Freedom @ MindSay

We are no longer slaves! It seems July 16th was Cost of Government Day. We are now working for ourselves. All government employees can kiss my ass!!

We didn’t enter this world being able to stand on our own.
We were carried.
Then we crawled.
Then we stood, only to fall.
Then one step, then two
Til finally, we walked
We walked to where we are now.

Learning to walk was a process, and continuing to walk is our journey—
A journey that is completely unique to us, for we are the sole owners of our feet.
One step at a time we have made our way to the present. Ask yourself, “Am I happy where I am standing in this present moment?” If not, why not? Why not move yourself to a different place? Why not keep walking? Perhaps on your walk, you find someone who matches your pace. Perhaps you find someone who walks just a little bit faster than you, but they’re headed in the same direction, so you push yourself to keep up. Perhaps these people you encounter on your walk are the ones you grow to love.

Of course we all trip, and many of us fall. But if we don’t get back up and begin moving again, our journey has ended. We remain idle for the continuation of our lives. Our journey never ends unless we let it.

The world is ours to explore. And the exploration begins with just one step. We don’t even need to know where we are going because our spherical world has no dead ends. So if we can’t fail, why be paralyzed by a fall?

We must walk to truly live. We must live to find love. We must love to experience happiness. If we never moved, we would never meet the people who mean so much to us. Happiness would only be a concept— when it is meant to be our reality. So live a little, love a lot, and walk some more.

Find out here.

by Jacob G. Hornberger

 

While Americans are celebrating pre-revolutionary efforts by the English colonists to avoid taxes imposed by their government (e.g., the Sugar Act, Stamp Acts, Townshend Acts, and Tea Act), the IRS is celebrating a federal court victory forcing a Swiss bank, UBS, to disclose the identities of U.S. customers who may have used secret accounts at the bank to avoid taxes. It’s a classic case of where one bad intervention — income taxation — inevitably leads to another bad intervention — invasion of financial privacy.

 

Historically, the Swiss have taken the right position with respect to financial privacy — fiercely protecting the identity and financial information of their bank customers, including from government officials. Unfortunately, the Swiss position on financial privacy is contrary to the position taken by the U.S. government, which is why the U.S. feds are now attacking UBS.

 

Over the years U.S. bankers have succumbed to the control of the federal authorities, especially with respect to the “war on drugs” and the “war on terrorism.” There is hardly a banker in the country that doesn’t quiver and quake at the thought that a bank examiner or IRS agent is paying a visit to his bank. Even worse, bankers have effectively been converted into spies and informants of the government, required by law to report any “suspicious” financial transaction to the feds.

 

For their part, the American people have become as sheep-like with respect to financial privacy as they have with civil liberties in general. The fact that their personal financial information must be reported to the government is considered “the price to be paid for living in a free society.”

 

Of course, never mind that those English colonists in 1776 were rebelling against these sorts of things in order to achieve a free society. After all, is it really just a coincidence that American lived without taxation on their income for more than 125 years?

 

People have the fundamental right to accumulate unlimited amounts of wealth and decide what to do with it. How much they earn and what they do with it is none of the government’s business. A restoration of liberty to our land not only requires a repeal of all infringements on financial privacy, it also entails a repeal of the income tax, the drug war, and all other excuses for infringing the financial privacy of the people.

 

Mr. Hornberger is founder and president of The Future of Freedom Foundation.

The local fishwrap published a letter I wrote. They actually got it in before the 4th. Wow! 

 

Editor, the Advocate:

 

Another 4th of July is upon us and it saddens me to write that this nation is merely a shadow of the one that declared its independence so many years ago.

 

What would Thomas Jefferson, Ben Franklin or Samuel Adams say about this government’s desire to track its citizens?

 

Recently, Congress decided to grant immunity to the telecommunications companies that helped our “leaders” violate the Fourth Amendment. Is it any wonder that the ratings of the current Congress are so low?

I am also disturbed by the fact that the government treats its citizens like criminals by having us fingerprinted and put into a database through an abomination known as TWIC. The TWIC is administered by the TSA and I don’t have to tell you what a mess they are.

 

It’s just one more pointless and costly government program. How costly? The government charges you $132.50 so they can keep track of you. That’s $132.50 on top of whatever they take from us to fund these programs in the first place. Isn’t 33 percent of our income enough?

 

Happy birthday, America!

 

I look forward to the day when you are free once again.