I hope that the readers of Happily Oblivious are enjoying the first day of a brand new year, or at least not suffering too bad from all the booze they had last night.

I hope that 2009 will be a better year than 2008, but I’m not certain that will be the case. I’ve heard a lot of people expressing optimism that the economy will get better and I have to say that I still think 2009 will be at least as bad as 2008 as a whole. People should still try to be optimistic about their prospects over the next year though. I’m personally happy about the way that my year is starting off, and I think that I’ll be doing a lot better financially than I was last year. Just because the big economic picture looks bad does not mean that you as an individual are doomed to do poorly. A large part of your financial well being is still up to you.

It’s very easy to get demotivated when you read the news these days. If you’re sweating over whether or not you’ll have a job, just remember that even with a high unemployment rate of 10%, that means that 9 in 10 folks in the job market are still employed. If you have lost your job or lost your house in the last year, then try to look at this as a new start. The same thing happened to folks during previous downturns, like the 1930’s depression, but those who didn’t give up were often able to make back the wealth they had lost when things got a little better.

Best Wishes,

Nick

This is the first of what I hope to be many libertarian oriented blog carnivals hosted at Happily Oblivious. I’d like to thank everyone who submitted articles. Now, get reading!

Trevor at the Will to Exist takes a look at 10 “crimes” that aren’t really hurting anybody.

Libertarians believe that for something to be a crime, there must be a victim. Therefore, we believe that consensual acts between legal adults cannot be crimes. They might be morally repugnant. They might be unhealthy and disgusting. They might be tasteless and silly. But they aren’t crimes.

Winton Bates at Freedom and Flourishing writes about the pros and cons of banning drugs and other substances.

I told him that as a businessman he should be aware of the pressure for governments to ban and regulate a lot more things including mixed alcoholic drinks, tobacco, gambling, pornography, vitamin supplements, fatty food, and high calorie food and drinks. I said he should be particularly concerned about pressure for governments to do more to protect people who are vulnerable to advertising and the debtaholics who can’t resist spending up to their credit card limits.

Bill at Liberty’s Life Line tells us about a frightening experience, and the reason that his freedom of choice saved his family’s life.

They are alive because I have the liberty, so far, to buy any vehicle that I choose and can afford.  The choices are many and I have made many choices through my life.  That is primarily because the government has not yet taken away that liberty and demanded what types of vehicles can be built and by whom.

Market Urbanism warns about the dangers of zoning laws to your personal freedoms.

While well intentioned, like many progressive interventions of the eary 1900s, zoning has contributed to sprawl (which has begun to be demonized by progressives over the recent decades) and served to inhibit the vitality and diversity of urban neighborhoods.

Masters in Criminal Justice provides us with a list of the top 50 Constitutional Law blogs. This is a great resource for those who would like to learn more about our rights as Americans.

Steve at The Super Gas Saver explains why an auto industry bailout may lead to higher gas taxes. Yikes!

Many politicians and others would love to see higher fuel taxes. That would raise fuel prices, and that, in turn, would force American drivers to turn to smaller, more fuel efficient vehicles. Driving smaller vehicles that would consume something closer to “our fair share” of the world’s resources would make some tickled pink. That group would not include the majority of American drivers.

Allison from The Smoking Argus Daily wrote a wonderful 4 part series about how to save the republic.

If the Republic is to be saved, the Senate must be restored to its Constitutional position and foundation upon Federalism.  While it is my estimation that many “progressives” were of good and genuine intent to see government reformed and corruption eradicated, their movement was merely co-opted by those who sought a total centralization of power unto themselves for purely selfish desires, not to the benefit of “We the People”.

Wisdom from Wenchypoo’s Mental Wastebasket gives us the truth about the economy and job creation.

I fear, with Democrat rule and the incessant need to make supposedly better decisions for us than we can for ourselves—for that, they need our money. This means that the tax benefits would likely end, along with beneficial trade policies that kept many of us working up until this point.

Greg Laden explains why race, as a concept, is harmful to society and people should be viewed in the context of their humanity instead.

They (racial boundaries) are temporary contrasts that emerge because of the movement of people — but that immediately, or shortly, begin to meld. Even as we assert the reality of the boundaries, measure the boundaries, use the boundaries for medical, social, economic, and political purposes, people on both sides of the boundaries are busy doing the horizontal tango and making babies that sillify the boundaries by the very existence of these babies.

Derek Clark from Geek Politics questions the sanity behind billion dollar bailouts and propping up big business while small businesses (the bread and butter of America, folks) can barely make ends meet.

If we stop doing things right, we will stop making money just like all of these big businesses. Unfortunately, at that point, we will all start to look for new jobs because Uncle Sam will not be writing us any checks. So my question is, why are AIG and GM more important than small businesses around America. Why are their stockholders protected at the expense of the taxpayer?

Greg at The Holy Cause examines whether or not the Bible makes a case for minarchism.

When the Lord created Adam and Eve, there was obviously no strong human form of government; there was what is best described as anarchism (note that this does not mean disorder).

The Frugal Libertarian gives us reasons that the Universal Service Fund (that pesky charge on your phone bill…go look, we’ll wait) amounts to socialism and theft.

Their website says “[t]he fund is maintained through contributions made by telecommunications providers across the country”.  They make these contributions sound as if they are voluntary.  I assure you that they are not.  These “contributions” are mandated by the Telecommunications Act of 1996.

Orna Ross examines the idea of freethinking.

Freethinking originally arose in the nineteenth century as a reaction against organised religion.  Today it still defines itself in that reactive and limiting way and is often used as a synonym for atheism or agnosticism.

James at Rise Up Rochester explains why individualism is better than collectivism (and why there’s nothing wrong with that!).

An individualist philosophy does not necessarily imply a selfish philosophy. Rather, it implies a philosophy which unbiasedly values personal liberty, freedom of expression through choice, and non-violence.

Kavmerica clues us in to the problems created by a two party system.

Democrats and Republicans are the only two parties capable of raising enough money to compete on the national political stage.  Over the years the campaign finances laws have been crafted in such a way that they benefit established parties and not the smaller ‘independents’.  Perhaps they didn’t do so intentionally but it is a by product of their dominance over the years.

Archvillain at Imagination gives us a defense of something that’s largely missing in today’s society: personal responsibility.

Some circumstances can be beyond your control, but how you react to those circumstances is your responsibility. You made the decisions. Choosing not to make a decision is also a decision, so you can’t escape your responsibility that way.

I came across a very interesting collection of photos from the old Soviet gulags. There isn’t much for me to say about this because I honestly don’t know a lot about the gulags or Soviet era Russian history. I just think the photos are great–not the highest quality, of course, but gut wrenching in the same way as photos from the holocaust or modern war zones. The photos were taken between 1927 and 1953. They come with very little description but I highly recommend that you take a few moments to look through them.

The Stand is one of the most enduringly popular Stephen King books, and for good reason. The Stand is a fictional novel about a plague–near total death and destruction–brought about by our own American government’s tinkering with nature. Nearly 90% of the population of Earth is wiped out when a man-made disease, which spreads like wildfire and kills almost everyone who comes into contact with it, is inadvertently released from a US military installation in the barren Nevada desert. The few people who survive the plague must then learn to survive without modern conveniences. There is no electricity. There is no running water. There is no social structure from which to draw comfort or support. There is only each person’s own tenacity and determination to survive in a harsh world filled with rotting corpses and other survivors, some of whom are not only hostile but hell bent on destroying what’s left of the human spirit.

The Stand is a must read for any libertarian or free thinking individual. It’s a long read. The uncut version is over 1000 pages, but it’s well worth the time. The story examines human relations on the small scale as well as the larger scale of society as a whole. What the book points out through brilliant and entertaining storytelling is that society is not always arranged to facilitate the success of the individual, nor is government necessarily instituted to protect anything but itself. The survivors of the plague crave the order that organized society gives them, but they discover that by entrusting their lives to a higher social order, they are leaving their own destinies in the hands of others and setting themselves up for more devastation by allowing a society to determine their destinies instead of taking control of their own lives.

I’ve said little with regards to the actual plot of the book and I think it’s best that way. I was enthralled for the entire novel and I don’t want to say anything to ruin it for someone who hasn’t read the book yet. If you have trouble reading long novels, take The Stand in small doses. The story will keep you entertained and the libertarian undertones will keep you thinking on a higher level.

In the United States, it’s illegal to grow hemp. Many people assume that hemp is illegal due to its mind altering properties. However, this couldn’t be further from the truth. In reality, hemp has no mind altering abilities. It can’t get you high. Smoking industrial hemp would be like smoking a dirty sock–no fun at all and probably not very tasty.

“Hemp contains delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), which is the psychoactive ingredient found in hashish and marijuana. While THC is present in all Cannabis plant varieties to some extent, industrial hemp does not contain an amount to produce any intoxicating effect, even in significant quantities.”

Now that we’ve cleared up the biggest misconception about hemp, you might be wondering how it came to be illegal to grow (but not possess) hemp in the United States. The short answer is that the US government’s blind obedience to the drug war punishes plants that even remotely resemble marijuana. Even though hemp can’t get you high, it does look like marijuana plants which makes it difficult for drug and law enforcement officers to distinguish whether your crop is legal or not. There are also very powerful lobbies–cotton growers, oil producers, etc, who would not appreciate the legalization of a crop which could very well put them out of business.

Now that we’ve discussed the reasons that hemp is illegal to grow in the US, let’s examine the reasons that it should be made legal. First and foremost, hemp is an extremely useful plant. Its fibers can be used to make textiles, hemp seed oil and other food products, diesel fuel, paints, detergents and paper products. Additionally, hemp is easier to grow and replace than trees so using it for our paper products is better for the environment. And I don’t think anyone needs to be told twice that using plant based materials in place of oil and oil byproducts is better for the environment.

Farmers would be well advised to grow hemp as a rotation crop because it uses very little water and has a short growing season. It could potentially help farmers keep the soil productive and avoid the use of pesticides and fertilizers.

All said, hemp is a versatile and worthwhile cash crop which must be imported to the United States instead of grown. The American people would be well advised to demand that our farmers be allowed to legally grow hemp (remember, this plant has no psychoactive properties). I myself use imported hemp to indulge my creative side by making macramé hemp anklets which I can literally wear day in, day out, in and out of the shower for years before they need to be replaced. The hemp fibers are strong, durable and soft. With the American economy on the decline, this would be the perfect time to allow our farmers to begin growing hemp. Not only would it provide a boost to the agricultural section of our economy without the need for any subsidies, but industry could use the additional hemp entering the market to make hundreds of consumer products to the benefit of the manufacturing and retail industries. It doesn’t make sense not to allow our farmers to grow hemp.

To those of you who are avid or occasional readers of this blog, I wanted to say that I’ve been working more hours lately with scarce internet access. I’m doing my best to keep putting up articles for you and Nick has been kind enough to fill in and do extra work while I’m “away”. If this blog should go severals days without an update, I can assure you that it hasn’t been abandoned and we’ll be back soon enough. In the meantime, let’s keep fighting the good fight!

With the DNC starting today in Denver, I almost wish I were still there. I have no desire to see the likes of Obama (or any other Democrats, for that matter), but I would like to be around to feel the atmosphere, to lock myself into a “free speech” cage and to gaze longingly at the Pepsi Center as I realize that with hockey season about to start, I won’t be there to see the Avs play.

I don’t know if I’m just more in tune with the news from Denver or if the city of Denver is far more fascist than Minneapolis, but I haven’t heard about many civil rights violations coming out of Minneapolis with the Republican and Ron Paul conventions in town. What I do know is that the city of Denver has cracked down on civil rights, abolished freedom and basically given its already questionable police-state force unlimited authority to stomp dissenters.

In fact, according to the Westword, which is the Denver Metro area’s biggest independent newspaper, the cops were overheard at an anarchist protest proclaiming, “I just want to shoot these motherf*ckers so bad!” It was a nice show of restraint on the part of the police to allow the pesky anarchists to continue living through the end of the rally. Unfortunately for the anarchists, the Denver police-state doesn’t take kindly to people who don’t believe in the police state.

The march ended roughly four and a half hours after it began, when police were able to box in the anarchists on Stout Street between 15th and 16th, forcing nearly half of the group to escape into a parking garage. The people that ran into the garage were pursued by officers on motorcycle and, later, several white police vans were seen driving into the building.

If you’d like to keep up to date on the latest civil liberties abuses occurring in Denver during the DNC, keep an eye on the Westword.

In this world of government owned property, nothing catches the ire of an idle bureaucrat like the defacement of said property. Jeff Deck and Benjamin Herson learned this the hard way after committing the  heinous crime of conspiring to vandalize government property (or fix government property, depending on your perspective).

Two self-styled vigilantes against typos who defaced a more than 60-year-old, hand-painted sign at Grand Canyon National Park were sentenced to probation and banned from national parks for a year. They had removed an extraneous apostrophe and added a comma to the sign.

The fiberboard sign has yellow lettering with a black background and is several paragraphs long. Deck wrote that they used a marker to cover an erroneous apostrophe, put the apostrophe in its proper place with white-out and added a comma.

The misspelled word “emense” — rather than immense — was not fixed, Deck wrote, because “I was reluctant to disfigure the sign any further. … Still, I think I shall be haunted by that perversity, emense, in my train-whistle-blighted dreams tonight.”

The duo probably thought that they were doing society a favor by correcting the poor grammar on the sign. After all, we’re frequently led to believe that the educational system in the United States is a shambles and that our young are getting stupider by the day. If so, proper spelling and punctuation are a necessity on government signage as the government is the entity charged with educating our children. Unfortunately, the grammar police didn’t see it that way and charged the pair of educated young men with crimes.

In addition to the relative insanity of charging people with the crime of using proper grammar, I must point out that the government in the United States (supposedly) is for the people, by the people. Taxpayers and voters (supposedly) own the government and all government property. These gentlemen, in effect, were charged with vandalizing their own property.

In the United States, military officers are sworn to uphold the Constitution against enemies foreign and domestic. What we see happening, unfortunately, is the US military violating the Constitution while fighting foreign enemies and doing nothing to uphold it against domestic enemies. At this point you may be asking yourself which domestic enemies I speak of. Surely, you say to yourself, there are no major domestic enemies who we should be protected from. Those who wish to harm us are dark skinned foreigners hiding in caves, shrouded in veils of secrecy practicing strange religions and speaking in tongues. But if you believe that there is no major domestic enemy, you’re wrong.

I’ll begin making my case against the most frightening enemy, foreign or domestic, that we’ve ever seen by quoting from the Declaration of Independence–possibly one of the most important and insightful pieces of political writing in all of human history.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

Certainly I don’t quote this passage lightly and without scrutiny, for to say that the government of the United States is the most dangerous enemy they have ever seen could be construed as an act of treason and sedition by those who hold our lives in the palm of their hand. By publishing this, I could be held in violation of the Patriot Act and any number of other laws. I could be held without trial, without access to an attorney, without contact with my family. I could be held indefinitely by the very government sworn to protect me. I could be held in solitary confinement for exercising rights which I am guaranteed under the Constitution and for expressing an idea which is as old as the nation itself. I could be labeled a “terrorist” for speaking openly about the very ideal that the United States was founded on, which has been celebrated for hundreds of years and which has now become a thought crime.

The executive branch of American government has increased its power exponentially since 9/11 in a way that would chill the likes of Jefferson, Franklin, Washington and Paine to their very cores. The executive branch is above the law, above the people and above morality. We have reached a point where no man, no freedom fighter, can fix the executive branch. President Bush has anointed himself King. He has made himself God. He has made himself higher than God. Obama will be our next God, not because he’s qualified, not because he believes in human rights, not because he wants a better America. No, Obama will be our next God because he is just as hungry for power and control, but he’s carefully crafted an image of caring and compassion–an image which is false, which will carry him to power, and once there he will abuse that power just as those who came before him. No, electing a new man to hold office as our elected God will not stop the abuse. We will simply be abused in new and different ways.

Few people are aware that Mr. Bush revised the Insurrection Act to give himself power to declare Martial Law and deploy troops within the United States to be used against American citizens. This power was previously unheard of. Now, you can be disappeared to a secret prison reminiscent of those in Soviet Russia and if enough people finally stand up to fight against it, the people’s own military can be deployed to murder them for doing that which is necessary to secure our freedoms.

Scroll up and read that passage from the Declaration of Independence again. Memorize it, if you can, for it may soon be wiped clean from the slate of history. Jefferson says that governments are created by men to protect basic human rights. However, in the last 200+ years, that concept has become perverted in the United States. It is no longer the government that is here to protect the people, but the people who are here to serve as slaves of the government. Sedition is not an act against the people, but an act against the government. Ignored is that fact that sedition could not occur if the government were ruling with the consent of the governed.

As the United States becomes increasingly fascist in nature, more people have begun to notice the erosion of our freedoms, the lack of respect for the Constitution and the American government’s complete disregard for basic human rights. As more people take heed, more people are also questioning why we are allowing ourselves to be destroyed by this malicious force which has increasingly highlighted the depravity of the human spirit. This government is an enemy domestic. This government is destroying us from within.

What will our troops do when the day comes? Will our men and women in uniform perform their sworn duty to protect the people of the United States from a domestic enemy when it becomes necessary? Or will they follow their orders like good little soldiers, turning on the very people who make this nation great, protecting the government which seeks to destroy us? Those who seek change are not the enemy. When the day comes and Martial Law is declared, I hope that our troops will understand. I hope that they will do what they have promised to do–to uphold the Constitution and the ideals that our people hold so dear. I hope that they will protect us from that highest of evils, that domestic enemy, that government which has turned on us. When that day comes, I hope that I will be able to stand side by side with our soldiers and fight for what is right, even if that is the harder fight to win.

Every once in a great while, I stumble upon something online which really gets my attention. Early this morning was just such an event. The article Why Do Intellectuals Oppose Capitalism? by Robert Nozick takes a look at the educational system and the reasons that the people in positions of power within it tend to exhibit far more socialist tendencies than society at large.

Nozick asserts that intellectuals, specifically those individuals who are both intellectual and highly verbal, are basically coddled by the school system into a false sense of worth or an undeserved sense of entitlement. These are the genius students who are also highly loquacious–the teacher’s pet, if you will. As they move forth through the school system, these students are doted on by their teachers and begin to feel that they’re superior based on their high intellectual abilities. They begin to feel that their intellect merits more praise and makes them more deserving than others. The teachers in the school system mimmick the central authority figure of government in society at large, and so we begin to see the roots of socialist tendencies in educational systems. The  people who are likely to obtain a PhD and spend their adult lives teaching at a university are the very same people who gained a sense of entitlement during their younger years in school. The problem is self perpetuating. At this point I’m going to break from discussion specifically about Nozick’s article and offer anecdotal evidence from my own time spent becoming educated.

I was raised in a conservative Republican household. Keep in mind that this was during the 80s. Republicans at that time were far more conservative than they are today. In the political linguistics of today’s world, my family would be considered more libertarian than Republican. No war-mongering, fascist neocons allowed. As the child of a Republican family, I was raised to believe in hard work, self reliance and liberty. The government was dirty and fending for yourself was the only proper way to live. So it comes as no surprise that when times got tough and money was tight, we suffered through it instead of looking for others to rescue us.

I was always very successful at school, and although highly intelligent, I wasn’t the verbal sort of intellectual. No, I was the introvert–the child that nobody could understand. Because of this, I was able to resist much of the socialist influence of the public school system…until college. I attended the University of Montana, which is a friendly and decent school in Missoula. However, the University is also highly liberal. Missoula, in fact, has a reputation throughout the state of Montana for being so liberal that it’s actually considered insane. And as I worked my way through the University, I was no longer able to resist the socialist propaganda that I was being bombarded with at every turn. In 2004 I voted Democrat (although, in retrospect, President Bush-Cheney has proven himself to be the right hand man of Satan so I’m not beating myself up over it). The socialist school system finally overcame my sensible upbringing and beat the idea of stealing from the few to give to the many into my head as a viable socio-economic system.

What socialists fail to realize is that if everyone is entitled, nobody is working. If I’m entitled to three “free” meals a day, “free” healthcare, “free” education, “free” housing, “free” daycare and a big screen TV, who the heck is paying for it? It certainly isn’t me, because if I can get everything for “free”, I’ve honestly got no incentive to work. If I didn’t have to earn a living, I wouldn’t. If I didn’t have to pay bills, I’d sit around writing for my blog all day every day. And by golly, if I’m educated enough to know how to write words in a sensible manner, doesn’t that entitle me to get everything for “free”? Of course not! I don’t feel that anyone deserves anything more from society than they put into it. And if I’m not willing to get off my arse and work, I don’t deserve jack. Yes, you heard me–I just said I’m not a socialist. The great thing about my upbringing is that those values that I was taught as a child are very near and dear to me. I may have been led astray, but I’ve returned.