End the War on Freedom

John T. Kennedy at Strike the Root - An Embedded Premise - good commentary on the recent ninth district decision on the Pledge of Allegiance. [notreasonblog]

Should there be religion in public schools? That's the wrong question. It embeds a premise that we need to reject. It's like the old joke: Have you stopped beating your wife? Except in this case it's no laughing matter. Religion in schools is not the problem; religion in schools has never been the problem. The problem is government in schools.

Should there be religion in public schools? The question presents a false dichotomy. Should the government require you to paint your house black, or white? The correct answer is that the government shouldn't have anything to say about what color you paint your house. And it shouldn't have anything to say about what happens in schools. As long as government is in schools, freedom of conscience will necessarily be trampled.

Remove government from schools and the "problem" of religion in schools is suddenly nowhere to be found--everybody patronizes the kinds of schools they favor. The supposed problem vanishes because it never was the problem; government was the problem all along.

Scott Bieser at Rational Review - A Pledge the courts won't be able to knock down - Well done!

I pledge allegiance
to the Bill or Rights
of the United States of America.
And to the liberty
for which it stands:
Self-governing,
Nature-given,
Inalienable,
With freedom and justice for all.

Garry Reed, The Loose Cannon Libertarian - You're Not A Libertarian If ... - why Joe Farah flunks Libertarianism 101.

MORALITY

Farah falls into a muddle puddle when he switches to morality. "Libertarians, more often than not, fail to understand the moral dimension so critical to self-government." He goes for extra credits with "Libertarians make a fundamental mistake about the nature of man. Man is not inherently good." False. That's exactly why libertarians demand a severely limited government. Farah further expounds, "We cannot ignore that a libertarian society devoid of God and a biblical worldview would quickly deteriorate into chaos and violence." As opposed to what? A non-libertarian society of God and a biblical worldview that produced centuries of Inquisition and witch burnings, a Northern Ireland of Christians killing Christians, decades of American pedophile priests? Guess that's why the Libertarian Party's web site says "individual liberty and personal responsibility" instead of "God and a biblical worldview." But Farah already knows this, as though he cribbed it from libertarians: "Freedom can only be experienced and maximized, though, when it is accompanied by personal responsibility."

Ron Paul at LewRockwell.com - Are We Doomed To Be a Police State? - a speech given to the House of Representatives by Dr. Paul on June 27. [jpfo]

But, Mr. Speaker, my subject today is whether America is a police state. I'm sure the large majority of Americans would answer this in the negative. Most would associate military patrols, martial law and summary executions with a police state, something obviously not present in our everyday activities. However, those with knowledge of Ruby Ridge, Mount Carmel and other such incidents may have a different opinion.

...

Political propagandizing is used to get all of us to toe the line and be good "patriots," supporting every measure suggested by the administration. We are told that preemptive strikes, torture, military tribunals, suspension of habeas corpus, executive orders to wage war, and sacrificing privacy with a weakened 4th Amendment are the minimum required to save our country from the threat of terrorism.

Who's winning this war anyway?

...

A growing number of Americans are concluding that the threat we now face comes more as a consequence of our foreign policy than because the bad guys envy our freedoms and prosperity. How many terrorist attacks have been directed toward Switzerland, Australia, Canada, or Sweden? They too are rich and free, and would be easy targets, but the Islamic fundamentalists see no purpose in doing so.

...

I'm sure that our intelligence agencies had the information available to head off 9/11, but bureaucratic blundering and turf wars prevented the information from being useful. But, the basic principle is wrong. City policeman can't and should not be expected to try to preempt crimes. That would invite massive intrusions into the everyday activities of every law-abiding citizen.

But that's exactly what our recent legislation is doing. It's a wrong-headed goal, no matter how wonderful it may sound. The policemen in the inner cities patrol their beats, but crime is still rampant. In the rural areas of America, literally millions of our citizens are safe and secure in their homes, though miles from any police protection. They are safe because even the advantage of isolation doesn't entice the burglar to rob a house when he knows a shotgun sits inside the door waiting to be used. But this is a right denied many of our citizens living in the inner cities.

L. Neil Smith at Rational Review - The Wages of Socialism Are Death - this Independence Day, you should dedicate yourself to... yourself, your personal independence.

Independence Day is on us again. In the west, instead of fireworks -- which have been forbidden by gubernatorial edict -- we have forest fires.

People have died. Homes and other buildings have been destroyed. All in all, there are wildfires raging out of control in 17 states. And each and every one of these fires -- including the devastating blazes in New Mexico and Florida last year -- have a single, common cause.

Socialism.

T.L. Knapp at Rational Review - Mourn on the Fourth of July: 2002 - Mr. Knapp laments the passing of liberty in its birthplace. This story links to his recommendation for a National Day of Protest on July 4th. Wear a black armband. If you run a website, make the page black on that day.

A year ago, American citizens were not deemed "enemy combatants" and held indefinitely in military prisons without counsel, charges or trials by juries of their peers.

A year ago, the U.S. government did not publicly admit to keeping prisoners in other countries where they could get away with torturing them.

A year ago, the occupant of the White House, while usurping a great degree of unconstitutional power, at least refrained from posturing as the military dictator of a totalitarian regime.

A lot can change in a year. A lot has changed in a year.

America's "president" dances atop the graves of 3,000 murdered innocents, smirking as he unzips his fly to urinate on the Constitution.

R. Lee Wrights at Rational Review - Is the Spirit of '76 Dead? - Sadly, yes.

So I return to my original query -- Is the spirit of '76 dead? Perhaps a series of questions can assist us in determining whether or not to hold a wake. Would any of the founding fathers have tolerated what Americans cheerfully endure today? I hardly think so.

Does anyone really believe that Samuel Adams or John Hancock would even carry governmental paperwork on their person, much less produce said paperwork to one of the king's men upon demand? Would George Washington or Thomas Jefferson have asked permission before adding a wing to Mt. Vernon or Monticello? Would Paul Revere, along with his fellow merchants and tradesmen, have tolerated their income being taxed because the King said that it was their duty to give their fair share? Would the founders have handed their precious children over to the state and trusted the beast Bureaucracy to properly prepare them for the cold, cruel world they would inevitably have to face? Did the citizens of Lexington and Concord just sit idly by and let the King's soldiers march into their towns to relieve them of their cache of weapons, which were their only means of resistance? I dare say the answer to all these posers is an emphatic and obvious No!

The Libertarian Enterprise - Letter from Paul Birch - an interesting idea for battling spam.

The Libertarian Enterprise - Letter from Scott R. Keszler - Mr. Keszler liked Carl Bussjaeger's Net Assets. So did I. Get your copy today!

Carl Bussjaeger at The Libertarian Enterprise - Right Wing What? - a response to last week's piece by Manual Miles.

And we object to governments because our experience - and that history we aren't supposed to know about - has shown us that no matter how benign in original intent, all governments grow and seize more and more power, authority, control over the people. American is a textbook example of this; the usurpation of power and shredding of the US Constitution is what dissuaded me from... call it Constitutional minarchy. Having a nice little benevolent government is akin to having just been infected with anthrax; it will get worse. That's the nature of both beasties.

...

Ideology: To quote the title of a friend's book: I just want to be left alone. Or, as one of my own characters says, "You let me be, and I won't have to kill you." Not the words of a psychopath; just an unmistakable statement that we won't put up with coercion. And we believe that everyone has the right to try to improve their lot in an uncoerced free market.

David M. Brown at The Libertarian Enterprise - So There's This Ticket Agent and This Jokey Passenger, See ... - concerning one man's plight in the nazi-security world where telling a joke is considered criminal.

Vin Suprynowicz at The Libertarian Enterprise - A Ridiculous Decision - Vin considers the recent ninth district decision baninng the words "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance.

And what about the Second Amendment, where the lower courts have long allowed self-righteous bureaucrats to insist that "reasonable regulation" is fine? Why can't we find that phrase anywhere in our version, which merely says the right to keep and bear arms "shall not be infringed"?

If the courts were as zealous in guarding that right as they are in protecting this purported right to be free from hearing so much as a mention of an "established religion," the correct answer for any 14-year-old girl endeavoring to buy a belt-fed machine gun over the counter for cash at Home Depot would be "No, you're not going to charge me any sales tax, and I don't have to show you any stinking government 'license' or 'permit,' either. Or would you like me to call the Bill of Rights Enforcement Squad ... right now?"

L. Neil Smith at The Libertarian Enterprise - Too Little, Too Late - the Earth narrowly missed being hit by an asteroid last week. What did the world's governments do to prevent it? Nothing. What could have been done. Plenty, if government would just get out of the way.

Unfortunately, the democratic system has a glitch that most of its founders failed to anticipate: it selects exclusively for only the most stupid, evil, and crazy among us. The filtration is amazingly efficient. Nobody with any brains, nobody who is truly decent, nobody completely sane can ever hope to be chosen as congressman, senator, supreme court justice, cabinet member, or president. Only a moron, a villain, or a madman can achieve high office in any of the world's democracies, and the United States is the worst of them all in that respect. I know of only one exception, and I don't know how he does it.

Ayn Rand used to say government has three legitimate functions, represented by the army, the courts, and the police. History teaches us how those functions are really performed. The police arrest you if you don't go along with what's politically correct; the courts deny you any real chance to defend yourself, provide a jury selected to convict you, rubberstamp anything the police did to bring you in and anything they want to do with you afterward; and if too many of you object at once, the army will imprison you in your own home, fill it with poison gas, set it on fire, and machinegun you as you attempt to escape.

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