It is often said that, modern politics, and political ads, over the recent decades, in The United States, has gotten uglier then ever before. Do you believe that to be true? If so, please think again:

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via ReasonTV

Below is President Ronald Reagan’s First Inaugural Address:

This is a Great Speech!
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“It is my intention to curb the size and influence of the Federal establishment and to demand recognition of the distinction between the powers granted to the Federal Government and those reserved to the States or to the people. All of us need to be reminded that the Federal Government did not create the States; the States created the Federal Government.”

- Ronald Reagan (First Inaugural Address)

“Bread and Circuses” (or bread and games) (from Latin: panem et circenses) is a metaphor for a superficial means of appeasement. In the case of politics, the phrase is used to describe the creation of public approval, not through exemplary or excellent public service or public policy, but through the mere satisfaction of the immediate, shallow requirements of a populace. The phrase also implies the erosion or ignorance of civic duty amongst the concerns of the common man (l’homme moyen sensuel).”

“In modern usage, the phrase has become an adjective to describe a populace that no longer values civic virtues and the public life. To many across the political spectrum, left and right, it connotes the triviality and frivolity that characterized the Roman Empire prior to its decline.”

“This phrase originates from Rome in Satire X of the Roman poet Juvenal (circa 100 AD ). In context, the Latin phrase panem et circenses (bread and circuses) identifies the only remaining cares of a Roman populace which has given up its birthright of political involvement. Here Juvenal displays his contempt for the declining heroism of his contemporary Romans. Roman politicians devised a plan in 140 B.C. to win the votes of the poor: giving out cheap food and entertainment, “bread and circuses”, would be the most effective way to rise to power.”

“Already long ago, from when we sold our vote to no man, the People have abdicated our duties; for the People who once upon a time handed out military command, high civil office, legions — everything, now restrains itself and anxiously hopes for just two things: bread and circuses.” – Juvenal (Satire 10.77–81)

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Wikipedia.org

“If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issuance of their currencies, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all their prosperity until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.”

– Thomas Jefferson

“The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public’s money.”

- Alexis de Tocqueville

‎”If you analyze it I believe the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism. I think conservatism is really a misnomer just as liberalism is a misnomer for the liberals–if we were back in the days of the Revolution, so-called conservatives today would be the Liberals and the liberals would be the Tories. The basis of conservatism is a desire for less government interference or less centralized authority or more individual freedom and this is a pretty general description also of what libertarianism is.”

- Governor Ronald Reagan (1975 interview with Reason Magazine)

Further Reading:
Classical Liberalism

“On every question of construction let us carry ourselves back to the time when the Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit manifested in the debates, and instead of trying what meaning may be squeezed out of the text, or invented against it, conform to the probable one in which it was passed.”

- Thomas Jefferson

Below is Judge Napolitano, on Apr 20, 2011, eloquently, breaking down, the break down in personal responsibility, and our Federal Government’s efforts to diminish our individuality. He also discusses the sets of values that factions both on the left and right, historically, through The Federal Government, have been pushing on the entire country.

This is a great monologue!

Enjoy!

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“We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security.”

- Dwight D. Eisenhower

“Emergencies have always been the pretext on which the safeguards of individual liberty have been eroded.”

– F.A. Hayek

“When people speak to you about a preventive war, you tell them to go and fight it.”

- Dwight D. Eisenhower

“Never was so much false arithmetic employed on any subject as that which has been employed to persuade nations that it is their interest to go to war. Were the money which it has cost to gain, at the close of a long war, a little town or a little territory, the right to cut wood here or to catch fish there, expended in improving what they already possess, in making roads, opening rivers, building ports, improving the arts and finding employment for their idle poor, it would render them much stronger, much wealthier and happier. This I hope will be our wisdom.”

- Thomas Jefferson

“The States are the most competent administrations for our domestic concerns and the surest bulwarks against anti-republican tendencies.”

- Thomas Jefferson

The words “Separation of Church and State,” were a metaphor used by Thomas Jefferson, in his correspondence between himself and The Danbury Baptists, in 1801. His exact words, were, “thus building a wall of separation between Church and State.”

These words, by Jefferson, to The Danbury Baptists, were used to demonstrate to them, and confirm, that, Constitutionally, our “Federal” Government was removed, legislatively, from the establishment, and prohibition, of any religion in the United States. Jefferson’s metaphor, not only is nowhere in the Constitution, but even in his letter, the metaphor was never intended to apply to our respective states. He was reassuring the Danbury Baptists that our Federal Government would not, and could not, make any laws that would abridge their religious freedoms.

It is the (Federal Government) Supreme Court, who, nefariously, used Jefferson’s metaphor to lead people to believe that there was no role for even state Governments, in our respective states, in the area of religion.

The Due Process clause of the 14th Amendment, was intended to ‘protect’ our individual rights, in our respective states. In the Everson vs. the Board of Education case, members of the Supreme Court used the case as a way to begin removing some of the state’s and the people’s (First Amendment) religious rights – which, traditionally, would have been a matter for the voters and their state constitutions to address.

Prior to that decision, state and local Governments did have some role, in our respective states, in the area of religion. It was after this Supreme Court decision, that public schools started removing prayer from schools etc. And, this is the same Federal Government that, for the last 30 or so years, many Conservative (likely, well-intended) groups have been working to ‘further empower’ with certain powers that, Constitutionally, have always belonged to, and, should always belong to the states.

Further Reading:
Everson vs. the Board of Education
10th Amendment

“If there must be trouble, let it be in my day, that my child may have peace”

- Thomas Paine

“It is better to know the worst, and provide for it, than to delude ourselves with false hope.”

- Patrick Henry

“An unrestrained intercourse between the States themselves will advance the trade of each by an interchange of their respective productions, not only for the supply of reciprocal wants at home, but for exportation to foreign markets. The veins of commerce in every part will be replenished, and will acquire additional motion and vigor from a free circulation of the commodities of every part. Commercial enterprise will have much greater scope, from the diversity in the productions of different States. When the staple of one fails from a bad harvest or unproductive crop, it can call to its aid the staple of another. The variety, not less than the value, of products for exportation contributes to the activity of foreign commerce. It can be conducted upon much better terms with a large number of materials of a given value than with a small number of materials of the same value; arising from the competitions of trade and from the fluctuations of markets. Particular articles may be in great demand at certain periods, and unsalable at others; but if there be a variety of articles, it can scarcely happen that they should all be at one time in the latter predicament, and on this account the operations of the merchant would be less liable to any considerable obstruction or stagnation. The speculative trader will at once perceive the force of these observations, and will acknowledge that the aggregate balance of the commerce of the United States would bid fair to be much more favorable than that of the thirteen States without union or with partial unions.”

- Alexander Hamilton (Federalist # 11)

“If ever a time should come, when vain and aspiring men shall possess the highest seats in Government, our country will stand in need of its experienced patriots to prevent its ruin.”

- Samuel Adams

Recently, I had a good friend of mine, knowing that I am both a Christian, and lean in the Libertarian direction, ask me my thoughts on the subject of Christianity and gay marriage. After a few days of thought, I decided that I would (with her permission) post our correspondence, on the site, and hopefully get some ‘insightful’ comments and feedback. This subject, as with others like it, can elicit passions from people of all faiths, and backgrounds. I can, and do, respect, all points of view. I only ask that everyone please be respectful to each other’s points of view, as well. The only way to find real solutions, to complex issues, in a country as large and diverse as ours, is to have open and honest discussion and debate.

Hi Mark, the questions I wanted to ask you are about homosexuality and where we should stand on it as patriots. I really waver on this issue. I know where I stand on it Biblically, but I am unsure politically where to be.

Hi Kori, well, me and you would agree, that, Biblically, homosexuality, according to God, himself, is a sin. So, we both agree, from a Biblical perspective. But, I have also thought of this a lot, as you have – and, as a Christian, I know that my relationship is between myself and God. Not, myself, my fellow citizens and God. My sense of morality comes from my Biblical beliefs – and, not from laws decreed by my Government. Also, I try to never judge anyone, Kori, lest I too want to be judged.

If all men are created equal and endowed by Him with the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, then should homosexuals be allowed to do what they wish?

I tend to lean in the yes direction. For example, marriage-licensing, to the best of my knowledge, and from what I have read, was made up by Government; and, instituted in The United States, in the early (please double-check that) 1800s. Therefore, who is the Government to tell any ‘two’ people that you can not have a contract together? In fact, contracts are wholly Constitutional, and should be adjudicated in our court system. So, there again, is this Government ‘legislation’ (or lobby groups) using licensing to social engineer our country, and play morality police? read more…

“I know of no safe repository of the ultimate power of society but the people. And if we think them not enlightened enough, the remedy is not to take power from them, but to inform them by education.”

- Thomas Jefferson

In George Washington’s Farewell Address – among the many insightful topics that he covered, his warning of the dangers of forming political parties, in our country, were, perhaps, his most brilliant words of all.

I’m sure there are many definitions of faction; but, when I think of political factions, I think of it as any like-minded group of voters, or elected officials, trying to infiltrate, or influence, our Government, laws, Constitution etc.

As George Washington, astutely, pointed out, the formation of factions, and allegiances, among several like-minded individuals, is, indeed, consistent with human-nature. However, in my humble opinion, they also defy human-nature. For example, we are individuals; and, as individuals, we don’t generally appreciate being controlled, or told to walk lockstep with a certain ideology; yet, we see this in so many facets of our lives, and political system - read more…

“Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare, but only those specifically enumerated.”

 - Thomas Jefferson

“Single acts of tyranny may be ascribed to the accidental opinion of a day; but a series of oppressions, begun at a distinguished period and pursued unalterably through every change of ministers, too plainly prove a deliberate, systematic plan of reducing us to slavery.”

- Thomas Jefferson