I just read Dan's answer, very appropriate, but you might take the trouble to rea ATLAS SHRUGGED, for a good look at the looters, the closed businesses, and the reason for the emphasis on individual rights vs the common good...the difference between "innocent until proven guilty" and the somewhat popular concept of identifying "bad seed" and putting them away BEFORE they do something bad... I read ATLAS SHRUGGED in 1960, and it is very timely RIGHT NOW for the state of our economy AND OUR CIVILIZATION!!!
________________________________ From: "[email protected]" <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Cc: [email protected]; [email protected] Sent: Tuesday, December 23, 2008 11:24:59 AM Subject: [Libertarian] For your Consideration WHO Is John Galt? I do not subscribe to everything said here but there are some good points. I also do not subscribe to any dogmatic approach to anything. The people on this list could be better served to take a like approach. To the disgust of many people on this list there is no one of national prominence that I support except Sarah Palin. I do not care what kind of philosophy you subscribe to you and I are wrong. I do not know the answers but do know that I cannot support much of what is going on around me every day. I hear much about many people including Ron Paul. He is no better than anyone else. His chains can weigh just as heavily on you as those of George Bush or Barack Obama. I would like to see some real discussion of how to end the current flavor of slavery and not institute a different flavor of some peoples desires. So, just "Who is John Galt" I have heard this question posed 3 times today. Twice on national radio. Anyone here know? Thank You, John Wayne Smith, 2010 Libertarian Party Candidate for Governor of Florida. 2012 Libertarian Party Candidate for Florida House Dist. 42 203 W. Magnolia St. Leesburg Florida 34748 CEO, 1000 Planets, Inc. Building a Private Road to the Stars! Http://www.1000Plan ets.com Dan, Bravo on waking up to the fear-mongering manipulations of the right, while realizing that the equally authoritarian, government-centered program of the left is no better! I think it's pretty remarkable that you have come all this way politically and philosophically in just the past four years. I am with M Carling that it might be better not to use the term "BLIND FASCIST IDIOT" to describe your former self, for the reasons he says. Before you forget too much what it felt like to have the beliefs you did until late 2004, I encourage you to recall them as well, and as fairly, as you can. This will help you better communicate with others who still hold similar beliefs, and open doors for them to enhance their understanding of what's going on. But on the whole, I applaud what you say, as well as your continued willingness to think outside the box rather than just adopting libertarian ideas unquestioningly. I personally agree with you that religion is part of the problem, and corporations to a large degree as well. It is this latter point on which people in the freedom movement (libertarians) will no doubt require the most convincing. While corporations have contributed to material prosperity, I think a major problem is that they do not honor the dignity and personhood of the individual. This failure by a major institution in society to respect individuality and nonconformity inevitably results in a society that is less centered around individual rights. Perhaps corporations can learn to do this better -- there is clearly a consumer demand for more personalized service, and concepts like the "long tail" (seehttp://en. wikipedia. org/wiki/ The_Long_ Tail) and the Cluetrain Manifesto (http://www.cluetrai n.com/#manifesto) hold some promise there. But I think that the size of corporations -- as with large governmental and religious institutions -- is itself a problem. When any organization becomes too large, there is too much power to be had at the top, which results in those top positions attracting the power-obsessed. Also, large organizations in general, not just governments, tend toward bureaucracy. The bureaucratic mindset is in and of itself antithetical to freedom, whether found in government or outside of it. Further, by moving production into large, distant facilities removed from communities, corporations have contributed to an alienation of the individual from the kind of small-scale, productive work that encourages a culture of know-how, self-reliance, and pride in quality. Far better for the cause of individual liberty that we have a system where many individuals run small-scale machines and productive operations, than one where the masses serve as mere cogs in operations the scale and complexity of which exceed the capacity of most people to understand their functioning. I think Karl Hess [former Libertarian leader, LP News editor, and speechwriter for Barry Goldwater] has some excellent things to say along these lines in his book "Community Technology." I am interested to hear your further thoughts on some of the stuff touched on in your manifesto -- in particular the "Zeitgeist" movies, scarcity, New Age ideas, and the expansion of consciousness. I am heartened by your recognition of the importance of the Non-Aggression Principle, as well as the radicalism suggested by your comment that "the whole system has got to go," especially coming from someone on this [Libertarian "Reform" Caucus] list, where (in Libertarian circles) I might logically have least expected to find it. Love & Liberty, ((( starchild ))) 19th-century libertarians tended to be 'radical' or 'dialectical' thinkers in Chris Sciabarras sense; they viewed state power as part of an interlocking system of mutually reinforcing social practices and structures, and were intensely interested in the institutional and cultural accompaniments of statism accompaniments which both drew support from and provided support to the power of the state. -Roderick Long On Dec 22, 2008, at 8:35 AM, Dan Cicconi wrote: >>> Everybody, This is an article I've been working on for some time. I believe it's finally finished. There will be many that disagree with me or think I'm way to influenced by the new Zeitgeist movies, or I'm way to Anarchistic or New Age. Personally, I don't believe this is the case but it'll be your opinion not mine. I would appreciate any feedback that's not overly insulting or derogatory. I'm of course an amateur writer so it's rough and raw, but from the heart, enjoy! Dan Cicconi >>> > My Political Manifesto > Dan Cicconi > This was originally sent to one of you privately but upon reflection after writing it I decided to post it here. I have also edited this article from it's original version for better clarification of my thoughts. I not only used my thoughts but also used other articles,quotes, and links to put this together. At the present this represents my current political views. I would appreciate any feed back as my thoughts on this as I learn are ever evolving and I love input and debate. I was a staunch right wing Social Conservative Republican for years but tended to lean Libertarian in my mind, but never acted on these thoughts or feelings. I was basically an activist and a large influence over the people and friends around me. As an owner of a business in the past I had customers and employees look up to me as someone knowledgeable about politics, something they didn't want to think about. As someone involved and paying attention they trusted my judgment. In my opinion those that didn't or wouldn't see or agree with my side were just left wing psychopaths hell bent on turning my United States into another Sodom and Gomorrah. I was confident this was happening. I wanted everyone responsible for this immorality and decadence lined up and shot. All I needed were my orders from Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Michael Savage and FOX News and I would have been on my way. I especially wanted to destroy the anti-war crowd after 911, Oh those left wing psychopaths had to go. After all, I was angry, and it was all about me. My United States got attacked, I lost money, had to liquidate a business I didn't want to, not to mention my pride after spending almost five years of my life's sweat, blood and tears on an investment and then having to walk away a loser. I was pissed-off at the world and wanted someone DEAD! DEAD! DEAD! And why not the brown people I was convinced at the time committed 911, they deserved it. I also wouldn't speak to friends and family who were against the wars. I didn't even speak to my own older brother for over three years, and we were fairly good friends. I championed Bush's victories in 2000 and 2004. Unbelievably to me now I sat in the middle of my Alaskan living room in 2004 and cheered during his convention speech. I went along with everything, the lies, the wars, all the Constitutional violations of our civil liberties. I didn't care, they could have carte blanche with the Bill Of Rights as far as I was concerned, I trusted them emphatically. Oh how naive I was. http://www.youtube. com/watch? v=2DYcg2_ 53SE Oh and just to add, if you didn't believe in Jesus Christ or were gay I most likely thought you were an idiot also and wanted yo destroyed. I even voted against gay marriage in Texas in 2006 and supported this oppressive authoritarian Unconstitutional ban in other states as well. Let's face it, I was a BLIND FASCIST IDIOT. I was convinced it was right to wield government power to oppress others who were just simply different from me. I was part of the heard mentality as it was living and destroying. http://www.thirdwor ldtraveler. com/Fascism/ 14_Characteristi cs_Fascism. html Then one day in Alaska on the radio Michael Savage made the mistake of mentioning an article by Pat Buchanan. This was in 2004 shortly after the election and Collen Powell's resignation. I went home that night and read the article on the internet. It was all about how the Bush administration and had been hijacked by people he called Neo-Cons. A term I had never heard before. He stated these people were using a NAZI playbook like Herman Goering advocated to scare the hell out of us and the whole world in an attempt to start the war on terror, and they had been successful. My firm unshakable beliefs along with cognitive dissonance would not allow me to accept this new information. I blew Pat Buchanan off as another type of psychopath, just different from the ones on the left. After all, someone did attack us on 911, didn't they? > http://www.ae911tru th.org/ > Here's a famous quote from Herman Goering; Naturally the common people don't want war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America, nor in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country". After we got back from Alaska in 2005 there continued to be a lot of new information floating around, and it wasn't coming from the left either. I slowly but stubbornly started to investigate this new information. To my surprise I found most, if not all of it to be highly credible, and even scary in some instances. I discovered and researched extensively Zbigniew Brzezinski, Henry Kissinger, the CFR, the Trilateral Commission, the Federal Reserve, PNAC, AIPAC, SPP, the Brookings Institute and the Bilderberg Group. I realized very quickly as Andre (http://www.outlawjo urnalism. com/? p=39 ) states in one of his articles, "I HAD BEEN TOTALLY DEFENSELESS" ! Then I started reading a lot of books about the history of governments and their structures, the Greeks, Romans and our Constitution. I read Philosophers who were alive during these times and wrote what they saw happening around them. I read and researched the 911 commission report! http://www.911truth .org/article. php?story= 2005052311273840 4 Then I discovered Ron Paul thanks to my brother. At this time there was no mention of a run for the Presidency but there was still a lot of information about him and articles he had wrote, he truly inspired me. For once I realized it was OK to feel and think the way I did about things, and that I wasn't alone in this world. To a lot of my friends and family surprise I abruptly came out of my political closet I had been hiding in. Here's a great Ron Paul Quote; "Failure Of Government Programs Always Prompts More Determined Efforts While The Loss Of Liberty Is Rationalized Away. Whether It's The War on Drugs, Education, Health Care, Poverty, Communism, Terrorism Or The Current Hitler Of The Day, An Appeal To Patriotism Is Used To Convince The People That A Little Sacrifice Of Liberty Here And There Is A Small Price To Pay. The Results However Are Frightening, And Soon It Will Be Even More So" Ron Paul Sometime in 2007 I woke up, and realized I wasn't a Republican, and hardly was a conservative. It was all clear to me. Life is liberty. Authority is violence. Blind obedience is insanity. I refused to be a tax-paying accomplice to State murder from that point on. I couldn't even look at myself in the mirror for what I had been spewing for years. I mean I liked what the Republicans said, and supposedly what the Republican Party stands for. You know the line, smaller government, less taxes, less intrusions on your life, stop the New World Order, all that crap. I had to realize painfully and sorrowfully that I had been deceived. It was like taking the RED pill in the matrix, all of a sudden the truth hit me so hard and the lies were so clear, I had to break down and cry, and cry I did for days. I begged whatever force was truly controlling the world to please forgive me and not punish me for what I had been believing and supporting. After that I said NO MORE. I always knew I was really a Radical but would never vote for one because I was always caught up in the lesser of two evils slavery. No longer will I be a slave to the two party system. A Radical I am, a Republican or Democrat I'm not, and I'm damn proud to share that fact with anybody. The happiness this has brought my life far out ways the negatives of the truths I have learned and become privy to. I can honesty say even though I know we face the gravest future imaginable, I'm as happy as I've ever been, and my family and I are ready to face the challenges ahead. When you really think about the differences between the two parties there is no difference. Lew Rockwell says it best. Look at the Republicans, who imagine themselves creating a modern form of Sparta, with military strength and a disciplined citizenry unified in the drive to national greatness, courage, and heroism. Along with this comes support for national service (the draft) and a demand that Congress stop meddling in executive-branch matters. Republicans also say that they are for free enterprise, but what they really mean is that they support their main constituents who are large corporations dependent on government contracts and privileges. That goes for the banks and the mortgage companies too, whose interests they defend through an inflationary fiat money system that further fuels state growth. Now to the Democrats, they favor a different form of dictatorship. Their vision is an Athens of their own invention, since the original culture and accomplishments depended on free trade, private ownership, sound money, and low taxes. What the Democrats are offering is a monstrously larger state that assumes control of all property, the crushing of private initiative, and an end to economic freedom. Note that they don't talk about this. But that is the core of all their plans for fairness and justice: an increased use of violence in society, and an increased centralization of political power. Often the person who recommends this path imagines that he will be the dictator, and that his plans alone will prevail. They don't consider that the state they advocate is also wholly capable of doing things that they do not like, like crushing civil liberties and starting wars all over the world. Note that the left's critique of Bush's big government is not that it is crushing liberty; rather, they believe that government power is being used for the wrong purposes. It is long past time for both of these parties to admit it. They won't of course, so it is incumbent on the rest of us to at least recognize it for what it is. It is often said that there is not a dime's worth of difference between the parties, but there is little reflection on what precisely they have in common. It comes down to a love of some version of dictatorship, of which they believe they will be the administrators. Voluntarism and Libertarianism offer the only real solutions for our current political quandary. I do lose Libertarians at times because I tend to be a very non-violent anarchist and support a form of this called Panarchy, Google it, it's very interesting. Most Libertarians don't understand or agree that economic slavery is subjective to ones own interpretation, absolute economic freedom for some might be slavery for others, or vice-versa. Panarchy allows for people to choose what system they want. Iceland used it for over 300 years and it was quite successful but left out 2 important mechanisms that eventually allowed the Christian Church at the behest of the King Of Norway to consolidate power and take the country over. I also lose some libertarians when I start to talk about scarcity. "Greed & competition are not the result of immutable human temperament. .. greed and fear of scarcity are in fact being created & amplified... the direct consequences of this are that we have to fight with each other in order to survive." Bernard Lieter - Founder EU Monetary System Lots of libertarians don't agree with this and those that do say it's just the natural way things must be, engaging in the monopoly game of capitalism lifts us all and helps society as a whole. In a truly free society these virtues might be beneficial, but under our current situation nothing could be further from the truth. The system is really completely controlled (rigged) and causes just about every problem we have, including wars. As we have globalized, many countries debts have greatly increased as well as their poor populations. The IMF or International Monetary Fund has just been a way for multinational corporations to fleece the planet, UNBELIEVABLE! !!!!! We must admit that when we break it all down self preservation and survival are paramount to everything else we are going after on this planet. I do believe we are all spiritually connected and to a point have social responsibilities to each other. But where I draw the hard line is when the state thinks it's got a right to manage or facilitate this oneness. No matter what social economic system a state chooses whether it's fascism, capitalism, socialism or communism the underlined mechanisms driving this is are money, labor and competition. The whole system has got to go, because in reality it's all the same, scarcity, just a different measure of it. It's time for something completely and totally different. I don't know about you but this is getting boring. With all our developing technology we can get there. Unfortunately however this developing technology is going to be used to enslave us further as apposed to free us. The three main enemies of natural, equal and human rights are the state, religion and the corporation. This trinity marches a destructive path all over the world stealing, killing and destroying lives wherever a tentacle can reach. Politicians have no idea how to fix any of these things as they are a key part of the destructive trinity, most of them are lawyers, they only know how to apply new laws or get rid of old laws in an attempt to fix our problems. This includes Libertarians, Democrats, Republicans, Independents, Socialists, Communists, etc. This is why I argue ferociously that the violent oppressive central state monopoly is worthless to us. I would say history confirms this as just in the last century alone the state has murdered about 170 million of it's own citizens not including foreigners. Only science, engineering, technology and a radical revolution and expansion of consciousness that doesn't include installing happy microchips in our brains will have the answers we need and the solution to our problems. The sooner we realize this and have the epiphany the sooner we can break our ritualistic cycles and get on with real progress. This epiphany must come first however, and the authoritarians destroyed or these technological mechanisms will be controlled by the same murderous psychopaths that are controlling our world now and they will use them to completely enslave us. This is the future we are headed towards right now if we don't stop it, and STOP IT WE MUST!!!!! Then and only then will we truly know peace, unconditional love and what NAP is (non aggression principle). With all this said however, if we are forced to have a state I will always lean on the side of arguing to keep it as small as possible and involved in as little as possible. This way of thinking saves lives, it's not about greed, it's about the preservation of our species. I must support reducing the size, scope and power of government at all levels and on all issues, and oppose increasing the size, scope and power of government at any level, for any purpose. "What I'm saying, how very important it is, to bring about in the human mind the radical revolution, the crisis is a crisis of consciousness, a crisis that cannot anymore accept the old norms, the old patters, the ancient traditions, and considering what the world is now, with all the misery, conflict, destructive brutality, aggression and so on, man is still as he was. He's still brutal, violent, aggressive, inquisitive, competitive, and he has built a society along these lines". "It's no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society" Zeitgeist The Real Deal "When we look at recorded history, we see a virtually unbroken line of slavery. The huddled masses of the human species have been continually used as a means to an end by a psychopathic elite minority. We must realize that this is what we are fighting. It is not a specific group of people, nor is it some fantastical group of space creatures; it is a system of domination, behind which is an ideology of elitism and a religion that justifies it. The future that is being planned for us is a nightmare, and our only viable option is to oppose it. This is nothing short of a battle for the survival of the human race. I will attempt to do my part to move our species into a future in which we can all live our lives out in peace, and pass that opportunity on to our children and the generations to come. Stay Free, Andre" As you may have noticed I keep the quotes above on the front of my facebook page and forward them a lot. I believe they say it all. I think it's important we really start to think about the real issues and start to listen to people outside the box or we'll never make it. Just as Joe Sobran states in one of my many posted articles I miss having that blissful confidence in my government and country, something I know I will never regain now that the veil of lies has been lifted. It was time for me to put away childish things. P & L: Dan Cicconi http://www.youtube. com/watch? v=mB8_wPei2ZM = Very Short Video, Hope. ************ ** One site keeps you connected to all your email: AOL Mail, Gmail, and Yahoo Mail. Try it now. (http://www.aol. com/?optin= new-dp& icid=aolcom40vanity &ncid= emlcntaolcom0000 0025) [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ ForumWebSiteAt http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Libertarian Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Libertarian/ <*> Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional <*> To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Libertarian/join (Yahoo! 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