Category: News

I guess we’ve uncovered another reason why I, just like the d-42 guy, only scored a 66 on the Libertarian Purity Test: I am all in favor of legalizing most things, but I’ll be damned if some international body is going to force it on my country.

Slashdot links to a story in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer about the World Trade Organization deciding that the United States is violating international trade laws by banning Internet gambling:

The World Trade Organization, in its first decision on an Internet-related dispute, has ignited a political, cultural and legal tinderbox by ruling that the U.S. policy prohibiting online gambling violates its obligations under international trade law.

The ruling by a WTO panel Wednesday is being hailed by online casinos operators overseas as a major victory that could force the United States to liberalize its laws.

But the Bush administration vowed to appeal the decision, and several members of Congress said they would rather have an international trade war or withdraw from future rounds of the World Trade Organization than have American social policy dictated from abroad.

“It’s appalling,” said Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Va. “It cannot be allowed to stand that another nation can impose its values on the U.S. and make it a trade issue.”

The decision stems from a case taken to the WTO in June by the island nation of Antigua and Barbuda, which licenses 19 companies that offer sports betting and casino games such as blackjack over the Internet.

Antigua and Barbuda argued that U.S. trade policy does not prohibit cross-border gambling operations and that the United States would be hypocritical to do otherwise because it wants to allow American casino operations to operate land-based and Internet-based subsidiaries overseas.

It is not clear precisely why the WTO ruled in favor of Antigua and Barbuda, because the specifics remain confidential. The ruling covers only online casinos based on the islands, but other nations could seek similar rulings.

Cheez, Luis, this makes me want to put on a black ski mask, go to Washington state, and heave a brick through a Starbucks window. So the NWO World Trade Order gets to overwrite the laws of its members now, and to force them to trade in things its members have deemed illegal?

I tell you what, I will support this decision as soon as the WTO forces Smith and Wesson shops in interior China and opens Saudia Arabia to America’s pork industry. Until that time, the WTO can stick to doing what it does best, which is…um….making bureacrats fatter.

On another note, we at MfBJN have created a pool to determine when regime change will occur in Anitgua and Barbuda. What the heck, who needs regime change? I say Antigua for us and Barbuda for our Canadian friends who so lust for a Caribbean paradise. Let the partitioning begin!

Medicare’s going to run out of money by 2019, its trustees report. And as the sun sets, the whooperwill start shrieking out for the soul of the departing entitlement; only they’re understandably chirping at Bush:

In a conference call with reporters arranged by the campaign of presumptive Democratic nominee John Kerry, Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois blamed the Bush administration and its Medicare prescription drug bill for Medicare’s shortened solvency.

‘The Clinton administration and Democrats believed save Medicare first,’ Durbin said. ‘The Bush approach is save the special interests first. … This is not just about Medicare. It’s about the credibility of the Bush administration.’

So you see, Bush and our revered leaders have voted to add a drug benefit which redistributes wealth from workers to retirees, thus accelerating the decline of the entitlement. And Durbin cheeps about special interests.

You win, Senator. The elderly who receive more something for nothing are now a special interest. Those of us funding the free ride are a special interest. We, the citizens and electorate, are nothing but special interests fighting each other for your privileged dispensation or disbursement.

Jeff Jarvis spends a lot of time championing Howard Stern as some sort of Libertarian hero, I’d like to provide my own Stern Update Rebuke from something he said this morning.

Stern held up recent legislation from Charles Schumer as an example of proper legislation as opposed to bills cracking down on indeceny on the radio. Proper legislation, I guess, is overreaching legislation that does not particularly target Howard Stern.

This new bill makes gang murder a Federal crime and apparently adds a number of related offenses. Schumer’s out to Federalize crimes already covered by state statutes (I assume it’s still illegal to kill someone in New York) and adds another redundant layer of offenses that short-circuit double jeopardy protections of the Constitution.

This is good legislation because it’s specifically not bad for Howard Stern.

Behold your leader, minions, and worship.

With his relatively orthodox libertarianism, I am surprised the blogosphere doesn’t hang on the Chicago Tribune‘s Steve Chapman’s every column (Mondays and Thursdays, kids). Here he is today on New York’s newly-unconstitutional vehicle confiscation law (registration required):

This is a small but important victory for the proposition that Americans should not be punished without a demonstration of guilt. It’s also a blow to the government’s habit of using law enforcement to snatch property for its own enrichment.

Word to power. Or power to word. Whichever one won’t flip the circuit breaker and make me tromp into the litter-cluttered dark of the basement in my bare feet.

Actually, equivalence makes two things equal. This story about the death of the Hamas leader does not actually equivocate:

Sharon’s government has gone after militant leaders using Israeli helicopter gunships in a controversial policy that has resulted in a number of civilian casualties in addition to the deaths of senior figures in Hamas and other groups.

It’s controversial because of accidental civilian casualties. Attacks that target innocent bus riders or train riders or just people eating in a cafe or dancing in a nightclub–that’s an accepted, noncontroversial expression from an aggrieved people. They’re acceptable, but the Israeli policy is not. Thanks for dishing up the unwritten commentary with the facts, AP.

Yassin was viewed as an inspirational figure by his followers in the Gaza Strip (news – web sites) and West Bank. His death could spur violent protests not only in the Palestinian areas but in the wider Arab and Islamic world, where he was well-regarded as a symbol of the Palestinian battle for independence.

His death could spur violence. Why should it differ from his life?

From Lileks today, expressing his fascist nature to the protestors:

These people want “freedom,” but only for themselves. Freedom to preen. Freedom to flatter themselves that they are somehow committing an act of bravery by Speaking Truth to Power. But they’re speaking Nonsense to Indifference.

Speaking Nonsense to Indifference. Put that in your pipe and smoke it. But print it out first.

Today, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch ran a story on the front page of its Travel and Leisure section entitled Angola sheds its image as nation’s bloodiest prison.

What does it say about the state of Louisiana, or the author’s view thereof, that the only attractions associated with Louisiana are plantation houses remade into bed-and-breakfasts and prison?

Please, don’t e-mail your responses. I’d rather not know what it means.

I know how poorly it reflects upon me, but I laughed at this account of an untimely death as presented on Practical Penumbra.

I am a ghoul. A ghoul, I tell you!

A Robert J. Samuelson column in the Washington Post about The Future of the Welfare State (registration required) triggered a thought. When Samuelson says:

But Europe relies heavily on a sales tax — the “value-added tax” — that, in theory, falls on consumption and not investment or work effort.

I think, you know, some people want to introduce a national sales tax, or consumption tax, in these United States to replace the income tax. I hadn’t given much thought to the stupidity of the consumption tax, but here’s my epiphany:

A consumption/sales tax rewards people like Scrooge McDuck who throw all their moneys into savings and vaults but don’t purchase things, which keeps the economy going. Of course, when Scrooge McDuck dies, the inheritance tax kicks in and the heirs get less than the sum of Scrooge’s savings, which they can save or spend (with applicable consumption taxation). Holy cow, Taxman!

Perhaps less taxes would spur the economies. But less taxes means less government dole, and how can one get elected with the latter?

Via The Meatriarchy, we see government largesse funding an artiste who mocks religion:

How about a performance artist who:

“suspended himself naked, filled his mouth with his own blood and assumed the lotus position. In Liaison Inter-Urbain he dug a shallow grave, inserted a vial of blood into his anus and contorted himself so that the blood flowed into his mouth.”

I think governments should pay good cash money only to artists who pry out their own eyes with spoons and hang upside down from trees to gain true knowledge. Put that on my 1040 form; I’d check the box to depopulate artists who suck in more ways than one.

Wizbang! points out that the story in this post about a guy who wore a devil costume to see The Passion of the Christ was a spoof.

But it can’t be. I saw it on Fark, so it’s gotta be true. Next you’re going to tell me is that the things in their photography ontests are faked.

Via the Ranting Professor, I came across a bit in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel (registration required, but go ahead and tell them you’re Bud Selig) about how the coastal upperclass media types view members of their audiences who are not from those silly little states across which you can drive in an hour.

Yummy bits:

Questions are not being asked. Meanings are not being interpreted. Certain neighborhoods are not being visited. Certain lives are not being explored in a meaningful way. And, through the prosecution of basic journalism, agendas are being set that do not reflect the way the other half, without the bulging 401ks, lives.

For instance, how many people on air or in print came from families that had walked a picket line? How many know how to bait a hook or gut a deer? (I’m bad at both.) How many have felt the economic insecurity that stalks the working poor? (And I’m not talking about the few weeks at college on the Ramen noodles diet.)

How many have had real experience with the criminal justice system, who have had home visits from social workers, who have scrambled to call the probation office, who know the awful taste of government cheese?

My feeling about the growing social distance was reinforced most personally during the investment of Wisconsin by the national press. I traveled with the Howard Dean camp, and there saw again how the elite media outlets employ people who, when they dip into smaller places away from Dupont Circle in Washington or the Lower East Side in New York, treat it as some sort of anthropological adventure.

It’s not just the media who do this; it’s any condescending person who thinks that New York, D.C., or Boston is the center of the whole universe, not just the condescender’s. By the same token, we must remember, too, that our Midwestern experience is not the end-all be-all, even if it’s down to earth and touch with physical reality. As individuals, we should keep some open minds toward all kinds of experience, even if it’s Ivy League education; just recognize that each experience offers perspective which might provide insight into different situations. It’s always a good idea to mix a cleric in with your fighters and magic user when you go dungeon-crawling.

And another point: USDA cheese doesn’t taste awful. It tastes like cheese.

Thank you, that is all.

A mother whose daughter was killed by a drag racer wants vengance to deter future teenagers from acting stupid:

The mother of accident victim Megan Landholt urged a stiff prison sentence for a teenage street racer who pleaded guilty Monday in the collision that killed her daughter in south St. Louis County last year.

Barbara Landholt said she wanted to make an example of the driver. She told Judge David Lee Vincent III that Jeremy Ketchum “and people like him cannot go on and think that this is not a big deal. We have a chance to set an example here. A message has to be sent to the drivers of these cars.”

I don’t want to knock this woman’s pain, but kids getting into their cars on Saturday nights don’t read the St. Louis Post-Dispatch or their court dockets to keep up with the consequences of their actions. They don’t think about their actions, much less the consequences. Automobile accidents, death? That happens in another school district every couple of years.

So putting the guy who killed your daughter in prison for a long or short time won’t do much for the greater good, and it probably won’t save another daughter from a drag racer, drunk driver, or cell-phone yakker. It will, quite frankly, end the life of another, albeit dumber, kid, and maybe that’s just retribution. Iit’s not, however, an example since not many are paying attention.