Individual Sovereignty, Society and the Responsibility to Protect

 I was reading World Net Daily just now and came across an article based on Barack Obama's call for Syrian President Bashar Assad to resign and Assad's preparation for a Libyan repeat in his country. I caution people to read WND with caution; they tend to dramatize facts for effect not for truth's sake. WND is more trustworthy that some "mainstream" media sources, but caution must be taken none the less because it is kind of apparent it is yellow journalism.
Yellow Journalism is better known as sensationalism today.

In the article "Syria mobilizing troops for conflict with U.S., NATO"

Read more: Syria mobilizing troops for conflict with U.S., NATO http://www.wnd.com/?pageId=336477#ixzz1ViV4AFOU

WND quotes George Soros from a 2004 Foreign Policy magazine article preparing the world for the now accepted Responsibility to Protect Doctrine. Let me just copy and paste the relevant paragraphs directly from the WND article:

"Soros himself outlined the fundamentals of Responsibility to Protect in a 2004 Foreign Policy magazine article entitled "The People's Sovereignty: How a New Twist on an Old Idea Can Protect the World's Most Vulnerable Populations." In the article Soros said, "True sovereignty belongs to the people, who in turn delegate it to their governments."
"If governments abuse the authority entrusted to them and citizens have no opportunity to correct such abuses, outside interference is justified," Soros wrote. "By specifying that sovereignty is based on the people, the international community can penetrate nation-states' borders to protect the rights of citizens.
"In particular," he continued, "the principle of the people's sovereignty can help solve two modern challenges: the obstacles to delivering aid effectively to sovereign states, and the obstacles to global collective action dealing with states experiencing internal conflict."

This is a classic example of the adage that a little bit of truth makes the big lie sound really believable. If you have been reading this blog you will know that I fully and wholeheartedly endorse and the real flow of power in government from the individual to the highest level of national society. In other words, power flows from God to the Individual to the local city-state to the nation-state to the republic/empire-state. This is the natural flow of power that God has established and ordained for all humanity. I hope you see the difference already between the truth and Soros lie. If not keep reading...PLEASE. 

Notice the natural and true flow of power is linear: from one to another in a straight line and no other interjections of power are involved in the flow. Additionally, the ultimate source of all power is God in this natural flow. Since God established and ordained this power flow, only God has the authority to interject if the flow is disrupted by tyranny. God is the avenger of the oppressed not any other source. God may use other societies to interject, but God alone makes that decision. Should an outside society interject it must be a prayerful and 100% certain grant of authority by God. Most times God directs an event that forces another society to interject, we could possibly use the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in NYC as an example. 

Soros would have you believe that we can make that decision for other people's societies if we don't like their society, and do so on a whim without provocation.

Also notice that the natural flow of power begins with God. God is the source for all power of human sovereignty. Without God, no power exists, we would not exist. 

Again, Soros leaves out a crucial truth, he states that power begins with the people (read "population of people". He totally forgets that all power and authority originates with God, then to the Individual, then to the societies to which they belong. Soros says power originates with the local societies at the lowest level. WRONG!!!

Let's review shall we...Soros says that God does not matter (or does not exist), and neither does the individual. He is socialist after all. Soros says that foreign societies can play God and pick and choose which societies are good and bad and destroy the societies they deem "bad." In other words, Soros is telling the world the same damnable lie that Satan told himself as he stared in the mirror and the same lie Satan told Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden..."You can de-throne God and take His place."

We shall see what God says about that in the near future. 

This example alone should tell the entire world just who George Soros serves...Clue #1: I'll narrow it down to two possible answers, God or Satan. Clue #2: It isn't God....I'll give you 3 guesses now.

 

But let's look at the Responsibility to Protect from another angle. Who are we to screw around with how other societies work? You might say "well the government is oppressive." Okay, who are we to say it is oppressive? Who are we as outsiders, having imperfect knowledge of that society, to make that God-like judgement? Are we God? Our standards are not their standards, and vice versa. And even if we determine it is an oppressive society, who are we to determine if the people are unhappy or unsatisfied with the present system? Are we able to make that judgement call for them?

If you answered in the negative for any one of these questions then we do not have the authority to rampage their society, even under the auspices of good intentions. If you answered in the affirmative to all of these questions, I want to see the nail marks on your wrists and the Shekinah Glory emanating from every pore of your body so bright it blinds me. So if you are not God, then you better have answered No to at least some of those questions.

Furthermore, unilateral action (even if that action is a consortium of other societies of the world with the world's permission) is not valid unless a legal claim has been made in a legal body and such claim is a Declaration of Independence from the old society and the Establishment of a new society that is outside and separate from the old society, not one that wishes to overthrow the existing society. Individuals or societies (if the members agree) have to right to separate from their old society, but in no way have to right to overthrow the old society. In cases of coup attempts the Old Society has the Legal Right to defend itself from overthrow. No outside power has the right to nullify that right to self-defense.

I will agree that the pictures of oppressed peoples are disturbing and at times horrifying. They may even prompt emotions that lead one to action to help them. These are good for people to have and I applaud those who have them as having the love of God and humanity.  And nothing stops those who have these emotions and a pressing desire to help from helping in humanitarian efforts. Remember that you do put your life at risk for these efforts and that is truly the definition of a hero.  But we must remember that if we act in a fashion to destroy a society, we are violating their rights and would be acting just as tyrannous as their present government.

It seems cruel to say, but it is absolutely true that people get the government they deserve. Governments are only a reflection of the people. If the people have murder in their hearts, it should be no surprise that the government practices murder. If the people have evil in their hearts, it should be no surprise that the government practices evil. Conversely, if a people are virtuous, their government also will be virtuous. If the people respect life, their government also will respect life. With this law of society in mind, is it any wonder that nation-building efforts in areas where people are murderous and evil-intentioned always fail and the society always retreats back into oppression and despair. 

We see this law in action in the Old Testament of the Bible. Every time God judges the tyrannous leader of a society, He punishes the people of the society as well. But to God's love for us, He always sends a warning to that society before the punishment so that the society can repent and change and avoid the punishment. See Jonah.

 

Believe it or not (and I hope you do believe it) this is actually good for the world. Rational individuals and people see the effects of bad government and a bad people and avoid those circumstances that led to the oppression. Learning by observation is one of the most powerful tools we have in our arsenal information gathering and processing. 

Examples you experienced:

Algebra class in High School when the teacher worked out examples on the board

English class when the teacher gave examples of correct and incorrect sentences

Gym class to learn new sports

Playing air guitar in the style of your favorite musician

Local language and accents and figures of speech

Watching older siblings either get in trouble so you avoid the behavior or get away with bad behavior and you repeated the bad behavior

The list goes on and on
So watching oppressive societies in action serves as a warning to other societies to avoid the morals and values that led to the oppression.

But let's look at the reasoning of George Soros as to why he wants a Responsibility to Protect Doctrine.
"If governments abuse the authority entrusted to them and citizens have no opportunity to correct such abuses, outside interference is justified," Soros wrote. "By specifying that sovereignty is based on the people, the international community can penetrate nation-states' borders to protect the rights of citizens.
"In particular," he continued, "the principle of the people's sovereignty can help solve two modern challenges: the obstacles to delivering aid effectively to sovereign states, and the obstacles to global collective action dealing with states experiencing internal conflict." 

Say what Georgie Porgie??? Effective delivery of aid? and interfering with the affairs of sovereign states? Georgie you are talking in circles son. Your premises are your conclusion DOH!
His logic is thus:
Premises-
1- to deliver aid effectively
2- to interfere in the affairs of sovereign states with internal conflict
Conclusion-
We should have a policy that says we can violate the sovereignty of foreign states to deliver aid effectively. Totally circular maaaan! Tubular Dude! Your premises cannot be your conclusion. You cannot justify your conclusion with your conclusion.
Let's look at the same argument only a little more personal.
Premises-
I need money
I want to invade your home
Conclusion-
There should be a policy allowing me to invade your home to take your money.
In neither case was there a reason to give aid nor a reason to interfere in internal conflicts. Just that the need to deliver aid exists and a desire to screw with societies for no reason exists.
I have an idea Georgie...if they want aid then they should agree to an effective delivery system for it. If the society is experiencing internal conflicts (to any extent) we should leave them the heck alone!
The Old West in America has a saying; if you poke your nose in other people's business...be prepared to eat hot lead.

So what Georgie is saying that if an outside state has a bit of difficulty in delivering aid then the world can just take over the receiving society. That would be about 75% or more of the world that could be just taken over by other nations.
And Georgie wants the ability of foreign powers to take over sovereign states if they are "experiencing internal conflicts." Tell me Georgie, is a two-party system of government with opposing political platforms "internal conflict?"  Just what is the threshold of "internal conflict?" And just what is the extent to the "experience" of internal conflict? Is it short-term, long-term, political or systemic? Is it ideological differences between two people? Would internal conflict be gang violence that is not political at all? Would internal conflict involve two churches who worship the same God in different ways but tolerate and love each other despite the difference? I mean that is a conflict of theology and it is internal.

Both of these intentions are so broad in nature and the power granted in the RTP Doctrine so vast that any consortium of nations would have the legal authority to conquer every other nation.  An empire by Coalition would be legal (kinda sounds like the feet of iron and clay in the dream of Nebuchadnezzar had of the stature interpreted by the Prophet Daniel, the 10 headed Dragon in Revelations, and most all of the word pictures that depict the Anti-Christ's global government). A ten nation coalition of allies could conceivably take over the entire world. 

I can conclude this with absolute certainty, no hesitation and as boldly as a lion walks his territory; This is proof positive that George Soros is a liar, a defrauder, and is actively working towards a world government system that would seek to usurp God's power and authority and seek to become a god. I can also boldly say that this global government will be the seat of power for the predicted Anti-Christ of Bible Prophecy. [a side note to all those who thought I was crazy about 15 years ago...TOLD YOU SO!!!!]

What I cannot say with any certainty or boldness is that Soros is the Anti-Christ. The dude is in his late 80's now and he couldn't handle his girlfriend let alone a world government. He is, however, setting it up for the real Anti-Christ, and the rate that this global government is being set up tells me that the End-Time is just days, weeks or months away...note not years, and I think I spread it too thin by saying months.

I will leave you with this thought; tyranny is a government that usurps the power of God and His natural flow of power. If a coalition of nations even under the best of intentions decides to interfere without provocation in the affairs of a sovereign state it is acting in tyranny and are tyrants themselves.

AA+ Credit Rating...The Horny Sailor At The Bordello Can't Pay The Tab

The sailor got his pass to go ashore. He made a bee-line straight for the red-light district in the port city. He rapped on the door in the code he knew well. The door opened and the Madam stood in the gap.
"No! You come here every night and never pay. Your tab is to big." says the Madam.
The sailor walks away. He tries a few more houses of ill-repute but the same thing happens at them all. Indeed, the sailor owed the bordellos more than he made in a year at sea.

The US Central Government got the same welcome by it's creditors Friday evening. The S&P told our government that we owe too much, spend too much and it doesn't make enough to cover the bills. In other words we are overdrawn.

It does not come to any real surprise to more than a few of us in the USA. As people feel the heat of the hellish economy they try to get loans to cover the costs of life till things pick back up, only to be rebuked by the bank manager who tells them that their income does not cover the debt they already have and the loan cannot be approved.

The difference between Americans and their government is that Americans cut back on their spending, reduce their bills as much as possible and sacrifice all they can to make ends meet; the government thinks that in hard times it can spend ramp up the spending. Does not sound smart, and indeed I agree.

If you were wondering why some politicians think they can spend themselves into a hole to create wealth I will explain the theory as it was explained to me in my macro-economics course.
A nation's productivity is measured as the value of all the final goods and services Consumed within it's borders, all the capital Investment, what the Government spends, and the value of the Net Exports (what is exported MINUS what is imported) in a given year. This is the GDP. It is expressed in the equation Y=C+I+G+Nx. Notice the G for government spending increases the GDP for the year. So far their theory looks good, but wait! In order for the government to get money to spend it must do one of two things: 1- Tax something; or 2- Borrow the funds. (Y is the variable used for GDP and for expendable personal income)

If the government imposes a tax to raise the funds then it takes away the available funds from Consumers that they use to buy stuff. If the government raises income taxes it directly decreases the income of the Consumer. If government raises taxes on the goods or services, it decreases the purchasing power of the Consumer (the increase in prices reduces the amount you can buy if your paycheck remains the same). This is expressed in the macro-economic equation of Y(income) = I+T-G. This means that your total income is the money your gross earnings (paycheck or income from investments) PLUS whatever the government gives to you in transfer payments (earned income credits, welfare checks, food stamps etc..) MINUS what the government takes from you. 55% of wage earners paid taxes last year, a vast majority of them in the middle and upper income levels. As their wages are relatively high they do not qualify for government assistance payments so taxes hit them the hardest (T is less than G). The other 45% of wage earners are low wage earners who do not meet the minimum income level to pay taxes. They qualify for most assistance programs so taxes barely touch them and they benefit the most from transfer payments (T is greater than G). Then there are those who do not earn a wage yet still receive transfer payments.
In micro-economics, a decline in income has a few negative effects. The first effect is on demand. Demand is the relationship between the price of something and the amount you are willing to pay for that price. Expressed in a graph, this is a downward sloping line from left to right. When income decreases, both the price your are willing to pay and the amount you are willing to buy go down. This is a shift in that graph line tot he left, and is called a decrease in demand. Another negative effect in lower incomes is the switch from normal goods to inferior goods. In other words, when your income is normal you would grab the name brand gourmet spaghetti noodles, but when your income is decreased you search out the Ramon Noodles. 
If the tax is collected during production of the goods or service (or at the point of purchase)  the cost of production to suppliers increases. That means prices increase. If prices increase, the amount of goods or services the same amount of money in your paycheck will not buy as much. An expected increase in prices causes the Demand for goods to increase BEFORE the increase occurs, then a decrease in demand for those same goods and services AFTER the price increase. If the price of your favorite coffee is going to increase tomorrow you will buy more than usual today (stock up) then search for a cheaper option (either another brand or a smaller amount) once the prices rise. Then the same switch from normal to inferior goods occur.

Both methods of taxation have the same effect on firms. Firms see the shift in Demand downward and cut production to meet the lower Quantity Demanded. Firms do not like to produce a surplus of goods that wont sell. It wastes money to produce them and the surplus inventory lowers prices. A cut in production usually means a cut in the number of employees. Firms also do not like to retain more labor than is necessary to efficiently produce the market demand. This causes a cycle of demand and supply shifting until a new equilibrium is found.

Therefore, in a bad economy when the government decides to spend it's out of the hole by digging it deeper it does not like to tax for the extra income. They prefer the second option of borrowing the funds. The problem with borrowing the money is that it only postpones the above negative effects till it is time to pay the money back.

Everyone who has borrowed money before knows that you have the choice of two payments to make every month: the minimum payment due or pay as much on the principle as possible. Smart people know you choose the latter over the former. When you pay down the principle of the loan (the core debt of the money owed plus accrued interest from previous cycles) it lowers the baseline from which interest is charged. For example: with an interest rate of 10% per month and a loan of $100, if you pay only the minimum payment (which is usually only the accumulated interest and very little principle up front) you pay only $10 that month but still have $100 in debt. The next month you owe the $100 plus another $10. If you keep making the minimum payments you will pay $10 per month for the rest of your life. Like I said before minimum payments have a little chunk of principle in it. In our example then the minimum payment would be $11 per month. This would take you about 18 months or so to pay back. $11 x 18 = $198 total payments. But if you make greater than minimum payments every month, you pay off the accumulates interest PLUS much more of the principle. Let's say you pay $20 per month. The first month you pay $10 to interest and another $10 on principle. The next month interest only collects on $90 (instead of $99 with the minimum payment) and you pay $9 in interest and $11 on principle leaving $79 left on the principle. The following months are ... $7.9 interest and $67 left, $6.7 interest and $54 left, $5.4 interest and $39.5 left, $3.9 interest and $23.5 left, $2.3 interest with $5.50 left and you pay it off the next payment with $6.05. You pay it off in 8 months spending only $146. You save $52 and ten months of payments.

All that to tell you that the US government is not that smart. For the last few years they only paid on the interest of the money they borrowed. On top of the that, they continue to add to the principle by borrowing more and more each year. During the last two and half years we added an average of $1.5 Trillion to the principle of the national debt per year. This is insane to any person.

To put the insanity into perspective, we owe 99% of national GDP right now. That means if government taxed everything at a rate of 100% the nation as a whole would have a whopping $150 Billion left over. That is $483.88 for everyone in the country (man woman and child), and I did not take anything out to cover any government expense. [the numbers I used were GDP=$15Trillion; Debt=$14.85Trillion (both not too far off the actual numbers) and the US Pop= 310Million people]

The insanity goes on till you puke. But to me the most sickening thing about this whole thing is that no politician knows what to do about it. In fact, they don't even know what the problem is that they need to fix. The politicians, mostly in the GOP, all say "we need to end spending, we need fiscal responsibility." WELL NO DUH SHERLOCK!!! So they proposed a Balanced Budget Amendment to the Constitution that will probably not pass the process, as well it shouldn't. It does not solve the problem. Some politician today said they need a law to cap the annual deficit each year.... WHAT??? Most politicians are clueless.

Let's say they pass that Constitutional Amendment and that Congressional law. Let's say they are both written in blood on solid gold tablets wrapped with a silver bow then hand delivered by God Himself to the President. Without any EXTERNAL checks to enforce it, it will be ignored. In fact, most of all the Constitution is ignored today and the law is violated on a regular basis for all to see. We have had a balanced budget law in effect since 1981 and yet no balanced budgets. We have laws that making it illegal to use governments buildings to make campaign ads, yet obama films himself in the White House map room delivering a campaign ad marketing a dinner with him and biden. So my pessimism has foundation.

An oath is only as good as the word of the person who makes it. The government says "trust us, we will enforce it on ourselves...pinkey promise we will." And this is what every politician is saying. We need a law to enforce the law that we passed to enforce this other law. Sorry GOP, I don't buy it. You are either ignorant, stupid or involved in the conspiracy. You want us to think that wiping the nose will cure the cold. NOPE! I am not stupid.

The problem is not your spending, and the problem is not the borrowing. If these were problems then the Founders would forbid you to spend anything. But the Founders did prevent you from consolidating power into your hands. They put many layers of checks to prevent you from gathering power, they used layers of balances to moderate the powers you do have. Each check and balance was EXTERNAL to the national government. And even with all these external enforcers they still put in internal checks and balances on the national government. The Founders did not want you to have POWER.

The solution then is not laws that will be ignored the day they are written, but to restore the EXTERNAL checks and balances that demand you follow the law and has the power to force you to do it. Repeal the 16th, 17th and 24th Amendments to restore the states as the power check of the purse and co-equal authority. Restore the power of the vote by re-instituting voter standards so that all voters contribute to society to earn the vote and as invested voters make responsible decisions.

Just like the horny sailor in town eventually has to report to his captain on ship and account for his actions, these solutions will return accountability to government just as the captain will return discipline to his underling.

Thanks for reading this and GOD bless.

Church Charity vs Government Welfare: The Effects of LBJ's Great Society

This is simple topic that is common sense; but a lot of people do not contemplate this topic so it really goes unsaid and remains in the forgotten halls of American daily life.

First, we must examine what a society is. Merriam- Webster's Dictionary says:

Definition of SOCIETY

1

: companionship or association with one's fellows : friendly or intimate intercourse : company

2

: a voluntary association of individuals for common ends;especially : an organized group working together or periodically meeting because of common interests, beliefs, or profession

3

a : an enduring and cooperating social group whose members have developed organized patterns of relationships through interaction with one anotherb : a community, nation, or broad grouping of people having common traditions, institutions, and collective activities and interests

4

a : a part of a community that is a unit distinguishable by particular aims or standards of living or conduct : a social circle or a group of social circles having a clearly marked identity <literary society>b : a part of the community that sets itself apart as a leisure class and that regards itself as the arbiter of fashion and manners

 Reading over the definitions one can see common denominators in each of them. The first common concept which is obvious is that of an enduring group of people. This group has an enduring common structure such as a common geographical territory with enduring common institutions. With these lands and institutions the group forms a common goal, a common tradition, a common system of norms...in other words they share a common agreed upon culture that exists over long periods of time. The individuals in a society are interactive with each other. They work, play, pray, and live in close proximity with others in the group. They know and have an emotional bond with each other. It must also be noted that membership in society is VOLUNTARY, not compulsory (I'll discuss why this is important both economically and socially later).

In such a society, it is not in the interest of the group's goals for one of it's members to be left behind because of temporary hardships. A hardship suffered by one hinders the others in the group. So those who are not suffering hardship will help those who are suffering hardship, voluntarily, to keep the goals of the group on track or lessen the impact of such hardships spreading to the group as a whole. This is not a one way street, those who receive aid are indebted (either economically or socially or both) to those who rendered aid. This debt binds the group together and actually strengthens the group over time.

Since the group is interactive with common interests they are emotionally attached to one another. Helping those in the society who are in need is not just an economic decision, but an act of love for one another. This brotherly love is the strongest of bonds within the group. When a member is suffering, each member feels the suffering with that member through those emotional connections.

Membership in the group is voluntary. Members can choose to enter or leave the group if they feel that they do not fit in the group or they discover a group that better fits their individual goals, interests, and beliefs. Furthermore, members may be expelled from the group if the group believes a member is not fitting in with the goals, interests or beliefs of the whole group or is an undue burden upon the group economically or socially. Expulsion is usually the last action taken against a member in a society because the emotional attachments to the errant member are difficult to break and mercy is the rule not the exception. Usually, the errant member, having economic and emotional bonds to the society, would correct themselves to stay in the group.

Compulsory membership in society has a devastating effect upon he group. Members are required to stay in the group even if they feel they do not belong or do not share the goals of the group. They are stuck, alienated and miserable. These members tend to be dissatisfied with life, depressed and unhealthy compared to the other members. As such, they pose an undue burden upon the group economically as they are not as productive as they could be towards the goals of the group and that holds every one else back. They also tend to burden the emotional ties of the group introducing dysfunction and ill-will to the interactions. The dissatisfied members tend to group themselves into sub-groups and splinter groups which destroy the harmony of the whole group. These effects could be avoided if the dissatisfied members were allowed to follow their hearts and pursue their own happiness (sound familiar?) and explore other groups or form their own society apart from the original society.

The genius of the Founding Fathers is beyond me. Freedom benefits everyone in every society. When we are free to follow our own path in life we benefit not only ourselves, but everyone in the society of origin and the society in which the seeker ultimately adopts as his/her own.

I discussed Free Society vs Compulsory Society; but what about Church Charity vs Government Welfare? Churches have historically been the center of communal life within all communities. They served the functions of developing the common threads of culture and family that every society needs to exist.  Churches helped develop the society's norms of behavior, the norms of interpersonal interaction and concepts of ethics in business. For more on social norms visit Wikipedia's Norms (sociology) page.
Please note that I do not use Wikipedia as an Empirical source of information, but in matters of background information of common knowledge it is not a grievous sin to use Wikipedia.


The Community church also strengthened certain social concepts such as the interaction between debtors and lenders. The church was the place were members in hardship humbled themselves before their friends and asked for help. And the church is where that humbled member repaid the debt by helping others who came to him or her just as humbled asking for help.

The Church was where forgiveness was taught and practiced. If a disagreement between members occurred the church was the arbiter of the dispute. Satisfaction was given to all sides of the quarrel.

Community Churches served as the seat of social government. With the above informal judicial role of the church, churches served as the society's record keepers. They recorded births, deaths, marriages, dedications, baptismals, the history of the society, and much more.

Church buildings were often used in the operations of the formal government as well. Often the church building was the only public common building in the town. This is still the case in very small rural towns and villages in America and Europe. In such cases the Church building is the town hall, the courtroom, the school-house, and the gathering place for fellowship and entertainment. Churches were the center of social life.

It is safe to say that without the Community Churches society can not exist. It must be noted here that I am using the word "church" in a broad sense to mean a religious building and those who belong to that religion the structure is dedicated towards.  I am not only referring to the Christian church or religion but to any religion. The Aztec and Mayan religions were extremely central to their society, Christianity is central to the Western World today, and Islam is central to society in the Arab World. Other religions that are central to the societies they serve are Hinduism, Zoroastrianism and many others.

So what did LBJ do that was so bad? Didn't he just formalize religious charitable giving through a caring government? Simple answer is "OHHHH HECK NO!!!"

Remember earlier I briefly discussed the ill-effects of a compulsory membership society? Well that is what Lyndon B. Johnson accomplished for us. The over-all effect of the government's social welfare programs have been disastrous to American societies. Notice I used the word American SOCIETIES (plural), and not American SOCIETY (singular). What's the difference?

The structure of the American continent from Discovery to the 1960's has been that of a multitude of independent societies on many levels. Each town was a society of people in itself nearly independent from other town societies. The collections of towns formed a society of counties, counties formed a society of colonies. The colonies' goals were that of the British Companies that held the Charter under the authority of the British Monarch who was the head of the British collections of societies. Townships and the societies they represented were self-governing and independent from the larger organizations because of the limitations of the transportation systems of the day and distance.

If you had to travel over land you either walked, rode a horse or drove a horse and buggy. Travel was limited by the endurance of the horse which is roughly 40+/- miles per day. Prior to 1820, it took a week to travel one-way from Boston to NYC; a roughly 200 mile journey.

Travel was also very expensive. When your horse was exhausted for the day you had to stop for the night. Unless you wanted to sleep on the road or in the woods you paid for a room at a boarding house and for the services of the livery stable.

Riding on horseback or on a bunk-board buggy was not luxurious by any means. In fact, it is downright torture (personal experience) for long distances. It was not something you looked forward to at all.

Travel was also dangerous. Roadside muggers, called highwaymen, waited for travelers to pass by, then attack and rob the traveler and sometimes kill the traveler.

So needless to say, if you did not have a really good reason or lots of money to travel to the next town over, you probably did not bother to do it. Probably a good 80% of people never left a radius of 60 miles from their place of birth. So, each individual township was an isolated community.

Fast forward to the 1950's. The automobile had matured into a family vehicle. Improvements to tires and range made it a reliable mode of travel. President Eisenhower got approval from Congress to build our current Interstate Highway system which connected the entire nation together. Individuals became highly mobile in their lifetimes. This high mobility was the beginning of the end for the American Societies. But it really was not harmful to the societies by itself.

Families would travel to far away places on vacation, such as the National Parks in other states, then come back home and share their experiences with the other members of their society. The bonds of society were being stretched but in no way broken. Communication and information/technology exchange between societies advanced all the societies in the trade. But the Progressives, who by now were kissing cousins of the socialists, could not let the individual societies get organized or gain too much power. The information exchange between the societies increased the knowledge of the societies; and knowledge is power. Ideas were no longer controlled by the elites in power.

Enter Lyndon B. Johnson. Oddly enough, LBJ's big plan was called "The Great Society." The idea was to destroy the individual societies that governed daily life and create a national "American Society." He would do this by:
1- Compulsory membership in the American Society through taxation;
2- Welfare/Public Assistance Programs
3- Class Warfare
4- Silence the Churches
I should be honest here that Franklin D. Roosevelt laid the foundation of the destruction of the individual societies with Social Security and his plethora of ABC programs during the Great Depression. The Great Depression was the perfect opportunity to reach into the individual societies when the societal ties of mutual aid broke down because all members of the society were in hardship, and natural forces (the Dust Bowl for example) forced the agricultural societies to disintegrate. FDR used this opportunity to endear himself and his party to the individual societal enclaves. But when the Great Depression ended, these societies proved to be more resilient than FDR realized. Societies reformed, although they were weaker.
Many young men that could have quickly rebuilt the societies were victims of World War 2.

Compulsory Membership in the Great Society through Taxation
Paying taxes is a necessary duty of membership in a society. It is necessary to pay for the essential services that the society brings to all of it's members. Services like a place to interact with fellow group members, a place to seek peaceful justice in a dispute among members, education of the children, and police protection from those that seek to harm the society. Moreover, paying taxes to your society is a sign of contribution, of honor and of good standing. The individual can be free to use the services in proportion to his contribution towards them. Members of the society voluntarily contributed their share of the burden.

The Founders understood this duty to one's local society so they instituted a ground up tax system. The local society provided the most abundant and direct services to the individual person, naturally they would have the lion's share of the tax revenue. Counties provided the second tier of services, then states then national governments.  Originally, the states taxed the people then sent a portion of that money to the Central Government. Now the flow is from the Central Government to the states then to the person. This reversal has destroyed the life of the states and is started to starve the life from the societies.

Because the members of the local societies do not see the direct benefit of their contribution of taxes, the members become dissatisfied and unfulfilled with the larger society in general. He or she feels forced to pay into the system. Their money goes to place they probably never been to benefit people they have never met. They feel robbed of their contribution and paying taxes becomes a burden.

Remember that all members contribute to society, and all contributors get to use the services. If you did not contribute to society you did not get to use all of the services provided by society. Paying taxes placed a person in good standing to use the services to which they contributed. People who did not contribute were incentivized to contribute when they could so they too may partake in all the benefits of society. One such benefit was voting for societies leaders. Enter the Zero Liability Voter. The 24th Amendment abolished these societies long held traditions of incentives to contribute to society by allowing those that did not contribute to vote for the society's leaders.

What was the first thing the non-contributors voted for? BENEFITS!!! Namely money from the public treasury. Enter the Welfare Programs.

Welfare/Public Assistance Programs
The non-contributors to society voted themselves money from the public treasury without the social requirement of owing anyone a debt of repayment, or owing society a return on the investment. They can take and take and no one can refuse them aid because the funds they are taking are coming from the taxes that are mandated to be given by the contributors. Contributors are forced to pay up and the takers take. Should the contributor refuse to pay seeing that the taker is not being a fair member of the group the government sends men with guns to arrest and confiscate the taxes plus penalties. What is worse for the contributor is that now he is banned from partaking in the services for which he is paying.

The Great Society is a compulsory membership society. Unlike the voluntary membership society members cannot recuse themselves out of the society if they do not agree with the society nor can members of standing expel members that are undue burdens. The contributor is stuck and has no choice but to comply, go to jail and lose all that he or she owns or die. Society is broken. This is the theme of the Ayn Rand book Atlas Shrugged; The contributor quits when there is no more benefit to staying with society. Enter Class Warfare.

Class Warfare
The contributor starts to hate the Zero Liability Voter. The contributor votes to lower taxes and end the welfare system and restore society. The Zero Liability Voter starts to hate the contributor for revolting against him. LBJ and subsequent politicians saw the divide they were waiting for and pounced. Of course they sided with the more numerous Zero Liability Voter (more votes = election win). Today, we see political ads of fiscal conservatives pushing grandmothers off of cliffs, in past elections it was grandma eating dog food.

The end result is a divided population of the whole nation arguing and fighting against each other. The Progressives have recruited other factions of society such as African Americans in the late 1960's and 70's, and illegal immigrants of this current time into the fray. But since this is about the destruction of society and concentration of power via government welfare programs race and immigration status have no relevance in the topic but the quick mention to illustrate the social divides that Progressives have created to gain power. This is the perfect implementation of the battle strategy of divide and conquer.

Silence the Churches
Churches have played such a vital part in the society and creation of the American people that to say without the Church there would be no America is an understatement of exponential  proportions.

Religious sects from Europe came to the Americas for religious freedom and founded towns near and wide. It was the Churches that hailed the call to arms by ringing the bells for the militia to get ready to fight. It was the preachers that motivated the men to resist British rule. It was the Church that bound every citizen to their respective society, taught the children to read and taught every one how to live a righteous life.

Many of the signers of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution were Reverends of the Church. The Founders all noted that a vibrant church is essential to keep social order, men moral and virtuous and to keep the tyrant out. Churches are then the Foundation of responsible government.

No wonder Progressives seek to destroy the Churches of America. Their attack started in 1948 when the Supreme Court ruled that religious education in the schools was unconstitutional. In 1962 the Court again ruled that prayer in schools was unconstitutional in any form for any purpose. The list goes on (if you have time read Torcaso v Watkins footnote 11 where it says that atheism is a religion LOL). There is even a case that bans the posting of the 10 Commandments in a school. But that is only one part of the Progressive plan, because you can not ban religion in every aspect of public life (although today it certainly seems they are succeeding in that), they had to shut the preachers' mouths. They had to get the preachers to stop making sermons on what was happening in government and the destruction of society and illegal power grabs and the tyrants that will assume that power. LBJ had another brain storm; The 501(c)3 income tax exemption.

Although Churches are tax exempt by their very nature of being a church (read this IRS pamphlet), this is not guaranteed to them. Church tax-exempt status is by law, not by Constitutional mandate. The Central Government was oh so nice to churches to allow them to secure their tax-exemption status (and tax deductible donation status) by giving them the choice to file as a 501 (c) 3 tax exempt corporation. Ain't that sweet of them? In 1954, Lyndon Baines Johnson was in a tight contested Senate race in Texas. It seems that in 1948 LBJ cheated and stuffed many ballot boxes with demonstrably fake votes. This fact, and that he also used very friendly judges to block his opponent's attempts to sue in court for recounts, led two non-profit 501 (c) 3 corporations to really lay it in on LBJ. So he convinced the go-along congress to muzzle the free speech rights of non-profit organizations incorporated under the 501(c)3 tax law. Churches who had filed under this law to protect their members from being sued and liable for the debt of the church were appalled to find out that they were completely muzzled from the political sphere.

Here is a list of things Churches are not allowed to talk about...ever:
1- It cannot endorse or oppose a candidate for any office on any level
2- It cannot even imply a candidate by pointing out what is on platforms (this silences churches from speaking against abortion because it is well known that Democrats are for it and Republicans are against it (nice touch LBJ you nose picking, booger eating, tyrant)
3- Basically do, say or think or imply you did, said or thought about political matter or public issues
4- All the above is null if you are a Progressive church that endorses Democratic candidates

With the Church now muzzled, the societies destroyed, and the "Great Society" installed, the Progressive Movement can consolidate all the power it desires and there is no more competition to counteract that power grab. But there is one catch to their grand plan: Since they destroyed the moral fiber of the American  Spirit and replaced it with relativism and immoral garbage from Hollywood, they destroyed the checks on human nature, and the Zero Liability Voters have emptied the coffers of every last dime, politicians with massive egos and grand plans have borrowed more money than the entire USA economic output. After 80 years of working to gain the control of the government Dragon and the destruction of the societies that opposed that usurpation of power all they have left to inherit is a stinking hole in the ground with kids running around in flash mobs attempting to injure or kill anyone for any reason, bone weary tax-payers that cannot muster another dime to give so they closed shop and headed for retirement, an economy that is based on nothing and is imploding, many wars on foreign shores draining what the takers did not see and left behind.

In conclusion, Church charity and the societies it created were built to last forever with compassion for all members. The system of checks and balances that these societies played to keep tyrants out of government was key to the Founder's plan. Church Charity is truly the best solution to any social problem.
On the other hand, watch the 6 o'clock news and see what government welfare programs gave us.

History will also afford frequent Opportunities of showing the Necessity of a Publick Religion, from its Usefulness to the Publick; the Advantage of a Religious Character among private Persons; the Mischiefs of Superstition, &c. and the Excellency of the Christian Religion above all others antient or modern.

• Benjamin Franklin Proposals Relating to the Education of Youth in Pensilvania (1749), p. 22 [5]

For my own Part, when I am employed in serving others, I do not look upon myself as conferring Favours, but as paying Debts. In my Travels, and since my Settlement, I have received much Kindness from Men, to whom I shall never have any Opportunity of making the least direct Return. And numberless Mercies from God, who is infinitely above being benefited by our Services. Those Kindnesses from Men, I can therefore only Return on their Fellow Men; and I can only shew my Gratitude for these mercies from God, by a readiness to help his other Children and my Brethren. For I do not think that Thanks and Compliments, tho’ repeated weekly, can discharge our real Obligations to each other, and much less those to our Creator.

• Letter to Joseph Huey (6 June 1753); published in Albert Henry Smyth, The Writings of Benjamin Franklin, volume 3, p. 144.

Benjamin Franklin's letter to an unknown recipient in 1757 (to a few sources)

Dear Sir

I have read your Manuscrit with some Attention. By the Arguments it contains against the Doctrine of a particular Providence, tho' you allow a general Providence, you strike at the Foundation of all Religion: For without the Belief of a Providence that takes Cognizance of, guards and guides and may favour particular Persons, there is no Motive to Worship a Deity, to fear its Displeasure, or to pray for its Protection. I will not enter into any Discussion of your Principles, tho' you seem to desire it; At present I shall only give you my Opinion that tho' your Reasonings are subtle, and may prevail with some Readers, you will not succeed so as to change the general Sentiments of Mankind on that Subject, and the Consequence of printing this Piece will be a great deal of Odium drawn upon your self, Mischief to you and no Benefit to others. He that spits against the Wind, spits in his own Face. But were you to succeed, do you imagine any Good would be done by it? You yourself may find it easy to live a virtuous Life without the Assistance afforded by Religion; you having a clear Perception of the Advantages of Virtue and the Disadvantages of Vice, and possessing a Strength of Resolution sufficient to enable you to resist common Temptations. But think how great a Proportion of Mankind consists of weak and ignorant Men and Women, and of inexperienc'd and inconsiderate Youth of both Sexes, who have need of the Motives of Religion to restrain them from Vice, to support their Virtue, and retain them in the Practice of it till it becomes habitual, which is the great Point for its Security; And perhaps you are indebted to her originally that is to your Religious Education, for the Habits of Virtue upon which you now justly value yourself. You might easily display your excellent Talents of reasoning on a less hazardous Subject, and thereby obtain Rank with our most distinguish'd Authors. For among us, it is not necessary, as among the Hottentots that a Youth to be receiv'd into the Company of Men, should prove his Manhood by beating his Mother. I would advise you therefore not to attempt unchaining the Tyger, but to burn this Piece before it is seen by any other Person, whereby you will save yourself a great deal of Mortification from the Enemies it may raise against you, and perhaps a good deal of Regret and Repentance. If Men are so wicked as we now see them with Religion what would they be if without it? I intend this Letter itself as a Proof of my Friendship and therefore add no Professions of it, but subscribe simply Yours




Thank you for reading this and God bless

Follow Up On Debt Deal Debacle...

Okay here is why we need Restorative Reform instead of Band-Aids to patch the gaping wound in our Nation.
Thanks to Drudge Report for compiling the news stories I am about to use to prove my point.

Clicking the titles take you to the source article.

Federal health department approves free birth control

WASHINGTON – Health insurance plans must cover birth control as preventive care for women, with no copays, the Obama administration said Monday in a decision with far-reaching implications for health care as well as social mores.
The requirement is part of a broad expansion of coverage for women's preventive care under President Barack Obama's health care law. Also to be covered without copays are breast pumps for nursing mothers, an annual "well-woman" physical, screening for the virus that causes cervical cancer and for diabetes during pregnancy, counseling on domestic violence, and other services.
...
The requirement applies to all forms of birth control approved by the Food and Drug Administration. That includes the pill, intrauterine devices, the so-called morning-after pill, and newer forms of long-acting implantable hormonal contraceptives that are becoming widely used in the rest of the industrialized world.


If that is not enough look at this article as well.


Justice Department Sues Alabama Over Controversial Immigration Law

The Justice Department has filed a lawsuit against Alabama's new controversial immigration law, essentially fighting Alabama on grounds similar to its legal battle with Arizona over that state's controversial law.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/08/01/justice-department-sues-alabama-over-controversial-immigration-law/#ixzz1TseczcZC


What do these two articles have to do with the Debt Debate Debacle? Let me explain it the way I see it.


If the Central Government is so destitute that it can not pay it's bills, it can not pay the military, it can not pay the Border Patrol or other employees. The Obama Administration has also threatened not to pay Social Security payments and Medicare payouts among all the other things. The Obama Administration demanded the debt ceiling be increased so he could pay the bills and the debt (do not get me started about borrowing money to pay for borrowed money sheesh!). The morning after a debt deal was announced (late Sunday evening 31July2011) the Obama Administration announces it will spend money, that they did not have just 10 hours earlier, to enforce new regulations placed upon American's Health Insurance coverage plans and it announces a lawsuit it will pursue against the state of Alabama to force them to scrap the state's immigration law. Please note, THEY DID NOT HAVE THE MONEY TO PAY FOR IT'S DEBTS AND PROMISES JUST 10 HOURS BEFORE THE ANNOUNCEMENTS.


You might make the case that with the health insurance mandates that the insurance companies are doing the payouts, not the Central Government. Okay, true, the brunt of the cost will be in the private sector; but the costs of enforcement for the requirements will run in the billions of dollars. Additionally, the cost of the requirements to the government in the long run will also be significant. 


These services, drugs and devices are not free. Someone has to pay for them. The drug manufacturer has to pay it's bills and employees so it charges someone for the product. Same with the condom factories, the IUD factories, so on and so forth. The price is paid by the next guy in the chain, whether that be the doctor, clinic, hospital, medical supply companies etc... (Please note that these supplies are going to get more expensive once ObamaCare begins to tax medical devices.) Let's just say the path from production to end user is this: Factory --> Doctor --> Patient. The Factory charges the Doctor for the drug/device then the Doctor to recoup his costs has to charge someone...the insurance company of the patient. 


The insurance company then has a decision to make. It has to pay the costs for the Doctor visit, the device and any other required service associated with the device or drugs. And Lord help us if the patient has an adverse reaction to the treatment and needs hospitalization. The decision is whether to eat the costs themselves (which reduces their ability to cover other people and procedures) or to pass on the costs to the customer in the form of higher premiums or to split the costs with the customer.


This is not an evil insurance company decision, but one of economic law. First I must explain elasticity of demand and elasticity of supply. Elasticity of demand is the measure of responsiveness of consumers to changes in price. In other words, how much is your willingness to buy a good or service changed if I change my prices. Elasticity of Supply is the responsiveness of quantity supplied to changes in price. In other words, How much of your product do you put on the shelves if prices change? 


There are three categories of Elasticity: 1- Perfectly Elastic; 2- Elastic; and 3- Inelastic.
1- Perfectly Elastic means that either the buyer or the producer is so sensitive to prices changes that even the smallest change up or down in price results in radically drastic changes in demand or supply.
     An example of Perfectly Elastic demand is a market with heavy competition with an identical product. Bottled Water fits this definition. Water is water and if you see a shelf full of water from different producers and they are all priced the same except one is higher priced by a penny, you will not buy the water that is one cent more expensive. And the opposite is true with a producer whose water is one cent cheaper.


2- Elastic is the middle ground. Your preference for Coca-Cola or Pepsi may override minor price differences between the two. But if the prices are drastically different you will choose the cheaper brand. For suppliers elastic means that changes in the amount supplied are in proportion to the change in price.


3- Inelastic means either the buyer or the supplier are not sensitive at all to changes in price. Both will buy or sell the same amount of goods regardless of price. For consumers, Gasoline is inelastic. You need to buy so much gasoline per time period to meet your needs of transportation, and, even though you gripe and grumble and complain and get mad and cuss swear shake fits call Congressmen etc...You will pay the price at the pump regardless of how high it is. You need to go to work, you need to get to the grocery store, you need to go to other stores to get necessities to live. To ease the pain at the pump you will cut other aspects of your life to compensate.
For suppliers, Hotels are good example of inelasticity. A hotel has a set amount of rooms, it cannot increase its supply of rooms and it loses money if it reduces the amount of rooms available. Hotels, to maximize profit, need to fill all the rooms every night. An empty room is money lost. So they sell the same amount of rooms regardless of the going rate of hotel rooms in the area. Travel websites use this inelasticity to get you good deals on hotels.


Why am I telling you this? To tell you this fact, in the relationship between consumer and supplier in the marketplace the one who is the more inelastic will pay the greater share of external costs. For example, the consumer is the most inelastic at the gasoline pump, so the consumer will pay almost all of the taxes government imposes upon gasoline. Why would the supplier bear the tax if you are willing to pay it? Another example is if government imposes a tax on bottled water. You have so many other choices to choose from that the supplier will eat the tax themselves to keep the costs down so you will buy their product.


I hope you made a connection between this Econ lecture and the Health Insurance industry; if not, I will connect the dots now. States place a barrier around their states and limit the insurance companies that can do business in their state. States also place minimum requirement coverages on the allowed companies in exchange for the quasi-monopoly. Consumers are then limited in choices making them very inelastic if they have to have health coverage. So consumers pay the brunt of external costs. But ObamaCare places a cap on the amount Insurance companies can charge in premiums (if the cap is on or above the market equilibrium the price will not change from the market equilibrium, however if the cap is below the Market equilibrium the price will be cap for all consumers). This cap if permanently set below production costs will give the companies incentive to exit the insurance market. These companies will find other investments to spend its capital on, but the insurance consumer will be out of luck. The cap will make firms exit and prevent any firm from entering the market. 


There goes all that GDP potential from the Insurance industry! Not only that but insurance companies do not just sit on the money you give them. They invest that in stocks, bonds, Treasury notes, other business ventures and a lot more. All these increase money supply, and boost the GDP. Kiss that good-bye too.


If the insurance companies exit the market, Obama will no doubt fill that gap with MORE GOVERNMENT! Increasing government expenditures by trillions of dollars per year.


Didn't Obama just throw a hissy fit about not being to pay the bills now? Sheesh!!


As for the law suit against Alabama...Obama is going to spend millions of dollars that it did not have just 10 hours before they announced the intent to sue. WHY BOTHER???


If the states are willing to assume the costs of immigration enforcement why not let the states do it? Don't look a gift horse in the mouth. Save the money, let the states go for it and sit back and enjoy the accolades of getting the job done cheaply. 


Dang Obama you are just not right in the head...or are you unwilling to share power and authority with the very sovereign entities from whom you stole it? Yep Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson and LBJ would be proud of Obama...He finished the job they started.

What Does Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, LBJ and Today's Debt Debacle Have in Common?

You may not have known the link between Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, LBJ, and the debt debacle of today had any link to each other at all, but they do. I will explain. 

The genesis of the Progressive Movement we know today (AKA liberalism or progressivism) was set in motion with Theodore Roosevelt in the late 1800's. Among the agenda for this movement was the idea of "Democratization." Democratization was supposed to end the corruption of political parties and their local bosses (Boss Tweed's Tammany Hall in New York City for a famous example) by opening up the process to the public through public voting and elections. To their credit, they did institute the primary elections that allow the general voting public to choose candidates for office, but they did much more damage than they did good. 

It is here that I would like to make a point about the USA's government system. We are not a democracy. We are a Federal Constitutional Republic with democratic traditions. Although the differences are numerous, the one difference I wish to concentrate on in this post is the source of power. In a democracy, the source of power is the ever changing and fickle will of the people. In our Constitutional Republic the source of power is not the will of the people but the Rule of Law. The Rule of Law is the kingship, authority, supreme reign and dominancy of the Law upon everything in the nation. The Law rules, as a king rules, over every aspect of our lives. No one person, agency, government or branch of government is above the law. Well, God is above the law. According to the Founders' philosophy God is the author of the law, they believed in Natural Law that is handed down from Nature and Nature's God. From this Thomas Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence that "...all men are created equal, endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights..." Our rights, freedoms, liberties and restrictions all come from the Law. No institution can take these away from you without due process OF THE LAW. So the Law gives, and the Law takes away. The will of the People of the United States of America must be subjugated under the law.

But even the Law has a hierarchy. The Hierarchy of Law is the tiered ladder of Supremacy of the different layers of law. The Constitution of the United States of America is the highest tier of Law in the USA. Treaties passed under the authority of the Constitution are also Supreme Law. Then there is Case Law, which are the decisions of the Supreme Court used as Stare Decisis (or Precedent used to make future rulings on similar topics). Although not formerly a law and holds no real authority of law, SCOTUS Rulings are used by all inferior courts and state courts to make rulings on similar cases. Case Law is used in the conforming of the next tier of Law to the Constitution, Normal Law passed by the National Legislature. Here is where things get complicated in the Hierarchy. The laws passed by the National Legislature may not be in effect everywhere (usually limited to lands owned by the General Government). Under Normal Law are all the rules and regulations by the agencies of the Executive Branch.

Sharing some of the same tiers in the hierarchy are State Constitutions which are the Supreme Law governing the state and are only applicable in the specific state. Under that are State Normal law passed by the state legislature and then the state agencies' rules and regulations.

But above all tiers of Law is the Law of Nature and Nature's God. Our rights as humans and citizens are sovereign of themselves, and we as citizens are sovereign over ourselves.

This muddled Hierarchy where Tiers of laws are both subjugated by a higher authority yet supreme at the same time is the heart of checks and balances and federalism.

I hope I made this clear because this is the foundation for my argument that the Progressives with the Democratization push had motives other than ending corruption; other more sinister motives.

(Still in history teacher mode here so bear with me for a little while longer) The Founding Fathers understood there was a problem inherent with creating a government that needed to protect the Rule of Law, guard the rights of the people and the sovereignty of the states while making the law, deciding the rights of the people and guarding the sovereignty of the states. It is akin to the fox guarding the henhouse or the dog guarding the steak. So the Founders, to the credit of their genius and wisdom, set up an extensive system of checks and balances designed to chain that fox and leash that dog while giving it enough leeway to do the job it needed to do. Each layer of government can not exercise its own powers without the other branches exercising their powers in agreement. James Madison explained the system of checks and balances as best as anyone of any generation in Federalist #51:

"But the great security against a gradual concentration of the several powers in the same department, consists in giving to those who administer each department the necessary constitutional means and personal motives to resist encroachments of the others. The provision for defense must in this, as in all other cases, be made commensurate to the danger of attack. Ambition must be made to counteract ambition... 

...If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions."

You are more than likely familiar with the concept of the Separation of Powers construct of checks and balances at the General Government level (I will shortly explain why I did not use "Federal level" to refer to the national government in Washington DC). Three branches of government (Legislative, Executive and Judicial) each with exclusive but interdependent powers. The Legislative Branch (created by Article 1 §1) was further divided into two houses, the House of Representatives (Article 1 § 2) and the Senate (Article 1 § 3). Note: the symbol "§" means "section," so Article 1 § 1 reads "Article One Section One."

Article 1 § 1 reads:

"All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives"

 Article 1 § 2 reads:

"The House of Representatives shall be composed of members chosen every second year by the people of the several states, and the electors in each state shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the state legislature."

Article 1 § 3 reads:

 "The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two senators from each state, chosen by the legislature thereof, for six years; and each senator shall have one vote."

 I added bold text to emphasize an important detail in those clauses. That detail is who chooses the persons for each house of the Legislature. Please notice that the people choose who goes to the House of Representatives and the state legislatures chose who went to the Senate (the actual procedures were left to the states' individual system and laws for appointing the Senators). This leads to the explanation of why I, nor the Founders, do not use "Federal" to refer to the General (or National) government. Federal is a term that means a form of government in which several independent states join together and form a union with a central authority but retain some or most of their own sovereignty over their respective territories. Even though it is not a sin to refer to the General Government in DC as the "Federal Government" it is technically not a federal government but only a portion of the federation as it pertains to the United States of America. This concept is extremely important to comprehend, so please take your time to understand it thoroughly and its implications.

In respect to checks and balances, federalism is one of the most important but overlooked (and today the most violated) check and balance of the General Government. As indicated above the Senate was comprised of politicians chosen by the states legislatures and therefore Senators represented the states' interests in the General Government. This is very important in that the states had control over the votes of their Senators and instructed them to oppose illegal power grabs by the General Government from the states. Also, as we will see later, states would also instruct their Senators to oppose spending for other than necessary things by the General Government.

Okay, with all that out of the way, let's get to the Progressive Movement's push for "democratization." Progressives were not for the anti-corruption agenda they sold the people. They were after power, and the greatest power was held in the unleashing of the General Government from its chains. The Progressives started movements in the states where people would vote for Progressive candidates at the state level who in turn changed state election laws to reflect the popular election of Senators for the state. Enough states were infiltrated with Progressives to turn the Senate into another chamber representing the people. Thus undermining the states' check on the power of the General Government.

Why is this such a bad thing? The conversation between George Washington and Thomas Jefferson (more than likely fictional but still useful) where Washington explains the bi-cameral Legislature to Jefferson as the House of Representatives being the hot cup of tea and the Senate being a saucer explains my point. You pour the scolding hot tea from the cup into the saucer to cool it down before drinking it so it will not burn your mouth. Because the people (represented by the House of Representatives) are "hot-headed" more willing to spend lots of money and concentrate power than the states (represented by the Senate) who were more "cool-headed." With both Chambers of Congress now representing the "hot-headed" people there is no longer a cooling function to stop the usurpation of power by the General Government. For symbolism purposes I will now refer to the General Government as the Central Government.

What is the difference between a Central Government and a General Government? Nothing really but technical terminology but it will hammer my point home. A General Government is the creation of the states to fulfill certain functions that unifies the states and mutually benefits all of them while maintaining their own sovereignty. With a General Government, the individual state are still the superior entity in the relationship between the state, the other states and the agreed upon central authority. With a Central Government, the central authority becomes the superior entity in that relationship and the states take the inferior roles. A Central Government is also more likely to concentrate power and money to itself and subjugate its creators, the states.

In 1913, with Woodrow Wilson as President, the final nail in the coffin of states' representation in Congress and the assurance of the death of responsible governing by the Central Government was placed into the Constitution as the 17th Amendment.

The 17th Amendment's first clause reads:

"The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two senators from each state, elected by the people thereof, for six years; and each senator shall have one vote. The electors in each state shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the state legislatures."

Since this Amendment was approved (via a coup d'etat of the Senate) the states are removed and voiceless in the goings-on of the monster they agreed to create. Now, each Senator is an at-large representative of the people's interest in the state not the interests of the state itself. To prove this point, the second sentence destroys the state's ability to control who can vote for the Senator by affirming the same voting eligibility to vote for Senator as to vote for the House of Representatives. Okay it does not say that, BUT in Article 1 §2, to be eligible to vote for the House you must qualify to vote for the larger state legislative chamber, the 17th Amendment reiterates Art.1§2 word for word for eligibility.

The first chain on the Central Government was forever removed from around it's neck, but there was another chain around it's feet that had to be removed. This chain was the purse strings. This, again, takes some historical backtracking to explain.

The Constitution (in Article 1 §9) bans the General Government (note the use of the inferior authority again) from directly taxing the people, thereby depriving the dragon of the necessary food to grow and thrive...money. Instead, the General Government could only independently raise funds using tariffs, excises, duties and imposts; all taxes on imported goods from foreign countries. To avoid trade wars with foreign nations these import taxes would be kept low. However, Thomas Jefferson boasted that he funded the entire General Government for most of his two terms on import taxes alone.

This limited authority to independently raise revenue was a huge check on the General Government. However, if it did overspend it's budget the General Government could then borrow money on the credit of the United States. This was not the credit rating of the General Government but the credit rating of all the states combined. In other words, the General Government could borrow money if the states co-signed the loan. The states were then required to repay that loan in the beginning of the next fiscal year in proportion of the number of representatives it had in the House of Representatives. This may need an example: if the General Government borrowed $435 last year to make ends meet each state would pay the amount equal to $435 TIMES (# of Reps the state sends to Congress DIVIDED BY total Reps in Congress). This is roughly equal to the percentage of the state's population of the nation as a whole OR the ratio of state population to the national population. So the budget was balanced every year naturally, the states forced the Senate to oppose spending and all was well and America flourished.

Progressives hated this chain. It really hampered their dreams of a powerful Dragon to accumulate wealth and power for themselves. Even after the Senate was effectively compromised through popular elections, the states could still withhold funds to pay the debt or worse withhold the credit it needed to fund bloated budgets that import taxes couldn't cover. Enter the 16th Amendment again by Woodrow Wilson in 1913.

The 16th Amendment reads:

"The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several states, and without regard to any census or enumeration."

Now the Central Government controls it's own purse strings without the states to check it. The Central Government can reach into each citizens wallets and take what it needs to feed that inner Dragon. The Coup D'etat is almost complete. There is still one more chain around the Dragon's belly that needed to be cut for the Progressives (who by now fall right in line with the European Fascists and Socialists). This chain was interests of the voters.

Voting rights have been controversial in America for a long time...so says the liberal today. I disagree, voting privileges, or more specifically the denial of voting privileges, has been a stroke of genius by those who understood government's inner dragon. The most popular restriction on voting rights was the requirement of ownership of property. As property owners you pay property taxes and these property taxes were used as voter eligibility. In effect they are poll taxes. You had to pay to vote. In other words, you had to be invested in the outcomes of the policies to vote; or in Pres. Obama's slang "had to have skin in the game." The Founders did not want those that did not pay taxes, who didn't care about the effects of policy on the economy or who were motivated by revenge or hatred or those who would vote to steal the wealth of others to give to themselves to vote for policies that could ruin the fiscal policy. Today we call these undesirable voters "zero liability voters" because they do not feel the effects or liability of the policies for which they vote in favor, while the ones who actually "have skin in the game" feel all the effects. The exclusion of the Zero Liability Voter, thereby giving more voice and checking power to those who have a vested interest, was the last and final constraint upon the dragon. The vested voter would not vote for candidates who would grow the dragon by raising taxes or concentrating power. Enter the 24th Amendment in 1964:

 " TherightofcitizensoftheUnitedStatestovoteinanyprimaryorother election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for senator or representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any state by reason of failure to pay any poll tax or other tax."

Lyndon B. Johnson knew that he needed the Zero Liability Voter to vote for his candidates to finalize the destruction of the Founders' dream of liberty and freedom and institute an authoritarian regime of money and power.  So how did LBJ do this? He got the 24th Amendment passed through a compromised Senate whose Senators are more than willing now to promise new constituents money from the public treasury. LBJ then got his Great Society agenda passed which gave us the modern welfare programs. The buying off of a majority of voters to retain power and wealth is complete. The dragon is fully loose from bondage. Now to feed the dragon!

Since their are no external checks on the Central Government now the only thing holding it back are internal checks; remember the three branches of interdependent powers? And there is always that specter of the states rising up too. How to solve these pesky nuisances? Oh yeah! For those pesky states. get them addicted to easy Central Government tax money just like the Zero Liability Voters...DONE! Block grants, grants in aid, funded mandates all give the states their dollar fix, and unfunded mandates keeps them broke enough to require funds from DC to survive.

 Now on to consolidating all that power into the Presidency. How do you do that? If you need the Congress to pass laws and the President to enforce them how do you slowly combine the two? The answer is regulatory power. The President is the chief executive of all the agencies in the Central Government. He can command them to do anything he wishes with an Executive Order. Now EO's have no effect of law outside the agency it is directed at, but that EO can direct the agency to make regulations that do have the effect of law...WITHOUT CONGRESS! Here is how this works:
1- Congress passes a law that is vague and without specifics;
2- This law gives the executive agency that is in charge of the area of the law "Regulatory Power" to fill in the specifics in the law;
3- The President then sends an EO to the Agency to make certain regulations the President wants.

There is an agency to control every aspect of your life from conception to graveyard maintenance.

So what do we have today thanks to Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, LBJ? An over bloated Central Government that has promised money it doesn't have to every entity that can either vote for or give money to a politician. It has borrowed so much money from creditors that the debt is now more than the entire productivity of all Americans combined (GDP). Politicians have passed laws to check itself, like the debt ceiling, but those checks are either ignored or moved out of the way. The states will not step up and force its way back into relevancy, the people are so accustomed to getting free money they wont put an end to the madness, and if you express a solution that cuts off their money teat they demonize you and claim you want to kill grandma by force feeding her dog food.

The Progressive plan to install a socialist/fascist government has worked. Today, we are on the razor's edge collapse economically and signs of social collapse are everywhere (but that is another post to explain that). All that Progressives need to do now is watch from a safe distance. I do not believe the absolute needed fix to this mess will be discussed in time, considered in time, implemented in time to have the time to work.

But for the record, in case you are wondering, the solution is Repeal the 17th Amendment. Return to a real Federalist Government system. Amend the 16th Amendment to reflect a tax rate floor of 5% and a rate ceiling of 10% to be laid on all wage earners regardless of income (Low Wage Earners would be taxed the floor rate while High Wage Earners are taxed at the rate ceiling). Return the requirement of the states to pay the debt and deficit in full of the previous fiscal year at the start of the new Fiscal Year. Reverse the Progressivism, Restore the Federal Constitutional Republic!

"In these sentiments, Sir, I agree to this Constitution, with all its faults, — if they are such; because I think a general Government necessary for us, and there is no form of government but what may be a blessing to the people, if well administered; and I believe, farther, that this is likely to be well administered for a course of years, and can only end in despotism, as other forms have done before it, when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic government, being incapable of any other."
Benjamin Franklin's Speech to the Constitutional Convention (28 June 1787)