It is here. At some point, I was expecting the government to step up and make service mandatory. The draft was too inflammatory as far as political correctness goes. But “serving your country” in other ways will be construed as patriotic and American. Well here it is.

The sponsor of the bill probably won’t shock you.

Charles Rangel
Democrat – New York

That’s right! The same guy who has lied about owning property abroad to avoid taxation and who is now under investigation for tax fraud amongst other things, he is proposing that if you’re between 18 and 42 years of age, you should be required to “serve” your country in some form or another. Doesn’t that just sound like liberty incarnate. I, for one, would love to serve this guy! He seems like an honorable, moral, freedom loving guy. I’ll serve two years being watchdog of crooked Senators and Congress-critters. How about that?

Oh my goodness! Did you hear Tiger Woods is cheating on his wife!? Did you see Avatar!? I really like Johnny Depp! Check out my new iPhone!

We are in historic times for some pretty terrible reasons and it seems some people are intoxicated on pop culture society. We’re breaking records for bad things in America and the Oscars are the focus of our attention.

Honestly, when is the last time you saw a body count of our dead soldiers since the conflicts started in the middle east? Do you have any idea the thousands of American families who are torn apart from their loss? What about the estimates that show that over a million civilians are injured in Iraq? You may never face these people are your peers or neighbors but if you have a soul you have to know they’re as much human as you are. And when you did hear a tremendously high number pinned to blood, death, and pain, how much did you feel the pain?

I was watching an interview today where a talk show host asked a former congressman how to fix the corruption in Washington D.C. The answer wasn’t too surprising to me but it went something like this: “I have no idea!” A congressman spending six years eyeball deep in the politics that control the people (as well as condemn them to future debts, war, etc.) says the corruption is destroying the federal government and he has no idea how to fix it. Think about this… Is there truly a fix? All of our history books says empires always fall. No matter how great they were or how gracefully they fall, they always fall. With that in mind, guess what folks? We have a military base in more than 130 countries in the world and we’re worse than broke. Where on the timeline of an empire are we? Our people are glued to frivolous pop culture as our so-called leaders are looting our lives away at record breaking pace. If you were objectively estimating the future of the world, where would America be in 20 years?

America is getting worse yet apathy is growing. Where do these two intersect? Are we on a non-stop train pushing a cure for apathy with a prescription for pain? Do we really need the country to descend into darker and darker times before we even acknowledge a problem and fight for a fix? Is there any other way than wait for the pain to get so bad the it effects the masses enough to break their attention away from American Idol?

That being said, it is strange that so much can be going wrong with America yet the American machine keeps pushing through it. It just keeps going like an NFL running back with defenders riding his back. Just keep in mind that eventually the strongest running backs fall. We’ve got all of history’s lessons to prove that.

Are you still there? Eyes still in head? Jaw not on the floor? What in the world could I be talking about?

How about this, give me one good reason that the United States has the right to put a missile shield in someone else’s country where it could possibly attack its neighbors?
How about this, give me one good reason why we should be promoting an imperialistic America.
How about this, give me one explanation how you can be against high taxes, inflation, and big government and still be for the missile shield?

To the first question, we cannot be a country that goes to war without being attacked. We have seen where that leads us and hopefully now realize that we’re not the imperialistic bully of the world who makes the rules.

To the second question, it goes against the constitution and the way this country was founded. We are to be strong national defense in the sense that we defend our country and our countrymen. You cannot distort this into growing our military into the “Democracy spreading at gunpoint” machine. It is possible when focusing on small government, low taxes, and liberty.

To the third question, the war machine that we as a country have created is a tremendous part of our annual budget and increases constantly. When we’re a country facing a tremendous economic crisis, we don’t have a choice to keep spending our military across the world. The spending causes either taxes to be raised even more, inflation from borrowing to pay for the wars, and the infrastructure of a tremendously top-heavy federal government. Do not skimp on defense but do not distort offense into the perverted definition of defense.

What does all of this have to do with blindly accepting news you ask? Well one of the biggest talk radio and television host personalities, Mr. Glenn Beck, decided that we have sold out by getting rid of the missile shield. His train of thought connects the missile shield program discontinuation to the talks between GE and Putin… I won’t get into that and I can’t say either way which is right or wrong. I do know this, the missile shield would cost the country a lot of money it doesn’t have and increased the empire we have to financially and ideologically support. Not only do we have to carve our more of our GDP or add more to our debt, but we also have to be able to face the rest of the world and say, “We have the right to put missiles wherever we want to defend from anyone we please. It doesn’t even matter if it is our land we’re defending and it doesn’t even matter if it is YOUR country we’re aiming at. We can do it, but you can’t!”

Personally, I disagree with that mentality. I am tremendously in favor of having the world’s strongest and smartest military, but I cannot see a logical reason for pushing for imperial ideals, actions, and goals.

The ultimate reality is, the missile shield being canceled is a great thing. It saves us from more inflation, taxation, federal debt, and a few more coats of that imperialistic paint that we’re being covered with by countries and people with anti-American rhetoric. We cannot continue to have a “holier-than-though” mentality and wonder why people speak against us or why terrorists bomb us. To be the best, we must act like the best. This does not include being the global bully, democracy enforcer, Christian spreader, or any other role that we would reject ourselves. This simply does not pass the “What if they did it to us?” test. If Russia put a missile shield in Cuba, we would have a fit (and rightfully so). If China put military bases all over North America to “stabilize” our continent, we would have a fit (and rightfully so).

We cannot continue to lie to ourselves and promote ourselves as immune to the idea of liberty for other countries and regions or claim we’re operating under a different set of rules.

I cannot say that Beck would disagree my statements but I have to disagree with how he presented this. We have to be careful about how things appear and be very clear how we feel on things so we don’t inadvertently give the wrong idea. When we speak, we must be thorough and specific on what we believe to be the truth. If I were a casual listener to his radio program and picked up on this show, I might have reacted with something like “Well what in the world are they doing? We can’t appear weak! Put that missile shield up! Obama is making us less safe!”

On top of being very clear about what we speak, we have to be vigilant about what we’re reading, hearing, and seeing. We cannot let any one man or woman or show or network become the ultimate source of flawless information which should never be scrutinized. This creates an unbalanced and callous mindset.

Former President Carter sounded off with a terrible charge that basically builds the case that you’re racist if you’re vocally against the policies of our current President Obama. Don’t get all uppity on me yet Republicans. Do you remember how the attacks of 9.11 and the flag were used for marketing of the war in Iraq? Does anyone remember how you were anti-American if you were against the Iraq war? Well this is the other side of the coin we are seeing here. You must be a racist if you don’t agree with Obama. First off, that’s incredibly insulting to say that it is your skin color or heritage that decides your political views. Isn’t he also implying that a black man can’t be a fiscal conservative or disagree with Obama? Wow President Carter I don’t believe that’s true or even productive.

Now the another side of his statements. Is there truth that there is racism in the country? Unfortunately, yes there is racism in the United States. And just for argument’s sake, is it not to be assumed that a white person who is racist is going to be against a President who is of mixed races? Well duh. So is there a point to bringing it up especially on center stage in the media? Not in a traditionally logical sense. But I would propose that the goals of saying that those who are against Obama are racists, are an attempt to discredit them and create a social stigma on questionining the President or the current administrations agenda. The small government crowd is already being advertised as “working-class, largely rural and elderly white people” by Joe Klein of CNN. He isn’t alone in his ignorant assessment either. Many others have been proposing that big insurance companies are paying for the health care reform protesters implying that their outrage was fake and it was just greedy big businesses trying to keep their profits high and the poor folks poor.

But what does the publishing of all these ideas really tell society? Anyone against health care reform must be a big idiot because the health care reform is going to help everyone and get rid of those ridiculous high profits of insurance companies. Don’t you understand that health care reform is going to give you money that the insurance companies used to get to keep as profits? Now we can make the rich people pay for everyone’s health care! Well hmm… noble in effort I guess. Not constitutional or ethical in thinking that you have the right to take other peoples money to fix your problem. Yet it is noble in a shallow thinking Robin Hood sort of way. I’m still trying to figure out why those “Harry and Louise” advertisements that were against health care reform in the mid-nineties are all of a sudden for the new health care reform. I have to keep in mind these are advertisements paid for by the Health Insurance Association of America (health insurance companies). I’m sure all of these insurance companies are lining up to sacrifice their profits to help pay for the health care of all Americans (legal and illegal). It makes me warm and fuzzy on the inside to know that all of a sudden, insurance companies are more worried about giving their money away forcefully than having the highest profits.

So you have some major players speaking out attempting to paint the anti-big government crowd as racists. Then there are people in the media making “teabagger” jokes about people who are so furious with the direction the country is headed that they actually go to protests such as the 9.12 rally in Washington D.C. You know, the rally where anywhere between 70,000 and 1.5 million people showed up. Strange how those numbers are all over the place. I’ll believe the pictures and video but it truly is irrelevant. Hilarity ensues when the liberal blogs and media instantly make it out to be a tiny crowd while the tea party goers themselves fall right into the trap and start arguing about the numbers with them. What the protesters fail to realize is as long as the real, true issues are out of the picture, the group in power gets to keep moving along doing whatever it is they want to do. Their protest is neutered just as soon as we get into “gotcha” journalism or debates about crowd numbers or racism or any other sort of joke.

The sad part is, when this happens, the people suffer and their voices are muted again and their message is watered down again, and their frustrations build again. The people who want their voice heard and want a real debate to be had and don’t want to get into name calling and don’t want to be called a racist or call others racists, those people get their voices silenced. All the while, the agenda proposed gets moved along and the media argues between Beck and Olbermann about what the real number of people were at the 9.12 rally.

Yet whether it is health care reform bill or the war in Iraq/Afghanistan/Pakistan/Somalia or whatever project that is the current crisis (so says the White House and their media brigade), it all keeps moving along the conveyer belt. Frustrations elevate and people start to act irrationally (e.g. “You LIE!” -J. Wilson). People get called racists and know they’re not racists but immediately defend themselves not thinking about the true reason behind their statements. They’re controlling the conversation. If you want to see truth spread and brought into politics, you must have honesty and true debate. No name calling from either side. No “gotcha!” journalism. No invalid arguments about irrelevant issues. True and honest debate is the only tool to educate the masses and remove the negativity from politics.

The next time you’re watching your favorite media outlet, or listening to your favorite talk show host, or watching a politician speak who is pushing an issue, ask yourself this…
Is what he or she saying relevant to the issue at hand? Do the research.
Is what he or she saying true? Do the research.
Is what he or she saying trying to group people together while turning those groups against each other? Do the research.

So no, it’s not racism and I don’t appreciate you changing the subject. No, it’s not racism and I don’t appreciate you trying to control the topic of  public debate. No, it’s not racism and  I don’t appreciate the false debates and false choices and bending of the truth. No, it’s not racism and I don’t appreciate legalese that tricks people into thinking what you’re saying is the whole truth.

This post was written in response to this terrible piece of writing.

Does it matter that a President can’t keep his wedding vows? Does it matter if there were weapons of mass destruction?

In a sense, no. Hear me out.

I say that because have rules and laws that are the core of our country. There are enumerated powers given to the federal government. If a President can’t keep his vows, that shows his personal moral issues but doesn’t change the constitution. If there were never really any weapons of mass destruction, does it really matter? We’re not the world police and we cannot realistically expect to police the world for anything our President finds worthy of war (I won’t get into the fundamentally flawed methods we chose to go to war yet). Not if we were following and enforcing our own rules.

If we the people were enforcing the laws of the constitution and stuck to our own guns, the President could lose his self control with a woman outside of the marriage and it would only embarrass him. The constitution would be the box the President is in would limit him from bringing those morals into his governing. The true balance of power would keep this moral decay from entering our laws.

If we the people were holding the politicians feet to the fire, the President could not declare war on a fishing expedition, or revenge for his father, or oil, or whatever. The Congress would have to declare war and it would have to be at the will of the people or in direct defense of the nation’s security. The self-righteous, self-serving war machine could not run rampant under our constitution.

The breakdown in enforcing the constitution may have started in the early 1900′s or it could have started when Bush took office or it could have started with Obama taking his oath. It doesn’t matter. The constitution is for all Presidents and any abuse of it that isn’t rectified is the fault of the apathetic citizenry. Freedom is as much a responsibility as it is an asset. As much as we would like to blame the politicians and special interest groups, it is our own fault for not noticing the slippery slope we have been on for many many years. Why can we all of a sudden defend the constitution against this President? Why not the last? Where have we been? How can we justify the blind eye to the previous administration or a blind eye to the current administration while crucifying the other?

The rules are clear. The constitution is clear. It is not a living document. It is not open to interpretation. The more we ignore the rotting at the core and the burning around the edges the more we can expect it to be destroyed and abused. The longer we wait to enforce the rules, the harder it is going to be to start enforcing them.

Think this to yourself… Do you believe that career politicians are crooked? Are they lying for votes? Are they abusing the public’s trust? Do they avoid speaking what they really feel to gain or retain votes? Do they take favors from special interests? Do they get treated like a better class of citizen compared to the average American citizen?

Most people are going to answer yes to quite a few of these questions. Now that you have that thought, why would you possibly vote to give them more power over you and your fellow citizen? Why would you vote to give them more money for a Wall Street bailout? Why would you want to create another entitlement program? Why would you give them a blank check for a continuous state of war? If you are for the public health care option, why would you think that they could handle running over fifteen percent of our economy? What has given you the idea that sending more money and power into a corrupt soulless system will either fix the problem or even just be neutral?

Is it a coincidence that the middle class is struggling with bills and our Wall Street counterparts get our money because they screwed up? Is it a coincidence that the big businesses are characterized as “too big to fail” when small business is cast aside in favor of Government Motors, AIG, Chrysler, etc.? Is it a coincidence that our dollar is now worth five percent of what it was a hundred years ago due to inflation?

Now that we’re all thinking about core issues and how they effect everything else, let’s address the current hot topic. The item the government has shoved into the town halls and newspapers and television programs is health care. Let’s address just this one issue using something that is a fundamental issue. The problem preached is people can’t afford insurance. All of a sudden, the biggest problem our country faces isn’t our currency crisis, it isn’t the three countries we’re at war in, it isn’t the dead soldiers being ignored by our media, it isn’t our coming economic depression, it is the health care system.

Now let’s see how we can fix this using a fundamental issue.

Let’s imagine we are controlling a family called the Jones. There’s two adults and their two children. One of the parents was laid off. One of their kids is about to go to college. Money is very tight. They can’t further afford health insurance nor can the put money away to pay cash for routine treatment. Why is this? The parent that was laid off says it is because the economy is in the tank. Why is the economy in the tank? We have had bubbles bursting in our economy since 1997. Why are we having these bubbles? Because the interest rates on loans are too low (very similar to the Great Depression). Why are interest rates too low? Because the “Federal” Reserve said so. At the same time we’re facing bubbles, the cost of living is going through the roof. Energy, housing, health care, food, everything has increased. Why is inflation so high? Because we’re spending more money than we ever have while borrowing $1.4 trillion from China and Japan just to keep ourselves at a $1.8 trillion dollar annual deficit (projected 2009). How are we doing this? We’re monetizing the debt! Well by we I mean the “Federal” Reserve.

Eek! OK so the root cause of this is the “Federal Reserve”. Let’s say we go back in time to 1990. Let’s say we remove the control of the “Federal” Reserve on interest rates. The market opens up to lenders. Lenders want to make money so they set the interest rate high enough to make a profit but low enough to win customers. Customers of the lenders want the lowest interest rate possible so competition breeds a steady interest rate. Let’s say it is stable at seven percent interest.

The Internet boom starts growing and growing. Unlike previously, this time the money that was borrowed to speculate in the market isn’t as cheap. People don’t repeat the mistakes of the Great Depression by borrowing and borrowing and borrowing and lending and lending and lending. This time the market set interest rates keep the stock prices of companies at a steady rate and makes investors search for good companies to invest in. They want to make good money on their returns. An IPO for PETS.COM isn’t the instant millionaire this time. This makes lenders find good people to lend to. They want to lend money to make interest but they don’t want to give it to fools investing into business plans that are faulty or overpriced investments into real estate.

This keeps the bubble from forming. In doing so, it also keeps the bubble from bursting. This stabilizes the economy. There would still be bears and bulls but they would be much less violent. This isn’t a utopia and shouldn’t be advertised as one. But this is much more stable than the bubble economy we’re experiencing in our lives now. The boom was fun but the burst is life changing.

On top of the market staying stable, this keeps the government from running the Wall Street Welfare program. This keeps the government from spending countless billions  and trillions buying public companies or putting bad debt accumulated by this huge companies on the tax payers balance sheet. This keeps our government from having to borrow our currency into oblivion.

What does this mean to the Jones? The parent that was laid off didn’t get laid off. Their income might not have been as high as it is currently but the cost of living wouldn’t be nearly as high. The cost of oil would be lower since the dollar is more powerful. The price of real estate wouldn’t have tripled or quadrupled so their mortgages would be much lower even though the market’s interest rate would be higher than the “Federal” Reserve wants it to be. The price of sending a child to college would be much less since it would be more expensive for student loans and colleges would have to compete to keep costs low to their customers (the parents of the students or the students themselves).

What does this have to do with health care? The same theories apply to health care. They would be able to afford the insurance payment. The price of health care wouldn’t have exploded along with the inflation and cost of living increases in every other aspect of the American life (Doctors have to pay a mortgage too, you know). The premiums offered by insurance companies would be lower because the dollar would be more powerful. The premiums would be lower because there would be less people without insurance going to the emergency room and stiffing the hospital for their care. The hospitals and doctors wouldn’t have to increase their rates to make up for inflation, cost of living, and what I like to call, donated health care.

Now with this one issue addressed, you can see why arguing about the health care issue is better dealt with at a core level. The very dollar used to pay the insurance companies, the doctors, the hospitals, it is at its core, being deliberately destroyed. Why? Because in 1913, we let the “Federal” Reserve slowly remove the concept of a dollar backed by gold. At the core of America is capitalism and with a flawed currency, that isn’t much of a core.

Quit arguing about whether or not Obama is a citizen of the United States. Quit arguing if there were WMD’s or if Bush did it for oil. We are being robbed blind at every level because we’re letting our currency get destroyed by the “Federal” Reserve. The fundamental issue is our currency and it absolutely overrides any other issue in the news today.

We all need to unite, regardless of political party, and face the thief in the night. Regardless of what political party we have next to our name, we’re being robbed and our political campaigns and policies won’t mean much when we have currency that is worthless.