Is Fascism Really that Popular in Arkansas?

 

  Things are still rosey, because its not fascism when we do it!

I have already demonstrated from the text of the law itself, that the 2012 "National Defense Authorization Act" laid the legal framework for martial law in the United States.    It replaced habeas corpus with a meaningless new "corpus light" and violated about four of the first ten amendments from the bill of rights.  "Obamacare" has people in a tizzy, and it should because its an awful piece of legislation, but of the two bills, the NDAA is clearly the more tyrannical.    Yet all four congressmen from Arkansas, R and D alike, either acted in ignorance or disregarded their oath of office and voted for this travesty. 

In an all-to-rare occurrence,  the Federal Courts did their job and ruled the act unconstitutional.  The government should not be able to lock up someone without a trial just on the Executive Branch's assertion that they are a terrorist.  That ruling did not phase our Congressional delegation.   They all voted to renew the act, which basically gave Resident Obama a blank check to arrest American citizens without trial and detain them as military prisoners.   Obama claimed authority to do this under the "authorization for use of military force" that was voted on prior to our invasion of Iraq!  Think back to when that was voted on.  Did you think that the purpose of that act was to allow the military to arrest people here at home?

Is fascism really that popular among my fellow Arkansans?   I define fascism as a form of government where individual rights are subsumed by a desire for "national security", usually as a part of some drive for "national greatness."     Our forefathers held to the belief, which I still hold, that the greatest nation is not the one whose military is the most powerful or whose security apparatus is the most comprehensive, but rather the greatest nation is the one whose people are the most at liberty.   Its the one where the people live their lives with the least fear of their government, and with the least interference from it.   How did we get from there to here?

It appears that President (and General) Eisenhower was right.  He warned us to beware of the military industrial complex, which now includes the security-industrial complex.   The military-industrial complex has teamed with big government and along with big media have joined together to induce such a permanent state of fear and insecurity in the population that many people are willing to surrender their heritage and fund a security apparatus which can, is, and will, be turned on them.

How did we become so fearful?  How did we become such sheep?     Many if not most of the "terrorist plots" uncovered by this growing security apparatus wind up being instigated by a government agent or informant!   They find some mentally deficient young social outcast and fill their head with crazy ideas, hand them a dummy bomb switch, and then grab the headlines for stopping another "terror plot" that never would have happened without their choreographing.   They were doing the plotting!   Meanwhile they loudly insist on the right to lock us up in violation of the clear text of the Constitution.

It does not amaze me that the Military-Industrial-Security Complex arranges these sorts of incidents in order to keep the dollars flowing.   It does not amaze me that a corporate media complex owned by some of these same interests which are hungry for sensationalist reporting keep pumping up a grossly disproportionate fear of terrorism.    It does not amaze me that our power-hungry ruling class relentlessly moves forward with implementing a police state, because that's what control freaks do even when they rule well (which our ruling class definitely has not).    None of that amazes me, because it all boils down to special interest groups of fallen human beings acted in their own interests even if it is against the interests of the nation as a whole.   I find it disgusting, but it does not surprise me.

What amazes and alarms me is the non-response from my fellow citizens.   What amazes me is that otherwise intelligent and reasonably virtuous people actually cheer this nightmare on.       What amazes me is their willingness to exchange their heritage of freedom for the false promise of security from a political class that they know is corrupt.   It makes no sense to anyone who dares to sit down and think about it for even a single hour.  Maybe that's the problem. Our lives are so full of noise that few of us have ever had such an hour.

Our Congressmen gave the finger to the federal judge who ruled the act unconstitutional, but they did vote for a fig-leaf provision by Rep. Louis Gohmert.   The provision said that persons detained by the military "when legally in the United States" had the right to file a petition for habeas corpus within 30 days.   So you can be locked up on the basis of an anonymous informant for up to 30 days before you are even allowed to file a petition to ask a federal judge to review the case and see if there are any grounds for holding you!   Current U.S. law, which conflicts with the NDAA, says that we have the right to file such a petition basically right away.

But hey, they might be able to water board you, and starve and sleep deprive you enough in 30 days that they can wring a "confession" out of you, because the NDAA authorizes them to do all that.   Some of you may be thinking "well, at least within 30 days we can still file a petition to let a judge look at our case."  Well, our ruling class is taking care of that one too.   You see, this "protection", as sorry as it is, only applies to persons "lawfully in the United States."   No worries you say, because that includes you and me right?  Not if Senator Joe Liberman has his way.  He is currently sponsoring a bill that would allow the State Department to strip you of your citizenship if they thought you were somehow connected to "terrorists." 

So problem solved!   Once this bill passes the same federal government who arrested you by mistake does not have to admit their mistake or let word of it get out in federal court. Thinking like a bureaucrat, they can simply strip you of your citizenship- thus removing your "lawful" status as a citizen entitled to a habeas corpus hearing!   They can then just stack you in Guantanamo with all the Afgan "mistakes" they made, when warlords kidnapped innocent civilians and claimed they were "insurgents" in order to collect on the bounty that the U.S. was offering.

The coming police state never makes mistakes (that you are allowed to hear about)!   Are we going to keep electing congressmen who vote for such legislation?  Is that the kind of people we are?  Do we really support the idea that if the executive branch of the federal government says someone is a terrorist then they must be a terrorist?   You cannot sacrifice freedom for security because once your freedom is lost the people you gave it to will then become the biggest threat to your security.

The Real Issue on J.P. Morgan

I have seen quite a bit of heat generated on the J.P. Morgan multi-billion dollar trading loss.   It is almost like the media wants to cover it without ever reporting on the core issue.    The core issue here is that J.P. Morgan appears to be gambling with financial instruments while claiming the transactions are on their regular banking side (backed by the FDIC and the taxpayers) rather than their investment bank side (not supposed to be backed by the taxpayers, at least pre-bailouts).

JPM claims they were only using the hedging to protect their asset pool, not generate revenues.  For example, if they had 10 billion dollars worth of mortgage backed securities on their books, they might take out a hedge (sort of like an insurance policy) that would pay them a certain amount if an excessive number of those instruments did not perform.

If that was the way they used them, they could have been telling the truth.   They would just be insuring against their assets' possible loss of value.   Of course, they should be hedging with capital reserves, not these pseudo-insurance policies with significant counter party risk.   But the main thing is, that does not appear to be how JPM was playing these hedges.   It looks like they were using them to try and make money.   In other words, they would bet on the failure of stuff they did not even own, or bet on the success of something that they did own.

 It looks like they were trying a gigantic version of a very simple trick.  If you keep betting "double or nothing" long enough, you are bound to win.   The trick is having a near infinite pool of money so that you can keep doubling down until you win, then walk away.   Of course this is just gambling.   It adds nothing real to the economy and takes no special talent.  Yet because JPM put these things on the commercial side instead of the investment banking side, the taxpayers are on the hook for the losses.

Our entire high-finance system is based on fraud.   Investment banks and regular banks should be strictly separated, just as they were before the repeal of Glass-Stegal.     The big banks are gambling.    If they win, they keep the money.   If they lose, they pass it on to the taxpayers through various means.   We don't yet realize how broke we are, because all the bad bets they have been using for "collateral" for loans at the Fed are still on the books as having value far in excess of their true value. 

Fraud is an interesting crime because for a while both the criminal and the victim think they have the money.   Right now, the American people think they have the money, in the form of the securities that the banks have been dumping on the Federal Reserve (with their collusion because they are controlled by the big five banks).  It is going to be a financial shock when the truth comes out.

The Effort to Push People Out of Cars Continues

Automobile users continue to pay high taxes at the gas pump.   Said tax money is then all too often diverted to mass transit, light-rail, and "alternative" transportation such as bicycle paths.   Here is the latest example.   Instead of refurbishing the old bridge, the State Highway Department is floating the idea of building a whole new bridge, while the old bridge (right beside it) is converted into a bridge for bicycles.   I don't have anything against bicycles, but special transportation infrastructure for bicycles needs to be paid for by people who ride bicycles, not automobile users. 

The State Highway Department and Move Arkansas Forward assured people that money from the highway bond issue that passed last year would only be used to "maintain what we already have" when we asked them about spending gas tax money on bicycle lanes.    This money is not from that bond issue, but it makes us wary of what is going to happen when that money does come.    It is a data point which trends toward a policy of making it harder for Arkansans to own and operate personal vehicles and pushes members of the public toward less personally-empowering forms of transport.  

Judge Rules Rep. Martin Did Not Discriminate, But Not So Sure About Democrats

                     Member of the Board that Was Exonerated

Black state Senator Jack Crumbly is suing.   He complains that a state redistricting  plan did not make his district black enough to ensure that minorities like him are the overwhelming favorites to keep those seats, thus harming minority interests in state government.   While he started by suing the entire board of apportionment (Sec. of State Mark Martin, Governor Mike Beebe, and Attorney General Dustin McDaniel) today the judge ruled that one of these men was not responsible for any unfair treatment of minorities resulting from the new district lines.   That one man was also the only Republican of the three, Martin.    It is the two Democrats that the three judge panel still finds suspect.

Crumbly himself testified that he did not think Martin was a part of the scheme to dilute minority votes- the heart of the complaint.   Indeed Martin's version of the redistricting map would have been more in line with Crumbly's expectations, but his map was voted down 2-1 by the two Democrats on the board.

Will the results prompt black Arkansan's to give the GOP another look?   That's probably not the way to bet!

Sounds Like Intelligent Design to Me

Bats and whales use sound in ways that are unexpectedly similar, according to this study.   That is, the findings would be unexpected if you believe these diverse creatures are the product of naturalistic evolution.    This is just the sort of thing you might expect to find if they were created by a common Designer.

The article makes a half-hearted attempt to say that maybe these commonalities are related to some limitations in the mammalian brain of the super distant alleged common ancestor.   I call WS (Whale Stuff).     What "fundamental limitations" are so unshakeable that they can't be overcome by evolution?   If mammal brains went from a pecan-sized lump in a shrew-like critter to a whale brain (or a human brain) then why should it be limited by some mystical sound processing barrier?   Especially since sound behaves very differently in water than in air.   

How do you give a Monkey Autism? Administer them the Vaccines we give to our Children!

The kind of tests that should have been done a long time ago have finally been done on lab monkeys.   The result is that young monkeys given a vaccine schedule from the 1990's tend to develop autistic symptoms while a control group did not.   Here is a link to an article reporting on the particulars of the research.  This result contains some variables not present today.   Thimerosal has been largely removed from vaccines today, so if that was the factor which contributed to the increase in autism associated with the vaccines then it could mean that today's vaccines are safer.    Regular readers of this space will know that my view is that it was NOT the  Thimerosal which contributed to the autism, but rather the presence of rouge human proteins from live virus vaccines cultured in aborted fetal tissue.   The MMR and Chicken Pox and some whooping cough vaccines fit into this category.

Hester-Summers Race Heats Up (Senate Dist. 1)

 Fresh Faces and Old Tricks in the Race for State Senate

Tim Summers is a Republican State Representative from Bentonville.   Bart Hester is the fresh-faced young realtor who is challenging Summers for the Republican nomination for Senate District #1.

The political newcomer Hester looks very strong so far in this race.   What has the sitting legislator Tim Summers in trouble?   Any state legislator whose district includes the Bentonville area is going to bend over backwards to be fair to Wal-Mart.    The knock on Summers is that he takes that too far and practically serves as the Representative from Wal-Mart in the state legislature.    Does the giant corporate person in his district get favorable treatment from Summers even at the expense of real people?   I am just reporting the common perception in political circles is that he does whatever Wal-Mart wants.

I will say that the other knock on Summers is that he is a relatively liberal Republican.   I have seen that.   I remember going to the capitol and speaking up for an education bill for autistic children that would give parents more authority than the educrats wanted.      Summers voted with the Democrats on the bill.   The vote was so close that the one switch would have sent it to the House floor with a "Do Pass" recommendation.      What I say fits with the perception that Summers, while not really a liberal, is liberal for a Republican.

Since the GOP is the dominant party in this county, everybody tends to vote in the Republican primary, even Democrats.   That's where the races are.   Because of that, crossover Democrats help pick the Republican nominee in these races.    That's why a very conservative Republican stronghold like Benton County still often elects people that are among the least conservative Republicans in the state.

A confidential but reliable source has informed me that Wal-Wart's top lobbyist Chris Neeley is now going door to door for Summers.   Obviously someone in his position would not do that unless it was authorized.  I doubt it would be authorized unless Summers is as influenced by Wal-Mart as his detractors claim.  Is there anyone out there that can confirm this for us?

The other word going around, and this is less certain, is that the Summers' campaign is targeting Democrats in the district.    That is, they are making a conscious effort to seek out Democratic households and get them to crossover into the Republican primary and vote Summers.   This tactic would be another example of the phenomenon I discussed earlier, where conservative Benton county winds up with relatively liberal representation because there everybody, even Democrats, vote in the GOP primary.  I would like some confirmation on that too, but when long time "friend of Bill" Dave Matthews is in your corner, its a good sign that you are the Democrats' choice for the Republican nomination.

Summers has the endorsement of the Democrat-Gazette, which normally means the other guy is the one to vote for.    He also has the endorsement of John Paul Hammerschmidt and Tim Hutchinson.    I respect what both of them did during their time in office and they way they were willing to be a Republican before being a Republican was cool.   At this point however, I think it is fair to say that both men represent voices from a Republican establishment that the rank and file as grown very frustrated with.

This is not to say that Hester is an angel.   I don't know enough about him to say, and there are also rumors of shady goings on from his campaign.   For example, someone has apparently been doing push polls which falsely insinuate that Tim Summers voted for Obamacare and other items that he did not vote for.    They don't say outright that he voted for these things, they merely imply it by asking the person polled if they would be "more or less likely to vote for Tim Summers if they knew he voted for Obamacare."   If this is going on, its dirty politics and Hester ought to order whoever his consultants are to operate with integrity or hit the road.      He's a fresh face, but can voters judge a book by its cover?

Beebe Setting Up Giant Tax Increase

Now that the fiscal session is over Gov. Mike Beebe has made a terrible discovery.    It appears that Medicaid will face a shortfall in the next two years that could run as high as $400 million dollars.    Either services will have to be slashed, or spending on the program increased.  And of course, not many people want to cut very deeply into medical care for the poor. 

Well, can we really blame the Governor for failing to see this one coming?  No we can't.  And for a very good reason.   He didn't fail to see it coming.  He knew it was coming.  A lot of people at the capitol knew it was coming.  Heck, even I knew it was coming.   What we can blame him for is deliberately refusing to act on that knowledge.     He waited until the budget session was over by a month or two, and only then do his people formally fess up to the legislature.  He has always treated the legislature as if they were mushrooms.

This leads naturally to the question of motivation.  Why would he do such a thing?   Of course anything I write about that would be judging the intent of another man's heart, and who can know such a thing?  Not I.  Unless its Mike Beebe.   I have endured enough of the man to get how he operates.   He is in an early phase of doing exactly what I told you he was going to do in February.

You may recall that Republican John Burris introduced his own version of a budget that spent $21 million less than the Governor's plan during the just concluded special session.   The Governor assured us that he would be forced to make draconian cuts if this dastardly plan to spend less money than he wanted to spend went through. 

Folks, if he can't stand to cut $21 million then he is not about to cut $400 million.   He is setting us up for a large tax increase.   He deliberately resisted cuts two months ago because he wants a budgetary crisis so big that we have no choice other than to raise taxes or watch poor people die for want of medical care.     If we had started cutting five months ago for this extremely foreseeable need then we would not face such a dramatic shortfall next year.

Here is how I put it three months ago....

"The pattern repeats itself. Big spending politicians set us up for another tax increase by hiding behind sick children instead of altering fiscal course while there is still time."

 If the Governor had really wanted to save us from a tax increase in the midst of a near-depression, then he would have gone with Rep. Burris' plan to cut spending, and come up with some spending cuts of his own besides.   He knew this shortfall was coming.  Lots of people knew.   He deliberately choose to wait until after the fiscal session ended in March to formally announce it.   The reason?  He wants it to be paid for with new taxes, not reduced spending.

I know he gets extreme cover from the Democrat-Gazette, but the guy is not that hard to predict.  Hey other team, have your own plan ready using budgets cuts- taken mostly out of his political hide.    He's earned it.

People Still Trust Local Government. The Feds, Not So Much

Politico had an interesting report on a poll.   The upshot of it is that Americans overwhelmingly no longer trust FedGov, though they still trust state and local government to about the same degree they have for years.   The decline in trust in Fedgov accelerated after 2002.

I have often maintained that all real power ought to be local.  When "your" Congressman messes up, it is not so easy to get a hold of him and demand change.   Your local JP or even a state rep., is much more accessible.   In addition, if your local government messes up enough, it is an easy matter to move to a new town or even county.    It's not so easy to escape bad policy that is nation-wide.

Stone County Massacre (GOP County Committee Purge)

At least six people have left the Stone County Republican Committee recently, including at least two who were officers of the committee at the time of their resignation and others who were past officers.   The reason?  They signed a petition to place Paul White on the ballot as an Independent for State Senate District 18 (or maybe 19).   White is a staunch limited-government conservative who ran for the seat last cycle as a Republican.   Sen. Missy Irvin beat him for the nomination last go round with what many perceived as help from the state GOP.   Irvin probably would not agree with the classification, but the resigning members believe her to be more of a big-government Republican.

In the intervening time, the state GOP raised the filing fee for a State Senate race from $4000 to an eye-popping $7,500.   That ought to keep out the Tea Party trash, right folks?   Plus, candidates who play ball with the establishment wind up getting their filing fee back and then some.  Candidates who lack the required, shall we say "moral flexibility" to play ball can wind up eating the filing fee.    

According to their testimonies, these (now) former Republican Committee members were contacted by Stone County Chairman Bill Smith and asked to sign a statement to rescind their signatures on the petition to place White on the ballot as an independent.   White read them a letter from 1st District Chairman Benny Speaks said that anyone who signed the petition for White could be removed from the Committee.  Smith later cited a rule which former member Donna Lancaster described as saying "anyone who did not back the Republican nominee that had been chosen by the Republican Party would have their names removed from the membership."   Insulted, the members resigned rather than sign the letter or wait for Smith to kick them off of the county Republican Committee.

I remember when I was a Republican, we used to look down on the Democrats' practice of having their people sign a "loyalty oath" to back every Democrat.    Now the Republicans have done them one better.   Although no one else has filed against her for the Republican nomination (who would given the history) technically she is not even officially the nominee until after May 23rd.

But that of course is just a technicality.   The people who resigned seemed to support White over Irwin, but signing the petition to place someone on the ballot in itself is not the same thing as saying that you will vote for them.   It just means you want some competition.  These days I find that the real disloyalty comes from the other direction.  It comes from the upper echelons of the Republican party towards its base who want smaller, less intrusive government.  Their disloyalty to the base is making some of the base restless.   That's why some of them want to see independent conservatives on the ballot as an option.  The root cause is that the party at the highest levels is not representing the things it claims to represent.   That's the root problem here, not the actions of these folks who are getting fed up.

  It's called blowback.  And trying to tamp down on dissent by taking a Soviet-Era position that anyone who does anything to allow anyone else on the ballot is a traitor who will be expelled from the party is only going to produce more blowback - such as the kind now occurring in Stone County.  I think you can still be for your party without taking the position that if it was up to you no one else would even be on the ballot! Again, it reminds me of Soviet-Era elections where the Communists were the only party on the ballot but they would go through with the pretense of an election just to show the world how beloved the party was.   How did that work out for them?


But the shock does not end there.   During a facebook discussion of the issue, Rep. David Meeks revealed that he favored the party position for committee officers and, depending on what the rule said, rank and file members as well! "As for signing the petition, If they are an officer of the committee, I would have to side with the party. If they were just a regular committee member, not sure. I would need to look at the rule they used." Meeks said.


Wow.  Depending on the rule, Meeks feels that regular committee members should be expelled from the party?  Remember this is not for endorsing another candidate, but just signing a petition saying "sure put them on the ballot."  So it seems.  But if that is not bad enough, he goes on to say something that truly astounded me, "I don't think it is asking too much to support the party candidate.  In most cases if you don't like the job the incumbent is doing, you run against them in the Primary. I agree that there is an issue with the filing fees.   This would be like if you worked for a natural gas company and they asked you not to sign the petition supporting the severance tax increase."   Meeks wrote.

Great guacamole!  Never mind how they rig the primaries and constantly tilt the field toward their favorites (how is Mitt Romney winning this thing?).   I don't think that analogy with the gas company could be more backwards.  The Party is not the "boss" of their members. At least they should not be. They don't pay the party members. It is really the other way around. The party should work for the members.

The analogy with the gas company would be better if some company sends their CUSTOMERS a demand. And I don't mean a demand they not sign a petition for a severance tax increase, I mean a demand that the customer not sign a petition that would permit other people to sell gas in the state, even if that customer has no intention of switching companies, they just want to be sure that everyone (even their company) is kept honest by free market competition.

CISPA Passes House with Four AYES from Arkansas

Artificial legal persons with lots of money called corporations wanted CISPA.   Real people, most of whom no longer have much money, either did not want CISPA or did not care about CISPA.   The result, CISPA is rammed through the house in a rush after adding provisions to make it even more ominous to real people.   Of course, all four of the corporate representatives who are sometimes alleged to represent the people of Arkansas voted for this bill. 

TARP Overseer Debunks Claims it has Been "Paid Back"

Of course TARP is just one of the outrageous programs that our bankster-captured government has to strip the American middle class of its wealth and transfer that wealth to a tiny parasite class that runs high finance.   I would say TARP was about the least egregious of the bailout programs that were ramped up in 2008.   That is why when you ask one of their (not our) representatives (such as Senators Boozman and Pryor) about the "bailouts", they will usually answer with "TARP", emphasizing the least morally indefensible program.

Well, it turns out their claims about TARP being paid back and the people making a profit on it were dead wrong.  Misinformation is about all the information we are getting from Washington these days.   I