Saturday, August 30, 2008

#141 - The Good News

Hello,

As a Classic Liberal/Paleo-Conservative it was kind of a very inspiring year to see the momentum that Ron Paul has generated in the spreading of truly American ideals. While he was not able to win the primaries, there are many indicators in my opinion that show a new generation of electorate are gaining control, and the old guard of both parties are losing the influence they had.

- To me it was obvious the establishment of both parties wanted a Clinton/Giuliani battle come november, this was made obvious by the trail of special interest dollars and party influence. While there two candidates were able to keep the traditional voters on their side. It was two candidates who had the image of outside of the beltway who ended up winning primarily supported by non-traditional party voters.

- Biden/Mccain are washington veterans who have a history of overstepping party boundaries, and represent the reformers of old.

- Obama/Palin represent the new reform of their respective parties and will be the face and voices of their parties to the next generation of US politics that this election is signaling.

- The Palin VP pick to me is a concession by the RNC that they'll need traditional conservatives and libertarians to have a chance in November.

- The growing momentum of Ron Paul Campaign for Liberty shows that while we did not win this year, the signs above that signal a new openess to ideas by the electorate is alive and we are capitalizing on it for future success.




This is a new era, the country is passing the baton to a new generation. The policies and direction this new generation decides begins this november, and either choice will result in more government intervention. Although if we continue to fight to educate and chage the way people thing the government structure will change along with those ideas.

So educate, learn, and be free

#140 - Alex Talks about Currency


Economics # 2 - Currency from Alex Merced on Vimeo.

Thursday, August 7, 2008

#138 - Appreciating the Phenomenon

Everyday I hear some baseless optimism that Obama is gonna change things for the better. Of course, Policy wise for the most part I feel that this is not that case since we're in store for the same deficit keynsian policies that Bush set forth. Though I don't think Mccain is all that better an alternative.

Although there is a greater trend here we should be optimistic about, that is signaled by Obamas nomination and the cult status he and Ron Paul have been able to achieve this election season. They represent a generational passing of the torch, a generation open to change and new ideas, while this season they fell pray to an image touting new ideas, many did look into the depth of the actual alternative Ron Paul presented.

Still, despite another establishment election, there is much symbolism to be optimistic about.

Saturday, August 2, 2008

#137 - Mind Altering

Wow Guys,

So the video below is an appearance by Ron Paul in a segment about giving drug regulation back to the states. As usual Ron Paul makes the clear point that state rights need to be respected, and that federal regulation of medical problems create unwanted blowback (i.e. underground drug market, burden of holding prisoners, etc.). Where it really grabs my attention is when the lady after Ron Paul saids some realllllly off the wall stuff which I'd like to address.



First off, she saids you can't compare Marijuana to alcohol cause Marijuana is mind altering drug....

(disclaimer: outside of undergraduate experimentation, I don't smoke and VERY seldom drink)

I can never say that I've blacked out on pot, or not been able to remember what I did the day prior, but on alcohol this has happened to me once or twice. So implying that alcohol is not a mind altering drug makes this lady lose a lot of credibility with me right there.


Then she sites some statistics of places where Pot was made legal and drug use went up...

Ok, I got two responses to this.

1) When something prohibited is no longer prohibited be sure that you'll see a short term increase in use, cause those used to the old law will react. It's like the release of a new product, it initially see big sales which taper off as the novelty wares. Same thing happened after prohibition was overturned.

2) as far the increase in heroine use she sited, remember when you legalize a drug you steal it away from the underground market. The underground market isn't going to sit idly and take the loss, they will begin to push a new product so this statistics makes sense to me since I would figure the drug dealers would need to peddle different drugs if pot is no longer illegal.

This is why, the war on drugs doesn't work, and making any of these drugs illegal only results in increased underground pressure and crime. Make them all legal and there is nothing the underground syndicates can fall back on. Sure, doesn't mean states can't regulate the use of the drugs, but I think the world would be better off with state regulated legal use where users can purchase from safe places at lower prices.