![How Independent Are We?]()
by Art Smith
Two hundred and thirty-three years ago, the men of the Second Continental Congress made a bold gesture as they sought to uncleave themselves from their ties with Great Britain. A gesture intended to convey that they were serious about the war that was already raging on the American Continent. A gesture intended to tell the world, and perhaps garner the support of other countries, that the American Colonies could not and would not continue to live under the yolk of a tyrannical King and Parliament.
A gesture that could cost them all, and indeed did cost some, their lives and their properties.
The Declaration of Independence was written primarily to formalize the decision to separate the colonies from British rule. It also sought to communicate the importance of concepts of liberty that were lacking in the current arrangement with the Britsh Monarchy. Subjected to Britain's control though they were, equal to other British Subjects living in the homeland they were not. Even in attempts to seek the kind of autonomy eventually considered standard within the British Empire were at that time brushed aside... self-government was not in the best interest of Britain at that time.
Many know that the original Jeffersonian draft of the Declaration included a statement that could not be agreed upon by the 13 "free and independent states"... that is, regarding slavery. Incredible that the words "...all men are created equal..." would remain in a document that could not hold the words:
"He has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred rights of life and liberty in the persons of a distant people who never offended him, captivatng [sic] and carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere, or to incur miserable death in their transportation thither. This piratical warfare, the opprobrium of INFIDEL powers, is the warfare of the CHRISTIAN king of Great Britain. Determined to keep open a market where MEN should be bought and sold, he has prostituted his negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or to restrain this execrable commerce." (Washington State University Web Site: Original Draft of The Declaration of Independence)
But these and more words were removed by a Congress that was unwilling to do the right thing, as it would have an impact on the economy of some southern states.
So our beginnings were not perfect. We moved forward tolerating [...]
by Linda Morgan
As goes Energy, so goes the country.
“The worse, the better,†Vladimir Lenin is said to have observed. What Lenin meant was that the worse social conditions became in Russia, the more likely he and the Bolsheviks could foment a communist revolution. President Barrack Obama’s White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel recently updated Lenin’s maxim, saying, “Never allow a crisis to go to waste.â€Last Friday, the Democratic leadership in the House of Representatives took those maxims to heart when they pushed through their 1,200-page American Clean Energy and Security (ACES) Act by a vote 219 to 212. The bill is supposed to address the twin crises of economic recession and climate change by creating millions of new “green†jobs. Instead of an old-fashioned Soviet-style five-year plan, ACES can be thought of as 50-year plan to radically transform how Americans produce and use energy.
…Well, look, Ron Bailey, this entire administration seems to me to emulate the tactics of Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, in all things, not just energy… and in my view we’ve not seen nearly the worst of it yet. (A Depressing thought as we come to July 4th, isn’t it?)
So why should Energy be any different? Energy, after all, is the key to our country and it’s prosperity. Which of course was why I raised such holy hell when the first thing Obama did upon being sworn in was to reverse President Bush’s sign off on offshore drilling. That action is the major reason oil prices have better than doubled in the last 6 months.
The question that Ron asks, though, seems to me pertinent:
Will Americans tolerate such sweeping interventions into their lives and workplaces?
…
The 1994 mid-term election became a referendum on [...]
by Art Smith
As you probably already know, the US House of Representatives approved the Cap and Trade bill last Friday (HR2454). I'm still reeling over that.
Although I am disappointed that so many Representatives in Congress voted for this blatent tax, I'm not surprised. I'm never surprised when the powerful in Washington find a new way to separate me from my money, regardless of the method or intermediaries.
There are those who believe that by taxing corporations or the rich, the impact on the rest of society is nil. But it never is. Although not always obvious, these taxes still get paid by you and me in the prices we pay for products and services. Corporations do not absorb millions of dollars in taxation from a mysterious pool of unspent profit. They factor those taxes into their revenue models to ensure they maintain the profit level expected by their owners (shareholders). We all end up paying those taxes.
And in the case of taxing energy consumption, there is no motivation provided to improve the consumption model or method of generating energy... the price simply goes up. The Heritage Foundation has provided an analysis of the impact of the bill on jobs and families, including estimates of gross state product losses, job losses and average family expense increases. This is not good for America.
Now is the time to contact your Senator. Updates to the bill should appear in the sidebar under "Cap And Trade Updates".
Frustrating are [...]
![How Independent Are We?]()
by
I'm saddened, frustrated , and absolutely disappointed. The story of Mark Sanford was a roller coaster that dumped me off a cliff at the end. Allow me to take you through this sequentially.
I've spent the past 36 hours dramatically changing my thoughts about how I might speak to the unusual story of South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford's mysterious disappearance. Mark was the head of the Republican Governor's Association (now headed by Haley Barbour), and considered a potential candidate for the 2012 Presidential nomination.
First I thought, after hearing that he had been missing for several days after driving off in a bodyguard's SUV, that this guy was a little weird. I could, at that point, conceive of only one type of circumstance that might explain this behavior, and that would be some kind of kidnapping or other threat by an outside party. Barring such a circumstance, I figured running for President didn't sound like something that could be on his calendar... disappearing on purpose and intentionally avoiding everyone with no explanation just didn't sound like an event that would instill anyone's confidence. The good news, I thought, is that he certainly hadn't disappeared because of an extramarital affair. No one would draw this much attention just so they could spend time with an alternate squeeze.
Later on I heard he was hiking in the Appalachian Trail. Clearing his head, evidently. According to his staff, this was not unusual, so my thoughts about the man didn't change much, just continuing to seem very odd and unlikely to be a kidnapping but rather just some eccentricity. South Carolina officials were [...]
![How Independent Are We?]()
by Art Smith
Today many are wearing green to show visible support for those in Iran who are protesting the apparently stolen election. Our web site is normally white and red... we've put on green today to stand by those who treasure liberty.
It is interesting to note that while many in the US are advocating an overthrow of the current clerically over-ruled government system in Iran, reports seem to indicate that Iranians as a whole are perhaps not interested in an outright change in the system, just fairness in this election.
Iran's history, especially with the United States, demands care in how our leaders address the situation. More on that later.
Political ambitions in the Islamic Kingdom aside, we here at TCR support Liberty whereever she is needed, and support the call for open and fair elections in Iran. To the Iranians leadship we say, make it right!
by Linda Morgan
There's much to discuss in terms of implication, as regards the shooting of abortionist George Tiller, none of them particularly complimentary to those claiming to take up Tiller's side.
Even from the outset, my instinct was that the reaction to the Tiller story was overblown... intentionally so. Whatever else might be said, we're talking about one man's death. Absent the issue of Abortion, and in light of the seven men in Chicago alone, shot in the same 24 hour period, one man being shot just isn't national news, sorry. It also and most certainly doesn't rise to the level of 'terrorism' as some have been loudly claiming.
It's interesting, too, how the word "'Terrorism" has been rediscovered by the left, to be applied to this thing, isn't it? Let's examine this, for a moment:
Since back in 1993, there have been seven abortion clinic workers killed as such. If this constitutes an organized bit of terrorist activity, I suggest it to be so far below the radar as to be invisible. This is a misapplication of the term terrorism, in light of the much larger terrorism we've seen in the last decade... terrorism that for the most part, the left ignored. They also ignore that the killing of Tiller has been condemned by every mainstream pro-life group. Their entire response seems out of the bounds of reason.
So unreasonably loud is the howl over this one in fact, that one cannot help but wonder if it wasn't orchestrated so. If we take what we see on the web as indicative, for the most part these are leftists.... who are people already used to making noise far in excess of their actual numbers. I think we can take this level of noise as an indication of the number of organized mouthpieces on the web right now. (And I think that has implications for our political future.)
There are a goodly number of left-of-center bloggers that have [...]
