About

Welcome to Licentia Loquendi, founded January 2009. L2 is a team blog that focuses primarily on political, military and Constitutional issues with a Conservative Christian slant. We are two college students, a Navy corpsman, an Army sniper and a Vietnam era Army veteran.

Each writer has free reign over postings. One writer's views are not necessarily the views of all writers.

11 April 2011

Too Little Too Late? The Answer is Private

People are all p.o.ed and perturbed over National Public Radio, to cut funding or keep it. Then you have another stupid leftist quote to add to their ever growing bank of them, by none other than Harry Reid. Yes I myself enjoy cowboy poetry, but I can assure you Mr. Reid that we are in the minority and the world won’t stop spinning if tax payers stop paying for it. The budget has after too many years, finally come to the tip of everyone’s minds. (Which you’d think would be quite easy for those whose heads come to a point.) Yet nobody in office seems to want to do anything serious to fix the problem, just moan and groan and propose feeble attempts to fix it. If you are shot, sticking your figure in the hole might be a solution for the few seconds until you can get an actual dressing on it, but it certainly isn’t a long term solution and not one that most people would even try because, it’s not really going to help. So to best preform the necessary cuts I used a little boot leather, accumulated calluses on my fingertips, and darn near broke a few toes when one of the books fell on my foot. If we think of this in a legal sense, like you would if bringing this to a trial at the supreme court, we have a lot of precedent that supports our cause, and a little thing called the constitution that tells us what we need to fund, and cowboy poetry just wasn’t one of the founding fathers priorities.
Article 1 section 8 of the constitution explains the purpose of the congressional coin purse, or in modern speak, credit card because the coin purse isn’t holding change, but rather moth balls. “ The congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States,”(don’t complain that is how it was all written and spelled) this provides a relatively clear picture of what they should be spending OUR money on. Defense is the first priority, blowing money like Clinton’s $400 doesn’t achieve any of them just like npr AMTRAK and the like. Then there is that vague general Welfare dooflinky. This has a muddled history that even the founding fathers couldn’t quite agree on with three different views on the subject. Hamilton saw it as there are no limits to spending and constantly pushed for this idea throughout his life. Yet the Constitutional Convention turned him down. In Hamilton’s 1791 Reports of Manufacture, he explains his view that the only limits of tax- and- spend power are that duties be uniform, that direct taxes be apportioned by population, and that no tax should be laid on articles exported from any state. The power to raise money was otherwise “plenary, and indefinite, and the objects to which it may be appropriated are no less comprehensive.” Thankfully the majority of the founding fathers didn’t share these views otherwise things might be a lot worse off than we are now. James Madison, and Thomas Jefferson both held the view that the power to tax and spend did not give congress the power to do whatever they thought best for the country, but that it was to further the end specifically enumerated elsewhere in the constitution. The third view was that “general” meant that it had to be of national benefit not local or state. This way of thinking is elaborated more in the X Amendment, basically stating that if that state thinks it’s good for that state, have at it, but at that states expense not the entire country’s. So, with those last two opinions it would look like a lot of what’s be going on of late is unconstitutional. Like bailouts, Haiti, NPR, National Endowment For The Arts, all of that has no business being paid for with tax dollars according to the constitution.
The First Congress refused to loan money to a glass maker after several members said it was unconstitutional. The Fourth Congress didn’t believe that they possessed the power to provide relief to Savanna Georgia after a fire destroyed the whole city. Guess what? Savanna looks like it’s still around, I think they made out quite well on their own. Now, what does that mean for New Orleans and the rest of the Katrina ravaged places? Precisely. Oh, yeah, George Bush in an alliance with global warming caused the hurricane. The debates don’t give their exact reasoning for not paying that really goes along with any of the above mentioned opinions, but rather that they reject such a broad interpretation of what they can spend. Pretty much they went against Hamilton’s interpretation. A few notable cases that go along with this limiting of spending include Andrew Jackson vetoing a $2oo million bill to purchase stock in the Maysville and Lexington Turnpike company, putting an end to this “dangerous doctrine” and the idea of directly paying for roads and canals by government. Congress got the message, (if they only would now) and didn’t even attempt to send another bill like it to his desk for four years. Then it was a bill to help make Wabash River more navigable, which he promptly vetoed, calling it a “fallacy”. Polk vetoed a bill for $6000 for the Wisconsin Territory, this in and of itself was permissible due to the stronger powers held over a territory, but the real reason for the veto was $500,000 for projects in existing states. Polk’s belief that to interpret the spending clause to allow for such appropriations would permit “combinations of local and individual interest [that would be] strong enough to control legislation, absorb the revenues of the country, and plunge the government into hopeless indebtedness.” Could he see the future? Read that again, that might make a nice new tattoo. That my friends, is pork barrel spending, and when you look at the big picture, he’s 100% correct, and that is how we are where we are. OK one more quick quote from Sandra Day O’Connor from her dissent of the South Dakota v. Dole case. “If the spending power is to be limited only by Congress’ notion of the general welfare, the reality…. is that the Spending Clause gives ‘power to the Congress… to become parliament of the whole people, subject to no restrictions save such as are self-imposed.’ This…. was not the Framers’ plan and is not the meaning of the Spending Clause.”
So where does NPR, the poetry festival, and pork projects fit in? There is no place in our government for them. We have debt because of them. It wasn’t until after the Civil War that this broad interpretation of the Spending Clause has been used, and since FDR started taking an extreme approach to spending, others have used this as an excuse to increase it even more. If it in some way benefits us all that would be one thing, but only taking care of people to buy votes and get reelected is pure and simple abuse of the power that we have entrusted them with. By waiting for a government handout, whether it be in the form of subsidies, welfare, or a bailout you are only helping them bankrupt us morally and economically. We shouldn’t have this notion that the government is always there to help us out, because for starters, that is not why the government is there, but history has shown us that the government is never there when you expect it. Instead you should plan ahead for yourself, social security is bankrupt, and even if somehow you do get paid it’s not enough for you to get by on. If you had that money invested in an IRA it would actually be worth your while and not spent already. With all of these programs are we any better off? Johnson’s War on Poverty hasn’t eradicated poverty in America; it just created more government bureaucracies and even more dependency on government. Which might not trouble you, but it does trouble those that actually have to pay for it, while you get handouts for nothing there are people that are struggling to get by, or they themselves have to get a handout because of having to pay for you.
The Grace Commission estimated that unless something was done about spending by 2000 the nation would have accumulated $15 trillion in debt, and as a result proposed how to cut, and where to cut. But this fell on deaf ears. Their plan would’ve eliminated the national debt in a few short years. I think this is something that maybe we ought to revisit now, that would mean wiping out programs entirely, but limiting the fraud and waste of a lot of programs. My personal opinion is that we can cut around ¾ of the government and that would fix almost every problem with the government. There is no need for Amtrak, they along with the postal service lose money every year. You want my suggestion? Either privatize them, or make it that they can cover their costs, such as paying their employees and upkeep. Regardless of if they are privatized or not they need to be run like a business. Tax money shouldn’t go to support it. How many people have ridden AMTRAK? Not too many. It isn’t providing something necessary, instead it wastes tax dollars to keept it afloat and by not trying to cover its own expenses; it essentially under cuts the private legitimate businesses providing the same service, but if you aren’t trying to make a profit, (at least break even) you have a monopoly on that service, and not only cause higher taxes, you eliminate fair competition from numerous other private companies that do the same thing, so you also have no competition and job creation to compete with you. That is socialism, the beginnings of communism. Take a look at the power that they are abusing, they refuse to let us drill for oil due to environmental concerns, yet they offer the tools and training to Brazil for them to drill, while telling them that we will buy it from them. It would seem that we would take better care of the environment due to all of the environmental wackos in the country and the standards that we have in place. They want to lessen our dependency on foreign oil, yet they promise Brazil that we will buy from them and give them the resources for it. This is doesn’t make any sense. They complain about the price of oil, and the economy; their solution: high speed train.
The reason why we don’t already have high speed trains is because people don’t want it. If we did the private industry would already have built it, so while the market sees it as a waste of money, they want to add to the debt by building one. The states are already starting to refuse it because of the high cost it would create for the states. The true solution is quite obvious. We drill now. This creates jobs. That will lower the cost of oil because we aren’t paying anyone else for it. The tax base will increase because of more jobs and the increase of money flow into this country. Yeah sure what if it does take ten years before we start seeing everything, the positive effects would be immediately obvious. The job creating and the stability that would come from it would start turning this country back around until to where it should be going.
We should be focusing on letting the private industry work itself out and not dabble. Fannie and Freddie is proof of this, whenever the government starts messing with the private sector it creates more problems than it started out to fix. We should be focusing on that, and not whether or not to cut funding for NPR and poetry festivals. The cuts that are straight forward obvious won’t hurt a thing except maybe a few liberal feelings. I’d love a world where we greased the treads of our tanks with leftist tears. If we apply this simple litmus test to most of the government’s spending: why isn’t the private sector doing that? That might explain why the government shouldn’t be doing it either because it is just a money pit. The excuse that we must do this to create jobs does not help the situation at all, instead it makes it much worse. Creating and or increasing the number jobs for government bureaucracies whither they are new ones or already existing shouldn’t even be considered as creating jobs. Why? Because it does the exact opposite of its intended purpose, sure those people are now employed, but that means that the government needs to increase revenue to pay those people. What does the government do whenever it wants to increase revenue? Raise taxes! That’s how. This once again stifles the economy, causing more lost jobs in the private sector, and even less revenue in the gov’t coffers. Is it me, or does that seem like an awful lot of harm just to claim that you created jobs for your reelection bid?
This is just a plain and simple economic reform that I know would do wonders for our current woes. This isn’t rocket science, it is a plain and simple answer to it all. Why are we bickering over a few billion, when the real number to be concerned is trillions? Remember that come election time. If a business did 1/5467949372393903932837 of that financial mismanagement, there would be no company come years end. The government doesn’t need to turn a profit, but they shouldn’t be wasting the fruits of OUR labor. This year’s tax freedom day is 12 April, tomorrow. That means that we have all worked over 3 months before we have started making money that goes into our pocket. That’s ¼ of the year. Yes we should be all very very P.o.ed over that we have wasted a quarter of our lives funding useless, fraudulent programs and actions that have no business existing. Remember that.

07 October 2010

Who Will Serve?

Defense Secretary Robert Gates addressed this question and the growing divide between the civilian and military communities. Never was it more obvious than at Tuesday evening's final editing session for the campus newspaper.
I was working on my column, a compilation of news stories. Lately, I've been including the ranks, names and ages of our fallen military. That came under fire Tuesday evening, when, for want of space, I was asked why I print that, because "it seems like filler." I was then told that "We aren't the Military Times," and then spent the next fifteen minutes arguing that the ages bring our military to a more personal level -- I can look at those names and realize that the specialist killed by an IED last week was my age, that the staff sergeant who gave his life yesterday could have been my best friend. For those who have never had any sort of contact with the military community, this is one way in which we can all relate.
Also, since my college campus has little to do with the military, it seems hardly enough to even devote a few inches of column space to the deceased. Can we not give them that much? They have fought and died for my right and privilege to contribute to the mass media -- can we not show them perhaps the only form of respect we are able?
Thirdly, posting a list of the war dead appeases two groups: anti-war and pro-war. Those against the war are able to look at the list and realize that people are dying, even though combat operations have ended. Those for the war can be proud of the fact that a small, private liberal arts college is devoting a portion of its newspaper to researching and printing the names of our fallen military personnel.

07 August 2010

Shell Game

Money is a rather touchy subject overall, rather it be how to save, invest, or spend it. Just look at taxes and health care reform. So, when you pay for something and you dish out a substantial amount of money for it, you hope that you get your money's worth out of it. For example, you purchase a brand new Cadillac off of eBay, when you go and pick up your $50k car you discover that instead of a brand new caddy you instead got a '72 Pinto that looks like it was sat on blocks in front a ramshackle trailer for 50 years while the squirrels and cats had their way with it. I think it is obvious that you would be quite upset by the incident and say lots of things like oh gee, gosh, golly darn, while contemplating the justifiable slaughter of the individual(s) behind the scam. But what you don't know is that a quite similar scam is being inflicted upon us right this very second as we speak.
Gasoline prices have skyrocketed over the past ten years, so much that it has altered our way of life and thinking. Instead of driving a nice big comfortable SUV with a 10.5 liter engine, we now shop for Fred Flintstone powered clown cars. So when you buy gas now you think of how to get the best fuel economy and dreading the next fill up. But what you may or may not know is that now when you are buying gas, you aren't getting just gas. The sign on the pump is rather small, it reads 10% ethanol. ETHANOL! Not gasoline. So, you might be asking what is the big deal? For a little over a year now I've been noticing a little silver and yellow sticker on tailgates, on closer inspection I saw it reads E85 ethanol equipped. So the newer vehicles are designed for use with ethanol, but what about me. The BEAST! was made in 1993 and does what its told, all while sounding quite seductive like a lady talking about rate of twist in Lazzeroni barrels with a southern accent. Sexy, much unlike the current fad of sounding like Miny Me getting a purple nurple. Anyhow, the BEAST! is not meant to run off of ethanol, so you might wonder why exactly I'm bringing this up. Well when lets look to the professionals for advice on the subject. Bud Tillman of St. Lucie Outboard Marine says: "Corn and cane make great whiskey, not fuel" is company handled over 200 cases where boats were damaged from the use of ethanol as an additive in 2008. So lets look at the "scientific" reasons for this problem.
Ethanol doesn't really mix with gasoline, they have a non- polar bond. Next what settles in is condensation that bonds with the ethanol, (everyone knows water in the gas tank is a no go) which pulls the ethanol and the octane levels from the gasoline and the know pretty much useless fuel to the top. Ethanol is a very potent varnish dissolving rust and gunk from your fuel tank sending it straight to your filters and possibly your fuel injectors causing a nice clog. Wow! I'm going to have to keep shelling out money for a rather underhanded policy just to keep my truck running! Yea!!! Mom, Dad, don't expect much for Christmas this year.
So those of you that have the extra money lying around to buy one of these new fancy cars you could probably care less about everyone else that doesn't have one. Well Mr. you are effected too, because ethanol is 28% less effective than straight up gas. So, you are paying for Pepsi, and getting water. Your fuel economy is considerably less than with straight gas, I'm not talking about what a truck cap can fix, this is more. Throwing stuff on the roof rack is known to lower mileage, but to compare it to putting something on the roof would be to through Oprah up there. So, why are they doing this to us? The whole lowering our carbon footprint garbage doesn't fly, because plants need carbon dioxide to survive, and there are more trees here then when Columbus landed. Here is a better reason for why, they are too stupid to drill for American oil. This cuts down on the actual amount of oil that we use, but doesn't properly address the problem. We are getting oil from people that wipe there butts with a bare hand one second and our plotting our demise next. The whole green movement needs to realize that we are the best place to drill because we are the safest. In the mean time I will continue looking for pumps that aren't trying to kill the BEAST!

31 July 2010

Due to technical difficulties, the

Due to technical difficulties, the Blogathon has been postponed until next weekend.

30 July 2010

Funny story. I have no

Funny story. I have no Internet connection.

WWP


Honor a wounded warrior at WWP Proud Supporter.

More Asianness!

Jay Chou is an Americanized Chinese singer. He starred in the Americanized film "Curse of the Golden Flower," which just so happens to feature one of my favorite actresses, Gong Li (I think she's absolutely gorgeous). Gong Li also starred in "Memoirs of a Geisha," but she doesn't speak English, so she memorized her lines by rote (impressive, considering the emotion in her lines). But, I digress. This is one of my favorite Jay Chou music videos.


And this one is just plain awkward.

Sad, But True

Gen. George S. Patton once said "No good decision was ever made from the seat of a swivel chair." Being that I work for the federal government, I have a phrase that I repeat quite frequently, this is not because of the alignment of the planets or the fact that when I sweat profusely my under britches ride up my butt crack; though I do frequently utter something about that, just a different one. For whatever reason the people that get paid the most for their alleged intelligence, do just the opposite, for example instead of cutting the size of our military, why don't we increase the number of troops, so that we have fresh people, and more people with a regular source of income. But that would make sense which is self defeating in the federal government. That is my quote.
So to tie this in to a much larger scale the fact that today Arizona's controversial law was to start being enforced today, but it wasn't. Because the federal government said that they couldn't enforce the most controversial parts. That being if someone was pulled over or caught jay walking, even questioned about an indecent exposure incident because nobody believed that I had the words "Your Name" tattooed on my posterior; they could ask to see proof of citizenship. This heinous atrocity must never happen! Why not? They already ask for I.D. and vehicle registration, and proof of insurance. How is proving that you are supposed to be hear that difficult? But this would make sense.
The supposed logic behind all of this was that they were trying to enforce federal law. Hmmm, local cops can arrest me for federal weapons charges, and tax evasion if they catch me at a still. Wow, I was always under the impression that any law enforcement agency could arrest me for any law breaking as long as it was, and they are in their jurisdiction. But that's just me, and what do I know?
Now I'm always told that if I see a problem I should also have a suggestion. If I was Jan Brewer I would have the law enforced anyway. What are they going to do declare marshal law. Oh please! Stop! My sides hurt at the thought of Obama having the intestinal fortitude. What are they going to do if they said since you aren't doing your job we will continue to cover for your sorry butt? They wouldn't do anything. The fact that they have to do this in the first place is very sad. But once again the tenth amendment permits Arizona to do so, this is not just the nations problem, but I think a little more Arizona's problem than say, Massachusetts. Just a thought. What is to stop a state from making a federal law stricter in that state? If this makes sense to you, either one of your personalities is a lot like the voices in my head, or B., you make less money than those that are supposed to be smart enough to see common sense for what it is. With that said, I think its time for me to call it quits and take my blood pressure medication, and read more terrorist transcripts on the newest and coolest in the firearms world while driving my roommate nuts blasting Ted Nugent in between Pavoratti and Dvork.

Minorities

There are so many African-Americans and Latinos on base that I started anxiously searching for Caucasians. Insane, since I'm Asian.

Profiling

Earlier this week, The Sergeant needed to stop by the classroom before his lunch break ended, and when we entered the room, two other soldiers were already inside. Later, The Sergeant informed me that one of them, Sergeant Ostrich (not his real name . . . obviously) had invited us to dinner at a nearby Mexican restaurant. The Sergeant told Sergeant Ostrich that he wasn't sure if I would eat Mexican, to which Sergeant Ostrich replied that he didn't think I looked like someone who would eat Mexican food (in Sergeant Ostrich's defense, he did preface that statement by saying that he meant no offense). Well. I immediately told The Sergeant that we would be happy to accept his invitation, and so we will be having dinner Sunday evening.

I've never had Mexican food.

Have You Honored a Wounded Warrior?

We are currently over 20% to the goal of $250. If you've not already donated, support a wounded warrior and ensure that this generation's wounded warriors is the most successful and well-transitioned by donating at WWP Proud Supporter.

10 Things I Like About You

About six years ago, my Pastor's wife invited the young teen girls from our church on a girls' night out. We spent the night in a nearby hotel, fellowshipping and bonding. One of the events of the night was to create a list of ten qualities we wanted in our future husbands. We dubbed the lists "Ten Things I Like About You," and gave them to our parents to keep until later and review. Since then, I've reviewed and revised mine, but only one has changed. I've also added two "optional" (read: two requirements that aren't required only because it would throw of the title of the list) traits. This is my list, as mentioned in my Bucket List.

Christian
- He must have a personal relationship with Christ. We should be on similar levels spiritually and able to challenge each other to grow. Bonus points if he's Pentecostal.

Supportive
- He must be supportive of my ambitions. Bonus points if he's willing to travel the world.

Intelligent
- His intelligence should be comparable to mine. Bonus points if he's got street smarts, since my common sense only occasionally jumps out of the negatives and into the positive percentile.

Understanding
- He must understand and accept who I am, my needs and wants. I do not believe in changing for others, and I would never ask him to change for me. Love is unconditional.

Conservative
- He must share my beliefs and values. I am unwavering in my support of the first amendment, second amendment and support of the military. I also believe that authority can and should be challenged from time to time.

Respectful
- He must respect me, himself and others, regardless of whether they are above, beneath or on his level.

Ambitious
- He must be able to support me (though I will be more than capable of supporting myself); he must have a drive to accomplish and succeed.

Devoted
- He must be loyal to me, as I will be loyal only to him.

Trusting
- He must trust me, and I him.

Strong
- He must be physically strong so that I feel protected. Physical strength is not based solely upon hand-to-hand combat skills. Proper sight alignment and trigger control are also viable criteria, though preferably at a ranger greater than mine.

*Fatherly
- He should be good with children and want his own.

*Humorous
- He should be able to make me laugh.

The last two are optional, but not. :]

Bucket List

A bucket list is a list of things you'd like to accomplish before, well, kicking the bucket. This is mine.

celebrate independence day in washington, d.c.
be kissed under fireworks.
visit washington, d.c. during the cherry blossom festival (with a significant other).
dance in the piazza san marco on a moonlit night.
eat duck tongue in wenzhou.
see the pyramids in egypt.
spend a day daydreaming on the battlefields at gettysburg.
have a picnic in a meadow.
visit williamsburg. <-- To be completed this evening!
finish at least one of my never-ending novels.
marry a God-fearing man (whom i love and meets the 10 things i like about you).
subsequently terrorize the world with kidlets.
go skydiving. maybe.
expand L2.
earn at least an MA in either political science, history, journalism or middle-eastern studies.
search for my biological parents.
learn to swing dance.
earn at least my third degree black belt in tae kwon do.
learn how to drive manual.
learn how to unassemble and reassemble an ar-15. preferably mine.

In My Opinion - Professional Sports

The other day, I was doing work in the cafeteria. It was around lunch time, and a middle-aged woman sat down in front of the television nearest to me. She changed the channel to a soap opera, which I endured for an hour, before her lunch was over and she went back to work. A few moments later, a man sat down nearby, and I waited until the woman left before I stood up to change the channel. Unable to find Fox News after about three minutes of searching, I settled for CNN another news channel. No sooner had I sat down than another man walked over, changed the channel to ESPN, and sat down with the first man. Enraptured, they stared at the cathode ray tubes while I packed up my stuff and passed three other televisions, two of which were broadcasting ESPN, on my way out of the cafeteria.

Professional sports are both a horrid waste of time and an ingenious distraction. Ignorant people who can't be bothered with important issues, such as politics, become caught up in a world of which they will never be a part. They wear the jerseys of their favorite athletes (which I never understood -- why are you wearing that jersey if it's not your name and you're not related?), they get angry when "their" teams lose. But, when people are so involved in something as inconsequential as sports, people of that mindset are obviously not as wholeheartedly involved in other affairs of the world (which is a good thing). Professional sports irk me. And yet, when I see the people who are so devoted to them, typically it makes me happy inside that these usually aren't the people forming the world's policies.

Mochi


Mochi is one of my favorite Japanese snacks. Mochi is made of glutinous rice and traditionally served around New Year's. The Sergeant and I currently have three boxes of daifuku (mochi stuffed with filling) -- red bean, taro and green tea.