trial by jury, or none of us do.  Furthermore, It is illegal for me to poison you, yet the federal government protects biotech giants like Monsanto who are doing just that.  You would be charged with counterfeiting if you printed your own money, but the Federal Reserve (private) bank has been granted this authority.

As a side note, and on the largest scale: If it is wrong for me to do "it," it is wrong for me to ask an agent of the state to do "it" for me.  This is true whether it be forced taxation (aka: theft/slavery) or holding you at gunpoint to stop you from an activity that harms no one outside yourself (such as using cannabis or growing a garden in your front yard).

Bigger picture aside, the current administration's arbitrary and unilateral decision to selectively enforce laws has set the stage for lawlessness.  And make no mistake: It may not be necessary to have a government to steal our money and start wars on our behalf, but it is important to live by rules that prohibit people from harming one another.

Related - The Non-Aggression Principle: Being the initiator of force in any situation is inherently illegitimate.

"Anarchy: Not without rules, but without rulers."