What about this?

Is this something new?

It’s Warm Tonight

I’m lying on a turned-inside-out sleeping bag (the slick outer side feels better in hot weather) on an old couch cushion on the floor in my 1961 Spartan-Imperial-Mansion travel trailer.  The box fan is blowing and I don’t have clothes on so it is not uncomfortable.

It’s midnight on what is statistically likely to be one of the hottest days of the year.

Today the usual family gang got together for Amy’s birthday.

However, some things were strange about this particular get together that made it oddly superior to many of those which have preceded it.

When I arrived, all the others were eating chips and drinking cold drinks, however, not inside in air-conditioning as one would expect, but outside in the heat. The temperature was in the mid nineties and faces were glistening and yet no one was complaining. 

Everyone seemed so content that I didn’t think to mention the oddness of their sitting outside on a hot day in July. Ceiling fans were rotating and there were steady breezes, sometimes tossing napkins about. Could it be that after fifty years of ac people are beginning to readjust to the heat?

There was too-loud music playing so I had it turned off, but that didn’t turn off the traffic noise from Interstate 20 which was clearly visible in the near distance.

Someone informed me that there had not been space for us inside.

I joked about the ambience, pretending that it compared favorably with an outdoor meal some of us could remember when we had celebrated  my 25th birthday overlooking Lake Constance in Switzerland over three decades past.

In contrast to the quiet elegance of that long ago meal when, as we were eating, a ship had passed nearby from which we could hear the strains of a band playing waltzes, these surroundings were more like some dystopian industrial or post apocalypse experience. Today we were paying to eat in the heat while being entertained by traffic noise.

It was a success.

We ate and talked and then regrouped and talked and talked until, finally, our food having settled somewhat, we felt the need, like some African tribe, to arise and make our separate ways back to our individual huts where our digestions would continue.

Southern National Congress

There’s a Southern National Congress coming up.

The idea is to create a political forum to speak for the South as a potentially politically distinct entity, separate from the US.

I attended one in Georgia a couple of years ago.

Constitution Class

 

About 45 people attended the Constitution class at Trinity Baptist Church on Saturday. It lasted all day.

The attendees were 9/12ers and C4Lers.

I wonder what it means that 45 people would spend $20 and eight hours studying that document.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Speaker of the House Bobby Harrell Hates the Light

Nikki Haley did not authorize this blog entry. Perhaps she would be appalled to see such an indecorous exposition involving her. Be that as it may, and with regrets that the analysis must roundly criticize the Republican Speaker of the House of South Carolina, Bobby Harrell, such is fate.

Nothing written here is personal in intent. While it is a pleasure to criticize the bad that is being done to the good people of South Carolina behind their back, it is the law itself, under which secret voting by the Legislature has been allowed to flourish, that is the true culprit more than the individuals who simply inherited it.

The ability to spend great sums of other peoples’ money in secrecy invokes the ancient story of the ring Gyges. Given its obvious potency, it is unsurprising that the power of invisibility, once obtained, might neither, in the hands of average human beings, be used for good, nor readily parted with. Despite the evil potential inherent in such power one who had risen by its mastery might be expected to oppose its extinction.

So I fail neither to appreciate nor to sympathize with the old hands who are fighting tooth and nail to retain that power. Their political careers have been built upon it.

I simply know that they must fail if we the Citizens are to win. And in this case, in so far as Speaker of the House Bobby Harrell has pulled out all the stops to protect the bad old ways, I am justified in taking aim at him in the following manner.

A Tyrant has to work in darkness. A Tyrant fears exposure of his machinations. Bobby Harrell isn’t skillful enough, though. Everybody knows what he did.

House Speaker Bobby Harrell doesn’t care about mere Citizens’ rights to be informed about his doings up there in Cloud Tyrant Land.

This is how one Citizen expressed his disgust with one act from King Bobby’s Trick Bag:

“Nikki, The cheap shot by House Speaker Bobby Harrell to remove you from an important House committee was an obvious and despicable abuse of power by someone who should be above that kind of shameful behavior. Everyone in the state should be made aware of how you were punished by the “good ol’ boys” for pushing them to be accountable for how they vote on fiscal matters. It’s shameful how they all hide behind the dirty skirts of the Speaker of the House, insulting the intelligence and abusing the trust of the citizens who voted them into office, and who they took an oath to represent in a fair and honest manner.”

Nikki Haley’s words in the video above begin:

“The boiling point came late in last session when we took up the cost of living increase, a bill that is debated every year. I was greatly disappointed when a legislative pay raise was slipped in, but I was literally sick to my stomach when the bill dealing with state retirees and police officers that have served our state, passed with a legislative pay raise on a voice vote.

“Not one vote was on the record. Not one. No one will ever know who voted themselves a pay raise and who didn’t. I was embarrassed to be part of a group that I was so honored to have been elected to. That day we reached an all-time low. It was a low in respect for the people of this state. And it was a high in arrogance. And it was a very sad day for South Carolina. My embarrassment turned to anger and my anger turned to the belief, “Don’t complain about it. Do something about it! And the very next day I filed the 2008 Spending Accountability Act…”

Talbert Black arranged this opportunity for Nikki Haley to speak about better government. Talbert is with Campaign for Liberty. If you want to be part of the solution look into them.

King Bobby hates Nikki Haley because she wants good government. He hates Governor Sanord because he, too, champions fiscal accountability. King Bobby hates everybody that wants transparent government. He hates the S.C. Policy Council as well as the S.C. Club for Growth and South Carolinians for Responsible Government.

Now, those of you who believe that BGGG (Big Government has Gotta Go) know why the Bobby Harrells of the world hate so many good people.

Secrecy allows individuals to choose a career in government for what government can do for them – not just by conferring status upon them but through tangible rewards as well. Only if they can keep the light of day off of their game can the fruits of their efforts end up in their own and their friends’ bank accounts. It’s as simple as that. Pay offs don’t have to be immediate. Payoffs can even thwart the light as with those involving “the revolving door.” The opportunities are as rich as the human imagination. But shining the light of day upon votes is fundamental. Perhaps we won’t even have to vote some of the bums out of office. Make shunting other peoples money towards themselves and their friends hard enough and the whole political enterprise might loose its luster.

What a pleasant thought.

Thoughts on Limited Liability

I ran across this today and it made me recall something that drifts into my consciousness from time: the fact that government grants of limited liability are a thoroughly bad thing.

In the legal sense corporations are people. That concept has to go. Humanness must be imbued with the sacred. Sufficient regard for individuals will only return when humans can no longer increase their material wealth by hiding behind a government provided shield of immunity for the harm done by their hirelings.

There are plenty of pictures of the victims of the Bhopal tragedy. Nothing will ever focus the minds of owners of stock on the risks the managers of their companies take until those owners, themselves, are exposed to more than just the potential loss of money when “mistakes” are made. And don’t say that big things will cease to be done under such conditions. Capitol holders will invest. Money will be made.

No person or body of persons possesses the right to confer upon any other a shield against liability for the harm he or it might do to others. The notion that I can provide the money (the material cause of a thing) and then be held guiltless for any potential harm its mature form (its final cause) might do is ludicrous.

The thing would not exist without my money. The entrepreneur, the manager and the workers could not cause any good or ill without having got the fuel, as it were, from me. Certainly, as long as I own a part of it I am partially responsible for it: I provide part of the fuel.

I know the argument that limited liability is necessary in order to attract capitol for large projects, that living standards would be far lower otherwise. I don’t think so. I think that limited liability creates recklessness and a less thoughtful investor class.

I do not know how to delve deeply into this subject. But the author, Vinay Gupta, is thinking along similar lines.

The time has come for this.

Thoughts on Limited Liability

One of the persistent threads running through environmentalism is the notion of "Corporate Responsibility." I've been thinking through some of the issues involving how corporations are formed and how the nature of the corporation affects how the economy assesses and handles risk and I'd like to present an idea for comment and examination.

The seed of the idea is that the limited liability corporation is a government subsidy to risky investments and as such may be partly what drives the reckless attitude of corporations towards the environment. Read on for more details.

So, please follow my chain of thought and see where it leads:

Read more at World Changing

Abrham Lincoln: Tyrant

Lord Acton famously bemoaned the defeat that occurred at Appomattox. The statesman understood what had happened and foresaw the great loss for all of mankind that was Lincoln's defeat of the Confederacy.



The fantastic harm that Lincoln did, we can never erase. We can never recreate the world that could have been, a world immeasurably better than a fake "democracy" that masks a ruthless tyranny.

But the least we can do is be aware that what we have today is the fruits of the death of the Constitution. The united states ended when Lincoln called up troops in order to attack South Carolina.

The dream of the Founding Fathers died when Lincoln's War began. No amount of doublespeak can alter that fact.

That dream can be restored in one way and in one way only: by the death of the regime that "won" Lincoln's War. The ruthless, life-blighting regime that occupies Washington D.C. will die, is dieing and is threatening all human life as it goes down. Take cover now and be of good cheer. The future belongs to those who remember.