Pissed off about Carson City

No this has nothing to do with the government of the State of Nevada, though, it may have to do with the City of Carson City or the county in which it resides.

I have a supplier on the outskirts of Carson City. They have routinely told me that they will ship the items I have just purchased, but in good weather I demure, telling them I will pick them up. Its one hundred and seventy-two miles round trip. My ulterior motive is three fold; first, to alleviate cabin fever, second, the ride through the Sierra Nevada mountains is spectacular, and third, there are several restaurants in Carson City that have good food and a patio (I generally travel with my Better Half and our dog). My favorite eatery has been Red's Old 395 Grill.

However, this last trip I was told by more than one clearly uncomfortable hostess (we tried a couple of different restaurants including Red's) that the pooch was no longer welcomed on the patio - the health inspector insists.

Damn. Damn. Damn.

Next time, they can just ship it.

Reparations for the Rich

Beginning with the New Deal, the rich have been bludgeoned and intimidated into sacrificing more and more for the unfortunate, the lazy, liars, and idiots. Each and every day, more and more of their income has been seized by the republic to fund the ever expanding, unstoppable rush to support the welfare class.

Now set the time machine for the future. At some point one of two things must happen. Either Atlas will shrug, and the earners will drop out, causing the economy to collapse (I know the Obama left thinks this will cause the undeserving wealthy to be replaced in positions of power by historically oppressed gays and minorities, but this will fail, eventually resulting in government ownership of all industry, economic collapse, and the new American communism) - or America will find the political will to boot out the unruly, spitting children in power now and reform the government.

Now, many hardworking, successful people pay upwards of 50% of their income in all the various combined taxes. As regular readers will know, we consider working without pay slavery, as you are basically without choice or compensation for some percentage of your working life. So effectively, if you pay 33% of your income in taxes, you are a 33% slave.

So let me be the first to call for two things.

1. Reparations to those unfairly taxed (and their heirs) by an unfair, oppressive tax system that singles out achievers for punishment. Reparations should be retroactive back to the New Deal.
2. A constitutional amendment that forbids the taxation of the populace at any rate higher than 10% of their total income.
3. A flat or fair consumption based tax that has no deductions, no exceptions, and in no way attempts to influence the behavior of the citizens
4. Automatic 2% tax cuts every year, requiring Congress to vote for increases to maintain current funding levels.
5. Automatic sunsetting and defunding of all new programs unless they show substantial progress in the first 4 years.

There. That should get us started. I can't wait to get my retroactive reparations check.

Patterns of Force

In the Star Trek Episode Patterns of Force, the Enterprise comes across a planet that is replaying the disastrous reign of Hitler's Nazi Germany. You might wonder why anyone would want to do that. As it turns out, Earth Historian John Gill had tried to adapt the aspects of the Nazi regime that restored order to post WWI Germany, while jettisoning the oppressive regime aspects.

At any rate, Gill's peaceful version of Nazism was eventually co-opted and soon the Ekosians were roaming the streets screaming "Death to Zeon!". The all-too-obvious point (at least it was too obvious in 1968) was that you can't cherry-pick the good aspects of a bad thing without taking the rest.

So why is a political blog in 2009 recounting Star Trek?

It seems in Washington D.C. that the Obama Administration is hell-bent on adapting those aspects of Socialism that restore order...

• nationalizing banks
• nationalizing production
• government control of electrical power
• government forcing the manufacture of profitless cars
• exceedingly higher taxes
• government takeover of the press (bailing out newspapers, fairness doctrine)

...without having the nastier aspects of Soviet-style Communism

• secret police
• rewarding citizens to turn one another in to the authorities
• government salary caps
• runaway inflation/devaluation of money
• rationing of health care
• rationing of food
• people disappearing in the dark of night
• closed borders (to keep the citizens in, not to keep illegal aliens out)
• complete sacrifice of personal liberty
• complete sacrifice of privacy

You see, you can't have the so-called free goodies of Communism without the oppressive regime that provides that kind of thing. This needs to stop. The federal government no longer serves the voters. They are in breach of contract. That contract is the United States Constitution, or as they call it in Washington DC, toilet paper.

Oh, and before you call me a racist for thinking Obama's regime (might as well start calling it that now) is headed in a disastrous direction, I need to point out that I opposed the same things when they were floated as ideas in the Clinton and both Bush administrations.

In short, big government is bad government, and will turn on you every single time. That's why our framers carefully crafted the concept of limited government. It's not a perfect system, but it allows the greatest possible amount of personal freedom. In this era, personal freedom is the most rapidly declining resource we have. Once it's gone, it usually takes revolution to get it back. And I don't want to see another American Civil War. Do you? Choose Freedom. Vote these bastards out of office. If they supported any of these bailouts or stimulus plans, they are advancing the cause of government, not you.