By Michael W. Dean
As we smash headlong into yet another decade, the fifth I’ve participated in during my 45 spins around this big blue ball, I reflect on the past and look toward the future. And the main thought that strikes me is ‘WHAT THE FUCK?????”
I really long for the days when I didn’t have to think about politics all the time. When I talked with friends about movies, music, art, dreams, life, love. Now most of what I think about is “THOSE LIBERALS ARE FUCKING CRAZY! THEY’RE KILLING EVERYTHING THAT’S GOOD!”
The ironic thing is, they love to call us (conservatives and libertarians) crazy. And selfish. Crazy for not wanting to regulate everything. Selfish for not wanting to be robbed at gunpoint for leftist “social justice” programs.
And it really is robbery at gunpoint. If you refuse to pay taxes, police will come to your house. If you refuse to come out, they’ll come in, point guns at your head, and take you to jail. All taxation, beyond the bare minimum outlined in the Constitution is theft. The government has no resources, and has to take my money to give you anything. And they do everything far less efficiently than the private sector.
I am a reasonable, peaceful man. And I’m happy to live in America, which really is, to quote patriot Boston T. Party, “the sickest patient in the cancer ward.” And he said that a long time ago, America has gotten a lot more sick recently.
And to quote Dead Kennnedy’s singer and head rabble rouser Jello Biafra,
I’m thankful I live in a place
Where I can say the things I do
Without being taken out and shot
So I’m on guard against the goons
Trying to take my rights away
We’ve got to rise above the need for cops and laws
(I love these lyrics, but I find it ironic that the guy who penned them believed in the “Hope and Change” of Obama, the “BIGGER bigger problem we’ve got now“, and is disappointed that Obama’s not the Second Coming of Christ.)
I don’t want to be taken out and shot. I shouldn’t be, I don’t break any laws, but I think that the folks in “power” now may start changing the laws. And I think Obama, Holder, Pelosi et al. may just be the “kinder, gentler” Lenins that paves way for a Stalin in a few years, if we’re not careful.
Execution of 56 Polish civilians in Bochnia during the German occupation of Poland; December 18, 1939
How do I deal with wanting to scream “THESE LIBERALS ARE CRAZY, AND THEY’RE STEALING FROM ME!”? Well…I live my life. I love sweetly on my wife. I talk to her, and listen to her. She’s the smartest person I know. I hug my cats. I say the Serenity Prayer.
- God, grant me the serenity
- To accept the things I cannot change;
- The courage to change the things that I can;
- And the wisdom to know the difference.
I work on political activism, gleefully writing feisty blog posts in the middle of the night, with a gun on my desk and a much bigger gun a few feet away.
I also try to educate younger people, being the “hip old grandpa Simpson of punk rock” and a few of them do listen to me…sometimes. I also work with various groups…some concerned with trying to get people to vote, some who don’t think voting works. But both have agendas similar to mine: liberty.
Then I wonder if maybe being an activist isn’t trying to “change the things I can’t.” But then I realize that when they drag us all off to the camps, or more likely, when America is turned into a horrible politically correct anti-utopia resembling Brave New World (or more likely, Demolition Man), I’ll want to at least be able to say to myself “Well, I tried.”
I thing about the fact that 6% of all people are sociopathic, about 12% will inherently follow sociopaths, and probably 20% are narcissists. That’s not quite a majority, but it’s close enough to make it hell for those of us who are decent in a Constitutional Republic that’s been dulled down to a “democracy” where “51% of the people can tyrannize 49%.” And right now, a room full of people in Congress are ramming shit down our throat that according to a recent non-biased Rasmussen pole, 55% of the country is against.
Yet THEY (liberals, leftists, socialist Americans, statists and the uneducated children who are allowed to vote because “everyone’s voice needs to be heard“) (Thank you, Ted Kennedy, you fat, dead, commie homicidal fuck) call US (conservatives, libertarians, tea party people and Republicans) “CRAZY.” “Crazy” is the most common five-letter four-letter word I’ve heard in the past year.
And it doesn’t even have to be verified. I don’t remember a sanity panel convening on my behalf. It’s one of those non-logic leftist tricks. You turn a person into a “thing” so you can dismiss them easier. “Crazy tea bagger.” It really is like calling someone a “racist” or a “drunken Irishman.” Calling someone “crazy” is just turning a person into a thing. And things are easier to throw away than people.
I think about the idea that “All Democracies fail between 200 and 300 years, because people who don’t want to work vote in people who will let them.” I look at my new calender and see that we’re entering year 234 in that range. Before I give up and say “Oh well, we’ve had a good run….” I want to complain a little more. I have to complain a little more. Besides, I can still say what I want without being taken out and shot, and the way things are going, I may find a time in my life when I can’t say the things I want without being taken out and shot….SO..
WHAT’S SO CRAZY ABOUT US?
Seriously…I want any smart liberal, leftist (Berube, I’m looking at you), socialist American, or statist reading this to please comment and tell me how ANYTHING IS CRAZY on the following list of common agendas and ideals of conservatives, libertarians, tea partiers and Republicans. Tell me in logical and uncertain terms, WHAT’S CRAZY ABOUT THIS? (I don’t really need to hear from the uneducated children who think their voice should count. Because if you can’t find my state on a map, can’t find Iraq on a map, cannot tell me how many US senators there are, and what the Electoral College is, let alone what Austrian Economics is, I really don’t think your voice should count.)
SO…..Tell me…WHAT’S SO CRAZY ABOUT
- Wanting “representatives” who listen to us, instead of dismissing us as crazy?
- Wanting to control what we do in our homes?
- Wanting to choose what we eat and what we listen to, without being nannied into compliance?
- Not wanting to be taxed to death?
- Not wanting to pay for crack babies and abortions if you don’t smoke crack and don’t like abortions?
- Not apologizing for America at every turn?
- Thinking the people who make our laws should not be above the law?
- Thinking less laws is better than more laws?
- Being able to do 8th grade math and knowing 10th grade history to realize that you can’t fix a recession by printing more money?
- Wanting the private corporation (that pretends to be a government agency) that prints your money to be audited?
- Wanting a President who calls bankers “fat cats” to quit appointing the fattest, greediest bankers in the world to his cabinet?
- Wanting our President to call terrorists what they are: terrorists?
- Not liking a President who wants to take away everyone’s money and rewrite the Constitution?
- Saying that disliking a tyrant doesn’t make you racist?
- Being upset about bribes being taken to ram something horrible down our throats?
- Questioning boldly?
- Wanting to keep our guns?
- Complaining that the guy in charge of taxes didn’t pay his taxes?
- Thinking corporations should be allowed to fail?
- Thinking that “redistribution of wealth” and “social justice” are criminal?
- Wanting to educate our own children, instead of letting the government indoctrinate and brainwash them?
- Not destroy our economy because popular pseudo-science says that “the sky is falling!”?
- Not being in favor of letting unlimited immigration choke our limited resources?
- Not being racist just because you’re not in favor of letting unlimited immigration choke our limited resources?
- Not voting for smiling charismatic evil fools with shadowy agendas and one-word “I’ll fill in the details later” platforms?
- I’ll think of more later.
The government will NOT fix everything. The government has a long history of fucking up and bankrupting most everything it touches. (All governments do.) I love America, but I fear my government. As we usher in the new decade, remember what Ronald Reagan said, “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are ‘I’m from the government and I’m here to help’.”
We may be reaching a tipping point in a divided America, but many Americans today are pussies.
The Whiskey Rebellion in 1791 was fought over taxes imposed to pay for the Revolutionary War, taxes which were higher than the taxes that war was fought over. And between manipulated inflation and Congress after Congress who consider their position (on both sides of the aisle) an excuse to loot via tax & pork, taxes have gone up over 1000% since then. But we’re just complainin‘, man.
But also, like I said, I’m a fairly peaceful guy….we are fairly peaceful people. But you can only back a sweet cat into a corner far enough before tasting some teeth and claws on your ankle. But that’s a different post for another day…..
Churchill said, “If you’re not a liberal at twenty you have no heart, if you’re not a conservative at forty you have no brain”. This explains why, without action, we may be doomed. Children, hippies, leftists (and many “anarchist” punk rockers who are actually socialists) all have a lot in common…including thinking that “wealth is a crime”, “everything should be free, man”, “the government will fix everything“,”the rich should support the poor” and that some nanny-parent group of old men in suits and ties needs to protect us from ourselves at every turn.
“May you live in interesting times.”
–Chinese curse
As we slam into the new decade, I try to be hopeful. I even look at all this in geological time, to try to put it into perspective. If you represent the time from the creation of the earth to now as a 24-hour clock, humans appeared three minutes ago. I doubt we’ve even got five more minutes left. We, all humans, are but chalk on the sidewalk, waiting for the rain.
My life and my thoughts feel important to me, but my words will likely not be disseminating via radio from an orbiting pod-bot 10,000 years hence. In the last decade I’ve reached more humans than most, but it’s unlikely any of the million-and-a-half dollars retail in paperback books with my name on them that have been sold since 1990 will be around in 100 years. My websites will likely go dark a few years after I’m rounded up and shot. I believe in God, but not with the certainty of some Christians so I don’t have the “What can they do, send me home?” non-fear of death. (I actually kind of envy that in people. Even though I don’t have it.)
I try to be hopeful. I polish my writing skills, polish my rifle skills, I exercise my First and Second Amendment rights daily. I clutch my wonderful wife, hug my cats, and I try to speak out.
I try not to watch too much TV, just enough to stay informed without drowning in worry.
I (begrudgingly) pay all my taxes, and don’t even jaywalk. But they’ll might still try to drag me off and shoot me at some point.
I will not go gently.
But I do feel hopeful, and I am grateful for all I have. My life is damn wonderful…and I should have been dead by age 30. In fact, I planned that. I wanted to be famous and dead by 30.
But somehow by the grace of something bigger than myself, I’ve got something much better: slightly infamous…but more importantly, I am loved and healthy and happy at 45. It certainly beats dead and famous at 30.
So let this decade come, me and my wife; and my cats and my blog and my rifle are ready for whatever it brings.
Michael W. Dean,
Casper, Wyoming,
5:29 A.M., December 31, 2009
Tags: audit the fed, first amendment, guns, liberals, michael berube, moonbats, new year's eve, obama, politics, ron paul, second amendment, wingnut, wingnuts
I hear you, Michael. I’ve been living this all my life.
But there is NO “minimum” or necessary level of government theft. There is nothing _necessary_ that cannot be done by mutual, voluntary association of free people. There is NO level of _involuntary_ government that is either needed or safe to keep around.
The key is VOLUNTARY cooperation and association – along with vigorous self and mutual defense. When people live that way, they have the true basis for self government and for peace.
Love, MamaLiberty
Hey, Michael, I wish you and yours a very happy new year. As to your questions: the only ones I can make good sense of are the one about the banksters in Obama’s cabinet and the one about allowing corporations to fail. I’m with you on those two. As for your questions about the nanny state — well, you know, I don’t see anything wrong with government mandating that clothing companies may not produce flammable children’s sleepwear or insisting that meat be inspected before it is sold. And I like it that the left gave us the weekend, the eight-hour day, Social Security, and child labor laws. As for things like climate change and Obama rewriting the constitution and taking away everyone’s money, all I can say is that we here in the reality-based community don’t hold grudges, and will welcome you back from wherever it is you’ve gone whenever you return.
That was the best rant I have read this year! I love the blog Michael.
Missy
Thanks missy!
Glad to have you on here.
MWD
Berube! You ol’ leftie rascal, you!
I’d consider moving to this “reality” of which you speak, but I already moved to AMERICA this year. Movin’ wears me out.
MWD
Berube, you’re a condescending douche. I am sure Michael is glad to hear you’d “welcome him back.” UFB
Homeschoolmom:
Berube is alright. He’s my good friend of 25 years, and about my only leftist friend who still talks to me. And we always poke at each other online.
We used to play in this band: http://www.babyopaque.com/
Michael Berubue’s a very *distinguished* moonbat, too. He’s even in that David Horowitz book:
“The Professors: The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America”:
http://www.amazon.com/Professors-Most-Dangerous-Academics-America/dp/1596985259/www30dollarfi-20
He’s in good company in that book: Bill Ayres, Angela Davis and Amiri Baraka are also among the folks listed.
MWD
I think if I were Berube, the thing I’d dislike the most about being on a list with Bill Ayres, Angela Davis and Amiri Baraka is that while he’s an actual PhD professor who went to college to be one, aren’t they all adjuncts who barely made it through high school? (Brooklyn and Oakland high schools, no less.)
MWD
… you know the decade ain’t over, right?
Yeah, I know. It’s next year. Artistic license, and common misconception.
But I changed the blog title, because this post is getting reprinted on another, much more popular blog tomorrow.
MWD
I wish I could buy the “51% tyrannizing 49%” theory, but I can’t, and haven’t for a long time. I think it’s more like “30% tyrannizing 70%”, and it has been for a long, long time. Pure democracy is mob rule, and the exact reason why our gov’t was set up the way it was. Too bad that according to the gov’t we have now, “The Constitution is just a piece of paper.”
I can’t really call myself a “leftist” but your challenge seems to be worth trying:
-Wanting “representatives” who listen to us -> Fair point. Actually, most of my political philosophy boils down to “Give me real accountability.” I’m sick of corporations and special interest groups hijacking my country.
-Wanting to control what we do in our homes? -> For most purposes, yeah. Theres always “running a slavery ring” and other such things as a caveat but for the most part sure.
-Being taxed to death. -> Stop whining. America’s taxes are lower than plenty of other countries and they’re not dying of over-taxation. Yes, taxes are annoying. But chances are you get more out of public police and fire departments alone to make up for it.
-Wanting to choose what we eat and what we listen to, without being nannied into compliance? -> You’re right in that we should be able to do those things. I find complaining about “lowering commercial dbs” insanely petty both as a law and as something to claim “nanny state over.” Trans fat is arguable, but not really worth the argument.
-Not wanting to pay for crack babies and abortions if you don’t smoke crack and don’t like abortions? ->
-Not apologizing for America at every turn? -> I love our country. That doesn’t stop America from having done some highly, highly fucked up, immoral, outright bastard shit. America is, in fact, not infallible. We’ve got enough power that we can fuck up and get a million people killed (specifically here I’m thinking of Iraqi civilians) and have it not really affect how much power we’ve got. That kind of wiggle room leads to more of the short-sighted decisions that have us stuck in Iraq.
» Thinking the people who make our laws should not be above the law? I’m all with you on this one. I think by not prosecuting George Bush we’ve given any future President carte-blanch to be an even bigger bastard.
» Thinking less laws is better than more laws? Neither is inherently better or worse. I want better laws. Laws that aren’t 4000 pages and stuffed with enough pork to offend every Jew and Muslim on the planet. Laws that can be explained with a single lucid sentence and enough else to handle exceptions and such.
» Being able to do 8th grade math and knowing 10th grade history to realize that you can’t fix a recession by printing more money? -> Fair point.
» Wanting the private corporation (that pretends to be a government agency) that prints your money to be audited? -> Or burnt down. I roll with Andrew Jackson on this one.
» Wanting a President who calls bankers “fat cats” to quit appointing the fattest, greediest bankers in the world to his cabinet? -> Well, yeah. Obama’s been bought and paid for and it was clear who was pulling his strings when he voted for the bailout last year.
» Wanting our President to call terrorists what they are: terrorists? -> Personally, I’d rather see the president’s legal ability to call those of us who aren’t terrorists gone.
» Not liking a President who wants to take away everyone’s money and rewrite the Constitution? -> Stop the hyperbole. It only hurts your case.
» Saying that disliking a tyrant doesn’t make you racist? -> Now you’re just being an asshole. Obama may be for bigger government than you want, he may want policies you don’t want. But calling him a tyrant just makes you the boy who cried wolf. Now if you say what he’s doing is paving the way for tyranny in a few years… now you’re talking sense.
» Being upset about bribes being taken to ram something horrible down our throats? -> Don’t be upset. Be pissed. Very, very pissed.
» Questioning boldly? Does boldly mean being a self-righteous ass about it? Seriously. I agree with you on more than a few of these and even I want to punch you for half this article.
» Wanting to keep our guns? -> Bah. We need more guns. More guns for everyone and the training to use them well.
» Complaining that the guy in charge of taxes didn’t pay his taxes? -> Fuck him.
» Thinking corporations should be allowed to fail? ->Fuck the ones who didn’t bother thinking ahead.
» Thinking that “redistribution of wealth” and “social justice” are criminal? -> I’m with you on the first part, and can see your problem with the second. Social Justice can be criminal. I’d also say if we could figure out a way to make it work without pissing on other people that’d be great.
» Wanting to educate our own children, instead of letting the government indoctrinate and brainwash them? -> Agreed.
» Not destroy our economy because popular pseudo-science says that “the sky is falling!”? -> Pseudo-science always needs to be kicked in the balls by the genuine thing. The trouble is figuring out which is which without having a Ph.D yourself. And hell, sometimes they look awfully similar.
» Not being in favor of letting unlimited immigration choke our limited resources? Check population grow rates. The population boom the last few hundred years have been riding is ending even in third world countries. In 20-30 years it’s entirely possible we’re going to be clawing to get more immigrants in here.
» Not being racist just because you’re not in favor of letting unlimited immigration choke our limited resources? -> Fair point. On the other hand many people who are anti-immigration really do just hate mexicans.
» Not voting for smiling charismatic evil fools with shadowy agendas and one-word “I’ll fill in the details later” platforms? -> How dramatic. If you strip this sentence of the hyperbole, I’d agree. Otherwise you’re being an ass again.
I’d just like to finish this: I’ve really enjoyed your books in the past. But all you’re doing is masturbating while claiming you’re fighting for freedom. You can’t let your anger run rampant. Frankly I think you’ve got a decent shot at being a decent Libertarian pundit if you don’t fuck it up by looking like a rabid asshole.
Yes, that’s my hyperbole. Do note how it doesn’t make you want to have a civilized conversation with me.