Many of the things I have seen from the start of the Obama presidency have seemed ripped right from the pages of my favorite novel, George Orwell's 1984. Propaganda stunts, the permission of torture and extended detention without charges, government control of the economy, and talk of national health care. It is total fascism, and the media and much of the general public are in full support.

Andrew Hughes has written a fantastic description of Obama's performance so far, entitled "America's Nightmare: The Obama Dystopia: Manipulation, propaganda, imagery & PR wizardry." Here is an excerpt:

The President that extended the hand of peace to the Muslim world has murdered hundreds of Pakistani men, women and children. The President who promised accountability in Government has filled his staff with lobbyists, banksters and warmongers. His Attorney General refuses to prosecute some of the worst war crimes committed in modern history and continues to give legal cover to criminals who tortured with impunity.

The country has been further bankrupted by the continuing theft of taxpayer money as the Wall St. campaign donors receive their quid pro quo. Obama has stood by idly as Bernancke states that the private Federal Reserve is not answerable to either Congress of the American public. The U.S. taxpayer is now on the hook for $14.3 Trillion and rising. Foreclosures and unemployment are rising with no meaningful efforts by the administration to alleviate the symptoms, never mind the cause. The new image of America is one of tent cities, lengthening soup kitchen lines, sherrifs evicting countless thousands of young and old from their homes, once prosperous towns descending in to an eerie stillness and an increasingly disillusioned populace.

The "War on terrorism" has mutated in to a control grid for an increasingly aware population. The foundation for this had already been put in place by Bush with the Patriot Act, Patriot Act 2, Military commissions act and numerous executive orders that strangled what was left of Posse Comitatus and the Constitution. (more here)

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The liberals are already turning on Obama, even quicker than conservatives turned on Bush. However, they really should have done so before the election–for example, when he voted in July to give telecommunications companies retroactive immunity after they broke the law to help the NSA spy on Americans. It was irresponsible of liberals to forgive Barack Obama before the election for violating our civil liberties. Their party came into power at the expense of our liberty. The least they could have done is voted for a third party progressive. Cynthia McKinney and Ralph Nader are still socialists, but at least they respect basic human rights and government transparency. Obama speaks like he supports those things, but his actions before and after the election show his dishonesty and complete lack of respect for the American people.

Here is MSNBC liberal commentator Rachel Maddow reporting on Obama's policy on handling detainees:

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The Federal Reserve has conducted stress tests on the United StatesÂ’ major banks. The results are ugly, and they donÂ’t want you to know about it yet. They wonÂ’t even admit they have the results, but they do, and now so do we. Here is the best update available today on the status of the banking system collapse that has been occurring for the last several months, and is on the verge of its final plummet.

On April 10th, Bloomberg reported,

The U.S. Federal Reserve has told Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Citigroup Inc. and other banks to keep mum on the results of “stress tests” that will gauge their ability to weather the recession, people familiar with the matter said.

The Fed wants to ensure that the report cards donÂ’t leak during earnings conference calls scheduled for this month. Such a scenario might push stock prices lower for banks perceived as weak and interfere with the governmentÂ’s plan to release the results in an orderly fashion later this month.

1) Of the top nineteen (19) banks in the nation, sixteen (16) are already technically insolvent.

2) Of the 16 banks that are already technically insolvent, not even one can withstand any disruption of cash flow at all or any further deterioration in non-paying loans.

3) If any two of the 16 insolvent banks go under, they will totally wipe out all remaining FDIC insurance funding.

4) Of the top 19 banks in the nation, the top five (5) largest banks are under capitalized so dangerously, there is serious doubt about their ability to continue as ongoing businesses.

5) Five large U.S. banks have credit exposure related to their derivatives trading that exceeds their capital, with four in particular - JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, HSBC Bank America and Citibank - taking especially large risks.

6) Bank of America`s total credit exposure to derivatives was 179 percent of its risk-based capital; Citibank`s was 278 percent; JPMorgan Chase`s, 382 percent; and HSBC America`s, 550 percent. It gets even worse: Goldman Sachs began reporting as a commercial bank, revealing an alarming total credit exposure of 1,056 percent, or more than ten times its capital!

7) Not only are there serious questions about whether or not JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs,Citibank, Wells Fargo, Sun Trust Bank, HSBC Bank USA, can continue in business, more than 1,800 regional and smaller institutions are at risk of failure despite government bailouts!

The debt crisis is much greater than the government has reported. The FDIC`s “Problem List” of troubled banks includes 252 institutions with assets of $159 billion. 1,816 banks and thrifts are at risk of failure, with total assets of $4.67 trillion, compared to 1,568 institutions, with $2.32 trillion in total assets in prior quarter.

Put bluntly, the entire US Banking System is in complete and total collapse.

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In reference to federal raids on medical marijuana shops in California, White House spokesman Nick Shapiro said today, "The president believes that federal resources should not be used to circumvent state laws, and as he continues to appoint senior leadership to fill out the ranks of the federal government, he expects them to review their policies with that in mind."

If this truly is the new President's policy, it may be the key for Americans to restore their liberty during the Obama presidency. Our best strategy for restoring liberty may be to start with the Tenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ratified December 15, 1791 as the finishing touch on the Bill of Rights: "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

Eight state legislatures are currently considering resolutions which assert a state's authority under the Tenth Amendment to handle issues not delegated to the U.S. government by the Constitution. These are Arizona, Hawaii, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, New Hampshire, Oklahoma, and Washington. Former gubernatorial candidate Andy Horning has proposed a resolution for Indiana, but it does not yet have a sponsor in the state assembly.

States will most likely have a reason to pass a resolution like this and to challenge the federal government if there is a specific issue it wishes to handle itself. In Oklahoma, the effort is motivated by a desire to pass strict immigration laws. States such as California and Michigan could do it to protect their allowance of medical marijuana.

States will most likely have a reason to pass a resolution like this and to challenge the federal government if there is a specific issue it wishes to handle itself. In Oklahoma, the effort is motivated by a desire to pass strict immigration laws. States such as California and Michigan could do it to protect their medical marijuana laws.

On the issue of marijuana regulation, the Supreme Court ruled in the 2004 case of Gonzales v. Raich that it fit within Congress' role of regulating interstate commerce. The six Justices who voted on the side of the federal government neglected the fact that growing a few plants in your home for personal use doesn't involve any interstate commercial activity.

The Justices who voted against the federal government made some very important statements of dissent.

Justice Clarence Thomas: "Our federalist system, properly understood, allows California and a growing number of other States to decide for themselves how to safeguard the health and welfare of their citizens."

More from Justice Thomas:

If the Federal Government can regulate growing a half-dozen cannabis plants for personal consumption (not because it is interstate commerce, but because it is inextricably bound up with interstate commerce), then Congress' Article I powers -- as expanded by the Necessary and Proper Clause -- have no meaningful limits. Whether Congress aims at the possession of drugs, guns, or any number of other items, it may continue to "appropria[te] state police powers under the guise of regulating commerce...

If the majority is to be taken seriously, the Federal Government may now regulate quilting bees, clothes drives, and potluck suppers throughout the 50 States. This makes a mockery of Madison's assurance to the people of New York that the "powers delegated" to the Federal Government are "few and defined", while those of the States are "numerous and indefinite.

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The idea of an economic stimulus bill is to improve the state of the economy. One has to wonder what these provisions in ObamaÂ’s $900 billion stimulus package would do to help the economy:

• $2 billion earmark to re-start FutureGen, a near-zero emissions coal power plant in Illinois that the Department of Energy defunded last year because it said the project was inefficient.
• A $246 million tax break for Hollywood movie producers to buy motion picture film.
• $650 million for the digital television converter box coupon program.
• $88 million for the Coast Guard to design a new polar icebreaker (arctic ship).
• $448 million for constructing the Department of Homeland Security headquarters.
• $248 million for furniture at the new Homeland Security headquarters
• $400 million for the Centers for Disease Control to screen and prevent STD's.
• $1.4 billion for rural waste disposal programs.
• $125 million for the Washington sewer system.
• $150 million for Smithsonian museum facilities.
• $1 billion for the 2010 Census, which has a projected cost overrun of $3 billion.
• $75 million for "smoking cessation activities."
• $25 million for tribal alcohol and substance abuse reduction.
• $10 million to inspect canals in urban areas.
• $500 million for state and local fire stations.
• $650 million for wildland fire management on forest service lands.
• $1.2 billion for "youth activities," including youth summer job programs.
• $88 million for renovating the headquarters of the Public Health Service.
• $412 million for CDC buildings and property.
• $500 million for building and repairing National Institutes of Health facilities in Bethesda, Maryland.
• $160 million for "paid volunteers" at the Corporation for National and Community Service.
• $850 million for Amtrak.
• $100 million for reducing the hazard of lead-based paint.
• $75 million to construct a "security training" facility for State Department Security officers when they can be trained at existing facilities of other agencies.
• $110 million to the Farm Service Agency to upgrade computer systems.

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A post by Liberty Pile at Bureaucrash posed the question of whether libertarians should make compromises. He starts with a quote from Murray Rothbard, "the day-to-day compromises of supposedly ‘ractical’ politics get pulled inexorably in the collectivist direction." The key for us to approach compromise is to not sacrifice any freedom in exchange for another. An action is not compromise if it grants a segment of liberty and does nothing to remove any segment of liberty.

The matter of compromise was a sort of the theme of our last Indianapolis Libertarian Meetup (or maybe it's always the theme for libertarians). We discussed whether libertarians should support Governor Mitch Daniels' property tax caps. Most people seemed to be in agreement that these caps would not guarantee lower taxes in any way, and that reducing spending is the only way to accomplish that. By supporting these caps we would give nothing up in exchange for the caps. However, the caps do not offer any actual tax relief, so we would gain nothing either. Shifting taxes around only sustains the system we are trying to fight. I would interpret this as a compromise because we would reinforce a system of unfair taxation.

An idea we discussed was making property taxes fair and consistent, by setting a permanent assessment at the sale of a property. This would prevent the assessor from coming in and saying that you owe $1,000 more this year (I know people who had this happen last year). It would also let the market determine the value of the property, rather than the assessor's opinion.

Is making property taxes fair and consistent a compromise? If our ultimate desire is to eliminate property taxes, then one could argue that it is. I have heard many anarchist-leaning libertarians argue that authorizing any level of government is a compromise of liberty and permission of enslavement. While I agree with an anarchist society as the ideal, I do not see it as a compromise to move government in the direction of liberty even though it is not the ideal final solution. Assessing property value exclusively at the sale would reduce the government's ability to come and take my property away. While not granting me total rights to the property as I feel is the moral and constitutional solution, this is a restoration of a segment of my property rights. It does nothing to remove any amount of liberty from me. This is not a compromise because I make no new sacrifice, but I do gain something from it.

As long as we are moving in the direction of liberty and reducing the size of government, we are on the right path. As soon as we exchange a piece of liberty for a piece of authority, we are compromising our principles; we are compromising our liberty.

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All eyes are on Washington D.C. this month as a new Congress convenes and a new President is inaugurated. Honestly, so far this year, I have paid little attention to the Capitol other than enjoying the latest Kucinich video on C-SPAN Junkie. Instead, I am much more intrigued with what is happening at the state level.

Today, I heard about an exciting bill that would provide for gold and silver transactions with the State of Indiana (but more on that in a future post), and that got me browsing through the General Assembly web site to see what else our state representatives and senators have in store for us. A bill that caught my eye was SB 284, regarding the International Energy Conservation Code. What is the International Energy Conservation Code and how could some international institution get to dictate what Indiana does with its energy?

The synopsis of the IECC bill explains that it

Requires the fire and building safety commission to adopt the most recent edition of the International Energy Conservation Code before July 1, 2010. Requires the commission to adopt any subsequent editions of the code not later than 18 months after the effective date of the subsequent edition.

• Effectively conserve energy
• Minimizes increases in construction costs
• Allows the use of new materials, products or methods of construction
• Eliminates preferential treatment for particular industries or types or classes of materials, products or methods of construction.

• Increases the cost of building a house
• Requires extra expenses that may be unnecessary for certain building projects
• Requires one to jump through even more hoops to build a house
• Prohibits the right to fully own property and choose what to do with it

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I would like to take this opportunity to tell you about my favorite candidate out of all the political races happening around the nation for this November's election. It is Andy Horning, the Libertarian candidate for Governor of Indiana, with his running mate Lisa Kelly for Lieutenant Governor. I had the pleasure of meeting Andy at an LP picnic and Lisa at a meetup event for the Ron Paul campaign. While they are not career politicians, these two candidates have a genuine enthusiasm for political change and the knowledge about issues and policy to back it up (Andy's points in the governor debates were history lessons as much as policy arguments!). Andy and Lisa are also running on a platform that I cannot imagine any Hoosier disagreeing with. They intend to follow the constitutions of the United States and the State of Indiana, the supreme rule of law of our land, and to serve the people of Indiana, not corporations or special interests.

Andy writes on his web site,

I will not abuse or refuse your rightsÂ…I will be the first real, constitutional, legal Governor Indiana has had in a hundred years. I will protect your rights, because that's the job, and that's the law.

That's no business. That's called Liberty, and I want it back.

The constitutional job of Governor is to enforce (or Execute) the Indiana Constitution, as well as to enforce federalism under the Constitution of the United States. The Governor swears an oath of office to do this. Should I become Governor, I'd be the first in a very long time to actually keep that oath, and make Indiana The Place To Be for the American DreamÂ…just as the Indiana Constitution demands."

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America's first President George Washington said that political parties "serve to organize faction, to give it an artificial and extraordinary force; to put, in the place of the delegated will of the nation, the will of a party, often a small but artful and enterprising minority of the community; and, according to the alternate triumphs of different parties, to make the public administration the mirror of the ill-concerted and incongruous projects of faction, rather than the organ of consistent and wholesome plans digested by common counsels, and modified by mutual interests."

President Washington would be disappointed to see the state of American politics today. Two huge political parties hold a near unanimous majority of political offices in America. Only one of our one hundred Senators is an independent (Joe Lieberman), and he is only identified that way because he lost a Democratic primary and ran as an independent (although a Democratic incumbent) against the nominee who beat him. The Democratic and Republican parties control the choice of Americans by offering only one or two choices on an issue, while there are really many more options that must be considered. Often, neither party considers whether or not a decision is constitutional, but the two simply debate about specific aspects of the decision. What is most devastating of all, these two parties have held their duopoly on American politics for so long that they have arranged a system where no citizens from outside their clubs may contest them.

Ballot Access News reported Monday that "Alabama is almost certain to be the only state with no independent or minor party candidates on the ballot this year, for any federal or state office other than president." Darryl W. Perry, who is running as a write-in candidate for U.S. Senate in Alabama, explained in an interview with me on the IndyTruth Show that the state required him to obtain 37,513 verified signatures of registered voters by June 3, 2008 to get himself on the ballot for Senate. The mp3 of the show including that interview is available here.

What is unusual about the ballot access laws in Alabama is that it only takes 5,000 signatures to get on the ballot for President, even though it takes a much larger number for other statewide elections. Andy Shugart, who is running for U.S. House as an independent in Alabama's 6th congressional district, discovered that 6,155 signatures are required in his district. The U.S. Supreme Court actually ruled in the 1979 case of Illinois State Board of Elections v Socialist Workers Party that "it is unconstitutional for a state to require more signatures for a candidate running for an office that covers just part of the state, than that same state requires for an independent candidate running for statewide office." Therefore, Alabama's ballot access requirements are unconstitutional and illegal.

We face a similar situation here in Indiana. Over the past 75 years, the Democratic and Republican parties that have dominated the state government have increased the signature requirements for state-wide ballot access 64-fold, from 500 signatures in 1933 to 32,741 in 2008. The signature requirement is currently calculated as two percent of the total votes cast in the most recent election for Secretary of State, currently 32,741 signatures.

If a "minor party" candidate can collect enough signatures to get on the ballot for Secretary of State, he can earn statewide ballot access for his party by receiving at least two percent of the vote in the election. The Libertarian Party accomplished this in 1996 and has held on to it since then. They and the two other "major parties" only need to turn in a form to get their candidates on the ballot.

If an independent or minor party candidate is running for another office, such as state representative, he must gather a number of signatures equal to two percent of the vote for Secretary of State in the most recent election in the district in which he is running. These requirements are often also unmanageable for minor parties. The Constitution Party and Green Party rarely run candidates for public office in the state of Indiana because they do not have statewide ballot access and it is expensive and time-consuming to petition for a candidate to get on the ballot. This year, Taxpayer's Party candidate John Waterman and independent Steve Bonney attempted to get on the ballot for governor, and both failed to get the 32,741 signature requirement by the June 30th deadline.

Independent candidate Ralph Nader and Constitution Party nominee Chuck Baldwin did not attempt Indiana ballot access for their 2008 presidential campaigns. The signature requirements were simply unrealistic for them to attain. The Green Party did not nominate its presidential ticket until July, after the June 30th deadline for ballot access petitions in Indiana, so Cynthia McKinney was unable to attempt ballot access here. These three candidates will be on the ballot in most states, enough to win the election. However, none could dream of a spot on the ballot in Indiana this year.

Ballot Access News reports that ten more parties will hold nominating conventions in August and September. Eight of them will not have the opportunity to attempt ballot access for their candidates in Indiana and many other states. The other two are the Democratic and Republican parties, which have very late conventions but are not subject to the same requirements as minor parties.

It is clear that the system for getting candidates on the ballot for elections is unconstitutional and discriminatory. The Republican and Democratic parties, who happen to have crafted the requirements, are not subject to the same rules as most other parties. Minor parties spend resources on petitioning which major parties are not required to do. If a party wants to gain statewide ballot access, it must "put all its eggs into one basket." A minor party could otherwise devote the resources used to attempt two percent of the vote for Secretary of State to candidates that have a better chance of winning in races for smaller offices. These factors put minor parties at a significant disadvantage against major parties in the state of Indiana. We must change these unconstitutional requirements so that Indiana voters have the choices they deserve when they go the polls.

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The Libertarian Party's presidential nominee Bob Barr issued a press release on July 4 saying,

"Today, as we celebrate our freedom and independence, we should stop and give thanks to God for the life and work of Jesse Helms. As a nation we are stronger and the world is freer for his commitment to liberty."

"As PresidentÂ’s ReaganÂ’s right hand and ally, he helped bring down Communism so that nations might grow and flourish in freedom."

"He was a stalwart ally of freedom fighters around the globe, knowing that we are all diminished if we allow fascism to flourish."

(2) We believe the United States is a European country and that Americans are part of the European people. We believe that the United States derives from and is an integral part of European civilization and the European people and that the American people and government should remain European in their composition and character. We therefore oppose the massive immigration of non-European and non-Western peoples into the United States that threatens to transform our nation into a non-European majority in our lifetime. ... We also oppose all efforts to mix the races of mankind, to promote non-white races over the European-American people through so-called “affirmative action” and similar measures, to destroy or denigrate the European-American heritage, including the heritage of the Southern people, and to force the integration of the races.

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