Medical freedom and the Constitution

"If people let government decide what foods they eat and what medicines they take, their bodies will be in as sorry a state as are the souls who live under tyranny"

 -Thomas Jefferson

Prohibition...goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control mans' appetite through legislation and makes a crime out of things that are not even crimes... A prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our Government was founded."- Abraham Lincoln

            What do the War on Drugs, 18^th amendment (prohibition of alcoholic beverages), Drinking age of 21(or any drinking age for that matter), and Obamacare and the individual mandate to purchase healthcare insurance or face financial and even criminal sanctions for civil disobedience of these laws have in common? They all restrict your constitutional right to control your own body and make medical and even non-medical decisions over your health so long as it does not come at the expense of someone’s life, liberty and property, including financial property. For anyone concerned about children the parents are responsible for their so called “minor” children and parents have a right to decide what medical care their children receive and what are children eat & drink unless the actions of the parent(s) are actually harming the child or will imminently harm the child. The following constitutional amendments protect our right to do with our bodies what we want to do:

 Fifth Amendment

“No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation. ”

Eighth Amendment

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

 Tenth Amendment

“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

Thirteenth Amendment

Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Fourteenth Amendment

Section 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Twenty-Sixth Amendment

The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.

The 5^th and 14^th amendments require due process before life, liberty and property can be taken away. Prohibition strips you of your right to eat & drink as you please and your body is your ultimate priceless property. Without self-ownership, you have no identity and no life of your own. The right to life means not only the right to be alive and free from unwanted harm, but to pursue one’s life as he/she pleases even if the lifestyle the individual chooses is unpopular. Our creator has given us life and man cannot control the creator who is also Mother Nature.

          Another authoritarian approach to socialized healthcare is forced vaccinations. Massachusetts once had them under the Devil Patrick regime where children would be vaccinated against the will of the parents and the children themselves. That’s Stalinist totalitarianism there for you. Governor Rick Perry or should I call him Prick Perry of Texas currently seeking nomination for Republican candidacy for US president created an executive order forcing young school girls against the will of parents and children themselves. Prick Perry’s dictator decree was overruled by the legislator of course.

          Anti-Drug crowds would say that drugs and underage drinking are a public health issue and the authoritarians believe it is their right to regulate the health of people and develop healthy lifestyles throughout the land. This sounds like Obamacare ideology where government controls your health and healthcare through one size fits all and bureaucracy and there is no rational basis for forcing someone to abide by a certain lifestyle. Government justifies legal drinking age of 21 on the grounds of curbing drunk driving and alcohol abuse. The best way to deal with drunk driving is to go after drunk drivers, not social responsible drinkers under 21 because drunk driving and underage drinking are two different things. Using the legal drinking age of 21 to combat drunk driving is like putting Muslim-Americans in internment camps to combat terrorism. To combat terrorism, go after the terrorists or conspirators of terrorist attacks, not Muslim-Americans who have done nothing wrong. Imposing a legal drinking age against someone’s will is not the best way and certainly not the least restrictive way to solve the problem of drunk driving and is preemptive and presumes Mr. and Mrs. Twenty and under guilty and irresponsible because they COULD POTENTIALLY drive drunk and abuse alcohol. Even water can be abuse by drinking too much of it and you can even die from water intoxication and our civil liberties might as well be thrown into the grave in order to fight crime like in North Korea where people are parented by a tyrannical nanny-state regime where people suffer from famines due to extreme government regulation of agriculture. Government is a necessary evil that should only secure the blessings of life and liberty. The preamble of the constitution endorses this.

“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

General welfare does not mean individual welfare like entitlement programs and government funded projects. Domestic tranquility does not mean legislating the health of the people and assuming the role of the traditional parents. Using the state to interfere with the lifestyle choices of the people and the parents is an act of violence against the people. Our US troops have been fighting for our freedoms oversees and are getting killed and hundreds of under 21 year old troops have been killed in Iraq and Afghanistan and never had the chance to legally drink alcohol and buy handguns from FFL dealers. These troops were treated as children in terms of alcoholic beverages and handguns as well as carrying concealed firearms but punished as adults in war and were considered adults and responsible under criminal law. Treating someone as a child and punishing them as an adult violates the principle of justice that our founders established and it violates due process because if someone is considered an adult in a court of law and can be either charged as an adult for most or all violations of criminal law and/or be sued in court, that person is responsible to make adult decisions. Any decisions made on the behalf of the child are made by the parent or guardian. Brain development is a very complex study and everyone’s brain develops at different paces and does not magically develop fully at the age of 21 or any other fixed chronological age, so all efforts to use brain development to justify age based limits.

Why Using Science, Statistics and Studies to Justify Government Policies and Laws Is Disasterous

“Oh, it is sad, very sad, that once more, for the umpteenth time, the old truth is confirmed: What one Christian does is his own responsibility; what one Jew does is thrown back at all Jews.” --Diary of Anne Frank, 22 May 1944.

            Throughout the history of civilization, politicians and special interests have often deceived the targeted public into supporting an agenda using manipulation of fear, propaganda, false or misinterpreted junk science, statistics and studies, and stereotypes of grouped people. Jews have been most notably targets of anti-Semitism throughout most of the 2^nd millennium, which lasted possibly since the crucification of Jesus Christ in 33 A.D. and some people claimed that Jews were responsible for Christ’s death and used fear-mongering tactics to rally people into supporting anti-semitism. The Nazi’s used junk science and fear to rally Germans into hatred of Jews, Gypsies, Homosexuals, the Disabled and other “undesirables”.  Joseph Goebbels, Hitler’s second in command as I call him, rallied the German people to boycott Jewish businesses and Nazi Germany enacted laws up to the late 1930’s making Jews second class citizens with no rights and completely at the mercy of the Nazi government, and the German people of “master” race agreed with Hitler, though mostly through fear and state terrorism. The Nazis forcibly relocated Jews into overcrowded, disgusting, and barricaded ghettos on grounds that they along with others considers by Nazis to be “undesirables”. Nazi propaganda claimed Jews were disease carrying parasites who needed to be walled up in order to protect the public from the alleged deadly diseases. The “final solution” came in 1942 when Nazis planned to deport Jews from ghettos to extermination camps where the Jews along with targeted groups were to be exterminated. Over 6 million Jews (2/3 of Jewish population in Europe.) as well as some other “undesirables” were killed by numerous methods of genocide by 1945, the end of World War II.

Governments have always been the no. 1 killers of all time because they have power and armies stronger than all the gangs and organized crime families combined, and usually the victims of genocide were disarmed through being tricked into giving up their right to keep and bear arms under condition that police will protect them. Usually non-compliant gun owners would be disarmed through force, forcing dependence in terms of safety and unable to protect themselves from outside harm. Most notably this happened in Rwanda in the mid 1990’s under the Hutu regime where their first step was to disarm the people and deceive them into thinking they don’t need to own firearms because the police would be able to protect them.  You can’t rely police to protect you from criminals in an emergency situation. In Washington DC, USA, each police officer would have to protect 17,000 people if police had the duty to protect individuals in a similar fashion as bodyguards. Is the government always right in deciding who needs what? Individuals and caregivers of disabled persons are best at deciding their needs. Government deciding what people’s needs are is a nanny state. Big Brother babysits the subjects of the government and is in control like a parent and dictator. An example of paternalistic societies comes from George Orwell’s famous novel 1984 in which Big Brother rules with an iron fist as an absolute dictator and guardian and is accountable to nobody but himself, therefore giving him the “authority” to do whatever he desires, including genocide of undesired persons and erosion of freedom. Winston Smith is a character who has his freedom stripped and is forced to accept that 2+2=5. This constitutes a dictatorship where government serves itself and people must obey the government without question or face bloody consequences. Under United States of America principles that our founding fathers laid out, government always serves the people. The US constitution’s first three words say “we the people”. It does not mean the majority but means the people, minority and majority alike. Majority rule leads to a disastrous result as there has never been in the history of civilization a democracy that has not committed suicide. Democracy is two wolves and a sheep deciding on what to have for lunch. The sheep is defeated and eaten by the two wolves by two votes out of three. The majority could easily be used as a weapon for political and special interest agendas. When tragic events occur, emotion can run powerfully and to the extent that human freedom is injured. Most notably in American history, this happened after Pearl Harbor bombing of December 7, 1941 during World War II. Americans across the nation supported US military involvement in World War II at the drop of a hat. The US declared war on Japan within hours of the attack on Pearl Harbor. In February of 1942, three months after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Executive Order 9066 was signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordering Americans of Japanese descent in pacific states in the western united states to be relocated to US internment camps. A young man named Fred Korematsu defied that unconstitutional order and was arrested for refusing to be interned. He was tried and convicted and sentenced to five years of exile from pacific states. In Korematsu v. United States, the US Supreme Court ruled that the internment order was constitutional by a 6-3 vote. Truthfully, it was unconstitutional on these grounds:

·        Congress has the power to suspend Habeas Corpus and the president simply can’t do this on his own. Abraham suspended habeas corpus during the Civil War just like a dictator would. Even in times of crisis, military dictatorship is never justifiable because it states congress has the power to suspend habeas corpus in times of extreme crisis. In no way is military dictatorship in America justifiable. By that I mean in terms of presidential powers.

·        Frank Murphy’s dissent: I dissent, therefore, from this legalization of racism. Racial discrimination in any form and in any degree has no justifiable part whatever in our democratic way of life. It is unattractive in any setting, but it is utterly revolting among a free people who have embraced the principles set forth in the Constitution of the United States. All residents of this nation are kin in some way by blood or culture to a foreign land. Yet they are primarily and necessarily a part of the new and distinct civilization of the United States. They must, accordingly, be treated at all times as the heirs of the American experiment, and as entitled to all the rights and freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution.

·        Robert Jackson’s dissent: A military order, however unconstitutional, is not apt to last longer than the military emergency. Even during that period, a succeeding commander may revoke it all. But once a judicial opinion rationalizes such an order to show that it conforms to the Constitution, or rather rationalizes the Constitution to show that the Constitution sanctions such an order, the Court for all time has validated the principle of racial discrimination in criminal procedure and of transplanting American citizens. The principle then lies about like a loaded weapon, ready for the hand of any authority that can bring forward a plausible claim of an urgent need. Every repetition imbeds that principle more deeply in our law and thinking and expands it to new purposes. Korematsu was born on our soil, of parents born in Japan. The Constitution makes him a citizen of the United States by nativity and a citizen of California by residence. No claim is made that he is not loyal to this country. There is no suggestion that apart from the matter involved here he is not law abiding and well disposed. Korematsu, however, has been convicted of an act not commonly a crime. It consists merely of being present in the state whereof he is a citizen, near the place where he was born, and where all his life he has lived. [...] [H]is crime would result, not from anything he did, said, or thought, different than they, but only in that he was born of different racial stock. Now, if any fundamental assumption underlies our system, it is that guilt is personal and not inheritable. Even if all of one's antecedents had been convicted of treason, the Constitution forbids its penalties to be visited upon him. But here is an attempt to make an otherwise innocent act a crime merely because this prisoner is the son of parents as to whom he had no choice, and belongs to a race from which there is no way to resign. If Congress in peace-time legislation should enact such a criminal law, I should suppose this Court would refuse to enforce it.

The government could not prove Korematsu was unloyal to America. The US Supreme Court ruled the very same day unanimously in Ex Parte Endo that anyone loyal to America could not be interned. He was being punished along with more than 100,000 Japanese-Americans for something the Empire of Japan did at Pearl Harbor, which as Robert Jackson pointed out is unconstitutional to group punish people belonging to the group of a person who committed a crime and happened to be of a certain group. People cannot be punished because someone in their family committed a crime or treason.

            I’d like to point out the most oppressed group of citizens in America. America’s youth. Incarcerated felons have twice more rights than youth do. People can’t help being young and can’t be deterred from it as well. The role of parents in raising their children and instilling values in them has been slowly shifting towards centralized government control in the past more than a century, since as early as the late 19^th century to early 20^th century. Our founding fathers intended for children to be raised by parents, free from state interference except in cases where children are actually being abused in certain ways. Our founding fathers recognized children as human beings who needed guidance in life to become independent and function, contributing members of society. Children are not property of anybody but parents are simply mentors who do a better job at guiding children to the path of success and contribution to society. Children are society’s most vulnerable and should be treated with love, compassion and respect and this creates healthier and happier families. Limiting the freedoms of young Americans instead of education on responsibility and real world life skills damages their ability to be responsible for themselves and forces dependence on someone else, something the founding fathers feared would happen and feared that government would make the people dependent on them for support. Judging individuals by skills and abilities they have makes better employees and produce more responsible individuals financially and socially. Government can only create an ineffective one size fits all approach when it comes to trying to create a healthy society through centralized planning, something our founding fathers feared would happen. History has proven government has failed all attempts to create economic and social prosperity through spending and centralized planning. Government cannot effectively legislate good health because it uses one-size-fits all approaches to all of its issues. Even if government could try to legislate the health of the people individually, bureaucrats would be in charge of what care certain people should receive and puts the government in total control of what healthcare people should receive and makes government the master, contrary to what our founding fathers believed. Obamacare supports bureaucratic red tape healthcare and centralized planning that puts the government first. The patient comes first because they are being served. Socialized medicine is funded through borrowed and taxed money, often in high amounts. Healthcare is best left to individuals and free markets where competition and incentives for great quality prevail. Free enterprise is what made the United States the Freest country on Earth. FDR’s New Deal imposed burdensome regulations, wasteful spending and high taxes like in Marxist Communist countries like the former Soviet Union, North Korea and Cuba.

            Obama is a big spending corporatist, communist traitor to American values and principles this country was founded on in the late 18^th century. He is using the fear of higher interest rates if default on the debt were to prevail. The progressive-liberal media is promoting the socialist approach to debt issues and will use fear to get people to support their agendas. Extreme and dramatic spending cuts alone are the only way to solve the debt problem. Solving debt with debt makes no sense logically. Obama might invoke the 14^th amendment and abuse executive power. The debt ceiling was recently raised and no serious spending cuts will be made under this sad compromise.

            I also like to say that correlation is not the same as causation. Correlation can only suggest and speculate causation but cannot point out actual causation. Example would be ice cream sales and shark attacks being correlated. But, this is illogical and are associated with warm weather. Our founding fathers favored logic over correlation and stated that government’s only legitimate purpose is to protect the life, liberty and property of the people, popular or not. We don’t need to use science to justify making murder a capital crime. Murder is the deliberate taking of someone else’s life against the will of the victim being murdered. The only legitimate crimes are crimes of violence, against property and disturbing the peace and posing an imminent threat to the public. In order to protect the principles our founding fathers fought for, we must reject all attempts to justify science and statistics for making government laws and use logical reasons instead that protect liberty & justice for all.

Serious Government Reform & Downsizing as an Alternative to Raising Debt Ceiling

Congress debates raising the debt ceiling and president Obama says that if this debt ceiling is not raised or a deal is not made, interest rates will rise and credit rates will rise as well and also claims a rise in taxes for everybody. However, something more serious and alternative needs to be done and that is dramatically reduce the size and scope of the federal government to less than 1/10 of its current size or even more than that. Article I Section 8 outlines enumerated congressional powers that the federal government can exercise. Almost everything the federal government does is unconstitutional. Spending cuts need to be made and must be legitimate. The rising debt ceiling will make things worse and could destroy the economy and even instigate riots and revolutions like the riots in Greece over their debt over 110% of their GDP. The American Revolution and independence from the British Empire had to be gained through the use of taking up arms against their own government back in the 1770’s and 1780’s. I wouldn’t accept the fact that the USA will become a debt slave to other authoritarian-leaning countries and if other foreign countries try to take over the USA then the US military must be vigilant and fight the threat of losing America. If debt keeps growing and it’s not being paid off, the possibility of a debt war could arise and the United States of America as the countries that America owes money to could possibly try to enslave America. Would this be a World War III, possibly, but hopefully there will not be a nuclear attack so long as the national security of the United States is strong and that no foreign entanglements and nation building are engaged. US foreign policy most of the time has been focused on nation building and military entanglements with interests that do not truly threaten the security and sovereignty of what is supposed to be a great nation. The only time that the United States should go to war is to protect the nation from foreign threats and domination. The last war that the United States was legitimately involved in was World War II which US involvement was from December 8, 1941-September 2, 1945 after Japanese air forces bombed Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on December 7, 1941.  Nazi Germany along with Empire of Japan aspired to conquer the world and their actions proved their words to be true. If it weren’t for vigilant allied troops and the factory workers who manufactured weapons, vehicles, armor, food, clothes, etc. then Germany and Japan would have possibly have conquered the world and Adolf Hitler would have become the most powerful dictator in world history. War is the very last option to protect national security. “People don’t start wars, governments do”-Ronald Reagan. Peace through strength is a great foreign policy where it involves diplomacy in cases of hostile disagreement and forbids nation building and intrusive foreign policy. The constitution requires congress to declare war. It is best to avoid war and every government policy should involve the least-restrictive and least expensive solution. War should be the final option when a nation is in danger.

            Now I’m going to what should be reformed in the government and my solution to this financial crisis. This is very simple and easy to understand despite some people’s objections. First of all, most government bureaus, agencies and departments are expensive, ineffective and some even unconstitutional. Here is a list of US departments, agencies and bureaus that should be retained:

Departments

·        State-bureaus and agencies those are important to foreign policy, national security, immigration & citizenship, a few domestic affairs to be determined later on.

·        Treasury-In charge of government finances and revenue collection. It’s also in charge of currency that is approved and coined by congressional approval.

·        Defense-In charge of national security and raising a military including army, navy and air force military departments. Veterans affairs should be handled by this department with very little bureaucracy.

·        Justice-In charge of legal affairs. US Marshals, Secret Service, CIA, FBI should be retained only. In charge of judicial matters.

·        Budget Management office

·        Executive office of president

·        Council of economic advisors

·        Interior department duties and powers should be moved to the Department of State under domestic affairs.

·        A new bureau should be created under a shared partnership between the state & treasury departments to address debt payments and payments of debt interest as well as a gradual plan to phase out all entitlement programs such as Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid and eliminate other entitlements. Liabilities should be paid off and promises to senior citizens should be met. Youth should be able to leave entitlement programs and the private sector should take care of retirement.

I would like to tell you that Senator Rand Paul’s proposal for a balanced budget is way better than establishment loser Paul Ryan’s proposal and double loser Barack Obama’s disastrous budget. The constitution should be restored to it’s fullest and federal activities should be reduced to protecting the borders and strengthening defense while keeping a pro-peace and non-interventionalist approach, payment of debts & interest, make sure that social security & medicare programs are paid off, sound money is installed in US currency and should include competing currencies. Bankruptcy laws, postal services, laws against counterfeiting, treason, piracy, settling disputes between states, enforcing prohibitions on states imposing discriminatory tariffs on out of state goods, all matters in District of Columbia(federal district) and non-self-governing territories, copyright protections, maintaining federal buildings that have agencies and departments with constitutional purposes, maintaining a military and military bases, arsenals, armories, institute a military code of justice and set rules for disciplining the military, set rules for naturalization and citizenship and any actions and spending to enforce the above proposed operations of what the federal government should be doing.

US Supreme Court Delivers a pro-free speech and business decision

On Monday in Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Association, the US Supreme Court ruled 7-2 that government has no authority to "protect minors" from video games that are deamed harmful to psychological health. Antonin Scalia worte the opinion of the court and was joined by all but justices Breyer and Thomas who dissented. California's regime claimed it was protecting parents rights. They were playing favorites by picking the parents who oppose video games over the parents who view video games as mere entertainment. Another issue is the morality of using force to solicit video game suppliers into refusing to sell certain violent video games to young people. Breyer's dissent has no real deal. Thomas dissented because he believed that our founding fathers approved of the right of parents to have absolute control of their children. Slavery was also legal in the southern states in the 1790's up to 1865 when the 13th amendment was ratified abolishing slavery. The 14th amendment established equal protection of the law and applied due process and other rights and freedoms to the states. The only constitutional distinction of age and gender would be voting, members of congress. The constitution is the highest law of the land and supercedes any law inconsistent with it. The 14th amendment means that all status offenses are unconstitutional and that the constitution is based on moral principles when dealing with rights rather than pragmatic approaches. Hopefully in future cases challenging status offenses or any law that treats youth like second class citizens this case can be of great help and from the looks of it I feel that status offenses could be struck down by no later than a few years from now if somebody acts soon. Wal-Mart v. Dukes was another case the court decided on last Monday and ruled unanimously that Wal-Mart is free to do their business, rejecting claims of discrimination of female employees. The US Constitution's commerce clause is only meant to prevent states from treating out-of-state goods more harshly than in-state goods and enables congress to enforce that policy, that's it. Commerce clause also gave congress the power to settle disputes between states and Indian tribes and set a trade policy with foreign nations such as tariffs. Government at all levels has turned from being a servant with limited powers to a fearful master with unlimited powers. I also want to tell you that house rejected a proposal to allow president Barack Obama to continue US action in Libya by a 295-123 vote with suprisingly a majority of Republicans voting AGAINST the Libya resolution. If this keeps up, government could once again become the fettered servant with limited powers within a whopping two years should Obama be defeated that is. Ron Paul is the strongest candidate against Obama, even going ahead in a recent poll. For Ron Paul's running mate, I propose that former Governor of New Mexico Gary Johnson be Paul's running mate. Johnson is also a libertarian who opposes interventionalist foreign policy(wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and potentially Libya for examples), the Fed, War on drugs, centralized economy and high taxes, and assaults on civil liberties like the PATRIOT Act and hates socialized healthcare known as Obamacare. I hope to see the Paul & Johnson ticket next year and hopefully defeat Obama on Tuesday November 6th of next year which happens to be election night, where real libertarian change will come to America!

If I were Running For President

Forgive me for not posting a single blog in 19 days. I watched the presidential debates for Republicans last night on CNN and I have to say each candidate says they are going to have Obamacare repealed, free markets respected, and the constitution respected. I trust Ron Paul the most because he actually KEEPS his words and does the WALK when it comes to policy meaning he means what he says and is honest. Mitt Romney as governor of Massachusetts has a liberal record and the most notable is Romneycare, a state level predecessor to Obamacare, a blueprint that the Obama administration has to thank. Romneycare includes a mandate to purchase health care insurance and also restricts patient choice, things common in socialized medicine. Romney was also in favor of the bailouts and TARP before he flip flopped on that issue and others. Mitt Romney is a dishonest Richard Nixon Republican who has flip flopped on issues such as illegal immigration, abortion and gun control. Romney’s position on gun control as governor was 'We do have tough gun laws in Massachusetts; I support them; I won't chip away at them; I believe they protect us and provide for our safety.' He also supports the “assault” weapons ban and the 5-day waiting period and the Brady Bill. He did win the debate but Michelle Bachman won the debate as an underdog and she is fantastic. She was the first person in congress to introduce a bill to repeal Obamacare before it was even signed into law by President Obama.

          Anyway, if I were running for president, I would have a simple, common sense and understandable policy: Government is a necessary evil and a servant of the people. The holy role of government is to protect rights to life, liberty and property, enforce legit contracts, protect the nation from foreign invaders and threats which is mostly the federal government’s responsibility. Foreign policy and the military are the most important roles of the federal government and when you have more than 130 military bases around the world then military spending will skyrocket and either taxes will have to be raised or money will have to be borrowed but neither of these are acceptable because spending is the problem. 130 military bases are mostly the reason why the United States spends more on military spending than the rest of the world. The neo-conservative foreign policy of interventionalism and nation building has resulted in Islam radicals committing acts of terrorism against America because they want the American military off of muslim soil. The United States is the aggressor in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and not a single war or military action was constitutionally declared by congress since World War II. The last war the United States had legitimate reasons to be involved in was World War II because Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan were a threat to America and to the entire world. Japanese air forces bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 and after congress declared war on Japan, Germany and Italy declared war on the United States. Hopefully the assassination of Osama Bin Laden reminds people, especially Republicans who favor war that the radicals had America because they bomb the Middle-East. If these terrorists hate us for our freedom, then they would also be attacking Switzerland. Switzerland has a staunch non-interventionalist foreign policy which involved no military intervention overseas. America has become leaning more towards a third world country because of major embarrassments to a liberty-loving nation such as $14 trillion debt, $1-2 trillion deficit, war on drugs, numerous federal and even state gun control measures, federal mandates, federal involvement and takeover of education, healthcare, transportation, violations of civil rights and liberties, drinking age of 21, criminal “injustice” systems, the state believing that it knows what’s best for us and our children, etc. Terrorists couldn’t care any less about our lifestyle and even if they hated us for our freedoms, our freedoms have been violated in almost every way. Politicians and law enforcement refuse to protect them most of the time and the judicial system hardly helps the situation and in some cases make it worse. Government has become the institutionalized version of violent criminals. This is unacceptable under the constitution and to our founding fathers who fought over 230 years ago to create this once great nation. We can’t condone or escape from these problems because they will eventually catch up and could destroy the world politically and economically. The only crimes should be crimes against people and property, conspiracy to commit those crimes, actions posing imminent and immediate danger.

What Should Be the Age of Adulthood? Part 2

There’s something I want to get out that I want to tell people about. It’s about restricting freedom based on age, relying on your birthdate. You could say to a teenager to just wait till they turn 21 to enjoy a glass of wine or a beer but that misses my point. My point is that the consequences of status offenses do not disappear after you turn the age that the age restriction is lifted. For example, someone who will turn 21 tomorrow gets caught by law enforcement drinking a beer and is charged with underage drinking. The charge will not be automatically invalidated and the criminal record that goes with it will not be automatically expunged on your 21^st birthday. Plus, Memorial Day is almost here as of the day I posted this blog and this gives me an opportunity to discuss servicemen and women in the military who have lost their lives in war before their 21^st birthdays. Do you think that it’s ethical to tell them that they’re too immature to drink alcohol and buy handguns based solely on their birthdate? What about the deceased servicemen and women who never had a chance to legally drink? I support ALL members of our military who believe in and protect the constitution and freedoms of the United States regardless of race, creed, nationality, age, economic status, and anything not relating to ability and performance on duty. We owe it to our troops who brazenly fought for our freedoms and for our country to bring them home and respect the civil rights of all Americans with no exceptions except if there are conditions imposed by a court of law on someone who has been convicted of a crime, such as probation, parole, prison, etc. I’m two months away from being 19 and my birthday is on July 28. Your birthdate doesn’t measure your maturity. Also, even though the brain doesn’t fully develop until you turn 25 or even 30 doesn’t mean that a teenager’s brain is inferior to a 35 year olds brain. The brain reaches its maximum weight at 16-18 years old for females and 19-21 for males. The brain actually starts to deteriorate once it’s fully developed. The brain changes constantly and I feel that anyone with a sound mind can realize that. If the ludicrous theory of drinking alcohol before 21 could ruin your brain was true then nearly every adult in western European countries and other eastern civilizations would be brain damaged alcoholics because throughout history ever since alcoholic beverages were introduced, very few people have waited till their 21^st birthday and most people who do wait are non-drinkers by choice, whether it be for religious reasons or displeasure of alcohol. If you don’t like alcohol, don’t drink it but you have no right to force others not to drink. If someone is believed to be a danger to themselves or others regardless of who they are, make sure they don’t get behind the wheel of a car or are left unsupervised. Good friends don’t let friends drive drunk. What about youth who are killed by drunk drivers OVER 21? Have the supporters of the drinking age ever think about that? Do they respond to that with the mentality of “at least he/she wasn’t drinking underage or providing alcohol to those minors”? Statistics are also used to justify the drinking age. However, an alcohol related crash is defined by the NHTSA as ANYONE, regardless of if they were driving or not or merely a pedestrian, who has any alcohol traced in their system. When you say that statistics “prove” that the drinking age of 21 “saves lives”, most teenagers injured or killed in alcohol related crashes were NOT EVEN DRIVING! They probably had a designated driver or walked home and were hit by a drunk driver who most of the time was OVER 21! In fact, 90-95% of drunk drivers in the past 20 years have been OVER 21. Are young people merely statistics? Relying on statistics to justify enacting a certain policy reinforces that ideology and if you believe that statistics should be used to justify limitations on our civil rights and liberties then you answer yes to the idea that people are just statistics. You may not say so but actions speak louder than words. I heard a story shortly before about an 18 year old who was hosting a drinking games party that had no alcohol and used root beer kegs instead. Police raided his house and tested 90 people for alcohol with non testing positive. What a waste of tax payer dollars to raid a home of teenagers minding their own business after mistaking the root beer kegs for alcoholic beer. OOPS! What about arresting the dangerous drivers before they hurt more people? Is it better for someone to be killed by a 15 year old than a 50 year old? It doesn’t matter because regardless of who killed that person, he or she is dead and the killer’s race, religion, age, economic status, nationality or other characteristics can’t influence what happened. What influences a homicide case lies in it being either justified, excusable or criminal. I feel that the best alternative to relying on an arbitrary age that judges people based on their date of birth is for parents and caregivers to teach responsibility when the child is able to understand by mental ability how to function properly in society instead of isolating them and then expecting them to be responsible at a given age at the drop of a hat. It doesn’t happen that way in real life. It’s easy to ban something and assume people will be more responsible than it is to be honest and teach responsibility. The easy way out is never the best way out of a situation most of the time. I feel that youth policy has been influenced by personal feeling and experiences rather than using logic. Government doesn’t understand people individually and can never do so. Government is not a god on earth and our rights do not come from government because it’s a man made institution. Rights come from our humanity. Our body is the most important possession of humanity because without a body, you cannot exist and that means that since it’s your body, nobody has the right to prohibit you from exercising it in a way that does not do harm to others. Punishing someone for abusing their rights by harming other people is more appropriate than prohibition. It’s okay to be afraid of bad things in life. But it’s unhealthy to deny reality and think that those things can go away if an institution of force known as the government can be used to change the health and well being of individuals. Not even local governments can fully understand people as individuals. Since rights come with responsibilities it would only make sense that people are presumed responsible for their own actions until proven otherwise. Freedom and responsibility are birthrights and not rewards. If a person is too incompetent to care for his or herself then the caregiver is the person who is responsible for the incompetent or dependent in their care. If a caregiver is to be punished for what the person in their care did in regards to hurting self and/or others then the prosecution needs to prove that the person who did it is incompetent to accept the consequences of his or her actions, that person was in the care of the person accused and also must prove that the caregiver could prevent that person from harming self or others. If you can accept the consequences for your actions, then why ban alcohol for those who are under 21 yet are able to accept the consequences of their actions? Government cannot teach responsibility that way. It never works that way. Forgive me if some of what I just wrote here may confuse you. My point is that people should be judged based only on their abilities and actions and reasons should be related to the matter being judged. The one size fits all approach to protecting children is ineffective and unfair. The people who need to exercise responsibility the most are the leaders and caregivers who need to set examples and be good role models because America’s future does better when they have examples instead of this ends justify the means non-sense. Happy Memorial day to our brave troops who fought for our country since the American Revolution.

Ron Paul Officially Runs For President as a Republican

Ron Paul announced he will run for president as a Republican. He is the only hope to avoid what I presume to the the true 2012 doomsday of America and possibly other parts of the world. If Barack Obama gets re-elected in 2012, I know in my heart that Obama will have four long years to destroy this great American nation without any political reprecussions! There are many clowns trying to run for president on the republican ticket and some are establishment clowns such as Mitt Romney, infamous Romneycare signed into law in Massachusetts in 2006 establishing the first socialized healthcare plan in United States history. Romneycare requires residents to buy healthcare insurance. Of course, if residents could not afford healthcare insurance they could recieve government subsidies. Romneycare should be considered a prequal to Obamacare. Both laws are identical in everyway except for one or two. Obamacare is at the federal level and named by and signed into law by a Democrat (President Barack Obama) and Romneycare is at the state level and is named after and signed into law by a Republican (Governor Mitt Romney). Mike Huckabee as Governor of Arkansas called for several tax increases and he was called a progressive liberal by the conservative watchdog group Club for Growth. Huckabee also supports draconian measures concerning drugs such as an ineffective addiction to incarceration for even the smallest non-violent victimless drug offenders, even for those using medicinal marijuana prescribed by a doctor. Newt Gingrich declared his candidacy two and a half months ago who supports big government intrusion and says global warming is real: "The evidence is sufficient that we should move towards the most effective possible steps to reduce carbon loading in the atmosphere." Newt Gingrich as speaker of the house in the mid 1990's was responsible for big government as much as Bill Clinton was. Gingrich said that he was a huge fan of Franklin Roosevelt and a huge fan of Woodrow Wilson. Was he an alternative to Bill Clinton? Anyway I will mention some other Republican clowns who have screwed many Americans over who will not run for president. George W. Bush was sick in the head for doubling the national debt, increasing domestic spending to more amounts than LBJ's "Great Society" of the mid 1960's, wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, even after missions were accomplished which leads to the fact Bush lied about promising non-intervention in his campaign in 2000 when he was running as a conservative, and Bush once said  "I've abandoned free market principles to save the free market system." YOU CAN'T SAVE THE FREE MARKET BY ABANDONING IT! That's like punishing victims or potential victims of crime to protect them from crime. George W. Bush has made the 2000's the worst decade in American history because of his 8 years of disasterous policies from 2001-2009. Republican canididates other than Ron Paul who have already declared candidacy include Newt Gingrich,Gary Johnson, lesser known candidates Fred Karger, Jimmy McMillan, and Andy Martin. Should Ron Paul become president and god forbid he is defeated, then Ron Paul will save America and the World and become the greatest president since Thomas Jefferson and Grover Cleveland. Ron Paul would surely defeat all that is unconstitutional and bring America to truly being the freest country in the world. We can all feel like Americans again if we reject Obama and big government clowns like him and put someone in power who won't be corrupted and that is Ron Paul and Gary Johnson.