Just a quick reminder for those of you who can vote here (i.e. if you’re an American and a resident of Utah)—the last day to register is Tomorrow, Tuesday the 29th of January. To vote for Ron Paul in the February 5th primary, you will need to register as a Republican.

Note: You will have to go to the county office in person to register, due to the lateness of the hour. No mail-in registrations will be accepted (as of a month ago).

That’s all folks! God bless America, and may we turn this good ol’ ship around!

B. J. Lawson is running for congress in North Carolina as a Ron Paul Republican. He needs $300k by the end of this month to make a good showing.

I’m going to begin donating to each of these constitution-abiding candidates throughout the Republic. Even a Utahn can help that way!

Harold Bloom recently warned that “what we are seeing is the fall of America.” While such a statement is dire, Bloom himself is quite insightful and witty. I was captivated by his intelligence and what amounts to 70 years of critical thinking. In particular, he mentioned in passing that America is “a third oligarchy, a third plutocracy and a third theocracy”. I wondered, if that’s so, where would the presidential candidates line up? Here is my attempt at understanding them from this perspective:

Clinton, if elected, would obviously be a part of a 20-year oligarchical reign in America. She’s connected like no other. McCain is Bush’s heir apparent and, if the economy and things in Iraq weren’t such a mess, he would probably have already been declared the Republican nominee. Thompson, Romney and Giuliani are connected to the powerful Council on Foreign Relations—Giuliani is especially connected to elite power circles and thrives on loyalty and favors. Huckabee is the obvious theocrat in the bunch, although I think Romney also leans that way. The little guys, Paul and Kucinich, are the only remaining candidates who don’t fit in the “thirds”. As labeled above, I am unsure of the placement of Obama and Edwards.

Any thoughts?

Note: if you’re unfamiliar with the terms, here is a short primer with links to Wikipedia:

Oligarchy is a form of government where political power effectively rests with a small elite segment of society (whether distinguished by wealth, family or military powers).

Plutocracy refers to the rule or power through wealth or by the wealthy.

Theocracy is a form of government in which a God or a deity is recognized as the supreme civil ruler.

I found the following Roosevelt quote while rummaging through some of my old files. It humbled me to think of how little I actually do… so many others are active and unsung heros in the cause of freedom. Like Murray Sabrin, for example, from New Jersey who is a “Ron Paul Republican” running for senate. I wonder what would happen if all of the Ron Paul revolutionaries started backing heros like this on a state-by-state basis. I think of Professor Sabrin and Dr. Paul as “in the arena”:

It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.

Theodore Roosevelt, “Citizenship in a Republic,”
Speech at the Sorbonne, Paris, April 23, 1910

I was walking home from school this morning and happened across today’s newspaper headline: “US Begins Airstrikes Against Sunni Militants”. And I felt angry. I thought, “Why do we have to propagandize this war by characterizing these particular Sunnis as militant, all while we are the ones who have begun attacking from the air?” I started to re-characterize the headline as I continued my walk:

“Christian Militants Begin Airstrike on Muslim Homeland”, or “American Emperialists Seek to Crush Muslim Resistance in Iraq”…

Once I touched on the “American” adjective in my musings, I started to think about our history as a nation. Two-hundred years ago, there was another empire that sought to expand its borders and protect its interests through force: the British. I wonder what their headlines would have sounded like?

“American Terrorists Sabotage British Trade Routes”, or maybe “British Warships Squelch Rebel Uprising in American Colonies”

With such a noble history of throwing off the chains of our oppressors, why can’t we see from the eyes of Iraqis? If we could do that, we would see right through the propaganda we are fed in the news.

So it didn’t go as hoped—Ron Paul came in fifth place (although there is some speculation that there were some electronic voting shenanigans that could have been in play, as well as some obvious miscounts that did not favor Dr. Paul). The big upset is on the Democratic side—that Hillary came from a 10 point loss to a 3 point lead. What happened?

I wonder if independents in NH had lost so much confidence in the Republican candidates that they went to the Democrat side and voted for pro-war Hillary. (Obama is moderately pro-war, although he seems to be a little more reluctant than Hillary). The Republican party really is in shambles. Even political reporter Josh Marshall doesn’t know what to make of it.

Update: I’m starting to really wonder if there was some vote fraud going on after all. If you would like a recount (as I would), there is a recount chipin project we can donate to (sponsored by the unstoppable Granny Warriors):

About a year ago, I wrote about election fraud in Ohio and how easy it is to hack into electronic voting machines.

Last week, Democracy Now did an interview with Harvey Wasserman who has been actively working with civil liberties groups to restore accurate vote counting in Ohio. It was very interesting to note how he had been laughed at before for suggesting this could and is happening in America, but it seems with several recent annoucements, he is being vindicated.

For example, the Ohio Secretary of State recently published a report admitting that the vote counts on these machines could “easily” be flipped. The 6% of the vote in Ohio that elected Bush over Kerry was fraudulent, as far as I can tell.

I’m so grateful that so many patriots are standing up all over the country to restore honesty and pride to our system of government. Whether inside or outside of the Ron Paul campaign, there is a revolutionary movement calling for a redress of grievances and a change in the status quo. God bless America!

Colorado is banning most of the electronic voting machines in its state, bringing the number of states that have properly audited these machines—and found them severely lacking in security and other measures that would protect against vote fraud—to 4.

Two conclusions caught my attention:

1. One of the ES&S machines could be permanently disabled using a simple MAGNET.

2. A Hart Intercivic machine was decertified “because test results showed that they could not accurately count ballots”.

WOW! And we thought we could trust technology to fix our woes. It turns out that hand counting is not only more accurate in this case, but it is also guaranteed to retain a paper trail which all of the machines fail to do.

We’re one step closer to ensuring that “he who casts the vote” decides the election, and not “he who counts the vote.” Thanks Colorado Secretary of State Mike Coffman!

Democratic presidential candidate and Senator, Chris Dodd, is currently speaking in the Senate. And speaking, and speaking. And speaking. The reason is that he is filibustering a bill that would give retroactive immunity to telecommunication companies that engaged in warrantless wiretapping against US citizens.

Harry Reid, the LDS senator who should know so much better than to trample the constitution under foot, is primarily responsible for forcing the filibuster.

Read more at The Seminal or watch Sen. Dodd live at c-span 2.

You can support Chris Dodd right now by calling your senator through this link. I just called Senator Hatch, a man who, unfortunately, seems to support corporations more often than he upholds the constitution.

Update: I just received an email from Democracy for America (a progressive organization):

You did it! Minutes ago, Senator Reid pulled the FISA bill from the Senate floor.

Since Friday at noon, you made 2,443 reported calls to Senator Reid demanding he stop this bill. All weekend internet blogs, like Firedoglake and DailyKos, kept it in the news cycle. From the ACLU to the Courage Campaign, progressives took action. And today, Senator Dodd threatened to filibuster. Together, we won.

Update 2: Here’s a great article, “Another Milestone on the Road to Serfdom”, on why it’s so important to not go down this slippery-slope of government-corporation collaboration.

Tomorrow is Sunday, December 16th, the anniversary of the Boston Tea Party in 1773. The revolution that began with a protest against the intolerable British tax is continuing in full force, this time with the campaign of Congressman Ron Paul who promises to stop using our tax dollars to fund foreign wars of aggression, and even to repeal the income tax with the help of congress.

Join the 32,000 other individuals who have pledged to donate $100 tomorrow and let’s make another historical splash!

One drop at a time, the dam will burst!