United Liberty

I must admit that this is a subject I wanted to stay away from but the continuing “uproar” saddens me. I want to like Sarah Palin but she makes it hard sometimes . At some point she is going to have to stop playing the victim card and act like a big girl.

I heard the Rahm Emanuel “retard” comment before Palin responded to it (I actually agreed with him). But something told me somebody would say something. Somebody would be offended. Somebody would act like a speech Nazi. Somebody would express an opinion that would attack the natural right of free speech.

As a former member of the GOP I can remember getting into debate after debate with “lefty” Statists on the subject of language. I guess because of who I am and how I was brought up I feel like I have a right to speak my mind and if you’re the “political correct” type you can get over it (Being raised in NYC probably contributed a ‘lil as well). I am not offended by anything that comes out of somebody’s pie- hole. Many people say things that alarm me, but being offended is somehow being “hurt” by what is said. Ms. Palin kept referring to her “thick skin” on the campaign trail. Did it somehow disappear?

I’ve already heard other people make the point that Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck use the word “retard” on their shows and Sarah hasn’t criticized them. Blah, blah, that isn’t nearly the issue here. The fact that the “Right” is now acting like the language police leads me to believe I left the GOP at the right time.

Let me create a scenario for dear Sarah and see how she would handle it.

The Supreme Court issued a significant ruling this week on the subject of campaign financing. It is a complex subject and the opinions authored by the Court illustrate this complexity checking in at 183 pages (read here if you dare). I have read most of them and will offer my thoughts.

In the 2008 election cycle, a group called Citizens United produced a film called Hillary: The Movie which was apparently quite an unfavorable depiction of the Presidential hopeful. Citizens United intended to distribute the film as an on-demand pay-per-view on DirecTV. The commercials which supported the film were deemed an “electioneering communication” by the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia and the film was not shown. Citizen United is a non-profit 501(c)4 corporation which has special non-profit status in that, unlike standard non-profit 501(c)3 charitable corporations, they can participate in the political process via lobbying and and campaigns. If this sounds complicated already, then welcome to the world of campaign finance in the United States.

Editor’s note: Please welcome Eric Von Haessler to United Liberty. Eric is a radio broadcaster (part of the of The Regular Guys), based out of Atlanta. He’ll be posting here as he can find time.

When I was a kid I always looked forward to the next television appearance of a guy known as The Amazing Kreskin. Kreskin called himself a mentalist and would demonstrate his ability to read minds by surprising members of the studio audience with his knowledge about what they were thinking right then and there. He ended every demonstration with a great gimmick. The host of the show would hide Kreskin’s paycheck somewhere on the set and the mentalist didn’t get paid for the appearance unless he found it before the end of the segment.

My enjoyment of this act was tempered by maturity. As I got older it became obvious to me that it was impossible for one person to read another person’s mind. My favorite TV mentalist was certainly entertaining but it was a parlor trick. I didn’t have to know exactly how he created the illusion- it was enough to know that no one can read minds. Therefore Kreskin cannot read minds. That epiphany from my young adult years strangely applies and helps to navigate me through the chronic Red state/Blue state bickering that now passes for debate in America.

If every passionate member on the Left and Right would take the time to remind themselves of their inability to read minds we’d be spared this endless cycle of faux-argument followed by faux-outrage. You know the drill. First a famous or semi-famous person makes a specious claim about the country, the administration, or whatever- then members of the opposite ideology begin the public handwringing and name calling that leads to an eventual boycott of something somewhere.

If it isn’t Sean Penn and Michael Moore raising hackles on the Right, it’s Ann Coulter and Glenn Beck poking at the Left. The brain dead Kabuki rolls ever onward and both sides turn out to be fueled by the same mistaken assumption. The idea that it’s possible for one person to read another person’s mind lurks at the bottom of the entire national discussion.

While perusing the morning headlines today I was greeted with the latest example of false debate from actress Janeane Garafalo. Ms. Garafalo, a well-known hater of all things right wing and Republican is now calling the Tea Party protestors ‘functionally retarded.’ She then adds that anyone of these functional retards that shows up at a rally or Town Hall meeting and shouts, “I want my country back” is just speaking in code. What they really mean is, “I want my white guy back”- presumably because they can’t handle the reality of dealing with a black president.

So how is she able to pick up on and decipher this right wing code? Well it’s obvious. She can read minds. No matter how much you natter on about the Constitution and free-market capitalism Janeane will not be fooled. She’s in your head. She knows what you are really thinking. It would be comforting to think she is alone in her mind reading quackery but it turns out to be a crowded field.

Garafalo’s latest gamma-burst of stupidity is only a parry to comments made by TV/radio host Glenn Beck about the President a few weeks ago. While opining on the whole Obama/Harvard Professor/Police Officer fiasco Mr. Beck couldn’t contain him self to commentary on the President’s actions alone. In order to round out his argument he made the claim that the President was in fact, a racist. He then went on to speculate about what might cause this deep-seated hatred of white people that lay at the core of Obama’s identity. Has the President ever expressed this hatred in a speech or interview? No. But he doesn’t need to do that. Glenn Beck can read minds and he knows what the President is really thinking.

Examples abound:

-Members of the Left just ‘know’ the war in Iraq was all about profits for the two oil men who occupied the White House at the time. Neither Bush nor Cheney claimed such a goal but the Left knows what they were really thinking.

-Many of my friends on the Right insist that Barack Obama hates the country and is engaged on a mission of sabotage in an act of personal revenge. President Obama has never articulated this as an item on his agenda but the Right knows what he’s really thinking.

Enough already. Speculation about the mindset of another may be a fun game to play but it has no place in the assessment of truth. The only proper way to judge a politician or anyone is to compare words and action. If a promise is made and broken, or a claim is found to be wanting, it is proper to draw conclusions about the veracity or competency of that person based on the evidence.  But this judgment gives you zero insight into the mind of the person you’ve just passed judgment upon. It can’t provide that insight because you don’t have the ability to read minds.

Give credit to The Amazing Kreskin. At least he understood how to entertain with claims of clairvoyance.  The white noise of constant outrage emanating from both the Left and Right is driving many of us to simply tune out.

If Glenn Beck and Janeane Garafalo continue to insist upon revealing the inner dialogue of their political enemies, we should demand a better show. Can you imagine the spectacle of Garafalo and Beck tearing apart the Fox News and MSNBC studios in search of their next paycheck? Now- That’s Entertainment!

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs faced some tough questions today, first from CBS reporter Chip Reid and then from Helen Thomas. The issue was that the Obama Administration is stacking the deck at town hall meetings and isn’t being transparent. Thomas pointed out that the administration is showing a “pattern of controlling the press.”

The general rule for me is if Alex Jones says it, don’t take it seriously. And that’s what I said on Thursday to several friends that e-mailed me a link to a story about how the Missouri Information Analysis Center (MIAC) basically correlates libertarians and more specifically supporters of Ron Paul, Bob Barr and Chuck Baldwin, with potentially being a domestic terrorist or member of a militia.

According to Ohio state law, convicted child pornographers are required to carry a Tier 2 sexual offender classification, requiring registration as a sex offender for twenty years. In this case, a teen girl from Licking Valley High School is charged with illegal use of a minor in nudity-oriented material, a second-degree felony; and possession of criminal tools, a fifth-degree felony.