Argument For a Return to a "Gilded Age" Government

With how big and diverse of a nation America is, we would be far better off as a federation of largely autonomous states, which is precisely how America was in our golden age, historically known as"The Gilded Age".

"In United States history, the Gilded Age refers to the era of rapid economic and population growth in the United States during the post–Civil War and post-Reconstruction eras of the late 19th century.The Gilded Age is most famous for the creation of a modern industrial economy. During the 1870s and 1880s, the U.S. economy rose at the fastest rate in its history, with real wages, wealth, GDP, and capital formation all increasing rapidly. For example, between 1865 and 1898, the output of wheat increased by 256%, corn by 222%, coal by 800% and miles of railway track by 567%. Thick national networks for transportation and communication were created. The corporation became the dominant form of business organization, and a managerial revolution transformed business operations. By the beginning of the 20th century, per capita income and industrial production in the United States led the world, with per capita incomes double that of Germany or France, and 50% higher than Britain.

The Gilded Age saw the greatest period of economic growth in American history. Eventually, the United States produced over one third of certain international goods such as steel and oil. After the short-lived panic of 1873, the economy recovered with the advent of hard money policies and industrialization. From 1869 to 1879, the US economy grew at a rate of 6.8% for NNP (GDP minus capital depreciation) and 4.5% for NNP per capita. The economy repeated this period of growth in the 1880s, in which the wealth of the nation grew at an annual rate of 3.8%, while the GDP was also doubled. Real wages also increased greatly during the 1880s."

The Gilded Age was followed by the "progressive era", which was dominated by FUD (fear uncertainty and doubt), and socially progressive (which translates to naive and ignorant) measures-- stuff like the "Prohibition", socialist feminism (which has done more to destroy American morality than just about anything IMO), and "reforms" in virtually every aspect of life, and every business industry-- which incidentally culminated in the Federal Reserve, the hallmark of the Progressive Era. What the important thing here is that "progressives" then (and now, from the looks of it) got off to fixing government policies that weren't broken, and expanding the government's power to cover areas that people were happy and prosperous without such interference.

The Progressive Age effectively destroyed the prosperity of America through the expansion of government in the name of, ironically enough, "eliminating corruption" (pot calling the kettle black much?) Politicians started utilizing war (starting with the Spanish-American War, and later with such wars as World War I) to force the states to unite against a common enemy, and exploited the FUD(fear, uncertainty, and doubt) in the nation to insert pieces of nationwide legislation which, were it not for the wars (and other engineered socio-economic crisis's such as the two "Great Panics") would be condemned by the states and people as unconstitutional. Things have been becoming more and more corrupt in America since then, and our national debt and high rates of crime/other disturbing trends reflect that.

Lessons to Learn from the Jewish Holocaust

I think that death of any kind is a tragedy, but I think the preoccupation with any ethnic group is completely missing the point. The real lessons we should be learning from the Jewish Holocaust should be the real issues that affect us all as humans: 


* The Danger of Fascism and its Destruction of Civil Liberties
* The Consequences of Ethnic Pride
* The Terrible Reality of War
* The Manipulative Power of the Mass Media Organizations
* The Corruption of the Banking System as a Contributor to War
* The Vulnerabilities of the Collectivist Mindset
* The Importance of a Balanced Political Knowledge and Awareness
* The Detrimental Effects of Self-Righteous Foreign Policies


These are lessons that we should have learned, but due to the scapegoating of the Germans and the Nazi regime, and the plethora of sympathy for the Jews, the vast majority of the world has learned virtually nothing from this great tragedy! Stop sympathizing with the Jews who clearly have not learned from the holocaust, and start honoring the dead by learning from our mistakes of the past!

My Views on Climate Change, and its Effects on Civil Liberties

First, I would to clarify to both sides of the argument of climate change that I neither believe, nor disbelieve in global warming. so  who believes that I am a conspiracy theorists or in any way against the current focus of scientific studies, rest assured I believe that any field of scientific inquiry, whether valid in its assumptions or not, is acceptable so long as it does not infringe on the inalienable rights of individuals. Which brings me to my pain point:

I am not so much against climate change, as I am against the lack of transparency in the scientific community surrounding it, the corruption and lobbying efforts on *both* sides of the argument, and (most importantly) I am against any government exploiting science (whether valid in its arguments or not) to generate FUD and use climate change as a reason to expand the size and scope of the federal government.

The reason why I think there is a strong possibility of the government-sponsored investigations being corrupted, is _because_ they were government-sponsored, and furthermore, the two countries involved in the investigations have a long history of using "facts" to mislead the public, and using the mainstream media as their strong arm to push a liberal agenda of government expansion. It has nothing to do specifically with climate change, except in that climate change has enough evidence backing it for the government (and the U.N., which has also become corrupt) to use it as an excuse to expand its powers.

In conclusion, I would like to remind everyone that there are three types of untruths: lies, damned lies, and statistics. So at the very least, the "evidence" of climate change is built on a very unreliable foundation indeed, as its "legitimacy" is almost wholly grounded in statistics, and the interpretation thereof. 

But there's at least one site, founded by the discoverer of Climate change, which at least provide transparency. Now that's progress! http://www.realclimate.org/

Wake Up America- Iran is Not A Threat!

   
Wake up America. Iran is not a threat. Israel is the one stacking up nuclear warheads, Iran is just enriching uranium and creating nuclear fuel rods. Why is it that the threat of the radical Zionist country Israel is completely ignored, and all of the FUD (Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt) is being dumped on Iran, for which despite decades of espionage and sabotage operations, there never beenany evidence of Iran producing nuclear arms. This preoccupation and pissing contest with Iran is absolutely ridiculous!

Ok people, let's look at this in a logical fashion. Iran has an extremely imbalanced economy. Petroleum accounts for 80% of its exports. With oil prices being so volatile, and the overall demand for oil actually leveling off, this kind of situation is an economic nightmare To top it all, all the FUD from Israel, the United States, and other world powers is sanctioning trade with Iran all over the place, so let's put things into perspective:

Iran needs to develop nuclear power to balance its currently impoverished and unstable economy. Considering the political environment of the middle east, Why would Iran develop nuclear weapons,especially when they already know Israel already has nuclear arms and the means to deploy them,not to mention a military force so good at what they do, that they are the preferred partner for the U.S. to train our soldiers?

For once, instead of taking the FUD approach, let's be logical and insert a little rational, Occum's razor in there. Think you can do that? If so, that would be greatly appreciated!

http://rt.com/news/iran-nuclear-program-achievements-411/
 

Why I Support Pro-Choice Legislation, Even Though I'm Extremely Pro-Life

The Benefits of Political Diversity

I'm libertarian (meaning I think the government is a necessary evil, and should be implemented to the absolute minimum necessary), so I propose that all government be localized (no Federal or State government, just municipal/county-wide governments. like each mayor is a mini-president. Sounds like the ravings of a naive political idealist, does it? Well consider the following benefits, which if such a style of government, would certainly develop as a result:

1. This would eliminate the need for a military (since there's no country, there's no political identity to defend), the country would actually be stronger owing to a far greater political diversity (instead of one government for terrorists/foreign powers/Al Kaida/ aliens from outer-space to target, they will have tens of thousands on their hands to deal with). As the economist' maxim goes, "don't put all your eggs in one basket"; our country should learn from this, and shed their identity in favor of diversity, which has already proven itself to be an evolutionarily favorable trend. Any military threats could then easily be handled by on-call volunteer militia, and local police forces.

2. Because the people's budget is controlled by more people, corruption will be minimized, as dubious budget plans and special interests agendas will be harder and harder to hide, owing to the superficiality caused by the given political diversity.

3. Because the government is smaller and more localized, the people will have far more say on the government's decisions, and the government official will most often make decisions that benefit the areas governed, because the localization ensures it (with the exception of trade agreements with other areas, government decisions would not impact the socio-economic climate of areas outside its own jurisdiction).

4. A localized government would have a comparably minimal budget, with whatever money that is taxed being spent in a way that is optimized for the people residing in that area, and in such a manner that is best suited for the predominating cultures of the given area.

5. Owing to the profound diversity of government, the outsiders (misfits, protesters, rebels, counter-culturalists, individualists, and any other people dissatisfied with the existing societies/governments) can just leave and go to another city/area that shares a greater affinity with their beliefs. Thus, greater diversity of government would largely eliminate insurrection, because the very concept of insurrection would be rendered obsolete by virtue of that diversity. Civil war, political unrest, and most other political issues would be transcended by diversity.

6. Political diversity would permit an anarchist's wet dream: To establish one's own autonomous community filled with like-minded individuals. Without the interference of federal and state government, establishing one's own autonomous region will become remarkably painless, because the lack of a federal government will result in a great deal of free land cropping up that is unaccounted for. As a result, even for those that cannot conform sufficiently to any local society or culture, they can always create their own!

Economic Globalization: The Real Reason for Corporate Tax Breaks

It's obvious at this point that the U.S. government isn't the one to blame for the corporations tax cuts-- the corporations themselves are. Although banks and investment firms are the most obvious targets (since they circulate the most money), large corporations of every industry has been lobbying for lower corporate taxes for the longest time.

If you think about it, the government wouldn't want to lower the taxes of companies, and especially not the taxes of large corporations and banks, as this is where the big money is at. Some conspiracy theorists attempt to show that politicians are either being paid huge bribes to support lower taxes and cuts for corporate entities, and/or have sizable investments in those companies to begin with. But all of the politicians in office put together don't have enough companies lobbying them to make up the bulk of U.S. corporations, so there's obviously a bigger force at work-- something that forces politicians to support big corporations no matter what their "special interests are"

That something is called "globalization", and it bring the capitalist plague to the corporate and government layers of things. Basically, it goes like this: "If you [the U.S. government] don't give us low taxes, we're [the corporations] going to another country to appreciates our business more." Large corporations are hitting the U.S. where it hurts-- they are threatening to leave the U.S. and go overseas, if the U.S. doesn't give them what they want. You can call it blackmail if you want, but corporations have more than enough leverage to pull it off.

The examiner has an interesting take on more recent events supporting this: http://www.examiner.com/finance-examiner-in-national/us-corporate-tax-rates-the-primary-cause-for-companies-moving-overseas

If you look at the rate of businesses leaving the U.S. to go overseas in the past 12 years, it's absolutely disgusting. (see the chart below, courtesy of wsj.com)

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704821704576270783611823972.html

If you compare tax breaks for corporations from the government over the same time period, you will see an increase in tax breaks for corporations that is consistently reactionary in nature. What we see here is a desperate attempt by the U.S. government to hold onto large corporations that are increasingly outsourcing their companies, and even transferring to other countries completely, to get better deals on their taxes than what the U.S. offers.

There are plenty of countries out there who are willing to offer far lower taxes than what we do-- in fact, almost all of them are, as the U.S. has the 2nd-highest corporate tax in the world. While many large corporations have indeed escaped the majority of this high tax rate, on paper they are paying this tax, and continue to levy for even more tax breaks on this premise, putting the U.S. government in a very diplomatically-weak position when it comes to tax legislation.

Sure the large corporations should be paying their dues. But due to the deadly combination of the free market and globalization, they don't have to. If the U.S. government threatens to raise taxes for corporations or close tax loopholes, the corporations will turn around and "remind" the government that they can always take their money elsewhere. So the U.S. government is given the choice of "less money", or "no money". Naturally, they take what they can get, and deal with all the political crap, because business is business.

The real problem then, is that we allowed these corporations to become this big to begin with. It's only significantly profitable for companies to outsource or have a foreign base, when corporations reach a certain critical mass. Small businesses, on the other hand, have little incentive to outsource or to move HQ to another country (due to the complications and expenses of exporting goods, not to mention the quality-of-life-in-another-country concerns). If America was more careful about preventing monopolies, and put more heavy emphasis on fostering small businesses, none of these problems would have ever happened.

So in the end, it's less about the problem of big government, and more about the threat of big money!