The Brian Factor

We're moving!

2010-02-01T21:07:00.003-06:00

It's a fact.

The Brian Factor is moving to greater and better things. I've abandoned this blog for such a long time that now I think it's just time to end it.

So, what's the replacement? Something better, for sure.

JibeNow is a project I've been working on with Paul Hastings. It uses the power of many open source technologies to bring an exceptional blogging framework around a strong community.

Today JibeNow goes live. So, go check it out at JibeNow.com or find my new blog at JibeNow.com/BrianFactor.

So, why use JN? For me...

Great community. Something we're still working on, but I'm at least there, right? And hopefully you will soon, right?
Strong Software. JN is based on WordPress MU, and Buddy Press. Hey, if it's good enough for Harvard, it's good enough for me.
Open and Free. It's easy to get free stuff online these days, but I like the open philosophy of JN and it's WordPress roots.

Do you want to join? JibeNow is available by Invite, so let me know if you want to get one!

Obama is going to destroy this country... yeah right.

2009-10-11T21:43:00.006-05:00

It's more likely that he will cause flies to illegally emigrate to Mexico. Obama is a fly terrorist.

So, apparently Obama won the Nobel peace prize. You know what I have to say about that?

(Warning: there are a couple cuss words in this piece, but nothing too vulgar. All together, I think it's good fun.)

A week of Christian Music Videos - finalists

2009-07-26T09:00:00.005-05:00

Alright. Well, it's been a good, busy week. So now I'm posting our top two finalist music Videos, what I consider to be the best.

In second place...

You noticed just how diverse the songs were this week. Well, the next song is a country western with a cool story a very nice twist at the end that pushes your focus upward.

"I Love You This Much" by Jimmy Wayne. (available at Dailymotion and YouTube)

Jimmy Wayne - I Love You This Much
by UniversalMusicGroup

Very nice twist, hu? Well, You haven't seen anything yet. In my opinion, the best music video of all time is...

"Praying for you" by Lecrae.

With both of these videos, make sure that you stay tuned till' the end. It'll twist your head in a different direction. Hope you've enjoyed this week. That's all, folks.

This Week's Music Videos:
# 1 - "Praying for you" by Lecrae.
# 2 - "I Love You This Much" by Jimmy Wayne.
# 3 - "Always" by Building 429.
# 4 - "While I'm Waiting" by John Waller and "The Motions" by Matthew West.
# 5 - "Give Me Your Eyes" by Brandon Heath.
# 6 - "Send Me" by Lecrae.
# 7 - "So Long Self" by Mercy Me.

Music Video # 3

2009-07-24T11:32:00.005-05:00

Greetings. A happy Friday to you! And It's time for Music Video number 3. Time for you know what. Another great Christian Music video.

Better get some Kleenex. Coming up the very touching "Always" by Building 429. This song is a very simple reminder that God will be there for you always. Very touching:

"I believe always, always
our savior never fails.
Even when all hope is gone,
God knows our pain,
and His promise remains.
He will be with you
ALWAYS."

John 10:28 (NASB)

"and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand."

This Week's Music Videos:
# 3 - "Always" by Building 429.
# 4 - "While I'm Waiting" by John Waller and "The Motions" by Matthew West.
# 5 - "Give Me Your Eyes" by Brandon Heath.
# 6 - "Send Me" by Lecrae.
# 7 - "So Long Self" by Mercy Me.

Music Videos #4

2009-07-23T10:22:00.004-05:00

We have a tie! Number four is between two excellent videos from great men of God, using their talents to His glory, even through adversity.

"While I'm Waiting" by John Waller. (As featured in Fireproof)

"The Motions" by Matthew West.

Both of these are great songs that use video to re-enforce their message. We have several coming that that I believe are even able to top these moving songs, simply by using this medium to not just re-enforce, but to add another dimension. If you would like more, make it easy on yourself and subscribe to my RSS Feed.

This Week's Music Videos:
# 4 - "While I'm Waiting" by John Waller. and "The Motions" by Matthew West.
# 5 - "Give Me Your Eyes" by Brandon Heath.
# 6 - "Send Me" by Lecrae.
# 7 - "So Long Self" by Mercy Me.

Music Video # 5

2009-07-22T18:36:00.004-05:00

One more amazing, inspiring, God-honoring video coming your way. Featuring great music from Christian Artists...

Today's special comes from a man who took home some brass from the GMA Dove awards, including best Male Vocalists and top Pop song. Here is the Gospel Music Association's song of the year; a song challenges my perspective on the world every time I listen to it: "Give Me Your Eyes," by Brandon Heath*.

This song is excellent. The music video is cool, but doesn't add another dimension to the song, unfortunately. There are four more, in my opinion, better, videos coming, so stay tuned. Even better! Subscribe to my feed. Thanks again.

"Give me your eyes for just one second.
Give me your eyes so I can see
everything that I keep missing.
Give me your love for humanity."

This Week's Music Videos:
# 5 - "Give Me Your Eyes" by Brandon Heath.
# 6 - "Send Me" by Lecrae.
# 7 - "So Long Self" by Mercy Me.

*Note: this is the YouTube video from Reunion Record's own channel. For some reason, they've disabled embedding this video. I don't understand this. They don't get any more money or respect. If anything, it DECREASES the song's views. Sad. The embedded video came from Tangle, as you can tell.

Music Video # 6

2009-07-21T15:12:00.004-05:00

The last video was pretty much non-controversial. And I often like a video that's just fun, relaxing, but sometimes you need to get a wake up call.

This next video is hard Christian Rap. Usually this stuff is too hard for my taste, but this message deserves a very hard medium, and it's grown on me. Number 6 is "Send Me" by Lecrae.

Warning: This Video is graphic. It is not the official music video for this song, but still an amazing song. I hope it challenges you like it challenged me. Do not watch it if you want to stay comfortable.

"I know this is a graphic view.
I pray that it's attackin' you.
Trackin' you to act
and do what you see in the back of Luke."

"The Great Commission says make disciples of all nations.
Have we even made them in our own nation?
Come on, Christians. Missions exits because worship doesn't.
People don't worship the God that Made them.
We're Ambassidors. Let's go!"

Lecrae and co. are on a tour called "Don't Waste Your Life." Their OFFICIAL music video by that name is available on Youtube. It's definitely a great watch. Please, DON'T WASTE YOUR LIFE on your Self. Give it to Christ.

This Week's Music Videos:
# 6 - "Send Me" by Lecrae.
# 7 - "So Long Self" by Mercy Me.

Music Video # 7

2009-07-20T22:43:00.005-05:00

Yes, today is Monday and I am posting (albeit rather late, but still...) my number 7 Christian Music Video.

This is a catchy song that just proves that you can have fun while giving the world a strong God-centered message. Drum roll please...

It's MercyMe's "So Long Self."

I just love this song and the great message it has about saying "so long" to self and just following Jesus. The video is also very entertaining. Hope You enjoy.

So long Self,
well It's been fun,
but I have found somebody else.
So long Self,
there's just no room for two,
so you are gonna have to move.
So long Self,
Don't take this wrong,
but you are wrong for me.
Farewell. Oh well.
Goodbye. Don't cry.
Oh, so long Self.

So long Self... hello Jesus!

The Federal Reservations

2009-07-18T08:47:00.006-05:00

What is the federal reserve? Honestly, most people don't really know. Most have only heard the name, if even that. Why does such a secretive institution get so much power? I'll post some good music videos soon, but I must now address this important issue:

This is why Ron Paul is presenting a bill to audit the Fed. The only major reason why we shouldn't get more info on them is, according to the Federal Reserve's own representatives, is because it would undermine their "Independence." Proponents of the bill have said that in this case "Independence" is nothing more than a codeword for secrecy.

So let's clarify: There's a difference between wanting information and wanting to make decisions. If the bill was that the Fed's decisions were subject to congress' approval, that would undermine their independence, but that's not what we're talking about.

The bottom line on this bill: Why not? It's not going to undermine your independence to just tell us what you're doing.

In a greater context: Milton Friedman, recipient of the prestigious Nobel Prize in Economics for his work on monetary policy:
"I've always been in favor of replacing the Fed with a computer." (Jim Powell. FDR's Folly. New York: Three Rivers Press, 2003. p 272.)

So, after analyzing centuries of the Fed's work, Friedman concluded that a computer could have done a better job. Pretty tough stuff. I agree.

A week of Christian Music Videos.

2009-07-17T12:02:00.003-05:00

Lots of cool stuff is goin' on. Namely, I'm headed to the University of Texas to study Computer Engineering and Google is going to kill Micro$oft Windoze. But I gave up on trying to write something cool about them. I'm just going to post a week's worth of favorite music videos. But this isn't the start of the week, so you'll just have to wait 'till Monday. In the mean time, please subscribe. It costs nothing to just have me in your reader, and you may end up with some REALLY AWESOME Christian Music videos.

Since I simply can't post a meaningless post, please listen to this video. It is well worth your time to get to the end.

I Got Off George Street

2009-05-28T13:08:00.002-05:00

Logo from Desktop Nexus.

I don't know that I have that many Linux/Ubuntu enthusiasts checking this blog, but I really believe that the Ubuntu Pocket Guide is nonetheless worth mentioning. Excellent resource. Check it out. It's available as a PDF or in Google Books.

Debate: 1AC

2009-03-18T16:59:00.007-05:00

Hello everyone,

The big reason this blog has been incredibly... boring is because I've been too occupied with speech and debate to post here. Sorry. So I decided to post my 1AC so everyone could see what's going on.

Note to everyone who is competing in NCFCA and still reading: Yes, this is the complete case flow for Maisano/Morgan from Texas (R4). If you continue to read it, I'm going to make a simple request. I understand that I can't enforce this, but I'm trusting in your conscience. :-) So, if you read this, please post your feedback. You are welcome to use the evidence we've dug up here, but the same principle applies. Post your evidence against it.

So, in a word, if you are going to use this, please return the favor and post any information you may have that will help us improve. Everyone hates free-riders, right?

As a side note, you can check out my marvelous partner's blog at: Toni's Thoughts.

1. Definitions
2. Goal: Long-term Responsibility
3. Status Quo
4. Impacts
5. Plan
6. Advantages
1. a) Math: Exponential Savings
2. b) Moral: Responsible Policy

Americans are among the most generous people in the world. That policy should not change. But the United States federal government should significantly change its policy toward India, because our current irresponsible foreign aid policy endangers our future.

Today we will examine the long term consequences of the government's policy of shipping foreign aid to India. But first we need to make sure we're on the same page by providing a couple definitions in:

1. Definitions

Sources and further definitions are available upon request. Here are a couple to get us started:

United States-"country North America bordering on Atlantic, Pacific, & Arctic oceans; a federal republic"

~~("United States of America." Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary. 2008. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/United States of America )~~

Significantly-"Having or likely to have a major effect; important"

(American Heritage Dictionary, http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/significantly)

Change-"to undergo a modification of "

~~(Merriam-Webster Online Dict. 2008, www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/change~~)

Policy-As foreign policy consists of 'decisions and actions which involve to some appreciable extent relations between one state and others', it can be defined as 'the actions of a state toward the external environment and the conditions under which these actions formulated'.

(Prof. Mustafa Aydın (professor of International Relations at the Faculty of Political Science, Ankara University, Turkey; as well as at the National Security Academy, Ankara, Turkey; was Research Fellow at the Center for Political Studies, Univ. of Michigan, Ann Arbor) 2006, "Turkish Foreign Policy at the End of the Cold War; Roots and Dynamics", Turkish Yearbook of International Relations, www.politics.ankara.edu.tr/dosyalar/MMTY/36 /1_mustafa_aydin.pdf)

Toward-"With regard to; in relation to"

~~(American Heritage Dictionary, http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/toward)~~

India-"A country of southern Asia covering most of the Indian subcontinent."

~~(The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/India~~)

Foreign Aid-"assistance (as economic aid) provided by one nation to another"

~~(Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/foreign%20aid)~~

In this case, we will be focusing on one goal. That's the second point we want to make:

2. Goal: Long-term Responsibility

So, in this round, we would encourage you to look at our policy on foreign aid and see if it is truly responsible, and if our plan can provide long-term benefits. But before we can look at the long term results, we need to see the current system's trajectory in:

3. Status Quo

Our argument here is that our policy of shipping foreign aid to India is simply irresponsible. There are three points to be made about foreign aid to India: We're spending money we don't have on a program that hasn't worked when there are perfectly valid alternatives out there.

a) Debt

This case specifically addressed economic aid, both in cash and in kind. According to the most recent report from the Congressional Research Service, we are sending India $74.1 Million annually.

Thomas Lum (Specialist in Asian Affairs Foreign Affairs, Defense, and Trade Division). "U.S. Foreign Aid to East and South Asia: Selected Recipients." October 8, 2008. Congressional Research Service, RL31362. http://opencrs.com/document/RL31362

Interestingly enough, the Department of the treasury reported that while giving India this money, we also owed them about $16.2 Billion in Treasury Securities.

~~United States. Department of the Treasury. Federal Reserve Board. "Major Foreign Holders of Treasury Securities." January 16, 2009. http://www.treas.gov/tic/mfh.txt~~

In other words, we're donating to our creditor. Our children are the ones who will have to pay for it This is anything but a responsible policy, especially when you consider that foreign aid has not produced long term results.

b) Ineffective

After pouring money into India and other countries since the end of World War II, we have quite a bit of evidence on it's long-term consequences. For example a study in the:

Cristina Arellano (Ph.D., Assistant Professor, University of Minnesota), Aleš Bulíř (PhD. M.Sc., Associate Professor, Prague University of Economics), Timothy Lane (Ph.D., M.P.H., Assistant Professor, University of California, San Francisco), Leslie Lipschitz (Ph.D., Director of the International Monetary Fund Institute). "The dynamic implications of foreign aid and its variability." Journal of Development Economics 88 (2009) 87–102. http://www.econ.umn.edu/~arellano/aidpaper.pdf

"The paper examines the effects of aid and its volatility on consumption, investment, and the structure of production in the context of an intertemporal two-sector general equilibrium model, calibrated using data for aid-dependent countries in Africa. A permanent flow of aid mainly finances consumption rather than investment—consistent with the historical failure of aid inflows to translate into sustained growth. Large aid flows are associated with higher real exchange rates and smaller tradable sectors because aid is a substitute for tradable consumption. Aid volatility results in substantial welfare losses, providing a motivation for recent discussions of aid architecture stressing the need for greater predictability of aid. These results are also consistent with evidence from cross-country regressions of manufactured exports, presented later in the paper."

Consumption, not investment. In other words, short term gratification, not long term responsibility. What about India specifically? Well, according to:

The Financial Times.
January 23 2008.
"Western donors wrestle with the contradictions of rising India." By Jo Johnson (B.A., M.B.A., Financial Times’ South Asia bureau chief). http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/3470229c-c9db-11dc-b5dc-000077b07658.html

"India does little to solicit aid and, sometimes, much to deter it. Ahead of Mr Brown's visit, Rahul Gandhi, a senior Congress party politician, hinted at the extent of corruption, claiming that only 5 per cent of development funds reached their intended recipients, down from 15 per cent when his father was prime minister.
His warning coincided with the release by the World Bank of a report that found "systemic fraud and corruption" in a flagship health programme and "suggested that other projects had been similarly compromised". The bank in the year to June 2007 provided $3.7bn in new loans to India, its largest borrower."

Even officials in the Indian government admit that foreign aid is being lost in a quagmire of corruption. So your 74 Million becomes 3.7 Million. With such a low rate of return, one must ask: Was it really need in the first place?

c) Irrelevant

As Indian economist Joydeep Mukerji said in response to that story in the Financial Times.

Joydeep Mukherji. (B.A., M.A. in economics, former economic consultant to the Asian Development Bank, works with credit ratings in Asia and the Western Hemisphere)."India’s aid donors reluctant to admit their irrelevance." Financial Times Letters, January 30 2008. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/0a0d5afc-ced5-11dc-877a-000077b07658.html

"Sir, Your article “Western donors wrestle with the contradictions of rising India” (January 24) implies that there is a contradiction between a booming India and the reality of mass poverty. The real contradiction is between aid donors who failed and their reluctance to acknowledge their irrelevance in an India that has finally learnt how to grow rapidly and reduce its massive poverty."

The Federal Government's foreign program is irrelevant because organizations on both sides of the ocean are more than capable of aiding India. The Index of Global Philanthropy 2008 shows that only about 12% of all American assistance comes through the government anyway.

The Index of Global Philanthropy 2008. Darrell Delamaide, Ed. Hudson Institute, Center for Global Prosperity, 2008. p 17-20. https://www.hudson.org/files/documents/2008%20Index%20-%20Low%20Res.pdf

So, because there are valid alternatives to US governmental spending that aren't in such a financial predicament, there's no reason to continue an Unfunded, Ineffective, Irrelevant program.

So it's obviously not a responsible policy. But why is this so important? That's the fourth observation:

4. Impacts

Our policy has three impacts. They are the impact to Us, to India, and to the Future.

a) Us: Wasted Resources

We can't afford to loose 95% on any program. This kind of waste does not meet long-term responsibility.

b) India: Subsidizing Bureaucracy

"Since the second world war, India has received more foreign aid than any country in the world. The money subsidised the creation of a corrupt, parasitic bureaucracy following anti-market policies typically advocated by well-meaning donors. The economy stagnated for nearly 40 years, compared with the dynamism of east Asian countries that relied on themselves and on markets more than on foreign aid."

So our policy actually makes Indians worse off by subsiding harmful bureaucratic tendencies.

c) Future: Swindle Futurity

We are swindling our future because this program is sponsored with deficit spending, money that is thrown to future generations - with interest.

Thomas Jefferson ~~to John Taylor, 1816. Lipscomb and Bergh, ed. The Writings of Thomas Jefferson 15. Memorial Edition. Washington, D.C., 1903-04. 23. http://etext.virginia.edu/jefferson/quotations/jeff1340.htm~~

"I sincerely believe... that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity under the name of funding is but swindling futurity on a large scale."

That's exactly what this policy does. It swindles our future.

If we are financing a program that doesn't help us, doesn't help them, and doesn't help the future, that program should obviously be stopped. That's our plan. We intend to phase out this irresponsible policy of sending aid and replace it with a sound investment in:

5. Plan

Our plan is really pretty simple. Here's the specifics:

the Agency and Enforcement: of this plan is the Federal Government of the United States. There are two mandates that this agency will carry out:

Mandate 1: Phase Out. Current government non-military aid sent to the India will be phased out. ~~According to the Congressional Research service, this currently includes CSH (Child Survival and Health), DA (Development Assistance), P.L. 480 Title II Grants (In-kind food aid).~~

Mandate 2: Pay Debt. Funds freed shall be redirected to pay off Indian Securities.

Next, the Timeline: This plan will be phased in over the next two fiscal years, FY 2009 and 2010. Savings will begin in FY 2011.

Finally, we reserve the right to clarify this plan as needed.

6. Advantages

In short, we are allowing private charities to do what they do best, and establishing a solid foundation for our children's future. There are two ways this plan pays off; you could think of it as M&M: Math and Morals.

a) Math: Exponential Savings

See, the aid we finance through debt doesn't just increase at a constant rate. It is also accumulating interest, so it grows exponentially, a lot like cancer. So, starting with just $ 74.1 Million,
-In 10 years, we will not save $ 741 Million, we'll save almost a billion dollars.
-And in 20 years, we won't save $ 1.4 Billion, with interest we'll save 2.5 Billion.

The longer we save, the more we save. So now is the time to start making this long term investment. But there are other reasons to adopt this plan.

b) Moral: Responsible Policy

This is more than just a frugal policy, it is also a responsible policy.

Iqbal Z. Quadir (B.A., M.A., M.B.A., founder and director of MIT's Legatum Center for Development and Entrepreneurship, formerly taught at Harvard University, and founder of Grameenphone, the largest cellphone company in Bangladesh) "Foreign Aid and Bad Government." Wall Street Journal. January 30, 2009. http://legatum.mit.edu/content-206

"In short, America should stop pouring billions into bureaucracies to buy short-term alliances and focus its efforts on bottom-up entrepreneurship. This would increase America's popularity, alleviate poverty, and promote real democratic change in these developing countries."

The government's current policy with India is nothing short of using our children's money to pay other countries for stuff they don't do. It not a responsible policy, and it turns out that it is not a necessary policy. So I urge you to do the responsible thing and affirm the resolution.

A Chrome Finish

2009-01-06T22:59:00.006-06:00

Google Chrome is a significant browser for one main reason: Google. It's the first part of the name that gives this little bugger such a punch. Not to say that it doesn't have some very nice features. On the contrary, Google Chrome is a very nice research machine, there just aren't many new, impressive features.

So... putting aside the Google label slapped onto it, what are some important points to make about Chrome?

1) It's Only available for Windows SP 2 and Vista. :-(

2) Each tab is treated as a separate process. This is nice in that errors in one tab can easily be isolated and not effect other tabs. It's also annoying to have 15 "chrome.exe" running.
Very nice feature, but IE beat them to it. The Internet Explorer 8 beta actually used this feature before Google. So it's a nice feature, but nothing to rave about.

3) Chrome uses Safari's engine, Webkit. This means it's fast. Really fast. Nice, but the performance gains aren't that major. Opera is already smoking fast, even thought it doesn't yet have the same compatibility. One major failure in my experience was download time. It loaded pages very quickly compared to Firefox, but when it was downloading a file it was using about an eighth of the bandwidth that Firefox could have gotten. Beats me.

4) It doesn't have some very important (to me) features like RSS, extensions, etc. This will probably change, but there's no way it can compete with FF's extensibility.

I don't think it's time to switch over to Chrome, but it is a very nice browser to use as a sidekick.

So, to rap it all up: Chrome will have an appeal for newbies (rivaled only by Internet explorer) and be useful for experts and newbies alike.

If it gets you away from Internet Explorer, go ahead. But I wouldn't trash your other browsers if I was you.

Merry Christmas!

2008-12-25T13:30:00.002-06:00

I think this post is self explanitory. Need I say any more?

> < > Brian

Browser Wars!

2008-12-19T16:05:00.007-06:00

Well, I've received advice from many friends to start blogging again. I know I have almost no readers, but it still seems like quite a shame to leave this blog so empty.

So I'm starting a series: Browser Wars!

I'm a pretty hard core researcher, as some of you could probably tell. I've done a lot of work through speech and debate, and I even got a researching job. This means that I have LOTS of experience with web browsers and how to efficiently use them. I'll share some of the experiences and research on the browser powerhouses, and maybe some of those browsers that are "up and coming," not really powerhouses.

What a great time to start. Micro$oft has shown us, yet again, why you DON'T want to use Internet Explorer. According to an article from BBC news, this hack (which now has a patch, thankfully) would have allowed malicious hackers to take control of your computer and steel your passwords.

Very frightening, yet M$ doesn't think you ought to switch to a more secure browser, even temporarily:

"I cannot recommend people switch due to this one flaw," said John Curran, head of Microsoft UK's Windows group.

He added: "We're trying to get this resolved as soon as possible.

Microsoft is completely in denial when it comes to how vulnerable their browser is.

Internet Explorer is not a solid wall protecting you and your data; it's Swiss Cheese. What's sad it that still boasts an overwhelming majority of web users.

All of that blue area was vulnerable to the attack for almost a week (from about December 13, when the hack was noticed, until this patch was released).

Hopefully I can convince you to leave the majority and you'll be a safer, smarter web user. Internet Exploiter's [sic] days are numbered, so stay tuned! In the meantime, check out one of my links, Browse Happy!

Brian's Voting Guide - Nov 6

2008-10-28T22:30:00.005-05:00

Hello all,

Elections are approaching, and I'm not able to vote, so I've decided to help everyone else vote... like I would have.

Unfortunately, my debate partner voted before I had a change to straighten... I mean instruct her in sound voting procedures. :-) Oh well. For the rest of you:

1) Federal
> Vote third-party. The mainstream in both parties needs to know that if they toss the constitution out the window, we'll toss them out after it. And they'd better bring it back.

2) State elections
Several people are up for state election. I honestly don't have time to research all of them (who does?) so I'm just going with the recommendations of the Texas Home School Coalition.

3) Austin-Area
There are three pieces of voter-approved legislation on the ballot for Austin. The best resource I could dig up on these was the incredibly one-sided endorsements of the Austin Chronicle. (scroll down to the bottom) I make my own conclusions based on their rhetoric... I mean reporting.

a) Proposition 1
Yup

This amendment basically passes several measures that better insulates the city auditor from political pressures. Very important for that job.

b) Proposition 2
Nope

I do not agree with giving the Domain (or any other business for that matter) subsidies that the whole city has to pay for. BUT: once we've made the agreement, we need to honor it. The City signed a contract with the Domain, and we should hold to our word.

c) AIDS Tax Ratification
Nope

The City school system does not need more money, it needs to do better with the money it has. My Mom should know. She's spent a long time in the system as a teacher. More money is nice, but not needed. And certainly not at the expense of more property taxes.

Hopefully this quick overview will be helpful for you! If you beg to differ, are wanting more information, or just feel like saying something, leave a comment!

Independants: Unite :-\

2008-10-05T15:56:00.005-05:00

I knew it all along. The media-created duopoly is nothing more than a scandal! It turns out that most Americans want an independent to become president, but don't believe they have a chance, when they actually do. In other word: we've fooled ourselves into believing that Independents don't stand a chance. It's a self-fulfilling prophesy. If we don't give independents a chance, then they don't have one. I was very happy to find this story from perhaps the most partisan news organization on the block.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,287190,00.html

Read the above story. My question to you is if you are one of those who would like to reach past partisan pandering and embrace a candidate who truly stands for what's good in this country.

As far as I can tell, there are three major independent options:
-Alan Keyes.
-Bob Barr.
-Chuck Baldwin.

Personally, I think I agree with Barr on the most issues, think Baldwin is the best guy (albeit he has no actual governmental experience), and would just love to elect Alan Keyes and surprise the media! :-) Really, I haven't developed a favorite, and probably won't need to.

Kung Fu Pander

2008-08-29T22:41:00.007-05:00

At the end of this week, I got to watch two historic moments. No, not the new movie that came out. The acceptance speech of Barack Obama and the Vice Presidential choice of Sarah Palin. At some times, these moments made me laugh at the absurdity of the whole thing we call politics, at other times, it almost made me want to puke.

And I am going to protest. I have had enough of politics, instead of people, ruling this country. O-bomb-a's class warfare is gross. McCain's gender card is disgusting.

Historic moments; yes. Worthy of anyone's vote; no. Don't get me wrong. The first major party black nominee is a major event, as is a brilliant Republican strategy like nominating Palin as a VP.

Communist Class Warfare.

Barack Hussein Obama's speech show has has a very thorough grasp of Marxist political philosophy. All throughout his speech I heard stuff like "we shouldn't raise taxes on working people," and, somehow, rich people from Bill Gates to Bill O'Reilly are no longer considered "working."

The Communist Manifesto was in fact not a book dedicated exclusively to political philosophy. It was also dedicated to political strategy. Marx's idea for getting communism to infect a country was to get the poor people to basically become more and more jealous of the rich people. (he called it become more and more oppressed, but we all know what he meant.)

This is the time when we are going to decide whether people are human-doings or human-beings. Hopefully Obama isn't.

Hillary-ous Pandering.

Probably the most insightful thing I've heard on the elections was when I was talking to a friend at church who said something to the extent of "I don't pay attention to the campaigns; God determines who gets elected." Absolutely right. But I still think campaigns are useful for a little comic relief every now and then. For example, this:

"Senator Hillary Clinton... showed such determination and grace in her presidential campaign."
~Sarah Palin

Wow. That's hillary-ous. Besides being another example of obvious kung-fu pandering, it is laughable to hear her talking about Clinton's "grace" during the campaign.

Door Number Three.

For those of you who actually value the constitution and are disgusted by both the policy, there are other options. Third Party candidates, prior to the civil war, where an incredibly viable alternative when majoritarian views overshadowed the truth. Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln and many others were elected as "third-party" candidates in their day.

Today, we actually have some good third party choices. World Magazine provided a brief introduction to three constitutional candidates, and then Ralf Nader (who knows where to put him?). So, google these three choices:
-Chuck Baldwin
-Bob Barr
-Alan Keyes

"But wait, Brian. I can't vote for these guys. I mean, if a pervert like Obama wins the elections, what will Americans do but cry?" Let's put this into perspective. Elections are short term accomplishments. Revolutions are long term processes. I think that was Ron Paul who said that. It's absolutely right. In the long term, an Obama presidency will be just fine, but comprising for the sake of expediency will not.

What if Obama Wins?

Every Reagan has his Carter. People and pundits need a glaring example of why we didn't choose socialism in this country. If Obama is elected he will NOT be able to fix the economy. He will NOT be able to restore peace to the world. Because presidents don't rule the government - yet. In fact, his liberal ideology will only make it worse if anything.

Joesph Farah has written a book entitled None of the Above, which expreses this generally spirit. He was absolutely right when he wrote this in a recent WND column:

"It is principally because of my strong belief in the Constitution that I am urging Americans this year not to vote for either major-party candidate – because neither Barack Obama nor John McCain understand, appreciate and revere the charter that serves as the very basis for our unique form of government. ...

"It's time for resistance. It's time for rebellion. It's time for radicalism. It's time to start saying "no" to the bad choices we are being handed by the system. It's time to change from a spirit of compliance to government to a spirit of obedience to higher to God and the Constitution that limits the authority of government."

Gross National debt.

2008-08-13T20:45:00.005-05:00

I think the gross national debt is well... gross. I find it disgusting that politicians think it's ok to spend money on our problems and make our children pay for it. That is just wrong.

Some of you may have noticed that I added a Gross National Debt counter on the top of my page. I am incredibly surprise by the rate that it is growing. I literally see tens of thousands of dollars disappearing right before my eyes. The Gross National Debt is, at this second, .

So, why is borrowing so popular among the Feds? Well, first off, because it's popular among the people. We need to realize that the first problem with debt lies not with politicians, but with the public. To date, the average American has more debt than savings.

The second major reason that debt has increased is that it is probably the only major way government can create short-term economic growth. Instead of taking money from one area of the economy and giving it to another, government borrows money from the future. It's not much, but it lasts until the next election.

Now, I'm not all gloom and doom. There is a way out. There are three ways, in fact, to reduce debt and each come with their set of problems. They are to print money, to stop spending, and to start taxing.

I personally propose a three step process. This works for both individuals and governments.

STEP 1: Stop borrowing. It is NOT FAIR to make our kids pay for our mistakes. We ought to live with the consequences and not have a pity party. Ye, it's harsh; live with it.

STEP 2: Reduce spending. PEOPLE: I don't care if you're conservative, liberal, or whatever. I don't care whether it's as important as social security, babies without doctors, or terrorists running around in the sand with nukes: IF YOU CAN'T AFFORD IT THEN DON'T BUY IT! Pretty simple.

STEP 3: Pay off the debt. We ought to use surplus money, (some of which will come from taxes, yes, it's a crisis, Mr McCain.) to pay off this astronomical debt before it gets worse.

Our top priority IS NOT the state of the economy. It IS NOT national security. It IS NOT health care for everyone. It is the future. It is our children. We should stop having a pity party about how high inflation and/or taxes are, and start looking to what kind of mess we're leaving future generations. STOP THE GROSS DEBT!

Are Voting Systems Fair?

2008-07-31T15:25:00.004-05:00

I prepared this post for some debate thing and then couldn't post it, so I'm posting it here. I think this is appropriate since I passed a bill at Patriot Academy intended to directly deal with these problems. The text of this bill is coming soon.

Are Voting Systems Fair?
POSITION: CON

OPENING STATEMENT:
Voting systems in the United States are not fair because...

I don't think the issue is whether they are fair or not, the issue is whether they are just. I contend that they are not because the electronic systems that are used in elections are not 1) secure and 2) open.

TALKING POINTS:
1) Secure

There have been a lot of studies that have found major security errors in various electronic voting systems. Five of these are documented on my blog here: http://brianfactor.blogspot.com/2007/11/01001000-01100001-01101110-01110011.html

Now I could enumerate the results, credentials, etc. but the bottom line is this: a voting machine just puts out a string of 1s and 0s that we know as binary. No matter how long or complicated we make this line, it will still be duplicated at some point. Security is just about making enough checks and verifications that we know when something has gone wrong.

2) Openness

http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~daw/papers/testimony-house07.pdf

The above link is to Testimony before the House on source disclosure in voting. It was given by David Wagner, Professor of Computer Science at U.C. Berkeley. According to him:
"I am not aware of any computer security expert who suggests that we should rely upon the secrecy of the source code as a key part of our strategy for securing our elections26 ; this would violate basic principles of secure design27 ." (Wagner 7)
This is exactly what we are doing currently. We are relying on secretive corporate agendas to keep our election software safe. Bad idea.

CLOSING STATEMENT:
So, what should we do about it? I propose two policies, intended to address both of the problems I presented above.

1) Paper print-out

You would never make a major purchase without getting a receipt, would you? Of course not. Then why would you cast a ballot when there was no way to verify your vote? I believe that it must be REQUIRED that election systems have some kind of paper receipts that can be recounted.

I am not advocating just paper ballots! Paper ballots also have many problems, such as the likelihood of errors, which are addressed by electronic machines. However, if we combine electronic and paper voting, we get the best, most secure, and most open voting system possible.

2) Source disclosure.

When you buy a remote controlled car, you have every right to disassemble it and figure out how it works. As long as you don't copy the design, you aren't infringing on anyone's rights by learning about this device. For some reason, Diebold thinks that they can be held to a different standard. These industries need to realize that when they serve the PEOPLE, they must reveal to the PEOPLE what is going on.

Secrecy is not an option, so we ought to disclose how the software used in election systems actually works.

It is time that we send a message to all the government and cooperate interests involved. Elections are the PUBLIC'S business and should not be based upon secrecy. The public has a right to verify that voting systems that run our nation.

Iraq

2008-07-20T22:26:00.009-05:00

For my government class, I posted regarding the Iraq war. What I said is below.

My problem with the war is not so much the costs v. benefits, but it is that fundamental principles that are violated by the war. Our military ought to be used to enforce US treaties and defend America against those who directly attack us; not to maintain an empire.

This war "...started off as a humanitarian mission then changed into a nation-building mission and that’s where the mission went wrong. The mission was changed. And as a result, our nation paid a price, and so I don’t think our troops ought to be used for what’s called nation building. I think our troops ought to be used to fight and win war."

Guess who said that? Believe it or not, George W. Bush started his campaign as an advocate of what he called a "humble" foreign policy. What Bush said above regarding Somalia in 2000 is true about Iraq in 2008: we have changed our mission, and paid the price. No nation in history has been able to maintain an imperial foreign policy, yet America thinks she can be the exception.

I personally side with the founders when it comes to our foreign policy. As supreme court justice John Jay wrote in the federalist papers, "The JUST causes of war, for the most part, arise either from violation of treaties or from direct violence." (Federalist No. 3) I think America shouldn't go "...in search of monsters to destroy" as John Quincy Adams said.

The reasons for occupying Iraq stand in stark contrast to this philosophy. Originally, we where penalizing Hussein for violating a treaty that probably shouldn't have been there in the first place. In the end, the war turned into a nation-building fiasco.

What are we supposed to do about it now that we're in the middle of this war? Quite honestly, I'm not sure about what specific policy steps we need to take, but I'm sure that we need to get some people into Washington who actually have guts; people who are willing to vote yes if war is justified, and vote against it if not. What congress did in regard to Iraq is no less than taking a wimp vote. They gave the power to declare war to the President when the constitution clearly gives it to them (Art I, Sec 8, Cl 11). If the war had been justified in their minds, then they should have voted for it, if it wasn't, then they should have voted it down. Instead, they cast the wimp's vote so they could blame Bush for whatever happened.

The major problem I see is that no one in Washington has developed concrete principles on when we go to war and when we don't.

Random Resources on Foreign Intervention:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Expeditionary_Force_Siberia

Lies My Teacher Told Me, by James W. Loewen (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1995, p 23-24)

Federalist 69 on Declaring War: http://www.constitution.org/fed/federa69.htm

Gubernatorial race at Patriot Academy 2008

2008-07-11T12:22:00.004-05:00

This is the note that I distributed to all the participants at Patriot Academy 2008 regarding my campaign for governor.

“ If a man neglects to enforce
his rights, he cannot complain
if, after a while, the law
follow s his example.”

~Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

I am pleased to announce my candidacy for Governor at Patriot Academy 2008.

Instead of just asking you to vote for me I would like to share with you the criteria that I use to scrutinize candidates. I hope that you will find them helpful in choosing Patriot Academy's new leaders.

1 - Person of Integrity: Can I trust this person?
2 - Predictability: Is the candidate consistent enough that we know what to expect?
3 - Philosophically sound: Does this politician have the correct foundational beliefs?
4 - Practicality: Does he/she support sound policy? Are they experienced enough to be practical?

During our time together, I hope to show how I fulfill these criteria. But, for now, I will just point you to my blog, BrianFactor.BlogSpot.com. Perhaps the best way to make an informed decision would be to simply come and say, “Hi,” at Patriot Academy. I'd love to talk to you.

More updates coming soon!

The problem of semi-universal healthcare

2008-06-25T18:15:00.003-05:00

Those of you who have discussed politics with me will know that I abhor stereotypes and cannot fit myself into any label. Perhaps the best label for me is a non-label-arian. This post is about to reveal this. I have a confession: I am a semi-socialist. Don't stop reading right now! I'm also semi-libertarian! Allow me to explain.

To synthesize this philosophy, consider this statement: Axiom: Every individual can surrender his own rights, but have no right to surrender another's rights.

Do you have the right to surrender control of your health care to a private insurance company? Absolutely. Because you are only surrendering your liberty. It's called a contract. As John Locke and Thomas Hobbes theorized, every person has a right to contract others; to loose certain liberties (such as the money you pay to the insurance company) in order to gain others (ie: the peace of mind the insurance brings). Following so far?

As far as I can tell, (and as far as liberals can tell) the only difference between a government and an insurance company is the content of the contract. Hence, it's perfectly moral to use government as an insurance company.

So, when Hillary Clinton says that could all become less greedy so that others can have health insurance, she's right.

WHOA!!! Stop right there, Brian! Did you really mean that? Well, only partially. See, what Clinton is missing is that everyone has to agree to sign this new contract that she proposes. Because she is proposing that this elitist group of people call politicians and their supporters ought to enlist everyone's money to bring her vision to life, I cannot support her plan, but I support the idea.

I do agree the we ought to have universal health care. Clinton, contrary to popular belief, only wants semi-universal health care. I believe that everyone ought to get together and say: "Yeah, there are people who can't get health care, and we're all willing to contribute in order to meet this need." Hillary thinks that we ought to get as many willing victims... I mean participants... into the program as we can get, and then force everyone else to join. That is not truly universal health care, and it is downright immoral!

Agree? Disagree? Please post a response.

HOWTO...

2008-06-17T22:15:00.011-05:00

TRY LINUX OUT

www.wubi-installer.org

It's simple. Follow the directions, you should have no problems at all. Wubi is amazingly simple.

ENABLE AWESOME EFFECTS

Just to wet your pallet for some more linux awesomeness, I'll give you some more pictures of my ubuntu desktop breaking the laws of Computer Science! (or rather junk science produced by the marketing idiots at Micro$oft)

Now this assumes that you have a little bit of experience with linux. You're the kind of person who knows where the terminal is (even if you're scared of it) and knows about synaptic. Plus you have to have a good computer. What's important here is that you have 1) a fast processor (you don't have to have dual-core; but fast.); 2) a fast video card (with 3D capabilities; don't forget that.)

If you are running Ubuntu, then enabling Compiz is easy. Just go to the System -> Preferences -> Appearance. On the visual effects tab, click "extra." Now, your GUI will look pretty sweet, but you won't have the ubber-cool features readily accessible such as cube or scale (which is just a rip from OS X's "expose").

To enable the really cool stuff, you need the compiz desktop effects manager. Install "compizconfig-settings-manager". There are two ways: 1) Use synaptics, search for this package, mark it for installation, then hit apply; and 2) (the fast way) open up your terminal.

TERMINAL

Yes; the terminal. That crazy black thing that you can see (and fear) if you open Applications -> Accessories -> Terminal. The terminal is incredibly powerful because, unlike Windows, Linux is based on the terminal. Anything you can do in the GUI you can do in the terminal. Not always faster, but sometimes with much greater ease. Installing programs is one thing that can very easily be done in the terminal.

To install a program type:

sudo apt-get install <application name>

replace <application name> with the exact name of the package you want to install. In this case, type "sudo apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager." Behold it installs! Isn't that cool?
So, what does it mean? Well, "sudo" is a command meaning that you temporarily become the administrator (also called root) (That's why they ask you for a password). "apt-get" calls the synaptic program to do its stuff. Finally, "install" tells "apt-get" that you want to install, not remove or reinstall, the program that follows.

PLAYING DVDs

One thing that confounded me when I ran linux was why it could not play DVDs. I decided to look into it, but all the advise I got online did no good. In the end, I finally clicked "help" in Totem Movie Player and BAM! there was my answer that I had long labored to find!

Turns out the Ubuntu can't come with certain codex (a program used to decode information in a particular file) because of legal reasons. When playing MP3s, it was pretty obvious what I needed to install, but you have to be a little more sneaky when you get a decoder for DVDs.

Use the same installation instructions above, and install the following packages:

libdvdnav4
libdvdread3
(and I think it helps to install) libdvdread3

Presto! It should work with only one problem: Totem cannot handle menus. If you want your menus back, then Totem recommends installing the gxine player. The package is named "gxine." (yes; I am positive)

MORE TERMINAL

I'm having fun writing this, even if no one cares to read it. Well, I figure that since I've taught you to do some somewhat advanced terminal language, then I should overview the basics, as well.

To navigate around like you would in Nautilus, (that's your file manager, BTW) here's the basic lingo:

When you open your terminal, you should see this:

<username>@<your computer>:~$

"~" indicates that you are in the home director (/hoime/<username>)

But we can change that! Type

<username>@<your computer>:~$ cd Desktop

(not the whole thing, obviously, just what is diferent from what you have now.

Your view should have changed. Now your terminal should look like:

<username>@<your computer>:~$ cd Desktop
<username>@<your computer>:~/Desktop$

Ok; maybe that isn't so amazing, but it is a step in the right direction. If you're still interested in mastering the terminal, (and hereby gaining the status of geek... er... I mean genius) Here's some commands to try out:

dir = gives you a list of files and folders in the file that you are currently "parked" in. (short for "directory")
ls = gives you a colored list of files and folder in ... yeah, you know what I mean. (think of "list")
cd .. = moved you up a file (don't ask me what "cd" stands for)
cd = all by itself indicated that you wanna go home. (yeah, back to "~")
file <name> = gives you the properties of the file "name."
exit = self explanatory
Check out this: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/UsingTheTerminal

Harmless Play or Fast-Food Fulfillment?

2008-06-13T22:42:00.007-05:00

Would you believe me if I told you that children who play video games are far more likely to be obese than children who watch lots of TV? Psychiatric studies are actually showing us that TV viewing doesn't relate to obesity as expected and that video game use is far more likely to be related to an unhealthy weight status. Who would have thought? There's a lot of controversy surrounding video games and their negative effects on children. When I got involved in researching the subject, I was not expecting much of what I found.

About a year ago, Thomas Umstattd told me that he wanted me to do research on the dangers of digital gaming for his forthcoming book on the subject. Thomas, a former "hard-core" gamer, believes that a mighty army of God will rise from the computer screen "cave." An amazing vision, and I was very willing to help out.

I was personally never a hard-core gamer. A lot of that is my Parent's fault. (They, by the way, are more than willing to take credit for the fact that I didn't turn into a zombie.) Sure I played more than I should, but I usually found something more interesting and moved on. Basketball, speech and debate, or whatever. When I started to research the lives of hard-core gamers, I was really amazed by what I found. Earlier this month, I posted a research paper that addresses some of the research I uncovered. You can see it here at CGames.com. I would absolutely love to get comments from YOU.

Now you're probably wondering if I just blurted out that first question to shock you or if I actually had some support. Well, here are the studies with no guarantee that they're infallible. A researcher at the University of Texas along with her college found that "...when parental obesity is taken into account, television viewing hours do not significantly relate to increased odds of childhood overweight..." (Vandewater and Huang 2006, 425). Wow. This was not some back-woods study performed by three geeks and their puppy dog. Vandewater and Haung studied 1483 6-19 year olds. Yeah, I thought that was out of this world, but it is true.

Elizabeth Vandewater (that professor at UT) along with a research team had, two years earlier, concluded that video games ARE very different in that they ARE correlated to obesity. This study questioned 2831 one to twelve year olds! Quote:

“Results indicated that while television use was not related to children’s weight status, video game use was." (Vandewater et al. 2004, 71)

Pretty wild, hu? Want to learn more about the dangers (which include, but are not limited to, ruined health) of fast-food digital entertainment? You can visit CGames.com.

Resources: (check it out for yourself)

B. Morgan. "MMO: A Minor’s Massive Obsession." CGames.com blog, 3 June 2008. http://www.cgames.com/2008/06/mmo-a-minors-massive-obsession (My Paper!)

Elizabeth A. Vandewater, Mi-suk Shim, and Allison G. Caplovitz. “Linking obesity and activity level with children’s television and video game use.” Journal of Adolescence 27 (2004): 71–85. (accessed via science direct)

E.A. Vandewater and X. Huang. “Parental weight status as a moderator of the relationship between television viewing and childhood overweight.” Archives of Pediatric Adolescent Medicine 160.4 (April 2006): 425-31. (accessible via PubMed or the Archives: http://archpedi.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/full/160/4/425)

Over due on a post... sorry!

2008-06-01T21:47:00.012-05:00

Well, It's been well over a month since I posted on this blog. I figure that it's time I do so.

I'm thinking that I'll forget politics for a little while and maybe I'll have all my posts focus around technology. One of the reasons I haven't gotten to this blog is that I've been playing around with Linux on my computer. I've installed Ubuntu via wubi on both of my machines. If you would like to give Linux a try, I'd recommend: www.wubi-installer.org.

So I'm going to show you some screen shots of my totally awesome desktops. The whole point of this is that Linux can do just about anything. (click to enlarge)

Ubuntu Linux has some very cool effects. Especially with Compiz fusion/Beryl!

Like the Mac OS X GUI? Ubuntu can do it, too! :-P

And, yes, I can configure Ubuntu to look like Vista as well.

Democratic Scwabbling... ooops... I Mean Debating.

2008-04-16T19:26:00.010-05:00

Well, I'm going to try a little live-blogging now that I've caught the democratic debate tonight I'll just do some spontaneous writing on Democratic stupidity... I mean policy. This is going to be one of my most disorganized posts. Anyway, if you're interested, I've posted it. If not, just scroll down and read about Obama devaluing babies.

Honestly, I find this debate disgusting. Neither candidate bothers to use any evidence while talking and uses statements that are so incredibly generic that they are meaningless. Well, they have a lot of emotional meaning but no real meaning in any policy debate.

It's a political debate, not a policy debate. That's why I usually don't watch these things.

Disclaimer: the below quotes are all paraphrases.

Hillary talked about Rev. Wright, Hillary said was told on her statement that Obama should have left the church when he heard the comments. She said:

"I was asked a personal question and I gave a personal answer."
-Hillary

Wow. Really? So if it had been asked politically you would have given a different answer? That sure sounds two-faced.

"I may be a lot of things, but I'm not dumb." -Hillary

Hillary wrote a book about going to Bosnia, but she still misspoke. I think she wasn't the one that wrote the book. She paid a secretary.

MAN! They are terrible at staying on topic! ARG! Answer the stupid question... gee!

Obama: "I haven't talked about the Bosnia issue."
ABC moderator: "But your campaign has"
Obama: "Of course"

Yeow. That's terrible. Obama won't get his hands dirty slinging mud at Clinton, but his campaign staff will.

Questioner (normal voter to Obama): "Do you value the American flag? All our service men wear it, why don't you?"
Obama responds: "There's no other place where my story could happen."

Then why was your wife not proud of America until you were doing well? Why wasn't she happy when the beautiful system of capitalism allowed you to succeed? Why do you now want to supplant that system

"I wish the Republicans would just apologize for the Bush years and not run anyone."
-Hillary

Do you? I think you're scared. Why don't you democrats apologize for the Carter years? They were much worse for crying out loud!!

"Clinton actually pardoned two members of Weather Underground."
-Obama

SMACK DOWN!!

DUDE! They actually quoted the constitution in the beginning of the debate. Well, I guess it was only because they were at the Constitution Center. That is really rare. I'm happy about that, though.

On Iraq, they make some great rhetoric, but none of them lay down any principles as to when we go to war and when we don't.

"It's because the Commander in Chief sets the mission... I will listen to the commanders on the ground with respect to tactics." -Obama

Smart. I actually agree.

McCain: (he got quoted in the debate) "These tax increases go under the fine print of hope. They're going to raise your taxes and hope you don't mind!"

hahaha!!! lolol!!! SMACK DOWN!!!

Yes, they're both committing to not raising the taxes for middle class (250,000 dollar people) people. BUT, they want to raise government spending by 20 times higher than McCain.

The moderator is now making a great point!! When the capital gains tax was raised, its revenues were decreased. Obama apparently failed his economics class. When people pay less taxes, they make more money, which raises the revenue. He really needs to do his homework. So does Hillary.

"You can't take out a credit card from the Bank of China and say you're reducing taxes. I believe you pay for it as you go." -Obama

Yeah, right. Good rhetoric, but your health care plan doesn't exactly

"Bush's administration has been very good for those who were well off." -Clinton

Like you! You earned 100 Million when Bill was out of office.

"If we had stayed on the course that we were on after my husband's administration we would be on a better road." -Hillary

Well, we'd be in Iraq. Hehe.

The next segment opens with the second amendment. I hope they address it. Good time since it's the 1 year anniversary of the VaTech massacre.

"I will also work to reinstate the assault weapon ban" -Clinton

hahaha!!! You're so naive. Do you think gangstas care? Do you think they'll read your law? NO!!!

Both of them believe that there is some kind of balancing act that must be some kind of balancing act between the right to bear arms and public safety. Which is stupid. The right to defend yourself it NOT at odds with public defense. Read this great article from Shaun Connell.

"Just because you have an individual right doesn't mean that the government can't constrain that right" -Obama

Uhh... yes it does. What else would it mean? That governments can do whatever they want? That's the purpose of rights.

"What works in New York City isn't going to work in Montana." -Clinton

Listen to yourself! Did you just hear that? Why do you think there's a federal solution to almost every problem?

In order to reduce taxes, we are going to tax the oil industries, (she calls it "windfall profit tax." My foot!) or at least that what we're going to do if Hillary is elected. She failed economics, too.

Moderator: "How will you use former president George W. Bush?" Hillary: "I'll have to think about that."

"We will get back to a nation of shared prosperity." -Hillary

That's what communism is all about. Wow, you are a blatant Marxist, aren't you?

Well, that's about it. This is Brian signing off.

Stop the Obamania!

2008-04-15T16:13:00.006-05:00

He may not be a Muslim, but he is an obamination! Turns out he's also a Jedi! lol...

Enjoy!

[Edit, July 5th, 2008: turns out that this video was not legally uploaded to youtube. :-( You can view the original video here: http://videos.newsobserver.com/index.php?a=player&id=1816319]

Babies are a Punishment?

2008-04-10T22:21:00.012-05:00

I am disgusted with the state of our society and how we don't value the next generation.
A baby is not a punishment! It is a responsibility. Sure, it involves work. But it is a joy! A PRIVILEGE!!!

Either Sen. Obama really messed up, has a twisted view of family, or just slipped and told us what he really believes about children. Take a look:

"Look, I've got two daughters. 9 years old and 6 years old. I am going to teach them, first of all, about values and morals. BUT if they make a mistake, I don't want them punished with a baby."
~Barack Hussein Obama

I have to side with others and say that Mr. O-bomb-a should retract this statement. Yet this isn't all that I want. He must prove that he actually supports the fundamental right to life.

My goodness. I really want to scream at someone, :arg: but I will contain myself. Abortion is not about religion! It is not about "my personal preference!" And, for goodness sake, it is NOT a gray area! :calms down to a logical state: Allow me to enumerate why I am decidedly pro-life.

1) Life is the most fundamental right of all rights. It is afforded to any human by the natural order of things. Basically, people are naturally alive, not naturally dead. No other person has the right to change this.

2) Babies are people for crying out loud! So what distinguishes a baby that is in the womb from a baby that it out of the womb? Only three things:

a) level of dependence

b) environment

c) mental and physical development

3) Therefore, babies (even those in the womb) should be protected by the government just like any other person's life should.

4) And for those of you who are still convinced that it's a gray area. It's best not to take chances when it comes to someone's life, don't you agree?

Alright, my frustration has been vented. What do you think? Should Obama retract his statement? Go ahead a leave a comment. I'd appreciate it.

Remember you can save yourself time and headaches by subscribing to my free RSS feed.

Democratic Debate Heats Up

2008-04-01T23:17:00.004-05:00

Wow. I knew the democratic debate would heat up, but I didn't know it would heat up this much. I checked my NBC news page and found out that in the last debate, (there was one today) Obama got sooo mad that he "accidentally" spilled his water in Hillary's face. Wow...

April fools! Now you can watch a hillary-ous Saturday Night Live video:

Have a great April Fools day!

Is the GOP nominee Able... or Cain?

2008-03-31T18:47:00.007-05:00

John McCain has officially gotten the GOP nomination. In my opinion, the Grand Ol' Party just chose a not-so-grand candidate.

Yes, I know what some of you die-hard Republican "conservatives" are saying: sure, I agree with McCain on some issues. My problem is that his heart is in the wrong place. What I mean by this is that McCain not only has little to no respect for constitutional standards (my first test for any candidate), but he also seems to be coming down with "flip flop" syndrome. Must have caught it in Washington.

McCain isn't really sure weather he's a Conservative or Democrat. This video shows McCain (rightly) stating he's a liberal:

Then he corrects himself. He isn't the best speaker around. Unfortunately, his principle slip just as often as his words do.

At the last debate, McCain showed us more symptoms of flip-flop syndrome.

"HOOK: At this point, if your original proposal came to a vote on the Senate floor, would you vote for it?"

[McCain tries to shrug it off by saying it wouldn't come up. Finally, he admits:]

"But, look, we're all in agreement as to what we need to do. Everybody knows it. We can fight some more about it, about who wanted this or who wanted that. But the fact is, we all know the American people want the border secured first."

First, note that McCain now is AGAINST his own bill. He won't admit it, but he he's changed his opinion. Second, (and this is most important) did you notice his reason? It wasn't that he's changed his political philosophy about amnesty or that he's discovered new evidence. He just changed his opinion because the "people" did. John McCain has proven this over and over: he's a compromiser. So much for Straight Talk Express! More like the wet-noodle express.

McCain won't just change his opinion because the public does. He'll also comprimise for his buddies in D.C. McCain insists over and over that he is proud of his record of "reaching across the isle." That is exactly his problem! He is willing to compromise principle for politics. This is the last person we need to give the veto power.

I have to (and I can't believe the words are comin' out of me bloomin' mouth) agree with Anne Coulter. I'd be more inclined to vote for Hillary than McCain. As she says it: Straight Talk Express Takes Scenic Route to the Truth.

The guy that the media has crowned "Mr. Able" may end up being no more than a modern image of Biblical Cain; inconsistent and stabbing America in the back. McCain's voting record isn't really all that good.

McCain has what the Club for Growth calls "a heavy anti-growth undercurrent." I just love the way they put it:

"Unfortunately, this undercurrent can sweep away the good with the bad."

Consider some of these facts:

McCain voted AGAINST Bush's tax cuts. Now he insists that he did it because they didn't have reductions in spending accompanying them. Then? Well, just read:

"I cannot in good conscience support a tax cut in which so many of the benefits go to the most fortunate among us at the expense of middle-class Americans who need tax relief." (qtd: Club for Growth)

McCain, the same guy convicted in the Keating 5 scandal, (you probably won't hear about John McCain's role in the whole thing until the Dems decide it's time to slosh mud) sponsored McCain/Feingold, which took a whack at the first amendment in attempts to bring more ethics to campaign finance. He really didn't have much moral high ground there.

McCain voted for No Child Left Behind, which is responsible for increasing your taxes, reducing local control of school, and driving teachers crazy.

This had better drive you crazy. Mr. McCain, who insists he is pro-life, not only supports embryonic stem cell research, (a gray area that has almost no promise of results) he wants to use your tax dollars to pay for it!

And McCain would rather let bureaucrats run businesses in many areas.

"Much like his record on taxes, these terrible votes cast a dark shadow on Senator McCain's positive votes. ... His occasional eagerness to support and encourage increased government regulation suggests a troublesome mistrust of the free market." ~The Club for Growth

So what's the alternative? Quite honestly, I don't know. I haven't done the research into third-party options. It certainly isn't supporting Mr O-bomba and Mrs H-Bomb. When I have an idea, I'll let you know.

For now, I can only complain because everyone voted for a guy because he was "able" to win... "able" to lead... "able" to be consistent... turns out he's more Cain than Able. He's likely to flip flop and stab America in the back.

Edit: The video isn't working exactly. Sorry about that.

A little bragging here

2008-03-25T13:18:00.002-05:00

Google has finally recognized my existence. I've been waiting for this for quite some time.

Now I have a page rank!

Google explains PageRank like this:

PageRank relies on the uniquely democratic nature of the web by using its vast link structure as an indicator of an individual page's value. In essence, Google interprets a link from page A to page B as a vote, by page A, for page B. But, Google looks at considerably more than the sheer volume of votes, or links a page receives; for example, it also analyzes the page that casts the vote. Votes cast by pages that are themselves "important" weigh more heavily and help to make other pages "important." Using these and other factors, Google provides its views on pages' relative importance.

I am ranked only 2 out of 10, but, still, that's better than not existing. Maybe I'll put some advertising on now. Any thoughts? Would it be annoying if I made a couple dimes off this blog?

Anyway... thanks for reading this blog. And thanks to those of you who have linked to it. God bless.

><>Brian

Global Warming and Unecessary Force

2008-03-16T21:16:00.008-05:00

(This was originally written in February for my English Class.)

The flames engulfed twelve houses in Lewiston, California. For these residents, it was their worst nightmare coming to life: wildfire! This fire, however, was not originally wild. It had been started by well-meaning agents of the Interior Department in an attempt to eradicate a weed. In the end, John Stossel reported that the fire went out of control, destroyed many homes in the area, failed to eradicate the weed, and provided more fertilizer for the weed’s descendants.

This is an all too common example of the unintended consequences of the government’s approach to solving problems. In an article entitled “The Environmental Issue From Hell” published in 2001, Bill McKibben presents a new governmental approach to what he considers “the great moral crisis of our time”: global warming. He proposes that this problem should be made a moral issue in order to motivate political action, while failing to address the consequences of such action. McKibben states that environmental activists need to “…pressure politicians to pass laws that would cause us all to shift our habits,” without specifically enumerating what laws. McKibben’s nebulous desire to use the government may result in governmental force being used in a manor that is unnecessary at best and destructive at worst.

McKibben believes that there are three major harms caused by climate change that are indicative of a moral issue. All these examples are certainly problems, and all of them should be addressed, but not all methods of addressing them are equal. An almost universally accepted axiom is that force should never be used unless it is absolutely necessary. It is simply immoral to force a change in behavior unless there is no alternative. McKibben focuses simply on the moral problem with climate change, not on what method will actually solve the problem. This acceptance of whatever policy solves the moral problem may lead to unnecessary government force in the form of regulation, taxation, etc.

McKibben thinks it is wrong to force urban conformity on nature, but he has no problem with forcing the conservative habits of 10% of Americans on the other 90% via government action. He states that “…10 percent would be enough to change the politics around the issue… forcing the system to respond.” If only ten percent of Americans thought that it was wrong to steal, then intervention would clearly be necessary to spark change in the other ninety percent. The criterion that should be applied is whether it is absolutely necessary in the case of gasoline consumption. If there is an alternative that would not require force, it would definitely be preferable and more effective. History and the study of economics reveal a very clear alternative to government force: a “laissez-faire” free market system.

Writing in 1776, economist Adam Smith stated that the individual is often “…led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention.… By pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of the society….” This “invisible hand” is especially present in the free trade of finite resources. As scarcity increases, companies will start working for alternatives and serving the public interest, all because they want to make a profit. There are plenty of examples of the “invisible hand” providing strong incentives for individuals to change their habits and benefit society.

Economists James D. Gwartney, Ph.D., and Richard L. Stroup, Ph.D., provide several historical examples. One of which was over whaling in the nineteenth century. At that time, whale oil was the standard fuel for artificial lighting. This changed when the whale population decreased, their oil became more expensive, and kerosene soon became the alternative to environmentally destructive whale oil. Could the same happen to fossil fuels without government tampering? Writing in their book What Everyone Should Know About Economics and Prosperity, Gwartney and Stroup almost directly answer McKibben saying: “Doomsday forecasters fail to recognize that private ownership provides people with a strong incentive to conserve a valuable resource and search for substitutes…” The age of oil is going to end. It will get more expensive, and industries will be pressed to look for alternatives like biofuels and hydrogen technology; alternatives, which will most likely be much more environmentally friendly.

Proponents of free markets are right on many accounts. It certainly is not a perfect system, and it is very clear that special interests cloud the judgment of otherwise rational people. Yet, this is true for Washington, as well. Looking at the governmental sector actually reveals examples of even more insanity than in the private sector. A good example is provided by Bruce Yandle, an economics professor at Clemson University, who recounts a major part of the Clean Air Act of 1977 that actually did not contribute to cleaner air. The act required costly sulfur removing “scrubbers” to be installed in all new coal plants. This was an excellent idea in theory but a nightmare in reality. After paying the expenses to install the “scrubbers,” coal plants actually were discouraged from using innovative low-sulfur coal. Washington had actually worked against the clean air ends that it intended to promote.

Not only has governmental regulation discouraged cleaner alternatives to fossil fuels, but, in a way, the government was responsible for creating the problem by propping up the oil industry. A study from the International Center for Technology Assessment (CTA) looked at what gasoline would really cost if the government didn’t subsidize oil. It found that oil companies receive both direct subsides, such as corporate welfare, research and development, etc., and indirect subsidies, in the form of environmental cleanup and health care costs. CTA’s conclusion was that gas may have cost as much as $15.14 per gallon in 1998 if government simply left the free market alone. According to the report, “In a country that professes a high regard for the free market system, the US oil industry is a glaring example of the gulf that often develops between public perception and reality.” Maybe it’s time to give the free market a chance in the area of oil. Would not fifteen dollar per gallon gasoline make bio-alternatives viable? Perhaps actually having a laissez-faire system could solve McKibben’s “moral crisis” without resorting to government force.

If America is truly going to find a solution to the fossil fuel problem, two points must be remembered. Firstly, we certainly don’t want to be so caught up in a moral campaign that we accept any old solution with a green label. Secondly, if it is possible to avoid using force and let the free market take care of itself, the government should. After all, no one wants to start a fire only to fertilize the weed.

Prince Caspian Countdown!

2008-03-12T18:18:00.002-05:00

Some Serious Humor... Seriously... Sorta

2008-03-07T23:48:00.004-06:00

John Kelso is a columnist with the Austin American Statesman who is sometimes hilarious! There is a little bit of **** language, but, boy, this should make anyone who lives in Austin chortle.

Some (what I consider) great lines from him that (for the most part) accurately portray the crazy city I live in; Austin:

Our new city motto is "Merge Left."

We pride ourselves in being a political city, but on election day sometimes 91 percent of us stay at home and avoid the polls like there's a bug infestation going on over there.

We are a laid-back community, so in 1989 many Austinites moped, cried and left poetry at the beloved 500-year-old Treaty Oak on Baylor Street after some idiot tried to murder it with a dose of herbicide. On the other hand, after leaving our poems, we'll tailgate somebody on the interstate at 89 miles an hour.

We're an educated university town, and we brag about how the University of Texas led us into the high-tech boom. Yet, the number of people in Austin who can name the starting quarterback at UT outnumbers the folks who can name an English professor on the 40 Acres by several hundred thousand. (No one ever scalped tickets to English 101.)

To stay fit, we jog and we bike. But we drive around in circles in our SUVs in the Whole Foods Market parking lot, fighting to get a parking spot a few feet closer to the front door.

We consider ourselves a kind and considerate bunch. But our neighborhoods are filled with speed bumps, traffic circles and other traffic-calming devices to keep us from driving over each other's trash cans.

Welcome to Austin. We're glad you moved here because we're sure you have something valuable to add to our community. Besides, there are still two--count 'em, two--empty parking spaces left downtown.

Hacking THE REPUBLIC!

2008-02-24T19:14:00.007-06:00

Previously I had brought up the great possibility of voting machines being manipulated by an experienced hacker. Now I would like to present a more in-depth documentary my Dad found online that not only further documents the likelihood of electronic machines being hacked, but also documents some very clear instances of voter fraud. Among them, a voting machine in Valusia county, Florida recording negative votes for Al Gore.

I know this video from HBO is somewhat long. Trust me, this will be one of the most politically enlightening hour-and-a-halves of your life.

"If... When people see what's really going on, there is no way we will allow it to continue."
~Bev Harris, founder of www.blackboxvoting.org

I have one correction: America is actually a Republic, not a Democracy. But, either way, using a hackable system to determine who will lead is wrong.

Will you let it continue? The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for Good men to do nothing!

How Super is Super Tuesday?

2008-02-05T16:47:00.000-06:00

The historic 24 states are up for grabs. This is a big deal for 99.999999999999999999... % of those presidential candidates that are still in the race. For those wondering, .9999... (repeating for ever) is equal to 1.

The title link from the New Republic is one of the better articles I've stumbled across. (although it seems to only have 20 states... don't ask me why)

"With 52 percent of all pledged Democratic Party delegates and 41 percent of the total Republican Party delegates at stake, Super Tuesday's results will be crucial for both party's candidates in securing the presidential nomination."

Well, I'm going to give you another link and leave it at that. No, I am not going to go into polls, because they've been wrong and they probably will be. Besides, I'm not a psychic. Oh, read this:
Joseph Farah | Don't Listen to Gurus. I have to add this quote:

Don't let anyone else tell you what to think or how to vote – study the candidates' histories and positions and make your pick accordingly.

So far, the gurus couldn't have been more wrong.

Even though I've disagreed with you, Mr. Farah, I couldn't agree more on this issue. Let us not make an extempore decision, but rather a well thought-out decision based on principles rather than polls!

Mark 13:11 Conviction: A Short Story

2008-01-28T22:49:00.000-06:00

"When they arrest you and hand you over, do not worry beforehand about what you are to say, but say whatever is given you in that hour; for it is not you who speak, but it is the Holy Spirit."

Mark 13:11 contains some very profound words of wisdom for me. My ability to reason, understand and engage in apologetics, (which, if anyone was wondering, has nothing to do with apologizing) should not revolve around me! They should be based upon what God plans to do.

I, personally, being an analytically-prone person, have a tendency not to give God the glory He desires. I prepare almost everything. I want to have all the research down, be ready for whatever questions will be thrown at me, and say things in just the right way. I don't want to let Him down. This is not a bad thing in itself. The problem arises when my preparation eclipses God's rightful glory as the originator of all reason.

I was really convicted of this tendency at my first Christmas Evangelism Boot Camp (CEBC) last year. I was there on the last day and, while praying and walking up to the Trail of Lights, God was really telling me, "No! Don't prepare your speech for the unsaved world. I have the best speech in mind. If you can relax and let my man on the ground work (the Holy Spirit), He'll take care of the rest." Maybe that was a paraphrase. It was kinda scary not knowing what to expect, not having control, but I kept reassuring myself that God has been in the business of saving people a whole lot longer than I have.

So, when there was a lull, I knew it was time to stand up on our stool and literally preach like Jesus did; right on the street. Yes, it was scary. I stood up and managed to get out the first few words. (These were the only words I had prepared, so I had prepared them to near perfection. They were astounding.) "Well, I want to welcome everyone to the trail of lights." At least I get to take credit for that. That was it; God took over from there on. Praise be to him, for it was not me, "but the Holy Spirit."

This session of preaching turned out rather well, I think. There was no resistance to the good news as I spoke. People really seemed to be open. After breaking the ice with some trivia, explaining to everyone the predicament of sin, and finally telling them the best news EVER!, I stood down, took a deep breath and thought: Not too bad for the first time. Then again, it really wasn't the first time; God had done it a million times before, he just hadn't used this particular vessel in this particular way.

"...do not worry beforehand about what you are to say, but say whatever is given you in that hour..."

C Games Through New Eyes!

2008-01-27T23:05:00.000-06:00

For the past year, I've been the research director for a friend of mine. Thomas Umstattd Jr. has been doing work to create awareness on the dark side of digital gamers. I have had the joy of helping him in his mission to reach those that, like us, have lost their priorities in gaming.

Now I am a contributor and officially the Research Director of CGames.com! My first post will be up in exactly 2 days, and I'll post the link soon. [Alright, the article is up: "Pearls" of Wisdom on Gaming. Feel free to leave comments, I appreciate as much feedback as I can get.]

The whole mission that I've joined with Thomas on is to help gamers and their families realize priorities and the amazing danger that gaming addiction poses to them. Thomas is in the process of writing a book on the subject. Check out his post on why. We are on a mission to see men that were lulled into worldly submission to the play station deity drop their chains and rise up as warriors of God!

Care to join? Or need help? www.cgames.com.

To Bow Down to the Paul Altar...

2008-01-23T22:24:00.001-06:00

Ron Paul is without a doubt the most-mentioned name on this blog so far. (outside of Brian) Some may think that I bow down to some kind of Ron Paul Altar. In fact, I've been around a few Ron supporters that seem to compare his presidency with the second coming of Christ. While I do support Ron Paul, I definitely am not going to make a religion out of it. Ron Paul has his faults, and I hope to enumerate some of them in this post, as well as show you why I still believe he is the best candidate.

The Club for Growth, in their presidential series, punches a few holes in the Representative's record in their report, calling him the "the perfect enemy of the good." He made a couple hiccups in his carrier, and I mean small hiccups such as a couple hundred thousand (which, in federal terms, is very small) to fund a local trolley project, a $130,000 for some Christmas tree project, etc. I consider this rather understandable when you think about the amount of legislation a congressman must weave through. Such slips are small compared to many of the major pork other candidates have approved. Over-all, I think its pretty good for a tenth-term congressman.

The Club also has problems with his opposition to international trade agreements, such as NAFTA and CAFTA, education ~~welfare~~ vouchers for home/private schoolers, and opposition to federal tort reform.

"But the recurring theme of Paul's career is his frequent willingness to let unattainable ideals obstruct attainable progress towards those ideals."

This is probably my biggest problem with the Representative from Texas. I do have to side with Ron Paul on some of these issue. Government "ordained" trade organization are not free, and involve more politics than trade. We also don't need to put home schoolers on yet another entitlement system. Don't get me wrong, I like to get money back from the government for not using their system, and I love free trade. Ron Paul has supported truly free free trade, without government arrangement. He also has supported tax-credits, rather than entitlements, for families that choose private education alternatives (such as mine). So, there are definite disagreements between the club and I as to what not only creates growth, but what is morally feasable.

But I do have to agree with the overall diagnosis of the Club. Some of Paul's goals aren't realistic, unfortunately. For example, I am about 90% certain that an absolute return to the gold standard within four or even eight years is impossible. Not only is there just not enough gold, but the economic tolls would be far too high to sustain politically, even if they are only temporary. Reagan couldn't get rid of the DOE, so Paul probably doesn't stand a chance. Yes, and I have yet to be convinced that we could immediately pull out of Iraq and be just fine.

There has been some concern about Ron Paul racism. The article I found was length and rather shaky. It contains many fundamental errors (later corrected), lacks verifiability, and often was based on faulty logic such as setting MLK on a pedestal of immunity from criticism and demonizing the confederates. Simply because someone writing in a Ron Paul magazine questions Martin Luther King's support of the "New Deal," or because Paul believes that Lincoln was wrong in asserting that states could not succeed, does not make him a racist! It also does not make him bigoted to assert that AIDs should be quarantined like other incurable diseases. The article contained absolutely no indication of any of this supposedly racist rhetoric in modern settings; leading me to believe, honestly, that it's rather pointless.

So, there it is. The problems I see in Paul, and those that I definitly don't. Now let's put it into perspective. I want to now delineate between three levels of affiliation:

1-worship: In order to worship anyone, they have to be right about everything. Sorry, Paul, Jesus beats you on that one.
2- support: Agree with basic postulates regarding government and must not only talk the talk but walk the walk. Federal candidates, to meet my standard, must believe that government ought to be limited and that they ought to be true to their oath, including to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States." I place Paul in this category.
3-vote: Choose the least bad of a bunch of bads. This is where candidates such as Thompson, Hunter, Tancredo, Romney and Huckabee fall, depending upon who they're up against.

I could vote for most of the Republicans if the stakes were high enough. However, I could not support them because they frequently violate their oath of office and do not seem to care for limiting government when it comes to national security. This is especially true now that (mostly) conservative candidates Fred Thompson and Tom Tancredo are no longer in the race. I would have a hard time voting for the democrats in the race, because of how perverse the party in general has become.

For me, a look at the alternatives never fails to bring me back to supporting Paul. To condense my support down to a few voting issues:

1) Ron Paul has principles, not pollsters. His philosophy doesn't change with circumstances, so you know who you're sending to the White House.
2) Ron Paul will actually keep the presidential oath of office. A president has to be true to his word. I can't trust any president that violates the first oath he makes in office. Ron Paul not only has but continues to promise to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."
3) Ron Paul does not want to solve the world's problems. He recognizes that government has moral as well as practical constraints, and can't and shouldn't deal with every problem. I want president that can actually exercise restraint when it comes to my money.

Through all his faults, Ron Paul is a man of astounding purpose and conviction. I pray to God that I will be a supporter, not some idol worshiper.

Ron Paul Continues to Amaze me!

2008-01-19T16:35:00.000-06:00

Please check out the above article. I respect Ron Paul for not pandering his beliefs in order to get the votes like Huckabee, but still standing up for them.

Wow. That's probably my shortest post. Ever.

What would Reagan do?

2008-01-16T18:20:00.000-06:00

Reagan was an amazing voice for the Constitution in his day. Check out the link above from the Heritage Foundation. I want to point out some of his great quotes:

"We are a nation that has a government. Not the other way round."

"The Federal Government did not create the states, the states created the Federal Government."

"As for the enemies of freedom... they will be reminded them that peace is the highest aspiration of the American people. We will negotiate for it; sacrifice for it. We will not surrender for it; now or ever!"

And so many more that you can see for yourself at the Heritage Foundation.

New Hampshire Primary Results

2008-01-08T21:46:00.000-06:00

are available at the above link. Wow, how in the world does the New Hampshire Secretary of State hold his head up with a website that is THAT lame. Looks like he hired a high-schooler to make it. Well, graphics design aside, official results will be posted on the 9th. Right now, we have un-official results that show McCain appears to have a pretty significant lead for the Republicans and the "Obama-nation" is closely battling the "Hillary-ous" (who is just ahead by a hair) for the democratic lead.

[Update (1/9/08): The NH SOS has such a terrible website, I can't even find the results today. At any rate, you can check out the results from MSNBC:
(D)-http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/01/09/563090.aspx
(R)-http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/01/09/563076.aspx
Apparently playing the gender card worked for Hillary.]

Presidential... something

2008-01-08T16:18:00.000-06:00

(I'm not quite sure what to call this post... not feeling very creative today. If you have any ideas, let me know.)

I found this Ron Paul Video very entertaining:

Ron Paul was not allowed into Fox's GOP debate, unfortunately. In an unfortunate turn of events, supporters got braded as "lunatics" by Sean Hannity. My aplologies, Mr. Hannity, some people just don't know when to stop. What I don't get is why it's such a big issue for you. There will always be some crazy lunatics in any campaign.

And the New Hampshire primaries go on. The results will be very interesting. Anyone like to make predictions?

Iowa Caucus

2008-01-04T10:15:00.001-06:00

According to caucus results, available at the Iowa GOP website, every COP county went either Romney or Huckabee, except for one Ron Paul county. Overall, the order GOP candidates came in was:
-Huckabee- with 34% of the total vote
-Romney- with 25%
-Thompson-13% of the vote
-McCain- with another 13%
-Paul- with 10% of the vote
-Hunter- with less than 1%
And I don't know why they had Trancredo in there; he dropped out. Ironically, he still got 5 votes.

Unless you do it by counties, and they the order is Huckabee, Romney, Paul and no-one else with any counties.

Concurrently, the Dem race was interesting, with Hillary convinced that this race was unimportant. She came in third; behind Obama and then John Edwards. Every other candidate might as well drop out with less than 1%. But that may be due to Democratic Caucus rules. If a candidate has less than 15%, his votes for that county go to someone else, or go no-where.

At any rate, I still support Paul, and have some more endorsements I'd like you to read:

“Congressman Ron Paul believes that our Constitution is the law of the land not decisions made by our Courts. As President of Our Nation, ROn Paul will obey and defend our Constitution.”
-Johnny Gardner, Director, Voice of the Unborn

“We support Ron Paul for President because he stands for what we stand for - eliminating the IRS, limiting government, stopping illegal immigration, bringing the troops home from everywhere, and restoring the Constitution to the people.”
-David R. Whetsell, President, STOPTAX.org

And the best for last...

“Ron Paul is one of the outstanding leaders fighting for a stronger national defense. As a former Air Force officer, he knows well the needs of our armed forces, and he always puts them first. We need to keep him fighting for our country.”
-President Ronald Reagan

www.ronpaul2008.com

ACC Students (that's me) Blog for Class

2007-12-29T23:58:00.000-06:00

Well, this semester at my local community college (ACC) is over. And... I got in the paper! Austin-American Statesman reporter Katie Humphrey did a story about how my class blogged for papers. Quote from it:

Brian Morgan, 16, a high school student who is dually enrolled at ACC, said he has been wanting to start a blog, and the class gave him a starting point. He said that he welcomed the opportunity to share his opinions with his classmates and that knowing they would read his essays compelled him to do more research to support them.

"The class ... is not so much about putting facts in your brain and spitting them out on a test or in a paper, but really helping you think about government and engage in it," Morgan said. "Instead of (a paper) being read by one person, or two at most, it's out there for the world."

I think the blogging was a worth-while idea, and my hat is off to you, Mr. Seago. Happy New Year!

Now that its all over, I'm going to call my blog the Brian FACTor and continue to blog (and maybe about more non-government issues)

Here are all the required links for class. I am now clearing the side-bar for my favorite links.

Huck's army-of Bureaucrats

2007-12-19T11:37:00.000-06:00

I received a comment on my blog from a friend of mine, Will, because I responded to one of his posts regarding presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee. I thought, that, while I'm at it, I might as well point out to you why I'd be more than willing to send Huckabee to a pulpit, but not to the White House. Is Huckabee superior to other candidates? Yes. He definitely is, but I honestly am not into comprimise, and this is one guy full of it.

Huckabee has proven that he is pretty much unwavering in his social conservativism. As an ordained minister, Huckabee stands for life and morality, things that I agree with, but aren't most important for the future Mr. President. Perhaps one of the most important expectations I have for the next Mr. president is that he remain unwavering and prevent a Democratic tax and regulation surge. After pouring into the research, I see no reason to expect Huckabee will do that.

Huckabee has gained himself a grade D from the CATO Institute for his Bush-like government expansion techniques as governor of Arkansas. Michael Tanner sums up the specific points I am about to go through very nicely:

"...Huckabee doesn't just embrace big government in the form of big taxes. He truly appears to believe that if something is a good idea it should be a federal government program."

So, let's go through some of Huckabee's populist/socialist/and sometimes even communistic economic rhetoric as enumerated on his website.

On education, he says 1) that No Child Left Behind Act has "value" and that 2) success of schools should be judged by "results" (basically, test scores)

My aunt has got her doctorate studying cultural differences in education, and study after study after study shows that this kind of federal control/regulation/help (if you'd rather use that word) in education (aka: No-Child-Left-Behind) "leaves behind" kids that don't comply with the one-size-fits-all standards that are imposed by the federal code. It also attacks teachers by taking away their ability to structure lessons to the unique needs of their kids, while still punishing them when students can't pass the tests. My Mom experienced the same pressure while teaching 5th grade last year. Apparently Huckabee doesn't want to remedy that by restoring federalism as the founders envisioned it; he wants to keep No Child Left Behind in his back pocket.

Anther major problem that darkens Huckabee's economic conservativism is that he does not believe in free markets when it comes to Energy policy.

"The truth is, we are so pathetically behind the curve right now that federal spending for energy research and development is only 40% of what it was in 1979."

So, he apparently wants to raise that spending; forcing people to pay for research they may or may not use. Has he even read the Constitution? He apparently doesn't understand what it means when it says private property rights.

More disturbing populist rhetoric on Health Care:

"As President, I will work with the private sector, Congress, health care providers, and other concerned parties to lead a complete overhaul of our health care system."

That is the very definition of socialism. Government "helping" the private market along. Oh, excuse me, that's actually closer to Nazi economic policy. Let's let the private market work, but reserve the right to take over. I look at Mr. Huckabee and I see a great man, but I sure don't see the two letters that I expect to follow the name of anyone who wants to overhaul the health care system; M.D. YOU ARE NOT AN EXPERT, GOVERNOR! DON'T PRETEND LIKE YOU ARE SMARTER THAN THE DOCTORS AND THEIR PATIENTS!

Finally, he is committed to what the founders called the "greatest enemy" to liberty; continual warfare.

In 1795, James Madison stated emphatically: "of all the enemies to public liberty, war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. . . . No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare". War is a big government program, and while it is necessary sometimes, but should always be a temporary policy, or Americans will loose or give up liberties in the wake of the paranoia that always follows war. Huckabee, on the other hand, believes we are currently in a "world war" against terrorism as we play police of the world. Huckabee has not made a commitment to end our intervention in countries where it does more harm than good.

Huckabee's socialist programs are not just rhetorical. In fact, the Club For Growth's report on him found that because of his governorship Arkansas "...state spending increased a whopping 65.3% from 1996 to 2004, three times the rate of inflation... Overall, Huckabee's substantial tax hikes far surpassed his modest tax cuts, with the average tax burden increasing by a whopping 47% over his tenure."

The assertion Will made was that "He used his influence to block the heavy-duty stuff but not every little thing." Mike Huckabee's claim in one of the recent debates was that it was pretty good for a democratic state. Ultimately what this indicates to me is Huckabee's willingness to comprimise. In order to maintain influence, he allows for spending to increase 60%. Honestly, if he is willing to sacrifice the people's money for popularity, I'm not willing to vote for him. Huckabee has still to provide reason for me to expect him to unwaveringly reign in a democratic congress that is more than willing to spend everyone else's money. Again from the Club for Growth:

"Finally, Governor Huckabee opposed further tax cuts at a 2005 gathering of Iowa conservatives. On January 28, 2007, Governor Huckabee refused to pledge not to raise taxes if elected President, first on 'Meet the Press' and then at the National Review Conservative Summit. The evidence suggests that his commitment to protecting taxpayers evidenced in his early gubernatorial years may be a thing of the past."

HucksArmy has launched in support of Huckabee. Based upon the evidence outlined above, they might fight him into office only to find that he prefers to fight with government bureaucrats and tax agents.

[Update 1/13/08: Shaun Connell put an excellent article on his blog that deals with the subject entitled Mike Huckabee — Christian Hypocrisy It deals with more of the true character of Huckabee, so I recommend it as a supplement to this post, which focused more on his political posision.]

Re: Gun Restrictions on Campus

2007-12-05T18:00:00.000-06:00

It seems like I have to join the minority on this issue and say why I believe colleges all over the States should allow guns on campus. Many of my peers have written on why they believe it is just "outright foolish" to allow students to carry guns. Now don't get me wrong, I believe ACC has every right to tell me that I can't bring a gun onto their property. If I really don't like it I can leave. My contention is that it is in their best interest to allow students and especially professors and staff members to carry the tools to defend themselves.

Have we learned nothing from the Virginia Tech shootings? There was an outright gun ban on campus, and because of that, when a deranged student, by the name of Seung-Hui Cho, snapped and started shooting, everyone else was defenseless. Had a responsible gun-owner been at the scene, Cho would have gotten maybe three people, rather than thirty. I find it ironic that terrible shootings such as this never happen at a rifle range where people can defend themselves. Massacres tend to occur where people are defenseless.

People these days seem to automatically associate guns with chaos; probably because of selective media coverage. The fact of the matter is that guns are not weapons of chaos, but rather tools of force. Like any tool of force, weather it be a hammer or an AK-47, guns can be used for good or bad. However, statistics consistently reveal that guns are more frequently used to prevent rather than perpetrate crimes. A good friend of mine, whose self-proclaimed specialty is gun control, wrote on ShaunConnell [dot] com that subtracting the number of crimes committed with firearms from the number of people who use these weapons to stop crimes yields a positive result of 1.8 Million (with a big M) crimes stopped per year.

I am not advocating that everyone should carry a gun, just that it would be in any college's best interest to allow people to defend themselves. The first step in doing so is allowing them to carry the "tools."

01001000 01100001 01101110 01110011 01100101 01101100 + 01000111 01110010 01100101 01110100 01100101 01101100

2007-11-28T23:08:00.000-06:00

According to my sources, the above spells "Hansel + Gretel" in binary (base-2) code. This article is going to take a more technological slant and show how local political climates have welcomed easy-to-hack voting machines that may loose Texas' democracy in the same way Hansel and Gretel lost their bread-crumb path.

In the wake of Florida's recount mess, there has been a great deal of push to move the ballot from paper to electronics so that votes can be counted with ease and speed. The problem with the electronic solution is that it simply leaves a trail of 1s (ons) and 0s (offs) that can be picked up by a malicious hacker and be more readily lost than any paper trail, just as Hansel and Gretel's bread-crumb scheme got them miserably lost. I am not against technology; in fact, I intend to pursue a career in electrical engineering. However, when technology has its limits, we must recognize them and not jeopardize the political future of this great state.

Multiple studies from Princeton University, the IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers), and independent reports commissioned by states such as Maryland, Ohio, and California have concluded that electronic voting machine, particularly the popular Diebold machines, can be hacked by a determined team. These are high-quality studies that have been performed by experts and, to varying degrees, they show the risk in entrusting any vote solely to a pattern of 1s and 0s.

The Princeton study, probably the most independent yet fairly recent study, specifically focused on one of Diebold's voting machines. It found multiple ways in which determined hackers could install malicious software on the machine that could completely alter the outcome of the election.

The very ironic thing about Diebold’s response to this study is that they nowhere claim that their new systems remove the problems these researchers found with the old ones, only that the machines are new, have the most advanced data encryption techniques, and that the old ones will not be used in another election. As explained by Professor Edward W. Felten, who lead Princeton's research team: "Diebold made the same kinds of claims about this [older] version — claims that turned out to be wrong — that they are now making about their more recent versions."

More than just three crazy computer scientists from Princeton are complaining. I found at least five other quality studies [*] which came to very similar conclusions; an electronic voting machine could be hacked by determined political activists. One such study from an independent corporation commissioned by the State of Maryland stated:

“This Risk Assessment has identified several high-risk vulnerabilities... If these vulnerabilities are exploited, significant impact could occur on the accuracy, integrity, and availability of election results.”

Because of the inherent hack-ability of a trail of 1s and 0s, it is important that Texas elections leave a paper trail; a trail that can be verified. A study from RABA, who was also commissioned by Maryland, concludes:

“Ultimately we feel there will be a need for paper receipts...” (p 3)

This is the solution I propose. Allow votes to be cast electronically, but make sure that the people can verify those votes with some kind of paper receipt that voters get to look at and personally verify.

Technology is a good thing in Texas politics, but we must not get so caught up in it that we loose our trail, just as Hansel and Gretel supposedly did.

*Quotes from, citations of, and bios for these studies will be posted later for those who are interested. [edit: see my comment on this post]

Definition

2007-11-27T11:34:00.000-06:00

This post is going to be short. I just want to define two things for everyone so you aren't fooled by political rhetoric.

Bond (in the context of government, not Chemistry)-"a certificate of debt (usually interest-bearing or discounted) that is issued by a government or corporation in order to raise money; the issuer is required to pay a fixed sum annually until maturity and then a fixed sum to repay the principal"

A bond sounds great, and we'll approve bonds easily to fund Austin schools. What about debt? Would we approve debt? I don't think we would as regularly, which is why politicians resort to such political rhetoric to pass thier proposals.

Debt-Slavery

Proverbs 22:7b rightly tells us: "...And the borrower becomes the lender's slave." (NSAB) I think we probably should take the advice of the wisest man to ever live, don't you?

Read this article by my good friend Thomas Umstattd about why the federal government shouldn't be borrowing and how we've got ourselves in a load of trouble because of it.

Global Warming: at Best a Hypothesis

2007-11-14T17:48:00.000-06:00

ABC's 20/20 has an excellent article on global warming that I found a while ago and was astounded by its depth.

John Stossel was told by Mr. Al Gore that "debate is over" when it comes to Global Warming. The former vice president wouldn't even give the him an interview to explain why. Is Gore scared that his "science" might become unraveled if he was interviewed by a conservative commentator? Well, the debate most certainly is not over. Michael Savage has whole page on his website devoted to debunking the global warming myth.

Consensus is one thing that is not present in the Global Warming debate. Paul Reiter of the Pasteur Institute and John Christy who won NASA's Medal for Exceptional Achievement were part of drafting a report from the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change. They quit after their objections were not respected. Stossel sums it up nicely:

In all the confusion surrounding the global warming debate, one thing is clear: Global warming activists don't welcome the skepticism.

Here's some skepticism for you. John Coleman, the original founder of the Weather Channel, calls global warming "the greatest scam in history." as reported by ICECAP.

quote:

I have read dozens of scientific papers. I have talked with numerous scientists. I have studied. I have thought about it. I know I am correct. There is no run away climate change. The impact of humans on climate is not catastrophic. Our planet is not in peril. I am incensed by the incredible media glamour, the politically correct silliness and rude dismissal of counter arguments by the high priest of Global Warming.
In time, a decade or two, the outrageous scam will be obvious.

Not good enough? You don't think a weatherman compares to a noble peace prize winner? Well, do you believe NASA? Al Gore's moans that the melting of polar icecaps may raise sea levels are not all unique to global warming. According to Professor James Morison of the University of Washington's Polar Science Center Applied Physics Laboratory:

"Our study confirms many changes seen in upper Arctic Ocean circulation in the 1990s were mostly decadal in nature, rather than trends caused by global warming,"

Global Warming might be a serious problem, it might not. However, government action should not be dictated by unconfirmed hypothesis. As long as the evidence for the urgency of the warming citation remains shrouded in uncertainty by findings such as those above, (and many more) the government should leave the free market... free!

Re: Medicare Cuts; Why Medicare is Not a Caring Policy

2007-11-11T23:55:00.001-06:00

As explained by the heading on my blog, I am taking a government class at my community college. My classmates posted on her blog, Farren's Inside Look, regarding Texas legislation to fund the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP) by taking money from Medicare funds.

I agree with the main point of the article. It makes no sense to take from one major insurance program to give to another. I think its just politics, little else. As stated by George Bernard Shaw, "A government that robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul."^[1] The issue I have with the article is in the last two paragraphs. The assertion Farren makes is that Medicare is the future of America's seniors and therefore is worth keeping around. I respectfully disagree. Medicare is a bad policy for the same reasons as other government welfare programs. The dilemma with government welfare programs such as Medicare is that either 1) money comes from taxpayer right back to taxpayers, and some mysteriously disappears along the way; or 2) Money goes from taxpayers to non-taxpayers and then Government has become no better than any thief.

The first problem is that when government takes money from people via taxation and then decides to give it back to them, some will inevitably disappear through government's "butter fingers." At best, it is useless; at worst, it causes economic lag. According to Economists James D. Gwartney, Ph.D., and Richard L. Stroup, Ph.D.:

"In the United States, studies indicates [sic] that it takes businesses and individuals approximately 5.5 billion worker-hours (the equivalent of 2,750,000 full-time workers) each year just to complete the taxation paperwork. This compliance cost adds approximately 15 cents to every dollar of tax revenue raised by the government."^[2]

Fifteen percent mysteriously disappears in the process of just getting tax money to the government, and that's not counting administration of the programs. On the other hand, when people can keep more of their money and invest it as they see fit, and then the money can be more effectively utilized. Therefore, I think that Medicare money should be given back to the people in the form of tax-cuts.

Secondly, it is morally wrong for anyone, especially the government, to plunder one person to "give" to another. If a person stole money from one person while threatening to take their property, he would be punished as a criminal. It doesn't matter if he had the benevolent ends of helping someone in need fund their health care. Yet, government somehow claims immunity from this law. Justice Brandeis had some very insightful words for us when he said: "Crime is contagious. If the government becomes a lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law..."^[3] No matter how benevolent the acts of the government be, sponsoring Medicare-like programs is still plunder if it takes from one person to "help" another.

After realizing the facts outlined above, Texas hero Davy Crockett stated before Congress:

"We have the right as individuals, to give away as much of our own money as we please in charity; but as members of Congress we have no right to appropriate a dollar of the public money."^[4]

I believe its time for Texas government to grasp this idea and realize that it has no more right to steel than anyone.

A note I believe I need to add: I am not attacking anyone who uses programs such as Medicare, Welfare, CHIP, etc. In fact, I was on CHIP for a while. I understand that such people have paid the government a lot of money, and should get at least a little bit back. I just believe that we should stop funneling money through a bureaucracy that has butter fingers and start letting people keep more of their own money.

References

I recommend The Law by Frederick Bastiat. It is an excellent primer on the philosophy of freedom.

1. George Bernard Shaw. Everybody's Political What's What? (1944) ch 30. http://www.quotationspage.com/quote/179.html

2. James D. Gwartney and Richard L. Stroup. What Everyone Should Know About Economics and Prosperity. (1993) p 76. available at: http://oldfraser.lexi.net/publications/books/econ_prosp/

3. Justice Louis Brandeis (dissenting). Olmstead et. al. v. United States. 277 U.S. 438. (1928) http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/cgi-bin/getcase.pl?court=us&vol=277&invol=438

4. David Crockett. "Not Yours To Give" originally in: Edward Sylvester Ellis. The Life of Colonel David Crockett (1884). http://www.house.gov/paul/nytg.htm

Some More Quotes

2007-11-10T15:06:00.000-06:00

"No nation can remain free when the state has greater influence over the knowledge and values transmitted to children than the family."
~Ron Paul on The Family Education Freedom Act,
http://www.ronpaul2008.com/homeschoolers/ron-pauls-record/

"I generally lean toward a flat tax, but I want to make it really flat-like zero."
~Ron Paul to Jay Leno

I support Ron Paul for president in 2008 because he is the only candidate in the race who is unwavering in his principles and has shown it over and over again. He believes in freedom and constitutional government he will stick by that. Plus, it looks like he stands a good chance, even when he's practically ignored by the media. Here's an amazing video on the subject:

My Favorite November Mosquito

2007-11-06T11:07:00.000-06:00

Yes, as stated by a simple cartoon character,
"Voting is like choosing your favorite mosquito out of a swarm."
-Maxine. quoted by: Dr Bob Griffin, http://www.grif.net/

So, I'm going to pick out mosquitoes. Here goes. This is how I would be voting in Today’s Constitutional Election. My default is "no," since, as I’ve already written about, our constitution does not need to get any longer or less understandable. I think its insane that the most basic law of Texas needs to be changed sixteen times just over the course of one year.

Prop 1-NO I can’t understand what it’s about by reading the ballot language or even by reading the official declaration. I have no clue what change in governance is required. Since they cannot seem to make their law understandable, NO!

Prop 2-NO The government should not encourage students to get into debt, and I’ve already written on the subject.

Prop 3- NO Not readable, makes no sense.

Prop 4- NO

Prop 5- NO This one is barely understandable. Here is one part I got, though. While reading the actual contents of the S. J. R. No 44 I came across the reason for the amendment: “To aid in the elimination of slum and blighted conditions in less populated communities in this state, to promote rural economic development in this state…” Well, I don’t think either is the government’s job, so NO.

Prop 6- YEAH, why not. It gives the government less money to waist. Would be pretty good for my Dad, since it would exempt his work truck from being counted in the property (aka: ad valorem) tax. My only objection is the fact that no where is ad valorem taxation defined.

Prop 7- YES I support property rights. While this amendment is somewhat weak in that it limits the reason property can be returned to only three, it is a step in the right direction by requiring the agency to sell it at the same price it was bought at.

Prop 8- No. This doesn’t clarify anything. If you want to make it clear, shorten the crazy thing so that people can actually read it.

Prop 9-YEAH. I probably have about the same to say on this as on Prop 6 .

Prop 10-Yes. Let’s clean up the constitution by eliminating the office that hasn’t been held in forever.

Prop 11-Yes! Please require that legislators have records of their votes. See, currently, law is sometimes passed when a speaker simply says “all in favor? Aye” “All opposed? No” and decides who’s louder. Usually, its about which side is louder in his head.

Prop 12-No! I’m protesting unnecessary constitutional indecipherability! Yeah…

Prop 13-No. The wording of this provision is insanely long. I’m not voting to make our constitution less understandable.

Prop 14-No. Same problem as prop 13. Geeze… It doesn’t have to be that complicated! How can people be law-abiding citizens when they cannot understand the law.

Prop 15- No. I don’t believe Government’s job is to fund research, and the money that is supposed to help develop a cure for cancer may be used in useless, and morally questionable, stem cell research. I don’t exactly want to take the chance of playing around with innocent human life under the sanction of the state.

Prop 16-No

Final tally: Yes on 5; No on the rest (11). You may agree with me, you may not. Whatever your posision is, however, it is important that you show up and vote as an active citizen. Because Texas will fail when Texans fail to care.

Tyranny of Volume

2007-10-31T23:13:00.000-05:00

Tyranny comes in many different forms. The founding fathers of the United States would probably look at Texas’ Constitution as one such tyranny. The author of the 62nd Federalist Paper^[1] tells us of three sources of tyranny—all with the same root—that would necessitate a radical change in the Lone Star Constitution.

It was probably James Madison^[2] who told us: “It will be of little avail to the people that the laws be made by men of their own choice if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read…” ^[1] This is the first problem with the current Lone Star Document. At ninety-thousand words of almost solid jargon, no casual or even a motivated citizen would attempt to read the whole document.

The second source of tyranny found in the Constitution, as the same author notes, is that it is “so incoherent that [it] cannot be understood.”^[1] Not only is it frequented with indecipherable jargon, but the structure of the document is lacking. For example, to this day Article 3, Section 48c is left blank, ^[3] since it was left out after being transcribed at the original convention. As admitted by the Texas government itself: “…the 1876 [Texas] constitution… is now considered to be one of the most disorganized and confusing of all state constitutions.”^[4]

The Constitution also “undergoes such incessant changes that no man… can guess what it will be tomorrow,” ^[1] as it was states in The Federalist No 62. In November, sixteen changes to the “foundation” of law in Texas will be put on the ballot for voter approval. ^[5] Indeed, Texas’ amendment rate has always been high:

“Some 615 amendments to the Texas Constitution had been proposed by 2005, only 129 years after that document was adopted. Of these, 439 had been ratified by popular vote. That averages to more than 9 amendments proposed and 6 amendments ratified for each two-year legislative session since 1876.”^[6]

Some might be asking themselves: What’s so important? What is really the problem with a jargonistic document if it is read by those who understand jargon? Maybe it would have been a problem in the early 1800s, but not now. The simple impact to the argument is this: There is no way people can be law-abiding citizens if they don’t know the law. To the Texas public, though, knowing the law is like chasing the wind: It doesn’t stop long enough to give you a breath and doesn’t bother to explain what’s going on. Is it any wonder that less than 20 percent of Texans bother to show up for special elections were constitutional amendments are considered? ^[7]

In the end, what is needed is a Constitution that the people of Texas can actually study and understand. As Thomas Jefferson commented: "Though [the people] may acquiesce, they cannot approve what they do not understand."^[8] The citizenry must demand to be able to take an active roll in government if they feel so inclined. Texas needs both the “enlightened” citizens that a republic demands and strong political leadership in order to resist the tyrannies of volume, incoherence, and ceaseless change that are too prevalent in the Lone Star Constitution.

References

1. James Madison or Alexander Hamilton. Federalist No. 62. (February 19 1788) http://thomas.loc.gov/home/histdox/fed_62.html

2. The authorship of this paper is not certain. The University of Chicago Press version cites Madison as the author: http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/v1ch12s22.html The Emory Law School, however, less confidently states that it could be Madison or Hamilton. http://www.law.emory.edu/law-library/research/ready-reference/us-federal-law-and-documents/historical-documents-the-federalist-papers/the-federalist-no-62.html Finally, the Library of Congress, perhaps the best source, says that the “Author: [is] Alexander Hamilton or James Madison” http://thomas.loc.gov/home/histdox/fed_62.html

3. The Texas Constitution. “Article 3 - Legislative Department” http://tlo2.tlc.state.tx.us/txconst/articles/cn000300.html

4. Texas State Library and Archives Commission. “The Texas Constitution of 1876” (Texas State Library, November 2005) http://www.tsl.state.tx.us/treasures/constitution/index.html

5. Texas Secretary of State. “Ballot Language For November 6, 2007 Constitutional Amendment” (n.d.) http://www.sos.state.tx.us/elections/voter/2007novballotlang.shtml

6. Texas Politics. Texas Constitution. “Mode of Amendment” (University of Texas at Austin, n.d.) http://texaspolitics.laits.utexas.edu/html/cons/0405.html

7. Micheal Hodges. “Observer’s Report for Texas: May 12, 2007 Constitutional Amendments Special Election” (Elections Advisory Committee, September 4, 2007) p 1. http://www.sos.state.tx.us/elections/forms/sept2007report.pdf

8. Thomas Jefferson. “Opinion on Apportionment Bill” (1792) Lipscomb and Bergh, ed. The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Memorial Ed. (Washington, D.C.: 1903-04) 3, p 211. http://etext.virginia.edu/jefferson/quotations/jeff1350.htm

More Presidential Info- From the Cato Daily Dispatch

2007-10-29T22:16:00.000-05:00

Today's Cato Daily Dispatch was nothing short of insightful. I recommend you read it. They have very nice quotes from two articles. One was from today's Christian Science Monitor. The other, as usual, is from one of their boys, Mr. Tanner, who published an article back in September. This article is still very insightful today.

Highlights:

Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security, just three programs consume 40% of the Federal budget. Does that make you wonder why we're in debt? Literally in 9 Trillion (with a big T) dollars worth of it. Just wait to you see where those numbers go when you factor in the State's spending.

I got to laugh at Clinton. Literally, this is Hillary-ous:
"we don't have a crisis in Social Security," she told the Boston Globe recently. "We have a long-term solvency challenge we can meet if we're smart about it."

Well. I can tell that she's a lawyer. She uses big words which basically spell out "problem." It is a problem that just 3 programs use of 40% of our government's resources when we are going into debt at the rate we are! Can't believe she doesn't get that. Ok, I can get it.

As much as I laugh at liberals, Neo-Cons are worse. Why? Because you can't predict them. What does neo-conservative mean? It is someone who supports the new, but still promotes the "good ol' days." Do you see a problem with wanting a new way and the old way? I do. The whole ideology is a contradiction of sorts. The nature of the neo-con is "I'm all for freedom but..." and you know what's coming after that. President George W. Bush (as quoted by CATO) is a great example:
"We have a responsibility that when somebody hurts, government has got to move."
That, my friends, is the ideology of socialism itself. Its coming strait from the famous "conservative" governor of Texas. This is what a "neo-con man" looks like. That is why I refuse to vote for all the major candidates recognized by the media. I just can't trust them. At least I can trust a Democrat to make bad decisions.

Now that I'm almost done editorializing, lets get to the "Fred Factors" in CATO's article:

Best marks from the National Taxpayers Union (except for Tancredo, and yes.. Mr Ron Paul).
He cast"his vote in favor of No Child Left Behind, but he now says he opposes increased federal involvement in education."
He is a huge backer of John McCain. Yes, that includes McCain/Feingold's campaign finance mess. Excuse me, WAS. In a Hannity/Colmes interview, he commented on the worthiness of the bill by saying: "Part of it was, and part of it wasn't."
I love this quote from Tanner: "It's hard to be a small-government conservative while favoring more widespread military intervention. War is a big-government program."

So, I'm voting Ron Paul '08. What do you think? Do Thompson's blights on his record really matter? Would you trust a neo-con? (aka: Giuliani)

Presidential Update

2007-10-25T12:53:00.000-05:00

Today's O'Brian FACTor edition is going to stray from the subject of state and local government a little. I'm going to take a look at some of the presidential canidates. Hopefully, we can do this more often in the future.

I think this is as important an issue as ever because, according to Paul Harvey, 41% of Americans can't name any presidential candidates. So sad.

First, republican fore-runner Rudolph Giuliani (left) is shifting his position on interrogation a bit. I was supprised that FOXNews actually covered it saying:

"Giuliani's stance indicates a subtle softening of his position on interrogation, five months after he declared that he would approve of "every method" one could think of to squeeze information from suspects."

Giuliani previously approved of "every method" now he only approves of simulated drowning (aka: "Waterboarding") well... he isn't exactly sure when. Just that "It depends on how it is done; it depends on the circumstances; it depends on who does it." So "politically correct."

Yes, I'm going to be a little biased here. I have to throw in something from my personal favorite candidate:

"For decades, the U.S. healthcare system was the envy of the entire world. Not coincidentally, there was far less government involvement in medicine during this time... We should remember that HMOs did not arise because of free-market demand, but rather because of government mandates. The HMO Act of 1973 requires all but the smallest employers to offer their employees HMO coverage, and the tax code allows businesses- but not individuals- to deduct the cost of health insurance premiums. The result is the illogical coupling of employment and health insurance, which often leaves the unemployed without needed catastrophic coverage."

~Ron Paul, July 24 2007, "Free-market Medicine"

Ron Paul tells the story of a man by the name of Dr. Berry. Being a medical doctor himself, Dr Paul was on the joint economic committee where Berry testified that he has opened a clinic that does not accept third-party insurance, and especially accepts no government pay. The result? He was able to "focus on medicine rather than billing." Because Dr Berry doesn't have to muddle through the bureaucracy, he can charge his clients who don't have insurance the same as what their co-pay would be else-wheres.

Sounds like a good idea to me. Yet, Ron Paul is the only presidential candidate to point out that most people spend as much or more time in the waiting room while paperwork gets done as they do seeing the doctor. The solution, then, is to reduce the paperwork by getting the government out of the way instead of simply creating more.

Even Fred Thompson, the self-proclaimed "federalist" in the race, doesn't seem to get this:

"Access to affordable, portable health care can be made available for all Americans without imposing new mandates or raising taxes... I am committed to a healthcare system that... Improves the individual health of all Americans by shifting to a system that promotes cost-effective prevention, chronic-care management, and personal responsibility"

He goes on to explain how, (in a very generic sense, I might add) but no where does he just say: if we eliminated the HMO Act of 1873 and reduced government interference, paperwork would go down dramatically and so would costs.

Its think its common sense, and politicians can't stand that. They can't stand Ron Paul either.

A Nessesary Evil

2007-10-22T22:00:00.001-05:00

Today I intend to wake up old literature on the O'Brian FACTor. Basically, I'm going to publish something that a friend of mine wrote a while ago. Since the PSAT just went whizzing by, I thought it would be topical to publish her essay on college entrance exams. When she said I could, I did, so here it is:

A Necessary Evil: College Entrance Exams
Originally written March 28 2007
By Shaney Lee

A common question asked of all high school students is “What are your plans for college?” The answers will be as diverse as the people you ask. Some people will plan to go to a junior or community college, others will want to go to a technical or trade school. Some will plan to join the military, still others will enter straight into the workforce. The vast majority, however, will plan to go to a four-year college. And those who do will have to make many decisions about how to get there. One common decision for all those who want to enter four-year colleges is, “What tests need to be taken to get in?” Although each college has its own policies, every four-year college will require at least one of the following: the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT, formerly known as the SAT I), the American College Test (ACT), and/or the SAT Subject Tests (formerly known as the SAT II’s).

The SAT claims to test “the critical thinking skills you’ll need for academic success in college. The SAT assesses how well you analyze and solve problems” ^{(The College Board, “SAT Reasoning Test”)}; however, many people are very skeptical as to whether the SAT really does that. Some people even question whether the SAT does anything useful at all. In fact, the Princeton Review says “[The SAT] continues to be a negative force in education” and claims that the SAT “doesn’t measure anything”, “underpredicts the college performance of women, minorities, and disadvantages students”, and “is coachable in all the worst ways”. ^{(“11 Practice Tests for the New SAT and PSAT”, vii)} The plethora of material claiming to boost SAT scores backs Princeton up on what is possibly the test’s worst weakness: high scores do not necessarily point to college success. Unfortunately, almost all high school students planning to go to four-year colleges will have to take the SAT sooner or later. Almost all colleges require the SAT or ACT for admission, and even those that don’t often use SAT scores for scholarship purposes. Because of the wealth of SAT prep material available today, it isn’t that hard to make a decently good or even very good score, provided the student is willing to put the time in to study. All high school students planning to enter a four-year college should plan on taking the SAT; however, if they know exactly which college or colleges they want to go to, they should check the policies at those schools concerning the SAT. If the schools do not require the SAT, it may be in the student’s best interest to skip the SAT and devote their time to something more useful. Unfortunately, most high school students will not have the luxury of skipping the SAT.

The ACT is often lumped with the SAT. It is rare to see the ACT being talked about in a context separate from the SAT. For example, if one opens up any teen magazine to an article about testing, the title will most likely read something along the lines of, “Tips For the 24 Hours Prior to Taking the SAT or the ACT” ^{(Stephens 17)} The ACT, however, is actually quite different from the SAT, as it claims: “The ACT is not an aptitude or an IQ test. Instead, the questions on the ACT are directly related to what students have learned in high school courses in English, mathematics, and science.” ^{(ACT, Inc. “Facts about the ACT”, par. 23)} Unlike the SAT, the ACT attempts to test knowledge rather than reasoning ability. However, testing knowledge does not guarantee good grades in college, so whether or not the ACT can accurately predict college success is debatable, just as it is with the SAT. It is not necessarily “better” to take either one; almost all colleges accept either test ^{(Brody, par. 3; Greenstein, par. 9)}. As with the SAT, students should check the policies of the specific college(s) they plan to apply to. If the colleges accept both exams equally, or if the student is not sure where they plan to apply, it is probably in the student’s best interests to take both tests. “A lot of overlap exists between the exams, and at least attempting both of them may give you the best shot of getting the score that you need,” ^{(Brody, par. 4)} It is a rare college that doesn’t require at least one of the two tests for admission, and the more competitive colleges take these scores seriously.

Students applying to more competitive colleges may also need to take one or more SAT Subject Tests (formerly known as the SAT II’s). “[SAT Subject Tests] are designed to measure your knowledge and skills in particular subject areas, as well as your ability to apply that knowledge.” ^{(The College Board, “About the SAT Subject Tests”, par. 1)} “[SAT Subject Tests] are knowledge-based tests, similar to most school finals” ^{(Greenstein, par. 3)} In the past, the Subject Tests were used for the same purpose that AP (Advanced Placement) tests are used today; today, some colleges require Subject Tests for admission to the school, “typically the ‘top 100’ scrutinize SAT Subject Test scores” ^{(par. 2)} Policies on SAT Subject Tests vary even more widely among colleges than policies on the SAT and ACT. Students should check with the colleges they are applying with to see if the schools require SAT Subject Test scores, or use them for advanced placement. Unlike the SAT, Subject Tests do not require extensive preparation ^{(par. 3)}; however, there is no good reason to take them if the college(s) a student is applying to don’t ask for them.

Almost all high school students will have to take the SAT or ACT; only a few will need to take the SAT Subject Tests. Each test has its good and bad points, and it is not necessarily “better” to take one in addition to or instead of another. The main factor in choosing which tests to take will be the policies at the college or colleges to which a student is planning to apply. What may be best for one person may be totally different from what is best for the next. In making the decision of which standardized tests to take, a student should always check the policies of the colleges that he/she plans to apply to, and talk to parents, teachers, and mentors. In the end, success in college cannot be measured by these tests; success in college will depend on the dedication of the student.

Works Cited

“About the SAT Subject Tests”. College Board website. College Board. 27 March 2007. http://www.collegeboard.com/student/testing/sat/about/SATII.html?print=true

Brody, Jay. “Act or SAT-How to Choose Between the SAT and the ACT?”. About. 2007. New York Times Company. 19 March 2007. http://collegeapps.about.com/od/satandotherexams/f/actorsat.htm

Greenstein, Mark. “SAT, PSAT, ACT, and SAT Subject Test-A Primer for Beginners”. Ivy Bound Test Prep. Ivy Bound. 19 March 2007. http://www.ivybound.net/MDprimer.html

Princeton Review, 11 Practice Test for the NEW SAT & PSAT. New York: Random House, 2005. vii.

“SAT Reasoning Test”. College Board website. College Board. 27 March 2007. http://www.collegeboard.com/student/testing/sat/about/SATI.html

Stephens, Teresa. “Tips for the 24 Hours Prior to Taking the SAT or ACT.” Brio & Beyond. Volume V. Apr. 2006: 17

[Update: Shaney has a blogspot you check out. Or, actually, two.]

:is disgusted with Perry:

2007-10-17T19:07:00.000-05:00

Hot off the press: According to the Austin American Statesman, Perry has given his official endorsement of former New York major and presidential hopeful Rudy Giuliani. This is even though Giuliani is know to be perhaps the most liberal republican on the block. According to the Texas Governor:

"I go to buy a pickup truck, if it's got one option on it I'm either not particularly fond of or not looking for, it doesn't mean I disregard that pickup truck."

I think its more like you find a pickup truck that has a thoroughly rusted frame, but a nice coat of paint. I'd discard the whole thing, even if it is the most popular car around. I can explain why, but I think that a like-minded teen by the name of Samuel Ashwood does a good job of explaining why Giuliani is more a liberal than a conservative.

I'm very disappointed in our governor. I've become more and more convinced that he really is not the conservative that he'd like us to think he is. But "liberal v. conservative" aside, how can a Texan really support a candidate who strongly believes in the Second Amendment... except in big cities.

Proposition 2

2007-10-12T19:40:00.000-05:00

In November, Texas voters will be given sixteen amendments to approve or reject. One of these, Proposition 2^[1] is about providing loans through government bonds in order to help college students, or that's the way supporters would like to put it.

Senator Judith Zaffirini, D-Laredo published a commentary in the Austin American Statesman that explains why she supports the bill. With all due respect, her argument is a total misunderstanding of economics and will simply promote irresponsible use of credit. Senator Zaffirini, who is the chairwoman of the Texas Senate Higher Education Subcommittee, supports this bill because, according to her, it will help fund "the education of our children"^[2] without increasing taxes. It sounds like a worthy goal, but there are two major economic flaws in the plan. Firstly, it produces a synthetic, artificially enticing environment for student debt to only increase. Secondly, her argument doesn't consider any of the great opportunity costs associated with this plan. Basically, there are better things we could do with the money.

The reason that interest rates on student loans are so high is because there is a lot of demand for loans. Its the simple economic law of supply and demand. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, the number of students who have debt increased ten percent between 1996 and 2000 and the average student's debt increased 36%.^[3] This statistic reflects one of the major problems with American today; we overuse credit. Because of this, the market is making corrections by raising interest rates, which will ultimately discourage students from taking too much money in loans. However, if Zaffirini has her way, the Texas government will just encourage this debt explosion by utilizing artificial, government-stabled interest rates that do not respond to the demands of the marketplace.

This is the first and greatest reason that I believe we should vote against prop 2: The Texas Government should not encourage debt! Artificially induced market situations only treat symptoms, instead of really dealing with the root of loan indulgence!

Then the Senator, being in Texas, makes the "no more taxes" argument:

"...because the bonds used to finance these loans are repaid by those who borrow the money, Prop. 2 will have no impact on our... taxes..."^[2]

While taxes will not go up what she ignores is that there are costs to this proposition; opportunity costs. As stated by Economist David R. Henderson,

"When economists refer to the "opportunity cost" of a resource, they mean the value of the next-highest-valued alternative use of that resource. If, for example, you spend time and money going to a movie... you can't spend the money on something else."^[4]

Opportunity costs are based upon the principle that when a resource is used for one purpose, it cannot then be used for another. It's basically what opportunities we will loose. In the case of higher education bonds, the money lent to the students is not available for four years or more. This money might have gone to a plethora of other venues such as improving roads, lowering taxes, improving policing abilities, and so forth.

The question we have to ask ourselves is this: are there better things we could be doing than manipulating the student loan market? I strongly believe that there are. So, for the sake of student responsibility and for a wise, economical, investment of government resources, I strongly and respectfully urge Texans voters to vote against proposition 2.

References

[1] Approved Prop. 2 ballot language: "The constitutional amendment providing for the issuance of $500 million in general obligation bonds to finance educational loans to students and authorizing bond enhancement agreements with respect to general obligation bonds issued for that purpose."

[2] Judith Zaffirini. "Keep college within Texans' reach" Austin American Statesman (October 4 2007). http://www.statesman.com/opinion/content/editorial/stories/10/04/04/1005zaffirini_edit.html

[3] Cited in: Sandy Baum. "The Role of Student Loans in College Access" (Pathways to College, January 2003):5. p 1. http://www.pathwaystocollege.net/pdf/NDSFA_report5.pdf

[4] David R. Henderson. "Opportunity Cost" in The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics. (Library of Economics and Liberty, 2002). http://www.econlib.org/LIBRARY/Enc/OpportunityCost.html

King George would be soooo proud

2007-10-12T16:44:00.000-05:00

(Human Events, 03/16/2007) - The complaints that the founding fathers leveled against King George in The Declaration of Independence were remarkably similar to the actions of the federal government currently. I recommend that you read this article by Helen E. Kreble. Its definitely a worthy read.

Favorite quote from it:

"Astonishingly, today’s Americans expect government to care for us from cradle to grave, the way commoners once expected a benevolent king to care for his subjects... In a deeply disturbing sense, Americans are voluntarily surrendering the very freedoms that millions fought and died to establish and protect."

Oh, Wake up America! We have got to smell tyranny and deal with it before it gets any worse.

Canyon making in the blink of an eye!

2007-10-07T15:57:00.001-05:00

Evidence pointing toward the "young earth" theory grows every day. I find this fascinating, and a recent article brought it to my attention.

According to evolutionary scientists who are dependent upon the "old earth" theory, geological formations such as the Grand Canyon could never have happened over less than thousands, or millions of years. However, the fact is: that they could.

What was perhaps one of the first major pieces of evidence for this possibility was at the Mount St. Hellens' eruption, where geological formations thought to have taken thousands of years to form-such as many "varves," or layers of sediments-were formed right before the eyes of awestruck geologists. ^[1] In recent times, there is even more geological proof-positive that the earth could be just as old, or rather young, as the Bible says it is.

I am writing this article because of an exiguous event that happened right here in the state of Texas. Beginning yesterday, the public will be able to see it for themselves. As recorded by the Associated Press and published by my local newspaper, a 2002 flood caused a canyon to literally be "formed overnight by flooding" in Canyon Lake, here in the great state of Texas. It formed this beautiful, massive structure of nature:
And its happened before:

"The sudden exposure of such canyons is rare but not unprecedented. Flooding in Iowa in 1993 similarly opened a limestone gorge behind a spillway at Corvalville Lake north of Iowa City, but Devonian Fossil Gorge is narrower and shallower than Canyon Lake Gorge."^[2]

With geological evidence continually pointing out that we might want to rethink the age of various significant geological formations, and even of the earth, experts still don't want to admit they might be wrong. A smaller version of the article from my local TV news service, KXAN says this:

"The formation of canyons usually takes thousands or even millions of years."^[3]

I really think its nonsense to continue to governmentally endorse the old-earth theory in public schools, even if the experts insist on making absolute statements like:

"It took water around 5 million to 6 million years to carve the crevasse [of the Grand Canyon] that plunges 6,000 feet at its deepest point and stretches 15 miles at its widest."^[2]

But, then again, I'm not an expert. But Dr. Tas Walker is. Check out what he has to say.^[1]

Resources

[1] Tas Walker. "Geology and the young earth" Creation (September 1999): 21(4). p 16–20. http://www.answersingenesis.org/creation/v21/i4/geology.asp

[2] Michelle Roberts, AP. "Canyon formed overnight by flooding opens to public" Austin American Statesman (October 5 2007). http://www.statesman.com/search/content/gen/ap/TX_New_Canyon.html

[3] Associated Press. "Canyon formed overnight by flooding opens to public" KXAN.com (October 5, 2007). http://www.kxan.com/Global/story.asp?S=7175389

Gorge Preservation Society. "Canyon Lake Gorge" (2007) http://www.canyongorge.org/

Justice: Capital Punishment

2007-10-03T20:59:00.001-05:00

"The most sacred of the duties of a government [is] to do equal and impartial justice to all its citizens."

~Thomas Jefferson (1816). ^[1]

"Texas Justice" has its own legacy, but it is now going through a process of being re-defined in the area of capital punishment. In fact, just "...Tuesday, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals halted the execution of Heliberto Chi... In so doing, the court asked the state prison system to address ongoing questions about... lethal injection..."^[2]

In the wake of this event, Rebeca Chapa, with the San Antonio News-Express, published a Wednesday commentary that starts off by outlining various facts regarding capital punishment in Texas, Kentucky, California, and in the past. It’s a very informative read.

Then, she adopts an editorial air. Chapa denounces all forms of capital punishment:

"At its core, the death penalty is fundamentally flawed. It leaves no room for human error and, more important, you do not kill to prove that killing is wrong. Now is the time for Texas to seriously consider a moratorium — if not an end — to the death penalty."^[2]

I have to disagree. Firstly, when she says “you do not kill to prove that killing is wrong” she misses a critical point. Death is a natural part of life. Last time I checked, there was no punishment for “killing;” just murder. Murder is the act of taking another innocent human's life into your own hands; away from them. It is a violation of the most fundamental natural rights: the right to life. This is the reason that it is not only wrong to murder someone, but an offense within government jurisdiction.

When another's rights are taken, it is government's job to right the wrongs. The question, then, is simply what punishment to administer. I believe that execution is the best punishment to administer in the instance of clear murder.

What is ultimately lacking in Chapa’s proposal is a concrete goal that the justice system should pursue instead. As generally accepted, a successful sentence should promote three goals: 1) Compensation; 2) Punishment; and 3) Deterrence. Since compensation is impossible in the case of murder, we must look to uphold the second two goals.

A sentence must provide adequate punishment in order to maintain justice. "An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth." That phrase is in the Old Testament at least three times; and every time it is used not as a justification for revenge, but as a standard for justice. "Let the punishment fit the crime" is the more generally accepted version. When the crime is murder, the only punishment that will fit it is death.

Finally, what is probably the most important goal of criminal punishment is to deter it from happening again. For most people, there isn’t anything more deterring than facing death itself.

If one looks at the issue in the light of the goals to be accomplished, we can see that, contrary to the opinions expressed by Rebeca Chapa, it is not time for a ban or even a moratorium on capital punishment, because it is still useful in our day to provide punishment and deterrence to the murderers that would otherwise terrorize our streets.

References

[1] Thomas Jefferson to Destutt de Tracy. "Political Economy," (1816) in: Lipscomb and Bergh, ed. The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Memorial Ed. (Washington, D.C.: Public Domain, 1903-04): 14, p 465. http://etext.virginia.edu/jefferson/quotations/jeff0100.htm

[2] Rebeca Chapa. "Innocence is not the only issue in the death penalty debate" San Antonio Express-News. (October 3 2007) http://www.mysanantonio.com/opinion/stories/MYSA100407.02O.Chapa.2140242.html

From MySA: What we take for granted

2007-10-03T20:24:00.000-05:00

An Editorial published the first of this month at San Antonio Express-News touched me because of all the political opportunities that we take for granted.

"More than two years ago, millions of Iraqis went to the polls.
"About 50 never came back, cut down in shootings, mortar attacks and suicide bombings, according to news reports.

"Thousands of miles away, where voters brave nothing more horrendous than long lines at the polls, civic participation is pathetic.

"The contrast between the two nations is startling."

Then, U.S. District Judge Robert Junell decided to do something about it.

"On Nov. 6, Texans will consider 16 proposed constitutional amendments on the ballot, and the turnout for such elections is usually abysmal.

"As Junnell put it, 'Our government doesn't ask a lot from us.' Voting is the least we can do."

All I can say is amen.

Federal issue: Children's healthcare: Robin Hood to the Rescue!

2007-10-02T23:45:00.000-05:00

Children's Health Insurance is a state issue gone federal. Bush has used the veto, going against the modern Robin Hood and good for him. But, on this issue, I am at odds with Heritage. The Heritage foundation would rather that both parties comprimise.

A BCC News article published today says:

US President George W Bush has vetoed a bill to expand a children's healthcare insurance scheme, after it was passed with a large majority in the Senate.

Stuart M. Butler, Ph.D. and Nina Owcharenko, in a policy paper published by the Heritage Foundation, support a "balanced" revision of the SCHIP (State Children's Health Insurance Program):

"Members of Congress should widen the discussion to include other policy ideas that could easily bridge the divide. Senator Mel Martinez (R-FL) and other lawmakers recently started to design a balanced alternative."

So my question is: do you believe in free markets or not? Do you really trust citizens or you you just say you do?

All I can say is don't comprimise. If you believe in the free market and the constitution, then act like it. If you don't, then don't say that you do just to get pro-market votes. In case you were wondering, Robin Hood did not believe in free markets.

I probably could not have said it better than Michael F. Cannon,

"SCHIP is senseless. Like its much larger sibling, Medicaid, the program forces taxpayers to send their money to Washington so that Congress can send it back to state governments with strings attached."

I think Bush is on the right side, on this issue. However, then Bush uses the same Robin Hood rhetoric on whitehouse.gov:

FACT: The President strongly supports SCHIP reauthorization and his 2008 budget proposed to increase SCHIP funding by $5 billion over five years. This is a 20 percent increase over current levels of funding.

FACT: The President's proposal maintains SCHIP's original purpose of targeting dollars to poor children who need them most.

I support giving money to the people that need them most, I just don't support stealing it from others to do it. That's just burglary under a government mask. Seems that both the dems and repubs don't get that. And then Heritage, who loves the free market, wants to comprimise.

Politics, Politics, Politics. :sigh:

What is property?

2007-10-02T11:04:00.000-05:00

On the O'Brian FACTor today, I'm getting a little more pro-active. This is an essay on a subject very near to my heart; property rights. Hope you enjoy! Please feel free to post comments for and against if you feel inclined to do so.

Private Property is a phrase thrown around a lot. Often, we're told of the atrocities eminent domain has claimed against private property. But what is property? James Madison, a man known as the "founder of our constitution" explained to us that private property is a "ketch-all" phrase, that "In its larger and juster meaning, it embraces every thing to which a man may attach a value and have a right..."^[1] Now that is a broad definition.

The founder's love of the right of property was put into the Fifth Amendment in the Bill of Rights with two prohibitions to protect the right of property:

"No person shall [...] be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due
process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just
compensation." ^[2]

Over the years, battles have been fought over what is meant by this clause, and most of it has focused on the right to own land property. Very little has recognized the far-reaching implications of the word "property" as originally intended.

James Madison, who (rather unwillingly) drafted the bill of rights as well as the main body of the constitution, enumerates what he meant by "property" in the essay quoted above. Two main threads come from his broad definition as "'that dominion which one man claims and exercises over the external things of the world, in exclusion of every other individual.'"^[1] The second was inclusive of opinions, speech, etc. The first (which I would like to focus on most) was not only inclusive of land property but, as he stated:

"In the former sense, a man's land, or merchandize, or money is called his property."

Notice, not just his land. Private property rights included money and merchandise. If we may then insert this definition into the Fifth Amendment,

...nor shall private [money or merchandise] be taken for public use,
without just compensation.^[3]

What is taxation? Princeton provides an obvious definition:

"charge against a citizen's person or property or activity for the support of government" ^[4]

Taxation is basically the government charging the people so it can survive; private money taken for public use.

So, then, if the courts would interpret this clause as it was intended to be interpreted, then any tax that did not go back to compensate the individual it had taxed would be unconstitutional by the fifth amendment. This does not mean that the government can't tax people; there just has to be some kind of compensation to every individual who is taxed. It means that government can't constitutionally steal from one person to give to another person. Such "legal plunder" is unjust, should be unconstitutional, and is just plain wrong!

Imagine with me that a lawn service comes to your door, points a gun at your head, forces you to pay them for mowing, and then, the next day, decides that you "aren't qualified" to receive their benefits. Every time the government taxes someone without paying them back with some kind of service, they are doing the exact same thing! Now, imagine with me the Salvation Army coming through your neighborhood to do the same thing. Yes, that's government "charity programs." You can probably spot them; affirmative action, welfare, etc.

This theory of the original meaning of private property has many implications. Ultimately, it has effects on both the feds and each state government as well. It would not only mean a more fair taxation, but also less taxation on both levels.

Let me leave you with the words to Davy Crockett who spoke against forced government charity as a representative from Tennessee before coming to the great state of Texas:

"We have the right as individuals, to give away as much of our own money as we
please in charity; but as members of Congress we have no right to appropriate a
dollar of the public money."^[5]

Then he boldly took this pro-active stance:

"I cannot vote for this bill, but I will give one week's pay [of my own money] to the object[...]"^[5]

Col. Crockett later told a friend that "Money with them [politicians] is nothing but trash when it is to come out of the people."

We should give for charity; but from our own pocket, not another's.

References

[1] James Madison, March 1792. “Property” in William T. Huchinson et al, ed. The Papers of James Madison. (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1962) in: The Founders Constitution, (University of Chicago, 2000) Ch 16. http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/v1ch16s23.html. (accessed 10/2/07)

[2] Bill Of Rights. "Amendment V" (15 December 1791) http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.billofrights.html (accessed 10/2/07)

[3] (paraphrased by me)

[4] WordNet Search "taxation" (Princeton University, 2006) http://wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=taxation (accessed 10/2/07)

[5] David Crockett "Not Yours to Give" (Project Freedom, n.d.) http://www.house.gov/paul/nytg.htm (accessed 10/2/07)

Dallas Tolls and Politics: The eye can be decieved!

2007-09-18T21:56:00.000-05:00

Toll roads are becoming more frequent sight in Texas. Austin now has its own toll road, and it seems like everyone else wants one now! In actuality, the "fact" of the matter is that tolls roads are a very controversial issue in Texas. Some want to do anything to ease traffic, while others insist that their taxes should be able to cover roadways and don't want the inconvenience. Hyperbolic statements, rather than statements of fact, can be found on both sides of the ally.

This article from the Dallas Morning News is about a fight over a specific toll road in Dallas called Trinity River. This article is important because it is a good representation of why the people of Texas need to do serious investigation into stories before believing everything they see. To quote the story:

"This is just one more example of gross misrepresentations by the proponents of this project," Ms. Hunt [the toll road's leading opponent] said. "Their pretty drawings show a forest of trees on the levees, and all this plush landscaping – trees and bushes and flowers. It looks lovely. But the median won't look so lovely when it's two more lanes of asphalt. And the only trees we're going to get are a few potted crape myrtles."1

When the toll road campaign was launched, several video and drawings were released showing a beautiful road with a green lush median and trees stretching across it. It turns out that, as it was stated by Ms. Hunt and admitted by members of the Dallas City staff, asphalt with a couple potted plants is more likely.

It is a classic example of political manipulation. This article well exemplifies why it is important to verify any information received against the facts! It is definitely a worthy read, especially for those who may be directly impacted by the toll road.

Citation
Dave Levinthal and Bruce Tomaso. “Fight over Trinity toll road starts at the drawing board” The Dallas Morning News. (September 18 2007) http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/091907dnmettrinity.34f69b7.html

Quotes

2007-09-13T11:38:00.000-05:00

Alright. Its been more than a week and its about time that I got some quotes, so I'm going to double up.

You know what, I think I'm going to put this on the main page of my blog: (We'll see)

"Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence." ~John Adams, "Argument in Defense of the Soldiers in the Boston Massacre Trials" (December 1770).

I love the idea behind this, but its a bit wordy, so see if you can get it:

"Liberty is to faction what air is to fire, an aliment without which it instantly expires. But it could not be less folly to abolish liberty, which is essential to political life, because it nourishes faction, than it would be to wish the annihilation of air, which is essential to animal life, because it imparts to fire its destructive agency." ~James Madison, "Federalist Paper No 10" (November 22 1787)

We'll throw in one funny one for good measure: "My fellow Americans. I'm pleased to announce that I've signed legislation outlawing the Soviet Union. We begin bombing in five minutes." ~Ronald Reagan.

He didn't seriously say that. According to Daniel Kurtzman, he made this joke during a mic check without knowing he was being broad-casted. I thought it was hilarious, and shows Reagan's light-hearted spirit. Apparently, someone didn't think it was that funny. Oh, well. I just think its important to be lighthearted every now and then. Just as long as you still understand what's really important.

Welcome!

2007-08-28T23:24:00.001-05:00

"Only lay down true principles, and adhere to them inflexibly. Do not be frightened into their surrender by the alarms of the timid, or the croakings of wealth..."

~Thomas Jefferson in a letter to Samuel Adams, 1816, http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=459

First thing is first: the totally awesome government quote for the week: (this one actually applies to more than just government, but I include it because all my government philosophy is based upon it; we should have principles that guide every policy, and those principles should not change)
Note right here: I will always include citations for the quotes I find. That's the research geek coming out in me. :-)

Welcome to my government weblog! This is really here because its part of my homework for my TX and Local Government class that I'll be taking at my local Community College with Seago. I hope this can become more than that as I share with you my passion for research, government, and most importantly: THE FACTS! (In case you where wondering, I'm going to say that over and over and over again.)

Respecting the facts starts by respecting the truth. This is a much ignored point in our society. I think the main reason is that we don't have the definition of truth. In John 14:6, Jesus tells us that he is "...the way, the truth and the life." Now, just because he said it doesn't automatically mean its right; there are many more reasons why Jesus has proven himself to be the truth; maybe I can go into those later. I do, however, hope that this blog is approachable for non-Christians, too.
I believe that where I posit, those who do not share the same convictions on Jesus can still agree. It's logical to assume that the truth is logical all the way around, right? I just thought I should give credit where credit is due.