I Love Hippies

Trendy...and expensive.

I know, shocking right? But it’s true. I freaking love hippies, or at least modern hippies. Now don’t get me wrong, I still hate old school hippie ideology; capitalism is evil, drop out of society, live ‘freely’ and all the other bull shit that ended up destroying the movement (turns out a life of drugs and unprotected sex doesn’t end well).

So why do I love today’s hippies? Because they not only fail to live up to the ideology of the movement that inspires them, they actually contradict it on a regular basis. They buy: $16 for a CD chock full of anti-capitalism anti-consumerism rhetoric, $40 for a t-shirt with some asinine phrase like ‘peace is a state of mind’ or ‘buck fush,’ $10 for a trendy poster of some leftist band or celebrity.

There is nothing more hypocritical than giving money to the ‘evil corporations’ in exchange for merchandise criticizing the ‘evil corporations’. Take the ever ubiquitous Che image for example. Is there anything more ironic than the commercialization of the image of a man who stood for Socialism and hated capitalist consumerism?

So go on hippies, keeping buying your trendy CDs and t-shirts, keep buying your leftist posters and buttons. And hey put those buttons on that $100 messenger bag, because while you might think you’re rebelling you’re still fulfilling the most important duty of every citizen, buying buying buying.

I googled ‘liberal t-shirts’ and here a few of my favorite finds:

Ya! If we were Socialist we'd be so much more free, I mean look at Fascist Italy, Nazi Germany, Communist Russia and Communist China...

But it can buy a trendy t-shirt with a nifty phrase about how useless money is.

Hey that looks like the stuff you used to buy that shirt!

America: Sexist or Racist?

“The Democratic primary was a lose-lose proposition for the image of American tolerance: If Senator Obama lost, ours was an irredeemably racist country. Senator Clinton lost, and we are infected by sexism. But whether viewed through the prism of radical gender feminism or a boy’s club media conspiracy, the truth is considerably less complicated. The vaunted Clinton machine—devoid of fresh ideas and facing a dynamic, inspirational opponent—simply couldn’t compete. Blame the media, blame the patriarchy if you so desire, but the truth is that Americans wouldn’t mind a woman as president. Just not that woman.”

The quote above is from a great post over at Reason.com that points out the lose-lose situation of the Democratic primaries. For those on the left the loser of the recent primaries could mean only one thing, Americans are either racist or sexist. The idea that anyone in America would simply judge a candidate on their character, policies and experience is apparently beyond the left.

Global Warming and Capitalism

Reason.com recently posted a great debate about the various approaches to dealing with the climate ‘crisis’ here. Check it out.

History Repeats Itself

I’ve often commented on the baffling nature of the West’s refusal to see the threat from the Middle East (read: Iran) and radical Islam as what it is, history repeating itself. President Ahmadinejad’s anti-semitic rhetoric is almost as similar to Hitler’s as the modern West’s insistence that he’s just playing politics is to the pre-World War II West’s insistence that Hitler would never act on his proclamations.

Michael Ledeen has finally cleared up my confusion in a must read article in the New York Times about this phenomenon here.

In Defense Of Mollie

I spent several hours re-reading George Orwell’s Animal Farm yesterday and I couldn’t escape the feeling of being pulled apart. On the one hand Orwell’s tale of how Stalinist Communism destroys the lives of it’s citizens is brilliant, on the other hand Orwell’s clear fondness for democratic Socialism remains frustrating. The character of Mollie perfectly represents the way even Orwell’s democratic Socialism crushes individuality and demands collectivist conformity. Orwell describes the white mare Mollie as,

“…the foolish, pretty white mare who drew Mr. Jones’s trap, came mincing daintily in, chewing at a lump of sugar. She took a place near the front and began flirting her white mane, hoping to draw attention to the red ribbons it was plaited with.”

Soon after the wise pig Old Major stirs the animals passions with a speech dripping in Socialist rhetoric (Old Major continually refers to the other animals as comrades throughout a speech that paints a picture of a farm without humans in which the animals keep all the products of their labor) the other pigs take hold of this idea, begin to flesh it out and start promoting this new philosophy (called Animalism) among the other animals. Mollie proves difficult to convince:

“At the beginning they met with much stupidity and apathy. Some of the animals talked of the duty of loyalty to Mr. Jones, whom they referred to as ‘Master,’ or made elementary remarks such as ‘Mr. Jones feeds us. If he were gone, we should starve to death.’ Others asked such questions as…’If this rebellion is to happen anyway, what difference does it make whether we work for it or not?’ and the pigs had great difficulty in making them see that this was contrary to the spirit of Animalism. The stupidest questions of all were asked by Mollie, the white mare. The very first question she asked Snowball was: ‘Will there still be sugar after the Rebellion?’

“‘No,’ said Snowball firmly. ‘We have no means of making sugar on this farm. Besides, you do not need sugar. You will have all the oats and hay you want.’”

But Mollie doesn’t want oats and hay, she wants sugar. In this “stupid question” Mollie shines a glaring light on the most basic problem with all Socialist states; they limit production, and thus choice, to that which the government deems best. In this case poor Mollie simply wants sugar, ribbons and the affection of humans, but the intellectually superior pigs have decided what is best for Mollie, oats and hay.

This attitude is alive and well in the American Left today. The regulation and taxation of cigarettes is based solely on the idea that the government knows what is best for you and I, as is gun control and any number of other Leftist schemes aimed at social control. And in academic circles any questioning of the validity of Leftist theories is generally met with a sort of elitist scorn; how could anyone ask such stupid questions as, “why should I hate the people and organizations that provide me with work and a salary?”

In the end what Leftists (and I include many of the neoconservatives in that label) fail to see is that all forms of Socialism, from the Bismarckian welfare state to Stalinist Communism, cannot help but crush individuality because they take the power of choice out of the individual’s hands and put it in the hands of the government. At best these systems foster a tyranny of the collective will, at worse they create vastly powerful dictatorial states.

And in animal far Animalism, like Socialism, was best for the stupid brutes. And so the pigs, being the elite, would go forward with their plans regardless of what Mollie or anyone else wanted; clearly she was simply to stupid to understand what was good for her.

And in much the same way Leftists remain frustrated to this day with blue collar workers who continually vote for Republicans, stupidly ‘voting against their own self interest’ as the Democrats say. They remain frustrated with the upper middle class who would rather vote for Republicans who will give them back their tax dollars (so they can buy that new car they’ve been eying) than vote for a Democrat who will surely raise their taxes; “don’t they understand the sacrifices we all must make for the cause?” Democrats protest.

It is this idea that intellectual elites know what is best for others, an idea that lays at the heart of all Leftist schemes, that is so detestable. Self-determination is our most basic right, the right on which all other rights rest, and it is this right that all forms of Socialism chip away at. We can only hope that something will soon deter the gradual degradation of this right or we might wake up one day to find it gone, a collectivist totalitarianism in its place.

Legalize It Man…All Of It (Part 1: The History of Hypocrisy)

Conservatives in America have developed an unfortunate image lately. The Religious Right’s growing ambition to go beyond protecting Christian’s rights to practice their religion as they please and begin writing their ethical and moral system into America’s laws (a ‘No Gays!’ Constitutional amendment? Really?!) along with a recent unpleasant streak of populism (read: socially conservative fascism) in the Republican party has cultivated this image.

The most prominently hypocritical result of this marriage of conservative religious fervor and Republican populism has manifested itself in the prohibitionist War on Drugs. In this first post on the War on Drugs I will lay out the basic early history of this ultimate hypocrisy.

Drug prohibition in the United States goes back to 1914 with the Harrison Narcotic Act which regulated the production and distribution of opiate containing substances. In the following years various regulations were laid upon various substances, the most famous of which of course was alcohol prohibition which started in 1919 and ended in 1933 with the 21st Amendment. But the War didn’t begin until June 17th, 1971.

On that summer day in 1971 then President Richard Nixon called substance abuse “public enemy number one in the United States” and declared the War on Drugs. This speech had come on the heels of the legislative declaration of War on Drugs, the Controlled Substances Act of 1970.

The Controlled Substances Act created a five tier classification system for all drugs, ranging from Schedule V substances which have a low potential for abuse and medical uses to Schedule I substance which have a high potential for abuse and no medical purpose; and everything in between.

The act also empowered the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs to enforce the law. In 1973 the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs was merged in the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA). This was the birth of the DEA and the government’s prohibition of substances it deems dangerous.

As drug use continued to grow despite the efforts of the DEA, Ronald Reagan was elected by a country enthralled with Cocaine. Reagan took it upon himself to ramp up the War on Drugs while the First Lady flew around the country promoting her famous (or infamous) ‘Just Say No’ campaign encouraging children to say no to drugs, because otherwise they would be saying no to life.

Ever since that speech in 1971 Republicans have almost universally supported the War on Drugs; a war that cost nearly $45.5 billion in 2005 alone; a war that imprisons at least one million Americans a year; a war that has failed to reverse or even slow growing rates of drug use; a war on the individual’s freedom of self determination. Nothing could be more hypocritical. The GOP cannot continue to claim to be the party of small government while also supporting the criminalization of non-crimes committed in the privacy of a citizen’s own home.

This is What They Think of You

A friend of mine sent this to me today upon finding out I had ‘converted’ and would be voting Republican in November.

If this isn’t the epitome of Liberal elitism, I don’t know what is. I particularly liked the caricature of the poor working class (who Liberals claim to support and represent) who apparently only vote Republican because they are just to dumb to know any better.

Not to mention the depiction of all rich people as greedy and selfish snobs, whose children are of course irresponsible coke head brats, and whose only rationale for opposing the estate tax is greed. Because God forbid you should be able pass on to your kids what you’ve worked your entire life to build without the government snagging some so they can waste it.

And of course there’s…well me. Apparently my opposition to taxes stems from my greed, which is odd considering I’m a college student who gets all of his taxes back every year. But clearly, since all political action is motivated by self interest, a hunger for money is the only thing that could possibly trump a desire to use the government to force people to accept me. Or maybe I just don’t believe the government should criminalize thoughts (and what do hate crimes laws do, if not criminalize what a person is thinking when they commit a crime?), or dictate to private employers who and how they can and cannot hire.

I really hope more like this comes out during the election, because even Obama can’t dodge the elitism bullet. At least now we know were Obama met those “bitter” voters “clinging to guns or religion.”

STOP!

If I hear another talking head on CNN spout off, “McCain wants to stay in Iraq for 100 years!” I think I might scream. While Obama and Clinton’s ridiculous comments tend to dissipate within a week or two of their utterance the media has been parroting this horrendous misrepresentation of what McCain actually said for months now.

Here’s the truth, when asked about a comment President Bush made that he would stay in Iraq for 50 years if necessary McCain responded, “make it 100.” Of course what you won’t hear on CNN is that he went on to explain that we still have soldiers based in almost every country we have ever won a war against, including Japan and South Korea. The reality is McCain was expressing two facts; first that he would not pull troops out of Iraq until the country is stable, and secondly that even after the majority of troops have been withdrawn some will remain in U.S. bases in the country.

The media’s blatant misrepresentation of this ten second clip is disgraceful, and it needs to stop.

A Glimpse of the Future

An Obama delegate in Illinois resigned recently after she received a ticket for violating a local ordinance banning conduct that disturbs or alarms people. She was given the ticket (a 75$ fine) after she responded to her neighbors refusal to tell their children to stop playing in a small tree on her property by telling them “the tree is not there for them to be climbing in there like monkeys.” She is fighting the ticket.

An Obama campaign spokesperson said, “Given the incident, Linda Ramirez-Sliwinski is stepping down as a delegate and will be replaced.” Way to defend free speech Obama.

You can read more here and here.

Obama Fever

Obsessed With Obama

“I want a world that doesn’t exist. And can’t exist.”

Yup, that sums up Obama Fever.