Entries from June 2005 ↓

As you pass through my blog today, please consider signing this petition for redress of greivances, which demands the impeachment of the five SCOTUS justices who voted against property rights for American citizens, and by doing so, spit on the Constitution of the United States of America and all those who have died for the freedoms we enjoy.

Show your support for seizing the home of Supreme Court Justice David H. Souter.

Press Release

For Release Monday, June 27 to New Hampshire media
For Release Tuesday, June 28 to all other media

Weare, New Hampshire (PRWEB) Could a hotel be built on the land owned by Supreme Court Justice David H. Souter? A new ruling by the Supreme Court which was supported by Justice Souter himself itself might allow it. A private developer is seeking to use this very law to build a hotel on Souter’s land.

Justice Souter’s vote in the “Kelo vs. City of New London” decision allows city governments to take land from one private owner and give it to another if the government will generate greater tax revenue or other economic benefits when the land is developed by the new owner.

On Monday June 27, Logan Darrow Clements, faxed a request to Chip Meany the code enforcement officer of the Towne of Weare, New Hampshire seeking to start the application process to build a hotel on 34 Cilley Hill Road. This is the present location of Mr. Souter’s home.

Clements, CEO of Freestar Media, LLC, points out that the City of Weare will certainly gain greater tax revenue and economic benefits with a hotel on 34 Cilley Hill Road than allowing Mr. Souter to own the land.

The proposed development, called “The Lost Liberty Hotel” will feature the “Just Desserts Café” and include a museum, open to the public, featuring a permanent exhibit on the loss of freedom in America. Instead of a Gideon’s Bible each guest will receive a free copy of Ayn Rand’s novel “Atlas Shrugged.”

Clements indicated that the hotel must be built on this particular piece of land because it is a unique site being the home of someone largely responsible for destroying property rights for all Americans.

“This is not a prank” said Clements, “The Towne of Weare has five people on the Board of Selectmen. If three of them vote to use the power of eminent domain to take this land from Mr. Souter we can begin our hotel development.”

Clements’ plan is to raise investment capital from wealthy pro-liberty investors and draw up architectural plans. These plans would then be used to raise investment capital for the project. Clements hopes that regular customers of the hotel might include supporters of the Institute For Justice and participants in the Free State Project among others.

# # #

Logan Darrow Clements
Freestar Media, LLC

Phone 310-593-4843
logan@freestarmedia.com
http://www.freestarmedia.com

I’m making lists of Top Tens, which I’ll archive and continue to adjust as I age. Here are my top ten personal beliefs:

1. Some lives are worth more than others.
2. Discrimination is a healthy survival trait.
3. Groups that protect the individual succeed. Those that don’t are doomed.
4. Citizenship should be earned, not a birthright.
5. Using force to redistribute income is evil.
6. I am responsible for the consequences of the choices I make.
7. Self-defense is my right and I’m willing to protect myself.
8. Technology is a double edged weapon.
9. Education is a holy endeavor.
10. Who owns you? Why you do, that’s who.

Thursday’s decision by the Supreme Court that any government body can take your home and give it to a developer is disgraceful and an embarassment to anyone who has ever claimed that Americans are a free people.

When I got to work this morning, I asked Fred—the 61-year old retired Marine Master Sergeant that I share an office with—what he thought about the decision. ‘Someone’s going to get shot’, was Fred’s straight answer.”

–Urban Grounds

Property taxes are bad enough, forcing you to rent your land from local government, and allowing them to take the land anytime you fail to pay. So you were already renting from the government. But until now, if you paid those taxes, in most cases, you couldn’t be driven out. Not so anymore. Now any developer and city council that decide they want your most valuable possession, your home and property, can take it by force. I’m enraged and disgusted by this decision.

It was a close call, with 5 traitorous justices making a decision that robs millions of Americans of the dearly held principle that a man’s home is his castle. I don’t use the term traitor lightly, but it is the only one that fits here. These five human beings are saying it’s OK for government to seize private property merely because it wants too. I thought theft was illegal. These traitors say otherwise.

I might as well make a list:

Traitor #1 - John Paul Stevens
Traitor #2 - Anthony Kennedy
Traitor #3 - Stephen G. Breyer
Traitor #4 - David A. Souter
Traitor #5 - Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Read the bios of your non-elected overlords, these five betrayers of the American ideal that any American property owner, no matter how weak or poor, is secure in his or her property. They’re nothing but enablers for greed and theft. If it were up to me, they would be replaced immediately and barred from further “public service.”

IO Error’s take on the decision.
Liberty for Sale speaks out.
Urban Grounds thinks someone’s going to get shot.

Join the Castle Coalition now and fight the government robbers who want to invade your domain.

If some things are worth dying for, and I think they are, property rights are on the list of those things. SCOTUS, you are being warned by many voices, and should listen carefully before you write a check you cannot cash. Why, oh why, are fools lining up in droves to help break down freedoms that made America a beacon for the rest of humanity? Something’s gonna give, and soon. A nation divided cannot stand, and we’re setting ourselves up for a nasty fall.

In a politically correct environment the rules make about as much sense as dipping your genitals into boiling water because “I was bored” would. I understand that there are dumb people in the world, and that I have to live with them from time to time. What I don’t understand is why we allow them to make rules about how we fly.

If you are the government, and you have issued rifles and pistols to your troops, and they will be flying with those rifles and pistols, how does it make sense to take away their nose hair clippers and lighters, as well as other “dangerous” items, while you ferry them like herd cattle into a combat zone where they may well die?

A lot of the energy in our national discourse as of late has been dedicated to complaining about desecration of various items like flags and holy books. The definition of desecration is: “blasphemous behavior; the act of depriving something of its sacred character.”

I submit to you, the reader, that by handing our servicepeople pistols and rifles and then taking away their nose hair clippers, lighters and knives, we are desecrating them. We are mocking their willingness to give up their lives voluntarily so that we can walk around fat, happy and ignorant. And that disgusts me. Stop the insanity by speaking out against this nonsense.

I love this country, and I’m willing to fight for it, but let me keep my goddamn pocketknife, you idiots. It comes in handy on the battlefield.

Bruce Schneier comments on this topic.

For the record, I believe that those who want to make burning the U.S. flag illegal are as emotionally immature as the ragtag bands of fanatical Muslims who run around screaming and rioting when they hear someone might have desecrated the Koran.

My advice to Orrin Hatch and cronies - grow up, you’re wasting time on bullshit that does nothing to actually advance the cause of America. In case you’ve forgotten, we used to advertise ourselves as the land of the free and the home of the brave, so please stop trying to make us the land of the regulated and the home of the legislative. It’s gotten fairly idiotic.

I am a member of the armed forces of this proud nation, and I would like to say that I support everyone’s right to burn flags, books and bras, or whatever else suits your fancy as long as you didn’t steal whatever it is you’re burning, and as long as you control the fire.

Being able to burn something in protest is an exercise of political free speech, and should be tolerated by a nation of free people, even when we disagree with the motivations behind the actions. You can no more desecrate a flag than you can desecrate a book.

How about spending the time you spent worrying about the flag possibly being burned working on ways to support the troops in Iraq and bring them home as quickly as possible? That would be a nice change.

The clearest indicator of a nation leaning towards facism authoritarianism is when it starts to imprison those engaged in peaceful dissent. An authoritarian government is incompatible with a nation of free people.

Visit the Flag Burning Page.

Don’t worry - the government only does good things for good reasons. You can relax. Someone else will take care of it.

That’s why it shouldn’t bother you that the Transportation Security Administration is saying one thing and doing another, in violation of directives specifically given to it by Congress. I’m not a big fan of either body, but the TSA does report to Congress, and is bound by law to follow mandates that Congress issues to it. So it’s no big deal that the TSA lied and gathered a “test database” about every single traveler in the United States during June 2004. Don’t worry, all that data is safe and will only be used for “official purposes.” Yeah, right.

Some people call me paranoid. Maybe I am. But I don’t want government to know any more than it needs to about me. It already knows way too much.

Others comment on the TSA’s abuse of government authority:

Prometheus - Hey, you think you’re processing credit cards here?
Billville - Transportation Security Administration Collected Airline Passenger Data Without Public Knowledge
Secondary Screening - More Questions about TSA and Privacy

The TSA isn’t looking for the right things, can’t find what it is looking for (I know, because I test) and won’t stop a determined terrorist(s). But honestly, how many of you think the next terrorist event in the U.S. will be plane related?

I flew to Dallas from Atlanta on Monday, and as I was shuffling through the security lines next to a dignified older couple, the man leaned over to me as he was struggling to put his shoe back on and said, “I think the terrorists have already won.” He’s right.

By causing the creation of the TSA, the terrorists scored a major victory in the war against freedom and liberty in America.

Perspective is an interesting thing. I present as evidence this joke found on an Iraqi’s blog. (edited for grammar)

An old Arab lived close to New York City for more than 40 years. He would have loved to plant potatoes in his garden, but he is alone, old and weak. His son is in college in Paris, so the old man sends him an e-mail. He explains the problem: “Beloved son, I am very sad, because I can’t plant potatoes in my garden. I am sure, if only you were here, you would help and dig up the garden for me, I love you, Your Father”

A day later, the old man receives another e-mail from his son. “Beloved Father, I hope the garden is dug up by now and you can plant your potatoes. That’s all I could do for you from here. I love you, Ahmed.”

Perspective. It colors everything we do, and everything we are.

I found an interesting blogging tool called Nucleus that is a) open source and b) claims to have built in anti comment spam capabilities.

However, the demo had been hacked. That’s a potentially discouraging sign.

I’m pretty sure the real admin has no interest in adding an entry consisting of the above information. I’ll keep my eye on them though, because comment spam is the venereal disease of blogging.

As you’re reading in the post-E3 buzz, Civilization IV is getting better and better. The game is nearly complete, and right now you can play a quite satisfying single or multi-player game.

So says the Firaxis web site’s Spring 2005 Behind the Scenes letter. I am a huge fan of every version of Civilization thus far. I have fond memories of countless hours spent exploring the world in Civ I, and I’m looking forward to seeing what Civ VI might have to offer.

In fact, I love the Civilization series so much, I’ve requested an interview with Firaxis regarding the upcoming release of Civilization VI. Whether or not they want to talk to a lowly blogger remains to be seen, but I’m hoping for some inside juice on what to expect.

Read an early review of the game.

One of the features I’m greatly looking forward to is the expanded trade system:

The system has been greatly expanded with the addition of many more resources, all of which are tradable. Some of the new resources, like marble, help to increase wonder production, some are food resources (these help with the overall health of your cities), and some, such as iron or copper, allow you to build certain types of units.

–Barry Caudill

I’ve always thought trade should play a more vital role in the game, and it sounds like Firaxis is going to coddle me this time around. Another promising change is the Alliance victory. If two players can work cooperatively on-line, maybe I can get my wife interested in playing this game with me. That would be awesome.

I feel a little bit like I’m seven years old again, and it’s Christmas Eve. It’s likely I’ll be in Iraq when the game is actually released, but I am willing to jump through whatever hoops necessary to get a copy of Civilization 4, even if I’m halfway around the world.

Look for an in-depth review to be posted here when I do.

While you’re waiting, don’t forget to visit the best Civilization series info source & forum on the Internet - Civ Fanatics.