Washinton DC is a degenerate city, an Imperial city extracting tribute from the provinces. All freepers should read this
DC is a non stop party at our expense. Dc and its suburbs
I consider myself lucky, just got a new job that pays twice a much as I earned at the auto parts store. It is a contract to hire position and it last 9 months and hope they hire me. It is in the mortgage/loan industry. I hope to get hired and I’ll do the best I can to achieve that. The Pittsburgh area took it’s share of hits but we are generally not as bad off as the rest of the country but it is still tough out there. I plan on saving money for a “rainy day” in case along with getting as many debt monkeys off of us as we can, I think that is the best thing to do with an uncertain future.
Given the topic, perhaps you won't mind my posting the following observations again:
"To preserve [the] independence [of the people,] we must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. We must make our election between economy and liberty, or profusion and servitude. If we run into such debts as that we must be taxed in our meat and in our drink, in our necessaries and our comforts, in our labors and our amusements, for our callings and our creeds, as the people of England are, our people, like them, must come to labor sixteen hours in the twenty-four, give the earnings of fifteen of these to the government for their debts and daily expenses, and the sixteenth being insufficient to afford us bread, we must live, as they now do, on oatmeal and potatoes, have no time to think, no means of calling the mismanagers to account, but be glad to obtain subsistence by hiring ourselves to rivet their chains on the necks of our fellow-sufferers." --Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval, 1816. ME 15:39Note Jefferson's very last thought here. He declares that when government taxing and debt have reached certain levels, in order for individuals to survive, then their chosen "employment" becomes "hiring ourselves to rivet their (the government's) chains on the necks of our fellow-sufferers."
Consider: As we approach 2013, as pointed out in this article, where are America's levels of employment highest? Is it in the once-thriving private sector, or in the ever-increasing government sector?
Have we reached that final phase of what Jefferson described as a logical end to what begins as letting "our rulers load us with perpetual debt"--a state where we actually become participants by "hiring ourselves" to make slaves of our fellow citizens?
"[With the decline of society] begins, indeed, the bellum omnium in omnia [war of all against all], which some philosophers observing to be so general in this world, have mistaken it for the natural, instead of the abusive state of man. And the fore horse of this frightful team is public debt. Taxation follows that, and in its train wretchedness and oppression." --Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval, 1816. ME 15:40
"Is it now high time for the people of this country to explicitly declare whether they will be free men or slaves. It is an important question which ought to be decided. It concerns more than anything in this life. The salvation of our souls is interested in this event. For wherever tyranny is established, immorality of every kind comes in like a torrent, it is in the interest of tyrants to reduce the people to ignorance and vice.” - Samuel Adams
And:
“The utopian schemes of leveling and a community of goods, are as visionary and impractical as those which vest all property in the crown. These ideas are arbitrary, despotic, and, in our government unconstitutional.” - Samuel Adams
Those who call themselves "conservatives" need to "conserve" these ideas on behalf of future generations.
Their spokesmen need to have studied history enough to be able to use the clear messages of America's Founders intelligently against the "chief redistributionist" and "leveler" of today.
Maddening.
This is very much the reason that, on my personal page, I have a requirement that the Congress can neither set their own pay, nor can they set their pay raises. That privilege belongs to their employers - the taxpayers of the state which elected them!!
I also believe that Congress should have NO authority whatsoever over federal programs in which they do not participate. Socialist Security comes to mind. The Congress opted out of SS, but they still control how the money is spent and what age people can retire to collect benefits from this so-called entitlement program that we pay for (which begs the rhetorical question, “how is that an entitlement”?).
later
The root cause of our problem is based in the philosophical underpinnings of our legal system. The Common Law system.
One reason the Common Law works so very well is the simple principal that “anything not expressly illegal is legal”. This idea is a huge boon to creativity and entrepreneurship.
However, “Old Europe” is dominated by the French Civil Code, which in turn is based on the Napoleonic Code and old Roman Law. It believes the opposite, that “anything not authorized by the law is illegal.” And this tends to smother both creativity and entrepreneurship.
However, many American political leaders are enamored with the European model, as it is based in elitism and nobles running the government. Something they imagine themselves to be.
So they have pushed incessantly to remake our Common Law based legal system into one more like the French Civil Code, by creating the false notion that Americans should only be able to do what the government *permits* them or *orders* them to do. And this means government micromanagement, or “nanny” government.
To do this, they keep piling on more and more government, regulations and laws.
In real terms, compare the constitution of the United States to the phone book thick constitution that Europe tried to create.
Our constitution is very streamlined, with the intent more than anything to limit and restrict what government is *allowed* to do. Anything else not mentioned is reserved to the states or the people. Ours, not theirs.
The European constitution made a serious effort to define everything that Europeans are *allowed* to do. Which is why it is an unwieldy mess and unserviceable. It is just gobbledegook. The People of Europe matter little if at all in their constitution.
Rising property values in the DC area: “rent seekers’ bubble”
Like the Communist Party in the old Soviet Union or today’s PRC
Hey Wapo, welcome to the party, pal.
I visited DC and NoVa in April. It looked like America used to look. You didn’t see “Available” and “For Lease” signs on 40% of the commercial buildings. Prosperity was evident everywhere you went.
My cousin lives in DC. She bought a house for 800 grand that would be about 40 here in Indiana.
I tell young people who are interested in relocating that’s the place to be if they can stomach the congestion. Snag one of those 15,000 new IRS jobs for enforcing Obamacare.
A young woman with two kids. I don't know if they were her kids or not...but she bought two bags of gummy bears or something like them...with Food Stamps.
Then she whipped out the cash to buy a pack of Marlboro's. She was dressed and clean..and so were the kids. The got into a nice SUV...newer than mine.
I wondered why she was on Food Stamps....Probably a reason, I guess.
Tea Party not allowed.
btt