Cain stumbling under glare of national spotlight - Yahoo! News

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Cain stumbling under glare of national spotlight - Yahoo! News

Don't worry. A man running for president is only joking about killing people. ha ha. what a kidder.

Here's a clue about telling jokes, Mr. Cain. First, don't joke about death, especially the death of the downtrodden.

Second, if you are telling a joke, pay attention to whether people laugh or not. If not, let them know you were telling a joke.

Third, don't lie about your non-jokes way after the fact and expect me to believe you.

Related articles

• "Herb Cain" answers Palin's flavor-of-the-week comments (hotair.com)
• Cain In Vain (theillogicalseminary.com)

Here's to the Crazy Ones

A lot of people think that fans of liberty are a bit whacked.

There's nothing crazy about wanting people to interact with each other peacefully.

That's all liberty is.

The actually crazy ones are those who think only force can solve problems.  Lets hope they emerge from their psychosis soon.

Any truly great idea must struggle to gain acceptance.  There has never been a better time to return to the great ideas on which this country was founded.

Banking Isn't the Problem

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There's nothing inherently faulty with people lending their money to others or with an intermediary taking part of the action for arranging things.

Most of the recent problems with banking have a different root cause, namely that the government relieves you of all responsibility for choosing wisely who you lend your money too.

Your savings are insured. But unlike rational insurance, risky banks are insured at the same cost as prudent banks. That doesn't exactly give banks useful feedback about the risks they are taking.

On top of that, the government also implicitly guarantees to these banks that they'll never let them go out of business. So they can take all kinds of risk and only suffer when they don't take enough high-paying risks.

And, over time, those in charge of this insurance take money for gradually loosening standards for what they insure. Yes, Congress is actually corrupt. Sorry to break it to you.

Oh, sure, Congress clamps down on the banks AFTER bad practices lead to disaster. But then, slowly and inexorably, time and lobbyist cash gradually get Congress to loosen standards.

The public, who didn't truly understand the causes of the previous disaster, has forgotten about what happened, the political pressure dissipates and Congress returns to subsidizing unreasonable risks.

But don't worry: you're insured. Unfortunately, unlike any other insurance you've ever bought, behind the scenes, the actual costs are being billed to you. You'll be forced to pay higher taxes in the future to clean up the very disaster the government supposedly protected you from.

Bill Clinton Misinterprets Constitution

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Here's the article.

Clinton points to this clause in the Fourteenth Amendment: "the validity of the public debt of the United States ... shall not be questioned." as justification for ignoring the debt ceiling. But as I read it, its talking about the debt not being questioned, not new spending not being questioned. Default is not allowed constitutionally. Clearly, paying the interest on our debts SHOULD take precedence over new spending.

Paying the interest on the debt is not the same as paying for new spending. There is more than enough revenue to pay the interest. If Congress and the President followed the Constitution, there's no risk of default.

Of course, the actual language is about whether the US is on the hook for debts incurred by the Confederacy or any losses related to emancipating the slaves.

"Section 4. The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void."

Unintended Consequences

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Another sad story.  An infant was shot and killed, this time in Silicon Valley.

Its unfortunate that those who report these sad stories seldom identify our drug policies as the root cause of a lot of the violence we see.

When alcohol was illegal during Prohibition, there was a great deal of violence associated with distribution of alcohol.  And it evaporated when prohibition was repealed.

If we simply allowed each neighborhood to decide for itself what drug use was allowed, drug sales would become a peaceful activity governed by the same laws as other industries.  And it would take place in limited areas, away from where people raise their kids.

And I think that's what people really want.  They don't need to control everybody's lives.  That's not possible under any system.  But it is possible to limit where it happens and greatly reduce the violence associated with it.

Related articles

• 50 Years of Prohibition...and where has it got us? (blackpoppymag.wordpress.com)
• Why "The War on Drugs" Has Failed (psychologytoday.com)
• War on drugs continues south of the border (seattletimes.nwsource.com)
• Mothers Day Plea to End the War on Drugs (alternet.org)
• Former world leaders: War on drugs has failed (usapartisan.com)
• Prohibition Failed Then and It Fails Now (cafehayek.com)

Are There Natural Human Rights? - NYTimes.com

The New York Times has an interesting article on natural rights.

Every human naturally seeks to be free of the coercion of others. No reasonable person is going to give others the ability to coerce him. But cooperating together to prevent such coercion is reasonable. And necessary, because groups of humans attack and control other groups. And this is also true of animals.

Rights are simply a way of specifying what the limits and purpose of such cooperation should be.

And its clear that reasonable people, when aware of all that the state is capable of, would only give it power to protect the interests of those agreeing to its establishment.

Everything beyond that is simply an attempt to hijack the state for one's own purposes, usually to be able to obtain what belongs to others or to control them in other ways.

People give the state the power that it has for one purpose: to prevent coercion. There really is no consent for everything else. If people were presented a checklist with everything the state could potentially do, all reasonable people would (naturally) check the "Protect me from coercion of others and do it for much less than it would cost me to do it myself" checkbox and not check "Do whatever you think is best" checkbox.

To submit yourself to a security arrangement does not mean you submit yourself to whatever else other people decide.

No reasonable person would have agreed at the establishment of the state that it should have unlimited power, unless, of course, he planned on being the beneficiary. So either the state, in its ultimate form, is not mutually agreed upon. Or the majority have been fooled. Or gradually, over time, the "social contract" has been eroded and twisted into something that no reasonable person would have agreed to and has no choice but to suffer through.

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