tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-43559196269173513872023-10-12T03:54:17.329-07:00Szandor Blestman's Blogsblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.comBlogger406125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-45694261632367825312013-12-27T08:05:00.003-08:002013-12-27T08:05:38.258-08:00Duck Dynasty, the Fed and the NDAA<p>Until last week I didn't know anything about Duck Dynasty. I really couldn't have cared less about those people, their business or their antics. Apparently, however, enough of my fellow human beings find them entertaining enough to make it worth A&E's time and effort to produce a show based on their lives. Now, suddenly, I know way too much about them. Now, suddenly, I feel like someone has grabbed me by the neck and shouted in my face "These people are important! What's happening to them is important! Pay attention to them!" All this because some old dude with a ratty looking beard expressed an opinion that to him a woman's vagina is more appealing than a man's anus, an opinion I happen to agree with, by the way. </p>
<p>What's happening to Duck Dynasty is not important. What he said was not important. The fact that some idiot executives (or highly intelligent and manipulative ones) at A&E decided to kick some commander of ducks off the show or some such thing is not important. What takes place between A&E and the duck people is between A&E and the duck people and has nothing to do with freedom of speech or any violation of human rights.</p>
<p>Sure the duck general, or whatever he wants to call himself, has the right to express his opinion, but no organization has the obligation to give him a platform upon which to do it. The only obligation here is to the federal government that they make no law violating the right to free speech. What we have in this witch's brew of inconsequential ingredients that has captured the attention of so many is a call to allow the federal government to do just that. It's all just a distraction, really, and in the meantime laws of real consequence that really do violate natural rights are being enacted and not a peep is heard because everyone's busy feeding the ducks. The magicians have once again done a good job diverting your attention while their slight of hand makes something precious disappear. </p>
<p>I am happy to notice that as this "controversy" grows more and more commentators are beginning to call out its artificial nature. Intelligent thinkers are pointing out the private nature of the contract between A&E and the duck people which makes the censorship not a First amendment issue and I've even read a couple of intellectual gay commentators point out that the tactics being used against Phil Robertson are the very tactics they abhor when used against gay people. It seems that perhaps people are finally beginning to understand the concept that in order for one to live freely one has to allow others to live freely, whether you agree with them or not. Allow others to have and to voice their opinions, however vile and repugnant you might find them. Allow others to conduct their own private business in their own way so long as they're not harming others or committing theft or fraud. Expect them to do the same for you. Just leave others alone to go about their day to day business and expect the same and we should all get along just fine. It really is a simple concept, "Do unto others..," Etc., ad nauseum, and yet one we still don't seem to get. Even so, it seems to me it's time to take the next step.</p>
<p>The time has come to stop talking about ducks and their dynasty. It is time to talk about parasites and theirs. The parasites I refer to are the central bankers, the corporate cartels and all the politicians which hail from these corporate families or are bought and paid for by corporate special interests. These are the people that attach themselves to the productive part of society and suck it's economic life's blood from it. These are the true entities of importance we should be talking about. These are the people that can truly affect your everyday life by their opinions and actions.</p>
<p>It is time now to start demanding a reversal of some of the things that make us less free rather than discussing what to do to curtail people who are exercising their freedoms, perhaps in a controversial way. It is time to start turning the conversation around and asking why aren't we trying to do something about the institutions that want to control and enslave us. It is up to the people who understand freedom to point these things out to those who might still have a foggy notion as to what freedom is.</p>
<p>For instance, as many of you might know, I feel the most important issue of our time is the Federal Reserve. I feel that if we could get rid of the Fed and decide for ourselves what currency to use when trading with others that many of our economic woes would disappear. So, if I'm standing around the water cooler and I hear someone talking about the ducks and their dynasty I might say something like, "That's nice, but you don't have to watch that show or read about what they're doing if you don't want to or if you disagree with them. We all pretty much have to use federal reserve debt notes in order to survive. We are forced to do business with families that are putting the nation into inescapable, incomprehensible debt. I think that matters a little more than what some duck dictator thinks." Keep the focus. Move the conversation to where it needs to go.</p>
<p>Another matter that is of importance is how the federal government is trying to use unconstitutional legislation to trash the Bill of Rights. For instance, while this whole pressed duck controversy was going on the 2014 NDAA was passed which still allows for indefinite detention and all kinds of other unconstitutional human right violations. So, if this is important to you, as you're standing at the water cooler and the whole duck kingdom thing comes up you might want to consider saying something like "Did you know that a new NDAA bill was passed while this duck BS was happening? They still think it's ok to indefinitely detain anyone, even Americans, without trial simply by calling them an enemy combatant. Why, they could accuse this Phil Robertson guy of plotting a terrorist action with renegade ducks, call him an enemy combatant and we would never hear from him again. I think that's a little more important than knowing whether or not he'd rather put his penis in a woman's vagina or a man's anus."</p>
<p>The point is, the establishment is using its media outlets to try to hide the issues that are truly important by creating issues that are not important. They don't want us talking about issues of importance and would rather have us clucking about non issues like a bunch of hens running around the chicken yard. They have used sneaky psychological methods in order to do so and it's up to us to counter as best we can in a way that nullifies the effectiveness of their methods. In the same way we must start denying consent to be ruled by a bunch of psychopaths in Washington, DC, we must also stop listening to their version of what is important and telling them what is truly important. As more and more people become aware of how the media is manipulating them, less and less will pay attention to the establishment media. When enough people deny consent and ignore the media, that is when we will see a true change for the better start to take place.</p>
<p>If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href=" http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation. For those interested, my latest work of fiction is entitled <a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/378731">Galaxium 2: The Losaurian Conspiracy.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti.</p>
<p>I have another new Youtube video created for the season entitled <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8ARX2khXI0&feature=youtu.be">Workshop at the North Pole</a> which is more like a commentary some of you might expect from me.</p>
<p>Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795">Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/378731">Galaxium 2: The Losaurian Conspiracy.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039">The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
sblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-59625019757763418922013-12-23T10:07:00.003-08:002013-12-23T10:07:53.775-08:00The Spirit of Christmas, the Nature of Humankind<p>Christmas, for me, is a beautiful time of year. It's not the pretty lights and the shiny decorations that make it beautiful, although they are quite pleasant to the senses. It's not nature's show of ice and snow that make it beautiful. Although such scenes make nice postcards to look at, dealing with them in real life is annoying to me and can actually be quite hazardous. It's not the clear air and the twinkling stars in the night sky that make it beautiful, although I do enjoy contemplating them I prefer the longer warm days to the longer cold nights. What makes Christmas beautiful to me is the spirit that's in the air. Not the spirit of commercialism, but the genuine spirit of giving and caring that comes from the heart.</p>
<p>This, to me, shows the true nature of humanity. Humans are not the beings we see on the television nightly news shows scratching and clawing each other in order to obtain some electronic trinket at a greatly reduced price. Those occurrences are actually the exception and not the norm which is why they make the news. Humans are, for the most part, rather docile and compliant and will follow the rules of civility even when placed in a competitive circumstance. This can actually be a bad thing when a tyrannical government tries to assert its authority over the masses.</p>
<p>Humans are not the murderous, torturous, war mongering rabble mainstream history portrays them as. People are, for the most part, kind, considerate, empathetic beings who just want to love and laugh and live their lives as best they can. Even as we study wars and battles and great generals and leaders and man's capacity to be inhumane to his fellow humans, we have a tendency to skip over the feelings and general misgivings of the common soldier who questions the morality of what he is forced to do through his circumstances and longs to return to a life of love and caring. The glorification of warfare is the job of the historian, the politician, and others who may profit from such an activity, the true terror and vileness of warfare is remembered in the hearts of the common folk who participate and can poison them for life. It is, in essence, unnatural.</p>
<p>We are, for the most part, beings of light and love having an experience in the physical realm. Christmas time is evidence of this. We take the darkest, coldest time of the year in the northern hemisphere and make it as bright, warm and festive as we can. We celebrate peace and love, giving and caring. We feel good in our hearts and souls for all that we do for our fellow human beings. This is where the vast majority of human beings want to be, the state of mind most of us want to achieve. That's what true human nature is about. I don't imagine that those who conjure dark thoughts and prey on mankind's insecurities like this time of year too much. It makes me wonder about the true nature of our so called world leaders, for their true nature certainly does not seem to me to be human. I don't see them as beings of light as all, but as beings spreading darkness across the globe.</p>
<p>This is why we must strive to keep Christmas in our hearts at all times. We must always strive to keep the darkness at bay. We must remain secure in the thought that most human spirits are kind, gentle and loving beings and do not wish to harm others. We are all more alike than we are different. We are not perfect and the darkness in this world will manifest, but by striving to keep it from manifesting in your heart you make the world that much brighter for the rest of us. Peace and goodwill to you all.</p>
<p>If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href=" http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation. For those interested, my latest work of fiction is entitled <a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/378731">Galaxium 2: The Losaurian Conspiracy.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti.</p>
<p>I have another new Youtube video created for the season entitled <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8ARX2khXI0&feature=youtu.be">Workshop at the North Pole</a> which is more like a commentary some of you might expect from me.</p>
<p>Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795">Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/378731">Galaxium 2: The Losaurian Conspiracy.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039">The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
sblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-73063519720030942732013-12-05T09:43:00.000-08:002013-12-05T09:43:03.165-08:00Central Banks and the Enslavement of Mankind<p>There is a saying that he who has the gold makes the rules. Indeed, throughout the history of mankind it has been shown that wealth is power. Why do you suppose that is? The answer to that question appears to be obvious. If you have money, many people will do what you want them to do simply to obtain that money. This is true whether you own a business and try to provide something costumers will pay for, or you work for a business and provide labor, or you sell sexual favors to lonely people. The answer should be obvious, and yet there exists sinister subtleties that allow for crafty conmen to take control of large swaths of governments and economies in this world. You see, there is evil afoot in this world, and I'm not talking about insignificant evil such as individuals doing drugs or having sex with strangers, I'm talking about industrial sized evil, evil on the scale of the holocaust, evil against all humanity, evil so subtle and pervasive that to many it doesn't seem like evil at all.</p>
<p>Imagine for a moment, if you would, that you were entrusted with the power to create currency for the nation you lived in. Imagine that everyone who engaged in commerce, in any kind of legal economic activity in your country had to, by law, use your debt notes as a means of exchange. Imagine that you got a portion of every legal transaction that took place across the nation. Even if it was a very small percentage, less than one percent, close to zero percent, you would still soon be a very, very wealthy individual before too long. Now imagine that this was so for many nations across the planet. It isn't hard to see how within a few years you'd be one of the wealthiest people on the planet, maybe even the wealthiest. Keep that business in the family for a couple of hundred years and there's little doubt that your family, your bloodline, would be one of the wealthiest, most powerful, most influential forces the world has ever known.</p>
<p>This is how it is with the families that own the central banks of the world. Their total wealth cannot be known. Their power and influence is unbridled. They are above all, masters of this world, and all because they were able to use their wealth and influence to pay for politicians who would sell out the common folk and create a system of currency based on debt, giving a monopoly on currency creation to those same families. Most people probably don't know about this little scheme of theirs, and they would like to keep it that way, which is why the fact that many central banks are privately owned remains hidden. But more and more people are becoming aware.</p>
<p>Many might wonder why people of such wealth would want to hide. Wouldn't they want to flaunt their power? Simply put, they don't want people to know who they are because they don't want to take personal responsibility for the damage they've caused. They certainly don't want the masses of humanity to know that such damage has been caused on purpose and with malevolence because they actually benefit more when damage is done than they do when humanity benefits. They know humanity is smart enough to figure them out and to target them and their agenda in so doing, so they hide as best they can behind propaganda, their masks of legitimacy and their political puppets who supposedly regulate and police them while actually enabling them.</p>
<p>The political class are actually also slaves to this master class which consists of old family royalty, the corporate elite and the banking elite families. They are just higher class slaves, the slaves inside the mansion rather than out in the fields, so to speak. If they want to keep their positions of comfort and avoid the whip they'd better do what is good for their masters, not what is good for the masses of humanity.
<p>We, the common folk, we are their laborers. We are their property. At least that's how they see it. They infuse their "money" with magical symbols and pictures of our "great leaders" of the past and expect to receive real wealth in return. For their paper money is nothing but debt notes, and they expect to be paid back with real property and commodities, not with more debt notes. When you think about it, what does it mean to be indebted anyway? What is debt? Debt is something you owe to someone, a favor that needs to be paid back. What is a debt note? It is a promise that you will pay back the debt you owe, and if you can't you will lose any collateral you own that might be of real value.</p>
<p>The way the elite banking families look at it, they have done you the favor of printing out debt notes for you to use in commerce, and they want that debt repaid. And yet they never spell out exactly what they want for providing this service. Oh, they said in the beginning the income tax would pay for their services, but it seems to me they wanted much more than a simple income tax. History has shown again and again that the price for them to provide this service is steep indeed, as all monopoly services tend to be, so steep, in fact, as to be unaffordable, IMHO.</p>
<p>First off, in terms of simple money, even their own debt notes, what started out as a very small income tax on the very richest Americans in order to pay for the Federal Reserve System's operations has ballooned into a tax on every hard working American who earns over an arbitrary amount of money per year as determined by an unelected set of bureaucrats working for an unaccountable IRS. This in and of itself can be considered slavery for you are involuntarily working a certain percentage for the government. You are least that percentage of a slave whether you want to admit it or not and therefore you are a slave. And don't let anyone tell you that the income tax is voluntary. Just try not paying and see what happens. Look what they did to Wesley Snipes and Ed and Elaine Brown. But go ahead and tell yourself the income tax is voluntary, if you want. I don't live in denial and I know the only reason I pay it is because violence will be used against me if I don't.</p>
<p>But, more nefarious that that, is the price we pay in blood. Look deep into the history that is hidden from the general public and you will see banking interests behind the wars and revolutions that have ravaged this planet for centuries. War is good for the wealthy elite and when banking interests are playing both sides of the conflict they will reap a large profit no matter the winner, a strategy they also use when backing political candidates, by the way. One could well ask what humans would support warfare and violent revolution for something as transient and inconsequential as power and profit over the peaceful advancement of all mankind? Very sick humans, I would venture to say. Very deluded humans. Perhaps someone who is less than human, or very inhuman. Perhaps someone who sees the rest of humanity as their property, as pawns to be played on a chessboard of political intrigue where ideologies are pitted against each other in a twisted game where the one side dominates and the other side either submits or faces extinction. Perhaps someone who believes they own you and your progeny and can send them off to die in some foreign conflict at their whim. Perhaps someone who believes they have the right to bind and enslave all humanity.</p>
<p>Believe in conspiracy or not, the power of the Fed is hard to deny. The history of their founding, the nature of their funding and the reality of their private ownership are not disputed. While some apologists would claim that such analysis as mine is harsh I would argue that their own historical words and actions provide strong evidence to back my opinions. These people feel it is their right to enslave humanity, that we are indebted to them, that they own us all like we are livestock. They are very dangerous and hold far too much power and influence over our lives. Humanity needs to stand up and strip them of that power and influence before they leave humanity impoverished, enslaved and stripped of the dignity it has taken us centuries to gain.</p>
<p>If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href=" http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation. For those interested, my latest work of fiction is entitled <a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/378731">Galaxium 2: The Losaurian Conspiracy.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti. I have a new Youtube video created for the season which can be found <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qndpW3bGYPQ&feature=youtu.be">here</a>.</p>
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795">Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/378731">Galaxium 2: The Losaurian Conspiracy.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039">The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
sblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-57670071069677919842013-11-29T13:54:00.002-08:002013-11-29T13:54:38.614-08:00The Biggest Bullies, Big Central Banks and Their Big Central Governments<p>I've been seeing a lot on bullying lately in the news and on social networking sites. It seems that no one really seems to like bullying much and everyone loves to see the little guy stand up to the bully. And yet there seems to be a disconnect when it comes to those who stand up to the biggest bullies of all. There seems to be some kind of cognitive dissonance that takes place when someone feels the bully is doing the bullying for your own good, or for the right reasons. I don't think bullying is ever good, no matter the reasons one might dream up for engaging in the practice. No matter how well intentioned, the ends never justifies the means when the means is immoral, and an immoral means always taints and corrupts a moral intention.</p>
<p>When we think of bullying, we often think of kids. We think of playground antics. We think of stealing milk money, or a cry for attention, or acceptance, or acting superior due to an inferiority complex, or of insecurity issues, or someone picking on someone else because they're different, or someone picking on someone else simply for the perverse pleasure they might get from instilling fear in another human being, from watching them squirm in fright. Mostly one thinks about the strong picking on the weak. It's especially about the strong picking on the weak.</p>
<p>But why think that these types of behaviors are limited to children? Why the belief that once a human being undergoes this process we know as puberty they suddenly drop the behaviors of childhood and blossom into adults who only engage in respectable behavior? In fact, don't we know from our personal lives that almost the opposite is true? Haven't we all seen adults in our own lives that act as immature today as they did when they were children? Doesn't it make more sense that the bullies of the playground might find an outlet in adulthood where they can engage in bullying techniques and it's not only respectable, many people might actually applaud it? Well, there are plenty of jobs in the public/government sector where bullies are needed to help implement the collectivist schemes of the power hungry political class.</p>
<p>Some may think about the law and enforcement arm of this little club of bullies that rules over the common folk when they read the above and I wouldn't blame them. The enforcement class, which would include judges and prosecutors as well as police, are the class that have to deal the most directly with the public. But these bullies who beat and intimidate with the muscle and the sheer power of "The Law" are not the biggest bullies on the playground by any stretch of the imagination. In fact, they likely have to deal with a different kind of bullying as they go about their work. No, the biggest bullies, the smartest and most nefarious bullies, are cleverly hidden. There is a good chance that most people would never dare to imagine them as bullies because they are so far from the picture of an archetypical bully that most of us carry around in our heads.</p>
<p>I'm talking, of course, about the banksters. Many people when thinking about bankers think about mild mannered, hard working, respectable businessmen. Indeed, when talking about a community banker, a George Bailey type for instance, this stereotype may prove true. When talking about central banking families, those more like Mr. Potter, the ones at the top pulling all the strings, however, nothing could be farther from the truth. These people are as notorious, as cold blooded, and as vile as you can imagine. They don't use muscle to bully so much as they use something much more powerful. They use money. They use economics, and economics targets everyone, not just those one wishes to control. Economic bullying is the carpet bombing of bullying.</p>
<p>These are the people who will threaten economic chaos should they be denied. These are the people who threatened congressmen with the spectre of martial law in 2008 unless they got a bailout. These are the people who can bring a politician's career to a swift end if they so choose. They are the puppet masters at the top of the power structure and they use their vast wealth to move forward with a collectivist agenda where they're in complete control and you will do as they say, or else.</p>
<p>It is the central bankers who have connived and plotted to centralize power in a system where power is supposed to be decentralized and the individual is supposed to have the power to run his own life. They bully those with federal power, who in turn bully those with state power, who in turn bully those with county power, who in turn bully those with city power, who in turn will bully you, the individual. Their favorite weapon of choice is fiat currency. They beat people over the head with the threat of funding removal. Some people might not see that as bullying, but that just makes it all the more subtle. Central bankers know all too well the harm that can be caused by crashing an economy. They count on it. It's all too clear in historical perspective. They also count on the common folk not understanding this, because no one likes to be bullied and if the common folk find out in great enough numbers they might actually do something about it.</p>
<p>So how do we stop such bullying? I believe the first step is to understand that is indeed what's going on. The next step is to confront the bullies. An audit of the Fed will initiate such a confrontation. After such an audit, a determination can be made as to just how much wealth was stolen from the common folk as a result of this bullying. Restitution then needs to be paid to the people in the form of real wealth, real assets and commodities, not paper debt notes that can be printed at will and have to have laws passed to force people to accept them as money. From there we should be very careful as to the rules we create as to what money is and how it drives the economy, with freedom and individual choice in currency markets taking a central role, remembering that history has shown us that what is easily given can be easily taken away.</p>
<p>We have lived in fear of the bully for far too long. The Feds have made excuses and covered their mistakes and their asses with their threats far too often. The system has been corrupted because its foundations have been corrupted with the insertion of a fiat, fractional reserve currency. Until we own up to such realizations we run the risk of the system collapsing around our ears. If we shine the spotlight on the bullies behind the scenes and expose them as those responsible for creating the economic mess we're in then maybe, just maybe, we can avoid economic catastrophe and figure out a way to return to monetary sanity. Perhaps it's time for the common folk to do a little bullying of our own. After all, there's nothing a bully hates more than being bullied.</p>
<p>If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation. For those interested, my latest ebook is entitled <a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/378731">Galaxium 2: The Losaurian Conspiracy.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti. I have a new Youtube video created for the season which can be found <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qndpW3bGYPQ&feature=youtu.be">here</a>.</p>
<p>Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795">Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/378731">Galaxium 2: The Losaurian Conspiracy.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039">The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
sblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-88810460360259513162013-11-04T11:52:00.001-08:002013-11-04T11:52:30.309-08:00Should Doctors be Arrested for Non-compliance?<p><a href=" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hV-05TLiiLU">"We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it."</a>
Nancy Pelosi on The Affordable Care Act.</p>
<p>There are many misconceptions about The Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare. The first is that it is a law. The second is that it is a tax. It is really neither, but it is both. It is a strange hybrid between the two. In short, it is an odd creature that has never really been seen before. Perhaps the best explanations for what Obamacare is, or is not, can be found <a href="http://stormcloudsgathering.com/obamacare-what-youre-not-being-told">here</a>.</p>
<p>If the bill had been read in the first place, perhaps this wouldn't have happened. Perhaps our congress critters would have realized what a severe clusterfuck it was and wouldn't have passed it. After all, passing a bill without knowing what's in it is sort of like going to a pet store to buy your kids a cute little puppy for Christmas and coming home with a mystery package containing some kind of animal you haven't seen, but the clerk assured you the kids would adore it so much more than a run of the mill puppy. Christmas day rolls around and your child opens the package with great anticipation and out pops a dangerous, feral wolverine ready to turn your happy holiday into a mad Christmas nightmare.</p>
<p>Well like it or not congress did pass this monstrosity. They did set a dangerous, feral wolverine loose in the house even though their intent was to give the kids a cute, furry, harmless pet. Now we, the people, must deal with the huge mistake our supposed representatives foisted upon us. They certainly aren't. They exempted themselves from it. Kind of like the parents hiding in the bedroom and making the kids figure out how to handle the wolverine.</p>
<p>As an aside, perhaps the funniest aspect to this are those who still try to defend Obamacare and the Obama administration. In the wake of all the proven lies, the broken promises and the broken website, there are still people in the administration who will try to convince the public that all is well, and there are still people who truly believe. They still think government mandated private health insurance is a good idea, that it still saves money, or that at least it was well intentioned, despite the protests, the website problems, the lack of transparency, the job loses, the lost income, the cost increases and the phenomenal number of people losing their insurance and their doctors. You want to talk about being in denial? It's kind of like those people with the wolverine refusing to believe the store clerk lied to them. They sit there looking at a growling, rabid wolverine, in the midst of destroyed draperies, a sofa that's been ripped to shreds, after little Suzy's had her left eye clawed out and little Tommy's had his right ear chewed off, and say, "But it's so cute and cuddly and unique." Well, it is unique.</p>
<p>So this terrible, awful bill passed and now we have to deal with it. How do we deal? If it is a law then we have to, as the above video suggests at the end, disobey en masse. If it is a tax, we must refuse to pay it. Now, a law will more or less try to punish you for doing something you're not supposed to do. A tax tries to make you do something you don't want to do. We see both these approaches in Obamacare. It might seem like one is trapped and has to obey to stay out of trouble, but as always human beings are very good at figuring out ways to get around any given situation. This is why, IMHO, Obamacare is doomed.</p>
<p>Obamacare acts like a law in that it tells insurance companies and doctors they can't do this or they can't do that. It acts like a tax in that it mandates purchase of insurance and imposes fines on those who would refuse to buy. Much frustration revolves around what can be done against such blatant abuse of power. Many people feel that nothing can be done and so they just try to go along to get along. That's what the powers that be want. They want people to believe they are powerless. Yet there is actually much that can be done to peacefully change things. It's mostly just a matter of disobeying. It's mostly just a matter of remembering that each individual has the power to just say "no" and that by doing so you are refusing to simply give in to tyranny. There are even ways to go about saying "no" and still staying off the radar, so to speak.</p>
<p>Doctors and their patients are beginning to figure out ways to get around these intrusive laws. One, a Dr. Michael Ciampi featured in the clip at the end of this <a href="http://benswann.com/obamas-trick-or-treat-i-just-lost-my-doctor/">article</a>, has taken a route many other doctors are taking and is moving to a cash only practice and refusing to accept insurance of any kind. He states he doesn't want to work for the insurance companies or the government anymore and simply wants to work for his patients. It's a novel concept, I perform a service for you and you pay me.</p>
<p>Personally, I see nothing wrong with this, but the insurance industry might. After all, if one can get the same quality service at less cost, one will usually opt for the cheaper option. Cutting out the middleman usually reduces cost because, well, now the middleman isn't taking his cut. That's what healthcare insurance companies have become, middlemen. They're not going to take kindly to someone who threatens their income, and they've already shown that they're willing to use government enforcers as strong arms to force Americans to buy their products. It wouldn't surprise me if their next step is to pass some kind of law to force doctors to accept insurance, nor would it surprise me to find out that such a provision is already buried deep in the tome that is Obamacare.</p>
<p>So what could they do? Charge private doctors in cash only practices with tax evasion, or with conspiracy to commit tax evasion for providing such services? After all, Obamacare is a tax despite the fact that so many promised it would not be a tax. Fine them so much that it puts them out of business? What if they refuse to pay the fines? Should they go to jail then? Should they be put in prison the same way many other tax protesters who have refused to pay their income taxes have been? Is this the road we want to travel?</p>
<p>We are supposed to be a free society. We are supposed to have freedom to associate with who we want to associate with. At the same time, we are supposed to have the freedom to not associate with people we don't want to associate with. These doctors obviously don't want to associate with these insurance companies. They should not be punished for that. No one should ever be forced or coerced to buy any product or service ever, which is exactly what Obamacare does. </p>
<p>Government is supposed to protect the weakest minority, the individual, from powerful corporations. They are not supposed to make powerful corporations even more powerful by agreeing to help them extort money from hard working individuals who have tried to do what's right and followed the rules their whole lives. If anyone should have to worry about going to prison it should be the corporate executives and the politicians who have helped to bring this abomination of a tax law to pass. I can only hope the establishment's enforcers come to realize this when they're asked to take the next steps.</p>
<p>If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation. </p>
<p>Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795">Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039">The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
sblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-25270674485413145122013-10-27T19:51:00.004-07:002013-10-27T19:51:56.907-07:00New Illinois Law to Centralize Health Care<p>My eldest daughter works as a billing specialist for a doctor here in Chicago. Her job more or less requires that she familiarize herself with the laws regulating doctors and the insurance industry. Unlike the layman who simply wants to see a doctor when illness strikes and be able to afford the treatments offered in order to get well again, she has to get into the guts of a system that requires 1500+ page tomes trying to determine the cost for treating every malady imaginable. As such, she has been studying a proposed new law, The State Health Care Innovation Plan, or SHCIP, that the Illinois legislature will soon be voting on. It is 200+ pages or so long, and what she has read concerned her so that she gave me the first 8 pages to read to ask me what I thought of it. </p>
<p>I have to admit, I find reading legalese quite tedious, but I was interested in this legislation since it would affect how just about everyone in the state of Illinois goes about shopping for their health care needs. I think everyone should be interested in this law since it puts the state between the patient and one's doctor and regulates all aspects of the relationship one has with one's doctor. </p>
<p>The main gist is that all health care providers will need to be a part of an organization. There are, of course, a number of different organizations that can be chosen from. The organizations will be formed around a primary care physician, and all specialty services will need to be referred out through the PCP. The organization will be paid by the insurance companies, not by the procedures they perform, but in a bulk payment, known as capitation, once a month, to be distributed by the organization to their physicians, not by how much work the doctors have done, but by however they see fit. The doctors are becoming slaves and you no longer have a choice in what health care services you're allowed to receive.</p>
<p>As I read the first 8 pages of this law, the first thing that struck me is that it read more like a report than a law. They were citing statistics. They were pointing out flaws in the current system. They were discussing a vision for the future of health care in Illinois that they had. It was more like I was reading a sales pitch rather than a law. It was almost as if they were trying to justify to themselves what they were about to do as well as to everyone else. Bad ideas often need massive amounts of righteous justification before they are implemented, if for no other reason than to give the politically powerful the ability to use the "good intentions" excuse when things go wrong and individuals are harmed. When I finished reading these eight pages, I had a vague idea of what they were trying to say and do, but I wasn't quite certain. I wasn't even sure if it was a law since, well, you know, laws should usually be straight forward and explain what you can and cannot do. I called my daughter and asked her what I had just read, since she has to deal with these matters every day.</p>
<p>Her insight confirmed my suspicions. They are trying to rid the state of private health care practitioners. Any doctor with a private practice will not be welcome in the state of Illinois, and the Illinois state government will go to any length to make sure that anyone who tries to defy them and run a private practice will find it very difficult to do so. If you are not a member of an organization, or some other "health care entity," as they like to call it, you are going to be subjected to unfair regulations and scrutiny in an effort to scare off the mavericks that might try to question the system.</p>
<p>When I was a kid, we went to a nice doctor that my family knew and trusted for most of our health problems that arose, and as a child I had plenty of health issues. His name was Dr. Gibson and I remember him as a kindly old man who showed genuine care and compassion for us. I remember that my family had a wonderful relationship with this man. It seems to me that this is the kind of relationships the powers that be don't want us to have anymore. They can't have doctors actually caring for their patients. That could interfere with the "business" of health care.</p>
<p>A doctor who cares too much for his patients might not care enough about profit and might actually try to buck a system that wants to recommend procedures that are more profitable above procedures that might actually produce a cure for a given condition. They don't want doctors thinking for themselves, they want doctors to have to come to a consensus. After all, isn't that what politics is all about, consensus building? It's only natural, then, that when politicians have their say in the field of health care - and they do have their say for they are creating and passing the laws that regulate it - they create a system they are familiar with.</p>
<p>Combine this with the for profit corporations that have bought out governments at all levels and you have a combination lethal to small businesses and start ups. In the health care industry this means doctors wanting to start their own practices and treat patients one on one, face to face. The corporations don't want to face that kind of competition and so they ask their friends in powerful political positions to create laws which make it nigh impossible for such competition to grow roots. These for profit corporations are the insurance companies that have come to dominate that industry. They are the ones who want the doctors corralled into "health care entities" so that they can maintain not only control over their activities, but their livelihoods as well. That's what it boils down to, complete control.</p>
<p>Large corporations like those that dominate the health care insurance industry want to create and protect monopolies for themselves so that they can profit all the more from the services they offer. The best way for them to protect their monopolies is to turn to those who have a monopoly on legitimate force and ask them to create laws to make it difficult for competitors to compete. To accomplish this, the political class has taken to illusion. They want the common folk to believe they are being compassionate. They pass laws designed to profit their corporate buddies under the guise of compassion. At the same time they want to remove anyone else's ability to show compassion. In essence, it's not enough that they create a monopoly in health care, they need to create a monopoly on compassion also in order to justify the system they want to establish.</p>
<p>The Illinois law is a tributary of the ACA. It most likely would never have even been conceived if Obamacare had not passed. Now it is taking a bad law and making it even worse. Illinois is trying to become the most SSR like of all the SSRs in the USSA. This law will pass so long as most people remain unaware and allow it to happen. The only way now to prevent such laws from passing is to speak up and speak out against these intrusive and restrictive laws. Let them know you want choice over mandates. Let them know you want the freedom to determine for yourself the kind of health care you want. Otherwise they will continue to take those choices away from you until you have but one choice, their monopoly, and you will take that choice whether you like it or not.</p>
<p>If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href=" http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation. </p>
<p>Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795">Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039">The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
<p><a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballotti</p>
sblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-91065586105531532662013-10-11T12:23:00.001-07:002013-10-11T12:23:21.114-07:00The Law: Spirit and Letter, Enforcers and CorruptionHere's something not too many people know. Back in the mid 1980s, I was
accepted to a couple of graduate school law programs. I never really
told anyone because I decided I didn't want to go. Or rather I told
myself that life had decided for me and that I couldn't afford to go.
There have been times in my life when I have wondered how things would
have turned out for me had I gone. Perhaps my life would have been
better, perhaps not. I wonder if I would have let knowledge of the law
corrupt me, as it seems to have done to so many others. I wonder if I
would have let knowledge of this secretive and highly influential
language taint my world view, or if I would have somehow managed to
remain true to my morals and principles despite subjecting myself to the
poisonous rot that passes itself off as law these days.<br />
<br />
As it stands today, I have the clarity of hindsight to base my thoughts
upon. I think that perhaps I have a better understanding of the law than
many current day lawyers. At least I don't have the burden of knowing
that I need the masses of people to not understand the nuances of law in
order to make a living. I believe, as do many others, that the law
should be written in plain English, or whatever language the masses
understand, so that everyone understands it, not just a few who can then
manipulate the language to their benefit. I believe we should do away
with this language known as legalese which has a tendency to take common
words and change their meaning for uncommon purposes.<br />
<br />
The law should be simple. You don't harm others. You don't steal from
others. Things like that. Of course there's going to be extenuating
circumstances that might come about from time to time and these things
should be considered, but the basics remain simple. So many people seem
to worship this thing we call "the law" that it almost seems spiritual
in nature. Yet spirit can be evil as well as good. Spirit can be
detrimental as well as beneficial. There is a spirit behind these laws
and that spirit should be designed to provide justice for someone who
may be victimized by a powerful entity. The law ceases to be legitimate
when it becomes the powerful entity that is victimizing the common folk.<br />
<br />
In today's society, it is not the spirit of a law that is enforced, but
the letter of the law. For instance, if a law says do not cross a street
except at the crosswalk or you will be fined, you could be fined even
if you had a legitimate reason for breaking that law such as trying to
avoid someone who means to cause you harm. We'd like to think that those
who enforce the law could use their discretion to understand when the
spirit of the law is being violated as opposed to the letter of the law,
but this is hardly ever the case. We'd like to think that judges and
juries would be able to do the same, but this is again hardly ever the
case. Enforcers enforce the letter of the law, no matter how much harm
that letter might do to another human being. Judges and juries only
judge guilt or innocence via interpreting the letter of the law, not
it's spirit.<br />
<br />
The power of the law is its spirit. That power has been usurped due to
the desire for expedience and the laziness of the common folk. It has
been corrupted due to governmental greed and the desire of the ruling
class to control the masses. The justice system itself has become one
huge injustice, one huge miscarriage of justice, one huge revenue
generating mill that punishes the innocent by encouraging plea bargains
where they plead guilty to a lesser charge to avoid attorney costs and
jail time, protects the guilty in the same way, and upholds bad laws by
not allowing or encouraging juries to judge the law itself over and
above the defendant's guilt or innocence.<br />
<br />
Today's laws are selectively enforced. They are often created by the
dictates of government agencies controlled by the executive branch
rather than through the conscientious debates of the legislative branch.
Those with political power or who are able to afford the cost of
political favors can oft times be excluded from the law while those
without who can't afford it must suffer the consequences of a law that
causes harm. Such is what we see in this huge 1600+ page monstrosity of a
law that is fallaciously entitled the "Affordable Care Act" and more
commonly known as Obamacare. It may have a well meaning spirit, but its
letter is malicious and malignant. It is the letter of this law that
will be enforced and as this happens its spirit vanishes into the ethers
as a dystopian society sprouts into being.<br />
<br />
The federal government has attempted to shut down some of its more
innocuous aspects supposedly over the attempt to defund the
implementation of this bill. The executive branch has failed miserably
in its attempts to deny the public certain services (that should cost it
extremely little to no money to provide) and to point the finger of
blame at a certain political party. Many people now understand what this
is really all about and that closing national monuments and parks is no
way to go about solving this problem. It is my hope that those in the
political class who are making a stand against funding Obamacare will
take it one step further and repeal the entire law.<br />
<br />
Yet I don't hold much hope that this will happen. There are powerful
interests that want this law implemented no matter the consequences. As
many have discovered and as I have said from the beginning it is the
insurance companies who benefit greatly from this law, not the common
folk. Think about it for a moment, how much better off would you be if
you could get the federal government to mandate that everyone had to own
the product or buy the service that you offer? With premiums going
through the roof and the government forcing all to either buy the
insurance or get fined, many will soon find that they will have much
less cash to spend on things like food, rent, gas for the car, clothes,
and other little necessities of life. Some may find they won't be able
to afford such luxuries as new shoes for their kids. Some may have to
leave their nicer homes in favor of more affordable abodes. Some may
find they just can't afford to be alive after they are fired or reduced
to part time labor all for the sake of a few insurance company
executives whose companies' profits needed to be boosted by law.<br />
<br />
Someday this law may indeed go into effect, and it may be someday soon.
When this happens the people need to disobey. They need to simply not
sign up for the mandated insurance. They need to simply say "no." When
this happens they need to refuse to pay the fines. They need to,
whenever possible, dare the establishment to come arrest them. They need
to, in effect, grow a pair. When enough of the productive in society
are threatened by government, something has to give. When this happens,
it is my hope that the enforcers will side with the people who produce,
not with the criminal, parasitic government. Bad law should not be
enforced. When the letter of the law is harmful it should be judged
illegitimate. No law that does such harm should be implemented in a free
society, but if it is than it will be time for the people to stand and
push back against it.<br />
<br />
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation. <br />
<br />
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help
me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews
if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795">Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039">The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballottisblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-23920995073419021732013-09-11T08:23:00.000-07:002013-09-11T08:23:24.973-07:00Is the Liberty Movement Delaying a Syrian Conflict?So, a war looms with Syria and I find myself having the same conversations with so called progressives about why we shouldn't attack Syria as I had ten years ago with so called conservatives as to why we shouldn't attack Iraq. I would have never guessed that progressives and conservatives were so alike. They like to think of themselves as different parts of the political spectrum, but when it comes to war it appears they are both equally easy to lie to and fool. War is ok as long as it's their side that's promulgating it. It's ok as long as it's their respectables with their suits and ties making the case and telling the lies.<br />
<br />
I suppose I could be wrong. One side or the other might be slightly easier to fool. It certainly seems to me that the Bush administration went to greater lengths to try to hide their lies and deceptions. Perhaps the Obama administration saw how well Bush was able to manipulate the emotions of his followers and figured it would be even easier to pull the heart strings of their own blind followers who are known for their bleeding hearts. After all, human nature makes it extremely hard to even admit that you could be wrong, as I just did above, and after all the Obama cheerleading and he's going to save the world and the hope and change thing and the peace thing, well any war he might want to get involved in must be justified, right? I think perhaps the Obama administration underestimated their followers. There's lots of people out there actually thinking these days and it's gotten much harder to use the same old excuses that have been used in the past. Jon Stewart does a wonderful job exposing this through his own special brand of comedy in this <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXC4aAdWRt4">clip</a>.<br />
<br />
When you think about it, it's really not so surprising that things are the way they are. No one likes to admit that they're wrong. No one likes to admit that they backed a war mongering tyrant. Most people will quietly change their positions and go on with their lives as if they never did back him. Those who were the loudest and most out front about backing such a person are more likely to defend him to the point of absurdity. The human ego can be a powerful force when it comes to one's behavior, and yet it seems so fragile that a simple admission of just the possibility of being wrong can shatter it. Well, when it comes to war and dropping bombs, more than just egos are at stake, the very lives of many innocents are at risk. More and more people are putting their egos aside and taking up the call to protest any military intervention anywhere.<br />
<br />
Public pressure has caused the Obama administration to cave on the issue of unilaterally launching a military strike without first seeking congressional approval. This public pressure is due, at least in part, to the freedom movement. It is due, at least in part, to the wisdom of the non aggression principle set forth in libertarian philosophy. It is due, at least in part, to the ideas and principles set forth in the individualist model of governance as opposed to the collectivist model. It is due, at least in part, to a desire to move forward into a new era of decentralization where power is put into the hands of ordinary individuals rather than backward into an era where power was centralized in the hands of a few wealthy royals. And while the powers that be might try to ignore such pressure and their mainstream media may try to create a perception that such pressure doesn't exist or is far less significant than it truly is, such forms of denial can't hold back the waters of reality indefinitely. Sooner or later, attention will have to be paid to the grassroots or the rest of the plant will wither and die.<br />
<br />
Those of us with a freedom and libertarian mindset have said for decades that war is wrong. We've pointed out the suffering of innocents. We've pointed out that wars are expensive and a drain on the economy, not a boom to them. Only a very few corporate and banking entities profit from war. We've pointed out the dangers and expense of trying to maintain an empire. With the long, drawn out engagements in Iraq and Afghanistan, many people are beginning to agree. We have too many conflicts going on right now. We don't need to buy into another one.<br />
<br />
Congress is due to vote on the resolution to intercede militarily in the Syrian civil war. Obama has intimated that his administration will carry out strikes against the Syrian regime regardless of how congress votes. It will be interesting to see how this plays out. It will be interesting to see if the Obama administration will be able to finagle the votes it needs from congress to rubber stamp his plans. It will be interesting to see if he does, indeed, go through with a military strike should he fail to get the votes. It will be interesting to see if he is somehow able to save face, or if he becomes a pariah among world leaders. The stakes are very high in this international game of centralization and control. The problem is they are playing with innocent lives they don't own and the rest of free humanity needs to remind them of this fact.<br />
<br />
The ruling elite want this conflict. They want to entangle the United States of America in another Vietnam type quagmire. If that's not obvious than nothing is. I'm not exactly sure why, but there have been hints left in many places and miles long paper trails which need to be seriously considered and investigated. A very few wealthy elite run the world for their own amusement and profit. A very few well hidden individuals are too influential for their own good, let alone for humanity's good.<br />
<br />
The ruling elite like to pretend that they can do what they want and it doesn't matter what the rest of the world thinks. They like to think they can hide behind their elite political puppets. They like to think their political puppets will take the heat when things go wrong and that they will still get what they want. That's changing. The real masters are being exposed. More and more people are beginning to see the men behind the curtains. It began with the bailouts when people began to question the Federal Reserve and it continues today with people questioning government sources more than ever, asking and investigating "cui bono?" more and more, and questioning the motivations of those who pound the war drums the loudest. We need to keep the pressure up and show just how frightened of the light the ruling elite truly are.<br />
<br />
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation.<br />
<br />
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795">Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039">The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballotti
sblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-36579665956599547372013-09-03T18:04:00.000-07:002013-09-03T18:04:09.284-07:00What Does it Mean to Wake Up When Life is Just a Dream?<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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These days, I hear more and more about how people are waking
up. I even write about it. When I write about "waking up" I'm trying
to convey the concept of becoming aware of hidden reasons for why reality is
the way it is. I'm trying to get people to look behind the illusions and the
curtains and discover the truth to the manipulations that are really going on.
But what if there is more to even that truth than meets the eye? What if even
the manipulators are being manipulated? What if those who are creating the
illusions are merely an illusion in and of themselves? What if we are stepping
out of one cave only to find ourselves in another? The possibilities are mind
boggling.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I don't usually talk about my dreams in my blog posts. I
don't mean the dreams I have for mankind and for living in a peaceful,
prosperous, free society, I mean the dreams I have while I'm sleeping. A few
nights ago I had quite an interesting dream. In fact, I found it interesting enough
that I thought I might like to share it with the world.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In my dream, I was asleep. There was a powerful entity that
was trying to wake me. At first I didn't know why he (it was a male presence)
was trying to wake me, but he was not being at all pleasant about it. As I
began to become more aware of what was happening, I began to feel an evil
intent oozing from this entity who was trying to awaken me. He began slapping
me and when I didn't respond he started slamming my body around. He then laid
me out and made the whole world shake around me. This frightened me more than
anything else he had done to me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Still, I refused to wake up in my dream. Rather, I refused
to move and let this being know I had awoken. You see, I suddenly realized that
this being was trying to make me get up and run. I instinctively knew that this
evil entity was planning on using my movement as an excuse to kill me should I
try to make a break for it. Although every fiber in my body wanted to bolt, I
fought with all my might to remain still and make the entity believe that I was
still asleep. Finally, frustrated that his efforts hadn't worked, the being
assaulting me took a baseball bat and started swinging it at my face. I didn't
flinch, aware that as long as I didn't move there was a force protecting me
from this being's malice. The bat was stopping inches from my face as he swung
again and again. Still I did not move. It was at this point I awoke into this
three dimensional reality and found myself laying in my bed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I have bizarre dreams quite often, but usually I don't pay
that much attention to them. I was unusually disturbed by this one and felt it
was trying to tell me something, but I wasn't sure what. The imagery is rather
obvious, and yet what is the meaning? Am I being warned to shut up? Am I being
warned to not let them know I am awake, to make them think I'm still asleep? Or
am I being told that I'm not actually awake yet, that though I might think I've
awakened to some ubiquitous truth, there's a deeper reality which I am not
aware of yet? It is my wont to ponder such difficult questions.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Here's a scary thought, what if certain elements within the
NSA can tap into the dreams of individuals and observe them, or even alter
them? That sounds extremely paranoid, but then a few years back it sounded
extremely paranoid to ask what if a government agency was listening to all
phone calls and other communications around the world. This is the stuff that
science fiction is made of, but then how much of what we have now was just science
fiction a mere decade ago? Is any idea really all that crazy anymore? Maybe we
should all start taking crazy sounding ideas a little more seriously and start
examining evidence with more open minds rather than being fooled into believing
that dancing shadows on the wall are reality because that's more convenient, or
less scary to think about, or more emotionally comforting, or for whatever
reason.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What if life is just a dream, as the childhood song claims?
Could we all just be characters in some theater created by someone else's mind?
Could our actions and behaviors all be controlled by what someone else's
subconscious determines it wants from us? What would happen then if someone
woke up in that dream? What if that someone declared he was a sovereign individual,
that it was he who owned his own body and not the dreamer? What if that someone
decided to control his own actions and behaviors instead of letting some unseen
dreamer do it? </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What if that someone was you? Would you observe others in
the dream still letting their lives and fortunes be determined by unseen
forces? Would you try to wake them, or would you just go about your business
knowing that you are free and not caring about the others? Since you would
still have to interact within the dream, how would you go about changing things
so that you could assert more control? Would you try to let the dreamer know
you were awake, or would you just go about your life and hope he never noticed?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What if the dreamer discovered you? What if he wanted to
prevent you from trying to wake others? If something was protecting you, would
you stay down and let him try to break through it, or would you take a risk,
get up and run hoping you'd be able to get away and warn others? That's the
risk taken by those who blow the whistle and tell the truth, and those in
control of the dreams of this world have made their lives nightmares.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What happens when the dreamer loses control of the dream?
What happens when he wakes up? Do the characters in the dream disappear into
some netherworld of unending emptiness, or do they find themselves free to
create the type of world they want to see? Do they at that point become
collective dreamers, each with his or her own goals and purpose? What if we are
all connected, woven into the fabric of a dream, each with the power and
capacity to change the world, and we just don't realize it? </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What does it mean to wake up when life is just a dream?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a>
to make a donation. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com.
Please help me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable
reviews if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged
in America: A
Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795">Ron
Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion
Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a>
A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The
Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew
Ballotti</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039">The
Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew
Ballotti</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The
Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew
Ballotti</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The
Edge of Sanity.</a><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>By Matthew
Ballotti</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The
Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballotti</div>
sblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-83929800884107500592013-06-29T11:30:00.000-07:002013-06-29T11:30:03.597-07:00Obama's Tyranny Against the MediaBack in 1987 I graduated from a night school course in digital electronics from the DeVry Institute of Technology which had a campus in Lombard, IL at the time. While attending night school in the two years prior I had a chance to talk with a couple of technicians who worked for AT&T at the time. They were continuing their education which was being paid for by their company because technology back at the time was in a state of flux and they needed to keep up with the latest as AT&T was transitioning from old relay style switches to digital circuitry. Seems they're always transitioning from something to something newer.<br />
<br />
I had occasion at the time, perhaps as early as 1985, to discuss with these gentlemen some of the more interesting aspects of their jobs. On at least one occasion that I can remember I was told of a switching room in the Oakbrook facility where one of the federal alphabet agencies kept some equipment. I was told this equipment could listen in on any phone conversation passing through that facility, and that facility handled millions of calls at least monthly, if not weekly or daily. They might not have called it PRISM back then, but the idea was very similar. At the time, I didn't think much about it. I thought it was strange that the feds might want to cast such a wide net, but I had other things to worry about. I was a new father trying to take care of a family and was on my way to getting a good paying job in the lucrative field of circuit board repair. I didn't give much thought to the implications of what I heard for myself or my children or the future of this nation.<br />
<br />
Think about that for a second. It was 1987 at the latest. Ronald Reagan was still president. The Internet was not yet available to the general public. PCs were just barely making inroads into the marketplace. There were very few in private homes. Cutting edge technology at the time would have been something like a 10 megabyte hard drive and 250K RAM. Running computer programs often times meant swapping out floppy disks quite often. Windows 3.1 hadn't even hit the market yet. People were still complaining about DOS. 9/11 was years away. Waco and Ruby Ridge were just small dots on the map no one had ever heard of. Already, 26 years ago, the seeds for the current police state were being planted.<br />
<br />
There I was, nobody special, just some guy looking to make a better life for myself, and I'm exposed by circumstance to a story that would some 26 years later become one of the most talked about stories of the day. I have to wonder, why wouldn't some reporter have heard about this? I knew about it and I was just a classmate with some low level technician. It seems to me that some reporter somewhere was friends with someone higher up at AT&T who should have known about this. How has this remained so quiet for so long? Why wasn't this broadcast far and wide decades ago?<br />
<br />
People talk. The alphabet agencies install their equipment in a private company and people have to know. They have to tell the people who repair the equipment to leave it alone. They have to warn the low level technicians not to touch anything that belongs to them. Those people aren't going to remain silent. They have lives. They go out drinking with their buddies on the weekends. They talk to their spouses at night and let them know how their day went. They tell people what they know. They aren't out to leak government secrets. They aren't trying to expose government wrong doing or abuse of power. They are simply explaining an aspect of their work that they have to deal with. It has never been a huge secret. It seems to me that just about everyone has known for a very long time now that the government has been listening, that they've been overreaching. Why did they wait so long to report it and to bring the debate to the public square?<br />
<br />
One might wonder what would have happened if this had been seriously reported on 26 years ago. Would that have stymied the oppressive surveillance state? Would there have been arrests made and precedent setting court rulings? Would our privacy have been honored by government agencies? Would we be safer now and feel more secure that our rights were being respected, or would terrorists have managed to hatch secret plots that would have killed most of us? It's all just speculation because it wasn't reported on enough to bring it to the forefront of American consciousness all those years ago.<br />
<br />
So why now? Because Edward Snowden publicly spoke out? Who is Edward Snowden anyway? Is he any more credible than my classmate who told me all those years ago about what he'd seen? Could my classmate be more credible since he was not involved with a government spying agency, he was talking to someone who was not involved (at the time) with any news organization and he had no way of knowing his revelations would come out in some obscure blog some 26 years later? Blogging wasn't even a remote concept back then. Is this some sort of strange psychological operation put into motion to get the American public to accept NSA spying as a normal fact of life? Are the powers that be desperately trying to gain the ability to openly rule the world instead of having to do it from behind the scenes? Is there something else going on that they don't want us talking about so they bring this to the forefront of our national debate? I don't have the answers to these questions and apparently the mainstream media remains reluctant to investigate such matters, but it seems to me that there's more here than meets the eye.<br />
<br />
Perhaps the so called mainstream media has finally started to pay attention to this story because it has finally, for them, come home to roost. It wasn't too long ago that it was revealed the NSA has been spying on news agencies. It has been spying on specific news reporters. It has been intercepting and reading emails and such. Now, suddenly, the news agencies are paying attention. Did they think they were going to be immune to the spying? Did they think that if they kept quiet about it and just went along with what the government wanted they'd be able to keep operating like it was business as usual? Does that sound maybe a bit to conspiratorial to you?<br />
<br />
Even in my own experiences I have come to see just how deep this spying goes. In the last half a year or so, I have had trouble with my Internet connection every time I try to publish one of these articles. When I go to add pictures to the article, suddenly I can't access my server and the connection times out. When I called my web hosting service they told me that the server was fine, that the connection was being interrupted somewhere between the server and my computer. I will wait a half hour or so, and suddenly there is no problem. This has yet to prevent me from publishing an article, but who knows what the future holds? Are they watching us? What other conclusion am I supposed to draw? I'm just a small time blogger expressing a freedom oriented opinion. I am peaceful and have never advocated violence. Why should they watch me? I pose no threat to anyone, but they seem to think I do. They are wasting my time and your tax dollars. It needs to end. Our right to privacy needs to be honored.<br />
<br />
Well that's nothing compared to Michael Hastings' death. Here was a reporter with a long history of taking on the establishment who had apparently been in touch with some other news sources and was claiming to be pursuing a huge breakthrough story. Strange how he should somehow end up dead not long after, before he could make his huge story public. I wonder what he found. Strange, too, that he should die in such a bizarre manner. Well, I suppose dying in a car accident isn't so strange, but the way in which this car accident took place, it's almost as if they wanted people to believe he was murdered. It's as if someone was sending a message to other journalists, a message like "if you don't want to end up dead, you'd better not stick your nose where it doesn't belong." I know it's just speculation, but it's kind of like the old Soviet Union where reporters would mysteriously die just as they were about to expose some kind of ongoing government misdeeds. Coincidence? I think not. There's been an awful lot of "coincidences" lately that keep moving neocon and new world order agendas forward.<br />
<br />
The question that I ask when I hear about something like what happened to Michael Hastings is, "Who benefits?" It's a question that not enough reporters ask anymore. Who benefits from Michael Hastings' death? If the answer is no one, then I would be more inclined to believe that it was, indeed, an accident. If the answer is someone, but that someone didn't have the means or the motivation to create such an accident, then I would still be inclined to believe that it was an accident. If the answer is someone else, and that someone else does have the means and the motivation to create such an accident, then things start to look a little suspicious to me. If what is said about Michael Hastings is true and he was about to break a huge story about spying on Americans, and I have no reason to doubt that it is true, then the intelligence gathering agencies within the United States of America would benefit from his death and had the means and the motivation to create a fatal accident for Michael Hastings.<br />
<br />
So yes, I am a little conspiratorial. I'm a little tired of people claiming that conspiracies don't exist. I'm a little tired of hearing people say those who believe in conspiracy theories are crazy nut jobs in tinfoil hats. I'm especially a little tired of people saying conspiracy theories involving government should be treated with derision and not investigated. Of course conspiracies happen, do you really think things like political assassinations, bombings, planes flying into buildings, etc. happen without two or more people plotting them? Do you really think that elements within the government wouldn't plot to increase their power and influence? Does it make someone crazy simply because they ask "who benefits?" Does it make someone crazy because they can see the obvious answer to that question and they point it out even though it might destroy the childlike fantasy we have that government is good and watches over us, or are so called "conspiracy theorists" called crazy simply because so many don't want to face the reality that we've been had by the establishment and we are no longer free and independent as we were meant to be?<br />
<br />
The Obama administration has taken to tyrannizing the media. They obviously don't want the truth of what some agencies in the federal government have been doing to come out, especially the spy agencies. They have a war on whistleblowers going on and now they have extended that war to the media. How long before that war is extended even further, to maybe anyone who says anything bad about any federal government agency? How long until we are living in the dystopia that is George Orwell's "1984?" Some would say we're already living it, and I would tend to agree.<br />
<br />
This op/ed piece was not approved by the ministry of validated opinions.<br />
<br />
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation.<br />
<br />
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.
<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795">Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039">The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballotti
sblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-75674861699749998072013-06-15T11:40:00.000-07:002013-06-15T11:40:05.486-07:00Free Markets, Central Planning and the Family BudgetRecently a Facebook friend of mine commented on a story about austerity not working and made a statement to the effect that therefore Hayek was wrong and Keynes was right. I was quick to race to the defense of Hayek and free markets. I pointed out that we haven't had a truly free market ever and that Keynesian policies had been in place since before Keynes even became a famous economist. I told him that if he was going to give Keynesianism credit for all the good that's come from economic policy, he needed to blame it for all the bad repercussions also. We haven't been vacillating between Keynesianism and free markets, we've been steadily but incrementally becoming more and more a Keynesian economy since at least the inception of the Federal Reserve and the institutionalizing of a fiat fractional reserve central banking system.<P>
Since my friend leans toward the liberal side of things, I even included some quotes from Hayek to show he was firmly against austerity measures. It seems Hayek was not the cold hearted libertarian many historians paint him as, nor was he as staunch in his belief of the free market's ability to take care of every humane need as some might suggest. Of course, being that he was in academia and therefore likely heavily influenced by bureaucracies of some form or another, seeing him acquiesce to some points is almost to be expected. If he hadn't, I wonder if history would even remember him at all. But I digress.<P>
Not long after airing my defense of Hayek, I read an article that contained an explanation of why the government's budget is not like a household budget, said that comparing the two was fallacious and offered an opinion as to why the deficit is a good thing. These explanations even seemed to make sense and I could see why the uninitiated would be easily fooled by the reasoning. It said, in short, that the government needed to keep spending up so that the economy wouldn't go into a death spiral, so that unemployed people could continue to collect unemployment and spend money at the grocery store so that grocers didn't go out of business, and basically to keep things going until the private sector got back on its feet. It needed to do this even if it had to borrow far beyond its limits and that eventually the deficit would be paid back.<P>
This got me to thinking. I have used the household budget example in the past, particularly when talking about debt and the fact that piling on debt upon debt does not get one out of debt, it gets one deeper in debt. The author of that article dismissed that argument out of hand because, well, government debt and your personal debt are two different animals, to coin a phrase. So, I wondered, where is the disconnect? Perhaps these economies of scale aren't understood not because the comparison is invalid, but because it is a case of the seen versus the unseen. Moral issues notwithstanding, this is another area where it takes a little more critical thinking and a little imagination to understand what has never been.<P>
What is it that we've never seen? Well, for one thing, I don't think in the history of the world we've ever seen a truly free market, except perhaps for a time in the so far distant past that it is long forgotten and archeologists find it hard to fathom. There's almost always been some kind of government intervention into the market system where someone powerful has used that power to bully people into doing things their way, usually revolving around taxes or the form of currency used to make transactions or some such thing. It is therefore fallacious to blame free markets for market failures. A closer look at failures will likely show that the intervention itself is to blame, either through corruption of the supposed objective of the intervention, through abuse of power that comes when intervention is turned to law, or through unintended consequences that inevitably occur when such interventions take place. What we've never seen is the power we as individuals would have to exercise if we lived in a truly voluntary society with a truly free market economy.<P>
To demonstrate this, I will use the well worn example of the family budget versus the government's budget, only this time I'm going to try to put a little twist on it. Let's begin by looking at the family budget as it exists in this reality, in modern times. There are a few things you're going to need money for every month. The top priorities are of course going to be housing such as mortgage or rent, food, utilities such as electricity, heat, and maybe water and sewer, communications such as telephones and Internet access, transportation expenses such as gasoline, car payment, and automobile maintenance, insurance payments, etc. All these are your responsibility. It's up to you to figure out which is most important to pay and how much you will need every month to pay these things.<P>
What this means is that you have the power to determine your lifestyle. Maybe you want the bigger, fancier home, so you have to drive a smaller car, or a used one. Maybe you don't need or want a large home, so you get a smaller one or rent so that you can afford the nicer car. Maybe clothes are important so you give up something to afford the really nice name brand suits. Maybe you want the latest in electronics, or the best food, or whatever, so you live more frugally in one area so that you can splurge in another. Maybe you just want to save your money so you have a nest egg so you live more frugally in all areas. The point is, it's your decision. You decide how the budget will work. You also decide which companies you want to do business with and which you don't. This gives you quite a bit of power as companies compete to give you the best deal so that they can obtain the dollar you budgeted for their product.<P>
Of course, if you run a business, budget priorities are different from that of a household, but the same principles hold true. It's your business, your decisions to make. Whether you succeed or fail depends on your ability to determine how much money will be coming in, where the money is best spent to help increase or maintain profit levels, and how well you can adapt to competition in a changing market. It also depends on how happy you can keep your customers so that they keep coming back.<P>
When government creates a budget, they don't have to worry about earning the money they get. They don't have to worry about keeping customers happy. They claim and have the authority to tax. They get their money no matter what. Why should they care if you're happy or not? If you don't pay your taxes you will lose your home, or your business, and they will sell it for the taxes you owe. They will use force to make it so, if necessary. You would think that would make government budgets the easiest to manage, for they should know how much they'll be getting year after year and how much they need to spend. Yet, somehow, it always seems like governments have the most difficult time sticking to a budget. It seems they just can't stand the thought of sticking to constraints. No matter how much money flows into their coffers, it never seems to be enough.<P>
Now, let's suppose for a minute that government was unable to just extort your money in the form of taxes and needed to compete against other organizations offering the same services they offer. In this case, every cent you ever earned would be yours to decide what to do with. All of a sudden you'd find yourself faced with more decisions to make and you'd have to think quite a bit more about what's important to you. On the national level, you'd have to think about how much each month (or year) you'd like to spend on things like the armed forces, the National Security Agency (NSA), the Transportation Safety Administration (TSA), and a myriad of other national agencies that every year clamor for more tax dollars and bigger budgets claiming they need more to do their jobs properly.<P>
On a more local level you'd have to think about how much per month you'd want to pay for education services, both for your family and your community, for police services, fire protection services, roads, libraries, parks, etc. Some of you would have to think about things like water, sewer and garbage services while others already have private wells and septic systems and a private company to haul away garbage. Yes, it might be a little more work. You might have to plan a little more for your children's future. You might even have to get a little more involved with your community and talk to your neighbors a little more often. You might have to take time to do some actual organizing or set up alternative organizations to field competing ideas. But just think what you could do with all the money you'd have if you didn't have to pay property taxes. Just think of the good you could do if you and others decided how that money would best be spent rather than a bunch of control freak politicians.<P>
Some people do this partially anyway. People already shop for a home in a neighborhood with good schools, some choosing to pay more in taxes because of the school district. Some people choose to dish out additional money to send their kids to private schools. A few may look for a neighborhood with good policing criteria, or may put out the extra money to live in a gated community. People donate freely to police and fireman benevolence charities. I remember once when the fireworks event in a community I lived in was going to be cancelled, but it went on that year better than ever because the park district asked for donations by putting jars out in the neighborhood grocery stores and people gave freely to the cause.<P>
Can you see the point I'm trying to make by using the example of the family budget? This all isn't merely about spending money, it's about power. It's about your power to decide what your future will look like. It's about taking your power away from you and entrusting it with someone else. It's about trying to make you believe that you're entrusting that power to some nice, well meaning politician when, in fact, that politician is most likely lying to you and the real power resides in the corporations paying for the politician's campaign. When you give away your power to a group of bureaucrats, whether those bureaucrats live in your neighborhood or in Washington, DC, your future is at least partially being decided by them. It should be obvious by now that they don't have the same vision of the future that you have. It should be obvious that their priorities are quite a bit different from yours. In fact, judging by the way things are going these days, it seems to me that they are the paranoid, delusional ones, not the common folk. It seems that the crazy people have all ended up in so called leadership positions and the sane folk are too frightened of them to do anything except obey.<P>
This is how they really maintain control, not through politics, not through political actions, not through their ordinances, not through their regulations and oversights, not through the laws they pass, but through economic means. Through the budget. Through not only telling you how much you should be spending on certain things, but by making you to pay that much through bullying and force of law. Through keeping you from even thinking that perhaps you should have a say in such matters. Through making you believe that they know better than you how to spend your money. Through making you acquiesce to their theft of your earnings. They are the biggest bullies of all. They are the mob. If you were able to withdraw not only your consent to be ruled, but your funding of their efforts to enslave you without fear of retribution, then it would be they who would have to change their way of thinking or suffer dire consequences. As it is right now you are the one who has to think the way they want you to think or you will suffer at their hands. This is what fundamentally needs to change.<P>
It's strange to think that usually I'm the one who's trying to simplify things. Usually I'm the one who's pointing out the obvious. When it comes to budgeting, I think it needs to become a little more complicated for the common folk. For too long we have shunned our responsibilities. For too long we have delegated our power to politicians just so we wouldn't have to think too much. If we want freedom, we will have to take responsibility for our actions, and for our economy. We will have to claim personal responsibility for our spending practices and will be expected to use this power to hold poorly run companies accountable for their foibles. Then we will live in a truly voluntary society.<P>
I cannot guarantee that a true free market society would be a better society, but evidence of past performance suggests it would certainly be a more prosperous one. I cannot guarantee that all our problems would be fixed by a free market economy, but it certainly makes sense that a myriad of solutions being tried at the same time is more likely to find the best solutions than any one size fits all solution based on force that government agencies might come up with. I don't promise that having a free market would lead to utopia because I am not a politician and I don't make promises that I don't intend to keep like they do. I simply believe that if we want to make a more fair and honest world we need to stop making excuses for and allowing practices akin to theft and extortion at any level, for any reason. After all, how can we have a fair and honest world when the basic fundamentals of our governing systems rely on unfair and dishonest principles?<P>
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href=" http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation.<P>
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.<P>
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman<P>
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795">Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman<P>
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti<P>
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<P>
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039">The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<P>
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<P>
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<P>
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballotti
sblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-23692162309623598752013-05-30T14:26:00.003-07:002013-05-30T14:26:24.172-07:00Monsanto and the Ron Paul SyndromeA few days ago millions of people in hundreds of cities worldwide participated in protest marches against the Monsanto corporation. Were you aware of that? If you're reading this then chances are you were, for most people that read blogs like mine are already aware of the freedom agenda that the powers that be are trying to keep hidden. But there's a problem in that there are still far too many people who insist on getting their news and information from the so called mainstream media. These people have no idea what reality is, for they actually continue to believe the propaganda they see on CNN, FOX, ABC, NBC, CBS, MSNBC and all the networks and that they read in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Chicago Tribune, The LA Times, and all the other so called trusted mainstream media newspapers.<br />
<br />
The so called mainstream media, the media owned by the same corporate elite who own the political elite who deign to rule over you, have refused to report on the March against Monsanto. I guess they don't consider this event important enough to report on. Funny, it was important enough for millions of people to participate in, but they felt it wasn't important enough to inform their viewers that this was going on. They want to keep as many people as ignorant as possible about what is really happening. They want to create the reality you see. They want to control your mind so that their masters can control your wealth. They don't like to see the masses waking up and doing something about the reality we live in, and so they do all they can to keep as many people as possible asleep.<br />
<br />
This is just further evidence of who really owns the media. If they don't make the news, they don't report it. If the news sheds bad light on one of their corporate masters, they don't report it. It kind of makes one wonder about the validity of the news they do report. It kind of makes one wonder about what they're not telling us.<br />
<br />
It's no secret that I was a big supporter of Ron Paul and an advocate of his run for the presidency. As such, I noticed a similar phenomenon when he was campaigning. The same mainstream media that now refuses to report on the March against Monsanto refused to accurately report on him. They refused to show his true popularity. They refused to report on the wins he had. They refused to investigate the reported cheating done by the GOP hierarchy to minimize his impact. This has apparently become a syndrome. When the media doesn't want the people to know how popular something has become with the masses, minimize it by not reporting on it, or by spinning it. It's dishonesty at its most disgusting level.<br />
<br />
Why would they do this? I believe it's because something like this is a uniting issue. No one wants to be a guinea pig in an experiment involving the very food we eat. Just about everyone wants to know that the food they're eating is safe. Just about everyone wants to be able to decide for themselves what is safe to eat and what is not by knowing what their food honestly contains. Just about everyone can see the inherent evil in allowing a company to patent natural processes. It doesn't matter whether you're a Republican or a Democrat, a tea partier or an occupier, when it comes to food and its consumption there is much we can all agree on.<br />
<br />
The message of freedom is just as unifying, and Ron Paul was all about the freedom message. But it seems the mainstream media doesn't want a unified electorate. Or, rather, the powers that be don't want a unified populace. They want to keep us divided, that way we're easy to control. They want to keep us fighting amongst ourselves so we won't unify to fight against them. That's why they don't want to report on Monsanto. They are Monsanto. They are the corporate elite, the corporate cartels. They don't care how many people are getting sick or dying because of their products, they just want your wealth and they don't want to honestly compete and provide a healthy product to get it. And if you get sick eating their GMO foods, well then you'll just have to spend more of your wealth going to their corporate controlled medical cartel who will prescribe drugs from the corporate controlled pharmaceutical cartel which will be paid for in part by the corporate controlled insurance cartel that you were forced to buy into by law. The mainstream media sources don't want you knowing about this, they certainly don't want you investigating it and they're most definitely not going to do that investigating for you.<br />
<br />
Just about everyone would be able to see the inherent flaw in the thinking that organically grown plants contaminated with GMOs somehow violate the patent holder's property. And yet there's already been many family farms that have gone out of business because Monsanto sued them when the GMOs have contaminated the natural crops. Were you aware of that? And the courts have sided with Monsanto! The courts, which you may have thought were there to protect the individual, are protecting the corporate interests! The corruption, the evil of this is unfathomable. That's become the mainstream media's job these days, to make sure the evil goes unreported and that those who perpetrate evil are left unaccountable.<br />
<br />
It's great that millions of people are trying to hold Monsanto accountable for their crimes against nature. It's wonderful that so many are waking up to this issue and are doing something about it. But it's not enough to just march against Monsanto. We need to also hold accountable those who enable Monsanto. We need to hold accountable the media. Stop watching corporate news. Stop reading corporate newspapers. Tell everyone you know to stop doing so, and tell them why. Keep up the social networking posts and tell everyone you know how you feel about this issue. It is an important issue. Point out the politicians who enable Monsanto, including Barack Obama who in March of this year signed into law what has come to be known as the "Monsanto Protection Act." No more excuses. The corporate influence in politics has become too dangerous to be ignored. It is up to you, now. You are the new media.<br />
<br />
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation.<br />
<br />
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795">Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039">The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballotti
sblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-86871871584920404462013-05-29T07:29:00.003-07:002013-05-29T07:29:48.390-07:00Hard Work and Savings or Financial ThieveryI work hard for a living. I've worked hard all my life. I think most
of us have. When I've had work, I've done my best to become the best at
the job I've done. When I haven't had work, I've done my best to keep
busy and tried to make the most of my time by writing, doing odd jobs,
and trying to get along as best I could. I used to make a lot less
money, but then a dollar bought a lot more back then. I was taught that
hard work led to great reward. I was lied to.<br />
<br />
Don't get me
wrong, I believe hard work can lead to great reward. Sometimes hard
work is reward in and of itself. In fact, I think that hard work should
be the way one becomes successful. Unfortunately, that's not the reality
of this world. I also believe that hard work can lead to poverty when
that hard work gains one nothing except a currency that loses its buying
power over time. This is what happens when a criminal element gains a
monopoly on the creation of currency in a society, whether that society
is local or worldwide. It's called fraud, and when an extremely small
faction of the world's population is able to dictate to the rest of us
what medium of exchange to use for our transactions that small faction
will garner immense wealth and power, enough to put itself above the
law.<br />
<br />
Herein lies the problem. Hard work and savings are
not rewarded in our society mostly because we operate on a fractional
reserve fiat currency that has lost much of its value over time. Fraud
and corruption are rewarded, however, as those responsible for issuing
and distributing that currency are not held accountable for their errors
or their criminal behavior. They are rewarded because they are able to
legally steal the wealth that you and I have worked hard to obtain. This
is done through taxation. This is done through inflation, which is
inflating the money supply. This is done through indebtedness and
artificially keeping the price of things so high that it becomes
prohibitive to save for most large purchases and so one is forced to
borrow.<br />
<br />
You own nothing. Your family is not secure. So
long as you have debt, your property is in jeopardy. So long as you are
forced to pay taxes you are the property of the system, of the
government, of an elite ruling class answerable to no one except the
corporations that pay for them. The second you can no longer afford to
pay for their excessive policies and social programs they will swoop in
and take everything you thought you owned in order to satisfy back
taxes. The courts are not there to protect you, they are there to take
everything you own from you and give it to the banksters and politically
connected the second you trip up, get sick, make bad financial
decisions, or otherwise find yourself unable to keep up with the
mortgage, or the car payments, or the business expenses, despite the
fact that you may have already paid off the original value of the
property two, three, four or more times. People worry so much about
those who might go bankrupt due to medical expenses, and yet they just
seem to shrug their shoulders and not care about those in danger of
going bankrupt due to excessive interest rates or property taxes.<br />
<br />
What's
it like to find yourself in your later years with nothing to show for
it? Perhaps you know, perhaps you don't. Perhaps you realize the
precarious position the vast majority of us seem to be in, perhaps you
think you're doing well for yourself and your wealth is secure. Don't be
fooled. No one is untouchable. The criminal class at the top want
control of all the wealth. Laws can be changed at any moment. Taxes can
be raised. The economy can be trashed. So long as the politically
powerful remain unaccountable for their actions, can garner support from
the masses, can use the force of law to condone what would otherwise be
obvious criminality, and command an army of mindless, unquestioning
enforcers to silence any opposition or questioning of their authority,
your wealth, your property, your life and liberty are in severe
jeopardy. Remaining silent now will not help you in the future should
they decide to come after you and yours.<br />
<br />
And yet, maybe
we're all just a little greedy. Maybe we tolerate financial thievery
because as a society the vast majority of us engage in it at least a
little bit. Many want a little something from the government. Everyone
wants their subsidies. We let them take money from everyone so we can
pay for our military, our roads, our schools, our trains, our buses, our
courts, our hospitals, to help the poor, to help the farmers, to go
into space, etc., etc., etc., ad nauseum.<br />
<br />
Whatever your
favorite government program, no one considers that you are forcing
others to pay not through a legitimate charge for usage, but through
force of law, mostly tax law. You are forcing those who don't use the
service to pay for those who do use it so that those who do use it can
pay less. That's theft. No one asks for donations. No one tries running
these services as businesses for profit. They just take your money and
do as they want with it. How can you compete with an organization that
claims the authority to take from everyone to service a few?<br />
<br />
Then
we sit there and piss and moan about corruption and waste in the public
sector. What do you expect? They don't have to tighten their belts when
times get rough, they just raise taxes. Can't afford your property
taxes? Too bad, they'll just take your house. Can't afford your income
taxes? You'd better or they'll throw you in jail, and the law be damned!
You don't like the wars, or the torture, or the drones? Too bad, so
sad. That's their money, not yours, and just try to withhold taxes as a
protest and see where that gets you. Complain all you want, as long as
you pay your taxes they couldn't care less.<br />
<br />
Of course the
system is corrupt, the very concept is criminal in the first place. And
so those who learn to play the system are financially rewarded. Free
enterprise in this nation died nearly a hundred years ago when the
federal government sold out the people of this country by implementing a
privately owned, quasi-public, central bank known as The Federal
Reserve System. From that point forward, only the corporate interests
with the right connections were able to truly win the game.<br />
<br />
How
do we correct this problem? Well, clearly doing what we've been doing
for the past century hasn't worked. Clearly trying to regulate this
behemoth with corrupt and corruptible politicians is not working. Maybe
we should try something different. Maybe we should allow a system based
on competition where you decide what kind of currency you'd like to use
for exchanging goods and services. I may be wrong, but I'd venture a
guess that under such a system honest money, money exchangeable for some
kind of commodity, like precious metals maybe, would soon be in greater
use than all the debt based fractional reserve currencies in the world.
Maybe that's why modern day central banks work so hard to prevent such a
thing from happening. They know that if they were forced to actually
compete against such honest money they would soon lose all their wealth
and power.<br />
<br />
We have a choice. We can continue to accept the
Federal Reserve System and the theft and corruption it represents, or
we can demand an end to the Fed and a return to a legalized, honest
monetary system. We might have to give up some convenience, but the
prosperity that would come from it would be well worth giving that up.
Imagine a world where you worked and saved and when you bought something
it became yours to keep. You wouldn't have to worry about losing it due
to sickness, or injury, or some other unfortunate mishap. You could
hide your money away for years and when you decided to spend it it would
still have the same purchasing power. You could plan for your
retirement using simple math instead of trying to guess how much you'd
need your money to grow in order to survive. I'm not saying it would be
perfect, but it would certainly be better than the uncertainty we have
today.<br />
<br />
The Federal Reserve with their monopoly on the
creation of currency have their hands on the levers of power. These
levers affect not only every American, but nearly every person on the
face of this planet. By taking these levers away we take the economic
fate of the many out of the hands of the few and give this power back to
where it belongs, to the people that earn the money through hard work.
And we should have that power, for we are the ones who produce. If you
want to see growth, if you want to see more production, then it behooves
us all to reward those who honestly produce reality rather than those
who fraudulently create illusion.<br />
<br />
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a data-mce-href=" http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php" href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation.<br />
<br />
Below
is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help me
by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews if
you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.<br />
<br />
<a data-mce-href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319" href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a data-mce-href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795" href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795">Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a data-mce-href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393" href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a data-mce-href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246" href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a data-mce-href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039" href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039">The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a data-mce-href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273" href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a data-mce-href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774" href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a data-mce-href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791" href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballottisblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-55521372343844028522013-05-23T19:54:00.000-07:002013-05-23T19:54:38.962-07:00Incompetence Rewarded or Malicious Intent?Ask yourself this, what would happen to you if you were incompetent at your job? What would happen to you if you were in management and people you supervised were constantly making poor decisions? What would your boss do to you? Would you still have your job? How many times would you be able to use the excuse that you just didn't know what some underling was doing? I bet it wouldn't take long before some disciplinary action was brought against you. It's likely that sooner or later you would be held accountable. If only it was that way in politics.<br />
<br />
Back when W was president he used to like to use the incompetence excuse also. I spoke out against it. He told Brownie he was doing a helluva job even after the Katrina debacle. He claimed his intelligence agencies had no way of knowing about the 9/11 attacks even though several other intelligence agencies had sent warnings. He spoke of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq when there were none. Time and again he claimed incompetence or no knowledge when handling events that they should have been better prepared to handle. I felt back then he should have been held accountable, and I feel now that Obama and his administration also ought to be held accountable for their incompetence and seeming inability to keep the president in the loop.<br />
<br />
The thing is, you had the left running cover for the right and now you have the right running cover for the left. Back when Bush was president, I believe it was Nancy Polosi, one of leaders of the left, who said that impeachment was off the table. Why would someone on the left say that of Bush? Why would these supposedly staunch philosophical opponents remove their strongest weapon for keeping the powerful in check? The answer is simple. They already knew that one day their guy would be in power, this time sooner rather than later. When that happened, they wanted their guy to be able to get away with the same bullshit the other guy got away with. In the political game, they know it's power that matters, not principle.<br />
<br />
I don't expect Obama to be held accountable for his administration's foibles, much as I'd like to see that happen. Of course, I would have liked to have seen the Bush administration held accountable for their misdeeds also. The fact that they weren't is one reason why I don't believe the Obama administration will be either. None of these people are ever held accountable, not unless you count Richard Nixon being forced to resign, and he hardly did anything as reprehensible as these past few administrations. But then, he did put an end to American involvement in the Vietnam conflict which had to anger the powers that be to no end.<br />
<br />
In the world of politics and public bureaucracies, it seems that incompetence is almost always rewarded rather than punished. The incompetent don't get fired, they get more money for their department's budget as if throwing more money at them will make them more competent. Powerful representatives don't get booted out of office by the electorate, but the overwhelming majority of incumbents are re-elected even when they've been incompetent, usually because he or she seems or is portrayed as the least incompetent choice of those running for office. It's the devil you know versus the devil you don't syndrome. In such an environment, is it any surprise that the system breeds incompetence? In such an environment, is it any surprise that people seem to almost strive to be as incompetent as possible? Or is there some malicious intent behind the scenes that wishes to create an illusion of incompetence to see how much they can get away with, how much control they can command before the common folk sit up, take notice, and begin to deny their consent to be ruled.<br />
<br />
Perhaps that's been the problem all along. Perhaps there really is a secret elite class that controls all the politicians. Perhaps this has been their plan all along. Perhaps there is a conspiracy to centralize all the power of human activity and commerce into the hands of a few people at the top who will be able to dictate to the rest of us what to do so that they can engineer a society based on their vision of what humanity should be rather than everyone else's. Perhaps they don't even care about building a consensus anymore, although they'd like you to think they do so that if you disagree you'll think you're in a minority and that you can change things simply by convincing others to accept your point of view.<br />
<br />
If there is a cabal working behind the scenes than maybe the puppets they control aren't so incompetent after all, maybe they're just following orders. After all, Obama seems to be a fairly intelligent guy. Even Bush seemed quite intelligent and articulate before he became president when he suddenly became a caricature of a southern bumpkin. How can men who seem so intelligent suddenly become so incompetent after being elected president? Is it more likely that there is some sort of malicious intent at work here? Is it more likely that there is a secret agenda being implemented? Could there be forces at work trying to manipulate the masses of humanity into accepting some form of authoritarian world government? Or is our political system such a failure that we are destined to forever elect incompetents into the supposedly most powerful office in the world?<br />
<br />
Whatever the case, incompetence, malicious intent, or both, the recent scandals have shown that the system is beyond broken. How can we continue to accept a president who consistently doesn't know what those under his supervision are doing? How can we accept a president who doesn't seem able to appoint high level staff who are capable of operating within the parameters set down for them by law? How can we continue to reward incompetence by giving those who prove incompetent even more power? How can we continue to give more trust those who consistently abuse or mishandle the trust they have already been given?<br />
<br />
The time has come to reduce the power entrusted to the administrative branch of the federal government. The time has come to enforce the limits of power on the federal government as set down in the Constitution. The time has come to investigate the incompetence and to determine whether malfeasance is involved and where it has come from. It is not enough to simply accept that low level bureaucrats who take their marching orders from above were somehow so incompetent that they couldn't do their jobs correctly. Somehow, someone at the top was involved. It's long past time that those at the top were held accountable for what those below them do.<br />
<br />
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation.<br />
<br />
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.
<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795">Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039">The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballotti
sblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-36805153723705907932013-05-09T17:36:00.001-07:002013-05-09T17:36:16.962-07:00The Fed and the War on You and Private PropertyThe word "war" has changed over the decades. It used to mean the
militaries of different nation states battling each other for dominance
over certain territorial claims and the peoples living in those
territories. Nowadays, because of the complete bastardization of the
English language, it has come to mean a battle against anything the
state wants to control but can't. It's come to mean the attempt of an
elite ruling class to gain control of all the wealth, property and power
in the world versus rising middle and lower classes who wish only a
small portion so that they can live their lives and raise their children
in relative comfort. It is a war of those who would be lords of all
versus those they wish to make into serfs.<br />
<br />
This war is being fought in secret and without the shooting, the
explosions, the mayhem and the gore of past conflicts. In order to win,
the lords need to keep the serfs from realizing that a war wages all
around them. They need to prevent the masses from understanding who the
real enemy is. They need to keep their serfs from realizing that they
are slaves and maybe even get them to love their servitude. They need to
get people to believe that they are free even as they become more and
more indebted to their masters, and to do all this they need to redefine
what freedom is. They may even try to redefine what it means to be
human in the process.<br />
<br />
They need weapons to carry out their plans. I would call these weapons
of mass mind destruction. They own the government. They own the
education system. They own the major media outlets. They use these to
infuse their ideals, their vision of what the world should be, into the
population. It is a vision where they are in complete control and you
are nothing but their livestock, something they own and so can do with
as they will, when they will it. The casualties of these weapons aren't
broken, dead bodies and human beings dismembered and maimed to the point
of helplessness, they are those who have lost the ability to think
critically, who accept as gospel what they are told by mainstream media
or government sources, parrot what those sources tell them, argue for
government violation of natural rights and are unable to imagine a world
where solutions are developed from the bottom up rather than from the
top down.<br />
<br />
I have come to believe that the head of this war machine is the owners
of the central banks across the planet, the most powerful of which is
the Federal Reserve System of The United Stares of America. Even if I'm
wrong and some higher power controls the central banks, they are at
least the heart of the operation.These people, for all their talk and
propaganda about providing jobs, growth and prosperity, have done
everything they've done not for the benefit of mankind, but for their
own damn benefit and for the benefit of their friends and allies who
would help them grow and maintain their power, wealth and control. They
have created a monopoly, debt based currency system not to help grow and
stabilize the economy, but to help solidify the control they have over
all of us. They control us through controlling the issuance of currency,
expanding and contracting it as they see fit.<br />
<br />
They can use this power to manipulate the markets however they please.
They pump their funny money into the areas of the economy they wish to
inflate, wait for the mice to come after the cheese, and then remove
their funds when their profits are high enough bursting the bubbles and
leaving the small investors wondering WTF happened? If you think you can
see where market demand is going to be and make investments based on
this analysis, you'd better factor in whether or not such demand is
going to benefit the elite. Guess right and align yourself with the
elite and you'll benefit along with them, but guess wrong and you'll be
left holding an empty bag as they run off with all your money, laughing.
Markets have become big gamboling casinos where the house always wins
in the end. This is how they wage war, by cheating your ability to
evaluate, cheating your ability to prosper, and hence making it more
unlikely that you will ever be able to challenge their economic
hegemony.<br />
<br />
So how can we win? How can mankind become free from these seemingly all
powerful masters of manipulation who hold all the cards? Well, I don't
know for certain, but there are some things I know. It won't happen
through apathy. It won't happen through blissful ignorance. It won't
happen if we all give up. And it won't happen through violence. It can
happen when enough of us realize that we have been played, that we are
really just serfs working for the benefit of the elite, and then we
begin to take steps to dismantle the institutions that have helped
ensnare us into this web of indebtedness. It can happen when we begin to
unlearn what the elite have taught us through their public schools and
relearn what it means to be free and independent people and how that can
lead to prosperity.<br />
<br />
This last step comes through certain realizations. The first is that you
own yourself. God does not own you, for he gave you the gift of
freewill. The government does not own you. Everybody does not own you.
Nobody does not own you. You own yourself. The energy inside you that
animates your flesh owns that flesh. Anyone that tries to convince you
otherwise is trying to sell you on some collectivist scheme that is a
direct path to some type of slavery. Your body. Your decisions on what
to do to that body. It is wrong for someone to force you to do something
with your body that you don't want to do of your own volition.<br />
<br />
The second is that everyone else owns their own selves. You do not own
them. It is wrong for you to force them to do something with their body
that they don't want to do of their own volition. It is wrong for you to
hire someone else to force them to do something with their body that
they don't want to do of their own volition. All interactions with each
other need to be voluntary. This includes business interactions as well
as personal interactions. Of course, there is the caveat that one not
harm nor defraud another.<br />
<br />
The third realization is that, if each one of us owns our own bodies,
then it comes to reason that we also own the product of what we decide
to do with those bodies. We own the fruits of our labor. It is wrong for
anyone to force anyone else to give up any portion of those fruits in
an involuntary or coercive manner. It is wrong for anyone to lay claim
to another's property when that property has been bought and paid for by
voluntarily exchanging those fruits for said property. It doesn't
matter whether it is a single person doing these things, or a group of
people calling themselves a corporation, or a group of people calling
themselves government, or a majority of people voting to take away
someone else's property. Theft is theft even when it's called by another
name, like taxes. Coercion is coercion even when those issuing the
threats were voted into office by a majority of voters. Force is force
even when those carrying out the force wear uniforms and claim to be
simply upholding a law or simply following lawful orders. As long as one
has not harmed another and has obtained his property through honest
means by providing a voluntarily paid for product or service, one should
not have to worry about losing his property, or his freedom.<br />
<br />
The Federal Reserve has endeavored to change how we think about freedom.
They have endeavored to make people believe they are entitled to
another's property. They have endeavored to make people believe they
have the right to steal products and services from others so long as a
majority says it's so. They have endeavored to remain hidden from view,
to pull the strings of as many people as they can so that we remain
divided amongst ourselves and pay no attention to them. They are in
control. They are the manipulators. They are the men behind the curtains
and if they have their way they will own you and all the property that
exists in this world. They are the ones that are waging the wars. They
are warring against you and your private property and until you realize
this you will not know who to struggle against. When enough people gain
this knowledge, however, and decide to do something about it, the
struggle will become easier.<br />
<br />
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation. <br />
<br />
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help
me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews
if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795"> Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039"> The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballottisblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-49342968100793017522013-04-28T22:37:00.002-07:002013-04-28T22:37:44.472-07:00The Forgotten Reasons for Advocating FreedomAs I watched the beginning of the Boston Red Sox game, the first
baseball game played in Boston since the tragic events of 4/15/2013, I
was flabbergasted by the propaganda that was taking place before my
eyes. Thousands of people applauding the police who had shut down their
city in an attempt to find one unarmed, wounded 19 year old. Thousands
of people applauding the martial law that had come to their city.
Thousands of people applauding the disintegration of The Bill of Rights
and welcoming the armed men who could remove entire families from their
homes at gun point without warrant and without, in my humble opinion,
just cause. All for one lonely, isolated teen accused, not proven, of
doing something evil and already judged guilty by the masses. <br />
<br />
The scene was surreal. It reminded me of those other collectivist
nations of the past, where the populace lined the streets and joyously
applauded as their so called leaders who had brought martial law down
upon them paraded by. They welcomed the tyranny. They welcomed the evil.
It was only years after the fact, when the truth was able to come out,
that humanity understood the suffering that authoritarian collectivism
causes. Are we in the United States of America to tread down that same
path? Are we to wake up decades later to discover the mistakes we made,
or are we to learn from others and forego the suffering they went
through? Have we so easily forgotten what our ancestors knew? Is it so
easy to disregard what the founding fathers taught us? Will history
remember us as those who reached the pinnacle of human potential, or as
just another society who forgot history and so repeated it?<br />
<br />
Can we remember what it was like before mankind took the first tenuous
steps toward a free society? It really wasn't that long ago that royal
families ruled all of Europe. They lived in opulence while the common
folks lived in squalor. While it is true that there are none alive today
that experienced such tyranny, enough people of empathy left record of
that time for us to imagine the horrors they saw and suffered through.
At first those who would be free agreed to give authority to a few elite
for their protection, but soon the elite were protecting them not from
outsiders who threatened physical harm, but from those within who
questioned the wisdom of the authorities. People feared the authorities
because authority wants fear to spread. Authority feeds on fear. Those
who question authority aren't a threat to the common folk, they are a
threat to the power structure.<br />
<br />
We have more to fear from those who would lead us than we do from those
who would attack us from without. Those with power over us have more to
gain from terrorizing us than the outsider with no influence over our
society. When we are frightened we have a tendency to rally around our
so called leaders and abdicate our rights without challenge in the vain
hope that we will be protected. As this progresses it always ends the
same. Secrecy and corruption grow as power is centralized and the ruling
elite become greedier and more entrenched in their positions of power.<br />
<br />
Freedom for all allows for more transparency. It allows for more
accountability. It allows for more personal responsibility, even in the
realm of security. It allows for a more open society. It allows for more
closely knit communities based on love and trust rather than doubt and
fear. In short, the principles of freedom and liberty allow for all that
most of us dream about. It even allows for more security, or at least
it allows for us all to choose the level of security we wish to have and
the level of risk we wish to take. I think that the fear generated by
recent events have clouded our thinking and caused us to forget the very
things we should be most conscious of, the very things the people of
the United States of America should hold most sacred.<br />
<br />
We are supposed to be the land of the brave. We are not supposed to
tremble and cower in our locked down homes in fear every time some mad
bombers show up in our streets, let alone some misguided kids who, from
what I've been able to gather from mainstream sources, cooked up some
hair-brained scheme. The real terrorists are laughing at us. We are
supposed to be a fiercely independent nation of rugged individualists.
How did we come to be so dependent on the state for our security? How
did we come to be a nation of meekly obedient sheep who so easily defer
to the "authorities" whenever some small time troublemaker acts out? The
real terrorists are taking advantage of us. We are supposed to be a
nation of freedom loving people. How did we come to be a nation of
livestock begging to be tyrannized simply because we have discovered
that the world can be a dangerous place? How can we give up that which
is most precious to us when we are supposedly afraid to lose it? The
real terrorists will be happy to take it from us.<br />
<br />
I feel for the people of Boston. I feel for those who lost their lives
and limbs and innocence on April 15th. It was a terrible tragedy, a
horrible thing to go through, but the reaction was worse. Will we go
after those who failed? Will anyone from law enforcement be fired? Will
anyone from law enforcement be implicated in the bombing and/or be held
accountable for negligence? I doubt it. They never are. Perhaps a more
important question is: why do these events always seem to take place
when some drill is going on? Maybe it's time to take a look at how these
drills are run. Maybe we should try to find out how terrorists seem to
know when they're going to happen. In a society with a more open
government the answers to these questions would more likely be
forthcoming.<br />
<br />
We, as a society, seem to have forgotten what it means to be free and
independent. We have come to depend on the government power structure so
much that we have forgotten what it takes to find our own way in life.
We have forgotten the pride one gets from working hard to create a
better life for one's self and one's family. We have forgotten the
immense personal sense of satisfaction one gets from knowing that what
you've accomplished you've accomplished through your own efforts, not
through some government largess.<br />
<br />
It's time we rediscovered what freedom is about. True freedom brings
peace. True freedom brings brotherhood. True freedom brings about
security. We have tried giving power to a few elite, and they have
failed. We have tried their centralization schemes and they have proved
catastrophic. It's time to decentralize. It's time to strip the federal
government down to its constitutional size. It's time to demand they
obey the law that is the Constitution of the United States. It's time to
stop cowering, step out and show that martial law is unnecessary no
matter the circumstances. If we don't honor freedom in the face of
terrorism, then history will not remember us as a free and independent
people, but the people of the future will instead shake their heads and
ask how we could not see what was coming and how it was we let the evil
grow.<br />
<br />
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation. <br />
<br />
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help
me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews
if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795"> Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039"> The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballottisblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-1957972068867493872013-04-19T11:38:00.002-07:002013-04-19T11:38:57.072-07:00How Progressives Love and Support CorporationsI don't like to label people. I don't like to speak in generalities.
Unfortunately we live in a society where labels and generalities have
become quite acceptable, particularly when talking in terms of politics
and political beliefs. It is, in my opinion, because of this, at least
partially, that we often forget we live in an individualist society. It
is among the most unique societies in human history. As part of
Westernized culture we have romanticized the idea of freedom, but as
Americans we have squandered the ideals of the founding fathers and
allowed a tyrannical centralized government and their corporate backers
to gain too much power and influence over our personal lives. I believe
this is because we as human beings seem to have this tendency toward
wanting to collectivize. This likely has something to do with the human
desire to be loved and accepted by others. We worry that if we don't
share the same customs and beliefs as others that they will not accept
us for loving, caring human beings. <br />
<br />
Because we live in a world where generalizations are prevalent in the
media, how we define the labels we use becomes distorted. For instance,
progressives are supposed to hate corporations and love government
regulations and intervention in the markets. Conservatives and
libertarians, on the other hand, are supposed to love corporations by
hating such government regulations and interventions and loving the idea
of smaller government. But the opposite is true. While many
progressives would be loathe to admit that they love and support huge
corporate entities, in practice they do. In the real world it is actions
that matter, not words. It is not so much what you say as what you do
that really makes the difference.<br />
<br />
Any so called progressive that is reading this is by now likely throwing
a fit. Inside his head he is likely fuming as he thinks about how much
he hates corporations. His sensibilities are likely quite insulted by my
accusation that he loves and supports them. He may well wonder how it
is that I can support such an accusation. Well, for one thing, in at
least one way they are in complete agreement with one of the most
infamous robber barons ever. Like John D. Rockefeller, they hate
competition and love monopolies.<br />
<br />
Why would I say this? Simple, they hate free markets and at the same
time they support the most heinous monopoly of all, the government
monopoly on legalized force. They are constantly bashing free market
philosophies and blaming them for the economic problems we currently
face, but the fact is that there has not been true free markets in this
country for a very long time, if indeed there ever were. Government
interventions in the markets have been going on since before the
founding of the nation, but they've become more egregious in the past
few decades with the most offensive intrusion being the introduction of
the latest iteration of the central bank, the privately owned Federal
Reserve System, a century ago. If anyone is to blame for our current
financial fiasco it is big centralized government. They have proven they
are either too incompetent, too inept, or too corrupt to trust when it
comes to centralized planning of the economy.<br />
<br />
Free markets are all about competition. They're all about a free flow of
ideas to try to keep as many consumers as happy as possible by
providing products and services that are demanded by the consuming
public. John D. Rockefeller said that competition is a sin and
apparently progressives agree for they seem to think that big government
regulation is a better way than competition to keep corporations in
check. They seem to think it's better to grant a monopoly on legitimized
force to a small group of elites and then have them erect barriers that
prevent competition from entering the market in an effort to contain
corporate influence rather than eliminating barriers, letting
competition bring choice to the marketplace and then letting the
consumers decide which products and services they wish to purchase and
which they wish to shun. In this manner, progressives and the robber
barons are on the same page.<br />
<br />
Let us not forget that corporations are government entities. The
government defines what a corporation is and what the rules are to
incorporate. Government allows for limitations to be placed on the
liabilities corporations can be held accountable for, hence the LL in
LLC. Big government decides the fate of these corporations, not the
courts, not the consumers, and agents of big government are going to
label their inept friends as "too big to fail" instead of letting the
free marketplace do its job and force the inept to fail so that the
competent can replace them.<br />
<br />
What do the progressives do? Do they demand that incompetent, inept and
corrupt government get out of the way so that competent, more
innovative, more productive businesses can step in and replace
corporations and give the consumer choice? Do they call for power to be
removed from centralized federal government and placed in the hands of
those who will compete for the trust of the common folk?<br />
<br />
No. They call for more laws that increase the powers of the very people
who caused the problem in the first place. They don't call for the break
up of the cartels and monopolies that are labeled "too big to fail,"
they just call for better enforcement of regulations and more
restrictions. They want to make it more difficult for competition to
enter the marketplace. They don't call for the arrests of corrupt
politicians who helped create policy that created this mess, they call
for more taxation, as if throwing money at a problem involving people
who create the money in the first place will do anything to solve the
problem. In short, they want to give more money and more power to the
elite who already have too much wealth and too much power. They want to
grow the power of the central government which then grows the power of
the mega corporations. It is a recipe that will lead to an even more
spectacular failure than we saw in 2008.<br />
<br />
Progressives like to think they're all about progress. It's just a trick
of the language, at least when it comes to their policies on business
and corporations. Their policies are really quite regressive, but not
too many people would want to be labeled a regressive. If you really
want to allow the people to have their say, then laws restricting choice
need to be repealed. Laws making it difficult to enter the marketplace
need to be repealed. The Affordable Healthcare Act, more commonly known
as Obamacare, much lauded by so called progressives, needs to be
repealed. A freer market where consumers can truly vote with their
dollars needs to be established and then one day, hopefully, a truly
free market which holds accountable the inept, incompetent and corrupt
and exalts the competent and innovative will be allowed to flourish in
our nation. Now that would be progress. When that happens we will all
surely prosper as the high tide will raise all ships. When that happens
the dream of freedom we keep in our hearts will be realized and we will
understand why our forebears romanticized it so.<br />
<br />
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation. <br />
<br />
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help
me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews
if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795"> Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039"> The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballottisblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-72426043449872911552013-04-16T23:59:00.001-07:002013-04-16T23:59:55.805-07:00Innocents Suffer, the Powerful ProfitI have said this before and I will continue to say it, I do not condone
violence. I particularly abhor random acts of violence such as the one
that occurred in Boston on April 15th, 2013 during the Boston marathon. I
say it was a random act of violence because as of this moment, as I
write this, no one has taken responsibility for it and no suspects have
been arrested nor any reason given for this act. This is only
speculation, but I would bet that there's some political agenda or
another behind it. For some reason those who seek power over others seem
to think that the way to go about gaining such power is through force
and coercion.<br />
<br />
Since I don't trust what I hear in the mainstream media, I haven't in
some time now, I listen a lot to the alternative media. I don't
necessarily trust what they have to say either, but I think what they
have to say makes a whole lot more sense most of the time than what you
hear in the state run corporate media that is supposed to be a free
press. But I like to keep an open mind. Right now there are many who are
trying to figure out whether this is a false flag event or not. They
are trying to examine the facts and see who will benefit from this and
what the agenda will be. As of now, the answers are not forthcoming and
there is much speculation going on. This has been an unusual situation
in that there is no boogeyman to blame as of this moment, no clear
agenda to point at.<br />
<br />
Usually in these types of bombings, some group or terrorist organization
is all too happy to take responsibility for such a heinous act. They
want people to know why innocent blood has been shed and so many have to
suffer. Not in this case. On that front, information is slow to be
leaked to the public. If some terrorist group has taken responsibility,
the authorities aren't telling the public.<br />
<br />
One thing I can say for certain, politicians will use this event to push
some agenda or another. If it's some foreign terrorist organization who
has done this, they'll push for more war and aggression against
whatever nation they feel needs to be suppressed. If it's a domestic
terrorist organization, they'll use it as an excuse to ban or tax or
otherwise restrict the sale of something, perhaps ammunition or
something that can used to make explosives. If it was a lone nutjob,
which would be the hardest scenario to figure out, they'll use it to try
to take what's left of our privacy and to violate our rights even
further than they've already done. They might even use it as an excuse
to roll out some kind of new surveillance gizmo, or grid, or program. No
matter what, they will try to grow their own power. That seems to be
their answer to everything.<br />
<br />
Another thing I know for certain, whoever did this harmed innocent
people. Events like this never hurt those who might deserve it. Like the
wars we wage, bombs don't just target bad people who have caused harm
to others, they harm innocents. They cause collateral damage. They harm
people who are just trying to go about their day to day business. They
harm children who have not even learned to hate yet. They harm women and
the elderly. They harm whoever happens to be in the blast zone, no
matter how evil or how kind and gentle those people may have been during
the course of their lives. Innocent people suffer because someone,
somewhere has some agenda to push, some quest for power to pursue.<br />
<br />
Initiating violence doesn't work. No matter who initiates it and for
what purpose, violence only begets more violence. The innocent suffer
while the powerful profit, which is another reason why I often feel
events like this are initiated by the powerful. It is they who feel they
can gain from such violence. Yet even they have to pay a price. The
price they'll pay is their humanity. That is the price for anyone who
uses or condones such violence, whether that violence happens in Boston
or Damascus, in Europe or in Asia, on the East Coast or in the West
Bank. It is the price one pays whether they are initiating such violence
for personal reasons, under orders from some terrorist group, or under
orders from some state run military. Unfortunately for us, there seems
to be far too many people in this world who couldn't care less for their
own humanity. Until we learn to put love in front of hate, until we
learn to crave peace more than power, and until we learn to respect and
honor the choices of others as we would want them to respect and honor
the choices we make for ourselves, we will continue to see such
tragedies as occurred in Boston on April 15th, 2013.<br />
<br />
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation. <br />
<br />
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help
me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews
if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795"> Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039"> The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballottisblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-11821152342233744822013-04-02T16:57:00.002-07:002013-04-02T17:37:34.501-07:00Justifying Unjustifiable AuthoritarianismSo I just finished reading this <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/25/opinion/three-cheers-for-the-nanny-state.html?ref=opinion&pagewanted=all&_r=0">op ed piece</a>
by one Sarah Conly who decided to step up to the plate and defend
busybody mayor Bloomberg and his attempt to ban the sale of large size
soft drinks in New York City. She is obviously a well educated person
and makes a fairly well thought out argument over why certain freedoms
should be curtailed. Well educated, however, does not necessarily mean
free thinking, nor does it necessarily translate into wisdom. In fact,
after reading Ms. Conly's op/ed piece I would say that she was decidedly
against free thought, unless of course that free thought leads one into
the arms of the ever coddling state.<br />
<br />
There is no doubt in my mind that Ms. Conly is a very loving soul who is
quite concerned about her fellow human beings. Her op/ed piece shows
that she is quite concerned with the well being of the rest of us who dwell
upon the planet with her. Like most defenders of the nanny state she is
quick to point out that government laws are there to protect you, and
she does so in an eloquent and convincing manner. She also manages to
verbally dance around one of the most important aspects of the debate,
as do most apologists for government intrusion on your life, and that is
the aspect of the morality of using force to change people's behavior.<br />
<br />
Force and coercion are the tools government has to get people to comply
with their mandates. With that in mind the claim can be made that all
laws have the potential to carry with it the death penalty. It would
work as an escalation. Man sells large sugary drink. Man is ticketed.
Man refuses to pay ticket. A warrant is issued for the man's arrest. Man
refuses to acknowledge the court's jurisdiction over him. Police try to
force compliance. Man resists. Police kill the man. Whenever a law is
passed the question should be asked, "Is this law worth killing people
over?"<br />
<br />
Some might say this is an extreme example, and they'd be right. Such
people would find it very difficult to argue, however, that even though
this scenario is extremely unlikely, it is not impossible. Because of
its extreme nature, if such an event were to happen the man killed by
the police would not be portrayed as someone trying to defend his right
to engage in voluntary transactions between two consenting parties, he'd
be portrayed as a crazy extremist. But perhaps they're right and I
shouldn't use such extreme examples. Perhaps I should take a page from
Ms. Conly's book and use examples like comparing banning certain sizes
of sugary drinks with preventing someone from crossing a derelict bridge
because, you know, those two situations are so similar.<br />
<br />
In all fairness the example is not her own. Ms. Conly uses an example
proffered by John Stuart Mill way back in 1859, then proceeds to
disagree with him. I think the point that Ms. Conly was making, though
in not so many words, is that the government creates law to keep you
safe. They make laws to protect you from yourself. But this hardly
works. One needs to ask the question, when does it become necessary for
someone to protect us from the protectors? Let's examine the example of
the bridge a little closer. She states earlier in the article that we
need to be stopped from doing foolish stuff, and apparently she thinks
the way to do this is to pass laws against doing foolish stuff. With
this in mind I ask, what would be the purpose of passing a law making it
illegal to cross the bridge?<br />
<br />
Ah, this would be an easy question to answer. The purpose would be to
prevent people from trying to cross the bridge so that they don't fall
into the river and perhaps injure or kill themselves. How do we make
certain people adhere to this law? Well, let's hire men to guard or
patrol the bridge and if someone tries to cross they'll tell them, "No,
you can't cross this bridge." We can even arm these men so they look
official and intimidating. What if, for some strange reason, the people
don't want listen and decide to cross anyway? Perhaps its the best way
to get to the other side despite the danger. Then those people will get
citations with court dates and fines. What if they throw the citations
away and still decide to try to cross despite all that? Even though it
remains dangerous to do so? Well, then the guards can shoot them. After
all, we have to keep people safe from their own foolish actions.<br />
<br />
Did this law accomplish its purpose? Was its purpose truly to stop the
people from crossing, or was something else at work here? Were those
passing the laws maybe more interested in collecting money? Were they
more interested in controlling people's behavior? Is there a better way
to stop people from crossing dangerous bridges than using the force and
coercion of the state?<br />
<br />
I didn't even bother to talk about how that law doesn't prevent people
from going down the embankment and trying to ford the river, even though
that might be more dangerous due to strong currents, nor did I examine the various reasons one might want to cross the river. The point
I'm trying to make is that force and coercion aren't always the best
ways to prevent people from doing something they might want to do. In
the case of crossing the bridge a sign making people aware of the danger
and pointing out safer areas to cross should be sufficient. In the case
of large servings of soda, perhaps some kind of public service
announcement or education effort paid for by concerned citizens, such as
Ms. Conly, could be a better solution than an outright ban on certain
sizes of soft drinks. Perhaps the mayor himself could afford to pay for
such a campaign, I understand he is quite wealthy. If he is so
concerned, perhaps he should show it by voluntarily contributing his own
money to such a worthy cause rather than using tax dollars to enforce a
law. In either case, I do believe the individual should be left to
determine for himself the level of risk he wants to take.<br />
<br />
Ms. Conly goes on to cite studies on cognitive bias and then seems to
fail to understand that she suffers from the same malady as the rest of
us. I understand that my cognitive bias causes me to believe that
freedom is the answer no matter the question. It seems to me that Ms.
Conly has a cognitive bias that favors one size fits all state solutions
known as laws. She mentions the status quo bias and then supports the
status quo of political power. It also seems to me that perhaps she
suffers from something I would call a propaganda bias in that she
accepts the statist propaganda (i.e. for the greater good, majority
rules, for the public welfare) without question. She cites cost/benefit
analyses and the fact that government has the resources to use such
methods as a justification for using force to get us to behave in
certain manners. I say such methods have been abused in the past, are
being abused in the present and will continue to be abused into the
future so long as people in power can benefit from such abuse.<br />
<br />
Going back to the beginning of her article, Ms. Conly asks "So, why is
this (the ban on large sized "sugary drinks") such a big deal?" Because
it should be a big deal. There needs to be a line drawn where people
start to say that we need to be protected against those who wish to be
the protectors. Apparently this is that line. A more appropriate
question in my mind is "Why are people like Ms. Conly making such a big
deal about the blowback this has caused?" Also, why is it that
collectivists will happily use the ideas of democracy and majority rule
when most everyone agrees with their policy proposals, but will suddenly
balk at those concepts and claim to know better than the rest of us
when their policy proposals are challenged by the majority or sometimes
even a significant minority?<br />
<br />
Ms. Conly is an associate professor of philosophy at Bowdoin College, a
prestigious private college located in Maine. She wrote a book entitled
"Against Autonomy: Justifying Coercive Paternalism." She is not only for
the daddy state, she wrote a book on it. I don't know why so many
academics seem to favor state solutions to societal problems, solutions
that have so often failed throughout all of history. I can only put
forth conjecture. Perhaps they've lost faith in humanity. Perhaps they
honestly believe that an academic, scientific elite should make the
decisions for everyone. Perhaps they see themselves as part of this
ruling elite class and don't want to lose the power and privileges they
perceive they have. Perhaps they don't see their education as just a
higher level of training, but believe that because they are so educated
they are indeed more intelligent and better than the rest of us. Perhaps
it has something to do with how the institutions that pay their
salaries are funded. I'm really not sure. I'm just kind of thinking out
loud and giving anyone who cares to chew on it food for thought.<br />
<br />
Ms. Conly does have one thing right, this is not about soda. And it's
not about health. It's not even about public welfare or the greater
good. It's about control. It always has been. It's about freedom versus
tyranny. It's about a small cadre of elitists pushing the envelope and
always trying to see just how far they can go, just how much they can
micromanage our lives. It's my hope that not only did they find that
limit, but that common folk realize this is what the elitists have been
doing all along and begin to take back their freedoms by forcing the
repeal of other prohibitions and restrictions that have stifled our
ability to produce for ourselves and enjoy the fruits of our labor.<br />
<br />
There's an even larger question at stake here. Mostly, this is about who
owns whom. Do I own my own body, or does the state? Do I have the right
to do with my body as I please, or does the state have some claim on it
as if I'm their property? It's ironic that Ms. Conly is associated with
an historical college that has a reputation for its anti slavery past
and yet writes opinions in favor of a more subtle form of slavery to the
state. When I speak of freedom, I am being an abolitionist. When she
speaks about coercive paternalism she is being an enslaving
authoritarian, no matter how eloquently she might make her arguments and
how reasonable they may sound.<br />
<br />
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a>
to make a donation. While Ms. Conly has an institution to support her
and her work, I do not. I can only humbly ask for your voluntary
donations as I try to respond to statist propaganda.<br />
<br />
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help
me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews
if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795"> Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039"> The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballottisblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-82231498541387171272013-04-01T21:13:00.001-07:002013-04-01T21:13:50.624-07:00How Free Market Competition Presents a More Cooperative SystemThe image of the robber baron has been burned into the psyche of the
American consciousness. When one thinks about capitalism or free
markets, this is the image that comes to the forefront of most people's
minds. This image has helped create the misconception that capitalism
and free markets have come to create the financial mess that the world
finds itself in. The truth is that government and their attempts to
regulate markets is what created the robber baron in the first place.
They would have never been able to reach the pinnacles they reached
without the levers of power that government provides. <br />
<br />
There's a difference between a good businessman and an elitist
"capitalist" robber baron who claims to be a businessman. A good
businessman will provide an excellent product or service which he will
constantly be trying to improve upon in order to keep his customers
happy and satisfied. An elitist "capitalist" robber baron will try to
eliminate all competition so that anyone wanting the product or service
he provides (usually through the form of some soulless corporation) will
have to be forced to purchase it through his corporation no matter how
poor the quality. He is not interested in keeping his customers happy or
satisfied because his goal is to create a system where they have no
alternative vendors to buy from. He is only interested in keeping his
"shareholders" happy and satisfied as an excuse to implement anti
humanitarian policies and not be held responsible either in the
marketplace or in his own conscience, if he has one.<br />
<br />
I put the word capitalist above in quotes because that's what most
schools would teach, that these robber barons of the past were
capitalists. A capitalist is someone who invests his own capital (money
or wealth) in some venture or business in order to make a profit. The
robber barons of old, the Rockefellers for instance, didn't get their
monopolies through investing their own capital in business per se,
however, they invested in government and government power so that laws
and regulations could be created that would help eliminate competition.
This is done by creating regulations that only the very wealthy
corporations can afford to pay for hence preventing most competition
from even entering the market in the first place, thus limiting consumer
choice. <br />
<br />
I think there's a bigger problem in that in a free market the consumer
needs to be well informed. This is a problem because it seems to me that
most people don't care to be informed about the most basic things
regarding consumption and the economy, let alone being well informed
about the things he's consuming and how the economy he takes part in
works. It seems to me that too many modern day common folk just want the
politicians to make the economic decisions for them which gives away
their power to someone else. They shouldn't be surprised when such
people do a poor job or abuse that power or make decisions based on what
benefits them personally rather than what benefits the public at large.<br />
<br />
It would seem counter intuitive that a free market based on competition
would result in a more cooperative system, but that is because most
people don't stop to consider that they are part of the system, along
with all other consumers who wish to partake in the modern marketplace.
The need for them to become well informed translates into an ability to
judge a product based on more than just its price. Unfortunately most do
not seem willing or able to judge past price and perhaps quality and to
seek out information on things like the conditions the production
workers endure to make the product, the environmental effects the
product might create, the contribution to community the producer makes,
long term health effects the product might have, and other more ethereal
details on how a certain product might be good or bad for humanity in
general. People only seem worried about whether they want something or
not and how much it will cost. Corporations love a less educated
consumer because then all they have to worry about is cost, more or
less.<br />
<br />
A free market, when operating properly, would let the world of ideas
come to fruition and elevate humanity to its highest potential. This
would work by allowing the consumer the ability to chose with his money
which competitor is the best. For instance, let's take the idea of a
widget. In the marketplace, company A claims to have the best widgets at
the cheapest cost on the planet. Just about anyone who uses widgets
wants to buy their widgets from company A. But Joe Public has what he
considers a better idea on how to produce widgets and bring them to
market. He goes about using his own capital and perhaps borrowing from
some friends and family to create company B and begins competing with
company A in the widget industry.<br />
<br />
Perhaps the widgets company B produces are equal in quality, but they
cost a little more. They are made, however, in a way that has much less
impact on the environment in a facility that treats workers with
fairness and respect. It would be up to company B and the consumers who
felt these were important issues to get the word out. It would be up to
the consumers to decide what was more important and how much they were
willing to support company B's principles. In this way, everyone has
their say in the marketplace. In this way, everyone decides which ideas
prosper and flourish and which ones wither on the vine and die. In this
way, everyone's vote counts.<br />
<br />
There are those who would argue with these ideas. They would claim that
people are too stupid, or lazy, or apathetic to make such decisions. To
these people I have a couple of things to say. First, do you really have
such disdain for your fellow human beings that you would judge them so
harshly? On what basis? Are you prepared to be so judged yourself?
Perhaps you're making this judgment about people you don't even know not
based on reason, or even emotion, but based on what you know about
yourself.<br />
<br />
The second thing I'd like to say is perhaps that's because of the
government owned education system. We are all imperfect human beings and
have a tendency to behave in ways we've been trained to behave in.
Unfortunately many of us seem to think that once our formal education
has ended we are no longer learning. Perhaps if we wish to build a freer
society where people take more responsibility for themselves and for
their community, we should start by training the children to be free
thinking individuals rather than mindless consumers. Perhaps we should
all realize that we should spend our entire life learning, whether we're
attending school or not, and strive to become free thinking individuals
rather than mindless consumers. It's a shame that we have little choice
in how our children are educated because so much of our income is taken
through property taxes that hardly anyone has the means to send their
children to any school other than public school. Are you truly surprised
when public schools indoctrinate children to empower the system rather
than training them to empower themselves? It is this government system
where the training to compete truly begins, and often children are
trained that competing against authority is futile.<br />
<br />
The alternative to free markets is what we have today. It is less choice
for the individual. It is the individual having less to say about what
is important. It is those in charge having more power to make decisions
for you instead of you having the power to decide for yourself what's
important and what isn't. It is a seepage from the marketplace of
products and services into one's personal life and the marketplace of
ideas. It is a growing tyranny that starts in a seemingly benign manner
and quickly mutates into horrors we as human beings seem to have to keep
revisiting from time to time for some strange reason. It is, as always,
the empowerment of a wealthy elite who seem to harbor dangerous world
domination fantasies. Do you truly wish to see these people continue to
steer us all down the path they've chosen? If so, then just go along
with the status quo, put your head down and continue to go along to get
along.<br />
<br />
Remember, change begins within. If you wish to see change in the world,
it is important to first create that change in yourself. As a consumer,
you have a great deal of power. Do not allow that power to be taken from
you. Insist that you be allowed to make your own choices. And when the
powers that be become determined to make laws limiting your choice and
therefore your power, insist upon denying consent. We are many and they
are few. Don't be afraid to stand up and be counted. Let them know that
you know. Just as they need your cooperation in order to rule over you,
the free market needs your cooperation in order for you to rule over
yourself.<br />
<br />
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation. <br />
<br />
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help
me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews
if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795"> Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039"> The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballottisblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-262197705141675372013-03-23T07:30:00.002-07:002013-03-23T07:30:11.499-07:00Freedom and Private Property Versus Criminal Government and BanksThere's a meme in the world of debate that once you start to compare the
politics of today to the politics of Germany during Hitler's reign the
debate is over and you've lost. So, I'm going to start this article by
comparing modern American politics to Hitler's Germany and other 20th
century collectivist political schemes. The point of this beginning is
to do so. If you don't want to read further, than don't. You see, I
don't buy the meme. Such a meme is developed, in my humble opinion,
simply because some people don't want to face the growing evil and
choose instead to remain willfully ignorant as to what has been
happening in the land that was supposed to be a beacon of individual
freedom shining to the world.<br />
<br />
The first thing I'm going to do is take the holocaust thing right out of
the picture. Many people conflate fascism with murdering innocent
people due to their religion or some other innocent aspect of their
character perceived as a flaw by those in power. That really has nothing
to do with the philosophy of fascism. That has to do with scapegoating.
That has to do with a divide and conquer mentality. The state doesn't
have to be murdering innocent people in death camps to be a fascist
state. It doesn't have to murder in order to be criminal.<br />
<br />
That said, don't think that just because such things haven't happened
yet they won't happen in the future. It's just that murder and putting
people in prison (FEMA) camps isn't what makes a nation a fascist
nation, fascism is merely the unholy marriage of centralized (federal)
government power and corporate power. This is tantamount to a marriage
between organizations with a monopoly on legalized force and
organizations with virtual monopolies on wealth. It is a very dangerous
partnership for those of us who wish to remain free peoples.<br />
<br />
The reason these two entities would want to unite is so they can steal
your birthright. They actually want to get you to believe that they have
your best interests at heart so that they can deceive you into giving
over all your real wealth to them. The real wealth I speak of comes in
the form of private property. It seems they believe that, as long as
they own all the property, they own you. This is the very thing the
founders of the United States were trying to alleviate when they came
over here in the first place. They wanted to establish a nation where
government could not dictate what you could and could not do on your own
private property. That's why the wrote the Bill of Rights, to codify
the limits of power that agents of the government could exercise over
individuals and their property.<br />
<br />
Private property is freedom. Without it one is basically a serf to the
landlord. One is more or less indebted to whoever owns the land one
lives upon. One must follow the rules and regulations that landlord lays
down or one risks being evicted from one's residence and thrown
unceremoniously into the street. As long as one owes a mortgage, one
does not own one's private property, the bank does and one is their
serf. As long as one pays taxes on one's property, one does not own
one's private property, the government does and one is their serf. One
is only truly free when one has bought one's property outright or paid
off any loans one might have on it and no one else can make any claim
that they can legitimately steal it for any reason.<br />
<br />
At one time, owning your own property was known as the American dream,
and many people were living it. Now it has become a nightmare. Now most
are mortgaged to the hilt. Most are in debt to the point where if they
lose their job they won't be able to make all their payments and in a
matter of weeks might lose everything they supposedly own. Everyone has
to pay taxes. Taxes have gone up for everyone, even the working poor. No
one owns their own private property anymore, no one except the
government, the banks, and the financial corporations. This is why they
are becoming richer while you become poorer. This is why you're having
problems paying for your lifestyle, why your quality of living goes down
while theirs goes up. They have monopolies on the things that matter
and you're going to have to pay through the nose in order to get the
crumbs that fall from their table.<br />
<br />
The ruling elite have all the real wealth, and they've gained it through
illegal means. They've bamboozled us all by issuing debt based fiat
paper currency instead of honest commodity based money. It is a scheme
that's been going on for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. Those who
perpetrate it know very well that their system will eventually
collapse. How could they not know? Historically, it has happened time
and time again. They understand the harm such a system will do to the
middle classes. They also understand that those who perpetrate the crime
will end up with unfathomable wealth while the huge majority of
humanity will be wallowing in poverty. The potential for reward is great
and the risk low, for historically they have not been held accountable
and after a financial collapse it will be they who, like the royalty of
the middle ages, will be able to dictate how the wealth will flow, and
they will be very stingy indeed when it comes to the lot of the serfs
they will own.<br />
<br />
When it comes down to it, I believe that all most people want is a nice
place to call their own, a place where they can raise a family, a place
where they make the decisions that will affect their lives, a place
where they are sovereign. This is something that people have been
striving for since time immemorial, to get the tyrants who tend to
gravitate to the halls of power, the halls of government, out of their
lives. This is something that the ruling elite have been striving to
deny the people for just as long. This is what freedom boils down to,
the individual's ability to make the choices, good or bad, that will
determine that individual's destiny. That freedom starts with the
ability to own private property. This is what America was supposed to be
about. It is why the Bill of Rights was incorporated into the highest
law of the land. It is the foundation of the American dream. <br />
<br />
The dream has been stolen by criminal banks and their government
accomplices, for they have acted in a criminal manner by ignoring the
highest law in the land. It has been stolen by promises broken, promises
of a better, fairer way, promises that could not be kept for they were
based on lies, deception, theft, coercion and force. We have been
conned, folks. It's time to look in the mirror and admit that. We have
been conned and those doing the conning continue to try to get you to
blame anyone but them for the financial downturn we continue to suffer
through. Those who continue to believe that the central banks are not at
fault and that fractional reserve, fiat systems are legitimate continue
to empower the criminality. Those government officials who continue to
work to protect the central banking systems continue to deny you your
birthright, the freedom you deserve.<br />
<br />
The criminality and fraud need to be exposed. The spotlight needs to
shine on those who have perpetrated it. Iceland has done so. They have
arrested high level bankers and politicians. Now they are well on their
way to fiscal recovery. The people of the United States still seem to
want to remain frightened and willfully ignorant. They don't seem to
want to admit that they've been played. They don't want to admit that
we've become a fascist nation. They're frightened of what could happen
should they attempt to tear down the collectivist system that the
establishment has become.<br />
<br />
There's really nothing to be afraid of, but the first step is to admit
that there is a debt problem, then the common folk need to divorce
themselves from those who have caused this problem. We need to insist
that the thieves can no longer steal from us. We need to tell the so
called "too big to fail" and their government agents that we are not
afraid of what will happen should they fail. In fact, we should help to
peacefully bring about a failure through criminal prosecution of those
who have, in the past, threatened the masses with violence should they
not get their way.<br />
<br />
There are many ways to help restore the American dream. It begins by
realizing we are no longer free and we are no longer represented by
government, but that fascism has imposed itself in our government
system. We must strive to divorce corporate power from government power.
We must then strive to deny our consent to those who would try to
impose their rule upon us. We must remove the levers of power they have
constructed to impose their will upon society, levers that cannot be
accessed by the common folk. These levers include the ability to create
currency out of thin air (central banks) and the ability to impose taxes
on private property and then claim that property, by force if
necessary, should the so called owners refuse to pay (government).<br />
<br />
We must strive to allow everyone to be free. We must strive to create a
voluntary society based on love and trust that individuals will make
good decisions for themselves rather than trying to regulate everyone
through restrictive law which creates a society based on fear that
individuals will make bad decisions for themselves. All these can be
accomplished by civil disobedience. All these can be accomplished when
enough of us simply say "No, I will not obey" to the powers that be.<br />
<br />
There is no doubt the criminality must be dealt with and cleansed from
the system. Most people realize that something is wrong, but they don't
know what. They find it difficult to do something about it. There are
several movements that are striving to deal with the problem and bring
freedom back to the masses. There is the movement to audit and then
abolish the Fed. There is the Tea Party movement. There is the Occupy
movement. There is a movement away from the mainstream media and toward
alternative sources of information. All these are valid ways to bring
about positive change, but one must be wary of the tendency for the
powers that be to infiltrate these movements in an attempt to neutralize
them. When the message morphs into something other than peace and
freedom, than one knows the mechanisms of co-opting are at work.<br />
<br />
If you belong to a movement then it is important that you remember to
stay on message. This is perhaps the most difficult thing of all to
accomplish. Lasting change seldom happens overnight. Sudden change is
usually violent. A peaceful world can hardly be achieved through violent
means, as the violent means becomes the violence in the world. Freedom
can hardly be achieved through tyrannical means, as the tyranny becomes
the established method. An honest system can hardly be achieved through
corrupt methods as the corruption rots away the system to its core.
Adhere to your principles and you will lead be example. You will become
the reminder to all of how things should be, how they should operate.
You will become the change you wish to see and the world will be better
for it.<br />
<br />
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation. <br />
<br />
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help
me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews
if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795"> Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039"> The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballottisblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-10195864953431835642013-03-10T14:16:00.002-07:002013-03-10T14:16:51.772-07:00Confessions of a Serial Conspiracy Theorist
I think that perhaps I've always been a conspiracy theorist. Now,
that statement needs a little clarification. Always is a long time, so
perhaps it would be better to say I've been a conspiracy theorist in
this lifetime. Ah, but even that is a long time and can be a little
unclear, so perhaps it is a little more accurate to say I've been a
conspiracy theorist for as long as I can remember. Hmm, even that's a
little incorrect because I can remember pretty far back to times when I
didn't have a realistic idea of how the world works. Perhaps if I claim
I've been a conspiracy theorist for as long as I've been able to think
about such things and use reason to come to logical conclusions. Yeah,
that's the ticket.<br />
<br />
But now there's something else missing. These two words, "conspiracy
theorist," when used together, what exactly do they mean? You see, in
recent times, in my opinion, these two words have been convoluted on
purpose by certain interests in order to obfuscate truth. They've done
this so that those who dig for the truth will be made irrelevant. Hmm,
that's a bit of a conspiracy theory in and of itself.<br />
<br />
A conspiracy is simply two or more people plotting something evil,
unlawful or just plain wrong. A theory is simply a proposed explanation
or conjecture as to why something is the way it is or happened the way
it happened. So a conspiracy theorist is merely someone who conjectures
that something happened as it did because two or more people carried out
a plot to make it so. Yet somehow the words "conspiracy theorist" have
come to mean "some crazy loon with a wild imagination who makes things
up" in the minds of many people.<br />
<br />
Most recently many so called conspiracy debunkers have concentrated on
conspiracy theories that involve government personnel. They will then
declare the conspiracy theorists crazy as there are so many good people
in government, too many people would know and it would be too hard to
keep it secret, or someone would blow the whistle, or some such thing.
These arguments are easily picked apart for the most part and are just
as emotionally based, in my opinion, as some of the conspiracy theories
they are trying to debunk. This observation makes me wonder if some
hidden power isn't trying to make the masses believe that government is a
most innocuous and beneficial organization so that they don't want to
believe that it in fact creates an environment for the most destructive
and malevolent forces of humankind to operate from. There I go again,
spouting my conspiratorial thinking.<br />
<br />
Yet believing the debunkers closes the mind. If one listens to them one
may never clearly understand all the evidence of conspiracy. One might
never ask the right questions. One might never question the right
authorities. One might even go as far as to twist the laws of physics so
that this religion of government, this belief that government is
nothing but loving, caring, and beneficial to the masses, isn't
shattered. Like a wife who refuses to break free of an abusive husband,
(or a husband who refuses to acknowledge a wife's infidelity) the true
believers debunk any evidence of unfaithfulness. Instead, they make
excuses that hold no water and point to the occasions where their spouse
expressed their loving and caring nature. It is the same with
government. A true believer might say something like "How can our
leaders who protect us from evil foreigners, provide us with retirement
funding, care about the welfare of our poor, regulate the soulless
businessmen, and give us education and roads do anything evil?"<br />
<br />
I grew up on the heels of the Kennedy assassinations. I remember the
Martin Luther King, Jr. assassination and the riots it caused. There
really isn't that much question that these conspiratorial events
involved some very powerful government entities and yet the guilty
parties were never held accountable. In fact those involved or their
families or agents still have a hold on power today. Their agenda
includes a determination to gain power across Western civilization and
to never relinquish that power. After all, should they lose that power
there's a chance that they may have to account for their past evils
perpetrated against humanity. They can't let that happen.<br />
<br />
Yeah, I confess, I do believe that there are powerful men hidden inside
the complex that is the modern corporate structure directing events that
will shape our future. I do believe they plot to create events that
will benefit their interests. I do believe they use their wealth and
power to buy high level politicians to make sure their interests are
represented first and foremost when it comes to making national
policies. I do believe they place their friends and even their family
members into positions of high power so that they can continue to cover
up past misdeeds and move forward an agenda. I do believe these people
would do anything to hold onto power, anything. Anything. And
everything. I don't believe they care one whit for the common folk. In
fact, I think they're frightened of us, for they worry that if enough of
us find out and decide to do something about it they may lose more than
just their positions of privilege. They are frightened at what we may
do should we decide to direct our ire at the true power behind their
puppet politicians.<br />
<br />
Do you mean to tell me you don't believe that? You don't believe that
men of wealth and influence would use that wealth and influence to guide
humanity along a path that would benefit their agenda? Do you think
that all these events that have taken place that just happen to benefit
the already too wealthy and too powerful are simple coincidences? Do you
believe laws created that are beneficial to large corporations but make
it difficult to create competing smaller businesses happen by accident?
Do you think events that generate terror, change the direction of
nations and usher in new paradigms happen on the whim of small minded
people acting alone or in small and otherwise insignificant groups?
Really? Well if we have that much power why can't we use it to build a
more voluntary, peaceful society where the use of force, even government
force, is no longer tolerated? Why must change be so violent? Why can't
we have what 90 percent or more of us seem to want?<br />
<br />
Yes, I am a conspiracy theorist. I think that all major changes in this
world have happened due to some conspiracy or another. I think there are
events that have taken place that have caused major paradigm shifts and
that other events have happened of a similar nature that have not
caused major paradigm shifts. I do believe that the difference is in who
has planned such events and what the common folks' reaction to these
events have been. I do think that such things are studied by the powers
that be, the wealthy privileged elite who want to remain in power. I do
think they use this knowledge to plot a path for humanity to take into
the future. I do think they have used this knowledge to plot events that
show complete disregard for the humanity and they will continue to do
so as long as they feel they can get away with it. <br />
<br />
I also think that more and more people are beginning to come around to
my way of thinking. For instance, in a recent facebook discussion about
aspartame one gentleman called those who claim aspartame to be dangerous
conspiracy theorists and claimed that aspartame was one of the most
studied and safe food additives ever. Most just laughed at that claim.
The next post pointed out that the studies he referred to were those of
the original patent holder (Searle) and that independent studies had
found multiple dangers. I think people are catching on more than most
realize. Conspiracies happen especially in certain government agencies
where power is brokered and corruption is incentivised. Whistle blowers
are punished now more than ever and secrecy is ubiquitous. Principle is
greatly discouraged in government circles and anyone caught exercising
it is as quickly as possible ushered out of any position of power he may
occupy.<br />
<br />
I think it's time we started our own little conspiracy. I think we
should show those in power that they aren't the only ones who can
conspire to create a vision of the world as it should be. Let us all
conspire to take back the power to determine for our own selves what our
own destinies should hold for us. Let us conspire to take back the
personal responsibilities we should have for our own lives. Let us
conspire to honor individual freedom. Let us conspire to honor the
choices our neighbors make rather than coercing them into government
mandated choices. Let us conspire to bring down government monopolies
and provide competitive customer service for the one size fits all
government solutions we are now forced to use.<br />
<br />
Let us conspire to question authority. Let us conspire to say "No!" to
unjust laws, police state brutality and surveillance state intrusion.
Let us conspire to scale back federal government to constitutional size.
Let us conspire to be peacefully disobedient. Let us conspire to deny
consent. Let us conspire to do so without violence and to show that
human beings can bring about lasting change in a peaceful manner. Let us
conspire to show the world that the only tool government can use to
make us compliant is force, and that, like bullies, they will use it if
they think they must or they will have to back down. It might not be
easy, but it starts with admitting that conspiracies exist and realizing
that in order to take back power, even personal power, you must be
among those conspiring to do so.<br />
<br />
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation. <br />
<br />
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help
me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews
if you like them so that others might also find and enjoy them.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795"> Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039"> The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballottisblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-4651150689122577872013-03-02T10:21:00.001-08:002013-03-02T10:21:03.432-08:00The Obvious Hypocrisy of TyrannyIf tyranny was a living being, it would be a strange and marvelous
creature. By that I don't mean it would be a good thing, I mean it would
be something to gaze upon and marvel at, much like a dangerous or
poisonous animal. One could appreciate its qualities, but one wouldn't
want to get too close for fear of being attacked or bitten. In many
ways, tyranny engrosses the human mind, hypnotizing the observer with
its brilliance and power. At the same time the observer knows he should
back off and carefully put some distance between himself and the
creature, yet he is enticed to creep just a little closer, to see just
how close he can get to test his mettle. This is a dangerous practice
which we know can end up in disaster.<br />
<br />
But tyranny is a clever predator indeed. It likes to hypnotize its
victims. It likes to entice them closer. It's much like a Venus flytrap,
sending out an enticing scent to attract the fly and then closing
around it when it enters. It operates much like humans did when they
first learned to domesticate animals. It sets out food inside a pen for
the victim and then once that animal comes to eat closes the pen and
then the animal is trapped and has to count on something other than
itself for its survival. Ah, but there's something even more insidious
to tyranny than that. Tyranny has to deceive to survive, but it also
wants those who serve it to participate. It wants to change the moral
into the immoral. It wants to make its victims into small versions of
itself as it feeds upon the innocent who blindly follow like sheep to
the slaughter.<br />
<br />
That's why hypocrisy is such a hallmark of tyranny. It has to be,
otherwise human morality would not allow it to survive. No one, or
almost no one, would want to admit that they were evil. Even Lucifer
himself makes the claim that he is "the light" and is working toward the
"greater good." When talking about intention, which I believe should be
considered, it is notable to understand that often times good
intentions can result in horrendous consequences. It is not just the
intentions that matter, but the means by which one attempts to bring
about those intentions. It is, for instance, hypocritical to tell others
that they can't video supposedly public servants doing their job in
public and then to use video cameras to spy on everyone else without
warrant supposedly in an attempt to provide security. Yet it seems to be
quite important to tyranny that those subjected to it believe it is
necessary in order to achieve some kind of good intention.<br />
<br />
This helps explain why politicians are able to promise one thing while
delivering another. It helps explain why they can tell bald faced lies
and still get re-elected. It helps explain why George W. Bush could make
the promise of smaller government, a humble foreign policy and no
nation (empire) building while campaigning and yet proceed to grow the
federal government by leaps and bounds, dictate to other nations, start
wars and expand the empire after he gets elected. It helps explain why
Barack Obama can promise a roll back of the Bush administration's
policies, a foreign policy of tolerance and peace, and government
transparency while campaigning and yet proceed to strengthen Bush era
unconstitutional legislation, continue allowing human rights violations
by US military and intelligence organizations, and crackdown on more
whistleblowers than proceeding administrations while becoming one of the
most secretive administrations ever after being elected.<br />
<br />
The biggest hypocrisies take place when these people take their oaths of
office. They vow to uphold and defend the constitutions (of the US and,
at a more local level, of their states) against all enemies, foreign
and domestic, then they turn around and become the very enemies they
just vowed to defend against by creating laws that violate the
individual rights of the people, which these constitutions explicitly
forbid. They more or less have to do this if they want to increase their
power, and most politicians do want to increase their power, because
these constitutions are written to limit their power. Politicians, then,
are making an oath to obey the law and not become tyrants, and then
turning around and doing the very things that tyranny demands.<br />
<br />
What we seem to have forgotten is that constitutions are not laws that
apply to the populace, they are laws that apply only to politicians.
They are the highest laws of the land because they are meant to regulate
those with the ability to cause the greatest harm. Constitutions also,
unfortunately, do not carry with them any recommendations for
discouraging the breaking of the law. In the meantime those who would
profit from using those in power to create a restrictive society can
provide an incentive for them to do so. Politicians who dishonor their
oaths and break the highest law of the land do so with impunity while
those who protest prohibitions and break bad laws have to worry about
government retribution and the wrath of the tyrants. The administration
and the critters inhabiting the halls of congress should have to worry
about the people, we should not have to worry about them and their
enforcers.<br />
<br />
Hypocrisy is the way of the collectivist. It is not the way of the
individualist. Even though they may wish to become tyrannical, those in
power still seem to want your consent to do so. They want you to
participate in your slavery. The way out of this is to choose to not
give your consent. The way out is to insist on freedom. It is to realize
that in order to be free, you must allow others to be free. It is to
realize that when one person is tyrannized, we are all tyrannized.
Understand that just because someone speaks out for something you might
disagree with, or against something you might agree with, that you must
allow him to so that you might also be able to do so. Understand that
that same someone should be allowed to speak his mind to those in power,
especially at a public venue, and not be limited to some "free speech
zone" where those in power will not hear him. Respect his right to do so
and your right to do so will also be respected should a time arise when
you feel it is necessary to express your views to those in power.<br />
<br />
Understand that people own their own bodies and should be allowed to
determine for themselves what they want to put into them. No one should
ever be forced to put something in their body that they don't want to
put in their body either. By allowing others to consume what they wish
to consume, you help create a precedent that will make it far less
likely that anything you wish to consume will ever be prohibited. By
standing up for another's right to refuse to be forcefully medicated you
help create a precedent that will make it far less likely that you will
ever be forcefully inoculated.<br />
<br />
Understand that by owning their own bodies, people also own the fruits
of their labor. If that fruit comes in the form of fiat currency, they
should be able to decide what they want to do with that currency,
whether they want to spend it or save it, who they want to do business
with and what products and services they wish to prioritize in their
lives and voluntarily purchase. No one should be forced to give a
portion of the product of their labor to any other individual or group
of individuals, no matter how important those others might believe their
service is. The immorality of this type of system should be obvious to
all. Anything important enough to be worth doing should be worth doing
on a voluntary basis. Anything that needs to use force and coercion to
fund itself is not a legitimate endeavor.<br />
<br />
The individualist is not hypocritical. To him, freedom is the answer no
matter the question. As long as no harm is being done to another and no
one else's property is being damaged or stolen, then people should be
allowed to do as they please. The collectivist will claim the same
morals, but with exceptions. I can own a gun, but she can't because,
blah, blah, blah. I can express my opinion, but he can't because, blah,
blah, blah. We can print money out of nothing, but they can't because,
blah, blah, blah. I can take certain substances into my body, but you
can't because, blah, blah, blah,. You can't run a ponzi scheme, but we
can because, blah, blah, blah. You can't forcefully take money from
others to provide protection, but be can because, blah, blah, blah,
etc., etc., etc., ad nauseum. <br />
<br />
Those who would impose a tyrannical collectivist system on you
understand that most people don't want such a system. That's why they
need you to believe you are free. That's why they want you to believe
that you need them. That's why they are forced into hypocrisy, for if
they kept their promises they'd make themselves irrelevant, and if those
who wish to truly make us free were allowed to run fair political
campaigns against the collectivists the tyrants would lose and become
irrelevant. By merely having a centralized authority with the ability to
force their will upon the populace tyranny exists. Until we all learn
to stop co-operating with such powers, the tyranny will grow until it
metastasizes. Until we stand up and refuse to accept the excuses for the
hypocrisy, we will be subject to the tyrannical whims of those who
rule.<br />
<br />
I am proud to announce that my latest book <a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">"Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom."</a>
by Szandor Blestman is now available at smashwords.com. Also available
exclusively at smashwords is the latest installment of my next book "The
Blessings of Freedom; Creating Prosperity in the 21st Century." Chapter
5 of the serialized version is available <a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/287155">here</a>.<br />
<br />
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation. <br />
<br />
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help
me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews
if you like them so that others might also enjoy them.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795"> Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039"> The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballottisblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-47722594839411074732013-02-24T16:29:00.001-08:002013-02-24T16:29:01.325-08:00How the Drug War and the FDA Prevent the Sick from Being CuredDo you know what's good for you? Have you personally studied various
cures, potions and concoctions to figure this out, or are you taking
someone else's word for it? Do you have any personal experience with
certain substances, medications or procedures when treating your
disease, or are you trusting someone else that they know better which
will work and which will not? Are you using an allopathic physician, a
naturopath, some other alternative practitioner, or maybe a combination
of all these? Are you sure the physician you use has told you all the
alternatives you have to choose from? Are you sure you know what would
work best for your particular circumstance?<br />
<br />
Chances are you might think you do, but that you do not. The simple fact
may be that there are just too many treatment choices for any one
person to know them all. Yet, sadly, in this nation of supposedly free
people, we don't have access to nearly enough of those treatments. The
FDA has already decided for you that many of those treatments are
unworthy of your time. They have done so despite evidence from other
parts of the world that some of these work for some (or even most)
people who try them. One might ask why an agency charged with
determining the safety and efficacy of food and drugs would prevent
proven cures from coming to market in the US, and one would be right to
ponder this question long and hard and look into the matter deeply.<br />
<br />
The answer, however, is really simple. The FDA doesn't care about you.
It doesn't care about safety. It doesn't care about food safety and it
doesn't care about drug safety. If it did, aspartame would not be
allowed as an ingredient in food products. If it did there would be more
complete and comprehensive studies on drugs and vaccines before they
became available on the market and those studies would be done by an
independent laboratory with no financial conflict of interest. If they
did, then they would report in great detail on a variety of health care
approaches rather than just blowing off every approach other than
allopathic. If they did, then there'd likely be a lot less processed
food on our store shelves and consumers would be more educated as to the
dangers such foods present to your health. If they did, then there
wouldn't be this epidemic of prescription drug deaths taking place in
our nation.<br />
<br />
Some would like to blame this on incompetence. They like to point at the
size and scope of the FDA and claim that it is too big and cumbersome
to do an effective job. I don't believe that. I believe that, at least
at the top, the FDA knows exactly what it's doing. I believe these
people are malicious and dangerous. They don't care about your safety
because they do care about the profits of some very large and
influential multinational corporations. They care about large
agricultural corporations and the large chemical corporations (Monsanto,
et al.) that provide them with herbicides and pesticides. They care
about the large pharmaceutical corporate entities. They care about large
medical interests like the AMA. They don't care about what makes you
sick or about what makes you well because you don't supply their
political cronies with the money necessary to stay in power.<br />
<br />
You can't tell me the people at the top of the FDA are stupid or
incompetent. In fact, I think they're probably pretty smart and that
they know exactly what they're doing. There is plenty of scientific
evidence out there to support my point of view that they have approved
dangerous food and drugs for consumption. I somehow doubt very much that
all this evidence has escaped their notice. They simply choose to
ignore it. Worse than that, they choose to prevent everyday working folk
from understanding it. It's not enough to allow their corporate buddies
to produce food and drug products that poison the bodies of decent,
hard working Americans, they allow the use of propaganda to poison the
minds of those same Americans to make them think that such food and drug
products are healthy and safe. They abuse the trust that has been
instilled in their institution so that the poor fools who still listen
to them will continue to believe that we have the "safest" supply of
"healthy" food and the most advanced medicine in the world. Nothing
could be further from the truth. The trust has been broken. All so that a
few people at the top of a few corporations can reap a harvest of
obscene wealth from the seeds of human suffering they have sown.<br />
<br />
Making sure your food and drug supply is dangerous and poisoned is just
one way the elite ruling class makes sure the sick of this nation don't
get well. They also do their best to try to prevent drugs and natural
cures known to be safe and effective from being sold in the United
States. Marijuana is perhaps the best known for this. For decades we
have been told that marijuana had no medicinal effects. The FDA even
declared that testing could not be done in the United States so that
science could not find differently. We of course now know better. Anyone
who still believes that marijuana has no medicinal uses is so far in
denial as to be beyond hope that the light of reason will ever penetrate
the darkness that has warped their mind. Either that or they're
involved with the drug war and on such a terrible power trip that they
have no empathy toward the sick and dying and perhaps even enjoy the
pain and suffering they cause.<br />
<br />
Why would these people still work to prevent access to medical marijuana
even after it has helped so many and so much evidence has been
presented that it does, indeed, have medical uses? The answer is again,
money. There is more profit in marijuana if it is kept illegal. By
keeping drugs illegal, governments with their monopolies of legitimized
force are better able to control the drug trade. Look into the evidence
that the CIA is one of the biggest drug trade organizations in the
world. You can continue to hide your head in the sand and believe that
intelligence agencies have only the best interests of the public at
heart or you can open your mind and at least look over the information
and admit that the possibility exists that some people just might be in
it for the wealth and power. Once it is legal to grow and it is removed
from the black market, the risk (of death and imprisonment) has been
lifted and more people will compete to grow it leading to a fall in
prices and a reduction of profit margins. At that point those involved
in the black market will have to look elsewhere to make the kind of
profits they now enjoy.<br />
<br />
But it's more than that. It's more than marijuana and illegal drugs. The
FDA prevents proven cures from coming to market, especially natural
cures. Cancer cures, for instance, have been around for years, but they
would have you believe that cancer is some mysterious disease that
baffles the medical establishment and will likely never be cured. Look
into alternative cancer cures. Look into essiac tea, Royal Raymond Rife,
Dr. Simoncini and his baking soda cure, "The Cure for All Cancers,"
dietary cures, etc. All these have been available for some time and
there are thousands of case studies where they've worked. I've even
heard from a personal source whom I trust implicitly that there is a
cancer vaccine that has been shown to be effective available in other
countries but not yet here. Yet these cures remain elusive to Americans
who are suffering from such disease. They are not widely known to the
general public. The FDA and the government has done more than just keep
knowledge of such cures from the people, they have actively prevented
doctors from treating patients even to the point of arresting them and
destroying their research and notes no matter how many people they have
helped and how much suffering they have relieved.<br />
<br />
Why would the FDA and other government agencies want to prevent such
cures from being known? Why would they want to crack down on doctors who
are helping patients using these methods? Why would they imprison
people engaging in voluntary business interactions with one another? The
answer is again simple. Money, power and influence have everything to
do with it. How many people need to die before something is done about
this injustice? How much suffering has to occur before people realize
that those who were entrusted to alleviate such suffering are actually
condoning the practices that cause it due to their own greed and lust
for power?<br />
<br />
Neither the pharmaceutical industry, the medical industry, nor the
financial industry want to see cures for many diseases come to market
when they can make so much more money by treating the patient's
condition for years. The pharmaceutical industry makes billions selling
expensive drugs such as chemotherapy drugs and the like. The medical
industry makes billions selling expensive treatments that take long
periods to complete such as radiation treatment. Researchers make
billions from government grants and charitable donations looking for
cures that always seem to show promise and yet never seem safe or
effective enough to come to market. The financial industry makes
billions selling health insurance to a populace that is frightened of
coming down with a disease that is expensive to treat and without
insurance will likely result in their financial ruin. This is even more
true today now that government has mandated insurance for everyone under
pain of fines for those who do not comply.<br />
<br />
The FDA, like so many other federal government agencies, has failed
utterly. It does not protect the public, it harms individuals that trust
it to make decisions for them. It has abused the power granted to it by
helping to enrich the ruling elite that already have too much wealth,
power and influence. It has helped dumb down the people of this nation
by fostering a false belief that their organization is looking out for
everyone's best interests and no one need take responsibility for their
own healthcare decisions. The FDA needs to be declawed. It needs to be
made into an advisory bureau only, with no method available to it to
enforce its will, if it is to exist at all.<br />
<br />
Mostly, people need to be made aware of its foibles and start educating
others as to its true nature. People need to take responsibility for
their own healthcare and the healthcare of their families and friends
who still wish to believe in the magic of government and trust its
agencies. People need to demand that government stay out of their
private business as well as their private lives. People need to deny
consent to be ruled even by the alphabet agencies supposedly set up to
protect them. After all, if I wish to listen to the advice of someone,
is it right for someone in power to force me to listen to the advice of
someone else? Is it right for someone to force me to do business with
someone I do not wish to do business with? No one should have that kind
of power, no individual and no group of individuals. I own my own body
and they do not. It is my decision what I put in it and no one should
have the power to prohibit me from doing so or to force some substance
or treatment upon me which I do not wish to take.<br />
<br />
I am proud to announce that my latest book <a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">"Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom."</a>
by Szandor Blestman is now available at smashwords.com. Also available
exclusively at smashwords is the latest installment of my next book "The
Blessings of Freedom; Creating Prosperity in the 21st Century." Chapter
5 of the serialized version is available <a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/287155">here</a>.<br />
<br />
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation. <br />
<br />
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help
me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews
if you like them so that others might also enjoy them.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795"> Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039"> The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballottisblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4355919626917351387.post-11956344484885599392013-02-19T10:13:00.001-08:002013-02-19T10:13:25.007-08:00The Energy and Currency Cartels, the Economy and Your LifeWhen I express my views on energy and the future of humanity I am oft
times labeled a dreamer. I am sometimes told the technologies I speak of
are too expensive and are therefore not worth it for homeowners to
install. I am told that homeowners would be better off financially if
they continue to pay the low prices charged by energy companies with
their coal burning and nuclear power plants. I am told that cars can't
make the change over to battery power because the technology simply
isn't there. I don't believe any of that is true. I think that
technologies have been developed that are far ahead of anything many of
us might imagine. I believe that the power elite I often talk about are
preventing these technologies from getting out simply so they can
continue to control your life.<br />
<br />
The key to the above is control. It is not money. It is not profit. It
is a way to maintain control over you and your life. It is a way to
control everything, everywhere. As long as you are paying a certain
percentage of your income to someone else so that you can power your
refrigerators, televisions, computers and other electronics, you are
dependent on their technologies and their aptitude. As long as that's
the case, they'll be able to cut your power, for whatever reason they
please, whether you like it or not. I'm not saying they will, or that
you'd give them any reason to do it, but these are uncertain times we
live in. We are dependent on oil and its supply can be interrupted for a
variety of reasons.<br />
<br />
The energy cartels are tied into another, more powerful cartel. They are
tied into the currency cartel. This is a group of financial elites who
supply the western world with its currencies, including the US dollar
(in the form of Federal Reserve Notes, or FRNs) and the European Union's
euro. It could be said that this really took hold when Nixon nullified
the Bretton Woods agreement by decoupling the dollar from gold. He then
went on to strike a deal with the Arab world that they would only sell
their oil for dollars, hence creating the petrodollar and at the same
time making the FRN the world's reserve currency. So should the need for
oil as an energy source be greatly reduced or eliminated, some very
powerful corporate interests would lose a great deal of their power and
influence. This makes for a huge incentive for both the currency and
energy cartels to make sure this doesn't happen.<br />
<br />
Oil drives the economies of the Western world. Imagine a world where all
modern devices are no longer able to operate. Imagine a world where
cars and trucks no longer operated. How would product come to market?
How would your electronic devices work? How would we communicate? Your
iphones and ipads would be worthless collections of silicon and metal
alloys. Your televisions, light bulbs, electric heaters and air
conditioners would become relics of a bygone era. How long until all the
modern processed food emptied from store shelves? In such a world one
would soon either adapt or die. You could either learn the old ways, or
we could develop new ways.<br />
<br />
I don't like to sound like a gloom and doomer, but at the same time I
don't want my positive nature to cause me to turn a blind eye to reality
or history. The reality is that the energy and currency cartels have a
tremendous amount of power and influence over our federal government and
the senators and congressmen who claim to represent the people. History
has shown that our "lawmakers" will make laws beneficial to these
powers rather than laws beneficial to the economic under classes or
protecting individual rights. The reality is that we've been going
through a long economic depression. History shows that often times hard
economic times end in massive and very destructive wars. History also
shows that the same energy and currency cartels benefit greatly from
those wars. Here's an interesting lecture on how all wars can be tracked
back to private central bankers as the initial fomenters of events
leading to war called <a href="http://www.silverbearcafe.com/private/02.13/allwars.html">"All Wars are Bankers' Wars"</a> by Mike Rivero. I urge everyone reading this to listen to it all the way through.<br />
<br />
Who are these men to make such monumental decisions? Who are they who
feel they can threaten the most powerful governments on the planet? They
threaten more than governments when they make such threats, they
threaten you, your way of life, your children and grandchildren's
future, and everyone's economic security. Who are they who feel they can
decide the fates of millions? Who are they who would cause such human
suffering to try to sate their own insatiable lust for wealth and power?
Are these men gods? Are they demons? What magic do they hold over
otherwise good men to cause them to turn against their fellow human
beings?<br />
<br />
These men are not gods or demons, though they might fancy themselves to
be. They have no power over other men, but these other men let greed and
lust for power rule over their judgment and corrupt their principles.
They excuse their immorality by claiming it necessary for the "greater
good," but in their hearts of hearts they know the greater good is not
served and a great evil is perpetrated. Those they have corrupted claim a
higher purpose, but they have been lowered to the basest of levels and
seek to do the same to all mankind. These men are the central bankers.
These men are the influential corporatists. These men may live amongst
all the finest luxuries this physical world has to offer, but their
souls are black as coal and their spirits reside in the depths of the
deepest, most stagnant, most fetid marsh imaginable. <br />
<br />
Money is not wealth, but those entrusted with its creation use it to
enrich their own selves. Money is not power, but those who create it use
it to influence those who have obtained positions entrusted with
certain powers. Money is not energy, but those who create it have used
that power to corner the market on fossil fuels. Fossil fuels are not
the only sources of energy, but those who produce them would like to
keep everyone dependent upon them. The way to break the cartels is to
break the cycle of dependence. The way to break the cycle of dependence
is to stop using the products they offer. As hard as it sounds, we must
each personally make an effort to do what we can to stop using fiat
currencies and to stop using the fossil fuels the cartels provide.<br />
<br />
It is important that we strive for independence. It is important that we
honor individual property rights. It is important that we do our best
to become self owning individuals who decide for ourselves which other
individuals or groups of individuals we want to do business with and
which individuals or groups of individuals we don't want to do business
with. In this way we can shun those who would wage wars on others. In
this way we can shame those who would bring harm to others. In this way
we can decide with our dollars who deserves our money and who doesn't.
In this way we can decide for ourselves who we associate with and who we
don't. In this way we can deny our consent to be governed. No
individual or group of individuals should have the power to force you to
do business with them. No individual or group of individuals should
have the power to force you to associate with them. No individual or
group of individuals should have the power to force you to let them
violate your natural rights or suffer catastrophic consequences. It is
only when everyone has the power to say "no" to these individuals or
groups of individuals without fear of retribution that mankind will be
truly free. It is only then that we will truly prosper. It is only then
we will be allowed to become the best humans we can possibly become.<br />
<br />
I am proud to announce that my latest book <a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">"Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom."</a>
by Szandor Blestman is now available at smashwords.com. Also available
exclusively at smashwords is the latest installment of my next book "The
Blessings of Freedom; Creating Prosperity in the 21st Century." Chapter
5 of the serialized version is available <a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/287155">here</a>.<br />
<br />
If you enjoy my writings, please visit <a href="http://www.szandorblestman.com/index.php">szandorblestman.com</a> to make a donation. <br />
<br />
Below is a list of all my works available at smashwords.com. Please help
me by purchasing one or more of my ebooks and writing favorable reviews
if you like them so that others might also enjoy them.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/284319">Caged in America: A Collection of Essays Celebrating Freedom.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
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<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/260795"> Ron Paul's Wisdom, A Layman's Perspective. A Collection of Opinion Editorials.</a> By Szandor Blestman<br />
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<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/251393">Galaxium.</a> A screenplay By Matthew Ballotti<br />
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<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144246">The Colors of Elberia; book 1 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
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<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/154039"> The Legacy of the Tareks; book 2 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
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<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/164273">The Power of the Tech; book 3 of The Black Blade Trilogy.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
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<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249774">The Edge of Sanity.</a> By Matthew Ballotti<br />
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<a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/249791">The Ouijiers</a> By Matthew Ballottisblestmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13805612188189563749noreply@blogger.com0