America Lost in a Bubble May 10, 2012
Posted by Dr. Robert Owens in Politics.Tags: Bush economy, Clinton economy, dot-com bubble, Dr. Robert Owens, economic bubbles, housing bubble, Obama economy
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All bubbles burst. This is a law of nature. No matter from what material the bubble arises. No matter what forces propel its expansion. All bubbles burst.
Actually the science of bursting bubbles has recently popped into the forefront of scientific discovery. Conventional wisdom has taught since the beginning of time that when a bubble bursts it simply vanishes. However, recent observations using high speed cameras has revealed that when a bubble bursts it leaves a circle of miniature daughter bubbles that pop so fast the eye cannot catch it. There is even the thought that each daughter bubble leaves a ring and each daughter bubble leaves a ring ad infinitum. All happening so fast it cannot be seen. And yet, each succeeding bubble bursts.
The physics of bubbles tells us that the pressure on the inside works against the tension on the surface and a ratio between the two determines when the bubble will burst. No matter how it bursts, no matter why or when it bursts one thing is certain: all bubbles burst.
In economics a bubble is the term commonly used for a cycle characterized by rapid expansion followed by rapid often dramatic contraction. What causes economic bubbles is often a matter of dispute among economists. Some believe they are a natural part of the economic cycle: everything goes up, and everything eventually comes back down.
Others believe they are caused by inflation. In this scenario everything has a natural price which is the intersection of cost and demand. The Bubble is the artificial rise of price over the natural price. Eventually the economy must correct itself and the inflated product will return to its natural price.
No matter which theory you subscribe to, one thing is certain: all bubbles burst.
Remember the Clinton years? Today the official History as dispensed constantly by the Corporations Once Known as the Mainstream Media is that the wise and benevolent rule of the man from Hope was a time of plenty. There was solid growth and balanced budgets. As the Progressive narrative goes, President Clinton alone was responsible for the growth of the nineties which Bush the Younger proceeded to destroy leaving a mess for President Obama who has fought valiantly to restart the economy and save the day. At least that’s the story as dispensed by the headlines and the talking heads.
The reality is approximately 180 degrees opposite of the spin.
President Clinton won a three way election with less than 50% of the vote (twice) and called it a mandate both times. The policies he opposed for his entire career had recently won the Cold War, and President Clinton reaped the rewards. He gutted the military and called it a Peace Dividend which he proceeded to spend on social engineering projects pumping up the economy with government spending. Then the Dot-com Boom turned into the Dot-com Bubble and the economy was roaring. Another plus for Clinton was the defeat of Hillarycare which would have torpedoed the economy just as Obamacare is now. He also profited by the election of a Republican House in 1994 which kept the promises in the Contract With America and led the way in cutting spending and building a budget that at least appeared to be balanced.
Everything was coming up roses. The economy was growing and so was the Dot-com Bubble, which everyone just knew would go on forever even though anyone older than the milk in the fridge should have known that all bubbles burst.
In 2000 George II won a contested election, and before he had time to change the drapes in the Oval Office the Dot-com Bubble burst. This led to a short sharp recession; this was the one that Bush didn’t blame on Clinton. He instead passed the now infamous Bush tax cuts and mailed out what he called rebates in the form of free money to spur the economy. All the while behind the scenes the housing bubble was beginning to inflate to epic proportions. Federal spending grew, the government grew, and the bubble grew.
During the go-go years people with no job, no money, and sometimes no ID were able to buy McMansions for no money down and walk out with cash in their hands. How could this ever go wrong? I remember hearing of people bidding on houses, offering 10% over the asking price and losing out to someone who offered more. Prices went up and up and up and somehow even sane people apparently thought it would never end.
Things looked good. Things looked very good. Following the recession which began seven weeks after President Bush took office, America had six years of uninterrupted economic growth. There were fifty two straight months of job creation producing more than eight million new jobs, the unemployment averaged 5.3 %, after-tax income per capita increased by11%, from 2000 to 2007, and GDP grew by more than 17 % adding almost $2.1 trillion. Exotic ways to paper over the fact that people with no money were buying houses fueling the boom kept everyone smiling and the bubble expanding.
The only problem was that eventually all bubbles burst. And when it did John McCain suspended his presidential race to fly back to Washington and add his hearty, “Me Too” to the bailout and seal his fate.
President Obama took office as the economy crashed into the deepest recession since World War Two. He immediately began blaming President Bush and hasn’t stopped yet. He passed the largest stimulus bill in American History, began a record expansion of the Federal government, and the largest spending binge since the beginning of time. All in the name of cleaning up the mess from the bursting of the housing bubble.
And what are all these trillions of dollars in reckless spending doing? Are they inflating another bubble? Change the words and you change the perception: spending becomes investment and responsibility becomes austerity. Those who are manning the pumps aren’t blowing up a financial bubble they are showing compassion for their fellow man and investing for the future. Anyone who warns of a coming crash or tries to slow the rate of spending is pushing grandma off the cliff for the benefit of millionaires and billionaires.
No matter how this mad dash to nowhere is spun one thing is certain: all bubbles burst
On the brighter side President Obama has perfected the cure for illegal immigration. The economy has taken such a massive hit that the illegal immigrants are leaving looking for greener pastures. And he has also brought the solution to a 10%+ unemployment rate. So many people have become discouraged that they have dropped out of the labor market, and according to our current administration this is good news. Perhaps we should take a cue from Mr. Obama’s favorite pastime and just consider his first term a mulligan.
Maybe the slogan for President Obama’s second term shouldn’t be “Forward.” Perhaps it should be “I deserve a re-do.”
Just remember: all bubbles burst.
Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion for Southside Virginia Community College. He is the Historian of the Future and the author of the History of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com © 2012 Robert R. Owens drrobertowens@hotmail.com Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook or Twitter @ Drrobertowens
Liberty is Null and Void April 18, 2012
Posted by Dr. Robert Owens in Politics.Tags: 10th amendment, 9th Amendment, Dr. Robert Owens, Nullification, Repeal Amendment
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America was founded as a Federal Republic. This means our nation was designed to have two levels of sovereignty. The States which pre-date the central government and which created the central government is to be one level and the central government they created was to be the second. The separate States first combined to found a central government when they drafted and ratified the Articles of Confederation in 1781. This combination was strengthened and expanded in the writing and ratification of the Constitution in 1789. However, in both of these new beginnings it was always stated and assumed that the States were the building blocks out of which the whole was built.
The Anti-Federalists sought to safe guard the inherent rights of the Sovereign States in the face of a proposed national government which concentrated power and superseded the primacy of the States. The Anti-Federalists are often dismissed by those of succeeding generations who have been educated by the victorious philosophical descendants of the Federalists, as mere obstructionists and people of no-account. However, their ranks were filled by some of the greatest names of the Revolutionary times such as Samuel Adams, George Mason, Thomas Paine, and Thomas Jefferson.
Another well-known leader of the Antifederalists, Patrick Henry, questioned the very legitimacy of what are possibly the most famous words in the document: “We the People” when he said, “I have the highest veneration for those gentlemen; but, sir, give me leave to demand, What right had they to say, We, the people? My political curiosity, exclusive of my anxious solicitude for the public welfare, leads me to ask, Who authorized them to speak the language of, We, the people, instead of, We, the states? States are the characteristics and the soul of a confederation. If the states be not the agents of this compact, it must be one great, consolidated, national government, of the people of all the states.”
Once the Constitution was maneuvered through the ratification process most of the Anti-Federalists faded into the background. Forgotten were their war time services and forgotten were their warnings that a central government once established would inevitably grow in power to eclipse the States.
In the early days of the Republic the former Anti-Federalists attempted to keep alive the idea that it was the States which had created the central government and that the States therefore had the authority to determine if the central government had overstepped the authority which had been delegated to them by the States. They proposed to do this through a process known as Nullification.
Nullification is the process through which they believed a State could suspend a federal law within its borders. In opposition to the Alien and Sedition Acts of the Adams Administration Thomas Jefferson and James Madison first enunciated this concept in1798. The tactic was accepted as a legitimate tool of the States by the Hartford Convention in 1814. It was seen as a logical and legal protection against the encroachment of the central government upon the sovereign rights of the States.
The idea that a state or a combination of States could nullify what they perceived as unconstitutional laws passed by the central government which exceeded the delegated powers granted to it remained a point of contention until it reached a crisis in 1832.
The enactment of tariffs which were believed to be advantageous to the rapidly industrializing North and injurious to the agrarian South brought the question to a head. South Carolina led the way by adopting an Ordinance of Nullification which stated that the tariffs, “are unauthorized by the constitution of the United States, and violate the true meaning and intent thereof and are null, void, and no law, nor binding upon this State.”
This was countered by President Jackson’s Proclamation Regarding Nullification, December 10, 1832. In this proclamation President Jackson stated, “I consider, then, the power to annul a law of the United States, assumed by one State, incompatible with the existence of the Union, contradicted expressly by the letter of the Constitution, unauthorized by its spirit, inconsistent with every principle on which It was founded, and destructive of the great object for which it was formed.”
Immediately after the President issued his proclamation Congress passed the Force Act. This law authorized the use of military force against any state resisting the tariff acts. The President being the man of action immediately sent warships to Charleston harbor and ordered the strengthening federal fortifications there. The situation staggered towards war as both the central government and the government of South Carolina prepared to dispute the Doctrine of Nullification on the field of battle.
It was at this critical juncture that Henry Clay who had not been able to find any other State willing to join South Carolina earned his reputation as the Great Compromiser. On the same day the Force Bill passed, Clay negotiated the passage of the Tariff of 1833. This law provided for the gradual reduction of the tariff over ten years until it reached the levels which existed in 1816. Jackson signed both measures thus priming and holstering the Federal power at one time. In response South Carolina repealed its Ordinance Nullification while at the same time reaffirming its belief in the legality of Nullification by nullifying the Force Bill. President Jackson knew he had won a victory and sought to move on by ignoring this face saving action.
After this crisis the issue of nullification died down. However, the belief that this was a viable and legal recourse for the States did not disappear, it instead evolved into the belief that the States which had created the Union could or should be able to nullify the union itself. This in turn led to the secession of Southern States beginning with South Carolina.
This next crisis precipitated the Civil War. This most deadly of all American wars destroyed the balance. The power of the States was crushed by the overwhelming power of the central government. Since that time the central government has grown, and grown, and grown until today it has become Leviathan. Not the sea monster referred to in the Bible but the soul crushing all controlling political and social government described by Thomas Hobbs.
Today this debate over the relationship between the central government and the States has resurfaced. As an administration moves aggressively to transform America beyond any semblance of a federal structure into a centrally-planned and totally controlled socially engineered society citizens from sea to shining sea are searching for ways to return to the limited government won by the Revolution and supposedly safe-guarded by the Constitution.
One of the most revolutionary proposals is a direct descendant of the Doctrine of Nullification. The Repeal Amendment is supported by citizens and their representatives in every State and in the Federal Congress. This proposed amendment states, “Any provision of law or regulation of the United States may be repealed by the several states, and such repeal shall be effective when the legislatures of two-thirds of the several states approve resolutions for this purpose that particularly describe the same provision or provisions of law or regulation to be repealed.” As of today, no State has passed the Amendment, and it has not gained enough support in Congress to advance past the proposal stage.
This proposed amendment is designed to restore the validity of the 9th and 10th amendments which have been fundamentally supplanted and submerged by the ever growing power of the central government.
The 9th Amendment states, “The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.” The 10th Amendment states, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
Unless we rebuild the reality of a balanced federal system we will soon find ourselves locked in the embrace of an all-powerful central government. This Leviathan will seek to regulate the smallest details of our lives and the spirit of totalitarianism we spent the last half of the twentieth century fighting will win by default as the change our fellow citizens voted for brings the death of hope.
Keep the faith. Keep the peace. We shall overcome.
Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion for Southside Virginia Community College. He is the Historian of the Future and the author of the History of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com © 2012 Robert R. Owens drrobertowens@hotmail.com Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook or Twitter @ Drrobertowens
The Heart of the Problem is in the Heart April 12, 2012
Posted by Dr. Robert Owens in Politics.Tags: Douglas MacArthur, Dr. Robert Owens, Noah Webster, Principles, Samuel Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Virtue
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Benjamin Franklin told us, “Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters.”
Socialism is a debilitating confidence game dressed up as an ideology used by demagogues and want-to-be dictators to fool its victims into believing it is possible to have your cake and eat it too. Those who fall under the spell of the charlatans singing this siren song actually come to believe it is fair and just to force some people to labor for the good of others. This is the same type of sophistry and rationalization that was used by the clergy and philosophers of the Antebellum South to justify unending human bondage for an entire race of people because it was for their own good.
This twisted tool of central planners and bureaucratic tyrants teaches those who have not that it is fair and just to take from those who have and re-distribute the plunder as the government decrees. This is not fair! This is not just! To teach that it is raises up generations of people who believe they have a birth-right to that which is not their own forfeiting their true birth-right: the opportunity to succeed through their own efforts. The products of such an educational system are citizens without virtue voting pawns without honor. Not because they have made a personal decision to live without these two attributes but because they have been programmed to believe taking the fruit of someone else’s labor is permissible as long as it will be given to someone else. Theodore Roosevelt said, “To educate a man in mind and not in morals is to educate a menace to society.”
Those who drank the Kool-Aid dispensed by the government schools learned that this type of theft is not only permissible it is laudable. They were told and they believe that this is what Robin Hood did: steal from the rich to give to the poor. However, in reality the legend of Robin Hood tells of a fighter for liberty and the sanctity of personal property who robbed the stolen wealth of corrupt government officials so that he could return it to its rightful owners: those who produced the wealth in the first place. However, the leaders of America today have turned the world upside down demanding that people objectified by the name “Millionaires and Billionaires” need to pay their fair share. Yet they never say what that fair share is or when enough will ever be enough. According to Noah Webster, “…if the citizens neglect their Duty and place unprincipled men in office, the government will soon be corrupted; laws will be made, not for the public good so much as for selfish or local purposes; corrupt or incompetent men will be appointed to execute the Laws; the public revenues will be squandered on unworthy men; and the rights of the citizen will be violated or disregarded.”
We look around us and we watch as our beloved United States of America crumbles. Our elected leaders act as if it is their goal to spend us into oblivion. The only way to understand the pronouncements and actions of this administration is if we consider ourselves a conquered people and the Washington-centered oligarchy as an occupying power. We, the silent majority who labor, innovate, and produce are treated as subservient beasts of burden needed and appreciated more for what can be extorted from us than for who we are. Samuel Adams once said, “No people will tamely surrender their Liberties, nor can any be easily subdued, when knowledge is diffused and Virtue is preserved. On the Contrary, when People are universally ignorant, and debauched in their Manners, they will sink under their own weight without the Aid of foreign Invaders.”
It is no wonder that we see such a sorry collection of second-rate scoundrels prancing about on the stage of power. They sell their snake oil of class warfare indoctrinating their victims to be needy and then promising to fill their gnawing need with loot legally taken from others. This immoral process breeds a population without the virtue of self-reliance or the honor of being independent. The soul sapping addiction to eternal government support leads to a nation neither adapted to nor deserving of liberty. When a birthright has been sold for a bowl of stew it cannot be regained by demanding more. Thomas Jefferson said, “Dependence begets subservience and venality, suffocates the germ of virtue, and prepares fit tools for the designs of ambition.”
We the present day guardians of America must stand before the tsunami of anti-education that leads our nation away from virtue and into unrighteousness. We must serve as examples working to earn what we receive and refusing to either play the victim or accept the self-imposed victim-hood of those who seek to expropriate the fruit of someone else’s labor. We must stand for righteousness or we will fall before the juggernaut of socialism’s final assault upon the land of the free and the home of the brave.
In the coming election we must choose wisely. We must find someone who is virtuous and who adheres to the principles of constitutionally limited government which alone can protect personal liberty, individual freedom, and economic opportunity. Samuel Adams instructed us in this basic truth, “Neither the wisest constitution nor the wisest laws will secure the liberty and happiness of a people whose manners are universally corrupt. He therefore is the truest friend of the liberty of his country who tries most to promote its virtue, and who, so far as his power and influence extend, will not suffer a man to be chosen onto any office of power and trust who is not a wise and virtuous man.”
Douglas MacArthur warned us, “History fails to record a single precedent in which nations subject to moral decay have not passed into political and economic decline. There has been either a spiritual awakening to overcome the moral lapse, or a progressive deterioration leading to ultimate national disaster.”
Finally, looking to the ultimate source of wisdom Proverbs 14:34 tells us, “Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people.”
Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion for Southside Virginia Community College. He is the Historian of the Future and the author of the History of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com © 2012 Robert R. Owens drrobertowens@hotmail.com Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook or Twitter @ Drrobertowens
Supreme Contempt April 5, 2012
Posted by Dr. Robert Owens in Politics.Tags: Dr. Robert Owens, Obama Constitutional Scholar, Obamacare, Saul Alinsky, Supreme Court
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Recently President Obama made this remarkable statement, “Ultimately, I’m confident that the Supreme Court will not take what would be an unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress.” For someone reputed to be a former professor of Constitutional Law at the University of Chicago this statement is hard to explain. Any high school student in a sophomore American History class knows there are many precedents for the Supreme Court making laws passed by Congress null and void. As a matter of fact, in the system of government tradition has delivered to us overturning laws as unconstitutional has been an important power of the Supreme Court for more than two hundred years.
And if the primary content of the President’s statement isn’t strange enough the supporting information is wrong. Obamacare wasn’t passed by a strong majority in Congress. In reality the final vote in the House vote was 220 to 215. Every Republican and thirty four Democrats voted against the law. In the Senate the vote was sixty Democrats and Independents voting for and thirty nine Republicans voting against. The Democrats, even though they controlled both houses of Congress knew they would lose enough of their own members that it was going to be a close vote so they moved the bill outside the regular order of business and used a legislative maneuver known as reconciliation to avoid giving the Republicans the opportunity to filibuster the law.
What is the context of these current pressure tactics being used by the executive branch on the judicial branch?
Soon after taking office in 1829, President Andrew Jackson a long time Indian fighter spearheaded one of his signature pieces of legislation through Congress: the Indian Removal Act. This act gave the president the power to negotiate treaties with the various tribes which still existed in America East of the Mississippi. These treaties, often accepted either under duress or under questionable circumstances seized the lands of the tribes and forced them to move West to the Indian Territory in what is today Oklahoma. The time for fighting had passed and most of the tribes quietly left their ancestral lands.
One tribe decided to try another route. The Cherokee Nation had adopted the ways of the Europeans. They devised their own written language and wrote their own Constitution. They had their own plantations, printing presses, and businesses. They also had their own lawyers and instead of going on the warpath as their ancestors had done they went to court to fight the orders from the State of Georgia which dispossessed them of their land.
In two cases; Cherokee Nation v. Georgia (1831) and Worcester v. Georgia (1832), the United States Supreme Court considered whether or not it had the power to enforce the rights of Native American nations in disputes between them and the states. In Cherokee Nation v. Georgia, the Court ruled that it lacked jurisdiction to review the claims of any Indian nation within the United States. In Worcester v. Georgia, the Court ruled that only the Federal Government not the states, had the power to regulate the Indian nations.
What the ruling in Worcester v. Georgia meant was that Georgia could not legally seize the Cherokee lands. It was at this junction when referring to the majority opinion written by Chief Justice John Marshall that President Andrew Jackson made one his most famous statements, “Mr. Marshall has made his decision. Now let him enforce it!” Instead of enforcing the ruling the Federal government joined in and the result was the Trail of Tears as the Cherokee lost their lands and moved west.
Franklin D. Roosevelt legislating Keynesian economic philosophy in the New Deal sought to end the Depression through government spending and central control. With massive majorities in both houses of Congress the president’s agenda was enacted as quickly as possible. Then less than three years after the New Deal began to transform America the Supreme Court began overturning some of the central portions of Roosevelt’s program
In response to this resistance to his vision for what should be done FDR decided to pack the court with Justices who would support his laws. What he proposed was that for any justice over the age of seventy who refused to retire, the president could appoint a new justice to sit beside the current justice and do his work. If his plan had been adopted and none of the then current Justices retired he would have been able to appoint six new Justices. Since he couldn’t force the conservative justices to retire he sought in this way to outnumber them and thus change the ideological complexion of the court. As the president moved ahead in his attempt to pack the court the Supremes started ruling in his favor which eventually stopped the need for his effort to influence the court through overwhelming appointments. Then time and attrition did what he had tried to do with legislation. By 1941, four justices had retired and two had died consequently by the end of his presidency seven of the nine justices were Roosevelt appointees.
Now we come full circle to President Obama and his obvious attempt to belittle and intimidate the court. Should anyone be surprised? This is nothing more than standard operating procedure for a Chicago politician. It is also a normal technique for a community organizer who has been trained in the tactics of Saul Alinsky. No, we shouldn’t be surprised but we could have expected more of anyone who has been entrusted with the highest office in the land. It is just such crude strong-arm tactics such as this which open Mr. Obama up to charges of being a typical South Chicago thug. If he wishes to avoid such charges he needs to avoid such actions.
The above brief review clearly shows that this was not the first attempt of a president to influence the court. However coming from one who is constantly extolled as a constitutional scholar it is certainly disquieting. As a constitutional scholar the president would obviously know what he said was incorrect leaving no other interpretation to his words than a conscious effort to alter the traditional system of checks and balances and the power relationship between the separate branches of the federal government.
Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion for Southside Virginia Community College. He is the Historian of the Future and the author of the History of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com © 2012 Robert R. Owens drrobertowens@hotmail.com Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook or Twitter @ Drrobertowens
Where Does the Supreme Court Get Its Power? March 30, 2012
Posted by Dr. Robert Owens in Politics.Tags: Commerce Clause, Dr. Robert Owens, individual mandate, judicial review, Supreme Court Obamacare
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This week the eyes of everyone concerned with the continuance of limited government were riveted on the Supreme Court. For three days the nine Justices heard arguments by the Solicitor General in favor of ruling the individual mandate which is the keystone of Obamacare constitutional. They also heard the representatives of twenty-six States argue that it is unconstitutional. This is the first time that a majority of the States have combined to protest an act of Congress. Now We the People must wait while the fate of our Republic is decided in secret by our Black Robed rulers from whom there is no appeal.
How did we get here?
We elect our representatives and they enact laws which are supposed to be within the framework of the Constitution. It should be the expectation of Americans that those we entrust with our delegated sovereignty would craft laws in accordance with our wishes as expressed in the founding document of our government. These laws should reflect our desire for limited government, personal liberty, and economic freedom.
And the unicorns danced with the elves until the cow jumped over the moon.
The perpetually re-elected who control the two houses of our legislature make law with no regard for the limits, the spirit, or the letter of our Constitution. In this case they have decreed not participating in Commerce is commerce, and that a penalty is not a tax, that is a tax, and then isn’t again. After years of stepping so far over the line they have forgotten there was a line. The Party of Power has finally legislated us to the point of no return. If the court of last resort gives this power grab the green light what limits are left?
Since the law was passed over the overwhelming rejection of the voters its validation would cement the dictatorship of the Party in the transformation of America from what we have known into what we would never choose. The Court appears to be our last line of defense. But where does the Supreme Court get its power?
The Supreme Court is principally occupied in a task that has no basis in the Constitution. The nine justices spend their time judging what is constitutional and what isn’t through a process known as judicial review. However, when the delegates of the thirteen original States drafted the Constitution they decided after much debate not to delegate such a power to the judicial branch or any other branch of the new Federal Government.
If the Constitution doesn’t give this power to the Court how did they get it? The surprising answer is that they assumed it unto themselves, and since no one stopped them they just kept doing it. The process began in 1794 when for the First time they declared an act of Congress unconstitutional. Then in 1803 they used a minor case Marbury v Madison to outline their justification for the process. Since that time the belief that the Supreme Court is the ultimate judge of the constitutionality of anything and everything has become such a cornerstone of the American System that the average person erroneously believes the power was granted in the Constitution. Thus the first power grab has become our last defense against what could be the final power grab.
In other words we who want to see the rebirth of limited government are hoping the Supreme Court will use an unconstitutional power to save the Constitution. We stand hat in hand waiting patiently to find out if the Commerce Clause can be stretched to give the central government unlimited power or will we step back from the precipice and wait for the Party of Power to try again.
Across the country we have watched as everything from abortion to gay marriage has been imposed upon us by the black robed tyrants of the Federal Bench. We have watched as popularly passed referendums were overturned, and common sense laws such as Arizona’s immigration statutes cast aside by activist jurists determined to force our nation into their mold. Unelected and almost unaccountable these imperious lawyers on steroids hand down pronouncements from Olympus on the Potomac as the sons of pioneers meekly accept the rule of tradition and the arbitrary decrees of men instead of the rule of law our ancestors fought and died to establish and preserve.
Now the arguments are over. The talking heads endlessly dissect what was said telling us what it means. For months we will hear rumors and hints as we wait until June for the word from on high. Is not purchasing insurance commerce? Does the government have the power to compel a citizen to enter into a contract? Is a contract made under duress valid? Does Congress have the power to make the purchasing of a product necessary to maintain the status of a law abiding citizen? If the answer to what should be rhetorical questions is not a resounding “NO!” we have strayed beyond the pale of liberty and are adrift in the seas of arbitrary power.
As we look to an unconstitutional process to save the Constitution perhaps we should reflect on the state of our Republic. I would also recommend a deep study of the works of our Anti-Federalist fathers. Since we are living in the world they predicted maybe we should take a second look at what they recommended as an alternative to what we have become?
Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion for Southside Virginia Community College. He is the Historian of the Future and the author of the History of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com © 2012 Robert R. Owens drrobertowens@hotmail.com Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook or Twitter @ Drrobertowens
We Know the Problem … What’s the Answer? March 22, 2012
Posted by Dr. Robert Owens in Politics.Tags: Cloward/Piven Strategy, Dr. Robert Owens, fundamentally transform America, rule without Congress
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This weekly column, which I have been privileged to submit for your consideration for the past three years, elicits many comments and questions. The most common of which can be summed up as, “I agree with your analysis, appreciate the Historical context, but how about some practical suggestions.”
If you are one of the many who have sent me those emails, posted those replies, made those phone calls, or asked me in person this column is for you.
To fully address these questions we have to look at two levels: the macro and the micro. We need practical suggestions for the very large and the very small. We need practical suggestions for the societal and cultural level and the personal level.
First of all we need some historical context for our current situation. In some ways we are unique, we are America after all. And in some ways what is happening to us has happened many times before. As I have often said in these columns if History doesn’t actually repeat itself it does rhyme.
The French Revolution occurred between 1787 and 1799. It was the first to try to replicate the phenomenon of the American Revolution which overthrew the age old tyranny of divine right kings and landed aristocracy replacing it with a federal republic operating on democratic principles based upon limited government, personal liberty, and economic freedom.
The American Revolution inspired the French to believe they too could break free of the chains and breathe the fresh air of freedom. However, it lost something in the translation. Perhaps because the French didn’t have the centuries long tradition of limited self-government and human rights which had grown up in England since the Magna Carta had been forced on a reluctant King John in 1215. Perhaps it was because the French had endured centuries of the cruelest servitude under the most absolute of absolute monarchs.
Whatever the reason once the French broke free of the cultural, societal, and personal restraint of the Old Regime which had persecuted and exploited them for so long the French people sought to exact revenge. They sought to cut the former ruling class out of society and while they were at it establish a completely new regime in its place. The French, always famous for philosophers, had produced one who had a tremendous influence on the thinking of the Founders of our country and the Framers of the Constitution: Jean-Jacques Rousseau.
However, Rousseau had two sides. On one he eloquently expressed the idea that government was established upon a social contract between the rulers and the ruled and that to have any legitimacy government must base itself upon the consent of the governed. Thus empowering the governed to decide when that contract has been violated and giving them a philosophical basis for change. Our forefathers based their work upon this side.
On the other side, Rousseau argued against private property. And that it is the role of the state to impose freedom, equality, and justice for all within the state regardless of the view of the majority. Thus empowering a minority to decide what constitutes freedom, equality, justice, and justifying the use of state power to mold society to fit the vision of the few. On this side Rousseau is considered the father of modern socialism and communism. This is the side that the leaders of the French Revolution chose to follow.
Another difference is that by 1787 France had been a highly centralized nation for centuries. The local governments served at the pleasure of the central authority and they could be established or overthrown upon the whim of the ruler. In America we had the experience of thirteen separate colonies each with their own particular history and each with their own particular traditions. In America this led to the establishment of a Federal republic with sovereignty resting in the states and only delegated to the central government.
These differences led to the corruption of the French Revolution into The Terror. This was a period between 1793 and 1794 when France was surrounded by enemies and pressed on every side. The Leaders of the Revolution felt as if there were agents and sympathizers of their enemies everywhere and they proceeded to execute thousands of their own people in order to secure freedom. The Terror eventually led to a military dictatorship which evolved into an Empire with a monarch at least as absolute as the one they had overthrown in 1787.
Unfortunately for humanity suffering under the yoke of absolute rulers and their crony elites, subsequent revolutions have tended to follow the French model instead of the America. The Mexican Revolution (1810-1821) was part of a wide ranging revolt against the once great Spanish Empire (1808-1826). From the Rio Grande to Tierra del Fuego revolutions cast aside the foreign rule of Spain and established homegrown republics. All of these republics modeled their initial declarations of independence on America’s but the successor regimes all came to model some variation of the French. The people rose up in righteous indignation against an oppressive system and in the end found themselves under one military dictator after another. They fought to gain their liberty and merely traded one elite for another as the iron heel of tyranny maintained its stand on the throat of liberty.
Other revolutions, the Russian (1917) and the Cuban (1952-1959) are further examples of the trend. What begins as an attempt to bring the blessing of limited government, personal liberty, and economic freedom to people ends up bringing instead a tyranny usually more cruel than what the people originally rebelled against.
As can be seen by this litany of subverted revolutions it is usually violence that brings the fall of the former tyranny and facilitates the rise of the latter. One example of a revolution that came about through an election would be the Nazi revolution in 1932. Another would be the current regime of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela. A revolution by way of the ballot box, but a revolution none the less.
Today America is in the midst of a revolution. America has elected a President who has vowed to fundamentally transform America. He promised this to his adoring supporters before his election, and he has worked tirelessly to bring it about. He is an Alinsky style community organizer who is working to organize our community by occupying the center of power and the streets at the same time. He follows the Cloward/Piven Strategy spending us into oblivion in the name of saving the economy. He has seized major portions of the economy and shoved national health insurance, a financial sector take-over, and undeclared war down the throats of a passive American public. Polls show that vast majorities do not want what he is selling but he is closing the deal anyway.
Right now Mr. Obama is campaigning day and night for another term, and a term that would be without restraint for a President who has already said he can rule without Congress. He would undoubtedly appoint at least one more Supreme Court Justice and solidify America’s passage from a federal republic to a European style social democracy.
That is the context, so what should patriotic Americans do now? As I said at the beginning to fully address these questions we have to look at two levels: the macro and the micro. We need practical suggestions for the very large and the very small. We need practical suggestions for the societal and cultural level and the personal level.
On the macro level we need to do everything in our power to make sure Barack Obama does not win a second term. We need to contribute our time, our talent, and our treasure to making sure he is defeated and defeated decisively in the November of 2012. Whom should we support? My advice is study the opposition candidates, and support the one who stands for limited government, personal liberty, and economic freedom. Choose the one that most credibly supports a return to constitutional government.
If after the primaries that candidate does not win the nomination of the Republican side of the government party, patriots will be faced with a dilemma. If we are forced to choose between Obama and the sure, sudden and, complete destruction of constitutionally limited government or a big government Republican who is in favor of more foreign interventions and a continuation of our role as policeman of the world what’s a patriot to do?
The problem with choosing the lesser of two evils is that you are still choosing evil. However in this instance with code blue on one side and a slow fall off a high cliff on the other we may want to choose the one who will drive us to the poor house a little slower. At least that way we will have more time to prepare and perhaps another opportunity to make the logical choice and vote for a return to constitutional government.
On the Micro level I am reminded of the many people I have met over the years who have escaped from any one of the hell-holes socialist revolutions have produced in the last hundred years. Whether it is Poland, or Russia, or Cuba they have told me over and over that they see the same things happening here that once swallowed their homelands. They have told me how they cry at night as they see central planning and social engineering consuming America. They have tearfully asked me, “Where can we go now? We escaped tyranny looking for freedom and now we see the same thing coming here?”
In answer to their questions I have asked one of my own, “How can we survive the coming darkness?” One by one they have all given me the same advice, “Get out of the cities, get yourself some land where you can grow your own food, and do all you can to protect your family and preserve the traditions of liberty.”
In other words, head for the hills and hunker down. Personally my wife and I have made this choice. We have decided to sacrifice whatever portions of our modern life styles and lucrative careers must be jettisoned to maintain what is truly important: our family, our lives, and our liberty. We saw this coming and made a five year plan which is now coming to fruition. Myself and many others have been sounding the alarm from the watchtowers for years.
Now is the time for all good citizens to come to the aid of our nation. We must stand up for our heritage. We must do battle in the marketplace of ideas, and we must engage in the struggle at the ballot box, but we must also prepare to save some seed corn in case the winter does descend. We must preserve what we can so we can begin again. So “that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
Keep the faith. Keep the peace. We shall overcome.
Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion for Southside Virginia Community College. He is the Historian of the Future and the author of the History of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com © 2012 Robert R. Owens drrobertowens@hotmail.com Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook or Twitter @ Drrobertowens
Praetorian Progressives and Their Imperial Dreams March 15, 2012
Posted by Dr. Robert Owens in Politics.Tags: Afghanistan, Dr. Robert Owens, Imperial Presidency, Iraq, limited government, Progressives, Ron Paul
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Under President Obama we doubled-down in Afghanistan? We sent more of our fellow citizens to a long hard slog in a country whose synonym is Quagmire while announcing the eventual date of their withdrawal at the same time. In an unprecedented action Mr. Obama announced our attack as he heralded our retreat in a calculated political decision that has cost lives, squandered treasure and told the Taliban to wait in the wings for the second act.
As our economy was being outsourced, our debt monetized, and our infrastructure crumbled we meekly followed the leader deeper into a thankless nation-building campaign in the Little Bighorn of nations. A nation that is more of a Western construct than an actual nation-state, and the tribes which inhabit this mountainous waste have resisted and foiled every empire from Alexander to Moscow.
There is a fundamental difference between a republic and an empire. Republics are based upon the consent of the governed. Empires are imposed from above. Republics foster a community of equals each with the opportunity to achieve. Empires exalt the ruling class at the expensive of everyone else. Though settled by European kingdoms seeking empires the United States wasn’t founded to become an empire. Individuals fought against the empire building tyrants until their determination and resolve won independence against all odds.
It is time to re-think America’s international military commitments. It is our world wide web of foreign commitments and entanglements that has been used by the self-righteous Progressives and their cronies in the military industrial complex in their efforts to transform the United States from republic to empire. They have used the never ending wars for peace to regiment our society and create a centrally-planned bureaucratic mega government.
George Washington warned us to avoid foreign entanglements telling us, “It is our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of the foreign world…” He warned us about allowing the military to grow to big, “Over grown military establishments are under any form of government inauspicious to liberty, and are to be regarded as particularly hostile to republican liberty.”
Thomas Jefferson outlined the essential principles of our government which included this advice concerning foreign affairs, “peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations entangling alliances with none.”
For the first 100 years of our existence we followed Washington’s great rule, “The great rule of conduct for us in regard to foreign nations is in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection as possible.”
The temptation to empire captured the American imagination in the 1890s: the beginning of the Progressive Era. This was a time when Europe was rushing to gobble up the last places open for colonization or carving up those areas unsuited for colonies into spheres of influence.
Under President McKinley the United States entered the scramble for colonies in the Spanish-American War winning Puerto Pico and the Philippines as well as a long war against those in the Philippines who wanted the independence they had expected when liberated from the Spanish Empire by the American Republic.
Teddy Roosevelt the great grandfather of the Progressives followed McKinley walking softly while carrying a big stick in the form of the Great White Fleet. He used America’s new found industrial might and military power for multiple intrusions into the sovereignty of Latin American countries. While better known for his war against business, or trust busting as it was then called, the first President Roosevelt extolled war as a means to national greatness, “No triumph of peace is quite so great as the supreme triumph of war”
After being re-elected on the promise to keep America neutral President Wilson proclaimed America must fight to “Make the World Safe for Democracy.” An adventure which cost over 300,000 casualties and which actually expanded the empires of England, France, and Japan while sowing the seeds of an even greater war.
After Wilson’s war the Congress of the United States re-asserted control by rejecting the international entanglements of the League of Nations Treaty returning to the traditional American foreign policy of freedom of trade and freedom of action.
Under FDR America fought an undeclared naval war against Germany in 1940 and 41 and imposed draconian embargoes against Japan prior to Pearl Harbor. Once we were attacked we had to defend ourselves. However, when World War II ended with the defeat of German, Italian, and Japanese totalitarianism and the vast expansion of Soviet totalitarianism, the guiding light of America foreign policy seems to have been permanently extinguished.
As the British Empire sailed into the sunset we filled the void taking up the role of leader of the West in the Cold War. For forty-six years we faced the Soviets until they collapsed. Then instead of coming home we spread our wings even further embracing Eastern Europe. We made a vain promise to send young Americans to fight for Estonia and Slovakia. We coaxed color-coded revolutions all around Russia while our allies moved the EU to the East. All of this rebuffed the hand of the Russians and made them instead of friends bitter foes who realized America had exploited their weakness and attempted to surround them with enemies. This is the exact scenario which has haunted Russian paranoid dreams for centuries.
It is against the traditional principles of American foreign policy to establish and maintain an empire of far-flung outposts. Doing so has broken the bank and we cannot afford to be the Policeman of the world. We cannot afford to build nations for people who don’t want them while allowing our own infrastructure to decay. How did a peaceful nation of free citizens become the advocate of pre-emptive attack and endless occupation? How much blood and treasure did we invest in Iraq and what will be the result: a precipitous pull-out resulting in a Shi’a ally for Iran.
The war in Afghanistan was obviously defensive and retaliatory in nature given the Taliban’s support and collusion with Al Qaeda. But ten years later what’s it all about? Are we really dedicated to building a modern nation for tribal people who have no sense of nationhood? Have we blundered into the same trap that brought the Soviets to their knees?
And it isn’t only our current hot deployment that is problematic.
The United States has armed forces in over 130 countries. We’re committed to defend most of these countries against aggression. Where were these allies on 9-11? Where are they in Afghanistan? Why do we have treaties binding us to go to war to defend those who refuse to support us when we’re attacked? If these policies are counter-productive are there any alternatives?
Close the foreign bases and bring our troops home. Sell the bases and save the money. Station our troops on the borders to protect us from the on-going invasion of illegal immigrants who are overloading our systems. Let the maintenance of the bases and the spending of the troops contribute to our domestic economy instead of the economies of other countries. If we need to project American power, use the carrier battle-groups designed for that purpose. Protect America and rebuild our infrastructure.
When asked what to do with the American Military after World War I Will Rogers said, “Get ’em all home, add to their number, add to their training, then just sit tight with a great feeling of security and just read about foreign wars. That’s the best thing in the world to do with them.”
We must jettison the Empire to save the Republic! If we don’t the imperial power will swamp the republican nature. We will retain the forms our Founders gave us as we find ourselves under the jackbooted heel of the Praetorian Progressives and their imperial dreams.
Dr. Owens teaches History, Political Science, and Religion for Southside Virginia Community College. He is the Historian of the Future and the author of the History of the Future @ http://drrobertowens.com © 2012 Robert R. Owens drrobertowens@hotmail.com Follow Dr. Robert Owens on Facebook or Twitter @ Drrobertowens
Dr. Robert Owens Chronicles the History of the Future 