A Geek With Guns

I reported a short while back that the Minnesota Republican Party has been unable to pay the rent on their headquarters. From individuals connected to the party I’ve learned that the Minnesota Republican Party aren’t planning on paying the rent and they’re also planning on fighting any potential eviction. At this point I believe it’s time to declare a new occupation, OccupyGOP. To help get this initiative off its feet I’ve decided to offer some ideas to help get OccupyGOP rolling.

First some slogans are going to be needed. One of the biggest fights Occupy has selected is trying to get local municipalities to allow tents erected on public property. Occupy’s argument is that housing is a human right so I believe the OccupyGOP needs to adopt a new slogan: office space is a human rights. The idea is simple, the Minnesota Republican Party currently occupiers office space and they don’t want to pay for it. What is one to do when they want something but don’t want to pay for it? Declare it a human right! People sick of paying for Internet access have petitioned the United Nations (UN) to declare Internet access a human right, which they happily did. Now when somebody wants Internet access but doesn’t want to pay for it they can just argue that they are owed Internet access by “society” because it’s a human right (positive rights theory is so convenient that way). Since OccupyGOP is already occupying a building there is no need to erect tents, although it would add to the movement if they fought endlessly for the right to erect tents on their property.

Next OccupyGOP needs to raise awareness. OccupyMN has been attempting to raise awareness by marching down major streets and obstructing traffic. Perhaps OccupyGOP can attempt something similar, but with a slight twist. Instead of marching down busy streets to annoy people OccupyGOP could march into polling places this November and attempt to prevent people from voting. This would raise awareness by annoying politically minded individuals who are trying to vote and it won’t require the passage of a constitutional amendment like the Republican Party’s current voter ID initiative does.

What about the police? Eventually the police are going to be called by the landlords to evict the occupation. OccupyGOP is in a better position than any other occupation since OccupyGOP actually has political connections. While screaming “WE’RE RESISTING ARREST!” several members of OccupyGOP could work with “representatives” at the capitol to pass legislation that will cut the pay of Minnesota police officers. This could lead to the police making a deal with OccupyGOP: in exchange for keeping their pay the police can refuse to evict OccupyGOP from the building they’re not paying rent on.

Overall it’s rather ironic that the Occupy movement, which has traditionally been considered a left-leaning movement, has more in common with the Minnesota Republican Party than the Minnesota Democratic Party.

Watching the European Union slowly crumble is an unfortunate but inevitable thing. First Greece’s economy collapses and now Italy is moving to join them. Italy has already cut spending a minor amount and that means entities previously receiving government money are pissed:

A museum in Italy has started burning its artworks in protest at budget cuts which it says have left cultural institutions out of pocket.

Antonio Manfredi, of the Casoria Contemporary Art Museum in Naples, set fire to the first painting on Tuesday.

“Our 1,000 artworks are headed for destruction anyway because of the government’s indifference,” he said.

The work was by French artist Severine Bourguignon, who was in favour of the protest and watched it online.

Mr Manfredi plans to burn three paintings a week from now on, in a protest he has dubbed “Art War”.

A scorched Earth policy never really accomplishes much. Honestly, these individuals are probably making the life of Italy’s future fascist state easier by burning much of the art before the state decrees it to be done. Either way I’m not sure how destroying art is going to make an argument that museums need more money, I would say it’s probably time to get any important works of art out of the museums before some asshole torches them (and without pieces of art nobody is going to go to a museum so they’ll receive even less money). On top of the hissy fits being thrown by those who used to receive government money Italy has also admitted it won’t be able to balance the budget by 2013:

It was previously predicting a 0.4% contraction in the economy, but has cut that to a 1.2% contraction.

The government has also admitted that it will not be able to meet its target of balancing the budget by 2013.

It now says that it will be able to balance the budget by 2015, which is still more optimistic than the IMF, which says Italy will not have a balanced budget until at least 2018.

The only ways to balance a budget are to spend less money of bring in more money. This means Italy will either have to take funds away from more entities or increase the amount of money they steal from the people in the form of taxation. No matter what route the Italian state choose people are going to be pissed. That’s the kicker about government programs, eventually the state runs out of peoples’ money to steal and reality must be faced. It’s far better for everybody involved when the state doesn’t get involved in anything. Another interesting story coming from Italy that could be a sign of dire times is the rise in Italy’s gold exports:

Italian exports of gold ingots to Switzerland have soared in recent months, data has shown.

Exports to Switzerland were 35.6% higher than in February 2011 “mainly because of sales of non-monetary raw gold”, statistics agency Istat said.

This could mean any number of things. One possible reason people are buying Italian gold is because they’re trying to liquidate their holdings of Italian bonds or currency. Since Italy uses the Euro it’s most likely the former. If the Italian state is looking to go into insolvency it’s best to rid yourself of any Italian state assets, like bonds, while they’re still worth something. With the collapse of the euro looking more likely it would be foolhardy to convert those soon to be worthless Italian bonds into soon to be worthless euros. Thus converting those soon to be worthless Italian bonds into gold, which has traditionally held its value, is a much better option.

Italy is looking to be the second Greece.

The Republican Party of Minnesota has been pushing two major initiatives: a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage and a constitutional amendment to require photo ID when voting. They are fighting hard for both of these initiatives while the most critical issues, namely the deficit and ever increasing oppressive nature of the government, are being entirely ignored. Needless to say they’re complete failures as far as small government and fiscal responsibility are concerned so I can’t help but laugh at this:

“We continue to be in a very precarious working capital position,” wrote Bron Scherer, the Secretary-Treasurer of the state party, in a March memo marked “Confidential, Do Not Forward.”

In the memo to the state party executive committee, Scherer noted that “we are not paying our office lease rent payment currently…and have not yet negotiated long-term payment schedules and/or negotiated settlements relating to most of the vendors on the accounts payable aging.”

Said one Minnesota Republican about a state with at least two House Republicans facing competitive re-elections: “I don’t know how the party is going to be at all capable of doing anything this cycle.”

A fate well deserved. I’m glad to see they don’t even have enough money to pay rent for their office, they have been doing nothing constructive and plenty that is destructive. They’ve made their bed and now they’re being forced to lay in it and they damn well deserve it. There could be some hope that the Minnesota Republican Party would do some internal changes in the hopes of getting in good with the people again but I doubt that will happen. Instead of appeasing the people of Minnesota the Republican Party will just find some way of blaming the Democrats for their current woes and appeal to the authoritarians with more neocon malarkey.

HAHAHAHAHAHA! My god this is just too much:

Picture nabbed from Facebook

If he’s the hero I don’t even want to meet the enemy. Actually if Bernanke is the hero then a successful free market must be the enemy, so perhaps I do want to meet the enemy. Saying Bernanke fixed the global economy is a perfect case of rewriting history, especially considering the global economy is still circling the toilet bowl.

Here in Hennepin County we’ve had a recent kerfuffle surround the security as suburban court houses. OK, the kerfuffle was stated by one judge who refused to hear any cases as suburban courtrooms because he didn’t feel they screened for weaponry enough. Instead of firing him the county eventually caved and spent major money on nothing:

“We don’t know that anybody will ever be injured in our courthouses, but we don’t want it to happen,” said Commissioner Jan Callison, who sponsored the resolution. “And we know that they are places that are high stress, with people under a lot of pressure. And people under pressure who have access to weapons do things they shouldn’t do.”

[...]

After considering closing the Southdale court in Edina — where it would cost about $900,000 to rebuild the entryway to accommodate a walk-through detector — the board decided to have visitors there screened with handheld devices for now.

A permanent solution for Southdale and the other two courts will have to await conclusions of a $150,000 study on court security that the board ordered Tuesday from the administration.

That report is due Nov. 1; in the meantime, a $77,000 security report commissioned from the National Center for State Courts will be finished this spring.

Emphasis mine. While nobody has actually been harmed in a Hennepin County courthouse they’re spending in excess of $1 million to boost security because of one whiny judge who was probably lazy and figured bitching about the lacking security at the suburban courthouses would get him out of working for a while.

But hark, a case proving the necessity of these additional security measures has appeared in Texas! Except, it hasn’t:

A man has opened fire outside a court in the US state of Texas, killing one person and injuring three, say police.

Again the emphasis is mine. Some people have been brining this case to my attention and claiming it as justification for spending money on additional security at the suburban courthouses here. Here’s the problem, the shooting at the Texas courthouse took play outside. Do you know what metal detectors and screening people entering the courtroom will do to secure the exterior of the building? Jack shit.

This case does bring up the fact that security the interior of the courthouse does nothing. If somebody means a prosecutor, judge, or other individual harm they will just wait for that person to exit the building. Once again the state is putting on security theater to solve a nonexistent problem.

I didn’t know this but it looks like the Federal Reserve has its own propaganda arm. The site includes games to indoctrinate children in kindergarden, publications full of economic falsehoods, and even lesson plans for teachers who want to get the kids believing in planned economies early.

I wonder how much funny money the Federal Reserve printed up to pay for this site? After digging through the site for a better part of an hour I can say that it contains no actual educational material. So far I haven’t found a single document explaining how the Federal Reserve’s printing of money causes inflation, which reduces the value of each person’s currently held dollars and therefore is nothing more than legalized theft. No document explains how the Federal Reserve has been bailing out European banks in secret. Hell, the name Ludwig von Mises and Murray Rothbard doesn’t appear on the site anywhere, without referencing their material you can’t even teach economics properly.

What really gets me is the fact this site was funded through ill gotten means. The Mises Institute, which actually provides economic education, is entirely funded through voluntary donations and transactions.

I’ve bitched and complained about taxes time and time again on this site. Outside of my criticisms of taxation being a form of theft I also bring up the practical problem with raising taxes, those who have money will eventually leave when their taxes get high enough. California, the state that taxes so hard it almost qualifies as rape, is learning this lesson:

State Controller John Chaing continues to uphold the California Great Seal Motto of “Eureka”, i.e., ‘I have found it’. But what Chaing is finding as Controller is that California’s economy as measured by tax revenues is still tanking. Compared to last year, State tax collections for February shriveled by $1.2 billion or 22%. The deterioration is more than double the shocking $535 million reported decline for last month. The cumulative fiscal year decline is $6.1 billion or down 11% versus this period in 2011.

[...]

California politicians seem delusional in their continued delusion that high taxes have not savaged the State’s economy. Each month’s disappointment is written off as due to some one-time event.

The State Controller’s office did acknowledge that higher than normal tax refunds for February might have reduced the collection of some personal income taxes. Given that 2012 has an extra day in February for leap year, there might have been one day more of tax refunds sent out. But the Controller’s report shows personal income tax collections fell by $325 million, or 16% versus last year. Furthermore, leap year would have added another day for retail sales and use tax collection, but those revenues also fell during February-by an even larger $813 million, 25% decline from 2011.

The more likely reason tax collections continue falling is that businesses and successful people are leaving California for the better tax rates available in more pro-business states.

The common cry of the collectivist movement is “Tax the rich!” As Bastiat warned us, some people are unable to see the unseen effects of state actions. What happens when you start taxing the “rich” more and more? Eventually they leave. The “rich” have money, a fact made evident by their status as being “rich”, and therefore can afford to move to a new state or country. When they leave they take their tax money with them, money that is sometimes used to fund programs that are supposed to help the downtrodden like food stamps, welfare, and worker’s compensation.

In the long run taxing the “rich” causes more harm to the “poor” than anybody else.

It’s a good thing the United States government bailout out General Motors otherwise we wouldn’t have the great Chevrolet Volt that nobody wants:

General Motors has temporarily suspended production of its Volt electric car, the company announced Friday.

GM, which is based in Detroit, announced to employees at one of its facilities that it was halting production of the beleaguered electric car for five weeks and temporarily laying off 1,300 employees.

A GM spokesman told The Hill on Friday that production of the Volt would resume April 23.

“We needed to maintain proper inventory and make sure that we continued to meet market demand,” GM spokesman Chris Lee said in a telephone interview.

Maintain property inventory is a friendlier way of saying that inventory isn’t reducing because nobody is buying our shitty electric cars. A basic economic lesson exists in this story, the state can’t simply make a market by dumping funding into a program it approves of. While the state keeps trying to create a market for electric cars nobody is willing to pay the Volt’s asking price, partially because most people aren’t setup to charge an electric car.

When people sign up for the United States military they’re promises many things including a pension and lifelong health benefits. What the state giveth, the state taketh away. Unlike private institutions, the state is able to violate any contractual agreements it’s made without consequence and I’m sure this is why active and retried military personnel are getting their health benefits reduced:

The Obama administration’s proposed defense budget calls for military families and retirees to pay sharply more for their healthcare, while leaving unionized civilian defense workers’ benefits untouched. The proposal is causing a major rift within the Pentagon, according to U.S. officials. Several congressional aides suggested the move is designed to increase the enrollment in Obamacare’s state-run insurance exchanges.

So the men and woman in this country’s military have just had their contractual agreement voided as far as I’m concerned and that means they should be allowed to leave the service immediately without paying the early termination fee. Since the state maintains a monopoly on the court system though it is unlikely any military personnel will be able to sue for breech of contract.

Another interesting thing about this is that the health benefits of military personnel are being reduced while said benefits aren’t being touched for unionized government employees. Interesting. It’s almost as if Obama is punishing military personnel for their large support of Ron Paul’s campaign while keeping the unions happy as they’ve been playing ball with the current president. That may just be me being a cynical asshole though.

I’m not sure Bill Gates realizes the sheer amount of idiocy he just spouted:

Bill Gates told an audience of energy entrepreneurs, scientists and investors at the ARPA-E energy conference on Tuesday that “It’s crazy how little we’re funding energy.” Energy research is underfunded by a factor of two, Gates said, referring to the amount of current U.S. government investment in energy research.

If only there was a source these energy companies could get funding from. What we really need is a multi-billionaire who is also an advocate of investing in energy companies. I wonder where we could find such a person?

Gates has expressed similar sentiments before. He is part of the American Energy Innovation Council, which about two years ago called for a government investment of $16 billion per year into basic research to deliver energy innovation. Since that foundation launched, he has said that he has been stunned that the government hasn’t been able to rise to the occasion.

$16 billion? It’s too bad we don’t know somebody who had an insane sum of money, say $59 billion, that could be invested into this market.