First They Come For Your Refineries...

Rep. Maurice Hinchey, a Dumbocrat from NY said: "We (the government) should own the refineries. Then we can control how much gets out into the market."

First of all, refinery capacity is only part of the gas price problem, most if it is the price of oil before it reaches the refinery.

Now THERE's an idea! Government control over the supply of goods is always a great plan and leads to stable prices and plenty for everyone! Oops, wait.. No, the opposite is true.

Just as I told Eleanor today about an article discussing price freezes on certain food items in Mexico, such controls always lead to shortages.

Are you old enough to remember the gas lines in the Carter era? If we were to nationalize the refineries, it would make those lines look like the express lane at the grocery store.

Imagine the social tinkering that would go on if government owned the refineries! In the face of inevitable shortages, they would have the power to decide what areas got more gas and what areas got less. They'd have the power to punish certain regions who used more than their "fair share" of gas according to some arbitrary formula. They'd punish people for having SUV's, etc.

Nationalizing refineries will only lead to shortages and then nationalizing of other things to compensate for the failure of that program.

Protest Gas Prices - July 4th

I have an idea for protesting high gas prices. It would take an immensely coordinated effort but it could be done.

I envision a two pronged attack.

Part 1: A massive "park in" at gas stations around America. Get the kids, pack some food and water and essentially block access to all the gas stations for an entire weekend. It would be better to start on a Friday morning but to ensure maximum participation, starting on a Saturday morning would be better. It would only take 10 to 20 cars at each gas station to make this effective. Imagine, completely blocking access to the entire nation's ability to refuel their cars!!

Part 2: This might be a little more difficult but could prove to be even more effective than Part 1. Coordinate thousands of truckers around the nation and have them park their trucks around the country in such a way that they block access to the busiest highways in the nation. In particular, I was thinking of blocking access to major freeway interchanges in Los Angles (especially around Long Beach since it's a major port for goods coming in from overseas). Imagine 2000 trucks in each city parked in groups in Los Angeles, New York, Atlanta, Chicago, San Francisco, etc. Shut down access to all the major arteries in the US. They would have to leave room for emergency vehicles to pass but a roadblock system where a few trucks can be moved to allow that access but prevent general traffic flow. Oh, we'd need to block rail access as well but that wouldn't take nearly as many trucks.

If something like this could be accomplished it would have a huge impact on gas prices. No gas purchased, no goods being shipped around the country, and law enforcement would be absolutely helpless to stop the process. There aren't enough tow truck in the country to haul away the cars and trucks that would be blocking everything. Furthermore, even if the police attempted mass arrests, they would be met with serious resistance and they would likely just monitor the situation and not attempt to remove anyone.

July 4th would be a good day to start this. It's a Friday, it's a national holiday and symbolically speaking it would be a great day for it.

The only real problem I see with this is that so many people are so complacent about everything that it would be hard to get people to participate.

We've got less than a month to get the word out. Can we do it? Post this on your blog, send it out in an email, let's get it done!

**Please note... this is not designed to get the government to "do something" about oil prices. This is a direct action by customers to let the suppliers know that we're very unhappy about what they're doing.

The Media Got It Wrong

You've all heard by now that Ted Kennedy suffered from seizures and it was discovered that he had a malignant brain tumor.

I don't think you're going to find this news anywhere else but I have heard from authoritative sources that the story was reported falsely.

The tiny lump that they removed from his skull was really his brain and the only healthy tissue he had. It turns out that Ted Kennedy is malignant!

After years of suppression by alcohol and strangling our freedoms, his brain attempted to assert itself but it was too late. Now the malignancy is complete since his brain has been removed. I can only hope that this trauma (meaning Ted, not the seizures) has now been rendered incapable of inflicting any more damage on the American people by the heroic and ultimately fatal efforts of his brain.

Why God Is A Libertarian

MikeT over at CodeMonkeyRamblings has written a post called Why God is not a libertarian.

Make sure you read his other related posts about why God is not a liberal or conservative.

For a long time I've been meaning to write a post on why God IS a libertarian (note the small L) so I'm going to answer Mike's replies line by line then add some things by myself.

Before I continue, I want to be clear that I'm not trying to stuff God in to my political philosophy but rather explain why libertarianism is closer to God's ideal for us than conservatism or liberalism.

Libertarians tend to believe that what you do in the privacy of your own home is no one else's business. God not only disagrees with this, but active conducts surveillance of said "private conduct between consenting adults" and makes legal judgments about that behavior.

Libertarians object to other, very flawed people making it their business what you do behind closed doors. Christian libertarians (like myself) believe that since God made us He can do as he pleases in regards to our lives. Those libertarians that are not Christians have bigger things to worry about than individual sins that others are not privy to.

Libertarians tend to not believe that those with money have any obligation to those that are poor and struggling to make it. God commands believers to feed and clothe the poor. This is problematic to libertarians because if one is not a believer, one is going to Hell.

Only the most ardent follower of Ayn Rand would believe that we have no obligation to the poor. Libertarians assert that giving to the poor is, as the Bible says and individual responsibility and that giving should be from one's heart. God says nothing about having your wages forcibly taken from you and handed over to the poor. Libertarians have no objection to voluntary charity.

Libertarians often oppose the death penalty. God imposed the death penalty for something like sixteen different offenses that ranged from saying bad things about God, to homicide.

By all means, show me where in the New Testament that the death penalty is applicable. I go back and forth on this issue to be honest. On the one hand there are some people that just need to die. On the other hand, I don't really trust the state to have the power of death and use it wisely or judiciously.

Libertarians believe that every individual is sovereign. God says that only He is sovereign, and any sovereignty you have is directly delegated from Him, for His purposes, not to just make you a "sovereign citizen" or something to that effect.

Agreed, but with reservations. Libertarianism never addresses anything beyond the civil realm. It neither denies nor promotes the concept of God. Conservatism purports to govern according to God's laws and to put the force of government behind such. Liberalism actively denies God and actively attempts to squelch Christianity in particular because it's a threat to that philosophy. More on this in a bit.

Libertarians tend to be vehemently opposed to the use of weapons of mass destruction. God has been known to rain down heaping quantities of "indiscriminate mass destruction" on populations that have royally pissed Him off. Where conservatives might nuke Iran for a few small insurgencies around the Middle East and getting nukes, God "nuked" a few cities for engaging in sexual debauchery.

Libertarians are opposed to man using that kind of force against other men at their whim. Do you trust others with nukes? I know I don't. God's judgment is perfect, ours is not.

Libertarians believe that government exists to keep us safe from criminals and foreign invaders and protect our rights. They also say that it cannot stop doing this. God has been known to not only withdraw his protection, but use foreign invaders as a big stick to whack His people with really, really hard.

Now here is where you are dead wrong. No libertarian I know thinks that it's up to the government to keep us safe or protect our rights in any proactive sense. The proper role of government is to adjudicate accusations of violations of our rights and protect us in the event of invasion. If it just happens to be that God sends invaders to conquer us, then we will be unable to defend our borders and your point is moot.

Libertarians believe that animals have no rights. God gave animals a right to rest on the sabbath, and said that a righteous man will have regard for the life of his animals. We all know what happens to men who aren't righteous in God's opinion... (hint: a decidedly non-libertarian outcome)

Believing that animals have no rights is not the same as believing that it's OK to be cruel to animals. And yes, God says to let your beasts of burden rest on the Sabbath as well.

**I'll add more to this later when I have time.

But He'll Gladly Steal From You

Democrat John Driscoll has won a Montana Democratic Primary without raising a dime of campaign contributions.

From the story:

Driscoll had vowed not to raise any money and said he'd be "perfectly happy" if he lost and "absolutely delighted" if Hunt won. But he's running anyway because he feels strongly that the federal government is corrupt, and money in politics is one of its worst vices.

All well and good but he's a Democrat which effectively means that he's not willing to accept voluntary contributions but he's more than willing to wrest money away from hard working Americans and give it to other groups of Americans without regard to actual merit.

How noble!

And Good Riddance

A recent high school graduate (a valedictorian as a matter of fact) and his mother are scheduled to be deported to Armenia because their application for asylum has been rejected.

I have no idea whether their asylum claim has any merit and I'm sure some people with legitimate claims have those applications rejected, but the fact of the matter is, those people are here illegally and that student used tax payer funds to receive his education.

But, but, he worked so hard to get to the top of his class, he should be allowed to stay! Why? Because he studied hard? He was here illegally, his mother should be reimbursing the state for his education. Granted, it is a public school, so it's tough to say just how much of an education he got but the principal stands, he had no business being there.

Homosexual Rights

I truly don't understand why the "homosexual rights" movement even exists. A very small fraction of the population is attracted to their own sex rather than the opposite sex as God (or even evolution if you believe that) intended.

You don't see straight people running around proclaiming their straightness and forming organizations for straight people. Really, I'd love to see some college campus groups form some heterosexual clubs just to goad the militant homosexuals.

Back to the topic at hand though. Why should any group of people be forcing their agenda down my throat based on their sexual predilections? As much as I think it's immoral for two men or two women to have sex, I really don't care what they do; I just don't want to hear about it. I don't want to outlaw it, restrict it, regulate it or politicize it in any way. It should be a non-issue!

Somehow, we have so little else to do in this country that we're spending our time and energy making sure that the government can force us to acknowledge and accept the immoral behavior of these people. If I own a business and offer spousal benefits, I can be forced to give those same benefits to a same-sex couple. Honestly, I'd rather stop offering spousal benefits.

Really though, it's unlikely that I would hire someone I knew was gay simply because of the likelihood of that person causing trouble and trying to sue me if I fired him/her for other reasons. For the same reason, I'd be hesitant to hire a black person that came across as the least bit militant.

My question is this: How do we fight back against the homosexual agenda? We get labeled as bigots and homophobes when we try. I don't really care about that, the problem is, we're not fighting for something, but against it and that's a much more difficult thing to do. Furthermore, most straight people don't really spend much time thinking about the fact that their straight nor do we have much inclination to become activists for it.

Help me flesh this out, what does a pro-heterosexual social movement look like? I'm open to suggestions.