Libertas Immortalis

Churchill brought to justice

2009-07-09T10:55:00.004-06:00

On February 8, 2005, former University of Colorado Professor Ward Churchill said, "I do not work for the taxpayers of Colorado."

As written by Denver District Judge Larry Naves, he does per Article VIII of the Colorado state constitution, which provides for “Educational, reformatory, and penal institutions as the public good may require, shall be established and supported by the state, in such manner as may be prescribed by law.” Further, the section states that "the establishment, management, and abolition of the state institutions shall be subject to the control of the state, under the provisions of the constitution and such laws and regulations as the general assembly may provide."

Churchill, however, believes differently. Hiding behind the First Amendment, he claims that a government employee cannot be fired simply because of what they wrote or said, and to do so is severe violation of his right to free speech.

But Churchill is wrong. In a February 21, 2005, editorial for the Colorado Daily, I wrote, "We welcome Churchill's comments anywhere but on our dollar. And yes, it is about the money. Why should any student paying in or out-of-state tuition be subject to his blatant indoctrination?"

I stand behind those words.

As an outspoken critic of the Ward Churchill fiasco that has plagued my alma matter for the better part of four years, I am thrilled with the announcement that not only will Ward Churchill not be awarded a single dollar of money damages for wrongful termination, defamation, or First Amendment claims, but he will also be covering the bill for all the time and money he wasted from my school.

This semester I will paying almost $5000, including close to a grand in student fees, to attend CU-Boulder. I expect CU to hold up the judge's ruling and not a cent to go to this fraud, this academic impostor who has tarnished CU's reputation as a prodigious, world-class university and exposed it as a battleground for lunatics.

Ward, it appears what you have experienced before you is a case of chickens coming home to roost. May justice be praised.

Independence Day

2009-07-04T11:42:00.006-06:00

As we celebrate our beloved national holiday, few Americans take time out of grilling hot dogs, eating potato chips, and drinking beer to think about what it truly means to celebrate the birth of this great nation.

In spite of recent events that make many, myself included, question whether or not America is still a free nation, there is one quality about this country that few Americans remember and many forget.

Famous speeches like Lincoln's "Gettysburg Address" and Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream" often point to ideas that while significant, lie well underneath the core of American society. Lincoln's speech asked if "a government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth." King popularized racial equality and the American dream, asking men to not be judged by the color of their skin but the content of the character.

And while representative government and racial equality are often touted, and justifiably so, as hallmarks of what it means to be an American, to be a member of a free nation, they do little to examine what lies at the core of all American ideas, of everything this great country was founded upon.

Prior to 1776, when a group of 56 men signed a document that made them traitors, the idea of a nation built upon liberty was nothing but a figment of imagination fit for philosophical musing. To suggest that "that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights," was an idea so radical for its time that modern men simply cannot grasp the revolutionary nature of the Declaration of Independence, and perhaps more importantly, the ideas and text it contains. For the Declaration of Independence was not just a document establishing the United States of America as a sovereign nation, it established a sovereign nation conceived in liberty, casting off the chains of despotism and tyranny once and for all.

What the Declaration did was cry out in one voice that this is the land of the free, that here a man is judged only by his character and his accomplishments, not by his birthright nor his family history. It established for the first time in the history of the world that a man has right to his own life, that a man recognizes authority to no one without his own consent, that a man is his own mind, his own body, for he is the master of his own destiny.

Modern Americans forget that. We now rely on outdated African proverbs, trite Native American sayings, and angst-ridden Marxist rhetoric to say that a man is only as good as the men around him. We have forgotten what it means to be the captain of our own ship and have instead traded it for berths as slaves on Whitman's ship of state, on the socialists ship of society, on the Christians ship of community. We have surrendered command of our own fates, mutinying ourselves in a vain effort to relinquish our duty to ourselves. And though there are men among us who will say that one man cannot do it all, that we must offer a part of ourselves to some part of society, of government of those around us, they easily forget H.L. Mencken's fair warning on liberty, that "Any man who takes the liberty of another into his own keeping is bound to become a tyrant, and that any man who yields up his liberty, in however slight the measure, is bound to become a slave."

This Independence Day remember not the birth of nation, for nation's can be torn apart. Instead, remember the idea, an idea only as old as the nation which is represented by it: that a man belongs to no one but himself. For this is what it means to be independent.

Invictus

2009-06-22T15:04:00.004-06:00

By William Ernest Henley
Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find me, unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate;
I am the captain of my soul.

A good friend introduced this poem to me, and I think it perfectly summarizes the individualist sense of life. In a succint and powerful few stanzas, Henley describes more about the soul of a man as it should be than the many novels and non-fiction volumes on the subject of individualism, forcing one to recognize such talent that only these stirring words drive me to jealousy, making me wish I had written it myself.

Obama's anti-smoking crusade

2009-06-22T11:51:00.004-06:00

In a move rivaling Colorado's 2006 public smoking ban, President Barack Obama has signed an anti-smoking bill which will allow the FDA to regulate tobacco products.

The law will allow for the reduction and control of nicotine in tobacco products, the arbitrary prohibition of marketing campaigns, as well as banning candy flavorings and blocking labels such as "low tar" and "light."

As though Obama was not relying enough on obscure literary and cinematic moments to further his statist agenda (his 60 percent government stake in car dealerships is straight out of Atlas Shurgged), he appears to be taking his latest cues from the 2006 tongue-and-cheek film Thank You For Smoking. According to this Denver Post article, "Tobacco companies also will be required to cover their cartons with large graphic warnings," a regulation eerily similar to Thank You for Smoking's "poison" label.

The tobacco companies have reacted, as expected, with resentment, mostly because the law directly hurts their business. One can imagine the tobacco executives pacing back and forth in their North Carolina offices, grinning with disdain, uttering the film's quintessential conflict.

"People, what is going on out there? When this cocksucker puts Captain Hook on our product, what the fuck are we gonna do?"

Apparently, President Obama thinks he has the answer.

Obama's American car dealerships

2009-03-30T15:05:00.008-06:00

President Barack Obama today moved one step further in nationalizing General Motors and Chrysler, assuring citizens everywhere that he is "absolutely committed" to saving an otherwise failing American automobile industry.

All socialist implications aside, President Obama's move is part of larger picture, a paradigm that has rendered Americans blind for decades.

While many commentators will say he is simply trying to save American jobs or that he is appeasing the unions, who helped get him elected, I wish to focus on a much deeper problem: Assigning intrinsic value to commodities.

A car is nothing by itself. It enables us to move, to be free from the bondage of a pedestrian lifestyle. As such, it should be treated as a part of a larger value, the value of mobility, which itself is related to both freedom and individualism.

However, Obama seems to believe, or at least he is publicly arguing, that American cars are somehow better than foreign cars, that there is a certain intrinsic value attached to American-made goods.

This is nothing more than economic patriotism, the kind espoused by localists, environmentalists, anti-globalization advocates, and hard-nosed economic conservatives, all of whom praise American-made products and demonize any outside threat to the sanctity of their credo, "Made in the USA." They hide behind their masks of so-called human rights, of animal welfare, of environmental welfare, of energy independence, of racism, of inhumane hatred; and for what?

So that the world will know that the American Apparel tag on the leggings that sit tight on the ass of a California-born supermodel look just as amazing as the Dearborn, Mich. imprint on the underside of the Ford Mustang muffler? So that the world will know the Chevrolet Corvette is an American icon, that we have not departed from our working-man, industrialized roots? So that children who would otherwise starve without "sweatshop jobs" in foreign nations can be spared of their sub-mininum-wage salaries? So that all our wine comes from Napa and Sonoma? So that all our bananas and pineapples come from Hawaii? So that all our oranges come from Florida? So that all our strawberries come from California? So that we can claim our bold, international superiority over every other race and culture?

May such claims be damned. May economic patriotism be damned.

There is nothing noble or intrinsically valuable about locally-produced fruit or nationally-produced automobiles. Who cares what the color of the skin of the man who made your clothes is? Who cares if our coffee comes from Costa Rica or our bananas from the Dominican Republic? Who cares if Australiza still produces better Shiraz on their limestone coastline than California does in its mediterranean valleys?

May this be a call to us all to realize that perhaps America is not the fanatastic, industrialized, international monopoly it once was. May this be a call that American manfacturers learn that no longer can they rely on consumers to buy an inferior product for an increased price. May this be a call that we all realizes the benefits of globalization: that one can eat Chinese food on Monday, Mexican on Tuesday, Cajun on Wednesday, a hamburger on Thursday, and French fine dining on Friday; or that an 11-year-old boy in Indonesia is in fact better off with a job in a Nike factory, even if he is not paid what Americans believe is due, for now he can feed his mother and his sister; or that the only way to improve the environment is for the world, not just Americans, to realize our reliance on it and our need to replant natural resources in order to sustain our future.

I, like many before me, too have a dream. I have a dream that one day, I will be cruising a free and reborn America in an Italian-made Lamborghini, my only companion my half-Latina wife, herself adorned in jeans produced by a man in another land, one that is now free. Then, and only then, will globalization not be looked at as an enemy of nations, as a violator of human rights, but as what it really is: the only way to guarantee capitalism and freedom to those who are currently without.

Proof that the youth are revolting

2009-03-26T11:47:00.010-06:00

An article in today's Washington Post states that interest in government jobs from young people is higher than ever. It cites "growing interest, dismal economy and desire for public service."

One 25-year-old student, Christina Lee, said the troubled economy "definitely" contributes to her interest in the federal government, adding, "With so many people having trouble finding jobs and keeping jobs, I'd like to know that when I get a job, it's secure.

While Lee's concerns about job security are understandable, they are not admirable. The very fact that job applicants (and Lee is certainly not alone) believe government jobs are "secure" says everything one needs to know about the quality and quantity of the United States government: It is nothing short of an overgrown abomination, where any college graduate (or veteran job applicant for that matter) can unapolgetically hide out, virtually untouched, without public scrutiny that asks whether their job is a part of the values of liberty at all.

However, perhaps what is more disconcerting about this increased interest is that many young Americans in the article cited a desire to serve the public for the greater good.

Another student, Matt Hartburg, 21, said, "When they were talking about how they need younger people to step up and work for the government, that's good to hear," he said. "I feel like I'm graduating at the right time."

Ah, yes. The old JFK defense. "Ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country."

There are few words uttered by any American president more despicable than calls for service, such as Barack Obama's dictations for public service or John F. Kennedy's request to help your country. Of course, not to pick on Democrats, Republicans are no better. Recall that McCain joined Obama in his demand that we all serve our fellow man.

Why is it that my fellow young Americans hold such revolting philosophical beliefs? Why is it that so many of my fellow young Americans believe that they are required to serve? Why is it that my fellow young Americans believe they should be subjected to someone else's will, whether it be a God who believes he governs or a government who believes it is God? Why is it noble to put others before yourself, even if it means sacrificing your own freedom, your own individualism, your own survival?

Volunteering is not about a debt to mankind, a requirement for public service, a high call from presidents and politicians, or a higher call from a priest or a God. It is about contributing your services and your talents because you want to, because you believe it is the right thing to do. It is about placing one's own volition above the commandments of his fellow men, raising his right hand and saying, "I do this only for myself out of my own free will."

Ask not what you can do for your country, ask not what your country can do for you, ask not what others can do for you, ask what you can do for yourself.

Dystopian advertising

2009-03-24T13:57:00.005-06:00

Driving through downtown Denver today, I came across a billboard that read: "Katie steals to feed her kids. You can change her story." An advertisement for Volunteers of America, the sign reads like a dystopian prognostication of a society ruined by circumstances beyond one's control.

Unfortunately, as their Website illustrates, this is one of many billboards in a nation-wide campaign to guilt-trip Americans into volunteering to help the disadvantaged, the indignant, and the impoverished. Other like-minded socialist and/or Christian organizations probably applaud such statements, fearing that without the assistance of their fellow men, an individual will rot in disease-ridden, poverty-stricken neighborhoods. After all, who will protect a woman from a man who abuses her? Who will feed the hungry? Who will cloth the naked? Who will take a man's life into his hands for safe keeping?

At the risk of sounding like a uncaring, misogynistic imbecile who lacks even an ounce of compassion, is it too much to suggest people look out for themselves?

Independence is a hallmark of virtue and is to be celebrated. For a man to stand naked and expect others to cloth him, for a woman to stand in a line and expect others to feed her, for a parent to expect others to raise his child, for a wife to expect others to force her to leave her abusive husband, for a human being to expect any man but himself to control his life: these are merely pathways on the road to serfdom, to human interdependence, to a world where man neglects himself in favor of the group, the commune, the collective. For any grown man who neglects his own life, any man who places his work, his volition, his very ability to survive into the hands of another is nothing more than an immoral leech. Living a life as man qua man means living for oneself, for his own survival, for his own liberty.

Virtue

2009-03-19T12:05:00.009-06:00

For years, my mind has been plagued with questions, asking what virtue in the context of individual rights means.

For too long, men have believed that if and when an individual is truly free, it is his or her responsibility to care not for his or herself but for others. It is said by almost all major religions and philosophies that all men should sacrifice themselves for their fellow men. Such religions will say: This is the doctrine given to man by the lamb who was slain. This is the doctrine for which one shall enter heaven. This is the doctrine of true enlightenment. This is altruism, to which we shall all surrender. For nothing is greater.

And yet, this is the doctrine of slaves. It is the scripture followed by disciples, by sheep who require a herder, by men who simply cannot and will not think for themselves. They surrender their minds and bodies to gods, to governments, to masses, to groups of men no more deserving of the adjective virtuous than these philosophies best representatives: Adolf Hitler and Josef Stalin.

For virtue is not born of so-called philosophical intuition or of passionate but irrational desires of the heart. Rather, it is born of the mind, where existence exists, A is A, and no man is required to surrender his own life for anyone or anything. That is rational egoism. That is virtue.

And to virtue's best representative, I turn not to a historical figure but a man born in fiction, an individualist created by a woman of liberty, a woman of virtue. As Howard Roark states in Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead: "I recognize no obligations toward men except one: to respect their freedom and to take no part in a slave society."

On Global Justice

2009-03-18T11:37:00.003-06:00

After sitting through an hour and a half discussion on "global justice," it occurred to me how hypocritical leftists can really be at times. Fortunately, this rhetorical nightmare on cosmopolitan society amounted to at least one prudent thought.

When a group of capitalists get together and talk about what's wrong with the world, it's denounced as a cult or a conspiracy. When a group of socialists do the same, it's praised as the hallmark of mankind, as a university.

Write that down.

The Pro Bowl Problem

2008-02-12T14:45:00.000-07:00

During Sunday’s NFL Pro Bowl, color commentator Daryl Johnston said over 84 million football fans cast ballots for the event via text messaging and online polls. Aside from quantifying America’s obsession with football, the votes prove one thing: the state of disarray of American politics. By contrast, just over 101 million people voted for the presidency in 2000. In 2004, the largest turnout for an election in United States history, still only 121 million people voted. The 2006 general election did not even attract as many votes as the Pro Bowl, with only 80 million cast.

Academic cynics will use this data to point out U.S. citizens’ neglect of civic duties, while others still will claim that football obsession is just another part of American consumerism and fascination with celebrities. But few will actually admit the real story behind 84 million people casting their votes to send their favorite players to Honolulu: the NFL has it figured out; Washington and Denver do not.

For NFL fans, the process was as easy as sitting in their favorite easy chair, and sometime between their fourth beer and a lame Cialis commercial, they had to pick up a phone and text in their favorite candidates.

In contrast, the government requires voters to register, somehow claiming the American electorate is more literate by forcing this process. Then, citizens are required to vote on only one day of each year, either through a mail-in ballot or going to their local precinct polling location. What motivation do already-proven lazy Americans have to move, especially when their vote, economically speaking, will not make a difference?

At least for the Pro Bowl fans had several choices: even the lowliest defensive ends all the way to Jared Allen were on the ballot. There were no preliminary elections to decide if Derek Anderson was even a viable candidate compared with Tom Brady.

But with the caucuses now over, Americans are left deciding among two men and a woman who is fit to run the nation. Soon, that number will shrink to two choices, and anyone who is not a diehard Hillary Clinton or John McCain fan is left with uneasy visions of two Americas: one of socialism or one of a security state.

No wonder no one votes anymore. In 2004, it would take even the most optimistic voter to find 3 million candidates willing to vote for his or her choice and “make a difference.” And currently, there is little difference between the candidates if any at all. Hillary is to McCain as Brady is to Manning: same results, different teams.

If academics and politicians really want U.S. citizens to become more active in the electoral process, they should start by revamping the system. Because when more Americans vote for a third-string cornerback than a U.S. senator, clearly, Washington has a problem.

Throw out the garbage

2008-02-08T12:15:00.001-07:00

Though I am not an endorser of term limits by any means, the following article in the Washington Post does make a strong case for getting rid of men who have spent so long in the Senate that their buttocks are permanently imprinted in the Senate-floor seat cloth.

Sen. Daniel K. Inouye (D-Hawaii) joined the most exclusive club in the Senate yesterday, casting his 15,000th roll-call vote since winning election in 1962. Inouye, 83, became just the fourth senator in chamber history to cast that many votes, along with the late Strom Thurmond (R-S.C.), Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.), and Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.).

Look at this list. A Judeo-Christian scholar could not have come up with better candidates for the Four Horsemen even if he tried.

Strom Thurmond led the infamous nation's longest filibuster for 24 hours and 18 minutes in order to derail the Civil Rights Act of 1957. At the time, he was a segregationist and an intransigent Democrat. His racist views subsided over time, as did his party affiliation, eventually switching to the Republicans in 1964.

The southern senator was also notorious for marrying a 23-year-old former Miss South Carolina (1965) turned office bunny when he was 66 years old. Usually, it is easy to ignore glitches in the personal lives of politicians, despite what public opinion might say, but this case is an exception. Anyone marrying a woman 43 years younger than him is disgusting.

Robert Byrd has served in office since 1959, only 17 years after he was a member of the Klu Klux Klan and an avowed racist. He was quoted about his opposition to racially integrating the military, saying:

Rather I should die a thousand times, and see Old Glory trampled in the dirt never to rise again, than to see this beloved land of ours become degraded by race mongrels, a throwback to the blackest specimen from the wilds.

The West Virginia senior senator claims he became disinterested in the Klan after a year and joined it primarily "because it offered excitement and because it was strongly opposed to communism." However, Byrd's involvement continued through at least 1947, when he wrote a letter to a Grand Wizard stating: "The Klan is needed today as never before and I am anxious to see its rebirth here in West Virginia" and "in every state in the nation."

Nonethelss, like many politicians, Byrd has sweet-talked and fiddled (literally) his way out of the KKK mess, stating in 1997 that he deeply regrets his involvement, has apologized a thousand times, saying "intolerance had no place in America."

However, Byrd's voting record is not much better than his jejune participations in the KKK. In 1964, he, like Thurmond in 1957, filibustered the Civil Rights Act, and for his entire congressional career, he has repeatedly voted against black judicial nominations.

Of course, the mountain man denies all of this as a past life, as a part of an environment that it took him years to get over, and that if he could go back, he would vote in favor of the Civil Rights Act. However, the real issue is not Byrd's regrets or current policies (despite his continual support for bills libertarians would consider frivolous or detrimental to liberty), but the fact that the people of West Virginia have sent this senator back to Washington twelve times, five of which were during the years he would have been described as a racist.

Outside of racial politics, Byrd appears to be a standard-issue Democrat. He opposed the invasion of Iraq, posses relatively liberal economic views, and opposes basically everything President Bush does. And in 2007, the longest-serving senator in U.S. history wasted the Senate's time with a 25-minute tirade against animal dogfighting, accomplishing nothing of importance, and earning himself People for the Ethical Treatment of Animal's 2007 Person of the Year.

Ted Kennedy is one of the most vehemently hated politicians in U.S. history, especially by conservatives. A stalwart liberal, the man lives and breathes to create the most progressive legislation known to mankind, including fervent support for gun control, same-sex marriage, abortion rights, progressive income taxes, and environmentally-friendly energy policies.

In April 2006, Kennedy was named one of Time's 10 best senator's, a label that should appear suspicious to all but the most adamant reader's of a magazine that espouses liberal values.

However, the problem with Ted is not his support to grant gays rights or that he is essentially Focus on the Family's anti-Christ. In fact, the man deserves credit for garnering such a reputation of hate by social conservatives. At least someone in America is keeping the evangelical Christian brainwash movement under control.

The problem with Kennedy is that no matter what social ideology the man may believe, his way of ensuring its fulfillment is through overbearing government laws. And of course, his relentless pursuit of a socialist America earns him the official and distinguished honor as one of Libertas Immortalis' Destroyer's of Freedom.

Last, but certainly not least, is Mr. Land of Rainbows, Daniel K. Inouye. While not much is known about the Hawaiian senior senator, at least, not in the Ted Kennedy sense, a quick view of his voting record reveals a man as committed to a socialism as Kennedy. Though it appears he is most committed to Hawaiian values, whatever those may be, 94 percent of time, he is in lockstep with his Democratic colleagues.

Government qua proctologist

2008-02-07T08:22:00.000-07:00

The federal government this week has launched so many so-called probes, or deep investigations, that Washington D.C. looks like a proctologist's office.

The Drug Enforcement Agency today announced it would launch a probe into Heath Ledger's untimely death, which was determined to be the result of a drug overdose.

"We're trying to identify if these were legitimate prescriptions that he had, or if they were illegally obtained or dispensed and by whom," a source told the New York Daily News.

For what? To make American's everywhere feel safer knowing that our government cares about not only our children but also our celebrities?

There hasn't been a Hollywood-government story this ridiculous since Arnold Schwarzenegger was elected governor of California.

To make probing matters worse, Congress has taken a deep look into a Lipitor commercial, hoping to get to the bottom of whether or not Robert Jarvik was paid too much money and whether or not he used a body double.

The cholesterol-lowering drug features a series of advertisements starring Jarvik, who is depicted not only a medical professional endorsing medication, but him paddling a canoe.

The Herculean feat astonished Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.), who believes that Jarvik used a body double, since obviously, there are no 60-year-old men capable of moving a boat across water.

And of course, there is the matter of legitimacy regarding his claim to be a doctor, a claim that Congress believes is false and is hurting consumers.

Despite Jarvik's public statement admitting that he is a medical researcher not a practicing physician, the feds are furious that someone not allowed to prescribe medication would endorse a medication.

If the Committee on Energy and Commerce believes that such commercials are detrimental to the health of Americans everywhere, perhaps it should launch an investigation into their own candidacy commercials next. They may be shocked to learn all the lies they tell to get public support.

First Ledger, then Jarvik. Either way, if you planning on a trip to Washington anytime soon, you better pick up a healthy supply of lubricant. The federal government may find out you lied about your weight at a high school reunion.

Abortion: a revision in thought

2008-02-06T12:14:00.000-07:00

It is not often that I will change my stance about a particular, and usually, when this happens, it becomes a humiliating experience, convincing not only myself but those around me, that often, nothing remains concrete.

However, in the words of syndicated conservative columnist and former New Left member David Horowitz, “it is not my values that have changed, but rather, how I approach them.”

Today, I humbly speak of abortion, an issue that in the past I have been so adamantly opposed to, I was often pinned as a Southern Baptist, a far-right neoconservative, or even a religious evangelical zealot. However, those epithets, as deprecating as they were at times (especially for a man who considers religion to be the source of over 1500 years of oppression and tyranny), somehow never bothered me.

Rather, it took a relationship with a woman much different than myself to realize that my stance on abortion needed a thorough reexamination.

I place life as the highest virtue a human being posses. For as Ayn Rand said, it “is the source of all other rights.” The question for me was not whether or not we should respect life or whether or not the value of life trumps the value of liberty (it most certainly does). It was whether or not abortion is an extraction of life. The conclusion I came to was influenced by the following argument.

Life is philosophically defined as rational cognizance. One does not grant the quality of life to a cow or a chicken, or in many cases, even more domesticated animals, such as a cat. Humanity may respect these creatures out of respect for their quality of being, i.e. that they are alive and breathing, but to grant them the quality of life based on their cellular movements or ability to feel pleasure or pain is a weak argument, endorsed by philosophers of the primitive school, such as Peter Singer. It is rational cognizance that separates humanity from animalia.

The argument described as pro-life is usually recognized as “the claim of a potential.” Essentially, this means that an embryonic cell must be recognized as life because of its potential to become a rational being. However, recent scientific investigation has proven that an embryonic cell does not even posses the ability to posses rational cognizance (its potential to become a rational being) until the end of the first trimester: when it becomes a fetus. Until this time, an embryo posses no more potential rationality than a sperm or an egg, and to be consistent in opposition to abortion based on “the claim of a potential,” one would also have to be opposed to masturbation, menstruation, and ejaculation that does result in fertilization. Indeed, opposition to two out of three of those would be impractical and unrealistic, if not downright ridiculous, and opposition to menstruation is impossible, as it is a naturally-occurring process.

And so, as shown through reductio ad absurdum, to be pro-life is irrational and inconsistent.

It should be noted, however, that abortions beyond the first trimester, however, are irrational, disgusting, and a violation of human life. Anyone considering an abortion at this point has little to no justification, unless, of course, not performing one would cost the mother her life as well.

Again, life is the value and source for my stance on abortion, just as before. The only thing that has changed is how I approach the issue. For even the most adamant libertarian still believes in the right to life.

Ron Paul: The Case for Liberty

2008-01-18T10:43:00.000-07:00

It is not often that this blog will openly endorse any candidate from either major party for a position of national, state, or local power. In fact, its author was so fed up with the 2006 governor's race in Colorado, that he and several friends wrote himself in as a candidate on the ballot.

However, for the first time since the Civil War, in a nation established on freedom, a candidate has emerged that has literally turned political races across the country upside down.

Reason magazine has a fantastic expose on the Ron Paul revolution, and so, this blog will go no further in establishing his support, except to summarize the article: Endorsements by Johnny Rotten (of Sex Pistols fame), George Will (a conservative Washington Post columnist), Republicans, Democrats, and Libertarians alike have driven the movement for liberty to new heights.

What this means for the presidential election, time may only tell. Ron Paul will probably not win the Republican nomination (a party that these days prides itself on such a big tent that you could fit Rosie O'Donnell and her hot air underneath), but he has certainly changed the way all the candidates are talking about the issues.

As one of the only antiwar candidates running in both parties, Paul certainly is not popular with the America-first patriots or the stalwart realist conservatives. His opponents constantly slam him for his opinion on Iraq, and even people like conservative columnist Michelle Malkin have chimed in on mess, adding that Ron Paul is a nut case and completely wrong for the Republican Party.

Democrats, especially those on the far left, would love Ron Paul's stance on Iraq. Trouble is, they hate everything else he stands for. Ron Paul is probably the only true capitalist in Congress, and do not forget his diehard stance on the Second Amendment. Guns and greed: two words bound to get anyone kicked out of the Democratic National Convention.

So where does Paul fit into the presidential races? If he is not going to win, then what is his point?

His point is that no one, not in a hundred years has stood up for capitalism. No one has said the war has gone too far (without first following the statement with a Bush bash, of course). And no one has said: what happened to America?

By asking the questions, Paul has opened two large doors in this year's presidential race.

The first is wide and recognized by candidates across the board, though all in different ways. It is a simple statement, a question that while many ask, few dare answer with words such as tyranny, oppression, destruction, or force. Paul asks: Where did America go wrong?

The second is much narrower. It is the answer beyond the answer to where America went wrong, and seeks a solution. Not in the form of legislation or of tyranny or of terrible ballot initiatives but in the form of a single idea, a virtue long adulterated long forgotten: liberty. For Paul is best summed up by his three clause platform:

I don't want want to run your life. We all have different values. I wouldn't know how to do it, I don't have the authority under the Constitution, and I don't have the moral right. I don't want to run the economy. People run the economy in a free society. I don't want to run the world...We don't need to be imposing ourselves around the world.

In the words of Dennis Miller: "Eloquent in its brevity." However, though these doors will open for only a short time during the 2008 presidential race, hope is that the doors stay open for the American people much longer.

What Paul has really accomplished is a renewal for the case of liberty. A renewal sought by many of the last decades, and aside from a few marks, has accomplished very little in our nation: We still pay very high taxes. Our freedoms are still restricted. The Constitution is more like guidelines than law. And the American people are no better today than we were under the tyrannical rule of King George III in 1775.

But for once, a candidate recognizes this and rather than asking what JFK immortalized in his speech, what you can do for your country, Paul is asking, why is your country doing anything for you?

Government is bloated and obnoxious. Rights have been repressed. And freedom is but one or two more laws away from extinction every day that Congress is in session. Many agree on this. But few dare say it.

The best of the people always stood for life and liberty, no doubt. But never have they stood together. Paul's campaign does this and more. It is an answer to the question that men have asked since the enlightenement, the central tenant of democracy, the central point of our Constitution, and the central word of our long-forgotten Declaration of Independence.

Scholars debate democracy and its uses every day. But while this author disagrees with democracy as a concept in general, we must not abandon its uses in the present. For perhaps there is no better explanation for the people nor answer for the academics than the summary Ron Paul gave of his supporters: "Freedom is popular."

Clinton's healthcare plan proposal a philosophical sham

2007-09-16T19:39:00.000-06:00

Hillary Clinton is at it again with HillaryCare, only this time she claims that it will be a mix of "private coverage and government subsidized health care." Though Clinton's proposal is slightly less socialist than her thirteen-year-old attempt at revamping health care via the government, it serves as a frightening reminder of the slow but painful death of the free market.

And though it is unlikely that even if Clinton were elected the plan would ever see fruition, the idea nonetheless spells doom for not only capitalists but freedom-loving Americans everywhere.

Unfortunately, Clinton is not the only one hell-bent on health care coverage. Colorado legislators are also considering several options, two of which claim to ensure over 90 percent of the population.

Philosophically, health care issues are often disguised as one's of critical government importance, since for many worldly citizens, the measure of a government's success is based on the life expectancy of its citizenry. However, these confused radicals not only know nothing of world history (until the last century, no government prided itself on the life expectancy of its population) but also nothing of philosophy.

What they effectively do is frame the argument as this: health care equates to life, and men have a right to life, therefore, we have a right to health care. In fact, a fellow student at the University of Colorado quickly found out how much people hold onto this belief when she was shouted down for saying there is no right to health care.

She is right. No man has a right to health anymore than he has a right to food, water, shelter, clothing, or any other basic human need. And while some particular religions or ideologies may require men to surrender themselves to others for these seemingly basic needs, reason would dictate otherwise.

It is not a sin to say no to free health care, and Christian or not, conservative or not, liberal or not, human rights activist or not, no one should believe that health care is a right. Humans have many rights, but the ability to go to a doctor for a common cold is not one of them.

The Great Global Warming Swindle

2007-03-16T17:35:00.000-06:00

Anyone who believes that those who do not "believe" in human-induced climate change are a group of heretics or uneducated morons needs to watch this video.

Capitalism and collegiate conformity

2007-03-09T19:59:00.000-07:00

It is all too often that students across this campus and capmuses across the nation speak of their liberal political, social, and economic views as somehow rebellious, even avant garde in a society formed around fundamental conservative values. They say that to offer a woman the right to an abortion is somehow progressive, as though ending innocent lives made were an important step in advancing human liberty. They say that to scarifice oneself unto the masses, specifically the unknown and underserving masses, is the greatest honor, and that one day, men will look back, wondering why men ever believed in ego or self-esteem. And they hold that material goods are nothing more than a measure of suffering, of destruction, and of the end of an age built on immoral grounds. But those students' views are inherently flawed. For such beliefs and the philosophical foundations that accompany them are all too common with people not only in college, but young Americans across the nation.

Look around at the current political spectrum. People under the age of 30 dominate left-wing parties and ideologies. Where does one find Marxist clubs? Universities. Where does one find hatred and disgust for the ability of a man to produce (though, oddly enough, they love the ability of a man to think)? Young people. Indeed it is no secret that College Democrats and other left-wing clubs dominate college campuses across the nation, and somehow, they believe they are "sticking it to the man," "being edgy," "living dangerously," or "f****ing the system."

But it is not these people who are the anticonformists. They are exactly the people they purport to be against: mindless, sheperd-led drones whose greatest accomplishment is surviving those freshman-year nights when they nearly died from alcohol poisoning (or more recently, according to local media, heroine addictions).

They spit hate-filled words for libertarian and conservative ideologies, their minds filled by the words of songs that inspire more vindiction for not only the president, but any sort of philosophy that may accompany a certain amount of freedom whatsoever.

They believe such nonsense like the cliched saying that "there's no such thing as freedom without responsibility," as though freedom can be trumped by any law that remotely incites responsibility in its audience.

Or how about other sayings such as "rich people don't deserve what they get"? This coming from a bunch of daddy-mooching coastal-originating liberals who have a heartbreak when they cannot find the proper pair of shoes or iPod cover at the mall? Its hypocrisy at its finest. They derride capitalism, and thus freedom, in the classroom, yet they propagate the system they claim to hate at the mall. And they call that nonconformity?

Being a liberal or a Democrat or a progressive is not being a nonconformist and these people are not "sitcking it the man." They are merely reinforcing over two-thousand years of religious and political-philosopher soaked rhetoric that each person owes something to everyone else. What these young leftists really owe is a promise to themselves. If they want to advance society and to achieve progress, then they're going to have to give up their Gandhian habits of nonviolence, their Marxist economic beliefs, and their Barack Obama bumperstickers and step into reality.

At this day in age, if you want to be a rebel, you better sniff that gasoline-scented air at the next Shell station and get high on what drives society and advancement: the rebellious nature and individualist mind of a capitalist.

The Clinton portrait

2007-02-17T15:45:00.000-07:00

As if the weird weather was not enough to keep national news agencies focused on Colorado, this ridiculous story has given them more reason to make our state appear weird and awkward.

If the federal government is really so desperate to come and take its portrait of former President William J. Clinton back, which has apparently become Colorado's Mona Lisa, then perhaps they should come into the state capitol with some federal marshals and a couple of FBI agents. It would make great publicity and besides, it would make the Democrats look like the big bunch of club-box losers that they really are.

Sadly, Republicans, including my own Rep. Doug Lamborn (R-Colorado Springs) have chimed in on the matter too, making the entire state assembly look like a bunch of Clinton-worshipping morons. Though Lamborn's intentions are likely to keep media coverage away from the appalling socialist legislation the Democrat-controlled legislature keeps passing, by merely speaking, he makes the situation even worse.

Does Colorado really need a Clinton portrait? Hell, if it were up to me, I'd offer to pay for the shipping to Little Rock and leave a note for Clinton to pick up the horse he rode in on too.

A rose by any other...

2007-02-16T14:40:00.000-07:00

Modern liberals, tired of having their political-ideological names disparaged as dirty words throughout conservative and other media, have taken to a new strategy: reinventing themselves as “progressives.”

The term progressive derives itself from its own etymological root: progress. In turn, the word progress comes from the Latin progressus, which means to advance or to go forward. Americans often use this word, progress, to describe our advancement in a particular activity, such as making progress on a project.

However, in the late 19^th century, groups of certain political philosophies, particularly those in favor of changing and innovating politics along with the recent mass industrialization, began calling themselves progressives to distinguish themselves from the conservative ideologies predominant in America at the time.

During the late 1800s and early 20^th century, a progressive was merely someone who advocated gradual, or progressive, social change in favor of workers’ rights, social justice, and particularly, the issue at the time: curtailing monopolies. Soon the political movement caught on and parties with progressive platforms began to appear, mostly advocating an end to monopoly and corporate corruption.

At this day in age, calling an end to monopoly is very much a popular idea. It has been engraved into the tablets of political platforms everywhere, manifesting itself most recently with Microsoft and Wal-Mart. Indeed, to even support these corporations is to commit political suicide, and most people who do find themselves in a small minority surrounded by members of the anti-corporate lynch mob. Money, they decry, is evil and those who create wealth, the producers, are even worse for holding it for their own selfish ends, such as a nice home or car.

But obviously, being a progressive is no longer about curtailing monopolies, as pointed out above, now very much a mainstream idea. To call oneself a progressive in the 21^st century implies to things: first, that person probably supports public policy initiatives somewhere along to the left of Hillary Clinton (think Nancy Pelosi and Barbara Boxer), and second, that person is a proud wearer of a blue badge of courage running deep into the heart of social justice.

But what really is a progressive?

Shakespeare so famously quoted in his play Romeo and Juilet that, “a rose by any other name is just as sweet.” Modern liberals, tormented by alleged right-wing lies about their hypocrisy and dirty politics, are hiding themselves behind their new badge, that of progressivism. However, both liberal and progressive are exactly the worst misnomers one could possibly use to either describe, praise, or even insult left-wing political ideologies.

Liberal comes from the word liberty, and one who is liberal is said to exercise liberty. It was a popular label during the American Revolution to call oneself a liberal. It meant you were a supporter of capitalism, freedom, and republican and democratic institutions.

As pointed out above, progressivism implies progress, and liberalism implies liberty. So how is it that people across American society, and even the world, continue to call themselves and be called by others names that better describe proponents of free markets and individual rights?

Progress is about innovation and change. Any member of any left-wing ideology is not about progress and change; they only believe they are. They conjure up fictitious views a utopia (a word that in and of itself means no place, meaning non-existent) built on the same sorts of political lies that were propagated shortly before the rise of the Soviet Union. In fact, to control people through legislation and coercion is very opposite of progress. It is a return to the primitive to feudalism and socialism, to ideas that seek to rule people’s lives by threatening men with the only thing humans in all societies value: death. Is death a progressive idea? Can the human race survive and progress if will kill everyone?

Liberalism is about granting liberty. Economic liberalism, as preached by Adam Smith in The Wealth of Nations, is about free markets. And social liberalism is about allowing people to make decisions for themselves, regardless of specific morals that may become all too adulterated and abused. There is no way to guarantee liberty for anyone if a nation cannot guarantee it for itself, and the modern, so-called liberals want to do exactly the opposite, whether it be for environmental policies, educational policies, or even morally-imposing policies.

If society is to advance, or progress, to the point of guaranteeing life and liberty for all, as so eloquently stated in the Declaration of Independence, then Americans and especially left-wingers must stop inscribing the name progressive across American media. Ideas of feudalistic and socialistic mentalities do not build the foundations of a free society, ideas of freedom do.

Valentine's Day: Let's sacrifice the bulls

2007-02-14T19:26:00.000-07:00

According to a short featurette by the History Channel on the history of Valentine's Day, the holiday was officially canonized in the early Christian church by a pope, hoping to get a handle on a pagan festival that originally occupied the day's spot.

In Rome, festivals called Lupercalia honoring fertility and health took place. During the debauchery, a priest would sacrifice an animal (likely a bull) and then its hide would be skinned and cut into strips. The still bloody strips would then be used to slap women on the back as a way of guaranteeing fertility.

A Wikipedia article backs up the story:

Lupercalia [February 15], of which many write that it was anciently celebrated by shepherds, and has also some connection with the Arcadian Lycaea. At this time many of the noble youths and of the magistrates run up and down through the city naked, for sport and laughter striking those they meet with shaggy thongs. And many women of rank also purposely get in their way, and like children at school present their hands to be struck, believing that the pregnant will thus be helped in
delivery, and the barren to pregnancy.

(It should be noted that the holiday, according to many historians was actually February 14.) Of course, when the Church found out about this, they were sickened, and to discourage new believers from participating in the festival, Pope Gelasius I abolished the holiday in 496, and then deemed it St. Valentine's Day.

Of course, no one actually really knows who St. Valentine was, though the Church is sure he existed as either (1) a priest in Rome, (2) a priest in Interamna, or (3) a martyr in the Roman province of Africa. Is it not interesting how forgetful a religion becomes of its holy men when they do not actually matter?

Either way, let it be known that to this day, we exchange over one billion valentines and waste millions of dollars in chocolates, flowers, dinners that never amount to anything, and time all for a man who allegedly existed, but the Church is not sure where or why.

Problem: energy crisis, solution: statism

2007-02-14T18:58:00.000-07:00

For five long decades, environmentalists and other green-thinking citizens have swarmed the steps of Congress and the halls of their local legislatures and city council chambers, demanding their elected representatives do something about the alleged on-going energy crisis. But until recently, there requests were ignored. In fact, it took a terrorist attack and a war for legislatures to finally come to the reality that nothing, even energy, is guaranteed, and nothing lasts forever.

In 2004, thanks to a ridiculous referendum approved by an ignorant Colorado populous, which requires energy companies to produce at least ten percent of their energy through renewable resources by 2010, the green-loving and tree-hugging citizens got their wish.

And now, three years later, a Democrat-controlled legislature intends to up the ante to 20 percent by 2020, in hopes that ultimately, what is good for the environment is good for us all.

Incompliant energy companies will no doubt be heavily fined and expected to make amends to Coloradoans everywhere.

Environmental actions groups probably see this as a victory: finally, those evil energy companies and their greedy, money-obssessed executives are paying the price for years of hatred of the human race. After all, burning oil destroys the environment, causes greenhouse gases, which in turn cause global warming and will be the end of life as we know it. Science says so.

At least, that is exactly what these "progressive-minded" citizens want you to believe.

What they fail to realize is that elected bodies and popular elections cannot determine the will and future of corporations or any one body. Those groups are what they are: government bodies designed to execute laws in a democratic (and even republican) form of society, acting as nothing more than tyrants. They are tyrannies of both the majority and the minority, and their legislation more often than not trumples on the very rights of men everywhere to exercsie their individual liberty and to execute themselves properly in a free market.

Even if renewable energy is a desirable trait for a growing population, especially a landlocked (albeit, resource rich) state such as Colorado, it should not be forced into the hands of producers to be spoonfed into the mouths of consumers.

Any state that imposes its will forcifully onto any corporation or any citizen without reason and without proper conduct (i.e. respect for the rights of man), is a tyrant and is no less guilty of the same sort of statism that has cost the lives of men and women across the world. Shame on them and shame on those who support such a disgusting cause.

CU President will resign

2007-01-18T20:16:00.000-07:00

University of Colorado President Hank Brown officially tendered his resignation as of today.

He says he will remain on staff until Februrary 1, 2008, keeping his promise to the Board of Regents to give at least one year's notice.

However, from all the mail in my inbox surrounding the event, and with several statements issued by Chancellor Bud Peterson as well as Governor Bill Ritter, there was no explanation given as to why the president is resigning.

Essentially, the text of the president's resignation statement read something like a public relations document for a research university, which is no doubt, exactly what it was. Aside from the paragraph-long diatribes about the wonderful state of the university (apparently, attendance and quality is higher than ever), the letter said nothing of importance.

One can only speculate as to why after only a year, President Brown would be so anxious to climb out of a secure, $400,000/year salaried position at a world-class university.

Brown may be stepping down to run for the coveted Colorado senate seat, from which its current occupant, Wayne Allard (R) announced this week he would retire. Brown previously held the same seat between 1991 and 1997.

Other possibilities include, of course, family issues or health problems.

However, it may just be that Brown, coming in as a powerful former Republican senator, finally realized that CU and the surrounding territory simply has no hope. Many non-socialist students accepted that two years after they arrived at Boulder. Perhaps Brown's epiphany simply came quite a bit sooner.

North Korea: a problem of commitment

2006-10-25T11:32:00.000-06:00

Author's note: I wrote this editorial for the local paper over two weeks ago, however, I'm beginning to think it is more and more relevant the more the Bush administration does nothing.

The alleged North Korean nuclear missile test has left the world dumbfounded. Captialist countries find themselves at odds once again with another communist nuclear power. Officials across the United States have become increasingly concerned with national security, and as usual, Senate Democrats are using the opportunity to lambaste President Bush for a failure to properly handle the renegade nation.

John Kerry topped the list of those fed up with neoconservative foreign policy and said “Weapons of mass destruction pointed at our allies and strategic partners represents a shocking failure of President Bush’s security policy and a threat to the interests of peace and stability in the world.”

Once again, Kerry is trying to save the day by pointing out the obvious: the North Korean nuclear test is a violation of international stability. He went on to criticize the administration’s reluctance to do anything in the past few weeks, citing instead concentration on the stalemate war in Iraq. The 2004 presidential hopeful failed to point out any solution for the process, citing only “diplomacy.”

What Kerry and his Democratic colleagues fail to understand is that the test is part of diplomacy. Surely, a man heralding from the state of Cuban missile crisis ex-President Kennedy could understand that.

North Korea is more than likely not preparing for a war it knows it would lose. Rather, it is merely testing the United States’ bargaining power and its willingness to commit, acting like nothing more than the antagonistic child on a playground of anarchy, screaming “look at me, look at me.”

The Bush administration’s answer was to denounce the tests as “unacceptable.” While lacking any semblance of testicular fortitude or military threat, what the Bush administration did establish was a reservation point, allowing North Korea to understand exactly where the U.S. stands on the issue. The point was joined by virtually the entire international community, including North Korean ally China as well as a Putin-led virtual-staist Russia.

But did the administration make the right decision?

The first option would have been to simply ignore the tests, much like one would a schoolyard bully. However, like a third-grade playground, this would have appeared weak in the international community and made President Bush look even worse than his apparent failures at diplomacy in the Middle East.

The second choice was to impose military action. This would obviously involve the most cost and casualties, and similarly to the war in Iraq, likely, Kerry and his liberal colleagues would have dismissed military action as unnecessary. But moreover than worry about political opinion, Bush would be faced with a near impossible task of eliminating a tyrant with eliminating his country.

So Bush, like almost all other international leaders before him, including former President Bill Clinton, took the high route, option number three and condemned the tests.

The real question is what will happen now?

The international community, the United Nations, and especially the United States await a response. While no back down appears in sight yet, more and more nations, including Korean neighbors, Japan and the Philippines, are criticizing the tests. But will North Korea succumb to international pressure?

Kim Jong Il will have to confront the protests soon. And likely, he will remain adamant in his position, refusing to move. Why? Because the United Nations and the United States have not demonstrated any willingness to punish the state or to commit to its position of a non-nuclear North Korea.

What will need to happen in order to prove the United States position is some sort of military mobilization. We need not attack yet, but without a even a presence in the area (aside from South Korean air bases), the United States is like the parent who will not commit to disciplining his bully son.

Let our president take a lesson from history and from childhood. Dictatorships do not move without a foreseeable threat. Schoolyard bullies do not end their tyrannical reign just because the playground monitor scolded him. President Bush must make the right decision: show a mobilization of force or be willing to pay dearly, even with civilian American lives. Unfortunately for America, this could mean another war.

The tyranny of the initiatives

2006-10-25T11:30:00.000-06:00

With statewide elections less than two weeks away, thousands of Coloradoans are scrambling to achieve the impossible: make a decision about who and what to vote for. While it is likely that most citizens will vote along partisan lines for candidates, several questions remain about the absurd number of “citizen initiatives.”

Disguising themselves as referendums, propositions, and amendments, these ballot measures are nothing more than attempts to circumvent an entire political process and place key issues before the hands of the uninformed masses. It does not matter what the issue is, gay marriage and civil unions, adding fluorine to water, legalizing marijuana or making ridiculous and unscientific environmental requirements, each one is based on the same premise: that citizens are actually intelligent.

James Madison, in Federalist Paper No. 63, wrote: “As the cool and deliberate sense of the community ought, in all governments, and actually will, in all free governments, ultimately prevail over the views of its rulers; so there are particular moments in public affairs when the people, stimulated by some irregular passion, or some illicit advantage, or misled by the artful misrepresentations of interested men, may call for measures which they themselves will afterwards be the most ready to lament and condemn.”

It’s modern translation is better reflected nowhere than a once-popular bumper sticker and t-shirt design that read: “Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.”

The citizens of this state and this nation forget that this nation was founded upon a republican, not democratic principle, for this very reason. A majority can take away a man’s rights and freedom as easily as any tyrant, and often, the former breeds the latter.

Athenian democracy, often praised by scholars for its power and longevity, was criticized heavily by ancient authors for giving power to the irrational and uneducated. The result ended in an unequal, slavery-ridden regime, one that ultimately resulted in imperialistic Athenian aims to conquer inferior nations. Some historians even argue that the failure of “people power” in Athens was a root cause of the Peloponnesian War.

Antebellum America was stricken by its own problems with democracy, most notably the institution of slavery, manifesting itself with the people in the doctrine of popular sovereignty, or the idea that western territories would put up the issue of slavery for vote by the people.

Time and time again in modern politics, men’s rights are violated because of a majority vote, a vote in the name of democracy. Smokers are denied of their right to a public existence, their very life. Businessmen are denied their rights to liberty. Students, including on this very campus, are denied their right to freedom of association. And why? In the name of democracy.

Alexis DeTocqueville once warned us of this very problem, an idea he conceptualized in his book Democracy in America. He warned Americans of the tyranny of the majority, writing, “If it be admitted that a man possessing absolute power may misuse that power by wronging his adversaries, why should not a majority be liable to the same reproach? Men do not change their characters by uniting with one another; nor does their patience in the presence of obstacles increase with their strength.”

The French author was all too correct, his warnings proving all the more true, especially with the upcoming state elections.

In less than two weeks, men and women in over 64 counties will be asked to make a series of decisions, each one of those decisions predicated on the idea that all men are equally informed, equally intelligent, and equally capable of making choices that will affect the lives of over 4.3 million people.

The question to be asked this election season is not whether or not Referendum I is fair and equal, or whether or not Amendment 2B is a good idea, or even whether or not marijuana should be decriminalized. Rather, the real issue, that one may predict will only get worse, is whether or not these citizen initiatives are morally right. Should the strength of a group of men destroy the rights of the individual? Should the so-called wonderful idea of democracy destroy the liberty of our fellow men? The answer is a resounding no.

REPORT: College students tortured

2006-09-19T16:45:00.000-06:00

Using the international standards for torture as proposed by a report on the interrogation techniques of CIA operatives, it has now been determined that, indeed, college students suffer from these same activities:

"...induced hypothermia; forcing suspects to stand for prolonged periods; sleep deprivation; a technique called "the attention grab" where a suspect's shirt is forcefully seized; the "attention slap" or open hand slapping that hurts but does not lead to physical damage; the "belly slap"; and sound and light manipulation."

In fact, in any given exam week, it was found that as many as four of these techniques were used through such malicious tactics as having study (sleep deprivation), standing for long periods (walking around campus to get to classes and having to work a double shift at the coffeeshop to pay tuition), drunk pranks during parties ("the attention grab"), and last but not least, having to wake up early (sound and light manipulation).

Let it be known, that such attrocities should not be accepted anywhere, from Guantanamo to Harvard. This is not American and no American student or prisoner should be subjected to the harsh treatment.