Category Archives: The State

Confederation Of Knaves Votes ‘On The Major Issue of the Age’

Federalism, History, Intelligence, Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim, Liberty, Race, Regulation, The State

The confederation of knaves is the California legislature. The pressing issue it has decided to tackle relates not at all to the following signs of “degradation and decline” in “the lost commonwealth on the Pacific,” as described by historian Clyde Wilson:

Public spending and debt have reached catastrophic levels unmanageable by a society of self-centered individuals and interest groups. Gang warfare dominates the urban jungle. The state doubtless leads the Union in … perverts, dopesters, and aborted children. Hollywood, once a source of pleasant diversions, now pollutes not only the U.S. but the entire world with pornography, nihilistic violence, and, what is worse, bad taste. The Terminator and various other flakes have been elected governor. Productive citizens are fleeing east and north by the thousands. If illegal aliens are not counted California is losing population for the first time in a century and a half of American settlement.

Rather, the “looming threat to human progress” that was banished from gangland is the Confederate flag, “(Though apparently the Hammer & Sickle, the Swastika, and Che Guevara and Black Power fists are still welcome) …”

MORE.

NSA: ‘Collect IT All, Sniff It All; Know It All, Exploit It All’

Government, Homeland Security, Intelligence, Military, Natural Law, Terrorism, The State

“Collect it all, sniff it all; know it all, exploit it all.” That’s the motto of the National Security Agency, as quoted by the genius Glenn Greenwald. Greenwald doesn’t resort to legalism, as does Prof Alan Dershowitz, who advocates that the NSA strike a balance between freedom and its violation. The charismatic, brilliant Greenwald, speaking without notes, defines exactly what it is that The Surveillance State consists of, and how terrorism has served as a pretext for the violation of rights stateside and abroad. In comparison, Dershowitz and NSA chief Michael Hayden sound like petty bureaucrats.

The real debate over the NSA starts, for some reason, 42 minutes in. “Live from Toronto, Canada, watch The Intercept‘s Glenn Greenwald team up with Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian to debate state surveillance with former NSA and CIA chief Michael Hayden and Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz. Greenwald and Ohanian will argue against the motion ‘be it resolved state surveillance is a legitimate defense of our freedoms.'”

Statists Collude In Sundering Honourable Swiss Tradition

Business, Economy, English, EU, Europe, Law, Taxation, The State

If the law applied equally to the state and not only to its subjects, the colluding governments—a cartel, really—participating in the concerted action against Switzerland would be prosecuted under anti-trust laws, for the creation of a global tax monopoly.

In 2010, it was reported that the US was putting pressure on Switzerland to end that country’s venerated tradition of “helping private property owners shield their assets against legalized theft (taxation).” Uncle Sam was meddling in the financial sector of an ostensibly sovereign state, siccing its legal footsoldiers on UBS AG, a Zurich and Basel-based financial establishment (and its American clients), because of tax evasion.

When they are not bailing out failed financial institutions, our statists are bankrupting viable ones.

Fast forward to 2014, and it transpires that the statists have succeeded—and not only semantically: banking privacy is now referred to as “tax secrecy.”

No secrets should be kept from The State.

At a ministerial meeting in Paris on Tuesday, Switzerland agreed to sign up to a new global standard on automatic information exchange, representing a decisive break with its centuries-old commitment to protecting the privacy of banking clients.
The move is a big step forward for governments that have mounted a concerted attack on evasion in the wake of the global financial crisis and a series of tax scandals.
Swiss co-operation is pivotal to the struggle to prise open taxpayers’ hidden accounts because of its long tradition of bank secrecy and its dominant wealth management sector, which has $2.2tn of offshore assets.
The declaration, which was signed at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in Paris, requires countries to collect and exchange information on bank accounts and the beneficial ownership of companies and other legal structures such as trusts. …

“European governments expect billions of euros to be repatriated as a result of the evasion crackdown.” “Repatriate” is yet another bit of semantic casuistry intended to whitewash these governments’ global property grab.

MORE Via FT.

Back to the post’s opening salvo: Sadly, even if a fair adjudicator were able to prosecute the colluding cartel on the grounds stated—the taxpayers would end up paying for the crimes.

The Occupational Hazards Of … Occupation & Murder

Barack Obama, Bush, Crime, Foreign Policy, The State, WMD

“Dude, this was like two years ago,” said Tommy Vietor, an ex-White House aide, in reply to Fox News’ questions about Benghazi. Your Millennial in action.

Republicans are furious over these latest revelations about Benghazi:

The Obama administration has been under fire since the emails were released earlier this week, with some Republicans calling them the “smoking gun.” The emails indicate a White House aide helped prep Rice for her appearances and pushed the explanation that the attack was because of an Internet video. The White House is now facing credibility questions, since they had previously downplayed their role in Rice’s talking points.
Vietor repeated the stance of Press Secretary Jay Carney, who has repeatedly tried to claim that the so-called “prep call” with Rice — as it was described in one email — was not about Benghazi. Vietor said the email was referring to ongoing protests around the world against American embassies.

You’d think that the fiasco and fibs of George W. Bush’s WMD were so much better. During the Bush years, GOP operatives, just like mainstream Democrat media, finessed Bush’s craven exploits in Iraq and refrained from covering the worst if it.

I feel for family members who mourn the deaths in Benghazi. But these are the occupational hazards of … occupation. Dedicate your life to doing the dirty work of the state—occupying people who’re uninterested in being occupied and democratized—and you should not expect your employer, Uncle Sam, to cherish your life or come to your rescue.

Speaking of occupational hazards, I approve of what Dana Loesch said on “The Kelly File” about the drawn-out, “botched” execution of confessed killer Clayton Lockett: “That’s the occupational hazard of killing somebody; your execution could go wrong.”

Here is an account of the “deeply troubling” Okla. execution of Clayton Lockett, as the execrable Obama called it, as well as the latter’s thoughts about abolishing the death penalty (with his pen and Idiot Pad, no doubt).

“In the application of the death penalty, we have seen significant problems,” such as racial bias and the execution of innocents, as well as the “deeply troubling” execution of Clayton Lockett, he said, responding to a question at a joint press conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Friday.
“All these do raise significant questions about how the death penalty is being applied,” he added.

Missing from the remarks of the odious Obama was mention of Lockett’s (white) victim. Was the termination of her life not a biased thing to do? Lockett shot young Stephanie Neiman twice with a shotgun before burying her alive, in a shallow grave. I believe that the fact of her rape has been omitted from the accounts.

Watch this beast’s confession: