Fourteen Signposts to Slavery (None Dare Call it Conspiracy)

Reactor Core ^ | 1971 | Gary Allen

[Old 300]

but reading a book is never enough is it.

When these books were written, it might have been possible to stop what happened later.

Online video: An Idea Whose Time Has Come - G. Edward Griffin - Freedom Force International

Griffin makes the case that serfdom is already here. He then makes some bold suggestions as to how to deal with the situation.

[Excellence]

4. Requirements that private financial transactions be keyed to social security numbers or other government identification so that government records of these transactions can be kept and fed into a computer.

The government intercepted and confiscated by child and spousal support, remitting it back to me by direct deposit only after obtaining from the various government agencies my S.S. number, driver's license number, and birthday; all the information needed for anyone to open a charge account in my name and go on a shopping spree. How long before the state decides they need more control over my spending habits by issuing to me food stamps instead of cash, or arranging to pay my "bills" directly, just to make sure I don't spend my own money foolishly? Most of all, it is absolute imperative that the state make the point to me, and if possible to you, that they are in charge; of your life, of your livelihood, of your getting up and laying down, your going forth and coming back.

[Old 300]

Great video: Overview of America from www.jbs.org.

Will we continue looking to government for solutions? Oligarchy will certainly continue to rise, if we do.

[Calpernia]

Relevant threads:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1878535/posts
COPUSA Program/FAQ’s re: ‘What is the Communist Party?’

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1235065/posts
EXCERPTS FROM NAKED COMMUNIST

[humblegunner]

As you are no doubt aware President Nixon already has invoked numbers 1, 14 and 14.

Yeah, he liked that 14th one so much he hit it twice.

[Carry_Okie]

Frankly, I'm not terribly impressed with Griffin.

His proposals are too vague to put together a program which is in any way salable. He may get contributors, but that doesn't construct a movement.

[Old 300]

I know what you mean. He’s apparently interested in something along the lines of leaderless resistance, which makes sense, but doesn’t make the basis of a club for liberty. He’s trying, and he’s talking about the important issues. It’s all any of us can do. The main message he has is “run for office yourself.”

[Carry_Okie]

I'd rather spend my time educating people already in power who are "savable," empowering them with an understanding of how and why liberty works through very specific proposals.

I'm going to more efficiently restate Mr. Griffin's problem statement here:

It doesn't work to drone on about lower taxes, reduced regulation, privatization, and limited government when most of the people we need to reach see that pitch as having nothing to do with them. They see Republicans as rich white guys grumbling about paying taxes while Democrats offer a government job with a fat pension. Republicans supposedly don't care about the environment, schools, or to give the less fortunate a fair shake. Unless conservatives can explain in simple terms how our policies do a better job, the majority of people won't ever listen.

Unfortunately, explaining how freedom works isn’t easy. The word doesn't mean much to an inner city single mom with gang bangers for kids, a farm-worker sleeping in a car, or a student at one of our institutes of higher brainwashing. These people have credible reason to believe that they need public help in order to survive, mainly because they can't see next month's rent check or a way to take care of their kids in abstract talk about limited government.

And that's just the problem: Coercion is an easy political sale because it is such a simple concept: If you want somebody to give you what you want, just vote for candidates who will force other people to give it to you. By comparison, it's awfully hard to make a case for freedom to someone who is barely getting by, convinced they are powerless.

The problem with coercion is that it doesn't work, because people are very creative in avoiding compliance, making enforcement hideously expensive. The economy loses the productivity of both the supposed skinflint and the enforcer. It loses competitiveness versus less restrictive governance. Coercion simply costs society too much for it to work, even if it were capable of acting impartially (which it isn’t).

Which brings us to the other problem: not only is coercion inefficient, it is sufficient power to be power for sale. It is regulatory power to put one's competitors out of business, or preclude market entry by innovative new technologies. Corruption is nearly always destructive to capital formation. Thus, not only is regulatory coercion a waste of productivity and destructive to global competitiveness, it costs jobs for those who fall for its false promises while favoring those with sufficient money to buy political favors: the extremely wealthy.

The power to buy favors is of course, the real reason why we have limousine liberals, most of whom didn't personally build the foundations of their vast wealth much less understand how wealth is really created. Controlling the market with political money keeps them from having to compete in a free marketplace of competitive ideas. Coercion, while destructive to total wealth, is reliably profitable (for them).

It is thus no accident why coercive government is the province of the Democratic Party and Republican moderates, because in a democracy possessing coercive powers, all one has to do to control the marketplace is to control public opinion. That is why those same wealthy statist interests just so happen to control the mass media.

By contrast, conservatism's strongest political assets are in their appeal to individuals: the unapologetic desire to profit in business, while expressing consistent moral values of honesty and decency in personal conduct. If conservatives go negative, they MUST do so from a position of credible moral authority. Else they will end up feeding the leftist pitch that conservatives are pompous, mean-spirited rich white guys with few solutions to offer for the less fortunate.

As is always the case with support from the "vast middle" of the political spectrum, their commitment to any candidate is at best ephemeral. So unless conservatives offer truly compelling ideas, those voters will always have divided loyalties. If it is truly the intent of the GOP to take the party to the left, and ignore the base that supplies it its supposed principles, then it will become the party of "We're not the Democrats," thus allowing Democrats to set the agenda to over all political choices.

So, in order for conservatives to win that public debate, it is critical to develop understandable alternatives to liberal governance and show how they work.

So, why don't we solve that little problem?

As I said, it isn't easy. I've been working for five years to introduce free enterprise environmental solutions, and started out speaking to rooms full of blank stares.

Criticisms come easy; learning to explain new ideas and how they work in simple terms takes time.

So, what have I done? Well, I have educated a couple of candidates on regulatory and environmental issues, showing them the corruption and counter-productivity of leftist programmes. I'd really like to get to Duncan Hunter, but so far his handlers have a fence around him. Learning this stuff takes time. If he wants to have a stronger set of proposals than "less" in debates, he'd best get started soon.

[Old 300]

You're a brave and dedicated soul. As government's clutches become more and more strangling, and when the entanglements invited by "moderate" positions can simply not be hid any longer, even ordinary people will start to be concerned. I don't think we're there yet. The cause is too far removed from the effect.

In any case, Griffin's message — and yours, are quite compatible, and I think you're both trying your hardest to make the best of being patriots.

So, in order for conservatives to win that public debate, it is critical to develop understandable alternatives to liberal governance and show how they work.

Unfortunately, it is almost impossible to let people know that there is only so much government can do for them. The tricksters have indoctrinated Americans with the fantasy that government potential to do good is limitless. You're asking us to tell them how great things can be without that. I see it as a big challenge. It's no accident that you focus on natural resources. These are things we could distribute more equitably to Americans if the globalists weren't in charge of the environment.

You're looking for a carrot. I'm trying to tell people that what they really want to avoid is the statist, globalist stick. It's destroying our country. Relief from that would be exhilarating.

I've just discovered Griffin, and in terms of presenting his ideas to you, I'm preaching to the choir. There are a lot of folks here who think otherwise than you, him, and I.