Sean Taylor’s Blood on Chuck Schumer’s Hands

While Florida police investigate the killing of NFL star Sean Taylor, somebody might want to ask how his murder could  have been prevented. New York Giants linebacker Antonio Pierce, a former teammate of Taylor’s, is on the right track. Pierce is pissed that high-profile targets like Taylor are rendered defenseless by the state.

“Somebody like Sean, he can’t defend himself,” Pierce said. “He has to keep a machete in his house. That’s ridiculous. Celebrities and athletes get put in such a fishbowl and when they need to protect themselves, they can’t. You are vulnerable. When an athlete gets caught with a gun on a routine stop it’s, ‘He has a gun, why?’

“Maybe he’s driving a $100,000 car and has $100,000 in jewelry and a lot of cash. Everybody knows who he is. Athletes don’t rob anybody. Athletes are not on a killing spree.

“They got all the money in the world and, yeah, that’s what everybody wants.”

So why was Taylor denied his right to self-defense? After all, Florida is a “shall issue” state, meaning that qualified citizens are automatically granted ”permission” to exercise their Second Amendment right. My guess is he was disqualified over his conviction for opening a can of whup-ass on the thugs who tried to steal his SUV awhile back. Like Pierce said, Taylor had what everybody wanted. And now he’s dead, because Schumer and his ilk will not allow people like Sean Taylor to defend themselves or the fruits of their labor.

Consume Nothing Day

Why just “buy nothing” today when you can consume nothing?

 

From the merry pranksters at Bureaucrash.

Investment of the Year

Forget the Google stock. The smart money was apparently buying up $20-denominated Ron Paul Liberty Dollars, which are now selling for $525 and up on ebay. Of course, the lucky owners can thank the feds for making the coins collectors’ items.

Ron Paul Is on the NY Ballot

Woo-hoo! No petitioning!! (Did I ever mention that I hate petitioning?) I just found this in the inbox from last night:

November 16, 2007
 
We are pleased to announce that just minutes ago, our attorney received a letter from the New York State Board of Elections informing us that Ron Paul will be on the ballot in New York!

If you’ve been braving the cold to get signatures to place Dr. Paul’s name on the ballot in New York, you can stop. No more signatures are necessary.

Thank you for being a part of our back-up plan for ballot access in your state.  Your hard work and dedication makes this campaign possible.

You never cease to amaze us!

For Freedom,

Ron Paul 2008 Presidential Campaign Committee

Now Where Have I Heard That Idea Before?

Curtis Sliwa says he’s going to run for Public Advocate in 2009 on a platform of abolishing the position.

 Sounds very familiar…

Liberty Dollar Bust

When the news started circulating through the blogosphere yesterday, a lot of people assumed it was a hoax, because the story was so absurd. But no, the FBI and the Secret Service really did raid the headquarters of the Liberty Dollar. To be honest, I’ve never been as big a Liberty Dollar fan as some other Libertarians – it always struck me as a multi-level marketing scheme — but there’s nothing illegal about that. It will be interesting to see if the feds really have anything on Bernard NotHaus and company, or if it’s just a typical heavy-handed bullying tactic.

The NY Sun coverage of the raid included a sidebar with a range of reaction from local Libertarians. As David Friedman once said, “Somewhere in the world there may be two libertarians who agree on everything, but I am not one of them.”

Iran: Bush Administration and Leading Presidential Candidates Repeat the Same Tragic Mistakes

Historically, Iran may be the poster child for tragically failed US foreign policy and the past is prologue if Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney or Hillary Clinton are elected.  To his credit, Barak Obama has a more intelligent position though he seems to have wised-up from his previous more hawkish rhetoric.  Ron Paul ?  No surprise - he hits the bulls-eye with a non-interventionist foreign policy.

The What’s News section of Today’s Wall Street Journal includes two pertinent items: “Iran seems to be honoring a pledge to stem the flow of deadly weapons to Iraq”,  and “Iran has made important strides toward transparency about it’s nuclear activities”.   The second item goes on to report that the US called for new sanctions.  

Obviously, I am no fan of the government of Iran.  But US foreign policy is and has been a major reason why Iran is a religious terrorist tyranny today and not the popular democracy is was in the early 1950’s.  Belligerent actions by the US government have not been the solution, they have been one of the major problems.  Trita Parsi’s, Treacherous Alliance gives an excellent history of the relationships between the US, Iran and Israel.  I would characterize that relationship as a pragmatic (though tyrannical) Iranian government  seeking better relations with the US only to be ignored, rebuffed and demonized by US politicians who either tragically misjudged the threats and opportunities or used Iran as a political scapegoat.   In my opinion this supports the growing belief that belligerent US policy creates terrorists and makes us less safe.    Duh!

Of course it’s common knowledge that the CIA incited a coup that overthrew the popularly elected Mossadegh regime in 1953 which replaced him with the mass-murdering Shah of Iran who was finally overthrown in the Islamic Revolution of approximately 1978-79.  If the US had left Iran alone it would be a large and mature democracy today.  Think about a Middle East after 50 years of a democratic Iran.   Want to trade that picture for what we have today?  Oops! Government screwed up - surprise - you pay.

In Treacherous Alliance,  Trita Parsi describes the Madrid conference of 1991, another in a long series of tragic US policy blunders. Up to that point, Iran had made it clear to the US that they were eager to play a role in a stable middle-east.  Though many countries (I think dozens) were included, the US refused to invite Iran attempting to further isolate them from decisions in their own back yard.  The Iranians concluded that they couldn’t expect to work WITH the US so the result was to work against us.  Read the book.  I can’t possibly do it justice.

Fast forward to 2007.  The US Senate votes to antagonize Iran by designating the Revolutionary Guard as a terroist organization.   Now amidst more and more evidence that Iran has tried to work with us, most of the front running candidates for President insist on using Iran to pander to their least informed constituents.   Consider McCain’s “Bomb-Bomb-Bomb Iran” episode.   Is that really funny?  That guy should be in restraints, not in the presidential race.  Or Dick Cheney’s suggestion that we might consider nuclear weapons against Iran.  How different is that from Ahmadinejad’s suggestion that Iran would bomb Isreal.

As I said,  I am no fan of the government of Iran.  But the US has already started two wars under this administration.  How many has Iran started?  Who is a bigger threat to  peace and stability in the middle east?

It Depends What Your Definition of “Tax Increase” Is

Apparently “everything changes on Day 1″ referred only to Spitzer’s campaign promises. Remember when Eliot promised repeatedly not to raise taxes? Well, he’s at it again.

If you plan to do any Christmas holiday shopping on the Internet, better get it in before November 30. On December 1, the Spitzer administration is going to start forcing Amazon.com and many other online retailers to collect sales tax on purchases originating in New York State.

As most everyone knows, in cyberspace you only have to pay sales tax when the retailer has a physical presence in your state. So, for example, I have to pay 8.375% sales tax on electronics purchased from BestBuy.com, but not from Amazon, because Best Buy has brick-and-mortar stores here.

Now, Spitzer is claiming that any Internet retailer with an affiliate program — and at least one affiliate residing in New York — has a “physical presence” in New York and must collect sales tax on all New York sales. In other words, if you put an Amazon link on your personal site that gets 50 hits on a good day and you live in New York, you are the physical embodiment of Amazon in the Empire State. And it’s not just sales originating from the affiliate sites that are subject to sales tax. Once that physical presence is established, all sales from New York for that web retailer get taxed.

State officials estimate the new policy will bring in $100 million in new tax revenues each year. Of course, the masters of Doublethink also insist it’s not a tax increase.

UPDATE: Just minutes after uploading the post above, I read that Spitzer is backing down on this Internet sales tax scheme… for now. Apparently his aides were worried the Republicans would talk mean about him again, like they did with the driver’s license thing. The steamroller has become the steamrolled.

Michael Gerson inadvertently exposes horendousness of Bush “Heroic Conservatism”

 

Altho , if you have a libertarian understanding , it’s a chore to listen to , Michael Gerson , with total lack of self comprehension , illustrates the horrors of dictatorial altruism in his discussion of his book “Heroic Conservatism” with Richard Viguerie on c-span Book.TV After Words .

He totally fails to understand the irony of his cataloging a series of Bush’s increasing control over “humanitarian” resources of the population into the same collective head that has done so much for our new Iraqistan . Jimmy Carter , who has done much more good since safely retired from power , is his hero .

He makes human Ron Paul’s ( and Harry Browne’s ) explanations of why ceding one’s choices on charity , just like all other decisions , to the political class , is foolish .

Presidential Candidates and Medical Marijuana: Republicans flunk except Ron Paul and Tom Tancredo

I just received a mailer from the Marijuana Policy Project.  If you are not a member - sign up now.  This is one of the most effective organizations anywhere promoting an issue important to libertarians.

The mailer includes a report card for 16 Democratic and Republican presidential candidates and the results are pretty interesting.  The only real surprise is that Hillary Clinton got something right for a change - indicating (according to the report card) that she would end federal raids on legal medical marijuana users.

Did you know that the federal government ignores state law in medical marijuana states and arrests and imprisons law abiding citizens?   After you read this you might want to take a look at what’s happening Pakistan.   Constitution? - we don’t need no stinking Constitution.

 The Democrats actually do pretty well in the report card.  Only Joe Biden scores less than an A.   Chris Dodd seems to have read the Constitution and says he would leave it to the states - yeah Chris! .  Mike Gavel says he would legalize marijuana - yeah Mike!.

Then we have those pillars of small government the Republicans.  Of course Ron Paul scores an A+.  No surprise there.  As a doctor an a libertarian Dr. Paul hits yet another bulls-eye referring to people making their own choices and to state law.  Tom Tancredo also earns an A+ referring to state law.  Good work Tom - I can see you read the Constitution too.  

Every other Republican earns an F.  FDR would be proud.  Shouldn’t the candidates of the party of small government read the Constitution and resist using the federal government to enforce their own view of morality - especially when the will of the people in those states has been made clear in the democratic process? 

Giuliani, the big “liberal Republican” in the bunch proves his big government instincts referring to the FDA’s assessment that marijuana has no medical benefit.   Well Rudy - a lot of doctors and a lot of voters think the FDA is wrong.  Rudy is big on obeying the law. Perhaps he should make it clear whether he would obey the law in this case.  Rudy - does the FDA over-rule the Constitution?

Romney’s comment is classic.  “I don’t want medical marijuana…”  Well Mitt - no one is forcing you to take it are they.  And I don’t think the sick people in medical marijuana states really care what a Governor of some other state thinks as long as he doesn’t become President.

I really can’t believe this is the crop the Republicans have raised up.  Except of course for our hero, Ron Paul, there isn’t an ounce of leadership in the batch.  I can’t wait til after the primary to change my registration back to Libertarian. 

Mitt, Rudy and you other flunkies - just keep pandering to your “big government conservative” base.  Hillary is counting on it.