If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in 5 years there’d be a shortage of sand. — Milton Friedman

When government fails, they are rewarded.

When terrorists attacked America (representing a failure in law enforcement and intelligence) we gave more money and vastly more power to government. As long as we are the world police, we’ll have enemies. Eventually we’ll see another attack, how much more money and power can we give?

The Federal Reserve Bank was set up to smooth out the free market depressions of the 19th century. Only after the creation of the Fed did we have the GREAT depression. Even then we didn’t learn. We gave government unprecedented power to fix things. It took over 10 years when normally depressions only lasted a couple years.

Did that teach us anything? Remarkably, NO! Now with our current economic crisis we are once again giving government unprecedented power and money to manipulate the economy.

Do we really expect these monkeys pulling levers have any clue what they are doing? When the market crashed in ‘87 Reagan decided to do nothing. That recession was over in a couple years. Let’s see what happens this time. If history has told us anything, with government meddling it will likely last much longer than a couple years.Government is in charge of k-12 education in America. Despite spending more per capita than any other nation on earth, our students rank among East European and Third World nations. What is government’s answer? Give more money and more power. Government decided to help students pay for college education. Since the early initiatives, the cost of higher education has gone up 500%. Faster than ever other segment of the economy. What’s the answer? Of course, let’s give government more money and more power. Government regulates and helps to finance health care. This segment of the economy has seen cost increase of 300%, faster than all other segments except higher education. This mess is a result of lobbyists buying votes (the Prescription Drug Plan), massive regulation, and businesses working the government red tape (insurance companies). What’s the answer? Give government all the money and all the power — nationalize it! Government now controls our banks. Government is likely to move into automaking, airlines, and who knows what else. They are sure to make a mess. But let’s all save our pennies (if we have any left), because when they fail, they’ll be demanding more money and more power to fix it.

Tags: government interference, small government is best
]]> http://www.sheeplepeople.com/why-government-should-be-smaller/feed/ http://www.sheeplepeople.com/ron-paul-speech-on-bailout/ http://www.sheeplepeople.com/ron-paul-speech-on-bailout/#comments Mon, 29 Sep 2008 23:12:52 +0000 admin http://www.sheeplepeople.com/ron-paul-speech-on-bailout/ “The most serious mistake that could be made here today is to blaim free market capitalism for this problem.  This has nothing to do with free market capitalism.”

“If you destroy the dollar you’re going to destroy a worldwide economy.”

Go get ‘um Ron Paul! Here is the complete Ron Paul Speech:

The bailout failed, but I am sure Ron Paul will get another chance to speak when the house pushes another ill conceived package.

Is your Rep fighting for you or against you?  See exactly who voted Yea or Nay for the Bailout.

Yea House Representative Votes

Nay House Representative Votes

Did your House of Representatives delegate vote the right way? House of Representatives Bailout Vote

Republicans are blaiming the Pelosi Speech for the bailout failing.  For a sound argument against the bailout you can’t beat Ron Paul: Ron Paul speech before the bailout vote.

The vote is still open until the chair “President of the House” closes it. It will take 13 more members to move over to the Yea side for the Bailout bill to pass.

While writing this one vote has now changed, 227 Nay and 205 Yeah votes. Someone has gotten the strong arm beat down.

Holy Sheep! The vote has changed again! Now it’s 226 Nay and the DOW is down 392.

How many more votes will change I don’t know, but you can bet your Trillion of dollars shady stuff is going on at the voting floor.

UPDATE 3:03pm EST: Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi Speech declares “Martial Law”?

No, we lost the second it started. It’s unbelievable to me that we would blindly go down this road again. After all, it was just 40 years earlier when we had the slap in the face that Prohibition gave us. We are STILL paying for Prohibition. By outlawing alcohol we created enormous profit margins for criminals. Criminals used those profits to build empires that persist to this day (the Mafia).

Think about it. If a product or service that is in high demand becomes illegal what is the first thing that happens? Profit margins go up. Once the allure of riches becomes apparent, then those that don’t respect the law will begin delivering those illegal goods and services. When those criminals feel that they’ve been taken advantage of, or ripped off - do they turn to law enforcement? Well…sure, the stupid ones might… but most realize they must take matters into their own hands. Criminals use their profits to build armies. Criminals kill each other and innocent bystanders that get in the way. In the most desperate neighborhoods and countries, druglords are the law.

By making drugs illegal we have turned Columbia into one of the most dangerous places on planet earth. Mexico is rampant with drug money pay offs and even the military is bought and sold by powerful cartels.

Federal, State, and local government spent roughly $50,000,000,000 (50 Billion!) last year enforcing and prosecuting drug crimes in 2007. Despite the costs in money, lives, and damage to society — most high school children have easier access to illegal drugs than they do to alcohol.

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Government intervention will make the problem worse. Didn’t we already experience what happens when government interferes with the free market while Carter was president?

Speculation makes markets react faster and increases liquidity.  Without liquidity the market could be much worse and subject to larger price fluctuations.

Speculators are not the problem.  The number 1 problem is government created:  The Gulf War has cost 600 Billion dollars.  Rather than force Americans to pay for this in taxes, the government has borrowed and printed money.  This has caused the dollar to crash in value.  Oil is a commodity, just like gold, copper, and steel.  All of these items have gone up in dollars as the dollar has gone done in value.

If the dollar held it’s past value, oil would be under $100 a barrel.

Besides the crashing dollar, other significant causes are:  increasing demand from Asia, decrease in new discoveries, subsidized gas in China, and high per capita consumption in the U.S.

Speculation is a debatable factor.  I don’t think it hurts us, but I know government interference will!

You can reluctantly vote McCain, who is likely to continue spending $150 Billion a year to fight a war halfway around the world. He’s also likely to allow government to continue over spending and intruding into more and more of our lives.

Or you can go with the leftist Obama, who is likely to reduce spending on war and use that money to completely ruin the tattered free market economy here at home. Are you looking forward to $25/hr unionized workers at Wal-Mart doing a worse job than they do now?

Either way, devalued American dollars and the loss of our lead in the world is likely. It’s a sad fact, but those are the choices and nothing short of a miracle will change it. America is on a downhill trajectory for the next 4 ½ years (at a minimum) no matter what you do.

Sure, maybe you’ve heard of Bob Barr (most haven’t). And maybe you know he’s against the War in Iraq and against Nationalized Health Care. If any candidate would actually reduce the cost and intrusiveness of government, it’s Bob Barr. But you know, I know, and everyone knows: If you vote for the Libertarian candidate Bob Barr you might as well have voted for the communist democrat candidate Barrack Obama .

I say: Who cares? We’ve already established that McCain is likely to do nearly as much damage at home and 200% more damage in foreign policy¹. Besides overspending as much (or more) than Obama, McCain could also do even more lasting damage.

The next president of the United States could place more Supreme Court Justices than any other president in recent history. Why worry about McCain’s picks? Good question: Because conservative judges have a track record for ignoring the Constitution and legislating based on party lines, an evangelical interpretation of the Bible, or popular opinion.

The law of the land should not be subject to whim. You may believe that suspected terrorists shouldn’t get the same treatment as we give to suspected child molesters, suspected murderers, or the most evil of all: pot smokers. But the fact is, until proven guilty; a suspected terrorist is not a terrorist. Conservative judges recently pushed for less rights for suspected terrorists. The decision went against them, 5 to 4.

If law enforcement finds convicting suspected terrorists is easier, compared to other criminals, they will take the path of least resistance and start to push all criminals towards the “terrorist” group. Already, the IRS uses the Patriot Act provisions on funding terrorism to go after offshore businesses that have absolutely no link to terrorism. Government is lazy, they will gladly trample your rights to go home early.

So what benefit could we get by voting for Bob Barr? Forget electing him, that’s is so unlikely it’s not worth considering. The real benefit is scaring the Republicans and Democrats back to the foundations of what made America great. Politicians pander (yeah, not news). If politicians see that 4% to 8% of the American people feel strongly enough about freedom, fiscal responsibility, and reduced influence of government in our lives they will take action. Ignoring that 4% to 8% would cost many candidates the election. Democrats would likely adopt some of the libertarian platform. They might take on social issues, increase personal liberties, perhaps an end to the drug war. Republicans would adopt fiscal issues, maybe, for the first time, they would see reducing the size of government as crucial to reelection.

If both parties adopt a little of the Libertarian platform, maybe, just maybe America could reverse our decline. Perhaps we could again experience the amazing growth and innovation that personal responsibility, economic freedom, and less intrusive government brings. A small government would bring back the strong American dollar, the economy that was the envy of the world, and the respect of all other nations.

¹ SheeplePeople believes good foreign policy means minding our own business, keeping our money and valuable lives here at home.

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Jeanetta Williams, representing a local chapter of the NAACP called the cuddly sock monkey: “pure racism at it’s extreme.” Obama supporters are condemning the makers of the toy. Outraged Obama supporters have even gone so far as to post the Lawson’s name and home address online.

Have we all become ridiculously racially sensitive or do you believe the essence of racism is bound up in this plush doll?

David Lawson has expressed surprise at the strong reactions this toy has generated. Despite the negative controversy, sales have quadrupled.

Here is a quote from the company:

“To Those with Heartfelt Queries,We chose twenty-two customer queries today that we believe merit a response. You touched us with either your concern, intelligence, humor, sensitivity, and/or your thoughtfulness. We thank you. There are other queries we received today as well that we chose not to respond to, because of their spewing of venom and their aimlessness.

We at TheSockObama Co. are saddened that some individuals have chosen to misinterpret our plush toy. It is not, nor has it ever been our objective to hurt, dismay or anger anyone. We guess there is an element of naviete on our part, in that we don’t think in terms of myths, fables, fairy tales and folklore. We simply made a casual and affectionate observation one night, and a charming association between a candidate and a toy we had when we were little. We wonder now if this might be a great opportunity to take this moment to really try and transcend still existing racial biases. We think that if we can do this together, maybe it will behoove us a nation and maybe we’ll even begin to truly communicate with one another more tenderly, more real even.

This is only our introductory plush toy. If we choose to move forward with a Republican candidate, we’ll begin with an elongated and slightly lumpy, fuzzy Idaho potato. Had a different Democratic candidate won the nomination, we were prepared to move forward with the cutest, fluffiest 12″ chestnut and golden-haired squirrel, with a short Farrah-like do in a brown pantsuit and call her Squirellary.

In earnest folks, we’re so sorry we offended anybody.

Best Regards,

TheSockObama Co. www.thesockobama.com”

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Even a cursory investigation shows those donations are misused.  The Junta regime confiscates the supplies and either hoards or sells them to the masses.  By donating to Myanmar, we are propping up a ruthless, violent dictatorship that is responsible for some of the worst atrocities in modern times.

These facts have been raised.  The left seems to believe that doing something is our obligation.  When “doing something” means hurting the people we wish to help should we continue?

The left and many on the right would rather ‘feel’ like they are doing something rather than doing the right thing, which is nothing.  Yes, that’s correct, doing nothing is the best course of action.  Sometimes, meddling in the affairs of others only makes things worse.

After sending $500,000,000,000 to Africa over the last 30 years, Africa is experiencing poverty more severe than when the “War on Poverty” started.  It’s unfathomable that we continue with the same plan despite obvious indications over many decades that the situation is only getting worse.

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