Your Doctor Is Going To Kill You- by James Altucher

"Do you ever have one of those dreams where you are farting really loudly but you are thinking, “well, at least I’m not crapping in my pants” but then you realize it’s not a dream and you actually are farting in real life in bed and then you hear, to your horror, your spouse move even further to the other side of the bed?

Because it’s this very thing that makes me afraid of the dark. When the lights are out and I’m about to go to sleep. The day has died and there is nothing left to squeeze from it.

There”s just that fear.

Will I wake up farting.

If your spouse loves you she’ll think it’s “cute”. Or at least that’s what she will say. And then she will try really hard to forget it. I hope that’s true. I hope she thinks I’m cute.

Phew. Don’t worry. Here’s a worse fear. Don’t read further if you don’t want the truth.

Your doctor is going to kill you.

When you’re sick people say all the time, “oh, no problem, just go to the doctor”. Those “friends” who say that want you to die.

Here’s the sick truth. The truth about sickness. 

- Alcohol Abuse. In a study done on the American College of Surgeons, 15% of male surgeons and 25% of female surgeons suffered from alcohol abuse and dependence. And a significant portion reported having errors during surgery in the prior three months because of this dependence.

I was at a dinner once and part of the topics being discussed in dinner was my opposition to sending kids to school. Someone who worked for Mayor Bloomberg asked me, “would you ever want to be operated on by someone who didn’t go to medical school” .

My answer is “yes”. If you want to be safe, it turns out, be operated on by someone who is male, who has children, and who specializes in operating on veterans. For some reason, these are the people least likely to be drunk while operating on you. I don’t know why.

- Malpractice. Johns Hopkins has done a bunch of studies on this. 98,000 people a year die from mistakes doctors make. Either a mistake in surgery or a mistake in a prescription or some other weird mistake. One study showed that if you randomly pull 100 medical charts, 40 will contain evidence of doctor errors.

- Fake medical degrees. At least 5000 doctors operating in the United States today have fake medical degrees. Don’t believe me? Google “buy a fake medical degree” and you can be operating within a matter of weeks in your basement.

And it makes perfect sense. Some “medical schools” located offshore have “virtual simulators”. You can practice surgery while sitting in your bathroom with your laptop!

- Doctors hate you and they hate their lives.

On average, one doctor a day kills himself. Despite what you hear about lawyers, doctors actually have the highest suicide rate according to the Journal of the American Medical Association.

It’s even worse among female doctors. You think they like looking at you with your clothes off? You’re disgusting.

The suicide rate among female doctors is 2.3x the national average. When they cut open that body and see what we’re really made of they think: “this is just hopeless”.

- Doctors are obese. There’s nothing wrong with being obese. But it will kill you. And doctors know that.

Obesity causes everything from diabetes to heart attacks to strokes and is linked to early onset of Alzheimer’s. And yet, doctors have a death wish. 53% of doctors, despite knowing all of this, are obese. And you put yourself in their care.

Why should it matter if doctors are obese? In a sample of patients who are overweight, only 7% of the overweight doctors would diagnose their patients as overweight. As opposed to over 90% of the doctors who were not overweight.

- If you get sick right now, you’re screwed. In medical circles (trust me, I’m a doctor) it’s known as the “July Effect”.

Doctors go on vacation in July. So interns become residents and residents pretend to be the real doctors. Deaths from surgery and malpractice skyrocket in July. I hope you don’t get sick this month.

- Bad handwriting. You know how the doctor prescribes this weird thing to you and you think, “how can anyone read that” but for some reason you trust that your pharmacist has this supernatural power to read doctor’s handwriting? Well… he doesn’t.

Over 7000 deaths a year occur because the pharmacist couldn’t decipher the prescription and gave you an overdose of some weird chemotherapy pill instead of viagra.

Claudia asked me the other day if she thought I would die before her. I know the answer already. The answer is “no”. Because I never go to the doctor. She goes to various doctors throughout the year. So I’ve just eliminated the leading cause of death.

Now I’m going to get a fake medical degree. Because the next time someone asks me what I do for a living I’m going to tell them the simple truth:

“I save lives”. " 
By James Altucher on July 9, 2013

Reprinted with permission from The Altucher Confidental

"Turn On, Tune In, Drop Out"- by Paul Rosenberg

[ onbornfree/ and Freedom Network  commentary: another great article from Mr Rosenberg, plenty of good and inspiring advice here, I believe. If you would like to discuss with me any of the points/issues he raises here  with me, let me know. We could either "Skype" or talk face to face somewhere convenient- regards, onebornfree.]



"This was a big phrase in the 1960s, as young people turned away from the corporate conformity of the 1950s and decided that they wanted more out of life than being an adequately-fed cog in a big machine.

Let’s be honest and admit that the modern corporate script involves selling your own wishes and dreams for paychecks. I know that a lot of us have played along with it because of necessity, but this is not a way of life to cling to, it’s a way of life to escape.

You are meant to live your life. Yes, I know it can seem hard, but it’s the only life that’s really worth living. You have to give meaning to your life, and you’ll never get it by following the televised script and hoping for pats on the back from the people who are playing along with you.

This life you have is precious. Human beings are engines of creation; we are able to imagine and to turn our imaginations into reality. And we are capable of supercharging our creative abilities by sharing our lives and loves with other people. We are astonishingly capable creatures.

Don’t waste all your life’s abilities in a corporate cubicle. You’ve already seen how that goes: Work excessive hours, go home tired, watch TV, sleep, and start over. Your kids end up in mini corporate worlds called “schools,” where they are taught to sit, be quiet, obey, and turn off their internal desires and loves. If you play that game you’ll miss most of your life in the process, as well as most of your children’s lives.

Once you get some corporate inertia going, it is all too easy to get sucked into it permanently. Don’t let that happen to you.

So, here’s my modern (and slightly adjusted) interpretation – Tune In, Turn On, Drop Out:

Tune In

Wake up and see the world as it is. Turn off the talking heads on TV and get to know the real world. Stop spending all your brain cycles on celebrities, sports heroes and gossip hounds – get to know your neighbor and the old woman who lives around the corner, strike up a friendship with someone on the other side of the world. Travel. Spend your time with real people; get to know them, and reveal yourself to them. It only seems weird because the people who programmed you didn’t want you to think freely.

Do you think I am being dramatic by referring to “the people who programmed you”? If so, read this:

Education should aim at destroying free will so that after pupils are thus schooled they will be incapable throughout the rest of their lives of thinking or acting otherwise than as their school masters would have wished.

That was from the highly esteemed Bertrand Russel, by the way, and I’ve got plenty more of them. Take this seriously, because your programmers have been.

Tune in to yourself rather than your programming: What do you really want? Most people can list a dozen things that bother them, but not a single thing that they really want. This is a problem. Find out what you want. What do you love? What do you want to work for?

Do you remember all those times in the Bible where Jesus berates people for being “hypocrites”? Well, the real word he used was actors – as in stage actors. And whether you are religious or not, this is crucial: Stop acting in someone else’s play. Take off all the masks and find yourself.

Turn On

Start doing what you love. Don’t wait for someone else, do it yourself. Start helping your friends and neighbors, spend serious time with your children – not at a game or a party, but just you and them, talking. Find out what they love. Tell them what you love, what you are proud of, what you regret. Tell them you love them. Tell them things you don’t tell your friends. Let them know you.

Start living, not merely existing. DO the things you feel an urge to do. And don’t fall into the usual trap of “what if I make a mistake?” That’s simply fear-based conditioning. Resist it. Do what you love, and in so doing, you will turn yourself on.

Are you going to go through your whole life and never follow your own wishes, always sacrificing them to the tyranny of other peoples’ opinions? Please don’t do that to yourself – you’ll suffer greatly for it when you’re old.

Screw all the expectations and turn on – act on your own will.

Drop Out

Stop wasting your time and energy on governments and arguments and politics. Drop out of their mindset and start reclaiming all those wasted hours. Lying politicians are simply not worth your devotion. Drop the endless party fights and stop arguing about them. Politics is ugly, and politics on the brain makes us ugly.

Stop paying attention to the hundreds of ads you see every day – they are scientifically designed to grab your thoughts. Turn away. Stop buying trendy things, and definitely stop buying things for the purpose of impressing other people.

Stop trying to fit in, and stop living according to other people’s expectations. Let them call you weird. Let them talk about you. Stop caring about it. If they were real friends, they wouldn’t treat you like that. So if they are willing to call you names, you’re better off dropping them now.

Don’t fight the system – that just keeps all of your energy and attention focused on them. Forsake the system and start creating a better life for yourself, the people you love and the people you respect. Stop giving all your life’s energy to a barbaric system of force and manipulation.

Let the system go; all of it. Move on and let it rot where it sits.

But We Need A Plan!

No, you don’t. You need a life!

Let go of the plan addiction. Life is organic, not mechanical.

First of all, you need to identify what you want to create with the precious life you’ve been given. Not what you want to stop, but what you want to make.

If you’ve never been told to do this before it may seem hard, but you can do it if you try.

Don’t sit and wait. Stop talking and start doing.

ACT!  NOW!"

Paul Rosenberg
www.FreemansPerspective.com

The Top 5 Reasons I Stopped Caring About Politics + "The Story of Your Enslavement"

[Obf and Freedom Network commentary: Another great article by Mr Paul Rosenberg entitled "The Top 5 Reasons I Stopped Caring About Politics" plus a related video presentation by Stefan Molyneux titled "The Story of Your Enslavement". The Rosenberg piece pretty much sums up my own current beliefs, while the Molyneux video hammers Mr Rosenbergs 5 nails "home". If you find yourself agreeing with most, or possibly all of these two presentations and yet you do not know what to do next, lets talk! - maybe I can help. Regards onebornfree. P.S. It's July 4th, so: Happy Surveillance Day! ]


"When I was young, I felt a need to understand politics, and I spent time studying. But as time progressed, I received diminishing returns on that investment. And in the past few years, I have given it up altogether.

These days, my concern with politics is limited to things like these:
• Who is making war, and where?
• Where is the crime occurring in my area?
• Are there laws that will force me to move my businesses offshore?

Beyond that, I’m really not interested. I see the headlines, but I seldom read the stories. And I’m very happy saying, “I haven’t looked into it,” when people ask my opinion on the day’s ‘news.’

Here’s why:

#5: It eats up a horrifying amount of time and energy:

Seriously, start counting the number of hours you spend on this stuff. How many hours listening to political radio, watching political TV, and reading political newspapers?

Then start thinking about the intense energy you spend on it. We all have limited reserves of energy; do you really believe that politics is the highest and best use for yours? What about using your energy to build your business? Or to nurture your children? Or to help a neighbor? There must be a dozen things that are more important than obsessing over the votes of congressmen or Supreme Court judges.

Direct Youtube link

#4: It’s an addiction:

If imagining yourself dumping politics makes you feel bad, you probably should dump it.

Try it: Imagine your life, devoid of all politics. How does it make you feel? Empty? Forsaken?

The truth is that millions of us are addicted to politics. People can’t pull themselves away from it – it’s the script that runs in the back of their minds 24/7.

The political addiction is so bad that even strongly religious people spend more time on politics than they do on God. Politics is the obsession of the age.

#3: It doesn’t change anything:

There was a popular bumper sticker in the 60s that read: If voting changed anything, they’d make it illegal.

Let’s be honest and admit that the bumper sticker was true. Even the best examples – such as Reagan on the right or Obama on the left – have failed to change much. Government is bigger than ever, the US government is involved in more wars than ever, and the Constitution is being trashed in more ways than ever before. This is progress?

And what of the vaunted elections that they always promote? Personally, I think Alvin Toffler was right when he called them “reassurance rituals.” But, that aside, it is certain that elections are  tightly controlled. In the US, two parties firmly control who gets on a ballot and who doesn’t. Everything is scripted; everything requires approval of the party. (The situation is slightly less bad in Europe.)

And please understand that ‘the government’ is far more than 600 faces in DC – it is millions of people in thousands of offices, all pulling together to get more of your money and to spend it upon themselves and their departments.

But even while politics doesn’t actually change much, it does keep everyone locked inside the system and servicing it. To illustrate, here’s a quote I never could forget, and that I hope you’ll never forget either:

Let them march all they want, so long as they continue to pay their taxes.

– Alexander Haig, 1982

So long as everyone obeys the government, why should it care about their complaints? Americans are nearly 100% obedient, so why should the government bother changing anything at all? There is no need.

Politics doesn’t change anything, because its actual goal is to keep  the populace reassured and compliant. And in this it has succeeded  brilliantly.

#2: In the end, it’s about violence:

Here’s a passage from my novel, A Lodging of Wayfaring Men, that expressed this idea:

Coercion is the sine qua non of politics; the thing, without which, politics would not be politics. Indeed, if you remove coercion, politics becomes something else – economics.

Politics cannot exist without force. In the end, it rests on violence. No matter how much they color everything red, white, and blue, violence or the threat of violence underpins it all. As Jim Rogers once wrote, “Somewhere in every process of taxation, a pistol is involved.”

Politics – government – is based upon a single transaction: Taking  money from people against their will. Everything else they do falls  apart without that.

You may think me rude for pointing this out, or you may come up with justifications for it, but the statement stands: Governments take money that they didn’t earn, by one type of coercion or another. If not, taxation would be voluntary and government would be just another business.

I don’t like dealing with violent enterprises.

#1: Politics is a relic of a barbaric past:

Being that I study the ancient past, I can trace men ruling over men back to about 6400 BC. I can trace a government that resembles ours back to about 5000 BC.

So, what else from two thousand years before the Pyramids still rules the lives of men?

If there is any example on Earth of humans failing to evolve, this has to be it.

Men no longer pull plows. They no longer start fires with flint. Nor  do they pull sleds or wooden-wheeled carts or rely upon animals for power. We have learned to write, to invent, to navigate, to cover immense distances, to drive, to fly, to reach into the heavens…

And yet this one relic of a primitive past remains. And please don’t  tell me that it remains because it is good – people complain about government more than they complain about cancer.

To illustrate government’s barbaric nature, consider this: Thousands of people like me would like to experiment with different ways of living, but we are forbidden. No one is permitted to leave the game. If you try, large armed men will assault you and lock you in a cage, or perhaps they will merely steal your money from the bank you entrusted it to. But in either case, government sycophants will solemnly inform the world that you are an evil-doer.

No exit is permitted and all escape attempts are met with violence. How is this not primitive barbarity?

IT’S YOUR CHOICE:

So, there you have it. You’re big boys and girls and you can make your own decisions, but I have to tell you: I am ever so happy with  mine. I am less stressed, more productive, and a clearer thinker.

Every so often, a friend asks me to examine a political issue. And,  nearly always, I politely decline; it makes me feel the same as when my mother wanted me to eat liver."

Paul Rosenberg

FreemansPerspective.com

Porcfest! American Revolution 2.0 begins in New Hampshire

[Onebornfree/Freedom Network commentary: Porcfest 2013- this sounds like a fun place to be- men in skirts with rifles, women with rifles {see pic. below} , mushroom aficionados- you name it- I'm sorry I could not make it- maybe next year?- Regards, onebornfree.]

by Kevin Barrett, reporting from the 10th annual Porcupine Freedom Festival in Lancaster, New Hampshire: 

"What do you get if you mix marijuana mavens, gun-lovers, unschoolers, computer hackers, bitcoin evangelists, survivalists, tax heretics, cop-blockers, cop-watchers, civil disobedience practitioners, gray- and black-market entrepreneurs, anarcho-activists, nullification enthusiasts, freedom theorists, sovereignty rebels, love-our-freedom Muslims, truth terrorists,de facto defectors, and other self-described enemies of the state?

The answer: Porcfest – as in porcupines, not pigmeat. Porcfest, a.k.a. the Porcupine Freedom Festival, showcases the Free State Project, which asks freedom-lovers to move to New Hampshire. Their goal: Make the “live free or die” state live up to its motto. If New Hampshire becomes a haven of liberty, these folks believe, it will not only be a really fun place, but it might even spearhead American Revolution 2.0. and help save America, and the world, from the forces of tyranny.

In ten years, the Free State Project has convinced more than a thousand liberty-lovers to move to New Hampshire. Their goal is 20,000 – which they calculate would be enough to radically change how business and government are conducted statewide. While they haven’t liberated the whole state yet, I can testify that the Free Staters have set up a wildly successful week-long Temporary Autonomous Zone here in the White Mountains of Northern New Hampshire.

The sweet smell of weed hangs over this place, rivaling the pungent woodsmoke from campfires and spicy meatsmoke from barbecues. All kinds of people are packing serious heat – not just holstered pistols, but also semi-(?)-automatic rifles slung casually over a great many backs. (That may be one reason visible law enforcement has chosen to stay away.) Some of the gun-toting guys look like hippies; a few even wear skirts. Others are skinheads in camouflage.

If you want magic mushrooms, you won’t have to wander around any cow pastures to find them. Unlicensed bars and lounges, some in plushly-furnished tents right out of the Arabian Nights, will serve you up just about anything you might desire, from absinthe to homebrew, from top-shelf wine and liquor to Miller Lite. (Since I’m a love-our-freedom Muslim, I prefer the equally luxurious gourmet tea-house next door.)

If the fear-mongering media stereotypes were true, PorcFest would be a terrifying place. During this week-long wild-and-crazy party, the official laws governing drugs, sex, firearms, currency, taxation, licensing and regulation are effectively null and void. All of us here at Rogers Campground are at the mercy of our fellow freedom-loving citizens. The state apparatus that normally “protects us” from each other is conspicuous by its absence. And yet somehow I feel safer here, among the pot-smoking survivalists with AK-47s slung over their backs, than I did at the normal campgrounds I stayed at while driving here from Wisconsin, where cops and park rangers are on duty to make sure you and your fellow campers follow all the laws…and if you don’t, they’ll kidnap you and put you in a cage.

It makes you wonder: Do we really need all those uniformed guys with badges threatening to kidnap and cage us, and beat the hell out of us or even shoot us if we resist? To borrow a phrase from police-beating victim Rodney King: Can’t we all just get along…without them?

Here at PorcFest, the answer is: Yes we can.

Several heroes of the resist-the-police-state movement are here: Jacob Crawford of Cop Watch, Pete Eyre and Ademo Freeman of Cop Block, and Antonio Buehler of the Peaceful Streets Project. All of these guys have come to the same conclusion: Since the police state is watching us, we’d better watch them right back. One way to do that: Film the cops whenever you can.

But cops don’t like being filmed. It’s almost like they have something to hide.

So when you film the cops, you risk arrest.

All of these guys – Jacob, Pete, Ademo, and Antonio – have been repeatedly arrested for filming cops. But they just keep doing it. Often, the cops will notice they’re being filmed, and decide not to carry out an arrest. Other times, the film will help the arrestee avoid jail. (Cops are trained to spin the facts and lie under oath, so having video of what actually went down can be useful to defendants, and embarrassing to cops…which is one big reason the cops hate being filmed.)

That willingness to tell the state “screw you, I’m going to stand up for liberty and take the consequences” also characterizes the civil disobedience panelists: Ademo, Ian, and Derrick Freeman, Lauren Canario, and Jim Johnson. They advocate Gandhi-style non-cooperation with the state at every level: don’t pay taxes, don’t get licensed-approved- and-regulated, don’t do what police and bureaucrats tell you, push it as far as you can (or as far as you dare), and when they kidnap-and-cage you, consider your stay in the Cheshire County Spiritual Retreat as a soul-building experience.

The panelists pointed out that when you’re resisting in a way that’s going to get you kidnapped-and-caged, it’s smart to do it in a place where the local jail is run by human beings, not sociopathic assholes. Fortunately for the free-staters in the Keene, N.H. area, the local boys-in-blue are mostly members of Law Enforcement Against Marijuana Prohibition, so a certain mutual respect prevails between the enemies-of-the-state and the thin blue line. Unfortunately, the same is not true in Manchester, where people are mistreated and (rumor has it) even occasionally “suicided.”

The freedom-fight in cyberspace

As the cop-watchers, cop-blockers, and civil-disobeyers fight for freedom on the ground in their local communities, other activists are doing the same thing in cyberspace. And the biggest freedom-fight in cyberspace right now is over Bitcoin, the leading crypto-currency.

What is crypto-currency? The short answer: Currency that gives its users privacy and anonymity in on-line transactions, in the same way that cash gives its users privacy and anonymity in real-world transactions.

If you use checks, bank cards, credit cards, pay-pal or other non-crypto-currencies, all of your transactions are being traced in real time by Big Brother. The Orwellian state can easily profile you, surveil you, and ultimately control you, based on the state’s knowledge of your recorded economic transactions.

And it isn’t just the state. Marketers can use knowledge of your activities, including economic activities, to figure out how to push your buttons and make you buy their stuff, based on surmises about the unconscious factors that drive your choices in life. In other words, they can profile you, attach puppet strings to your unconscious mind, make you dance to their tune, and steal your money.

The government (like the big corporations that own it) doesn’t like Bitcoin and other crypto-currencies for the same reason it doesn’t like cash: Big Brother wants to know every detail about every penny that passes through your hands. The most obvious reason, of course, is taxation.

The government wants to know about every penny you spend so it can extract a sales tax. And it wants to know about every penny you earn so it can extract an income tax.

A fringe benefit of knowing every last detail of your economic activity, from the government’s perspective, is that it can use that same information to profile, surveil, and control you. If you seem to have a little bit more money than you should, you’re probably growing a couple of marijuana plants in your closet: Time to kick in your door, shoot your dog, terrorize your kids, beat the shit out of you, and put you in a cage.

If you use crypto-currency carefully, the government and the corporations that own it will not know about your economic transactions. When tax time rolls around, you can actually do the “voluntary compliance” the IRS requires. What I mean by that is that your compliance with the tax laws will actually be voluntary, as it is officially supposed to be.

Needless to say, most of the end-the-state folks here at PorcFest will “voluntarily comply” with taxation as little as possible. They believe that taxation is theft, and that its main product is not roads, bridges, education, and security, but violence and injustice.

I used to think such people were crazy. But 9/11 and the so-called war on terror woke me up. It now seems fairly obvious to me that the government is just as evil as the wildest-eyed Rothbardian anarchist says it is.

Maybe even more evil.

Another huge advantage of Bitcoin crypto-currency is that it is a commodity currency, not a fiat currency. Bitcoins are based on a type of mathematical object that exists in limited numbers. Half of all bitcoins have already been “mined” (discovered). Unlike US Federal Reserve Notes and most other official currencies, bitcoins cannot be printed in unlimited numbers. For that reason, they are likely to hold their value, or rise in value, while official fiat currencies perpetually lose value as governments print more and more of them.

No wonder so many PorcFest participants have phased US dollars out of their lives, and are using Bitcoin and commodity currency (mostly gold and silver) for all of their market-exchange transactions.

Could the crypto-currency revolution bring down the government? That is what many here hope. Their forecast: Because crypto-currencies offer privacy and stable value, all rational economic actors will gradually move out of fiat currencies into crypto-currencies. The dollar, and all other fiat currencies, will collapse. Governments will no longer be able to print currency or tax their subjects. Bankrupt, they will wither away, replaced by mechanisms of voluntary association, beginning with the free market.

In preparation for that day, the Freedom Movement is big on agorism: Entrepreneurship in gray or black markets. Agorism basically just means starting a business – except you do it in such a way as to minimize or eliminate taxation and regulation. If possible, your agorist business will also help spread the word about the movement.

A PorcFest event called The Agorist Pitch offered prizes worth thousands of dollars to those with the best business ideas. The winner: Davi Barker’s plan for crowd-funded follow-ups to the Milgram and Stanford Prison experiments on obedience to authority. Runners-up included an educational game and a chicken farm.

Unlike the 1960s hippies who camped out and partied at places like Woodstock and Altamont, the folks here at PorcFest are not using “freedom” as a vague and mystical slogan. Their intellectual heroes – people like Murray Rothbard, Ludwig von Mises, and of course the overrated Ayn Rand – offer a rigorously analytical libertarian philosophy and economics. Personally, I’m not convinced that these ideas always have straightforward and unambiguous real-world applications; like PorcFest speaker David Friedman, the son of famed Chicago School economist Milton Friedman, I think we need historical observation and empirical reality-testing to complement and sometimes contradict all of the wonderful libertarian theories.

But if the anarchists finally won their argument with the Marxists, as I think history shows they did, it was for a reason. The anarchist critique of government is correct.

If the government isn’t around to tell us what to do – or if we just ignore it – what will stop us from doing terrible, evil things?

The dominant school of thought here at PorcFest holds that humans are rational animals who will find ways to maximize mutual benefit through free interaction. People will find ways to pool their money to build roads and schools, defend their communities, and enforce justice, without something called the “sovereign state” threatening to cage or kill them if they don’t.

Others, including myself, believe that people need divine guidance to fully achieve their highest goals, aspirations, and potential. Like Will Coley of Muslims for Liberty, and Davi Barker the Muslim Agorist, I draw on divine revelation as the source of real freedom.

If you submit absolutely to God – not to anyone or anything else – you are truly free.

And if you care only about God’s opinion of you, and care nothing for what anyone else thinks, you have achieved real inner freedom.

Even David Friedman, a brilliant Jewish scholar who is neither deeply religious nor a hard-core anarchist, finds Islamic “law” – a deeply pluralistic set of guidelines that needs no state and is not meant to be coercively enforced – to be one of the most promising alternative models for libertarians.

Are David Friedman, Davi Barker, Will Coley and I “trying to bring shariah to America” ?

I plead guilty.

I’m a truth terrorist.

I’m an “Islamic radical.”

Because I love our freedoms.

And I’m tired of seeing them taken away.

Hope to see you next year at the 11th annual Porcupine Freedom Festival, insha’allah!"

Article source

Government Against the People: It Gets Worse In the Late Stages

[Onebornfree and Freedom Network commentary: this thoughtful article from Mr Paul Rosenberg starts out with a simple truth: 
"All governments –communist, capitalist, fascist, monarchy, theocracy, whatever – survive on the skim. They take money from productive people, by force or threat of force. However prettied-up or justified this fact may be, it remains the central fact of rulership",  and goes on from there to tell us all why your government is doing what it is doing." {i.e. because it must, that's its nature}. 

The article really is getting into the fundamental nature of all governments, everywhere. Essentially, it is nothing but "a gang of thieves writ large" , as Murray Rothbard famously quipped.  I myself  have previously briefly covered this very subject here, and also here.   

Personally, I believe that for the freedom-seeking individual, probably the single most important concept that they could grasp is an understanding of the true nature of the state; of ALL states/governments everywhere, regardless of their stated goals, {which are all either deliberate lies, or  at best, the voiced self-delusions of totally naive individuals. }

 Our Choice: Adapt or Die !: the article ends with : "We can also adapt to avoid most of the consequences. We may not like it that we have to adapt repetitively, but history doesn’t give us many options – late stage mega-institutions will behave like late-stage mega-institutions. And in the short term, the “Government against the People” philosophy is not going to disappear. In fact, it’s likely to get much worse. Our choice is to get out of the way, or not." 

I agree with Mr Rosenberg, each of us has a choice, to either " get out of the way, or not". As a Problem Solver/Personal Freedom Consultant I can possibly help _you_ to adapt and to "get out of the way", it's your choice :-) Regards, onebornfree.

"All governments – communist, capitalist, fascist, monarchy, theocracy, whatever – survive on the skim. They take money from productive people, by force or threat of force. However prettied-up or justified this fact may be, it remains the central fact of rulership.

It’s a simple but disturbing truth: A late-stage state’s modus operandi must always be “government against the people” – an MO that is inherently predatory. And it’s not because the participants are all sociopaths (though many are).

At most times, governments try very hard to skim quietly, as with payroll taxes, where the producer’s money is taken away before he or she ever holds it in their hands. That’s also why tariffs were a traditional tax – the average person never saw it, and didn’t feel violated.

But when governments are massively over-extended, they lose the luxury of the quiet skim and become more aggressive. This is simply what happens in long-established, monopolistic institutions, like governments. They spend wildly to make themselves look good, then find they need more money. Not willing to cut their spending, they have two choices:

1. Debasement of the currency, which they always do first. But this trick never works for very long, since people do engage their minds when conducting commerce and adjust their prices to counteract the debasement.
2. Squeeze the producers dry, any way they can.

The Problem of Legitimacy

You may wonder why the governments don’t just cut their spending. That would seem an obvious choice. But they can’t cut spending without tarnishing their image as the mighty protector and the great fount of human compassion. People pay taxes willingly because of this high and mighty image; lose the image and you lose tax compliance.

Think about it: the governments of the West portray themselves as the saviors of the weak, the healers of the sick, and the fixers of every problem. But if they stop paying off the poor, there will be riots, and the producers will get hurt. No longer being protected, they may no longer consent to having their money taken away from them day by day.

Governments function on legitimacy more than force. If they lose their legitimacy, they are done. Therefore they cannot cut spending.

The Philosophy of “Government Against the People” at Work

Our Western civilization is at a late stage, just like Rome in the 5th century, or Greece in the 3rd and 4th centuries BC, or like the Egyptians and Sumerians before them. The same basic suite of problems engulfs them all at these stages, but we will use Rome as example, since that is the closest to us in both time and temperament.

Take a look at the two graphs below.

This one shows the Roman debasement, which involved mixing cheap metals (such as lead) into their silver coins:

Now look at this one, showing the debasement of the dollar, which involved the creation of debt-based currency:

 These are essentially the same chart, showing the same phenomenon.

What came next for Rome was the abuse of the producers.

Rome taxed in very different ways than modern governments, so I won’t take pages to describe it all, but I will give you a few highlights:

• The local elites who were charged with collecting taxes couldn’t keep up with Rome’s demands and started running away. Rome couldn’t find anyone willing to accept these very high positions, no matter how much prestige was attached.
• People adapted to avoid taxes, and Rome passed new laws in response. (This helped create the serfdom of the middle ages.)
• People ran away to the Germanic and Frankish areas that surrounded Rome. To illustrate that fact, here’s a quote from a man named Salvian the Presbyter, from about 440 AD:

Thus, far and wide, they migrate either to the Goths or to the Bagaudae, or to other barbarians everywhere in power; yet they do not repent of having migrated. They prefer to live as freemen under an outward form of captivity, than as captives under the appearance of liberty. Therefore, the name of Roman citizens, at one time not only greatly valued, but dearly bought, is now repudiated and fled from, and it is almost considered not only base, but even deserving of abhorrence.

I could go on at length, but I think you get the picture. There were taxes on income, taxes on sales, arbitrary taxes, farm taxes, plain confiscations, and so on. If you had a friend close to the emperor, you had a chance to be ignored, but if not, you were mercilessly bled dry. (And even a friend with the emperor’s ear might not help.)

Your Choices Now

I think it’s quite clear that we’re in the same civilizational stage as late Rome. What happens to us won’t be identical, but it will be similar. The one great advantage we have now is information. If we pay attention, we are able to see what is happening before it hits. We can also adapt to avoid most of the consequences. We may not like it that we have to adapt repetitively, but history doesn’t give us many options – late stage mega-institutions will behave like late-stage mega-institutions.

And in the short term, the “Government against the People” philosophy is not going to disappear. In fact, it’s likely to get much worse. Our choice is to get out of the way, or not."

Paul Rosenberg
FreemansPerspective.com

Random Acts of Revolution -by Daisy Luther

[Onebornfree & Freedom Network commentary: another thought provoking article from Daisy Luther- which does not mean that I agree with everything she writes here. For example, I believe that it is very dangerous to believe that "You have a Constitutionally protected right to be free." I wish that were the case, but as a Personal Freedom Consultant I believe that it is delusional to believe it, the way things are { and the way they probably have always been}, and that believing it, then doing some of the things on Ms. Luthers list, could get you in a lot of trouble that might well further decrease your own freedom, rather than increase it. In this regard I would particularly advise against doing anything that draws obvious attention to yourself from "unwanted parties", if you catch my drift :-) . Anyhoo, at this point thats all I have to say here - if a reader wishes to briefly discuss the implications of this article, or of my  brief commentary, let me know and I will try to briefly talk with you if convenient to both parties. Regards, onebornfree.]

The 13th Amendment to the Constitution abolished slavery. This means that if you are a slave today, it’s either illegal, or you have voluntarily accepted your servitude.

Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

You have a Constitutionally protected right to be free. If you aren’t free, then revolution is your duty.

Many people believe that revolution requires that they lead a march, stand in front of a crowd with a bullhorn, or form a militia. They feel like it’s a job for the Alex Joneses, the Adam Kokeshes, the James Wesley Rawleses, and the Bradley Mannings of the world.

They’re wrong. You don’t have to be a person with thousands of followers on Twitter and Facebook . You don’t have to be a person with a military leadership position on your resume. You need not get yourself arrested on the steps of the White House, got to prison forever for telling the truth about your unit in the army, or stare down a bunch of scary-looking thugs in jack boots.

But you do have to do something.

You can’t just sit there and complain unless you are really just another armchair Rambo.

The way you lead your life every single day can be an act of revolution. By refusing to concede your natural rights, quietly and resolutely, you are performing an act of revolution. Walking the walk doesn’t always require civil disobedience or militia membership (although those actions definitely have their places). It requires your consistent determination not to be infringed upon.

It doesn’t matter if you are a soccer mom from the suburbs, a college student in a dormitory, a church-going dad and husband, or a person who has found themselves homeless through the ongoing economic crisis – by living resolutely, you are performing an act of revolution.

Don’t get me wrong – we need the Alexes, the Adams, the militias, the Bradleys, and the JWRs. We need the people who stand in protest. We need those who expose wrongdoing. We need the organizers, the shouters, the big personalities, the quiet strong types, and the leaders. But these are not the only ways to revolt. If every single person was off organizing their own rally, there’d be no one left to march in it.

What it is imperative upon us to do is to find our compass and follow it. We must make ourselves immune to control by not needing what “they” hand out. We have to be armored against the way everyone else lives and choose our own paths. We must stubbornly refuse to participate in the hoop-jumping that is everyday life in North America. 

By all of us who believe in liberty doing this, we form an army of stubborn non-participants in the status quo.

Here’s an example. It’s a small thing, a battle that today only affected my daughter and me. My daughter is not vaccinated. She attends a public school where the kids must be vaccinated, or hoops must be jumped through. I filled out the initial forms stating that I had an objection of conscience to vaccines. I was contacted by a representative of the school system who suggested that I sign instead the form that stated a religious objection, because that was “easier”. 

I refused, because my objection is NOT one of religion, and I felt like that was a cop-out. I knew that I was within my rights to have an objection of conscience, and I felt that it was important to make a point that might make it easier for the next parent. 

I was then told that I’d have to pay $25 and get a statement notarized to allow her exemption on my basis. I said I’d be happy to get a statement notarized, but not at my expense. I pointed out that nowhere does our local law state that I should have to pay any money for my child to NOT do something. Lo and behold, after 5 months of politely going back and forth, being escalated through numerous different superiors of superiors in the school board and public health system, my daughter is still unvaccinated, I have not spent $25, and she was not suspended from school. 

The point I’m making is not about vaccines, but about not stepping back from your rights, for your convenience or for the convenience of others. This requires that you read the relevant laws and understand them. It requires a certain degree of persistence and a willingness to be a pain in the butt.

There are valid reasons for revolution.

One of the benchmarks of tyranny is the dizzying arrays of laws on the books, with more and more added every single day. It is humanly impossible not to break multiple laws every single day. Regulations are revenue builders and/or control mechanisms. If the “authorities” can ALWAYS find a law that you’ve broken, then they can ALWAYS give a “reason” for punishing you. Punishment might include incarceration, hefty fines, or the removal of some privilege (like taking away your driver’s license or not allowing your child to go to school).

"If the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood; if they be repealed or revised before they are promulgated, or undergo such incessant changes that no man, who knows what the law is to-day, can guess what it will be to-morrow. Law is defined to be a rule of action; but how can that be a rule, which is little known, and less fixed?" ~ James Madison, Federalist Papers 62

The police state is growing at a dizzying rate, and often the news makes it look like we live in Nazi Germany. It is now or never. Like cockroaches, “they” – the thugs in jackboots and their masters – multiply in the dark, and will soon overtake us if we don’t put a stop to it right now. They want to take our guns because that would make our resistance more difficult. They keep buying up ammo and now have more than enough to kill every man, woman, and child in America multiple times. The NDAA means that any person can be indefinitely detained. There has been a sustained attack on the Bill of Rights and one by one our rights are being submerged beneath the desires of those who would demand our submission.

How can you be an everyday revolutionary?

The most revolutionary act is to be self-sufficient and in need of nothing that the government can provide for you in exchange for some small liberty. When there is nothing that you require enough to submit, then bullying you becomes much more difficult.

This list of suggestions is by no means comprehensive. Please, add your own random acts of resistance in the comments below.

• Question absolutely everything you hear on the news. Always be a sceptic. All major media goes back to just a few conglomerates. The “news” is now all a propaganda ploy to help the rich get richer and the powerful remain in power. The media can make or break a candidate with unholy zeal in less than a week. These people and others like them are the ones that decide what “we the people” get to see. If they feel like a candidate or a news item might upset the status quo, they black it out by refusing to cover it.

• Call out the media. Let everyone know that the mainstream media is the enemy of the people. When you see coverage that is clearly biased, take a moment to call out the media about it. Take the time to comment on mainstream media websites and point out the unbalanced coverage. If you use social media, share this information and post on the media outlet’s social media pages as well.

• Get out of the banking system. By opting to “unbank” or “underbank” there is a limit to what can be easily stolen from you. When you have physical control of your financial assets, you are not at as high a risk of losing those assets, and therefore, less likely to be dependent on “the system.”

• Turn your savings into precious metals or tangible assets. On the same note as unbanking, you definitely don’t want to rely on a 401K or savings account to provide for you in your old age. Ask the people of Cyprus how well that worked out for them. Diversify with assets you can touch. Purchase tangible goods like land, food, ammo, and seeds. Once you are well supplied, move on to precious metals to preserve your wealth.

• Educate others. At the (very high) risk of people thinking you’re crazy, it’s important to let people know WHY you do what you do. If you are an anti-Monsanto activist, teach others about the dangers of GMOs. If you object to a municipal policy, speak at a town meeting or send a letter to the editor of your local paper. By ranting incoherently or by keeping your mouth shut, you influence no one. By providing provable facts, you can open minds and awaken others to tyranny.

• Get others involved in the fight. For example, if you are fighting with the city council that wants to rip out the vegetables growing in your front yard, let your friends and neighbors know, post a notice at the grocery store, and write a letter to the editor. When injustice occurs, use the power of social media to spread awareness. Often a public outcry is what is necessary to get the “authorities” to back down. Look at the case of Brandon Raub, the veteran who was kidnapped and taken to a mental hospital for things he posted on Facebook. Raub was not charged, but he was detained in the psych ward involuntarily. His friends and family immediately mobilized and spread the videos of his arrest all over the internet. It snowballed and alternative media picked it up – soon Raub was released, and all because of a grass roots and social media campaign to bring the injustice to light.

• Grow your own food. Every single seed that you plant is a revolutionary act. Every bit of food that you don’t have to purchase from the grocery store is a battle cry for your personal independence. When you educate yourself (and others) about Big Food, Big Agri, and the food safety sell-outs at the FDA, you will clearly see that we are alone in our fight for healthy, nutritious foods. Refuse to tolerate these attacks on our health and our lifestyles. Refuse to be held subject to Agenda 21?s version of “sustainability”.

• Take control of your health. It is imperative that you not blindly trust in the medical establishment. Many members of this establishment are merely prostitutes for their pimp, Big Pharma. Millions of children are given powerful psychotropic drugs to help them fit into the neat little classroom boxes, and the numbers are growing every day. Americans spent 34.2 BILLION dollars on psychiatric drugs in 2010. (Source) Big Pharma is an enormously profitable industry that only pays off if they can convince you that you’re sick. Learn about the toxic injections and medications, weight the risks and benefits, and always look for second and third opinions before making a medical decision. Maintain your health by avoiding toxins, exercising, and ditching your bad habits to reduce the number of doctor’s visits that are necessary.

• Refuse to comply. If you know your natural rights, which are guaranteed under the Constitution and its Amendments, then it makes it much harder for “authorities” to bully you. You don’t have to let them search your home without a warrant, you don’t have to answer questions, and you don’t have to comply with laws that are in conflict with the Constitution.

• Learn. Every day, spend time learning. This shouldn’t stop once our formal education ends. Fill your mind with history, with current events, with constitutional law, and information about the natural world. Learn about health, study economics, research things that interest you, and unravel the complicated conspiracies that are afoot. To pursue unbiased knowledge is to free your mind from the prison of propaganda and indoctrination.

• Don’t consume chemicals that cause you to be dumbed down. Avoid chemical-laden food with brain-killing neurotoxins like MSG and aspartame. Don’t drink fluoridated water.

• Embrace your right to bear arms. Be responsible for your own safety and security.

• Don’t be in debt. No one can be free if they are in debt. If you are in debt, you are forced to work in whatever conditions are present, for whatever amount is offered, complying with whatever criteria is necessary to keep your job. in order to either pay your debt or face penalties. As well, the high interest rates that you pay only serve to make the bankers more wealthy. Instead of borrowing, save until you can afford something or realize that if you could actually afford it, you wouldn’t need to borrow money to have it.

• Be prepared for disaster. Have enough food, water, and supplies to take care of your family in the event of a natural disaster. Don’t expect FEMA to take care of you.

• Be involved in your children’s education. For some, this means homeschooling or unschooling, and for others this means being on top of what they are learning in a formal school setting. Join the PTA and actively volunteer if your child goes to school. Be an advocate for your child and insist that the teachers teach. If your child goes to school, supplement this at home with discourse about current events and outings that help them learn about the world around them.

• Be the squeaky wheel. If you see something wrong, don’t just ignore it. Say something about it, and keep saying something until it changes. Whether this is some process that infringes on your privacy, a job requirement that impedes your health, or another injustice, pursue it relentlessly. Ask questions publically, write letters, and use social media to bring pressure to encourage a change.

• Reduce your consumer spending. Spending less helps to starve the beast by reducing the sales taxes you pay and withdrawing your financial support to big conglomerates. If we vote with our dollars, eventually there will, of a necessity, be a paradigm shift that returns us to simpler days, when families that were willing to work hard could make a living without selling their souls to the corporate monoliths. A low-consumption lifestyle reduces your financial dependency, which allows for more freedom.

• Ditch popular culture. If reality TV isn’t a tool for dumbing people down, I don’t know what it is. My daughter recently begged to watch an episode of a popular reality TV show that “everyone” was watching. She managed about 15 minutes of it and then said, “This is the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen.” She decided to read a book instead. Popular entertainment is a media tool used to change our perspectives about our personal values, and to tell us how to think and feel about issues.

• Buy locally. Support local small businesses to help others who are fighting for independence from the system. You might pay a little bit more than you would at your big box store, but the only people benefiting from your purchases made at the corporate stores are those with the 7 figure annual bonuses.

• Develop multiple streams of income. Don’t put all of your eggs in one basket. Figure out several ways to bring in income. Not only does this free you from being a wage slave, but it allows you to hire friends or family members. You are less entangled in the system and not subject to corporate whims. If one business fails, or becomes subject to regulations that make it no longer worthwhile, you are not forced to comply just to keep a roof over your head.

• Say thanks, but no thanks. There is no such thing as a benevolent hand out. Nearly anything offered for free (particularly by a government entity) has strings attached. Maybe there is a handy-dandy registration form that you need to fill out. You might be influenced to vote a certain way just to keep the freebies coming. You might have to pee in a cup every two weeks. Perhaps one day you’ll need to have a microchip embedded in your hand. Either way, by accepting handouts from those in “authority”, you become beholden to them or you need them, and someone who is free is neither beholden nor needy.

Don’t take the easy road. The PTB like to seduce people with simplicity. ”If you just sign this paper, it will be much easier,” they say. ”This chip is for your convenience,” they tell you. ”By giving up this, it lets us take care of you and you will be much safer.” The easy road only gets you to Slave Street a whole lot faster. Take the difficult road and be responsible for yourself. Don’t take shortcuts that compromise your beliefs. Go to court to fight a ticket, read the laws and defend yourself, and know that anything you give up, you will never get back.

According to the Declaration of Independence, ”Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

That means that you don’t have to accept the unjust laws. That means you don’t have to quietly take it, muttering under your breath that it isn’t right, but not daring to raise your voice. That means that “they” are only in control of you if you allow it.

There are nearly 316 million people in the United States.

Only 3% of the population fought in the Revolutionary War, and 10% actively supported them.

If 9,480,000 people quietly and peacefully revolted by withdrawing their consent to be governed by tyrants we could not be silenced.

If 31,600,000 people supported those revolting, we could not be stopped.

The government might be watching us, but we can watch them right back. Make the way you live your life a revolutionary act.

What random act of revolution did you commit today? Please share it in the comments section below.

Reprinted with permission from The Organic Prepper.

June 3, 2013

Copyright © 2013 The Organic Prepper