Theocrats invoke "principle over party"

"Take back the Party!" says Mr. Doug Hoffman, the Conservative Party candidate in New York's 23rd congressional district. John Karr posted on Goodreads Tea Party: Mr. Hoffman "has the backing of Fred Thompson, Dick Armey, and Sarah Palin. Yet Newt Gingrinch is against him and for the liberal Republican...."

I commented:

Having primary elections is consistent with the government being of, by, and for the people.

Politicians who do not abide by the results of primary elections, yet stay with their Party and continue to reap the benefits of being a member, have no honor.

I read here that Republican candidate Dede Scozzafava is pro-choice and pro-gay rights. I reckon this is why theocrats are invoking "principle over party".

Response to: Mark Sanford on Ayn Rand

* Mark Sanford on Ayn Rand *

[I am an Objectivist-Thomist. I voted for Mr. Obama in 2008 because Mr. McCain is anti-capitalism (his hero is President Theodore Roosevelt), and because the Republican Party has been highjacked by theocrats. I created these topics on Goodreads Tea Party: John Allison for President 2012!! on June 20, 2009 after I joined the Facebook group with the same name, and Mark Sanford 2012 fourteen days earlier. I regularly update the latter with Facebook information which I receive as a Facebook fan of Governor Sanford.]

Governor Sanford presents and agrees with the essentials in Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged. He concludes, “… this is a very good time for a Rand resurgence. She's more relevant than ever.”

The Governor has mixed premises – he was blown away when he read these novels, he remains in-between loving or hating them, and has “grown more critical of Rand's outlook because it doesn't include the human needs we have for grace, love, faith, or any form of social compact.”

The article references Heller's book, and mentions Ayn’s “chief acolyte (and lover)” and her “dictatorial control over her inner circle”.

One’s private life is no one’s business. Everyone deserves privacy. Even the dead. One who disrespects privacy is no respecter of rights.

To repeat what you do not know firsthand is gossip. A decent person rejects hearsay and would judge Ayn Rand by her books, articles, public speeches, and TV appearances. Running one’s inner circle like a volunteer army is not inconsistent with reverence for individual liberty because one is free to join or stay away, and one knows the rules beforehand.

What Governor Sanford considers as “major flaw in Rand's thinking”, I consider his: “Galt … explicitly denies the existence of original sin. The idea that man is perfectible has been disproved by 10,000 years of history. Men and women are imperfect, or "fallen," …” This reveals a belief in a malevolent God. The original sin creed portrays God as unjust. To hold that man is imperfect and non-perfectible is to claim that God is a sadist. Pointing to history as proof that human beings are “fallen” is to evade the history of the United States and the Industrial Revolution.

The Governor goes on to say: “Men and women are imperfect, or ‘fallen,’ which is why I believe there is a role for limited government in making sure that my rights end where yours begin. There is a role for a limited government in thwarting man's more selfish instincts that might limit the freedoms or opportunities of others.”

Ayn Rand said that the only function of law and of government is the protection of individual rights. She revered the Founders: “If it is ever proper for men to kneel, we should kneel when we read the Declaration of Independence.”

Governor Sanford thinks, “… at a fundamental level many people recognize Rand's essential truth…”

Honesty is fidelity to the truth. The truth is what conforms to reality. Integrity is fidelity to logic. It is the refusal to hold contradictions; it is the consistent cohesion of words and deeds; it is honoring one’s mental creations by giving them physical existence.

The right to the pursuit of happiness is the right to selfishness. One not concerned with oneself has no desire to live. The concept of one’s concern for oneself, represented by the word selfishness, has been twisted to mean malevolence towards others. Those who desire to live but accept the twisted meaning of selfishness unwittingly facilitate insidious destroyers. Unable to rule nor influence individuals who accept no guilt in their desire to live and pursue happiness, destroyers demonize their core by associating callousness and malevolence with selfishness.

Is major swindler Bernard Madoff selfish or selfless? The basic selfishness criteria are self-preservation and self-reliance followed by self-love and self-respect. Bernard Madoff is not self-reliant. A dependent, he fed off his victims. Unmindful of losing his liberty, he committed massive fraud. Self-preservation is clearly absent – Madoff does not value himself. He fails even the basic selfishness test. Madoff is selfless.

Selfless means no self: no self-esteem, no self-respect, no self-love.

Independent equals must choose: self-reliance or dependence. Self-reliance requires selfishness. Dependence breeds moochers, looters, and rulers.

The sixteenth amendment, a stick-up of hard-earned wages, tramples on the Declaration of Independence and incinerates property rights. The Antitrust Law spits on logic, puffing up that free competition must be enforced! Undefined, flexible, contradictory laws are hailed. Sacrifice is the Holy Grail. Selfishness is trumpeted as having horns, a pointed tail, and a pitchfork.

Honesty demands that one’s soul be put on trial: The advocacy or sanction of coercion is the mark of evil. Integrity must be summoned to reclaim the Declaration of Independence from the clutches of sacrifice glorifiers.

Check your premises on selfishness. Self-preservation requires it.

The Republican Party shares Governor Sanford’s mixed premises and evasions. I hope his party heeds his advice: “… this is a very good time for a Rand resurgence.” Otherwise, the choice in the once Land of the Free will continue to be: toward-socialism or toward-theocracy.

Bill O'Reilly: No Freedom Fighter

I posted the following comment (# 28) on this article:

Mr. O'Reilly implies that the WH irrationality is Mr. Emanuel’s doing. If this is true, then President Obama is mindless. Otherwise, he is irrational and a tyrant.

Mr. O’Reilly’s counsel to President Obama is not anchored on individual rights. Don’t attack Fox News because it is hypocritical, Mr. O’Reilly advises. President Obama shouldn’t, because it is unconstitutional. Mr. O’Reilly "would remind the president that the US military, being a vital enterprise, deserves a chance to win…." The US military has self-esteem, honoring its constitutional mandate to secure rights. Sacrificing national security and soldiers evinces the civilian leadership’s immorality.

Mr. O’Reilly counsels: drop the healthcare public option, increase insurance competition, add tort reform – because these bring down healthcare costs without taxpayer money. President Obama and Mr. O'Reilly need to be reminded of the Declaration of Independence and what its author said:

"Rightful liberty is UNOBSTRUCTED ACTION according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual."

As top adviser to the president, Mr. O'Reilly guarantees higher poll numbers for Mr. Obama.

Mr. O'Reilly is no freedom fighter.

Thinking by Walter D. Wintle

If you think you are beaten, you are
     If you think you dare not, you don’t
If you like to win, but think you can’t
     It’s almost certain you won’t.

If you think you’ll lose, you’re lost
     For out of the world we find
Success begins with a fellow’s will
     It’s all in the state of mind.

If you think you are outclassed, you are
     You’ve got to think high to rise
You’ve got to be sure of yourself before
     You can ever win a prize.

Life’s battles don’t always go
     To the stronger or faster man
But soon or late the person who wins
     Is the one who thinks “I can.”

A Teenager Asks: What is Truth?

A teenager on Goodreads asks: "What is Truth?" In response, I posted the following:

The truth is what conforms to reality. Honesty is the pursuit of truth; it is the refusal to evade or fake reality.

From Royal Serf, based on Objectivism:

The metaphysically given is the standard of right or wrong. In order to succeed, an individual’s values and actions must conform to metaphysically given facts. Man cannot fly, so the Wright brothers invented the airplane; they found a way to counteract the force of gravity. Man cannot walk on water, so we build boats. Man cannot move a mountain, but we can build a tunnel through it. We can’t prevent earthquakes, so we must erect buildings that could withstand them. Man is a mortal being - doctors and pharmaceutical industries try to save and prolong lives.

The purpose of epistemology is to define a method of cognition that makes a fallible being capable of truth, a method that enables man to gain knowledge of an independent reality. Objectivity requires this method of cognition: logic.

Logic is noncontradictory identification within the full context of one’s knowledge.

Epistemology is a practical necessity – it guides man in the proper use of his conceptual faculty. Thinking, to be valid, must adhere to reality. If man’s goal is knowledge, rather than error or delusion, he must use reason.

Reason is the faculty that organizes perceptual units in conceptual terms by following the principles of logic. Reason is the existence-oriented faculty. It is the faculty of proof.

Knowledge, i.e. knowledge of reality, is contextual and hierarchical. Man’s only direct contact with reality is the data of sense – therefore, they are the standard of objectivity. Reduction is the means of connecting an advanced knowledge to reality, i.e. to the perceptually given, by retracing the essential logical structure of its hierarchical roots. Proof is a form of reduction.

Logic is the means of validating a conclusion objectively. Including the recognition of context and hierarchy, logic is the method of achieving objectivity. Only by using logic could man base his conclusions on reality.

From Ayn Rand and Objectivism: truth 

More from Royal Serf, based on Objectivism:

Objectivity is both a metaphysical and an epistemological concept pertaining to the relationship of consciousness to existence. Metaphysically, it is the recognition of the fact that reality exists independent of any perceiver’s consciousness. Epistemologically, it is the recognition of the fact that a man’s consciousness must acquire knowledge of reality by means of reason in accordance with logic.

Objectivity holds that in matters pertaining to human knowledge, metaphysically - reality is the only authority; epistemologically – one’s own intellect. Reality is the ultimate arbiter of the mind. In all aspects of human existence, man achieves his values only by making his decisions consonant with the facts of reality.

Axiomatic concepts are the foundation of objectivity. Objectivism has three axioms: existence exists, consciousness, and the law of identity: Aristotle’s A is A. Axioms are perceptual self-evidencies. They are the starting points of cognition, on which all proofs depend.

A is A, and contradictions are impossible. Every entity has a specific, noncontradictory nature. It is self-evident that an entity can act only in accordance with its nature. The law of causality is the law of identity applied to action. Causality is a corollary of identity. All actions are caused by entities. The nature of an action is caused and determined by the nature of the entities that act; a thing cannot act in contradiction to its nature.

A fundamental principle to the metaphysics of Objectivism is the primacy of existence. Existence comes first. Things are what they are independent of consciousness. Consciousness is a dependent – its function is to grasp that which exists.

St. Thomas Aquinas, the man who ended the Middle Ages and ushered in the Renaissance, said reason does not rest on faith but is a self-contained, natural faculty which works on sense experience. Echoing Aristotle, he said that the essential task of reason is to gain knowledge of this world.

St. Thomas Aquinas declared that men must use and obey reason because whatever one can prove by reason and logic is true. He held that faith is valuable as a supplement to reason.

Can reason and faith coexist, parallel to each other, in the same man? This question is included in the Reason Reigns trailer.

For NJ Governor, Write-in Judge Andrew Napolitano (July 19, 2009)

Judge Andrew Napolitano is a staunch advocate of Jeffersonian principles. Intelligent, accomplished, and well-known, he has a good chance of being elected.

Short-term goals: defeat President Obama’s candidate and derail the assault on freedom.

Long-term goals:

A Jeffersonian governor who is well versed in the law and who has great friends in the media would be a great leader in the fight for individual rights.

As governor, Judge Napolitano could assert to the Federal Government and to the Courts that the principle of individual rights is not subject to a public vote and that capitalism is the only economic implementation of political freedom.

He could proclaim that businesses and workers should not pay any federal taxes or fees, and that the State Government would protect them from tyrannical Federal agencies and laws, like Antitrust. He could assert State Rights, and would give to the Federal government only 1/50th of the Defense Department budget.

He could fight to eliminate or phase out State laws or policies that violate Rights. He could phase out coerced welfare and State taxes.

These acts would attract businesses, entrepreneurs, and productive citizens. These would lead to prosperity-explosion in the State.

Other States, like Virginia, could follow suit, leading to a concerted effort to rein in the government.

For more information on Judge Napolitano: here

Honest Reaganites: Ponder a Contradiction and the Theocracy Threat (July 19, 2009)

A Tea Partier at http://www.reteaparty.com says he is an Independent, his favorite book is Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand, and his favorite President is Ronald Reagan. He says, “I am a Tea Partier because I have a strong intrinsic commitment to individual freedom, free markets, and the constitution….”

Reaganites profess to revere individual freedom and free markets, yet President Reagan was anti-capitalism. Not a single antitrust law was repealed or amended under his watch. In 1985, more than a dozen executives from electrical contracting firms were jailed for antitrust violations.

Free competition enforced by law is a contradiction. Under the Antitrust laws, no matter what a businessman does, he becomes a criminal. If he charges prices deemed too high, he is guilty of monopoly or the ‘intent to monopolize’; if he charges prices lower than those of his competitors, he is guilty of ‘unfair competition’ or ‘restraint of trade’; and if he charges the same prices as his competitors, they are all guilty of ‘collusion’ or ‘conspiracy.’

Full disclosure and insider trading laws allow intervention by force into the very process of gaining and using knowledge. Intellectual egalitarianism, the belief that the minds and the knowledge of all men must be equalized, is their root premise.

John Shad, SEC chairman in the Reagan Administration, initiated the explosive growth of insider trading prosecutions in 1981. He said about defining unfair use: “Once you get one, it doesn’t take sophisticated minds long to figure out where the edges are.”

Laws without edges are tyrannical. A conscious effort to avoid defining unfair use, rendering the most honest bankers and investors vulnerable to prosecution and persecution, is evil. President Reagan sanctioned this evil.

Politics defines the principles of how man should treat other men. Political freedom is an individual’s freedom from physical compulsion, coercion, or interference by the government. The government holds a monopoly on the use of force. Injecting private matters, e.g. family values, into the realm of coercive power is rights-infringement.

Advocates of a law declaring that a human zygote is an actual human being are theocrats, the moral descendants of Galileo’s persecutors. Using a zygote to justify imposing a tortured life on a girl/woman and the child she would bear is akin to decreeing “The sun revolves around the Earth” as scientific fact.

Theocrats spurn God’s greatest gift: reason. Instead of using reason and persuasion to advance their values, they advocate using coercion.

It is logical that anti-capitalists, like President Reagan, would insidiously pave the way towards theocracy.

Freedom Advocates - In Words and In Deed (July 19, 2009)

When asked to be king, George Washington responded: “Abhorrent!” He rejected power. Power-lust is for little men.

For over a century now, kings in the three branches of government puff up with power. They crave to boss citizens around, infringing the individual's right to be the boss of himself and his business. Taxpayers are under a bipartisan dictatorship.

To “do good by force” is a power-luster’s subterfuge. People motivated by the desire to do good yet advocate coercion are frauds – they are motivated by power-lust and envy. Loathe to admit even to themselves that they survive by looting, the enemies of producers invent causes to "do good". Rights-infringement is unacceptable regardless of the motivation.

The Democratic and Republican Parties claim to champion the people’s welfare. Touting platforms that are in the public interest, they have a common way of implementing them: by force. The advocacy or sanction of coercion is the mark of evil.

President Ronald Reagan was a staunch supporter of Antitrust and Insider Trading laws. Those who evade that these are tyrannical laws are on the side of freedom destroyers.

Many Reagan admirers are moral descendants of Galileo's persecutors. Reaganites evade that an embryo has no brain activity, the criterion used to declare that a person is no longer alive. They blank out that it takes cruelty to impose a tortured life on a mother and her baby, and that giving one's baby up for adoption is 24/7 torture for life.

In socialism: looters and moochers are kings, and babysitting adults by force is the law. But theocracy is the worst scourge of mankind. A theocrat would burn a Galileo at the stake; whereas, a socialist would let him live, hoping that he would sacrifice for society.

Uncommon citizens: let us elect Jeffersonians in words and in deed. They do not hold contradictions.

The Art of Nonfiction: A Guide for Writers and Readers by Ayn Rand

Ayn said that what one needs for nonfiction writing is what is needed for life in general: an orderly method of thinking. Writing, she said, is literally only the skill of putting down on paper a clear thought, in clear terms.

She discussed subject and theme, creating an outline, writing the draft, floating abstractions, editing, style, book reviews and introductions, writing a book, selecting a title, and acquiring ideas for writing.

She contrasted an active psycho-epistemology (i.e. method of thinking) with a conforming one. She discussed the only way to learn, the only way to be independent. She stressed independent thinking and principles.

The Art of Fiction: A Guide for Writers and Readers by Ayn Rand (Read in August, 2009)

Ayn Rand is an excellent teacher.

From my Goodreads profile (see here):

I learned fiction writing from Ayn Rand's The Romantic Manifesto (A Philosophy of Literature), and from books that pleasure me. I revere Ayn Rand and her hero in The Fountainhead, Howard Roark....

Candide by Voltaire (Read in August, 2009)

** spoiler alert **

Excerpt from the book jacket: "Candide is relentless in its attacks upon corruption and hypocrisy - in religion, government, philosophy, science, and even romance.”

Kudos to Voltaire for writing about a great subject and for his courage in exposing unreason. But I give it three stars out of five because of the following:

1. I do not appreciate ridicule that does not include an alternative to what's derided. Candide’s “we must cultivate our garden” is a resolution without a foundation - the stated purpose is vacuous.

At the end of the story, Candide resolves to work to avoid boredom, vice, and want. This has nothing to do with what the book ridicules: slavery, thuggery, wars, or unreason. It blanks out the use of the mind in one’s work.

2. Unlike his purposeful resolve to be reunited with Cunegonde, Candide’s globe-trotting is driftwood-like. What happens when they are reunited is not romantic nor Romantic.

3. In Candide, Voltaire used the emotion-oriented literary style: he asserted rather than showed.

4. Voltaire showed no hows nor whys in his El Dorado (Golden City). It is perfect. Period. The basis for the wealth and peaceful existence is not depicted. The place has a king which means the citizens have a boss.

Gold and gem stones are considered worthless. The place uses money as a medium of exchange but the standard of value is not mentioned.

Selected Stories of O. Henry (Read in July, 2009)

O. Henry is a great delight. He transported me to his world of joy and wonderful surprises.

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin (Read in July, 2009)

Dr. Benjamin Franklin is the embodiment of Thomas Edison’s “Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration.” He came from a poor family. His sensible father was of good character. Dr. Franklin was a deist. What God has given man, he purposefully, methodically, and continually used to improve himself. A self-driven independent thinker, he endeavored to improve, not only mentally and financially, but morally. He did it for his own sake, and the fruits became the glory of mankind.

Dr. Franklin resolved to practice virtues every moment. He said he was not so successful in some, e.g. Order, but his ambitious efforts did him well. Some in the list, e.g. humility, were purposed to conquer his natural inclinations. It is clear from his depictions of his practice of humility that he did not mean self-abasement nor self-negation – he practiced diplomacy. He said about humility:

“I cannot boast of much success in acquiring the reality of this virtue, but I had a good deal about the appearance of it… In reality, there is, perhaps, no one of our natural passions so hard to subdue as pride. Disguise it, struggle with it, beat it down, stifle it, mortify it as one pleases, it is still alive, and will every now and then peep out and show itself; you will see it perhaps, often in this history; for even if I conceive that I had completely overcome it, I should be probably proud of my humility.”

A benevolent man of great honor, Dr. Franklin had no mean bone in his body. He used reason and persuasion to advance his convictions. His integrity earned the respect and trust of his fellowmen. It is logical that he could not subdue his pride – because, as Ayn Rand said, “pride is the sum of all virtues” (see here). Dr. Franklin earned the virtue of pride.

He depicted errors that he regretted. He had the misfortune of losing a four-year-old son to smallpox.

I found page 63 very interesting. I dearly enjoyed reading Dr. Franklin’s words. I laughed heartily at this part: a great gun is certainly a fire engine.

Dr. Benjamin Franklin had an exemplary, glorious life.

Autobiography of Thomas Jefferson

I read the Autobiography of Thomas Jefferson in February, 2009. I dearly worship Mr. Jefferson. It is exceptionally wonderful to read his own words about his life. As I expected, he treasured his privacy - he said very little about his private life. He lovingly spoke of his wife in one sentence - he said he lived with her in "unchequered happiness".

Mr. Jefferson clearly admired Mr. George Washington and Dr. Benjamin Franklin. I love these:

"I served with General Washington in the legislature of Virginia, before the revolution, and, during it, with Dr. Franklin in Congress. I never heard either of them speak ten minutes at a time, nor to any but the main point, which was to decide the question. They laid their shoulders to the great points, knowing that the little ones would follow of themselves."

"Were we directed from Washington when to sow, and when to reap, we should soon want bread."

In 1769, chosen for the first time to be a member of a legislature, he "made one effort in that body for the permission of the emancipation of slaves, which was rejected..."

Youngsters-friendly, Rapid-fire Q&A about Political Principles

From Royal Serf:

An eighteen-year-old boy from the audience asked, “Mr. Marianto, could we have a youngsters-friendly, rapid-fire Q&A about political principles? First: the principle of Individual Rights?”

     “Live and let live. Thou shall not coerce.”

“Capitalism?”

     “Mind your own business. Good work is the key to good fortune.”

“Socialism?”

     “Babysitting adults by force. Legalization of robbery.”

“Mixed economy?”

     “Clean water with drops of poison. A mixture of freedom and controls devoid of principles.”

“Antitrust Laws?”

     “Russian roulette, with the government holding the gun to every businessman’s head.  Government-mined fields traversed by businessmen.”

“Regulations?”

     “Shackles for wealth and job creators.”

“Profit?”

     “To the irrational: damn if you do; damn if you don’t. Greed if you profit; greed if you don’t.”

“Do good by force?”

     “What President George Washington called ‘abhorrent’. The power-luster’s subterfuge. Absolving the lazy from the necessity of thinking. Arranged marriage.”

“Coercion?”

     “Military draft. Taxation. Government as CEO of the economy. The command to eat vegetables.”

“Centrist?”

     “Too lazy or cowardly to take up a position. Revels in contradictions.”

“Extremist?”

     “A pragmatist’s description of one who has integrity.”

“Pragmatist?”

     “Anti-reality. Anti-reason. One who blanks out the past, the future, the whys, the wherefores, and the hows.”

“Lobbying?”

     “Courting crooks.”

“Dirty Politicians?”

     “Power-hungry. Tax-guzzlers.”

Same-sex Unions - May 16,2009

Any act that does not pick my pocket nor break my leg is none of my business and none of the government’s.

“The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others.” - Thomas Jefferson

Miss California Carrie Prejean has been disparaged because she favors traditional marriage, a legal union of a man and a woman. She is appreciated by opponents of same-sex unions.

Opponents of same-sex unions are theocrats or collectivists. They spurn self-ownership.

Theocrats advocate that one’s life belongs to God. They crave to impose in God’s name, in contradiction to God’s creation: free will. Collectivists advocate that one’s life belongs to society. They deem that man exists by permission, not by right, that he exists to serve the public, and that he must conform to the majority’s mores.

Advocates of same-sex unions who want to enforce acceptance are of the ilk of theocrats and collectivists.

I respect the freedom of theocrats and collectivists to speak out against same-sex unions. Their beliefs neither pick my pocket nor break my leg. I hope these citizens will never be voted into the seat of coercive power.

To advocates of same-sex unions who respect rights: think of Patrick Henry. A man of moral certainty, he dismissed evil:

“If this be treason, make the most of it.”

Cockroaches Objecting to Skyscrapers - December 17, 2008

The throwing-shoes incident in the presidential press conference in Iraq shows contempt for freedom. The gleeful outpouring of support for the profound hatred of freedom and benevolence must never be forgotten when the USA sends her troops to harm’s way or when she allocates taxpayer money.

Cultures that revel in the malevolence of flying shoes are not worth risking the life of a single American soldier. They do not deserve one taxpayer dollar. Neither the cowards in these cultures deserve freedom or benevolence.

The shoe thrower and his supporters are cockroaches objecting to skyscrapers.

Declaration of Socialism - February 11, 2009

President Obama said that government deficit spending stimulates the economy. This is the dishonest version of ‘spread extorted wealth around’. Deficit spending is wealth confiscation, wealth created by productive slaves. Much, if not all, will be borne by yet-to-be-born producers. Right to life includes the freedom to not be burdened with other people’s debts or costs of living. Mr. Obama is no respecter of rights.

“It is absolutely true that we can't depend on government alone to create jobs or economic growth," President Obama said. "But at this particular moment, with the private sector so weakened by this recession, the federal government is the only entity left with the resources to jolt our economy back into life. It is only government that can break the vicious cycle where lost jobs lead to people spending less money which leads to even more layoffs."


Only the government has the power to coerce. Mr. Obama’s solution to the ailing economy is: more coercive power – more enslavement.

Tragically, the alternative offered by the Republican Party, a staunch advocate of oppressive laws like antitrust and insider trading, is a path towards theocracy.

Recessions are caused by serfdom. The cure is freedom. Dr. Benjamin Franklin observed:

“Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need for masters.”

The solution to the devastating loss of jobs is capitalism. Unleash job creators!

Job Losses: Dishonest Diagnosis, Deadly Prescriptions - February 3, 2009

It is devastating when a breadwinner loses his job, or when there are no jobs for jobseekers. Yet, politicians, judges, the media, and voters unremittingly bash job-creators, i.e. businessmen.

The most prolific job-eradicator is the government. The destruction of jobs and their creators is due to serfdom made possible by unreason, envy, power-lust, and the criminalization of the value enshrined in the Declaration of Independence: the freedom of action in the pursuit of individual self-interests.

For more than a century, businessmen have been slaves. Power-lusters, looters, and moochers have rendered them fair game to every vilification, extortion, and rights-infringement by dishonestly portraying them as callous evil crooks.

Job-creators are widely denounced as exploiters of consumers, employees, investors, competitors, and the public. It is dishonestly blanked out that businessmen with no political pull cannot impose their products or services on anyone. Only the government has the power to coerce.

Job-creators are widely denounced as materialistic and greedy. It is irrationally evaded that they must earn profits in order to survive, that big profits mean more jobs. In a government where extortion has been legalized, big profits also mean more money in the coffers of the kings: i.e. congressmen, senators, and the president, as well as the royalty: i.e. recipients of coercive-favor or coercive-welfare.

The only savior of jobs and their creators is freedom. Unleash the job creators!

But power-lusters, looters, and moochers will not relinquish their coercive power over businessmen. Although many job-creators have gone out of business or have been jailed and banned from creating more jobs, e.g. Mr. Mike Milken - the creator of 62 million jobs, the job-eradicators irrationally believe there will always be job-creators to bash.

If you cherish jobs and freedom:

o Champion reason
o Advocate capitalism: the complete separation of state and economics
o Free businessmen
o Value people who do not want the unearned
o Do not confuse capitalists with political entrepreneurs. Capitalists do not want the government to coerce anyone in their behalf. Political entrepreneurs loot through corrupt politicians.

Support for serfdom leading to job-eradication is hugely bipartisan. Democrats are for socialism and the Republican Party is not for capitalism.

Republicans staunchly support tyrannizing job-creators with regulations like antitrust and insider trading. The Republican Party is not for freedom: it is not pro-choice, the cornerstone of liberty. It dishonestly describes itself as pro-life. Inasmuch as the Republican Party blanks out the life of the pregnant human being, since it champions destroying the life of an actual human being, most of the time: a young girl, and because it advocates force – it advocates forcing a female human being to go through a lifetime paying for a mistake - the Republican Party is certainly not pro-life. It is paving the way towards the worst scourge of mankind: theocracy.

A corrupt government has favors to sell. Unwilling to relinquish this goldmine, it cannot grasp that what rights-respecting producers and consumers do is none of the government’s business, that the rights-respecting market must be absolutely free for the economy to survive. Freedom categorically ends lobbying and favor-seeking because it ends the politicians’ power to offer extorted property and their own souls for sale in the name of the poor and the middle class and in the interest of the public. Serfdom is not in the interest of rights-respecting people.

Serfdom, e.g. businessmen-bashing, neutron-bombs jobs. The honest prescription to the loss of millions of jobs is freedom.

Unleash capitalism. Free the job creators!”

Serfdom - January 21, 2009

In his inaugural speech, President Obama spoke of duty and the price and rewards of citizenship, both contrary to the principles enshrined in the Declaration of Independence.

Duty is an unchosen obligation – a free man chooses his responsibilities.

An individual owns his own life – it does not belong to the state. The only obligation of a free man is to respect the equal rights of others – he does not have to pay a price to be allowed to live.

Reason, Logic, and Good Premises - November 10, 2008

President-elect Barack Obama referred to President Abraham Lincoln in his first speech on the day he was elected President of the United States of America. He mentioned self-reliance and individual liberty.

These are President Lincoln’s wise words:

"We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing. With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor; while with others, the same word may mean for some men to do as they please with other men, and the product of other men's labor. Here are two, not only different, but incompatible things, called by the same name - liberty. And it follows that each of the things is, by the respective parties, called by two different and incompatible names - liberty and tyranny.”

Aside from using the same word but not meaning the same thing, one could also hold contradictory values. But contradictions are impossible. Either one is for liberty or for tyranny.

I hope President-elect Obama is for self-reliance and individual liberty. If he is, he must check all his premises so that he will not champion contradictory policies. Based on his campaign declarations, he has many principles incompatible with self-reliance and individual liberty. I hope that as president, he will not espouse contradictions.

Logic is non-contradictory identification within the full context of one’s knowledge.

Mr. President-elect, I wish you: Reason, Logic, and Good Premises.

Unbridled Greed for the Power to Coerce - November 1, 2008

One who utters “unbridled greed” is maliciously envious. A politician, like Senator John McCain or Senator Barack Obama, uses this term to cover his unbridled greed for the power to coerce.

Governments’ sole justification for being is explicitly stated in the Declaration of Independence: to secure individual rights. The principle of equal inherent inalienable Rights is: as long as a man does not infringe the equal rights of others, anything goes - he is free to determine and pursue his own happiness - he is free to be selfish. The rich, the middle-class, and the poor have equal rights. Politicians and citizens who demonize the rich are no respecters of Individual Liberty.

Thomas Jefferson said:

“Reason and persuasion are the only practicable instruments.”

To remove the use of force from citizen interactions so that individuals may deal with each other only by reason and persuasion, citizens delegate their right to self-defense to their government. Citizens cannot delegate a right they do not possess – hence, the government does not have the right to regulate inherent inalienable Rights, including the rights of individuals who hold that selfishness is a virtue.

George Washington said,

"Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master."

There is bipartisan dedication in Congress and in the presidential candidates to criminalize Individual Liberty. To do this, politicians lust to outlaw selfishness. They hurl “unbridled greed”, not at themselves, their protégés, nor the administrators of their government-sponsored enterprises like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, but at wealth and job creators.

Neither the rich nor the selfish have the power to coerce. Only the government has the power to use force. When the government enters the realm of production and trade, it dishonors its noble mandate – it becomes a tyrant. Politicians who hurl “unbridled greed” at citizens are cannibals. They corrupt the government’s noble mandate to secure individual rights.

Power-Lusters and their Serfdom-tool: Regulations - October 30, 2008

I cherish the principle of equal inherent inalienable rights because it adheres to my personal philosophy: I want to be happy, but never at the expense of anyone. I earn my own happiness. I don’t want anyone to sacrifice or to be regulated for me. I greatly appreciate acts of benevolence, and I am forever grateful to innovators who carry me along to a better existence where their brilliant minds take them.

It is in my own self-interest that active minds flourish. They can flourish only in freedom.

The response of power-lusters to great achievement is not admiration, but a desire to destroy or control. They succeed because many citizens evade that regulation is a form of slavery, and that their approval or silence is an endorsement of serfdom.

Regulations are used by politicians, their protégés, and constituents to lord it over wealth creators. As President George Washington would say, such tyranny and these tyrants are abhorrent.

Neither Senator Barack Obama nor Senator John McCain is an advocate of freedom. It is logical that they are both anti-capitalism. Senator Obama plans to spread the wealth around while Senator McCain’s hero is President Theodore Roosevelt, a dedicated antitrust enforcer who, by endorsing income tax and an inheritance tax in 1908, became the first President of the United States to openly propose that the political power of government be used to redistribute wealth.

Alan Greenspan says in his essay entitled Antitrust:

"No one will ever know what new products, processes, machines, and cost-saving mergers failed to come into existence, killed by the Sherman Act before they were born. No one can ever compute the price that all of us have paid for that Act which, by inducing less effective use of capital, has kept our standard of living lower than would otherwise have been possible."

The following is from Mike Milken, a brilliant innovator who created millions of jobs, and consequently, tyrannized by power-lusters:

“In 1993, a new government health-plan proposal would have led to sweeping changes in the pharmaceutical industry, including what some feared would be regulation of rates of return on investments. This would have had a major impact on an industry in which it can take 14 years to bring a new drug to market. The ten largest companies in the industry lost a staggering $70 billion in market capitalization in only 14 months because of the mere possibility of regulated rates of return. Tragically, but logically, pharmaceutical companies responded by cutting research-and-development budgets in a necessary realignment of risk and return. While we'll never be able to measure what medical breakthroughs may have been lost or delayed, one thing is certain: corporate managements can never afford to ignore regulatory developments.

In the late 1980s, Congress passed the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery and Enforcement Act (FIRREA), which typified a brief period of over-regulation that targeted insurance companies, bondholders, banks and other lenders. Well-meaning but ill-advised, FIRREA banned investments by savings and loan institutions in non-investment-grade companies and forced the S&Ls to sell existing loans that had been made to these enterprises — the very companies that create all the new jobs in America. (Over the last 30 years, more than 100 percent of jobs created in the U.S. have come from small and medium-sized companies that don't qualify for an "investment-grade" credit rating. During the same period, the 800 or so investment-grade companies have actually shed a net four million workers while smaller companies created 62 million jobs.) At the time, there was only a handful of investment-grade companies headed or controlled by African Americans, Hispanics, women or unions.

Thus, as recently as the late 20th century, the Congress of the United States effectively, albeit unknowingly, said it was illegal to provide capital to businesses headed by minorities and women or to any company that would create jobs. It was OK to make a mortgage loan that would build a building; but you couldn't finance the company that provided jobs for the people inside the building. That's why I called FIRREA and similar regulatory acts "neutron legislation" - like a neutron bomb, they left buildings standing but eliminated the people, or at least their jobs. Because only a handful of our 50 states have more than a few dozen "investment-grade" companies (some states have no such companies), Congress effectively redlined most regions of the country, reducing asset values and employment.”

Serfdom has bipartisan support in Congress, and we will soon have a president of like mind.

I hope citizens of mettle will rise to defend freedom -- that the nation conceived in Liberty shall not perish from the Earth.

Socialism or Theocracy - October 26, 2008

The choice in the Land of the Free has become: toward-socialism or toward-theocracy.

Socialism is a lesser evil. Thus, I hope the Republican Party will be demolished in November, and then a party for Individual Liberty will rise to clobber the Democratic Party.

Since every American is free to be a religionist, deist, atheist, or agnostic, there is no justification for injecting religion in a political party to achieve religious freedom. Thus, an organized religion that pursues a political agenda lusts for the power to use force to impose its beliefs.

Theocrats have hijacked the Republican Party.

Man, by nature, is fallible and not omniscient. Teenagers could make mistakes and get pregnant. The Republican Party holds that such youngsters have no window to change course, and must go through a lifetime paying for a mistake. The party holds itself as an advocate of life, yet champions forcing a woman, or even a girl, to suffer the toils of unchosen paths.

A political party that wants to impose a tortured life on a citizen is a monster. It is against happiness; hence, it is not pro-life. After imposing a no-abortion policy, it would prohibit birth control and divorce, by force. Think back – the power loom and anesthesia were denounced as sins; Galileo was convicted of heresy because he advocated that the Earth revolves around the sun.

Capitalism and the Declaration of Independence - October 12, 2008

Capitalism is rooted in the Declaration of Independence (DOI), which, in turn, is rooted in reality....  (the article is here)

I posted the following on Goodreads on October 3, 2009 (message 10 here):

1. This is the rationale for the existence of the US government: To remove the use of force from citizen interactions so that individuals may deal with each other only by reason and persuasion, citizens delegate their right to self-defense to their government.

2. The USA's fundamentals:

----the individual's life belongs to him (individual rights)

---- the government’s only function is to ensure every individual’s freedom

3. A right is that which can be exercised without anyone's permission. Rights are rights to action, not to man-made values.

"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, — …"

"Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual." - Thomas Jefferson

4. The entity that has a monopoly on coercive power must not intervene in any other realm (e.g. moral & intellectual (e.g. production & trade)) because this defeats the purpose of the self-defense delegation:

---- it injects the use of force into interactions, and only one party has the legal power of "Do what you're ordered to do, or else": the government

---- the rights-protector must, at all times, be an impartial referee; thus it cannot be a player and a referee at the same time

5. The principle of individual rights mandates the:

---- separation of church and state
---- separation of state and economics
---- separation of state and education
---- separation of state and science
---- separation of state and arts
---- ...

6. What independent equals delegate to their government is their right to self-defense - this means that the government has no right to interfere in the intellectual and moral life of its citizens. It is not the government's function to protect a citizen from himself or from nature.

The Declaration of Independence mandates absolute freedom in all realms not involving the use of force delegated to prevent, counteract, defeat, and punish fraud and the initiation of force.

The Police Force and Criminal Courts prevent rights-infringers from defrauding, robbing, or physically harming citizens; they apprehend and prosecute rights-infringers; the Civil Courts resolve civil disputes; the Armed Forces prevent, repel, and defeat foreign aggression. Government functions other than these subvert the Declaration of Independence because they involve using force against innocent citizens.

Men are independent equals with inalienable rights to pursue happiness. Having no slaves, each man is responsible for sustaining his own life. The government has no right to extort in order to provide goods or services for its citizens’ sustenance. The government has no right to infringe the inalienable rights of citizens who do not attempt to defraud, rob, or physically harm other people.

7. Citizens cannot delegate a right they do not possess – hence, the government has no right to regulate inherent inalienable Rights, including the rights of individuals who hold that selfishness is a virtue.

Wealth has to be created or earned. If an individual does not share his creations or earnings, he is not infringing anyone's rights. No one has a right to one's property except the owner. A law mandating its disposition is a stick-up. A government could call it taxation, regulation, or nationalization, but any honest man recognizes its nature: it is legalized armed robbery. Honesty shines light on the fact that as it is a crime for an individual to rob or loot, it is a crime for a government to expropriate the property of any of its citizens.

Part 3: The US Presidential Candidates’ Declaration of Dependence and Sacrifice - October 1, 2008

One who declares for a cause higher than the individual cannot claim to be a defender of individual liberty.

Individualism regards every man as an independent, sovereign entity who possesses inalienable rights. An individualist respects individual liberty — his own and that of others. Independent equals must choose: self-reliance or dependence. Self-reliance requires selfishness. Dependence breeds moochers, looters, and rulers.

Men who glorify servility need serfs to provide their sustenance. They are not satisfied with benevolence; they demand sacrifice – the renunciation or destruction of the precious. They damn selfishness as evil, and preach masochism and sadism in the name of service and sacrifice.

Selfless means no self: no self-esteem, no self-respect, no self-love. One who is not self-reliant, a moocher or a looter, is selfless. He does not use his own mind. Having no self-respect, he needs others – for approval, guidance, and/or sustenance. One who babysits adults dishonors independence, and derives self-esteem from others. A criminal is selfless - he recklessly risks his life and freedom for his need of victims. A power-luster tramples on individual liberty and derives satisfaction from enslaving others – he is not an individualist; he is not selfish.

Those who fear self-reliance, i.e. selfishness, demonize individualism - they advocate service and sacrifice. Since President Abraham Lincoln and his heroes had eradicated serfdom, citizens are conned into thinking that voluntary self-immolation is noble. Men conned into regarding selfishness as evil evade that it is enshrined in the Declaration of Independence. They unwittingly facilitate power-lusters who recognize that man’s love of self must be destroyed so rulers could thrive.

To value is a function of the self – it is selfish to care for loved ones; their well-being or happiness is not divorced from the valuer’s. That good people live and prosper is in one’s own self-interest – one benefits from the advantages of social existence: exchange of knowledge, trade, division of labor, and defense from force – one wants to live in freedom and in peace – therefore, to cherish a society that respects individual rights is selfish.

The virtue involved in caring for loved ones and doing the right thing is integrity: you love, so you care; you think it is right, so you do it.

Individualists do not need sacrificial lambs. Men with self-esteem, i.e. selfish men, take pride in independence. One cannot achieve happiness without self-esteem. Without self-respect, life is not worth living. This explains why men of integrity do the right thing no matter the cost. No matter how difficult, they cannot do otherwise - they cannot sacrifice their self-respect. Doing the right thing is not sacrifice – it is upholding the precious, not renouncing or destroying it – this explains why President Lincoln did not utter service or sacrifice in his Gettysburg Address.

Patrick Henry immortalized selfishness when he said, “Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!"

President George Washington protected and preserved individual liberty when he rejected a movement to make him King of the United States, calling it "abhorrent", and when he refused to run for a third term. He evinced an enormous respect for himself and his fellowmen. He personified integrity.

President Thomas Jefferson said, "The care of human life and happiness, and not their destruction, is the first and only object of good government."

Those who damn selfishness denounce the desire to live happily. Those who need slaves damn selfishness because people who value themselves cannot be ruled. Men who love themselves but facilitate these damners are cowards.

You who defend selfishness honor its advocates: President George Washington, the Founding Fathers, President Abraham Lincoln, and brave individuals who struggled or are struggling that the nation conceived in Liberty might live.

Those who declare for self-renunciation or self-destruction are unfit protectors of individual liberty. They should be voted out from the government of the people, by the people, for the people –

That the Land of the Free shall not perish from the earth!

Part 2: The US Presidential Candidates’ Declaration of Dependence and Sacrifice - September 25, 2008

The US presidential candidates exhort Americans to serve and sacrifice, but they clearly differ for whom or what. The following dialogue is fiction but based on facts:

American: Senators McCain and Obama, are you men of integrity?

Senator McCain: Yes, I sure am.

Senator Obama: Certainly; I am.

A: You both hold the conviction that the ideal of service and sacrifice is a cause greater than the individual.

SJM: On my honor, I do.

SBO: I solemnly do.

A: Senator Obama, since Senator McCain sacrificed in a war while you have not, would you now honor your ideal by halting your campaign, thereby sacrificing your wish to serve as President of the USA?

Senator McCain, since you have already sacrificed and served for many years, would you now honor your ideal by sacrificing your wish to serve as President of the USA, that Senator Obama may experience what you both hold dear?

SBO: But there is a cause greater than my wish to serve and sacrifice as president: this country and the world need me and my vision for change!

SJM: I have a duty greater than my wish to further serve and sacrifice, which is to restore traditional values!

A: A man of integrity acts in accordance with his values, and translates his convictions into practical reality. President George Washington, who thought it abhorrent to be king of the USA, set a precedent in the interest of Liberty by refusing to run for a third term.

SBO: I admire President George Washington, but my favorite is President John Kennedy who said, “Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.”

A: I ask not what the government can do, because the Declaration of Independence is clear: the only purpose of law and of government is the protection of each man’s Life, Liberty, and his pursuit of Happiness.

I ask not what I can do, because it has been immortalized by Presidents Lincoln and Jefferson: I can do as I please with myself and the product of my labor, within limits drawn around me by the equal rights of others.

I ask not what I can do for my fellowmen, because we are independent, sovereign entities endowed with equal rights.

I do assert every man’s inalienable rights! My government:

Ask not that I volunteer to be a slave; do solemnly swear to defend my freedom.

Ask not that I accept masochism and sadism as noble; do highly resolve to protect my right to pursue happiness.

Ask not that I condemn selfishness; do take increased devotion to honor and preserve its advocate: the Declaration of Independence.

Ask not how to limit the individual; ask how to get out of his way!

The US Presidential Candidates’ Declaration of Dependence and Sacrifice - September 16, 2008

In the “Service Nation Presidential Candidates Forum” hosted by Columbia University on September 11, 2008 (link), the US presidential candidates glorified service, sacrifice, and a cause greater than oneself.

Senator John McCain said that after 9-11, he would have called upon Americans to serve. He said, “What has been missing is a president in the White House that taps into that yearning (for service) in a serious way.” The senator extolled service: “Finding new ways to serve - that’s what these next few years should be all about.” “It’s not about the individual, it’s about the cause we serve.” “It makes us exceptional in the kind of citizenry we have and the kind of service and sacrifice that we are capable of.”

Had Senator Barack Obama been president at the time of 9-11, rather than tell the American people to shop, he would have done this, among others: “I would have asked very explicitly for young people to engage in community service and military service.” The senator also extolled service: “The next president is going to have to actively pursue these issues of service.” “… a president who is willing to inspire people to get involved and get outside of themselves.” “What it means to be an American (is) to serve and to sacrifice.”

The US presidential candidates spoke not only of service to the nation, but to the world.

Senator Barack Obama’s national service plan has a price tag of around $3.5 billion, while Senator John McCain would sign the bipartisan bill on national service tripling the size of AmeriCorps.

The Declaration of Independence does not include the words “serve”, “service”, or “sacrifice”. It mentions “Happiness” twice and “Rights” thrice. It does not speak of a cause greater than oneself, but of the “Right of the People”:

“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.”

The Gettysburg Address does not include the words “serve”, “service”, or “sacrifice” either:

“Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the Earth.”

President Abraham Lincoln also said this: "We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing. With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor; while with others, the same word may mean for some men to do as they please with other men, and the product of other men's labor. Here are two, not only different, but incompatible things, called by the same name - liberty. And it follows that each of the things is, by the respective parties, called by two different and incompatible names - liberty and tyranny."

Founding Father Thomas Jefferson said: "Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual."

Americans who, like President Lincoln and President Jefferson, think of liberty as: “each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor”, find that the legacy of the Founding Fathers and the brave men President Lincoln honored in his Gettysburg Address, is not represented by any presidential candidate.

President Lincoln said that he had an oath registered in heaven, the most solemn one: to preserve, protect, and defend the government of the people, by the people, for the people -- to preserve, protect, and defend the nation conceived in Liberty -- liberty, which means: “each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor.”

On January 20th, 2009, the United States of America will have a president who will take the same solemn oath that President George Washington, President Thomas Jefferson, and President Abraham Lincoln took. But this president will preserve, protect, and defend “liberty” which means the opposite of “each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor.”

On January 20th, 2009, the President of the United States of America will extol service and sacrifice, not individual rights and happiness. He will glorify a cause greater than oneself, instead of “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness” - Liberty as “unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others.”

The next President of the United States thinks sacrifice is noble. He speaks not only of service to the nation, but to the world. The next President of the US will do what he thinks is noble. Will he sacrifice his countrymen and his country for a cause greater than an American, greater than the Declaration of Independence?

The person who serves and the one being served are both dependents, just like the sacrificer and the sacrifice-profiteer. The presidential candidates glorify dependence and sacrifice, and thus dishonor the Declaration of Independence.

After 9-11, Senator John McCain and Senator Barack Obama would have called upon Americans to serve. The senators fault President George W. Bush for not tapping into the Americans’ “yearning for service”, and for asking them to shop.

After 9-11, President George W. Bush assured Americans that their government would protect them, that they could travel and go about their normal lives. He did not ask them to sacrifice nor do their government’s responsibility -- he urged Americans to honor what they are: brave and strong. He threw a ceremonial baseball pitch at the Yankee stadium -- he glorified what is mentioned twice in the Declaration of Independence: Happiness!

I thank President George W. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, and nameless courageous heroes, for successfully thwarting another 9-11 for seven years.

Fellow Americans, let us demand that the government of the people, by the people, for the people, honor George Washington, the glorious 56, the sons and daughters of Liberty, and the principles enshrined in the Declaration of Independence -- that Individual Rights, that the pursuit of happiness and of one’s own personal interests, shall not perish from the Earth!