September 02, 2005

Looters: The Low-down on the Low-down
By Nathan A. Barton © 2005

As I write this, New Orleans is rapidly devolving into a level of society somewhat on the back side of “barbarism,” where at least customs and tribal fealty play some role, even if it just limits who you can eat.

Looting, like rape, is an example of “works of the flesh” that virtually all societies and religious systems reject as being irredeemably evil, an example of the most base greed, cruelty, and complete breakdown of morality. It is, in fact, associated with riots, rape, and murder, usually in wholesale lots. It was for many centuries, a military offense with an automatic death penalty. Looting was (and is) a feature of tyranny, of the kind of government and society that far too many millions for far too many centuries were forced to endure. Looting is part of the brutal piracy and invasions and genocide associated with the Northmen raiding Ireland and England, the Mongol conquest of Russia, the “ethnic cleansing of Bosnia,” the Soviet “rape” of Berlin. It is evil, despicable, beyond the pale of humanity. (Read the rest here)

The Federal Government is using the
General Welfare Clause to Steal your Money
By Robert Greenslade © Nitwit Press

Many Americans believe the Sixteenth Amendment, the so-called income tax Amendment, is the constitutional provision that allows the federal government to impose taxes on the people of the several States. This is not the case. The Sixteenth Amendment has nothing to do with the federal government's power to impose taxes. [The 16th Amendment is not the Source of the Federal Income Tax] In fact, every federal tax, including income and social security taxes, originate from a provision in the Constitution commonly known as the "general welfare clause." This provision, which is found at Article I, Section 8, Clause 1 of the Constitution, grants Congress the power "[t]o lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common Defense and general Welfare of the United States..." (Read the rest here)

Hey, Big Spender
by Congressman Ron Paul - R - TX

When Congress returns to Washington in September, final touches in the form of last-minute pork will be added to the enormous 2006 federal budget. Rosy predictions about a balanced budget in five years will be made, and both parties will pat themselves on the back for crafting another budget agreement. There will be little partisan acrimony, and the media scarcely will report the results of the vote. Congressional spending, which dramatically affects every American, never generates much public interest – while distractions like Terri Schiavo and Michael Jackson occupy the nation’s attention for months.

Congressional budget agreements really don’t mean much. A congressional budget passed in 2005 has absolutely no impact on spending decisions in the future, and will be quickly forgotten as all past budgets have been. No politician or government official in 2010 will be heard to say, “Gee, we promised back in 2005 to spend less than this, so we better stick to that pledge.” Only a fool can believe that Congress will consider itself bound by past budgets, and constitutionally the budget is passed one year at a time. Anything else is just talk. Congress can make all the deals it wants, but it can only implement a budget for the coming fiscal year. (Read the rest here)

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Libertarian Commentary on The News
By Nathan A. Barton © 2005

I have been surprised that I have received not a single negative piece of feedback about my comments regarding New Orleans, but today I want to take a more serious look at it. We are seeing a crisis that is rapidly becoming worse than Bloody Tuesday (9-11) in cost and impact, if not lives; are we seeing an advance warning of what a really massive natural disaster or terrorist strike, or an actual invasion, would look like? I said originally (and based on weather and other factors, still believe) that the bullet missed us: if the Hurricane had remained a Cat 5 or 4, and had hit New Orleans dead-on, the conditions would be even worse than they are turning out to be. But read on...

Storms and Their Aftermath

Anarchy [sic] disrupts relief effort - Crisis grows as flooded New Orleans looted
BBC News AND Tampa Tribune
Looting and lawlessness is widespread in flood-stricken New Orleans as people made homeless by Hurricane Katrina grow increasingly desperate. There are reports of shootings, carjackings and thefts across the city, where a full evacuation is under way. (BBC) "Helicopters dropped sandbags on two broken levees as the water kept rising in the streets. The governor drew up plans to evacuate just about everyone left in town. Looters ransacked stores. Doctors in their scrubs had to use canoes to bring supplies to blacked-out hospitals. New Orleans sank deeper into crisis Tuesday, a full day after Hurricane Katrina hit, and conditions worsened Wednesday and into Thursday. 'It's downtown Baghdad,' said tourist Denise Bollinger, who snapped pictures of looting in the French Quarter. 'It's insane.'" (08/30/05)

Chaos. A variety of sources say that conditions are getting even worse: dead bodies floating in the water, left in evacuation shelters, police officers joining the looting by siphoning fuel from cars, stealing ammo from already looted gun-shops, and taking food from stores with claims of "commandeering" supplies because they are not getting any supplies and have no communications (centralized radio systems are useless because of flooding and lack of fuel to keep emergency generators going). Estimates range to as high as 100,000 people still in the collapsed city, while crime runs rampant in refugee camps now dotting four states. Presumably, more and more people are dying. (Read the rest here)

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