Showing posts with label Libertarian. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Libertarian. Show all posts

Neo-Libertarians
We call them Congress

by Elizabeth Martinez and Arnoldo Garcia, National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights


"Neo-liberalism" is a set of economic policies that have become widespread during the last 25 years
or so. Although the word is rarely heard in the United States, you can clearly see the effects of neo-liberalism here as the rich grow richer and the poor grow poorer.

"Liberalism" can refer to political, economic, or even religious ideas. In the U.S. political liberalism has been a strategy to prevent social conflict. It is presented to poor and working people as progressive compared to conservative or Rightwing. Economic liberalism is different. Conservative politicians who say they hate "liberals" -- meaning the political type -- have no real problem with economic liberalism, including neoliberalism.

"Neo" means we are talking about a new kind of liberalism...

Ron Paul - Great servant, but Not a Master

In an article I just read, Ron Paul declares our efforts in Syria and Iraq to be illegal, as well as part of the problem. The rhetoric is clean, and feels well thought out. Reading his words I was lulled a bit into thinking "Yeah, why the hell should we care?" Many commentators on the article suggest that our country needs a man like Ron Paul Some one who looks at things clearly, and without all the hampering of political trappings. 

I am lulled enough to almost agree... almost. Then I smell the burning. 

If this guy was president, we would have zero foreign policy, no Department of Education, no EPA. no public schools, no SSI, no unemployment insurance, no medical research, no colleges. He's a Libertarian, and the Libertarian views always sound good when you are in the middle of struggles, because they ask, "why are you doing all this stuff? Just stop. It is not our problem." 

"Finally, I think that the smallest level of government possible best performs education. Teachers, parents, and local community leaders should be making decisions about exactly how our children should be taught, not Washington bureaucrats." -- Ron Paul


Which sounds good. Until you see what is going on in Texas right now... where every social science book and history text melds biblical rhetoric (most of it wrong) into the fabric of every aspect of our history -- Moses was the founder of our Constitution. Jesus told our founders that everyone is equal under the law, Divine Mandate was our right for slaughter and slavery. Don't believe me? Look for your self



Of course this presses for home schools or on-line schools, which is the real Libertarian goal for national education. Those of us in the Middle Class would only think this is a good idea if we were non-parents. The 1% just higher a teacher. No worries. 

And getting rid of the EPA is a must because they are inconvenient for oil, coal, health, waste and profits because they insist that even if Climate Change isn't real, we still need to breath -- check out China's life without EPA. 

However, Climate Change HAS to be false, at all costs, because if it is real, then the EPA has to remain and government has to be seriously involved in our industry and business. So, Climate Change can not be real. The Koch put out millions every year in propaganda and false studies, to insure we remain on the fence about that, and pay off congressmen so they'll act like idiots in hearings. The longer Climate Change is put off, the more money the 1% will make. 

Never mind that as of 2007, when the American Association of Petroleum Geologists released a revised statement, no scientific body of national or international standing rejected the findings of human-induced effects on climate change. There are fringe people, most of whom do not show their processes or give peer review evidence (or are simply falsifying information), who continue to cry out differences, but no serious group has any doubt that Climate Change is happening, and that it is human-induced.  

None of that matters. Business first, health and life second. 

Interestingly enough, Ron Paul wants small government, a government with their hands off business and the market, but believes his personal feelings about abortion should be pressed onto women. Back off the Education, and the EPA and the FDA and anything else that stands in the way of a business man doing what he wants to do, but he'll keep is paws inside every woman's womb. Typical. 

Ron Paul opposes the War on Drugs. Believes that drugs, and their legality should be a local community issue. -- Like that has ever worked any where in the world, ever.

Ron Paul supports the elimination of the income tax and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). He asserts that Congress had no power to impose a direct income tax and has introduced legislation to repeal of the 16th Amendment to the Constitution, which was ratified on February 3, 1913.

"An income tax is the most degrading and totalitarian of all possible taxes. Its implementation wrongly suggests that the government owns the lives and labor of the citizens it is supposed to represent. Tellingly, “a heavy progressive or graduated income tax” is Plank #2 of the Communist Manifesto, which was written by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels and first published in 1848." -- Ron Paul


Which sounds good, unless you believe the government should have things like a military, boarder patrols, roads, hospitals, emergency response for disasters, and just about anything else. And yes, Income tax is Plank #2 of the Communist Manifesto. So what?
In the year 10 AD, Emperor Wang Mang of the Xin Dynasty instituted an unprecedented income tax, at the rate of 10 percent of profits, for professionals and skilled labor. He was overthrown 13 years later in 23 AD and earlier policies were restored during the reestablished Han Dynasty which followed.

One of the first recorded taxes on income was the Saladin tithe introduced by Henry II in 1188 to raise money for the Third Crusade.

The inception date of the modern income tax is typically accepted as 1799. This income tax was introduced in Britain by Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger in his budget of December 1798, to pay for weapons and equipment for the French Revolutionary War. 

... so it isn't an invention of the Communist Manifesto, as Ron Paul (the Transparent) implies with his statement. 

Another thing Ron Paul isn't being Transparent about is that Libertarian politics is only a small step up from Anarchy.  So no, he wouldn't engage in the Middle East, and he wouldn't care at all that your child needed to eat, or that a plague came into our country, or that medical research needed to be done to save millions. Let the world burn. He's fine with that.

The Theory of Planned Behavior

Introduction The Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) provides a comprehensive framework for understanding and predicting human actions in a pla...