Real Time News and Its Enemies

We are entering the next step of personalized news. Rather than waiting for your congressman to be chosen for an interview by Fox News or the New York Times, you can interview your own congressman in "real time." Watch this video from John Culberson (R-TX), who uses an internet-connected video camera and a Blackberry to "broadcast" his side of a news interview. Imagine the possibilities, and the accountability!

What are the ramifications of this new technology? The first major benefit is that we no longer have to wait until the MSM decides to interview our congressman. Real time technology allows us to interview him or her directly. We can watch our representatives and senators explain their votes, make speeches, or even observe a chat in the hallway as it happens. The second benefit is that we can disseminate this information to friends via the internet. This activity is the essence of classical republicanism which is based on individual equality and self-interest bound by morality. Ideas and events otherwise hidden in the netherworld of uncovered MSM news are brought into the light and into the hands of everyday citizens.

Real time can become your personal news source. Micro-blogging platforms such as Twitter, where short text messages are used to spread information about what is happening right now. Twitter is used by the firefighters in California to relay information and by the people being evacuated to tell family and loved ones where they are and where they are going. The Red Cross uses Twitter and so do Congressmen from the floor of the House. Sign up for Twitter and search, monitor, and communicate with anyone you choose, on your computer or cell phone. You don't have to be a geek or have a bunch of spare time--Twitter is quicker and easier than email.

In Congress, only leaders are allowed to use this technology. All other members are currently not allowed under the archaic House franking rules. For example, because email has the word "mail", it must be reviewed by the Franking Commission before it is sent. However, there are two congressmen, Representatives Culberson and Tim Ryan (D-OH), who are skirting the gray area by using Twitter, Facebook and Qik Video to talk directly with those members of the public that have signed up to do so. Culberson and Ryan send messages about what's happening on the House floor in real time, bypassing the MSM and, so far, leadership approval. This is the essence of the internet--free flowing information in real time. And as with Tivo, if you don't catch it live, watch the recording.

But not all is flowing smoothly. Full congressional use of this technology is being challenged in the Democratic-controlled House. At issue are concerns regarding decorum. The House doesn't want racy content or political advertisements adjacent to official congressional communications. Oddly, these same rules do not apply to print, radio or television. Rep. Michael Capuano (D-MA), Chairman of the Commission, wrote this letter to Rep. Robert Brady (D-PA), Chairman of the Committee on House Administration, recommending no actual changes in the rules. This sparked a flurry of activity on Twitter last week, with even the left-leaning Sunlight Foundation joining the fracus with the Let Our Congress Tweet campaign. YouTube has also responded by offering to provide a separate platform for Congressional use without advertising. Republican Leader John Boehner (R-OH) fully supports the use of this technology, and issued this letter (pdf) to Speaker Pelosi saying:

"I believe Members of Congress should have the ability to choose whichever service they believe will best assist in communicating with their constituents, and not be limited to only services "approved" by the House Administration Committee or any other government entity. We must encourage, not restrict, the free and open flow of uncensored information between the American people and their elected leaders over the Internet."

Speaker Pelosi replied with this letter, castigating the Republicans for supposed false allegations:

Unfortunately, inaccurate rumors have been circulated asserting that the suggested standards allowing for web video outside of the House.gov domain would affect Member blogging or use of sites such as Twitter. Dissemination of this false information does a disservice to the vital dialogue on using technology to increase citizen involvement, education, and transparency in the House.

The above link from "inaccurate rumors" goes to a blog post in which the Capuano letter is sanitized by someone telling us what Capuano "meant" to say. Culberson writes in at comment #5 stating that he spoke directly with Capuano to confirm that oversight over all congressional electronic communication is the ultimate goal. According to Congress Daily, "He [Capuano]said that he is not seeking to regulate anything other than video — not blogs, chat rooms or any other written communication – “but [at] some point we may have to.” [emphasis added]

Culberson has since written this letter (pdf) to Speaker Pelosi in which he chronicles the fact that the rules placed upon internet communications are not, and rightfully so, applied to print,radio, or television. He believes Congressmen were elected by the people because of their good judgment and that Congress should place no burden restricting that judgment.

Real time is where it's at. Every rugged individualist should have the power to find their own personal news and then spread it among friends. Such ability is the true design of an engaged electorate in a free democratic republic. It is both the voice of democracy and the sublime nature of a republic when the leaders and the electorate can speak in an open dialog unedited into sound bites. The republic is then protected by a transparency that quickly reveals actions done for selfish motives for amassing control and power. Imagine a future in which congressmen who refuse to use this technology of transparency being viewed not only as Luddites but as suspect. Congress should act soon to allow its use.

There Is No I In Democrat

The collectivist ideas of the leaders in the Democratic Party are not a secret. Each Democrat Presidential candidate has announced plans of Big Government control of our health care. However, FEMA's response to hurricane Katrina revealed the sluggish, grinding wheels of entrenched bureaucracy. The truth of a bureaucracy is: process is more important than solution. Solution is feared because it could end the necessity of their position. Also, most bureaucrats vote for the party of collectivism either through ethos or job security. To a bureaucrat,fouling the plans of an opposing administration is an admirable task.

The constant murmur of the MSM credits the faults of a bloated government to theopposing administration as if a passing administration is synonymous with government. The MSM perpetuates this dark lie through its constant white noise murmur machine that seeks to obliterate contrary thought. Collectivist government, good; Republican administration, bad.

However, something tremendous happened when the Senate thought they could blithely pass another bureaucratic reform with the Immigration Bill. Our hierarchal government leaders were as soundly rebuked as King John at Runnymede. Rather than the simple-minded Michael Moore definition of a collectivist "We the People", the arrogant elected officials met the "We the People" of the individual. The united action of individuals shut down the Capital Hill phone system. The uniting idea was that the government was not trustworthy to do that which they promised. The power of individuals unified by an idea is unquantifiable.

Every day I hear the lament that Republicans have no leader. I discount that whine as a passing of responsibility. There is a great moment in the movie National Treasure when the character Ben Gates, frustrated because no one believes his warning of a threat to steal the Declaration of Independence, looks upon the revered document and reads the line:

…it is their Right, it is their Duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future Security.

Not only do we have the right, we also have the DUTY — the responsibility — to do something to provide new guards, new representatives, for the future of national security from a fascist Caliphate and liberty at home in this war on the individual. The melting of the Capital Hill phone system is evidence that we have the power necessary for change.

Responsibility belongs solely to the individual. Each of us knows what must be done to stop this collectivist march. Their murmur has become a subversive clamor, declaring the nation broken. We know this argument only serves the purpose of entrenched bureaucrats acting in their collectivist best interest while stalwartly supported by intransigent Democrats. Their condescending arrogance is incongruous with the ideals that established this nation.

We do not need a leader to tell us this or to tell us what action needs to be taken in preparation for the next election. Pruning deadwood and rooting out bad seeds must be done before we can ever hope to plant a new course of action. The murmur machine must be humbled so that new seeds can take root in preparation for the intense change we are demanding. We must not allow our precious vote to continue the bad because the good isn't good enough. Such reasoning leads to cultural destruction and besides note it is the MSM murmur machine telling you of your dissatisfaction. The individual bears that responsibility. Our vote is required.

Because my own district was mad at the Republicans for playing the earmark game, Chet Edwards (D-TX District 17) is now earmarking himself into a lifetime seat in Congress, even though the man is the antithesis of our cultural values. Chet Edwards is the epitome of the absent father, buying off his children rather than representing the values that respect his constituents.
Every state has districts struggling to replace an entrenched Congressman. They are like Chet Edwards, bringing home the bacon, but are not the kind of man you’d be proud to call Daddy or follow as a leader. Lift your comrades up as they engage in the fight. Don’t let our front line falter when the negative accusations reach those shrill high notes. Press forward, keeping your eye on the prize - the establishment of a foundation for change. Just as we must crush the fascist Caliphate into the pit of hell from which it came, we must use the power of united individuals to crush collectivism and stun the murmur machine used against us. As individuals united by an idea we have the power to make a change. Just raise your hand in commitment in the fight for individual freedom. The Federalist Party ceased to be because of their arrogant condescending attitude toward the citizenry they tried to control with Federal power. The ideas of the Federalist were despised by the people. The Democratic Party was established on the ash heap of slavery and their collectivist ideas are real time slavery. They must be defeated because of their ideas. Remember there is no “I” in Democrat.

We Are At War!

I have been away for a long while and I apologize to my dear readers. The truth is that I suffer from intense depression and sometimes I just fall off the map for a while. However, I did do one thing in my absence and that was to write a piece for my dear Beast Tracking blogger friend, Yaacov Ben Moshe. YBM has made it his purpose in life to track the footprints of the Beast in an attempt to shine the light of truth upon the destruction left in the wake of its passing. YBM is a modern St. George and the jackalope applauds his work. I urge you to read my Beast story.

The Beast bears two horns: a horn of hatred and savagery and a horn of authoritarian subversion. The trumpet of the first horn calls individuals to immolation or acts of savagery upon other individuals so heinous and unconscionable that they defy civilized standards of behavior. The blood sacrifice of the immolator erases the individual. It is one of the methods the Beast uses to subdue the entire world. The promise of heaven for the immolator produces a living hell for the individuals left behind. Savagery destroys the connections between individuals. Fear petrifies and isolates. Retaliation against this must be sure and absolute. Civilized people must unite and be resolved or we are lost.

The second horn is a loud trumpet of murmuring. It is the horn of demoralization. It is the horn of authoritarian subversion seeking to imprison the soul and mind. The constant murmur discredits individuals that stand against it. This is the technique of Stalin or any dictator. Anyone disagreeing with Stalin was obviously insane until receiving a shot in the back of the neck for being a criminal. In many ways, the questionable mental characterization is worse than the bullet, since the discredited individual must continue to live in the world from which he is now separated.

This is the horn of the beast that pierced my soul and grieves my heart. This is the method the Beast is using to cause America to destroy itself.The source of the Beast’s power is big government – its politicians and bureaucrats. The Beast twists intelligence into business savvy, character into shrewdness, and virtue into the ability to be irresponsible and escape the consequences. The mark of the Beast is man trebled and an empty oblivion, which is the absence of God. The murmur is used to destroy the righteous man while upholding the acts of the wicked. The murmur believes the nation is broken. The conflict is simply big government, entrenched politicians and bureaucrats at war with the individual. The Beast with its mighty horns is at war with our American philosophy both within our nation and on foreign soils. But here comes the Beast’s main obstacle.

The murmur has created a void and nature abhors a vacuum. The more God is denied, the more He exists. What happens to victims of the Beast in the horror work camps of North Korea? God rushes in and feeds their individual soul with precious smuggled pages of the Bible. When the Russian dissident Alexander Solzhenitsyn contemplated walking into the darkness of the Siberian snow to lie down, to give up, and let the snow cover him into a frozen death it was another prisoner making the sign of the cross in the snow with his foot that restored a broken heart. Triumph over the Beast does not come from the death of the individual, but the blood of the perfect sacrifice, crucified but yet victorious over death and the Beast. God in his infinite wisdom understood that man must be free in order to make a choice to worship Him. Likewise in the American experience, we must be free in order to choose our future.

Every day I hear individuals clamoring for a leader, someone to call them to arms. This is simply passing the responsibility. We acted as individuals during the Immigration Debate and shut down the phone network on Capitol Hill. The power of focused, like-minded individuals is unquantifiable.

We recognize big government types, entrenched bureaucrats and politicians, and the purveyors of murmur. We can see that the Democratic Party is at war with America, the individual and ultimately at war with God. That they sense no danger in that endeavor only heightens the necessity of our action.We have the power to encourage others to shake off the self-imposed shackles of group think and the deafening murmur. We have a vote and we can empower individuals around us to vote. We can urge them to be not afraid.

Imagine an America where we are proud of our way of life and would defend it to death. Imagine an America without the false promises and incessant murmuring of the Democratic Party and their fawning media murmurers. Imagine an America not at war with the individual, but rather feeling great pride because of individual success.

We don’t really need a leader to tell us these things. We know it instinctively. When the French republicans stormed the Bastille, it wasn't really to free prisoners, but to gain control of the weaponry stored there. We must unite to rid ourselves of the weaponry of backroom deals, lies, fabrications and the senseless murmuring constantly used against us. If in this next election we were to send every elected Democrat home, can you imagine the instantaneous hush of the murmur? Can you imagine the fear our enemies would experience when the Americans who empower them every day lose both political power and also their murmur machine?

Yes, we have Republicans entrenched in political schemes, but let us concentrate upon the most ruthless adversaries to American individualism and send them packing with a smarting defeat. Individuals united can reject every collective socialist in Washington, and even to our city districts. The Revolution of 1994 was only the first volley. Victory has not been declared and we have been sucked into the black hole of stalemate. As individuals, we have the power to defeat collectivists as surely as we can crash the phone system of our leaders.

The 2008 election must be a resounding victory for the Declaration of Independence, The Constitution and Bill of Rights. It must be a victory for the individual and a complete rejection of the murmuring poll-driven press.

Once we stop being at war with ourselves, America can defeat any foe on any continent. We just have to make the decision. I'm drawing the line in the sand. Are you with me?

Learning From History in the War on Terror

Last night I began the DVD series Lord Mountbatten: The Last Viceroy. The story is about the British delivering a self-ruling government in India in 1946. The Jewel in the Crown, as India was described, then operated under a half system of self governance called the Raj. Under the Raj, tribal leaders ruled territories but ultimately answered to British authority. The Crown gave Lord Mountbatten authority to aide the Indian leaders in establishing a democratic Parliament and ultimately complete self-determination.

The comparisons to our work in Iraq are very interesting. One of the problems the blossoming Indian Parliament faced was religious animosity between Muslim, Sikh, and Hindu. Different leaders had their own desires for the future of India. Genocide followed as religion divided the nation into three parts. The British had been able to keep order, but as they discussed pulling out to allow self rule, factions sprung up to take advantage of the situation. There are historians that say the British set an unrealistic date for the Indian government to gain control and settle differences.

This sounds very close to the current situation in Iraq. The Iraqi government must have authority across the entire country and over each tribe and faction within their border. Some Indian Muslims, lead by Mohammad Ali Jinnah, wanted their own country; a complete Muslim state. Some Muslims, Sikhs, and Hindus wanted to remain where they currently lived with the freedom to practice their own religion. If the United States were to pull out our troops too soon, could what happened in India happen in Iraq? There are even more comparisons.

The DVD shows Mohammad Ali Jinnah, leader of the Muslim League, stirring up a mob by declaring, "We will have Pakistan or we will destroy India!" It is hard for our pragmatic western minds to understand such thinking. However, when we recall the kamikaze pilots of WWII, Buddhist monks torching themselves in protest of the Viet Nam war, and the current crop of suicide bombers, we should realize that self immolation has been a route to paradise in the eastern mind.

The undeclared war between Muslim and Sikh along with the usually fate-driven Hindu in the Punjab is reputed to have killed between 200,000 and 360,00. This number could be higher if the 10 years before 1946 are counted. The migration of the different ethnic peoples to the portion of India they preferred to occupy was a dangerous journey because of violent attacks by other factions. The anger boiled over and blood flowed freely.

President Bush is wise to stand firm against any timeline for American departure in Iraq. The Congressional leaders that demand America pull out now have not studied their history and because of this educational lack, the blood of Iraqi innocents would be on our hands. It is very disturbing that the people that preach "caring" for others to their vassals here in the United States deride our military for being in Iraq and taking the time to empower this new democratic government.

Today India and Pakistan have joined us in The War On Terror. Maybe the memories of the brutality they endured spur them to action to join us. Whatever their reason, we welcome them in this fight. If the Democratic Party joined the fight maybe Ahmadinejad and Bashar al-Assad, the Mohammad Ali Jinnahs of today, would not be openly supporting insurgent terrorists with money and tools of destruction or threatening to wipe Israel off the face of the earth.

Human nature dictates that when benevolent authority is perceived as weak, evil men will rise to fill the void. If the American troops leave Iraq and Afghanistan before self-rule is strong, evil will respond as it will. Most of America seems to understand this, but Bush-hating tunnel vision has destroyed the Democratic Party and innocents are being slaughtered every day because of their weak and selfish rhetoric. I suggest they be quiet, sit in their comfortable chair and read The Life of Reason by George Santayana because "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."

A New Species of Democrat

Back during the days of the Viet Nam war, the left came up with the name Chicken Hawk to describe those that were pro-military but did not serve in the military. Yesterday's vote in the Senate to cut off funds for the troops overseas fell from the sky in flames. Only 29 Democratic Senators voted for the measure, including Hilary Clinton (D-NY) and Barak Obama (D-IL) in a political machination to vote for a bill they knew would fail in order to satisfy the blood lust of their wacked out base.

In light of the fact that new species of animals are being discovered at an alarming rate, it should be noted that a new species of Democrat has been discovered in the Senate: the Chicken Nugget Dove Democrat. The Chicken Nugget Dove can be recognized by the biological oddity of the lack of any bones, which causes the new species to do a lot of flapping and squawking but an inability to vote its conscience because of re-election fears.