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"It has been 384 years since America’s first Thanksgiving. As I sit down this year with my family to give thanks for all the bounty in my life, I will give special thanks for my ability to obtain natural health products and services to help me work toward better health."
http://www.newswithviews.com/Dean/carolyn21.htm
"Norway, with the highest gun ownership rate in Western Europe, has the lowest murder rate--far below England's. The only European nation that bans all guns, Luxembourg, has the highest murder rate (except for Russia): 30 percent higher than the U.S. and ten times that of gun-dense Norway."
http://www.independent.org/newsroom/article.asp?id=1621
"Home-schoolers are a direct challenge to the public-school monopoly. This monopoly makes it almost impossible to fire tenured public-school teachers or principals. As a result, tenure gives most teachers life-time guaranteed jobs. They get this incredible benefit only because public schools have a lock on our children’s education."
http://www.americandaily.com/article/10357
"Now, the arrest of someone -- an 18-year old legal adult, mind you -- merely for possessing -- off campus -- a story, written for English class -- that is verboten for 'involving a school or function' -- and treating the offense as a felony is not something that should happen in a sane society, let alone a free one. For his work of fiction, this young man was dragged off to the police station as if he had committed a criminal act. The judge set his bond at $5,000."
http://www.fff.org/freedom/fd0508e.asp
"But while Americans bicker incessantly over pedagogical teachings, we seldom fight over theological ones. The difference, of course, is that the Bill of Rights precludes the establishment of an official religion. Our founding fathers were prescient in calling for the separation of church and state, but failed to foresee the dire social consequences of entangling education and state. Those consequences are now all too apparent."
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=5214
"Imagine ... a tired and lonely old man. For one reason or another, he has no wife, no family, no one to help fill the final years of his life with something other than loneliness, despair, and sadness. The only bright moment in his existence is an hour spent in a theater showing dirty movies. It's all he's got and all he ever will have. What kind of evil person would take what little he has away from him?"
http://www.ncc-1776.org/tle2005/tle346-20051120-02.html
"I visualize an exponentially growing number of 'sleepers.' We'll rock no boats, we'll bust no guts. We'll go about doing ordinary jobs, keeping heads low and harming none. Some will actually work for government! We'll have to, for a large portion of the jobs open will be in the Parasite Sector, not the Productive Sector. But every one will have learned what freedom is like, and will be cultivating a powerful thirst for it, biding our moment."
http://www.strike-the-root.com/52/davies/davies8.html
"Labor unionism, rightly understood -- and practiced absent criminality or state intervention -- is not 'anti-market.' It's part of the market. Specifically, it is a type of cartelization (much like that allegedly outlawed by the anti-trust laws -- which, last time I checked, libertarians usually oppose). Labor -- much to the chagrin of Marx et al -- is, for market purposes, a commodity. Like any good or service, it may be bought, sold, rented, leased and otherwise traded. ... And like all scarce commodities, it may be profitable for its sellers to, as best possible, 'corner the market' by aggregating large enough quantities of it so as to jack the price up."
http://www.fmnn.com/Analysis/118/2970/2005-11-22.asp?nid=2970&wid=118
"According to a weepy article in [the] ... Washington Times, migrant women are frequently being raped as they attempt to cross the border between Mexico and the US, sometimes by the very men they have paid to protect them on their journey."
http://www.anti-state.com/blog/?p=29
"Yet because the central government is weak, the various ethnic groups have less fear that one group--such as the Serbs in the former Yugoslavia--could get control of the levers of power and oppress or murder the other groups. Although Bosnia has an uneasy peace, this decentralization probably at least somewhat inhibits the return to civil war."
http://www.independent.org/newsroom/article.asp?id=1620
An interesting page at an interesting site: "The operating principle of a world no longer based on industrial production will be decentralization. From survivalists to confederated villages, governance will be on a smaller scale than it is today. -- Editors " You may not agree with everything there, but the site has much food for thought.
http://www.optoutamerica.com/secession.html
"Earlier this year, the PQ [Parti Quebecois] formally adopted the position that Quebec can unilaterally declare independence one day after a successful referendum on sovereignty, even if that vote is decided by a single 'Yes' ballot."
http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/story.html?id=0fd55088-f5e8-4fbd-81b7-71093924783f&k=75700
"If there is a war between 'the terrorists' and the U.S. government, why should the Iraqi people be made to pay the price for such a war? Why should their homeland be devastated, their people killed, their museums ransacked, their economy destroyed, and their entire nation thrown into chaos and conflict? What did they have to do with the war between the U.S. government and the 'terrorists'?"
http://www.fff.org/comment/com0511h.asp
"The worst transgression was the Bush administration's decision to deceive our nation in order to use a war in Iraq to pursue an undeclared agenda in the Middle East. Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld committed treason. They still have not told us the real reason they were so determined to invade Iraq that they used falsified intelligence to justify a war of aggression. We must find out their real agenda and hold them fully accountable for their crimes."
http://www.counterpunch.org/roberts11212005.html
"In a different prison location, where there was a hole in the floor in which to urinate, thicker tubes were inserted into prisoners' noses; and when one was removed from Al Shehri's nose, Julia Tarver wrote (in another passage quoted by Judge Kessler), 'blood came gushing out of him. He fainted, and several of the other detainees almost lost consciousness'."
http://villagevoice.com/news/0547,hentoff,70204,6.html
"For those unaware, when a worm is exposed to light, it typically writhes and thrashes wildly in a vain attempt to quickly acquire cover. It's a curious sight, this random, and often pointless, expenditure of energy. Sometimes it's downright amusing. Actually, other creatures of the dark do similar things. Observe the actions of salamanders, snakes and sewer rats. When their cover is blown, they scurry, scamper and slither posthaste back into the darkness."
http://www.strike-the-root.com/52/zervas/zervas2.html
"That, of course, is how we got into this war in the first place -- and, if we keep playing by those rules, we'll never get out. The 'debate' will pit Bush and Rumsfeld against the me-too tag-team of Pelosi and Kerry, forever bickering over how to 'win' and whether the president needs to report on his 'progress' -- with the fundamental rightness of the mission never in dispute, not even for a moment."
http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=8093
"From a military and strategic standpoint, 'the mission' as defined by the President, and as authorized by Congress, was essentially completed before we ever set foot in Iraq. But certainly, at the time of Bush's speech from the USS Lincoln, our military had removed any chance that Iraqi was a threat to American interests. The dreaded weapons were gone, the Iraqi Army was utterly vanquished, and most of the leaders of the 'outlaw regime' were either dead or in jail."
http://www.newswithviews.com/Brownlow/david50.htm
"In the Internet we see the key to diminishing the power and status of the state and liberating ourselves from its oppression and deception. ... The Internet is proof of libertarianism in action. In this unregulated sector of society, we have seen more progress and changes and improvements than in any other sector in any comparably short period of time. No other invention went so far so quickly. And all of it rests on the economic principles of spontaneous order that we have been touting for years, but had to wait until now to see fully realized."
http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig/garris3.html
"Should our monetary system be reformed so that it is based on a pure gold coin standard? Yes it should. This would be the single best reform we could make for the cause of freedom. Its commercial benefits include stability, predictability, and honesty in finance. Its moral benefits include a financial system that does not reward living beyond one's means. From the point of view of government, a gold standard would tie the hands of the state. They could wish and long for wars, welfare, foreign aid, bailouts, subsidies, and graft, but unless they could raise the money by taxing, all their talk would be pointless."
http://www.mises.org/story/1971
"Any discussion of gold always comes back to certain basic questions: Why is gold money? Why is gold valuable? Why can't money be whatever we say it is? (The last question is usually asked by government officials because they don't know the answers to the first two.) Why does gold give rise to all kinds of controversy not associated with, say, platinum or lead? Why is the stuff an emotional, political statement for those who love it and for those who hate it?"
http://www.freemarketnews.com/Analysis/153/3000/2005-11-24.asp?wid=153&nid=3000
"Who benefits from pasteurization laws beside government bureaucrats? Why, the large corporate dairy operations do! ... The government not only benefits from merely growing in size and power, but also from pleasing [its] many private sector johns. We, the people, don't mean a damn to them. We are here solely to be put to work, bled dry, and coaxed to vote for various representatives of the ruling class every few years."
http://freemanlc.blogspot.com/2005/11/beware-of-fiendish-diabolical-agents.html
"This would be a less severe problem if all government did was protect life and property. Even then, taxation would not be justified, but at least the government would not be in the advocacy business generally as it is today. Since the state has its hands in everything, it is able to take stands on everything."
http://www.fff.org/freedom/fd0508b.asp
"[B]y labeling these normal personality traits of children a 'disease,' public school authorities in many states can now pressure parents to give their children mind-altering drugs to make the kids 'behave' in class. This is a classic case of blaming the victim, the children, for public schools' education deficit disorder."
http://www.newswithviews.com/Turtel/joel3.htm
"As Murray Rothbard explained in 'The Anatomy of the State,' the state cannot persist and expand through force alone; it needs the tacit consent of the people. Nothing bamboozles the people out of their consent like a war." A great speech which has so many quotables that I chose the first words as being the easiest solution.
http://www.lewrockwell.com/gregory/gregory98.html
"The attributes of war have always been: A) financed by theft (taxation, usually accompanied by inflation) B) almost total disregard for the rights (life, liberty, property) of innocent non-combatants. The few exceptions to this seem to be weak attempts to preserve "historic" buildings. These usually do not belong to private entities. C) no one is held accountable for the violations of rights."
http://www.sunnimaravillosa.com/archives/00000533.html
"The Democrats, however, are proving to be the Avian Flu of the antiwar movement. They are willing to divvy out just enough fodder in hopes of luring in the antiwar crowd, and then they strike."
http://www.counterpunch.org/frank11212005.html
"This off-and-on engagement with history isn't of mere academic interest; as the dominant imperial power of the moment, U.S. elites have a clear stake in the contemporary propaganda value of that history. Obscuring bitter truths about historical crimes helps perpetuate the fantasy of American benevolence, which makes it easier to sell contemporary imperial adventures -- such as the invasion and occupation of Iraq -- as another benevolent action."
http://www.counterpunch.org/jensen11212005.html
"When I entered VMI as a freshman in 1968, which was at the height of the Vietnam War, I was as innocent and naïve as 18-year-olds today serving in the U.S. military. The last thing that entered my mind was that federal officials would lie, especially about something as important as war."
http://www.lewrockwell.com/hornberger/hornberger68.html
"R.C. Hoiles['] ... influence has been great, but little-studied. His consistency during invasions of civil liberties (such as the incarceration of Japanese-Americans during WWII), his strident opposition to public school education (his frequently quoted '21 Ways[".].. is below), and his advocacy of individual rights has no match in the newspaper business."
http://classicalliberalism.blogspot.com/2005/11/rc.html
"High above the valley city of Muzaffarabad, the view is at once terrible and awesome. Stretching for miles along both sides of the turbid Jhelum River is what's left of a major city --- in every direction piles of rubble and dust and glass, still hiding thousands of corpses, with all the standing structures giant deathtraps mined with fatal cracks."
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/_/id/8829219
"In Fallujah, it was widely reported that the US, after encircling the city in preparation for its assault, refused to allow such Iraqi males to leave the doomed city and left them to their fate as the assault began (a war crime, since under the rules of war anyone, inclulding combatants, must be allowed to surrender and leave the field of battle)--an assault that included the use of phosphorus bombs."
http://www.counterpunch.org/lindorff11262005.html
"The public call by Pennsylvania Democrat John Murtha, a 37-year Marine Corps veteran who has been generally pro-military and hawkish, for a prompt beginning to withdrawal of U.S. military forces from Iraq has served as something of a catalyst for what was bound to happen soon anyway: a national debate or discussion on what to do about Iraq and perhaps about U.S. foreign policy in the near future."
http://www.antiwar.com/bock/?articleid=8149
"In creating these famous works Toulouse-Lautrec greatly advanced the art of color lithography. His surviving drawings and sketches for the posters give the effect of speed and casualness, but in fact they represent a painstaking discipline and mastery in their extended use of line and reduction to essentials. The linear and uncluttered appearance of these works, as well as their flat, almost two-dimensional quality, owed much to Japanese art."
http://www.discoverfrance.net/France/Art/Lautrec/Lautrec.shtml
"After several years as an itinerant pianist playing in saloons and brothels throughout the Midwest, he settled in St. Louis about 1890. There he studied and led in the development of a music genre now known as ragtime--a unique blend of European classical styles combined with African American harmony and rhythm."
http://www.lsjunction.com/people/joplin.htm
"The confusion of Dangerfield's stage persona with his real-life personality was a conception that he long resented. Described by his wife as 'classy, gentlemanly, sensitive and intelligent' [1], people who met the comedian nonetheless treated him as the belligerent loser whose character he adopted in performance. In 2004, Dangerfield's autobiography, It's Not Easy Bein' Me: A Lifetime of No Respect but Plenty of Sex and Drugs (ISBN 0066211077) was published. The book's original title was My Love Affair With Marijuana, a reference to the drug he smoked daily for sixty years."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rodney_Dangerfield
Historical drama stars Sally Field, Danny Glover, John Malkovich, Lindsay Crouse, Ed Harris and Amy Madigan, directed by Robert Benton. "Places In The Heart explores human love in many of its various forms. In addition to telling a compelling story, each major character with their relationships shows some aspect of love. ... Some instances are 'sacred' and some are 'profane,' but all are part of human life and presented in a quietly powerful manner."
http://endervidualism.com/agora/places_heart_1984.htm
"The cast will get the chance to say thanks to their fans face to face at the Big Damn Flanvention ..., which is being held December 9-11 in Burbank, CA. The actors have appeared at various comic and sci-fi conventions throughout the summer as part of the promotional activities for the movie, but this will be the first solely-Firefly/Serenity convention held in the US." I wish I could be there. If you are near Burbank, this looks like fun.
http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art37761.asp
"Cold War writers like Philip K. Dick, Ursula K. Le Guin, and Samuel R. Delany had to find radical new ways to express their inexpressible hopes about the future, claims Jameson. At this moment of neoliberal triumphalism, he suggests, we should take these writers seriously - even if their ideas are packaged inside lurid paperbacks."
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2005/11/20/back_to_utopia/?page=1
Leader of the free world -- Flash animated Cartoon
http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0548,fiore,70398,9.html
Dubya pouts, Cheney scowls, no one brings pie -- and why is Rove looking at Barb that way? Adult satire.
http://www.sfgate.com/columnists/morford/
We'll tell you whatever you want! Just stop with the talking points!
http://www.comedycentral.com/sitewide/media_player/play.jhtml?itemId=24906
"Nothing that I have written can possibly be reasonably construed as a denial of individual responsibility. But it is not a denial of that responsibility to acknowledge the simple, uncontestable reality that culture matters. It matters a lot. But for many libertarians, none of this is to be discussed. And libertarians wonder why they aren't more successful. ... Those cultural issues are profoundly important. We do not grow up or live in a vacuum; we grow up and live in a particular society at a particular time. "
http://powerofnarrative.blogspot.com/2005/11/in-praise-of-contextual-libertarianism.html
"Any action by the state to impose a uniform standard of quality..., across the board, necessarily eliminates [it] as a competitive issue between firms. Thus, the industry is partially cartelized, to the very same extent that would have happened had all the firms in it adopted a uniform level of quality standards, and agreed to stop competing in that area."
http://mutualist.blogspot.com/2005/11/corporate-liberalism-at-microsoft.html
"For a government to arise it is necessary that one of these judges or arbitrators succeed in establishing himself as a monopolist. That is, he must be able to insist that no citizen can choose anyone but him as the judge or arbitrator of last resort, and he must successfully suppress any other judge or arbitrator from trying to assume the same role (thereby competing against him)."
http://www.mises.org/story/1959
"What I think bugs me most about Necessary? is that Dowd doesn't give enough credit to men. I know many husbands who revel in their wives' intellect and professional achievements."
http://www.sptimes.com/2005/11/20/Columns/Gender_s_chaotic_batt.shtml
"Why is Maureen hermetically single? For starters, she is not just now your classic hot ticket. She's not just over the hill, but into the mountains, to Grandmother's house we go. She probably gets more daily maintenance than a 747, but she still looks as though a vocational school held an injection-molding contest and everyone lost. That leaves her with only her personality as bait. The prognosis is grim."
http://www.fredoneverything.net/Maureen2.shtml
"The Republic survived product placement during radio soap operas and The Jack Benny Program without an epidemic of obesity. (Remember 'there's always room for Jell-O'? How irresponsible!) Consumers aren't idiots. They may well prefer brand placements during their favorite TV shows to watching seemingly endless blocks of commercials, but they'll rebel if the placements become too distracting."
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