TSA checkpoints have a terrifying 'backdoor'

From Komando.com (Aug. 9):

Two tools used by the TSA to protect flights and passengers have dangerous security flaws. Security researcher Billy Rios found the problems and shared the details at Black Hat last Wednesday. This is scary stuff because it could help terrorists sneak weapons onto planes.

The Morpho Detection Itemiser 3 trace-explosives and residue system and the Kronos 4500 time clock system both have major issues. Both come with default backdoor passwords from the manufacturers. That makes them vulnerable because if a hacker figures out the default password, it's no longer safe.

Rios says the Itemiser he tested also came with a backdoor password. Exploiting that,   he was able to alter the configuration of the Itemiser system, which could allow an attacker to prevent the system from detecting explosive residue, for example.

"Once you have access to the software, it's game over," he says.

If hackers crack the password, they could change the machines to stop detecting bomb residue. Morpho says the TSA now uses an upgraded Inemiser DX, but Rios said it could still have backdoor password problems.  [read more]

Yea, that is kind of unnerving. Backdoor passwords are used for testing purposes. The password in this case either needs to be changed to a long random password or removed all together.

The Terror Business

From FEE.org (Aug. 7):

Headed by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who holds a Ph.D. from the Islamic University in Baghdad, IS is run like a firm. Similar to traditional firms, IS issues what The Economist refers to as a corporate report, a document detailing IS's attacks throughout the past year. Within IS, the “group’s leaders had been meticulously chosen,” and the management even keeps a detailed accounting of the group's war effort. “They had itemized everything,” according to The Guardian’s source. IS also provides services that the Iraqi government struggled to provide effectively: It directs traffic, fights crime, and issues receipts for taxes collected.

Many who understand how markets and incentives promote prosperity through bottom-up entrepreneurship fail to apply the same logic of incentives and decentralized actors to foreign affairs. Destructive entrepreneurship is a decentralized process of searching for opportunities—which is exactly how IS formed. As an intelligence official speaking to The Guardian put it, “There was no state actor at all behind them, which we had long known. They don't need one.”  [read more]

So, IS is run like an organized crime syndicate. I wonder if they have a code of silence too like the mob. Both employ similar terroristic tactics. But the motives are different. The mob killed purely for money. IS kills for religion or ideology. 

From The Blaze.com (Aug. 8): Militant Websites: Islamic State Leader to Declare ‘Jihad Against America’  What else is new.

Also, from The Blaze.com (Aug. 8): “[W]e will raise the flag of Allah in the White House.”

Collectivistic Thought Throughout Time

Legalism (280 – 233 BCE). Chinese thinkers such as Shang Yang (390-338 BCE), Shen Dao (c. 350-275 BCE), and Shen Buhai (died 337 BCE) advocated a much more authoritian approach to government, which became known as Legalism. The only way that people could be controlled, the Legalists argued, was by a system that emphasized the well-being of the state over the rights of the individual, with strict laws to punish undesirable behavior.

Giuseppe Mazzini (1805-1872):

• The pursuit of individual rights is insufficient for the social good…
• …because not everyone is able to exercise their rights.
• …because the pursuit of individual interests leads to greed and conflict.
• Individual rights should be subsumed under the duty to one’s country.
• Therefore, say not I, but we.

Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (1809-1865):  Property is theft.

Karl Marx (1818-1883):

• Capitalism and private property make labor into a commodity.
• This alienates workers from what they produce, from their work, from their human identity, and from their fellow humans.
• Communism abolishes private property and brings the end of alienation.
• Thus, communism is the riddle of history solved.

Eduard Bernstein (1850-1932):

• Socialists  expected capitalism to produce poverty.
• Yet capitalism has increased the wealth of workers.
• Capitalism has proved to be a stable secure system.
• This means that workers accept capitalism.
• We have to take working men as they are.
• Therefore, socialists should argue for piecemeal reforms under capitalism.

Beatrice Webb (1858-1943): Argued for a welfare state that would provide protection against unemployment and illness. She and her husband argued that social problems could be solved by benevolent planners, administering society in the best interests of all.

Rosa Luxemberg (1871-1919):

• Inequality and oppression exist in a capitalist society.
• The oppressed workers do not need external leaders…
• …since they will rise up spontaneously to throw off their oppressors.
• Thus, the mass strike results from social conditions with historical inevitability.

Giovanni Gentile (1875-1944):

• The law and the will of the nation take precedence over individual will.
• All human and spiritual values lie within the state.
• All individual action serves to preserve and expand the state.
• Thus, the fascists conception of the state is all-embracing.

Joseph Stalin (1878 – 1953):

• The wealthy farmers are an exploitative class.
• They control others because they control food production.
• They resist collectivization.
• They are the carriers of capitalism.
• Therefore, the wealthy farmers must be deprived of the sources of their existence.

Mao Zedong (1893-1976):

• China is an agrarian rather than an industrial society.
• Therefore peasants are China’s proletariat class.
• Peasants have no power against armed capitalist exploiters.
• In order to get rid of the gun, it is necessary to take up the gun.
• Thus, political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.

Source: The Politics Book.

Eduard Bernstein thoughts are interesting. First, he acknowledges that capitalism is stable and actually does help workers. Then later on he says capitalism should be gradually changed. Well, if it is stable and beneficial why change it at all? Answer: socialism = religion or if you prefer socialism = dogma. It doesn’t matter if socialism works or not—it is a matter of belief.

Joseph Stalin’s attitude toward the wealthy farmers is not much different than Hitler’s attitude toward the Jews who he considered wealthy and who he thought were controlling the economy. Both scapegoated groups died in the end.

Conservative Thought Throughout Time

Immanuel Kant (1724-1804):

• Happiness is gained and felt in different ways by different people.
• This means that it cannot be used to generate fixed principles that are equally applicable to everyone.
• Since laws must be agreed as applicable to all and reflections of the common will…
• …no generally valid principles of legislation can be based on happiness.

Edmund Burke (1729-1797):

• Government is a human invention to oversee human needs in society.
• But some human needs and desires conflict with those of other people.
• Government must judge between conflicting wants to produce the fairest outcome.
• Therefore, the individual’s passions must be subjected to the government’s laws.

August Comte (1798-1857): The tendency to attack “the family” is a symptom of social chaos. The family is the true social unit. It is on the basis of families that society is constructed.A

Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859):

• Socialism ignores the highest human virtues.
• Socialism undermines private property.
• Socialism stifles the individual.
• Thus, socialism is a new system of serfdom.

Winston Churchill (1874-1965):

• An appeaser believes he is not powerful enough to defeat a tyrant.
• Therefore he makes concessions in order to avoid going to war.
• His concessions make him weaker and the tyrant stronger.

Michael Oakeshott (1901-1990):

• Parliamentary institutions grew out of the practical are of governing.
• Rationalist positions is based on ideology and abstract notions.
• They have existed for generations and govern based on experience and history.
• Rationalist politics engages in destruction and the creation of a new order.
• Thus, parliamentary government and rationalist politics do not belong to the same system.

Source: The Politics Book.

You might say the philosopher Immanuel Kant was a conservative? I don’t know that for sure. But his idea about happiness is correct. It is defined differently among individuals. The state cannot define it for everyone. That is why in the Declaration of Independence it says “the pursuit of happiness” and not the “guarantee of happiness.” It is ultimately up to everyone to pursue their own happiness.

Newt Gingrich in his 2013 book Breakout made an interesting comment about Winston Churchill. He said while Churchill was First Lord of the Admiralty he invented the tank after realizing that the combination of the internal combustion engine and treads could be a solution to the problems of trench warfare. No one in the army had thought of this.

Here are more conservative thinkers that are not in The Politics Book:

• “The Ten Cannots” by William John Henry Boetcker (1873–1962)
• “But—I'm a Conservative!”  by Peter Viereck (1916 – 2006)
• “The Essence of Conservatism” by Russell Kirk (1918–1994).  In this article he talks about his canons of conservatism.

Political Thought in Age of Reason

Francisco de Vitoria:

• All humans share the same nature.
• They therefore have the same rights.
• No people has dominion over another because…
• …in the beginning everything was common to all.

Jean Bodin:

• Competing power and structures lead to civil war and chaos…
• …so there must be a single sovereign answerable only to God.
• For a sovereign’s power to be absolute, it must be perpetual and not granted by others or limited in time.
• Therefore, sovereignty is the absolute and perpetual power of a commonwealth.

Johannes Althusius:

• Humans associate in groups at different levels, families, organizations, cities, provinces, and states.
• The purpose of the state is to protect members of its associations and their communications.
• Elected state representatives must reflect the many views of these differing associations.
• Thus, politics is the art of associating men.

Hugo Grotus:

• Life and property are natural rights of all individuals.
• People have the power to claim these rights.
• The state has no legitimate power to take these liberties away.
• Therefore, liberty is the power we have over ourselves.

Thomas Hobbes:

• Left ungoverned, men will terrorize each other in a state of nature…
• …in which individuals will stop at nothing to ensure their own self-preservation or self-promotion.
• In the state of nature, the condition of man is a condition of war of everyone against everyone.
• To avert a descent into the state of nature, men must enter into a social contract submitting to the authority and protection of a sovereign.
• The sovereign must be an absolute ruler, with indivisible and unlimited power, to prevent factional strife and chaos.
• If a sovereign fails in their duty, the social contract is broken and individuals may take action, leading back to a state of nature.

John Locke:

• Humans are rational, independent agents with natural rights.
• They join political society to be protected by the rule of law.
• Thus, the end of law should be to preserve and enlarge freedom.

Montesquieu:

• A government’s administration duties should be split between three powers…
• …an executive branch, responsible for enforcing the laws of a state.
• …a legislative branch, responsible for passing and amending the laws of a state.
• …a judicial branch, responsible for interpreting the laws of a state.
• Therefore, since these power are separate from and dependent on one another, the influence of any one power cannot exceed that of the other two.

Ben Franklin:

• The health of a nation depends on the virtue of its citizens.
• Aristocrats are conservative and unproductive.
• Independent entrepreneurs are useful, industrious, and thrifty.
• Thus, independent entrepreneurs make good citizens.

Source: The Politics Book.

Except for Hobbes and Bodin all are good ideas. What Bobin wants is a monarchy. But unless the ruler has direct contact with God and prove his communication there is no way to prove what God is instructing him to do. As for Hobbes his idea won’t work because if everyone is a beast then what’s to prevent the ruler from being a beast? I mean he’s a person too. So, the sovereign will eventually fail in his duty.

Like I stated before, Locke and Montesquieu were widely read by the Founders. That’s where we got the Constitution. Especially, Montesquieu.

And then there is Benjamin Franklin. My favorite Founder. You gotta love him.

Medieval Political Thought

Barons of King John:

• Free men have a right to liberty protected by law.
• A despotic monarch can exploit his subjects and punish them arbitrarily.
• A monarch’s power should be limited by the law of the land.
• Thus, no free man shall be imprisoned, except by the law of the land.

Thomas Aquinas:

• External law is divine, and comes directly from God. The eternal law rules the entire universe.
• Natural law is made clear to us through our God-given gift of reason. It guides our moral and ethical behavior.
• Thus, human laws on crime and punishment must be based on reason, so that they relate to the values we deduce from natural law.

Niccolo Machiavelli:

• The well-being of the state is the responsibility of the ruler…
• …and should be achieved by any means possible including deception and intrigue.
• The ruler’s own morality is less important than the good of the state…
• …and he will be judged on the results rather than the means he has used.
• Therefore, a prudent ruler cannot, and must not, honor his word.

Source: The Politics Book.

Machiavelli also thought that people are like sheep in that they can be manipulated by harnessing the weaker traits of humanity such as credulity, instinct for self-preservation, lack of individuality, and fickleness. Machiavelli advised rulers not to be deceptive in their private life, but only in their public political life. Well, I would think to pull that off you would have to be a border line sociopath. Otherwise, a ruler would eventually have a spiritual breakdown. It’s true that a leader is responsible for the well-being of a state, but  Machiavelli’s advice is I believe twisted.

Miscellaneous Thoughts Part 33

• If corporations aren’t people then neither are labor unions.
• I think it would be confusing if you were schizophrenic medium. You never know for sure if you were talking to spirits or not.
• Overregulations is a war on the small businessman.
• To make a student learn a subject make it interesting, or fun, or forbid the student from learning it.
• Voter-id laws are a war on the dead and illegal voter.
• Liberty is the enemy of socialism, communism, fascism, and progressivism.
• If you have a life advisor you can blame him on any bad choices you make.
• Next time a Leftist blames Bush on the Iraq war someone should say, “What difference, at this point, does it make?!”
• Power is the food (drug?) for the progressives.
• I am old school. I prefer email to texting.

Ancient Political Thought

Confucianism:

• A leader should be a “superior man.”
• Less than perfect people can be changed by an example of sincere goodness.
• This superior man possesses the qualities of virtue, faithfulness, and sincerity, which he shows in rituals and ceremonies.
• The superior man therefore sets a good example for his people.
• Therefore, if a leader’s desire is for good, the people will be good.

Mohism:

• Only virtuous capable people should be given positions of authority.
• Virtue and ability do not necessarily come from adherence to tradition or belonging to a noble family. 
• Virtue and ability can be learned through study.
• Therefore, plans for the country are only to be shared with the learned.

Aristotle:

• People come together to form households to form villages, and villages form cities.
• The purpose of our lives is to lead a “good life.”
• We have developed ways of organizing these city-states in order to live a “good life.”
• Living in a society organized by reason such as a city-state, is what makes us human.
• Anybody who lives outside the city-state is either a beast or a god.
• Thus, man is by nature a political animal.

Source: The Politics Book. Big Ideas Simply Explained (2013) by DK Publishing.

Not bad philosophy. The current administration could learn from the first two political thoughts. Especially the virtue and sincerity parts.

The founder of Mohism said if a leader is unrighteous these disasters would happen to a country:

1. Neglect of the country's defense, yet there is much lavished on the palace.
2. When pressured by foreigners, neighboring countries are not willing to help.
3. The people are engaged in unconstructive work while useless fools are rewarded.
4. Law and regulations became too heavy such that there is repressive fear and people only look after their own good.
5. The ruler lives in a mistaken illusion of his own ability and his country's strength.
6. Trusted people are not loyal while loyal people are not trusted.
7. Lack of food. Ministers are not able to carry out their work. Punishment fails to bring fear and reward fails to bring happiness.

Well, it is a good thing none of those disasters are happening in America. Emperor President Obama being a righteous and honorable leader. Hey, wait a second… Doesn’t the country have most of those points? Hmm…

Canvas Fingerprinting

From Komando.com (July 22):

There's a scary new method of tracking people's behavior online. It's called "canvas fingerprinting" and it's fascinating but frightening technology.

Typically, sites and advertisers know what sites you click on and when by installing what are known as "tracking cookies" on your computer whenever you visit a site.

Here's how it works:

In HTML 5 - the standard computer code for most modern websites - every site can be programmed with a "canvas" that you can draw pictures on. This canvas doesn't have to be visible and can't currently be blocked by the usual methods.

Sites that track  you with canvas fingerprinting use the canvas to capture an image of your browser. Every browser on each individual computer is unique, just like a fingerprint. This tracking tool follows that fingerprint around the Web. [read more]

Yea, it is kind of unnerving. Some of the websites that use this technology are: The Blaze.com (kind of surprised by this), NOAA.gov, usnews.com, dailykos.com, aarp.org, whitehouse.gov (no surprise there), ssa.gov, dhs.gov  etc. You can go to the “secure homes” website to search for a specific website.  There are in total 5,619 sites that use the software. That’s quite a few.

If you wondering the NSA.gov and CIA.gov website doesn’t use the technology for some reason.  At least they are not listed on the website anyway. 48 gov’t websites use canvas fingerprinting including cities, states and foreign countries.

The AddThis.com website  and another company created the software. That’s why it is on a lot of website. To be transparent, I use the AddThis widget on my blog but don’t see any of the analytics.

According to Wikapedia.com, AddThis only uses the data from the tests for internal research.

Early Champions of Liberty

The chief purpose in the establishment of states and constitutional orders was that individual property rights might be secured…It is the peculiar function of state and city to guarantee to every man the free and undisturbed control of his own property.  -- Cicero (106 BC – 43 BC)

And unnatural, irrational, sinful, wicked, unjust, devilish, and tyrannical it is, for any man whatsoever — spiritual or temporal, clergyman or layman — to appropriate and assume unto himself a power, authority and jurisdiction to rule, govern or reign over any sort of men in the world without their free consent; and whosoever doth it — whether clergyman or any other whatsoever — do thereby as much as in them lies endeavor to appropriate and assume unto themselves the office and sovereignty of God (who alone doth, and is to rule by His will and pleasure), and to be like their creator, which was the sin of the devils', who, not being content with their first station but would be like God; for which sin they were thrown down into hell,…   --  John Lilburne (1614 - 1657)

Where there is no property there is no injustice. – John Locke (1632 - 1704)

The price of liberty is constant vigilance. –- Thomas Jefferson (1743 - 1826)

Those who expect to reap the blessings of liberty must undergo the fatigues of supporting it. – Thomas Paine (1737 - 1809)

Let women share the rights, and she will emulate the virtues of man; for she must grow more perfect when emancipated. --  Mary Wollstonecraft (1759 - 1779)

The accursed system of slavery! To sustain that system, there is general willingness to destroy liberty of speech and of the press, and to mob or murder all who oppose it. – William Lloyd Garrison (1805 - 1879)

All taxes, levied upon a man’s property for the support of government, without his consent, are mere robbery; a violation of his natural right to property.  -- Lysander Spooner (1808 - 1887)

The smallest minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities. – Ayn Rand (1905 – 1982)

These guys (and gals) don’t know the meaning of the word “politically correct.” You can’t say they are not outspoken. Hat tip to Jim Powell’s 2000 book The Triumph of Liberty : A 2,000-year History, Told Through the Lives of Freedom's Greatest Champions for the list of names. These names (and there are many others) come out of the first section.

Cicero was admired by John Locke. Cicero was killed by Marc Anthony (not directly—he ordered some thugs to do it) for criticizing  him. Both John Locke and Cicero were read and studied by the Founding Fathers.

A lot of libertarians claim Ayn Rand as their own. But she always said she wasn’t one. She had her own philosophy—objectivism. Matter of fact, she criticized the libertarian philosophy. She also said, to be fair, she wasn’t a conservative either. But she definitely wasn’t a Leftist. The Left was criticized most by her. She was a strong supporter and advocator for the free-market system. What’s interesting is even though she was an atheist she still respected Christianity. The fanatical atheistic fascists who want to remove God from the dollar bill should take a lesson from her.

Mind Blowing Optical Illusion

Hackers hit American power grid

From Komando.com (July 1):

Symantec, the company that makes Norton Anti-Virus software, announced some very scary news yesterday about the security of the energy sector. The company said that a hacker group is targeting the worldwide energy industry, and the U.S. is a main target.

The hacker group is called Dragonfly and it's using malware to access and control computers at energy companies in the U.S. and Europe. Its two main malware tools are Backdoor.Odrea and Trojan.Karagany.

Big companies aren't the only ones at risk. Malware attacks are on the rise across the board.

Karagany is capable of uploading stolen data, downloading new files, and     running executable files on an infected computer. It is also capable of running additional plugins, such as tools for collecting passwords, taking screenshots, and cataloging documents on infected computers.

Right now, it seems like the group is using its access for spying purposes, but it could cause actual damage to energy supplies and delivery if it wanted to. [read more]

Scary. Maybe it wouldn’t be a bad idea to let companies and even individuals make and sell their own electricity to others. In other words, decentralize the power grid. Right now, individuals cannot legally make and sell power to others. The big power companies won’t like it but at least the whole grid won’t have to come down.

10 Values of Branch Banking and Trust Company

1. Reality- Take things as they are. Not what you want or wish them to be.
2. Reason- an "active mind"---a mind committed to learning from experience, profiting from mistakes, and being free from evasion.
3. Independent Thinking- "the most important psychological decision you can make, to be responsible for yourself." Says, John Allison, former CEO of the bank who is also responsible for the values.
4. Productivity- For Allison, BB&T is looking for high performers who have "a gut level commitment to getting the job done."
5. Honesty- With BB&T it's an obsession with ethical conduct 24/7, complete transparency---not even a white lie, and no exceptions [my emphasis] for the bosses at the top of the pyramid.
6. Integrity- always doing the right thing, always acting consistently with one's philosophy, no matter what.
7. Justice. Justice, as Allison puts it, "means you're going to award superior performance and deal with nonperformance."
8. Pride. Allison puts it, pride is "the greatest of all virtues, because to have it you had to have all the others."
9. Self-Esteem. In the BB&T philosophy, pride is what you earn by living your values, and self-esteem is what you earn by doing excellent work.
10. Teamwork.

Source: I Am John Galt (2011) by Donald Luskin.

Good values to have in any business not just banks. Too bad the federal gov’t can’t some of these values. I would be satisfied with values 1), 2), 5) (especially the no exception part) & 6).

As a side note, in 2008 because of TARP Allison was forced to give substantial control of the bank to the U.S. government. Not because the bank was failing, but because it was succeeding. BB&T had made no subprime mortgage loans. It had 30,000 employees and over $150 billion in assets, making it the 12th largest U.S. bank.

My analysis is this: The gov’t thought even though it wasn’t failing it could fail in the near future. And we, the Fed, can’t allow that. After all it was too big too allow to fail. What this shows is a lack of trust the gov’t has in the free-market system. And yet Washington wants the citizens to completely trust them. Well, trust has to be earned.

The Radical Cool

Greg Gutfeld in his book Not Cool: The Hipster Elite and Their War On You defines what it is to be what he calls “radical cool:”

• Honesty
• Fidelity on principle. It’s somebody who sticks to his guns, and is considered brave, in the course of daily events.
• Unpredictability that starts to make sense once you realize the person has a code. Remember when you first met someone and though, “Wow, this person is odd. Why is he doing that?” Then over time, you find that his behavior isn’t erratic at all, that there is an internal consistency embedded in his behavior that explains every tic.
• Persuasive correctness. It is one thing to be right, but it takes a real character to be right and explain why in simple, straightforward terms.

Those traits fit me to a T. For the most part. I say with all humbleness. Ha! Anyway, those are good traits to have.

Clichés of Progressivism

The following comes from FEE.org:

1. Income Inequality Arises From Market Forces and Requires Government Intervention
2. Because We’re Running Out of Resources, Government Must Manage Them
3. Equality Serves the Common Good
4. The More Complex the Society, the More Government Control We Need
5. Warren Buffett's Federal Tax Rate Is Less than His Secretary’s
6. Capitalism Fosters Greed and Government Policy Must Temper It
7. The Free Market Ignores the Poor
8. The Economy Needs More Planning–Central Planning, That Is
9. Human Rights Are More Important Than Property Rights
10. “I Have a Right!”

FEE keeps adding to the list. There is currently 11 clichés altogether.  The list pretty much sums up the Left’s philosophy.

Class War in the Time of Robin Hood

From FEE.org (June 16):

Only those who are particularly wary of an apparently left-wing message in the legend take exception. Socialists, of course, make the most of Robin Hood as a hero of the underclass and a medieval precursor to modern Marxist class theory.

Because Robin Hood is a centuries-old folk hero and not a historical figure, each generation has been able to reinterpret the legend to fit its agenda. It was only in the nineteenth century, for example, that Robin Hood amended his modus operandi to include giving to the poor. But if we look to the era in which his legend first "became genuinely popular," according to historian Simon Schama, we’ll see that the classes in conflict don’t neatly fit the Marxist theory. They do, however, fit the older, now mostly forgotten libertarian class theory of French and American classical liberals.

The Black Death reached English shores in 1348, killing almost half the population by 1350. The survivors were, of course, devastated. Not only had they lost their friends and families; they lost any sense of order in the world. The Middle Ages were marked by a belief in permanence and predictability. For the commoners who made up more than 90 percent of the English population, the details of one’s life would have resembled those of one’s grandparents and could be expected to be the same for one’s grandchildren. Then everything changed.

The population became drastically smaller—especially among working people—but there was just as much gold, as many acres of farmland, and as many buildings and other artifacts of pre-plague England. There was, in short, the same amount of wealth in pre- and post-plague England, and only half as many people to possess it.

With fewer peasants to till the soil, landlords had to compete to attract the surviving labor. After many generations on the same few acres of land, healthy field workers were suddenly uprooting and moving to wherever they found the best opportunity. Market forces made the lives of working people immeasurably better—and the nobles who lost the bidding wars for their services didn't like it.

As happens in every era of dramatic change, the economic has-beens appealed to the coercive power of the State to return conditions to a comfortable status quo ante.

The Statute of Labourers (1351) made it illegal for peasants to accept wages that were higher than pre-plague levels. Meanwhile, food prices skyrocketed, as we should expect from a doubling of the supply of money relative to food supply.

The poor, forced to endure hunger and shortages, could see ever more clearly that the source of their suffering was not just bad weather or pestilence; it was a political class growing rich from peasant labor. [read more]

And so the producers or if you wish the Common Class revolted. What? You meant the peasants revolted right? Well, not exactly. Yes, there was some peasants revolting but it was mainly merchants and lawyers. They also got screwed by the statute.

The Left will read the above and say, See the Rich oppressed the Poor like always. It was the Ruling Class (the landlords) who made it hard on the peasants by putting pressure on the State to make the Statute. Crony capitalism anyone? Yea, even back then. Before capitalism was even a word. The State had the choice not make the maximum wage law. So, basically all the people revolting or protesting back then were an early form of TEA partiers.

One other thing. Robin Hood robbed from the corrupt oppressive government not from rich. This is another fact the Marxists have twisted to suit their needs.

7 Articles of Impeachment to Take Obama Down

From Godfather Politics.com (June 13):

Barack Obama has committed numerous crimes since assuming the presidency. Many of them have been high crimes, felonies and a number of them of been misdemeanors. In all likelihood, one could make a list of several dozen crimes that would be worthy of his impeachment, but what ones would be best to topple the Traitor-in-Chief?

Andrew C. McCarthy has laid out what he believes are the 7 crimes most worthy of Obama’s impeachment and removal from office. McCarthy is a former Assistant US Attorney for the Southern District of New York. He is the man who prosecuted Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman and eleven others for the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. He also contributed to the prosecution of the terrorists who bombed the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

McCarthy has released a new book, Faithless Execution: Building the Political Case for Obama’s Impeachment, in which he spells out what those seven crimes worthy of impeachment are. In his interview below with WND Radio, McCarthy discusses his articles of impeachment which are:

1. “The President’s Willful Refusal to Execute the Laws Faithfully and Usurpation of the Legislative Authority of Congress”
2. “Usurping the Constitutional Authority and Prerogatives of Congress”
3. “Dereliction of duty as Commander-in-Chief”
4. “Fraud perpetrated against the American people”
5. “Obama’s illegal immigration policies”
6. “Justice Department’s alleged failure to execute the laws faithfully”
7. “Undermining the constitutional rights of the American people”

[read more]

Yea, McCarthy presents a pretty good case. But will Congress act? Probably not. As for the 7th article, the whole Obama administration is a fraud.

A Teacher Reveals Why He Helped Write Common Core

From The Blaze.com (May 22):

A teacher who claims he helped write the controversial Common Core State Standards informed a stunned audience at the New Hampshire Institute of Politics on Monday night that he decided to get involved because he is a “white male” who has been “given a lot of privilege that I didn’t earn.”

Dr. David Pook, identified as a professor at Granite State College and chair of the history department at the Derryfield School in Manchester, New Hampshire, had just been introduced at the event when he delved into his ties to Common Core.

“The reason why I helped write the standards and the reason why I am here today is that as a white male in society I am given a lot of privilege that I didn’t earn,” he said.

In new video flagged by Campus Reform, the audience can be heard gasping and laughing, seemingly surprised by the comment. [read more]

This is another example of a Leftist espousing the “white privilege” mantra. I think this is the newest fad among the Left. Author Shelby Steele calls this “white guilt.” Which I think is more apt.

The professor says that all kids “equal opportunity to learn how to read” . True, but when the Left gets involved there is hardly any opportunity. The students just become more confused and more bored.

GOP Senate Victory Is Key

From Dick Morris.com (May 27):

Why, some Republicans are asking, should the GOP focus on winning the Senate this year? What will it achieve as long as Barack Obama is still president? We won't get 67 votes to override his vetoes, or even 60 votes to overcome filibusters. Why bother?

There are a number of strong reasons why winning the Senate is worth working for.

• If Republicans control the Senate, they can block the confirmation of judges who will allow Obama's power overreach.
• The president does not have a line-item veto, so control of both Houses could empower Republicans to put in budget lines that restrict Obama's favorite programs.
• Republicans would also be able to stop obnoxious treaties from being ratified.

[read more]

The key here is that the republicans have to be conservative. They can back down on any of those points. It would be nice if they could repeal the Unaffordable No-Care Act aka Obamacare instead of just weakening it, but I’ll take what I can get. But that would require a president, preferably a conservative republican president, that wouldn’t veto the repeal.

The obnoxious treaties Dick Morris is talking about are Arms Trade Treaty and the Law of the Sea treaty which both restrict America’s liberty.

A 5th Grade Teacher Comments on Common Core

The following are excerpts from a Blaze.com interview (May 22) done with Brad McQueen, a 5th grade teacher from Arizona who after working on the development/review of rubrics and questions on the PARCC/Common Core test grew disgusted with what he was seeing and decided to speak out about it, ultimately self-publishing a book titled “The Cult of Common Core.” Below are his comments:

Working on the CCore test was a very different experience and had 50 more shades of bureaucracy. My Common Core handlers weren’t interested in my questions about where the standards came from, who wrote them, who wrote the test questions, etc. If they did attempt an answer they usually parroted the phrase “Teachers were involved.” Something didn’t feel right.

My turning point came when in answer to questions I had about a student writing sample, my Common Core handler blurted out, “We don’t ever care what the kids’ opinions are. If they write what they think or put forth their opinion then they will fail the test.”

I have always taught my students to think for themselves. They are to study multiple views on a given topic, then take their own position and support it with evidence. “That is the old way of writing,” my Common Core handler sighed. “We want students to repeat the opinions of the ‘experts’ that we expose them to on the test. This is the ‘new’ way of writing with the Common Core.”

After a week of work I was convinced of the correctness of my feelings and my research about the Common Core. During this visit I worked with Pearson and ETS on the questions they created for the test. Again we were just window dressing so that they could check the box that “teachers were involved.”

The Common Core is much bigger than just a set of standards, a test, or a data gathering machine. Like a virus, the Common Core tricks its victims into lowering their guard by pretending to be something it is not. But the Common Core isn’t just a mindless infection of our society; rather it is an intentional takeover of our education delivery system and therefore a takeover of our children’s minds. It is a one-size-fits-all, homogenized, centrally controlled education delivery system steeped in Progressive ideology. It is antithetical to everything that makes our country exceptional. This cult is relentlessly pulling our children under its control, with a seemingly endless supply of money, and uses intimidation to silence its opponents.

The Common Core standards are not more rigorous, they are just different. They supposedly only prescribe what is to be learned in K-12 math, reading, and writing. The Thomas Fordham Institute conducted a study in 2010 that compared the Common Core Standards with each of our country’s state standards. They found that 13 states’ standards were at par or better than the new Common Core standards.

The Common Core group confuses “more rigorous” with “more complicated.” In math they boast about how their standards teach less math concepts at each grade level than before, but they teach them deeper. A kid can’t just know that 12-9=3, they have to demonstrate their knowledge of this concept by showing it 5 different ways visually. Many of these ridiculous math problems are posted daily online for the world to see by bewildered parents of equally bewildered children.

That sounds like indoctrination than learning. Why does a child need to show five different ways visually for a simple subtraction problem? It doesn’t make sense.

What this is is a war on school children. How’s that for a meme.