How the Government can ensure 'Fairness'

There are numerous calls from some in Washington and some in society for the Federal Government to ensure fairness for all those in society. They decry how a minority child born to a single minority mother in a poverty-stricken area is at birth at an unfair disadvantage when compared to a white child born in a white two-parent family in a well-to-do area. Those who decry that those infants were born into unfair situations are correct. Nature is not fair; however, nature is not unfair. There isn’t a volitional force that looked at the combination of ovum and sperm to say ‘upon my reason and feelings, this combination will be X and this combination will be Y.’ In nature and how things come about in nature is the epitome of the saying: it is what it is.

A thief may steal property; a tornado may destroy property. A thief has to continually take into account his life, his environment, the interactions between the two, along with where he sees he should direct himself; this is consciously or (generally) unconsciously done. The tornado doesn’t take anything into account; it is just the result numerous forces that have no contemplation to them. It is wrong to conflate what Nature brings with what the State may bring. What is the difference?—it is the difference between what is chosen, against what just is. The thief chooses his actions. There is no will in Nature. Nature doesn’t act in the way men do. Men act from will; nature acts in material causation without any will. Fairness may exist in the world of will; fairness doesn’t exist in material causation. Only a hack will prevaricate the word ‘fair’ when comparing the fairness they want the State to provide against the fairness that Nature didn’t provide.

The government, regardless of how much those in it may desire, is not like Nature. Government isn’t just is; government is nothing more than a collection of individuals who have been entrusted with the legal use of force to ensure justice prevails in a society based on the laws therein. The laws are to reflect individual rights. If the government goes beyond the protection of individual rights (which are to pursue self-directed action) it is to giving things to the people (entitlements). Entitlements are ‘rights’ to that which someone else produced. The government doesn’t have its own means, is not self-sustaining, and it needs to be funded – primarily through taxes. To go beyond allowing free actions to entitlements, government ‘giving’ can only be done by someone else first producing something that is then taken by the government that has legal (not moral) use of force. After the government takes the product of one to give to another, the laws become unfair by definition – taking from one who invested their resources (time, energy, money and material goods) to be given to a third person who did not do the work for that given product.

How can governmental unfairness be implemented?—in two ways: in who is selected to have their resources taken; in who is selected to receive those resources. What is it that is unfair in such government actions?—it is the legal use of force to take from one to give to another. What must be done before the government may take from some in order to give to another?—there must be a legal division amongst people. Who can make and enforce such legal divisions?—only the government. The divisions possible are infinite. Common divisions are gender, income, ethnicity, sexual preferences, health/handicapped, immigrant status and on, and on; to add to the infinite combinations, groupings may be made such as physically (and/or not mentally) handicapped elderly, mentally (and/or not physically) handicapped Asians, Filipino homosexuals, single black mothers and on, and on where adjectives and nouns may be switched about easily. With so many divisions are made that the most quickly growing (i.e. shrinking group) minority group is that of the healthy individual. Who is going to provide for the rest?

Among our rights are the freedoms of speech and free association that are in the Constitution. The right to justly acquired property is not explicitly stated; it is implied for if one doesn’t have a right to their justly acquired property, then they have no means of sustaining their life, or to pursue any other actions.

Financially, utilizing the right of speech and association (and property) is how we proceed in the businesses we frequent, banks we store our money in and if deciding to be charitable, what charities we want to donate to: voting with our feet, or wallet. For example, a family with a child that has Downs Syndrome may decide to donate their money to a charity that helps like families, or frequent a private clinic that has treatment programs the family sees as best for their child. The same freedom of speech and association happens for the patron going to a restaurant owned by a member of like ethnicity, or for one who uses organic & free-range goods, as a matter of convenience for being nearby, and all other various options that any individual may use in justifying their preference for A over B.

At the individual level, it is an act of free speech and association with who we want to relate to, or not relate to in both business and professionally. This includes wise and foolish choices. Discrimination is good when properly applied; the one who wants to support a specific cause, team, family member does so by discriminating against the rest for not being the one they want. One who discriminates foolishly is to be given the same right to associate and speak as they choose, and suffer the necessary consequences. Nothing will remove stupidity as quickly as feeling the full force of the consequences of stupid decisions, such as the teams who refused to allow blacks to play losing to the teams that were integrated.

The government, using force, removes the free speech and association that are our rights; government officials pass and enforce laws that remove our decisions from us. Based on the whim of those in power, they take the resources taken by force and give those resources to a specific group. Through the force of a gun (don’t pay taxes and refuse the fines and see what happens), the bureaucrat will give your funds that you didn’t willfully give, and hand them over to those you don’t support. Where is the ‘fairness’ in that?

Even with this said, there is a way for the federal government to ensure fairness to the extent government can in its actions. It is obvious and being so, overlooked. The divisions that have been fostered from class-warfare, gender wars and all the various ethnic-hyphenated groups only seek to divide us, making us easier to rule for we don’t target the cause of the divisions. The way to ensure fairness in government actions is to not look at those divisions.

If we allow the federal government to make one division, the principle that dividing us is acceptable is made and all groups will seek to be the exception. If we denied the federal government this division, then most of the problems that exist in contemporary society would be gone. Don’t like ‘welfare mothers,’ or bank bailouts?—the federal government shouldn’t be looking at income. Don’t like different standards for minorities/whites/males?—the federal government shouldn’t be looking at skin color or gender (the government is the only one that can force segregation). Lobbyists would exist, but eventually become extinct for they wouldn’t be able to petition the government to act on the behalf of any one individual/group/industry over another. The problems with drug enforcement no longer exist for without rights-violations there is no crime to punish; the government couldn’t punish someone using heroin, smoking marijuana any more than someone drinking a beer (alcohol), or a soda (caffeine); regardless of what was ingested, the actions outside consumption would be the punishable offences for violating another’s rights, just as rights-violating acts are punishable when sober. Taxes would be the same percentage regardless of what was being purchased, or what one’s income may be; the government couldn’t say one was more sinful than another, or that one earned too much. The rich would still pay more, but not in percentage, and all would have ‘skin in the game.’ This lack of division would also apply to services, for the government shouldn’t be looking at who needs and uses (if uses how much) those services (health care, contraception, food) over those who don’t.

Charities help people more than government can. Charities are funded voluntarily. As being voluntarily funded, it was through individuals giving their resources they’ve earned and giving it to causes they believe in and want to donate. Charity is a gift those in society give its other members. It is to be recognized as a gift for when demanded and taken by the State, entitlements state that we are allowed to keep some of what we’ve earned, and the State will decide how much that may be. What is the fairness in having a third party deciding what you’re allowed to keep from the work you put forth?

The federal government doesn’t have any business separating us in society beyond what the census is for: have you been born?-are you still alive?-are you of legal majority (i.e. legally an adult)? How much anyone made, color of skin, gender, ethnicity and all other factors would be (as they should be) irrelevant to the government. What interest should the federal government have in any of these divisions?—in recognizing these divisions, the federal government codifies and buttresses the divisions as relevant. Is that a desirable result: legal division, of stating who is what type of an individual based on whatever collective-flavor-of-the-month is popular? If we denied the government that extra-constitutional liberty, then most all government abuses would be eliminated: no cronyism; no regulations protecting some/punishing others; no one who could see another as by a matter of existing, owing anything to anyone else.

Some will decry about some form of collective fairness: that some group suffered more by another and needs to be compensated. (as if fairness could be possible by lumping all individuals of a shared characteristic into the a group that a few members actually acted inappropriately; there is no fairness possible when crossing individual and group responsibility). But let us look at attempts at collective fairness, briefly. Some of us have proclivities and choose life paths that are more rewarding than others; think of the productive member of society who after years of training and hard work beyond a standard 40-hour work week, becomes a success and is targeted to have more taken from him in taxes to pay for the rest, and contrast that member with someone who works enough just to pay the bills, doesn’t devote themselves to bettering themselves beyond that, and contrast both of the aforementioned to the thief who wants to steal the first two’s property. They contribute, or even take away from society, differently. To have them treated equally would be unfair to society, for the one who works harder will not continue to do so as his efforts are not rewarded, and if the thief is not punished appropriately, he will continue to take from society. The lesser elements will thrive and the higher elements will starve. Is that fair for society as a whole?

If we allow the government to make such distinctions among us, and to try and help us, we not only not fix the issue of unfairness, but solidify it ever moreso in our lives for it is further codified in its dividing us amongst, and against each other. Absolute fairness is impossible. Miscommunications and abuses will still exist; they exist in the free market just as they do in government. The unfairness that may emerge in the free market may be more quickly remedied by the affected parties. With unfairness codified in the laws with divisions made amongst us, the law ensures we will be infighting, and the groups contesting against each other most will cycle so that we don’t look at the cause of our divisions: the State. To remove codified and systematic unfairness, it would require systematically having those groups divided as such to not compete against each other and unify against what created them.

Finally, fair is such an easily prevaricated term, it gets tossed about in conversations without a Stasis point, without an agreed upon definition. As such, where agreement is superficially made, there is still disagreement in principle. Worst of all, those who want to manipulate us use the word fair, intentionally prevaricating it, in order to push their agenda getting us stuck in their new system. With such problems following the word fair, it can be one of the worst four-letter words in the English language. It’s too important, the fields where the term fair may be used. Let’s make sure we know exactly what is being discussed when fair is used.

In Memoriam

RIP Andrew Breitbart. Like with most people, I agreed with him on some ideas, disagreed on other ideas. Where he was an exemplar was in courage and dedication in his work.

Taking my lemon to the mechanic

I have this car that has numerous problems; it doesn’t run smoothly and makes numerous noises. When I took it to the mechanic, he looked at the carburetor (my car is an old model) and said it needed to be replaced. Among other problems there were leaking gaskets, the radiator has a leak that required, like the oil, to be filled nearly daily. The transmission sticks and the brakes grind. The windows don’t roll down or up, the dash lights don’t all come on and the windshield wipers are stuck.

The mechanic, looking over the car, at the wear on the vehicle could tell I also drove it hard. And, I did. I pushed the RPMs into the yellow, if not the red frequently as I like to accelerate quickly, drive fast, and brake hard. With respect to routine maintenance, I didn’t bother with it; keeping its gas tank full was good enough.

To get it fixed, the transmission will have to be wholly replaced, the pistons and rods have been damaged from low oil and they have to be replaced, the radiator, carburetor, numerous gaskets, hoses, and fittings all have to be replaced. As I didn’t replace the brake pads routinely the whole brake assembly had to be replaced. Many parts will be needed, and it will take a long time to take the car apart, remove the bad parts, install the new parts and finally put the whole car together again.

My mechanic, being well-trained and experienced said he could fix my car; he could get it working practically as good as new… as long as I’m willing to pay for the repairs. Can you believe that? There was this other guy who came in to have his car looked over; my mechanic only charged him the regular fee for maintenance. Granted, this other guy’s car was in good shape as he took care of it and only had the oil changed along with the air filter, but why should he not have to pay more? He could afford to pay more. My mechanic is being unreasonable and taking advantage of my needing to get my car fixed.

A confession: this isn’t about a mechanic looking over a car, but a doctor looking over the health anyone’s body.

Now, some will decry that there is no equivocating how one treats their car with the health of their body. And, they are mostly right, but this isn’t about that comparison; this is about the mechanic/doctor and how they are expected to act. Regardless of whether someone pushed their body hard, didn’t take care of it and it is having problems, or just had ‘bad luck’ from anything that wasn’t initiated by them, it doesn’t take away from the fact that the doctor, like the mechanic, has to invest his resources (time, experience, money and goods) into fixing the body of the patient, instead of a car.

For example, to replace the aforementioned transmission, amongst the other parts will require the manufacture of those parts, the assembly of the parts (each required an investment of research and development, and education to first formulate), the packing, shipping and installation of those parts. If the parts are to a newer car that has much more technological advancements, there will also be the advanced training on how to install those parts – then there is the installation itself, along with all the time that will take. It doesn’t matter if the breakdown came about how I drove it, or if it was a defect in the original manufacture; the mechanic has the same work to perform regardless of how mechanical faults came to be. With a body, for example in replacing a hip there is the manufacture of the part (and its first research and development), the collecting and transport of the rare materials to create the pieces, the manufacture of the machines that made those pieces and so on, along with all the other aspects that the mechanic must undertake to deal with automobiles… only with the much more expensive work that is medicine. For the doctor to treat the patient, it doesn’t matter how the maladies came to be, only that it is and there are requirements for treatment.

With the fact that the doctor has to go through extensive training, and for specialists even more training in their respective fields, along with the huge expense that exists in the medical field with respect to the equipment used, the upkeep and the very buildings all is housed within or based from, the costs are a necessary part of the service. To make the cost the same regardless of the patient’s in coming to use the service need (routine check-up or chemotherapy) is the surest way to make it so no one will be able to use the service for it will not be sustainable and shut-down. Every step in the process of treatment requires funding, and the funding is a necessary part for each step for without funding there is no way that the pieces could be shipped, created, researched, doctor to receive his training, et al.

To make everyone pay the same regardless of services needed is to deny the economic reality that there is a cost to everything, included medical services. A want to insure everyone not only doesn’t help everyone but will in the long-run end with hurting even more people for the medical system will regress to the lowest remaining services, and those will be in short-supply – those services will still be reserved for those with the proper connections. No one can remove the cost of production; the way to make it more affordable is to let the market come in and let the other, necessary forces come in – how prices change from changing supply-and-demand. If the market is removed, then the available services will be reduced greatly. The masses will be out again with less of a chance on receiving treatment.

Keep Freedom Watch

Judge Napolitano, one of the few voices speaking out against the Big-State Party (Rs & Ds), while advancing the idea of individual liberty. May FOX get the sense to bring back the Judge’s show; they need someone with the intellect and consistency that many others at FOX miss

http://www.change.org/petitions/dont-cancel-freedom-watch-on-fox-business-network

Governing and Government

What is it to govern?—it is to control, regulate or something. The necessary questions that follow are: who governs?—what is to be governed? The big question following the aforementioned is: do we govern our individual life or is the Government to govern our lives?

What is it for an individual to govern his own life? For each of us to govern our own life is in following our individual rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness; i.e. controlling, regulating and directing our lives how we see fit. This is not to state that there is nothing that restricts what we may do, for self-governance is a principle to be applied and as a principle, it is to be applied to each one of us in society. This means that no one has the right to violate another’s rights – govern another through compulsion. Whatever one wishes to consume, act with voluntary partners, or pursue any professional/spiritual/personal (blending all three) is nobody else’s legal concern as long as their rights are not violated. Any action, without rights-violating, is voluntary. A corollary of this involves no one has to protect us from the negative consequences for our poor decisions; to embrace our individual rights is to be responsible for our actions. Rights violations can be legally punished.

What is it for the Government to govern an individual’s life? For the Government to govern our lives is by telling us what to do; i.e. controlling, regulating and directing each of us and how we live. Individual desires and especially rights are at best, a secondary concern and may be upheld or rescinded as deemed necessary. Whatever may be eaten or drank is that which is allowed; the same is true for pursuits of relationships or professional/spiritual/personal goals. What is allowed isn’t related to our preferences, but the preferences of State. We are not individuals, but merely pieces in a body politic. As mere pieces of the body politic, we may be shuffled and used as the body directed, that is the State dictates. We either obey, or are punished for not following how the body demands. This may be in outright bans and prohibitions, or more subtle manners such as fines to ‘nudge’ our other behavior. Acts may be compulsory. (The State/Government actually doesn’t ‘decide’ for it is nothing more than a collection of individuals who together have legal force behind them).

Can one govern another without rights-violations?—if so, in what context? There are two situations when one may govern another; 1) as an act of abdication in some degree, such as employment or any other agreement of voluntary authority-giving; 2) when dealing with our children. Neither one of these is absolute for in the voluntary giving of authority, it is limited to what is allowed and agreed upon; with children, it is the job of the parent to teach their child as he grows to become a self-sufficient individual interacting in society. The State, with the legal use of force uses compulsion. To keep its authority, it doesn’t want self-sufficiency and growth, but wants dependency and as a slave master to keep its subjects in perpetual servitude.

There is not a possible blending of the two for the principles are mutually exclusive; we are either sovereign in our own life, or the State may rule our life. To allow one non-right violating compromise is to violate the principle of self-sovereignty, thereby destroying the principle; only the standard that the compromise was to invoke remains – State-sovereignty.

Let us keep this in mind whenever we hear someone stating that we need the Government ‘to do’ things for us, guide us or otherwise tell us what is acceptable behavior, or in other words, when someone wants the Government to control, regulate and direct us. They ignorantly or maliciously seek to make us all mere subjects to their preferences that they project upon the State.

SOPA, NDAA, TSA, Patriot Act, 'blueprints' for society. 2012(1984) Amerisoc & Barak 'O'Brien'

2012(1984), Amerisoc and Barak 'O'Brien' [Part 3]

The key idea O’Brien advanced in the ‘curing’ session is that there is the Party, and nothing else. The Party is immortal. Anything that wasn’t of the Party was not important at best, didn’t exist at worst. Individuals who were decided by the Party as problematic became ‘unpersons.’ Winston was well acquainted with what an unperson was, for in Minitrue, part of his job was removing unpersons from the records – an unperson was someone who was removed from existence, physically, mentally and historically. Unpersons end by ‘never’ existing. As part of the Party being everything, only what the Party advanced was real. Newspeak was modified to continue the removal on unwords that not just the words were removed, but the ideas those words represented were removed from existence, or corrupted to reflect what fits Newspeak, e.g. liberal in the early 1900s referred to a preference for small government, but as the Party wanted to use the term it now refers to someone a preference for government influence in daily life.

Winston wrote in his journal, that ‘there is truth, and there is untruth’ and ‘freedom to say two plus two is four’ [to speak an objective truth]. An objective truth is outside the Party’s omniscience and omnipotence, so with an objective truth being advanced outside the Party being something that didn’t exist, one who advanced it was guilty of having a ‘defective memory.’ A major focus of the torture was to get Winston into delirium, so he would see the four fingers held up by O’Brien, and see as O’Brien advised “Sometimes they are five. Sometimes they are three. Sometimes they are all of them at once.” In dreamed delirium, Winston was having an amicable talk with O’Brien who said “The law of gravity is nonsense. No such law exists. If I think I float, and you think I float, then it happens.” O’Brien summarized in a torture session “Whatever the Party holds to be truth is truth.”

We citizens are both Smith and Parsons; the one who questions and the one who accepts. How does each one of us act? However, we, like them are individuals and as individuals are overall, irrelevant to the Party. Winston thought that with Parsons’ blind faith in the Party, that he’d be forever safe. When the Party needed to make an example that the individual would be sacrificed for the collective, Parsons was offered up to sate the State; he begged to be placed in a labor camp where he could still be useful. Parsons’ obedience was through-and-through, believing himself guilty of the crimes he was charged for the Party couldn’t be wrong and charge an innocent. Winston knew he’d be caught eventually, and argued against his captors, even through his torment. When arguing the difference in existence between men like himself contrasted with Big Brother, O’Brien simply replied [on Big Brother] ‘of course he exists,’ [about Winston] “You do not exist.”

Where does this bring us?

We find ourselves in the process of O’Brien’s breaking of Winston; as we assert our individualism, Obama mocks it. After an indefinite amount of time of starvation and torture, our ragged national body, like Winston’s physical body is brought before a mirror as our tormenter chides us ‘look at you’ and to emphasize their potency, pulls out one of our teeth. When we decry that ‘you did this to me,’ Barak O’Brien simply states “No. You did this to yourself.” Our weak economy, dollar, housing market, continued loss of jobs, are all ‘our’ fault – not the Party’s. It doesn’t matter that the laws and regulations the Party (again Rs & Ds) created were the causes of the weaknesses, that there is a difference between forced starvation and a diet; the Party cannot be wrong.

All the various faces of the Party, and Barak O’Brien move to quash those who are not towing the party line (towing the party line isn’t enough, see Parsons). The various laws, old and coming do not punish violations of rights, but seek to curtail behaviors that in essence seek to make ownlife more enjoyable; salt, alcohol and other forms of pleasure. Through SOPA, NDAA (and if the NDAA isn’t successful, there is the Enemy Expatriation Act whereby citizenship may be revoked), our own homes being considered as part of the battlefield, numerous laws restricting and intruding into our free behavior, we are becoming more enmeshed in the world of the Party, and we may ‘unexist’ when we’ve been deemed problematic. There is an ever-expanding list of ways that we may be considered problematic. Simply arguing against the power-grab of the State may get us listed as malcontents, and persons of interest. The TSA’s and drug-raid expansions, with the other laws shows that the Party can get us at any time, any place.

Think that only ‘the bad guys’ will be the ones who get prosecuted? That only the ones who are the lawbreakers are the ones getting what they deserve? What are the laws expanding into?—salt intake, dress-codes, speech. Each law is expanding more and more to embrace more and more behavior. Coupled with the numerous ways that the police may disregard individual rights (wiretaps, searches, detainment, tracking… all without warrants and due process), the precedent has been set that the Party may get into our lives in numerous ways, according to its whim. With expanding laws that first appear to be ‘for our own good’ the laws become tools of the Thought Police curtailing ownlife, while advancing life for the Party: Party social engineering. The die has been case, as one who hadn’t picked up a gun, fired a shot, only spoke against the Party didn’t even get due process, and was assassinated; don’t let the appearance of Anwar’s guilt be the guiding factor in how we act. Recognize, legally, he was someone who didn’t have charges against him, but he was still killed. Precedents come back and are applied to us; due process has been removed, and will be removed again.

Finally, there is the assumption that Winston had for the reason for his curing by torture, for why people had to be broken in Miniluv: that it was for their own good, and the greater good for all. This is where O’Brien seemed to get flustered, and increased the severity of the torture. O’Brien quickly corrected Winston. Power is its own reward; its own end. There was no love for the proles, or even the Outer Party from the Inner Party. There was just control: dominance. As O’Brien continued when mocking Winston’s hope for Man who would overcome Big Brother, “If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face – forever.” That is the true nature of the Party. The laws they make do not make us safer, or improve our lives outside of herded sheep to be shorn or slaughtered; the Party wants self-abasement from the people. Even if there was an Inner Party member who did think that we could be guided for our own benefit, it isn’t the nature of the position sought by those in the Inner Party, and they’d be drowned out by those who want to stomp on our face for even the Inner Party members, as individuals may unexist for contesting the Party. Should, however, an actual “saint” emerge in the Party, will it matter? Slavery is slavery, regardless of the goals of who holds the whips.

It isn’t too late. We still have time, but it is dwindling. The Inner party is not wholly joined, though their goals are coming nearer together. The combination of the drive of the Party (Rs and Ds), along with technology is bringing the event horizon that much closer. Based off of the audio systems in England, there are areas in the US where pre-crime light systems to highlight those who are suspected of possibly getting ready to commit a crime, scanners read license plates to ‘justify’ pulling someone over even if the driver isn’t doing anything illegal but is on a suspect list, and local police forces are now getting drones that were created for military use.

We need to stop the Party from continuing as it wants, before we have a two-way screen in our rooms with a woman telling us that we aren’t trying hard enough in our morning exercise; before her bosses decide that we need to unexist.

Don’t let the would-be Inner Party members control our present.