By Liberty Report Staff
H.L. Mencken observed very astutely: The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.
While reading through an old piece from Patrick Buchanan from April 2, 2010, one finds the following:
"Diplomacy has failed," Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., told AIPAC, "Iran is on the verge of becoming nuclear and we cannot afford that."
Think about today.
Replace Iran with North Korea. It's the same script. Mencken was right....constant alarm. The military-industrial-complex has Americans wrapped around its finger.
By Chris Rossini
Our outside world is a reflection of the dominant ideas that people hold. It's a mirror image of the beliefs that dominate at the time. When we gaze out of our eyes and see government dominating virtually all aspects of society, it's no surprise to see multitudes of people who believe that this is the way it should be. The outside is a mirror image of the inside. Since we don't live in a static world, but one of constant change, the ideas that dominate are always changing as well. The ideas of Liberty once dominated in America. That gradually changed to a fervent faith in government power. When the ideas of Liberty dominated in America, those who sought limitless power were in the minority. They struggled and were distraught. Prior to the formation of the American military empire, one of its architects, Theodore Roosevelt, lamented that Americans were so attached to the ideas of peace with foreign nations, that he feared his empire and wars would never come. Today, we are at the opposite end of the spectrum. Many Americans fear that the perpetual wars will never end! In the same exact America, we have seen polar opposite ideas come to dominate. For the time being, it is Liberty that is in the minority position. But unlike Teddy Roosevelt, we need not despair.
Imagine that you have a handful of watermelon seeds. You head over to some fresh soil that you've prepared and plant the seeds.
The next day you come out to check on the watermelons, and all that you see is soil. No watermelons! You throw your hands up in despair and say: "Oh, this is ridiculous. This doesn't work at all! ... I give up." As silly as that sounds, it's how many freedom-lovers approach the ideas of Liberty. Always surrounded by people who preach about government power, the freedom-lover feebly makes his case, is bombarded with statist responses, is called names for proposing liberty, and he gives up! "People don't change. They deserve the government that they have. What's the use? ... I give up." That's the kind of attitude that keeps a minority opinion in the minority much longer than it has to be. Liberty would spring forth much quicker with a simple change in attitude. Let's go back to the watermelons, but this time, you're not looking for an instantaneous result. Instead, you recognize that your job is done. You planted the seeds, and now it's out of your hands. You let the sunshine and the rain, and all the variables that are out of your control take over. You did your part. You planted. After several weeks go by, you head out to find beautiful watermelons. It does work, and it works perfectly! You planted watermelon seeds, let go of everything else and watermelons came up!...Not cucumbers...Not tomatoes. You also notice that, even though you planted a handful of seeds, every one of those seeds didn't sprout. Some may have washed away. Others, for whatever reason, didn't spring forth. You don't go digging for them. You don't try to find them and "set them straight". You let them be. Your job wasn't to grow anything. Your job was to plant, and you did it! The rest was out of your hands. Now let's apply these concepts to the ideas of Liberty. The success of the ideas depend wholly on your ability to plant them (i.e., understand and share them with others). Once you share them, it's out of your hands. You let all the countless variables take over from there. You did your part. You shared. The results of this great good that you have done, may never appear to you directly. Ideas are invisible and the effect that they have as they spread from person to person cannot be measured and put onto a spreadsheet. Someone across the country may be persuaded by the idea that you shared, and you'll never know it. At the same time, the other person will not know that the message originated with you. Fascinating! At all times, however, you're well aware that every seed doesn't spring forth. Despite anything you say or do, your uncle may still think that the U.S. should destroy another country, and your best friend may still think she has a "right" to healthcare. You let them be. Your concern is not to "set them straight". Your job is to plant, and to plant abundantly. That's the measure of success. Did you plant, or not? If you planted today, you succeeded today. You're not bothered that you don't see the results instantaneously. There is no reason to despair. You did your part. You also realize that you don't go out into a country of 300+ million Americans with a puny handful of seeds. The vultures will eat those before breakfast, and then laugh at your silly fringe ideas. Instead, you go out with buckets and truck loads full....every day. You plant and let go. Plant and let the countless other variables take over. You're confident that when you plant the ideas of liberty, they will produce liberty. Just as a watermelon seed doesn't produce a cucumber, neither will the ideas of Liberty produce tyranny. What does the seed of Liberty look like anyway? No individual or group of individuals (that includes government) has the right to use aggressive force against anyone else. If force is ever used, it is only justified in self-defense to repel an aggressor.
That's the idea.
How each of us plants depends on our own skill set. Some will write, some will speak, some will Tweet, some will make YouTubes. Others will even come up with brand new ways to deliver the message. There is no central planner for Liberty and there is no central plan. No hubs and no spokes. When enough people plant the ideas of Liberty, in their own way, sufficiently and in abundance, those ideas will dominate again. It won't be a surprise for people at that time to gaze out of their eyes to see a multitude of people who believe in the ideas of Liberty and Peace. It could be no other way. The outer world is a mirror image of the inner world.
Join Daniel McAdams and Ron Paul for a discussion on Dr. Paul's new book about the tenth anniversary of the "Ron Paul Revolution." What was he thinking at the time? Where is the movement today? Where is it going? You will be surprised at the conversation and by the book!
By Liberty Report Staff
Today President Trump asked why the Senate Intelligence Committee isn't looking into the fake news mainstream media in America. While it's certainly reasonable to sympathize with the spirit of the question, it's preposterous for government to concern itself with the dissemination of any news, whether from foreign or domestic sources. Government is not there to shelter Americans from ideas that it disagrees with. Its job is not to isolate Americans and tell them what is fake news and what is not. Much of what government says is a lie. Look at the never-ending wars and the lies that were used to get into them. And that's just the deadly tip of the iceberg when it comes to government lies. And government is supposed to investigate and tell us what qualifies as "fake news"? Come on... Daniel McAdams discusses below:
Sec. 702 of the FISA Court Amendments is set to sunset at the end of the year. Congress is scrambling to find a way to give the Intelligence Community a way to continue spying on Americans in the name of "fighting terrorism." Their new bill of choice is the Orwellian-sounding USA LIBERTY Act. The CATO Institute's Patrick Eddington joins today's Liberty Report to discuss.
Are the Cubans attacking US embassy personnel in Havana with sonic weapons? As relations continue to deteriorate despite no proof, who benefits to a return to Cold War with Cuba?
By Scott Horton
On this episode of The Scott Horton Show, Ron Paul reflects on his “Yes” vote on the Authorized Use of Military Force following 9/11, how it continues to be used and abused today, and the history of how the United States has perverted its legal authority in foreign policy. Then Dr. Paul turns to the escalating situation in North Korea. Paul shares why he has some optimism about the situation in North Korea, his worries about Trump’s volatility, and what he would have done about North Korea as president. Listen below:
The recent tragedy in Las Vegas has left us with many questions. Today Ron Paul discusses the knee-jerk reactions versus alternative ways of coming up with solutions that can improve safety in America.
By Jacob G. Hornberger
On July 21, 1821, John Quincy Adams, who would go on to become the sixth president of the United States, warned that if America were ever to abandon its founding principle of non-interventionism in foreign affairs, she might well become the dictatress of the world. Adams issued his warning in a speech he delivered to Congress, a speech that has gone down in history with the title “In Search of Monsters to Destroy.” Adams was referring to the fact that the United States was founded as a constitutional republic, one whose military forces did not go around the world helping people who were suffering the horrors of dictators, despots, civil wars, revolutions, famines, oppression, or anything else. That’s not to say that America didn’t sympathize with people struggling to experience lives of freedom, peace, and prosperity. It was simply that the U.S. government would not go abroad to slay such monsters. Here is how Adams expressed it: Wherever the standard of freedom and independence has been or shall be unfurled, there will her heart, her benedictions and her prayers be. But she goes not abroad in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own. She will recommend the general cause, by the countenance of her voice, and the benignant sympathy of her example.
Adams was summing up the founding foreign policy of the United States, a policy of non-interventionism in the affairs of other nations, specifically Europe and Asia.
And that’s the way the American people wanted it. If Americans had been told after the Constitutional Convention that the U.S. government would be intervening around the world, there is no way that they would have ever approved the Constitution. In fact, as a practical matter, throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, there is no way that U.S. officials could have gone abroad in search of monsters to destroy. That’s because a nation needs a powerful military to go abroad and free people from dictators and despots or save people from famines or other bad things that happen in life. When the Constitution called the federal government into existence, the last thing the American people wanted was a powerful military. They were overwhelmingly opposed to what they called “standing armies,” which was a term used describe a big, permanent military establishment. That was why there was Pentagon, no big, permanent military-industrial complex, no CIA, and no NSA for more than 100 years after the country was established. The American people didn’t want those types of governmental apparatuses to be part of our nation’s political system. The reason Americans were so opposed to standing armies is because they believed that standing armies constituted a grave threat to their freedom and economic well-being. They knew, from both first-hand experience and through history, that dictators and despots used powerful military establishments to destroy the freedom and prosperity of the citizenry, oftentimes in the name of keeping them safe, secure, and prosperous. So, while there was a basic military force throughout the 19th century — large enough to suppress Native Americans or even to defeat a neighboring Third World nation like Mexico in the Mexican War, it certainly was nowhere near as large enough to cross the oceans and invade and conquer European or Asian countries. The one big exception, of course, was the Civil War, but the army immediately demobilized upon the conclusion of the war. Things started changing with the Spanish American War in 1898. There were those who argued that America could not be a great nation without owning overseas colonies, like the British and French Empires. Opposed to that sentiment was the mindset that had guided the founding of the country: that empire and foreign interventionism would end up destroying the country from within. The interventionists prevailed. First, U.S. officials misled and double-crossed the colonies of the Spanish Empire by leading them to believe that the United States was intervening against Spain to help the colonies win their independence. It was a lie. As the colonies soon learned, the real aim was to step into the shoes of the Spanish Empire by acquiring its colonies. That’s how the United States ended with Puerto Rico, Guam, the Philippines, and Cuba. Second, the trend toward empire as a way to make America great was followed by foreign interventionism, with World War I and World War II being premier examples. That was followed by the conversion of the U.S. government from a constitutional republic to what is known as a “national-security state,” a governmental apparatus characterized by a massive, permanent standing military establishment and secretive agencies with the power to assassinate and spy on the citizenry, in the name of preserving “national security.” That was followed by massive interventions “in search of monsters to destroy” through assassinations, coups, invasions, occupations, support of dictatorships, and regime change: Korea, Guatemala, Iran, Cuba, Congo, Brazil, Chile, Grenada, Panama, Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Syria, and others. Here is how Adams eloquently expressed what would happen to America if she were ever to abandon our nation’s founding principles of anti-empire and non-interventionism: She well knows that by once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even the banners of foreign independence, she would involve herself, beyond the power of extrication, in all the wars of interest and intrigue, of individual avarice, envy, and ambition, which assume the colors and usurp the standard of freedom. The fundamental maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to force. The frontlet upon her brows would no longer beam with the ineffable splendor of freedom and independence; but in its stead would soon be substituted an imperial diadem, flashing in false and tarnished lustre the murky radiance of dominion and power. She might become the dictatress of the world: she would be no longer the ruler of her own spirit.
No one can seriously deny that Adams has been proven correct — that America — or, more correctly, the U.S. government — has become the dictatress of the world — issuing orders and commands to people and regimes all over the world and backing them up with coups, assassinations, sanctions, embargoes, invasions, and occupations, and all headed today by a democratically elected president who has all the traditional traits of an old-fashioned dictator or despot.
This article was originally published at The Future of Freedom Foundation.
Press Play to hear Ron Paul deliver his Weekly Update:
By Ron Paul
Now that the defeat of ISIS in Syria appears imminent, with the Syrian army clearing out some of the last ISIS strongholds in the east, Washington’s interventionists are searching for new excuses to maintain the illegal US military presence in the country. Their original rationale for intervention has long been exposed as another lie. Remember that President Obama initially involved the US military in Iraq and Syria to “prevent genocide” of the Yazidis and promised the operation would not drift into US “boots on the ground.” That was three years ago and the US military became steadily more involved while Congress continued to dodge its Constitutional obligations. The US even built military bases in Syria despite having no permission to do so! Imagine if Syria started building military bases here in the US against our wishes. After six years of war the Syrian government has nearly defeated ISIS and al-Qaeda and the US-backed “moderates” turned out to be either Islamist extremists or Kurdish soldiers for hire. According to a recent report, the US has shipped two billion dollars worth of weapons to fighters in Syria via eastern Europe. Much of these weapons ended up in the hands of ISIS directly, or indirectly through “moderates” taking their weapons with them while joining ISIS or al-Qaeda.
“Assad must go,” proclaimed President Obama back in 2011, as he claimed that the Syrian leader was committing genocide against his own people and that regime change was the only way to save Syrians. Then earlier this year, when eastern Aleppo was about to be liberated by the Syrian government, the neocons warned that Assad would move in and kill all the inhabitants. They warned that the population of eastern Aleppo would flee from the Syrian army. But something very different happened. According to the UN’s International Organization for Migration, 600,000 refugees returned to Syria by August. Half of the returnees went back to Aleppo, where we were told Assad was waiting to kill them.
What happened? The neocons and “humanitarian interventionists” lied. Just as they lied about Libya, Iraq, and so on. While it was mostly ignored by the mainstream media, just this week a Christian was elected speaker of the Syrian parliament. The new speaker is a 58-year-old Orthodox Christian law graduate and member of President Assad's Baath party. How many Christians does our “ally” Saudi Arabia have in its parliament? Oh I forgot, Saudi Arabia has no elected parliament. Why does it seem that US policy in the Middle East always hurts Christians the most? In Iraq, Christians suffered disproportionately from the 2003 US invasion. In fact there are hardly any Christians left. Why aren’t more US Christian groups demanding that the US get out of the Middle East? The US is not about to leave on its own. With ISIS all but defeated in Syria, many in Washington are calling for the US military to continue its illegal occupation of parts of the country to protect against Iranian influence! Of course before the US military actions in Iraq and Syria there was far less Iranian influence in the region! So US foreign interventionism is producing new problems that can only be solved by more US interventionism? The military industrial complex could not have dreamed of a better scheme to rob the American people while enriching themselves! What have we achieved in Syria? Nothing good. |
Archives
March 2024
|