Posted by Paul S. on 11/05/09

Sixteen people or so gathered at the Brighton Hilton in another Campaign for Liberty meeting.

C4L Coordinator Greg Brown welcomed the attendees and began the campaign by reviewing the goals.

To promote and defend these great American principles by means of educational and political activity:

• individual liberty
• constitutional government
• sound money
• free markets
• non-interventionist foreign policy

He also explained that he was a coordinator, not the leader of the group. One of his tasks is to coordinate Livingston County activities with state and national. Campaign for Liberty

Jason followed Greg and told his story as a family man concerned for his young children. He was no longer willing to wait for a leader to step forward to show the way. He was going to be the leader he wanted as best he can. His call to action asked us to do the same.

Jason introduced Wendy Day our keynote speaker. Day was the organizer of the April 15 2009 Tea Party in Lansing. She began with a personal recommendation of the movie "Amazing Grace". She continued talking about the excitement of arranging and implementing the Lansing Tea Party.

An important part of her current efforts involves looking up the voting records of Michigan Legislators. Their records and their position on the principles of liberty, individual responsibility and limited government are questioned, identified and posted for everyone's benefit.

A question and answer period was followed by a recruitment request for the Campaign for Liberty and a reminder of the next meeting On November 10 at 7:00PM at the Brighton House Restaurant.

Posted 11/09/09 Deanne Hunt Chelsea, MI

OUTSTANDING! Very encouraging. Good luck to you!

Posted by Paul S. on 06/19/09
Last updated 06/19/09

Real free care can work. That is freedom of choice, freedom to assemble as patient and provider, freedom from unauthorized disclosure, freedom to pursue tort, etc.

Tell someone that we should repeal the Sherman Anti-Trust Act that is supposed to regulate monopolistic powers. `Oh! You can't do that. Evil monopolies of the free market will take over and we must smash those monopolies` they cry. So a couple of years later Congress creates the Federal Reserve which is a legal, government-sanctioned monopoly. When they disrupt the economy by accident, through stupidity or by confidence game then almost everyone that has used their money has suffered losses. A direct result of their monopoly to create money without commodity or labor added to justify any value added to the money supply. After nearly 100 years the dollar barely buys a couple of pennies worth in 1913 terms. Or if the Federal Reserve had managed the gallon like they did the dollar a gallon (4 liters) would be half a teacup (4 ounces).

Now many seem to be clamoring for yet another monopoly created by law where one has never grown naturally. This medical monopoly would be created by law and owned and administered by the federal government. Politics can easily replace sound science, fiscal survival and what just works. If they manage health policy like they do monetary policy they will be soon offering to make you sicker so you can get better. I jest. It has the possibility of being far more tyrannical. As with all government monopolies any errors will be suffered union wide. In an aggregate of competing medical providers the free market tends to keep prices lowest and weed out inefficient users of resources. The government only has political tools. But government doesn't produce anything. Its tool is regulation requiring obedience. Political solutions create unintended consequences and political results.

In the meantime, when you get a medical bill offer to pay 1/3 the amount and stick by it. That's the amount of settlement the insurance company makes. Only the government pays full price. Then take off the 14% that it costs the practice for claims administration. A first person payor does not need the claim processing or its cost. But anyone who causes their provider as much trouble as the insurance company deserves a 14% surcharge.

Better yet find providers that will give you the discount rate used by third-party payors beforehand. Market demand for professional services at fair prices is your right regarding health care since it's yours in a free market. We have the vote in the market with our money and at the polls. Which one do you think will provide more favorable results?

Posted 11/09/09 Deanne Hunt Chelsea, MI

lol - your comparison to the gallon, nice.

Posted by Paul S. on 06/05/09

Michigan is in shock, but my neighbors are for the most part have not lost their pioneering spirit and we will do what has to be done.

The governments can't save us.The financial system couldn't even save itself as it went begging to the Federal government established by we the people. Wall Street can't save us as the bottom might easily be 1200 points on the Dow.

Main Street or more technically the Free Market is where we the people will be going to first keep ourselves alive and then to prosper.

We need to help ourselves and we need government to get out of the way.

- Make gold and silver legal tender in competition with Federal Reserve Notes.

- Establish fractional reserve banking as a fraud. It is fraudulent to lend property that one doesn't have. How about punishment by imprisoning the guilty in a glass room on public display?

- Eliminate the Federal income tax, Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid donations. We know how to spend our own earnings best. At least when one of us makes a mistake all of us don't suffer.

- Balance the Federal Budget adjusting for tax cuts above. Starting with our Foreign welfare programs.

- Actively protect individual privacy, personal property and legal contracts. Investigate and prosecute fraud, and provide swift justice. We cannot build a free market with rampant frauds going unpunished.

Isn't it amazing how "We the people" is where everyone goes for help? We will cut out the middle men who take our taxes and who rob us further by devaluing the dollar. Then after taking their cut give us back our own money with a bunch of regulations on how it is to be spent.

The option is the road to serfdom under a global fiat currency. It seems far wiser to seek self sufficiency in a truly competitive and free market. We don't even have to wait for the government to help. Many of those in control still live in the fantasy land of yesterday. The veil has dropped and we will act alone if need be.

Posted 06/05/09 libertyspirit Modesto, CA

I love your bullet points because it shows the need to restore justice. Also, the second to the last paragraph hit the nail on the head for me. You wrote, "Isn't it amazing how "We the people" is where everyone goes for help? We will cut out the middle men who take our taxes and who rob us further by devaluing the dollar. Then after taking their cut give us back our own money with a bunch of regulations on how it is to be spent." You rightly suggest that "We the people" is where help can be found, just not at gun point by a third party middle-man. It's should be voluntary! Nothing and no one can justify the taking of trillons of dollars which will result in the slavery of future generations who won't even benefit from the taking, which wouldn't make it right anyway. Thank you for your clear-sited view.

Posted 06/07/09 Paul S. Brighton, MI

I thank you for the affirmation, libertyspirit. You're reminder that future generations will be held liable for these debts strengthens my resolve to move these campaigns for liberty forward. Paul

Posted by Paul S. on 01/29/09
Last updated 01/29/09

> former NSA analyst and now-whistleblower Russell Tice unveiled a massive NSA
> spying and wiretap program, which he claims vacuumed up an astonishing
> amount of communications and financial data on journalists and innocent
> Americans.
>
http://www.dailytech.com/Whistleblower+Says+NSA+Monitors+Everybody+Targets+Repor
ters+and+Dissidents/article14038.htm
>
It's like a dream come true. One day about a decade ago I was thinking of ways government could spend the money they were borrowing on my great-great-great grandchildren's behalf.
 
 Ring....
Heh
Heh
Cold?
Yeah, windy too
Snows over my boots
We got rain & ice
Hunh
Got a big buck.
Today
ya
Out back.
Nah down at the barn
hunh
 
Tens of thousands hours of important phone calls and billions of emails and other digital debris recorded for posterity.
 
Will they do sarcasm five generations from now? Seriously. Dear children, I thought this operation was just foolish which seems odd given all the smart people in the NSA. It's not very useful as a crime prosecution tool as wiretapping has been held as generally inadmissible. Besides how would one prove it wasn't government manufactured data? Its use for crime prevention is limited because it isn't a crime until it is committed.

Then one or more unscrupulous characters are hired or elected and they recognize the true value of such a data repository: extortion, blackmail and coercion.

So we have a system that allows us to elect representatives who spend taxpayer's current and future earnings in order to build a system that spies on us secretly. Is anybody OK with this? And how?

Posted 04/17/09 Deanne Hunt Chelsea, MI

haha, your "recorded message" made me laugh.

Posted by Paul S. on 12/10/08

More knee-jerk anti-unionism. There is all this talk about the cost of labor but not one shred of evidence that this was instrumental in anything.

Should the Campaign for Liberty alienate union workers without justification? We need to educate everyone on dangers to the middle class of growing the money supply and how it steals money out of everyone’s paycheck and bank account. Money is the only product where increasing the quantity decreases its quality as measured by its value. Let us not forget the importance of following the Constituion. The bailout is unconstitutional

Unions are just one more cost. What about the bubble caused by the $100,000 tax break given small business for vehicles weighing over 6000 pounds? This virtual demand left the car companies struggling when fuel prices skyrocketed and all their tooling made overstuffed SUVs and big tough trucks. How about the high prices of steel, copper and aluminum? Insurance skyrocketed for union and managers alike. Labor is just another cost.

Economists applaud if owners and their managers take home increased profits, salaries and benefits. Yet there seems to be no end of scorn for unions that negotiate similar deals for themselves. Is there anyone in one of those companies that has a lower pay and benefit package that a union worker? No. Would the company have settled if they were to stop being profitable? No! Would the union kill off their employer for short term benefits? Austrian economics is based on rational self interest. Somehow union members don’t qualify as rational economic actors?

GM’s GMAC is a financial company that stands to profit from a bailout because they are sitting on big losses from bad mortgages and loans. They gambled and they lost. Every business has a particle of risk.

Currently the company is managed by executives not capitalists. If they do poorly they lose their jobs and leave on a golden parachute. The Capitalists in this case are the shareholders but somehow they have little say unless they just dump their stocks. The unions have a golden parachute when the executives do poorly. It is called job bank.

Too big to succeed! No bailout. Bankrupt, reorganize and get back to making stuff.