Free kibbles

FREEDOM OF SPEECH:

Good points about the WikiLeaks saga so far:

"Presently, our ability to attain knowledge is threatened because said knowledge represents a threat to the state — not to "national security," as is claimed, but to the legitimacy of the state itself. Julian Assange, through WikiLeaks, has made available to society a vast collection of information that undermines the state's legitimacy. Assange cracked the government's veil of benignity and brought into question the state's tactics. His website undermines its moral authority."

"There is something positive that both sides have neglected to take notice of — WikiLeaks won."

WikiLeaks is still up and running. The government hasn't managed to crush it yet. But the author lets his emotions get the better of him and runs off on a foolish route.

"Some may fear that the uncontrollable nature of the Internet might stimulate more pervasive forms of government intervention and regulation. That is, that the Internet may force the state to grow at a faster pace than it already is. Perhaps an "Internet police" is in the United States' future (if it doesn't already exist).

I say bring it."

Bring it on yourself, not me, thank you. He may look forward to having government storm troopers kicking in his door sticking guns in his and his family's faces, wrestling them to the ground, chaining their hands then dragging them off to a tiny cage as well as seizing their computers, cell phones, tablets, and whatever else, but I don't. I prefer to keep the internet free. Libertarians are quick to point out how often government violently harms others, and rightfully so, so it makes no sense to turn around and invite government to hurt more people. This guys seems to wish for it because of the greater good.  That philosophy sounds sickeningly like the philosophy of the communists, "To make an omelet, you have to break some eggs." No thanks.

"Bloody revolution is no longer with the times, because government's armies are becoming more and more immaterial."

In what world? Go tell it to the Afghans. Go tell it to the Iraqis. Contrary to what this guy believes, his wishes will not bring about peaceful revolution. Did the drug users bring about peaceful revolution? No. You know who did bring about peaceful revolution? The alcohol drinkers. That's the only way to take away government's power peacefully. Repeal government. It can be done. Inviting an escalation of the police state in hopes that a peaceful revolution may follow may be a sweet, romantic notion for a fool, but I don't want to suffer through a revolution because the government will not pass peacefully into the night. It will kill people in earnest. I want to win peacefully, and that means repealing government, not wishing for a revolution.

It cracks me up that while the US government tells people it loves freedom of speech and pretends to be all principled, the Air Force is blocking the New York Times, Washington Post, and leading foreign papers because they reprint WikiLeaks material. You can't make this stuff up.

Every now and then, despite the best efforts of the statists in the media, you see a headline that is pure honesty:

"WikiLeaks' Assange equates government with conspiracy"

Duh.


SOCIALISM:

Unions drag A&P into bankruptcy. A&P has been forced to pay rent on many previous properties it was no longer using too, most of which are in union haven Detroit.

ECONOMY:

List of Austrians who predicted the housing bubble collapse. See how many others you can find who predicted this.

TAX AND SPEND:

Video of British protesters.

Here's a good reminder that no matter how rich a government is, it can still spend too much and go broke as Montgomery County, Maryland, one of the richest counties in the country, goes on an austerity program.

HEALTH CARE:

Michelle Obama summarizes the position of the ruling class on every issue:

"If you will recall, Michelle has been on this healthy eating kick, even getting a child nutrition bill passed through Congress and officially signed into law by her hubby. During yesterday's signing ceremony for the law, Michelle Obama came out with this telling line about what children should eat: "We can't just leave it up to the parents.""

Wrong. That's exactly what we need to do. But before we can do that we have to get over the mistaken impression that people including parents are free to make all the decisions that affect their daily lives today. They're not. Government subsidies, mandates, regulations and bans severely corrupt the food market available to parents and pervert the prices making unhealthy, processed food cheap and healthy food expensive. Government is the problem, not the solution. When we extract government from the marketplace, and it will happen either by our choice or when the government collapses, people will begin eating healthy again.

Cost of Romneycare in Massachusetts spiraling out of control. Duh.

GLOBAL WARMING AND ENERGY:

Satellites image urban heat island effect. All the concrete and blacktop in cities hold heat which inflates temperature readings in cities, creating the false impression the overall planet is heating when in fact it's isolated to the cities.

POLICE STATE:

Michelle Malkin blames Obama, Bernie Sanders and other class warfare agitators for the politically motivated arsonist in Cape Cod. I understand her point. They always try and blame conservative big-whigs for the violence of conservatives.

LOCAL:

We're so used to the incompetence of government that we take it for granted and no longer notice it. That's the only reason we tolerate government taking three years to fix three bridges on I-75 that need raised. Three years. A private company could send a man to Mars and back in that amount of time. And here's the kicker:

"One lane of traffic will be maintained in both directions during the six-month project."

And people wonder why so we suffer so many deaths on our highways.

MISC:

Voyager 1 has reached the point where there's no solar wind any more.