Enlightened insights taken from the past week’s reading:
"Antifa’s absolutism brings to mind Finley Peter Dunne’s definition of a fanatic as 'someone who does what the Lord would do if He knew the facts of the case.' Antifa and any other group should be allowed to publicly denounce President Trump as a fascist, tyrant, or serial golf score cheater. But if the entire nation becomes like Portland, tacitly permitting masked Antifa attackers to maim who they please, American democracy is doomed."
James Bovard
"The War on Drugs is unwinnable because you can't defeat a desire. And that is just what the pharmaceuticals are counting on: your desire for a cure. And the only group legally allowed to tell you they have a cure for any disease is Big Pharma.
An unwinnable war results in never-ending profits. No one ever evaluates the success or failure of this 'war' and the propaganda machine that pumps out scientific research paid for by the manufacturers and feeds the results to the media mouthpieces. They dutifully 'inform' the public of all the new diseases created out of convenience, and all the drug cures that Big Pharma so happens to have developed. Anyone who questions the validity of the narrative is deemed insane, a 'quack'."
Bob Livingston
"You will not hear the mainstream media or even much of the alternative media talk about the real solutions to elitist criminality or government corruption. You won't hear about these solutions because they are hard; they require struggle and sacrifice. Voting is easy, which is why it does not work. Legislation is easy, which is why it does not work. And, protesting with signs on a street corner is easy, and it might spread the word on an issue, but ultimately it does not work. The corruption remains.
There are two options left; walk away peacefully from the system and build one that works on your own or with others of like mind. If you are successful, then expect the corrupt system and the elites behind it to try and stop you. When this happens, the only option left is to fight back and remove the threat. This is where we are inevitably headed, not because we want it, but because they will force the issue."
Brandon Smith
"If Big Tech and Big Government jointly establish speech rules, it goes against the First Amendment. What else happens? It freezes out the new competitors or potential competitors, because they are forced into adopting the new 'industry' rules and standards. Their comparative advantage in hosting wild and woolly free speech disappears. They can’t attract their clienteles. Big Tech becomes a government-born cartel or monopoly.
Big Tech is NOT at present a monopoly, because anyone can start a new social media platform. It’s already happening. Conservatives, stop! Look! Listen! Do not again do the wrong thing by falling into the big government trap."
Michael Rozeff
"As the drunkard cannot see beyond the next drink… democracy cannot see past the next election."
Brian Maher
"The CIA – along with the NSA, the DEA, and a bunch of others – should be abolished, because the CIA has become an actual Praetorian guard. It’s become a government within a government. They have their own armed forces, they have their own sources of income. You can go rogue within the CIA, and if you’re powerful enough or clever enough you can basically do what you want because you’re an armed government agent that’s a member of a very powerful group.
These people are completely out of control. And they have a powerful propaganda machine that works around the clock to convince ignorant and paranoid Boobus americanus that they’re actually good guys, working for his interests against the rest of the world."
Doug Casey
"We should reject any restriction on free speech. We might ask ourselves, 'What’s the true test of one’s commitment to free speech?' It does not come when people permit others to say or publish ideas with which they agree. The true test of one’s commitment to free speech comes when others are permitted to say and publish ideas they deem offensive.
The test for one’s commitment to freedom of association is similar. Christian Americans have been hounded for their refusal to cater same-sex weddings. For those who support such attacks, we might ask them whether they would seek prosecution of the owner of a Jewish delicatessen who refused to provide services for a neo-Nazi affair. Should a black catering company be forced to cater a Ku Klux Klan affair? Should the NAACP be forced to open its membership to racist skinheads? Should the Congressional Black Caucus be forced to open its membership to white members of Congress? The true test of a person’s commitment to freedom of association does not come when he permits people to associate in ways he finds acceptable. It comes when he permits people to voluntarily associate in ways he deems offensive."
Walter Williams
"'Truth' is essential to the economic means in order that the parties have precision in the property interests being exchanged, as well as other terms of the contract. Because political activity is grounded in lies, exaggerations, deceptions, and corrupt practices, truth is largely an irrelevant factor. To the politically driven in a thoroughly politicized world, a lie is as good as the truth as long as people believe it!
Given the inherent dishonesty that is the nature of all political systems, the state is constantly engaged in protecting its secrets from being disclosed to the world. Documents or other information are routinely 'classified' in varying levels of secrecy, largely to protect the state from being embarrassed by the public being made aware of its criminal, unethical, or other untoward acts. This is why Julian Assange, Chelsea Manning, Ed Snowden, and the Wikileaks organization – persons I refer to as Aletheians, after Aletheia the Greek goddess of truth – are enemies of the state and must be destroyed. In silencing such persons, the state further weakens what little credibility it enjoys with a public that remains attached to the sentiment that the world should make sense, as judged by the standard of truth."
Butler Shaffer
"Egalitarianism under the best circumstances becomes hypocrisy; if sincerely accepted and believed in, its menace is greater. Then all actual inequalities appear without exception to be unjust, immoral, intolerable. Hatred, unhappiness, tension, a general maladjustment is the result. The situation is even worse when brutal efforts are made to establish equality through a process of artificial leveling ('social engineering') which can only be done by force, restrictions, or terror, and the outcome is a complete loss of liberty."
Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn
"It’s no small feat to recognize that freedom is not something granted to the individual from somewhere up above.
But something for which it requires the individual to consciously accept responsibility.
And to own completely his or her own massive power as a free individual.
Because the REAL truth is…
We are already free.
And nothing, not even tyranny, is more gut-wrenchingly horrifying than that."
Chris Campbell
"Kill one man, and you are a murderer. Kill millions of men, and you are a conqueror. Kill them all, and you are a god."
Jean Rostand
"Whatever privileges of regulation and subsidy and patent protection and business contracts that the Big Tech giants currently have, these should be removed. Their presence doesn’t justify further intrusion of government, which denies the property rights of everyone.
And the government construction of 'civil' rights also doesn’t justify extending them into new areas of regulation and thereby destroying rights and creating privileges."
Michael Rozeff
"To do any legitimate study of U.S. aggression would take one back to the very beginning, but the past 120 years have seen the continued slaughter of innocents as a normality of the American way of life. I say this because the masses have for the most part supported this indiscriminate killing, and lauded those responsible for the carnage. There were of course dissenters from this norm, but in the end, they were mostly marginalized or worse. Those who do not tow the line of the military today are in many cases ridiculed. And given that every major event, especially sporting events, display 300 foot U.S. flags, military jets, and military personnel ad nauseam, including the recent presidential spectacle, a parade dubbed the 'military show of a lifetime,' the devotion shown by the spectators is nothing less than unadulterated worship."
Gary D Barnett
"Unthinking respect for authority is the greatest enemy of truth."
Albert Einstein
"Those who learn don’t seek to rule. Those who seek to rule don’t learn."
Jeff Thomas
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