From Our "Rapidly Heating Earth" Comes This!

"This is probably just a perception, but I just have the feeling that the glaciers are melting, the snow capping the mountains is less than it was 12 years ago when I saw it last time," [Canadian Astronaut] Thrisk was quoted as saying. "That saddens me a little bit."

Reminds me of Al Gore, I think he invented space flight.

Meanwhile, in "real science" land:
3,000 Low Temp Records Set This July!

Of course, the above article comes complete with a bunch of giant disclaimers and "well, these outliers certainly don't represent any evidence of "Climate Change" (remember, now that people are starting to notice the Earth isn't actually warming, they're changing the lexicon to something even harder to quantify and disprove). Get past all that and take a look at what the numbers really are. I'm already hearing people coining the phrase "year without a summer". And this wouldn't be the first time that happened.

I still think man has great hubris to think that, short of seriously massive events such as large scale nuclear weapons usage, they can have any great and meaningful effect on the overall climatology of this planet. After all, we're competing with the sun, and large volcanic events, which themselves can singularly affect global temperatures by one and two degrees C. Remember, in geological history Alaska has been a tropical paradise, and glaciers have covered large portions of the planet.

What a mess.

Further Rumblings of the 10th...

I've said before that I firmly believe that the only way we're going to stem the tie of Statism in the Federal Government is by...well...Statism. Of the local kind of course.

Rick Perry has been making some fairly bold statements recently, including on the right of Texans to manufacture guns for use within its own borders without the BATFU having anything to say about it. That action, along with a 10th Amendment resolution (that likely had no teeth, yes, I know) unfortunately died in a filibuster at the end of the Texas session this year (along with a number of other bills I wasn't a fan of, so I'll call it par for the course). We are, however, still left with a potential wrecking shot from the cannon of ObamaCare.

Gov. Perry was interviewed by the Star Telegram today. Among other things, he said:

"I think you’ll hear states and governors standing up and saying 'no’ to this type of encroachment on the states with their healthcare," Perry said. "So my hope is that we never have to have that stand-up. But I’m certainly willing and ready for the fight if this administration continues to try to force their very expansive government philosophy down our collective throats." - Governor Rick Perry, TX

One of the problems with a strong Federalized system where the Rule of Law has been suspended is that a majority of looters can happily trample right over your Liberty, gleefully tearing the money out of your wallet, taking the roof from over your head, and the food out of your family's mouth on their way through. By keeping these types of programs managed locally, you can gain two immediate advantages:

1. It is far easier for the citizens of a State to affect how they are governed. Politicians are within driving distance, and deal with a smaller number of constituents, allowing them to be more responsive.


2. If you don't like the way your state is going, in a properly balanced system as envisioned by the Founders, you can always go to another state that is more in line with your beliefs.

All that aside, this is really a business opportunity. If one or more States were to secede and create an environment of Freedom and Opportunity such as envisioned by the Founders, I have a feeling we'd see an even more massive influx of businesses to this state. A lower tax environment, less oppressive regulations, and an already reasonable cost of living would make this a fine place to take up where The Republic of Texas left off so many years ago. Should the rest of the States United pass ObamaCare, Texas could become a haven for Doctors to continue providing the top notch care that currently brings people from all over the world to the US for treatment.

Allowing those Doctors to thrive by limiting their exposure due to tort abuses perpetrated in the current system, and therefore greatly lowering their costs could create a high-end health care haven that would bring millions in revenue to the state. Many higher-end Docs have already indicated they would move their practices to the Caribbean to flee the oppressive and draconian solution that is ObamaCare. Why not give them someplace closer and more stable to go instead?

This has the extra advantage of being reachable by a larger number of people who, while unable to go to the Caribbean for care due to costs, could easily load up the car and come down to Texas for top-notch treatment. The ability to actually get paid a reasonable wage would attract the talented Doctors and medical staff trapped in the USSA, and the ability to charge a rate that was dictated by the market rather than by a bunch of looter bureaucrats in Washington D.C. would attract medical research and development companies and their amazing new medical innovations - further increasing Texas' prestige as THE place to go for treatment.

I have come to the belief, as have many others in (or related to) the Threeper community, that the cause of Liberty and Freedom is lost to the entity known as the United States. Every year, rules are changed to allow more and more looters, those who don't pay taxes and therefore have no skin in the game (and no compunction against voting for people that will raise taxes), more and more agencies are created to enforce increasingly draconian regulations, and our "masters" become ever more violent in their attempt to cling to the "Authority" that those who should be our servants claim to hold over us. Illegal Immigrants will surely be given amnesty in the next year, resulting in an even further tip of the balances towards those who would loot rather than produce. The "minimum wage" will be raised ever higher, making it harder and harder for smaller businesses to pay their low-skill workers.

The only final recourse, short of "shooting the bastards" (is that Vanderboegh there?) is for one or more States to go their own way. This, unfortunately, will likely result in having to shoot the bastards anyways - we all saw how this type of activity went down in 1861.

Either way, secession or not, winter is coming. The darkness may fall when the final attempts to manipulate the economy fail epically, the "poor and oppressed masses" (read: looters) decide that it's not enough to slowly bleed the productive folks dry and decide to go after the golden egg with their own hands, or a foreign nation finally gets tired of buying our debt with an ever dwindling chance of ever getting their money back and demands payment in blood. Either way, something will break, it'll break big, and likely sooner rather than later.

Prepare and act accordingly.

Fed to Congress - We have no idea where that $500bil went...

Denninger's Market Ticker blog has an excellent excerpt from Bernanke's testimony today.

I'm heartened (just a tiny bit), to see that at least some of our Con's in gress are starting to ask the correct questions:

Listen and read here:Where Did the Money Go?

Ted Nugent Does it Again

For those of you that haven't been over to the LawDog Files, I'd like to direct you to a YouTube clip he posted earlier today. Yes, it's Ted on the 2nd again.

Take a trip over to LawDog's and see what's happening. He is an excellent storyteller and an upstanding Texan.

The LawDog Files

The Importance of Standard Capacity Magazines (and more than one of them)...

Akron police investigate teen mob attack on family

Out of nowhere, the six were attacked by dozens of teenage boys, who shouted ''This is our world'' and ''This is a black world'' as they confronted Marshall and his family.

The Marshalls, who are white, say the crowd of teens who attacked them and two friends June 27 on Girard Street numbered close to 50. The teens were all black.

''This was almost like being a terrorist act,'' Marshall said. ''And we allow this to go on in our neighborhoods?''

They said it started when one teen, without any words or warning, blindsided and assaulted Marshall's friend as he stood outside with the others.

When Marshall, 39, jumped in, he found himself being attacked by the growing group of teens.

There is a term for this, it's called "disparity of force". Very likely, most of the perpetrators of this attack weren't armed (then again, you never know), but they were being ruled by a mob mentality - anything goes, and boy isn't it fun to go with the crowd?

Ultimately, the sheer number of these people meant that there was very likely an affirmative defense for the application of lethal force had someone decided to break up the melee by shooting at these scum. While I will freely admit that shooting into a crowd of youths is truly not something anyone wants to do, the gentleman who ended up in the hospital with a concussion is very lucky he didn't get worse from the kicking and stomping. Kicking someone who is down is well known to cause serious bodily injury, and if there are "dozens" of people taking turns kicking, serious bodily injury is a foregone conclusion.

Take a moment to think this situation through and determine what your actions might be to prevent the death of a loved one who had done nothing wrong and was now being assaulted by a crowd of cowards. Realize that ten shots very likely won't be enough. Do you have "standard capacity" magazines?

What is most unfortunate about this situation is the following:

The Marshalls say they fear retaliation at home or when they go outside. They are considering arming themselves, but they're concerned about the possible problems that come with guns.

For now, they are hoping police can bring them suspects. They believe they can identify several of the attackers.

''This makes you think about your freedom,'' Marshall said. ''In all reality, where is your freedom when you have this going on?''

Mr. Marshall, your freedom lies in your ability to protect yourself and your loved ones. The Police won't be there if these thugs come back, you're going to be right back into the same situation - you and yours vs. all comers. The only "problems" that come with guns are those you bring upon yourself.

I sincerely hope that someone knowledgeable in armed self defense can sit down with Mr. Marshall and help him and his family make an educated decision to ensure he is able to take action to prevent this kind of thing from happening to his family again.

I also hope that the youths that perpetrated this attack see the error of their ways before they choose the wrong person to beat up. I'd much rather they live a full and rich life in harmony with society than end up bleeding out in a gutter after attempting their little game on someone who doesn't tolerate that kind of crap.

Liberals in Conservative Clothing

I had an unpleasant exchange with the person who asked me what my agenda on Social Security was yesterday. I now am reasonably convinced that they are either actually Liberals trying to stir the pot, or are people that call themselves Conservatives but really are of that breed that likes basic gun rights but thinks anything else is fair game as long as you "need it", and Liberty be damned.

You see, after stripping identifying information from their email, they told me it was private (alrighty, no problem) and they didn't want it on the blog. That's ok, I can understand that. However, they stepped out further, accusing me of "stoking my ego", threatened their support for sites that link to me, called me unethical, and then finished off by declaring I was un-American. When I pointed out to them it is kind of hard to sit on a high horse when you're chucking insults like that, they told me that they were done talking to me, demanded again I remove their email from the site, and threatened litigation if I did not.

I'll direct you back to my older post "The Art of Liberal Communication". If you'll recall, the typical Liberal's argument goes something like this:

1. Make an unfounded statement.
2. When challenged with facts on that statement, change the subject.
3. When the subject can't be changed, insult the person counter arguing.
4. If that fails, attempt to get the Police or Authorities involved, or stamp off in a huff.

Sound familiar? I think I actually erred by leaving off "or get lawyers involved" from #4.

In the end, this person chose to try and take a public discourse (or at least, I'd like this to be a public discourse - logically constructed arguments are more than welcome in the comments section, and you *can* post anonymously) privately for whatever reason, and I just don't operate that way. If you're going to question my agenda, great! Do so here, so that myself and others can learn. If everyone that had a problem with what I said demanded private attention by email, how are we supposed to have an open dialogue and learn from each other, let alone leave me the time to write what little I can on this blog?

Anyhow, whatever. The offending email is summarized, the world is back on its axis, and the Liberal in Conservative's clothing is (or should be) happy. And I suppose my ego is stoked, whatever the hell that means.

If you are so against Social Security, how do you propose we live in our old age?

I received an email from a so-called "Conservative" and "Pro 2nd Amendment" person today. I'll hit the highlights here:

Having searched http://tyrannyunleashed.blogspot.com/search/label/social%20security, this person went on to say they had lost their retirement in the recent market crash, and that at 60, they needed Social Security to live on. They then asked me what my agenda was.

The post they are referencing is here. As to my "agenda", it is simply this: We can not pay for this stuff. We just simply can not mathematically pay for it.

Social Security was never meant to be your sole retirement income. It was meant to provide a partial pension to make things easier. Workers were expected to provide personal savings, income from children, and corporate pensions to supplement Social Security to allow themselves to stay under a roof and fed.

Over time, corporate pensions have gone away, and in this day and age of consumerism, easy credit, etc, one can not necessarily rely on their children any more either. Observe further that we've gone from a decent house being a postage stamp (by today's square footage estimates) to a 3000sqft luxury retirement home in AZ.

Finally, since we now don't really have a Social Security surplus, the plethora of retiring boomers is creating a situation where Social Security has turned into a ponzi scheme. The money I'm paying into it is going straight into another investor's pocket to keep the checks flowing. And since we're facing a declining population of people paying into the system, we're headed for a giant shipwreck.

The coffers got this way by Congress deciding that Social Security funds were fair game for them to spend (sound familiar???) So now, the funds that this person paid into the fund for their own retirement are long gone - again, it's my money that is going to allow them to retire.

So here is the question. Should I keep paying my money into a system that I know will very likely be completely bereft and bankrupt by the time it's "my turn" to collect? Should I starve down the line because somehow I bear responsibility for Government mismanagement, when all this time it has been people older than myself putting up with the looting and repeatedly voting for more looters? By 2050, the annual Social Security deficit, in 2001 inflation adjusted dollars, will reach $419bil - almost half of the entire Income Tax revenues collected for a year.

The answer? I don't think that people who are about to retire should be cut off and starved, but I also don't think my income taxes need to be raised by 81% (to almost 44% of my income), crippling my ability to live and prosper, let alone save money so that I don't starve when I'm 65 and there is little in the way of social programs left to serve me just so that a bunch of people who didn't save enough to retire can do so.

Furthering my issues with Social Security is the awful return I will get from the monies stolen from me (assuming that number isn't flat out $0). As a single male born around 1977, I'll earn less than .5% on the money I put in to the system when I it is finally returned to me at 65. I could do far better than that on safe Government Bonds alone. Again, I am punished for others' irresponsibility.

Why do I say my money is "stolen"? The Supreme Court ruled in 1960 (Flemming v. Nestor) that I have no ownership or right to the monies taken from me for Social Security benefits. This essentially means that the Government could capriciously tell me next week that I will never see that money again, and I have no recourse (short of going to the rifle).

So what you're basically saying by insisting that I give you my money so you can retire, and insisting that I pay nearly double my taxes so that you retire, with the full knowledge that the system very likely can't survive even long enough for me to get my money back out of it, is that you don't give a good *** damn about my ability to stay solvent, to save for my own future, or to live my life as I please. You'd rather raise my taxes, empty my bank accounts, foreclose on my home, remove the food from my mouth, and trample my Liberty so that you can retire in comfort.

Pardon me if I don't agree with that.

I would encourage you, dear friends, to read about Social Security over at the Heritage Foundation. If you are truly Conservative and Pro-Constitution, I want you to understand what it is you are really demanding when you command us to save Social Security at all costs.

My agenda? My agenda is to attempt to ensure that everyone has the best chance, under the restrictions set forth in the Constitution, to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness in this country - and raising taxes to support failed Socialist programs is not the way to do that.