This morning after listening to Tom’s show on Free Speech TV I called 202-225-3121 and asked for the speaker's office to protest decreasing the disability payments by 20%. After listening to America the Beautiful for 8 minutes John B comes on and invites me to leave a message. Then the message line informs me that I could not leave a message because his message box was full. I called back the switchboard to complain, and was transferred to the Rules Committee. Alec, who answered the phone informed me that there is no plan to reduce the disability payments reported on Thom's show, was a lie and that this was just presented to incite me. His solution to the dilemma was: Would you rather pay for him to have a system to accommodate hearing from the citizens of the US or repair the roads?

But keep trying - got through my third time.

Reply to #10: Bravo, Marc! I missed the boat with Perot. But at least I voted for Nader!

Reply to #26: Anything oil can do hemp can do better.

Kend: You say, "The moral of the story is never trust government." Let's be clear here....how about never trust a government that has been purchased and is controlled by individuals like the Kochs, one that no longer represents the best interests of the vast majority? You know damn well that's what we have, so stop giving us that Koch /Teabag bullshit about how bad government is. The billionaires are the "government" now....it's called Fascism.

I am not sure how contacting a member of Congress is going to help. We get pre-packaged answers written by PR people. The vast majority of Americans have zero influence over government policy making. Public opinion, if it is considered at all, is manufactured by misdirecting, limiting information or outright lying to the citizenry. The action we should be taking is forming citizen based democratic institutions to combat unjust economic policy that heavily favor a tiny fraction of the population and their functionaries.

The US government has always function to serve the wealth interest of the country, but indifference to the general welfare of the population has gone beyond greedy self-interest government official, elected and unelected, acting as money managers for the 1% to a morally bankrupt system blindly or deliberately leading its population to economic oblivion.

Our political system is a farce or a tragedy depending on your disposition to laughing or crying. We must develop alternative means to combat these political and economic forces of domination. The hope, in my humble or not so humble opinion, is massive public organizations based in popular democratic control, but that takes courage, sacrifice, vigilance and hard work. We could start now and create what we want or possibly be forced into something we don't quite believe in later.

Sorry I had to edit..

The best example of a Leninist benevolent dictatorship is probably Cuba. Fidel and his brother are genuinely benevolent - by, of course, their understanding and definition of what that means.

They are also, however, genuinely dictators and thus I still wouldn't want to live in Cuba.

Quote D'Anne Marc:

Mark J. Saulys ~ First of all, human history is full of Monarchies that have served the peoples interests just fine. You have Augustus Caesar of Rome, Suleiman the Magnificent of the Ottoman Empire, Cyrus II of Persia, Frederick the Great of Prussia, Louis XIV The Sun King of France, but to name a few. Even our modern day Republic is based on a weak Monarchy. That is why we have an executive branch capable of executive actions and of assuming the role of a Monarch in an emergency. We did not move away from Monarchies because they "always" are Tyrannies. At the time of King George, there was a Tyranny; and, the colonists wanted nothing to do with any system that could be turned into such a Tyranny. Of course, what should be obvious to us all by now, is that ANY GOVERNMENT can be turned into a Tyranny. It might be much harder to turn a Democracy into a Tyranny than it is to turn a Monarchy into one--because to do so requires changing the will of all the people, instead of just one--yet, it certainly can, will, does, and has happened. As Benjamin Franklin said at the penning of the Constitution, "Well, you have your Republic, if you can keep it." Fateful words, indeed.

Again your assertion is founded on presumptions not based in fact. First of all, reputed "benevolent monarchies" of history may or may not have actually been benevolent or may well have been benevolent to a much more limited degree than the history books will allow. Remember, it's the victor and the dominant and powerful who write history and the often self flattering accounts within it. Some of them may have been benevolent to the extent that they could but NOBODY can choose for someone else as well as someone can for themselves.

The Founders of the U.S., the French revolutionaries and others didn't do away with monarchy just because they didn't like the current monarch. If that were the case they could have much more easily effected a "palace revolution" wherein a faction opposing the sitting king assasinates him and replaces him with one of their choosing. They were fed up with monarchy in general, with the long, historical succession of monarchs. Their campaign to eradicate monarchy spanned hundreds of years and included milestone advances as the Magna Carta in the 1400s, the Great Revolution of 1688 and so on. The French revolutionaries went through four republics before they arrived at a stable democracy. Their revolution of 1793 was succeeded by a couple of "benevolent dictatorships" of Robespierre, known for the "Reign of Terror", and the vainglorious Napoleon.

Also, as far as "executive actions assuming the role of Monarch in emergencies", that's reminiscent of the Weimar Republic becoming the Third Reich by the ceding of "emergency powers" to the executive branch of the German government after the burning of the Reichstag and G.W. Bush trying the same thing after 9/11. Always fear is mongered to undermine faith in the people and in democracy and instill a fearful sense of a need for authoritarianism - a PR tactic which seems to have worked very effectively on you, D'Anne Marc..

Quote D'Anne Marc:

Secondly, only a Monarchy will serve the needs of a group of people thrust into a new and challenging environment for the first time. Even the American Indians tribes had Chiefs, and arctic natives--Eskimos--had elders, who wielded absolute authority without question. The only reason you missed that fact is because these Kings ruled over relatively small groups who never expanded beyond their borders. Nevertheless, these are also very good examples of a benevolent Monarchies; or, Kingships. The harsher the environment the more essential absolute authority is.

Actually, D'Aanne Marc, that's not true. Native Americans - of a prehistoric, preagriculural level of technology - did not have any hierarchy of authority and only white accountings of history and of their culture have them there. White people encountering Native Americans felt a need for there to be such hierarchies and invented them on the natives' behalf, among other reasons, for the sake of negotiating with - or swindling - them or, more precisely, giving an air of legitimacy to their dishonest negotiations, e.g., "That one's their leader and he says we can have Manhattan for 20 bucks.". I invite you to read Native Americans' own accounts or those of scientifically. responsible anthropologists. "The harsher the environment the more essential authority is." is similarly, I would assert, I'm sorry to say, a canard, i.e., false and another unfounded presumption.

Quote D'Anne Marc:

you can tell what kind of leader people have by looking at the people. Wherever there is security, prosperity and happiness amongst the poorest of the people, there is benevolent leadership at the top.

Another canard I'm afraid, you can tell, by looking at the people, how much relative power they have to govern themselves. "Security, prosperity and happiness amongst the poorest people" is an oxymoron, if they have security, prosperity and happiness they are not poor - and they have power. The only way to redistribute wealth is to redistribute power.

I'm really very sorry to find out you don't believe in democracy, D'Anne Marc, and are, what I would consider, rather euphorically and injudiciously enamoured with authoritarianism.

Quote D'Anne Marc:

Quote Mark J. Saulys:

I don't see why, "according to the precepts of the hypothetical", you can't just relinquish control and allow democracy to flourish - unless you would see this as an opportunity to force a vainglorious fantasy on someone else.

Actually, that would be my ultimate plan. I know that any benevolent Monarchy can and will eventually be perverted into a Tyranny. A benevolent Monarchy is only as good as the term that Monarch serves. Therefore, it would be my wish to simply stabilize the colony to the point of it being self sufficient and secure. At that point I would reorganize the government into one that is Democratic and self governing. I would have the people vote for a structure that they approve of; and, then step down. The greatest gift a Monarch can give his people is to delegate his authority to them. That would be my final goal.

So you're Lenin. Marx believed - quite scientifically and rather incontrovertably - that the state was invented to enforce private property rights - and, indeed, there are many, still today, who believe that to be the only legitimate function of the state. He thus believed that the abolition of private property would remove the need for the state and lead to its gradual "atrophy from disuse" and "withering away" as the absence of private property results in ever decreasing posessiveness and greed and strengthening of community. But first, by Marx, it would be necessary, just after the proletariat revolution, to live in the "dictatorship of the proletariat" wherein the proletariat assumes the status of "ruling class" in the period of transition to the abolition of all classes.

I have a distrust of even temporary, "necessary" dictatorships. It seems those never lead to the intended democracy either but only to more dictatorship.

Quote D'Anne Marc:
Mark J. Saulys ~ Remember, PFNELKAK was referring to another world, not this one. Also, remember, this question is hypothetical only. Absolute monarchy can take one of two forms: that of a King, or that of a Tyrant. There is no middle ground. A King attends to the needs of his people. A Tyrant tends to his own needs.

D'Anne Marc, the reason monarchy was abolished in America and elsewhere in the Enlightenment period is because ANY king is a tyrant simply because he is a king. all people have a right to self government and NOBODY can be trusted to serve the supposed "benefit" of the people ALL the time or even to discern what constitutes that benefit. Nor do they have a right to define what is "right" or "good" for anybody but themselves, EVERYONE has a right to define that for themselves and anything else IS tyranny.

Leninist communism is the political philosophy of the benevolent dictatorship - mainly because the Russian peasantry of the Tsarist epoch was not ready for anything else, they had a superstitious belief in the "divine right" of the tsar and of the feudal hierarchy so that Lenin had to be their "tsar" for them until they were, as a society, industrialized, were educated and became enlightened, as it were, and free of their ignorant superstitions. He tried to be the the "good tsar". Fidel, Mao, Ho Chi Mihn - and even Stalin and Kim Jong Il - all followed that example.

Quote D'Anne Marc:

Survival depends upon order, leadership, and cooperation. If I cannot inspire that cooperation with my leadership, law, or example, I will fail. That is not an option. I'm not going to run away from that challenge. According to the precept of the hypothetical, only I can provide what is needed. Therefore, that is what I would do. Anyone of these survivors who chooses not to follow my law--for whatever reason--is free to do so. I do not want to force anyone to pretend to be a good person. They are more than welcome to leave the community any time they wish. There will be no questions asked nor exceptions tolerated.

That entire assertion is a weak justification for tyranny founded upon presumptions that have no basis in fact. First let's take "Survival depends upon order, leadership, and cooperation." Tell that to the Native Americans or arctic natives or ANY group of people at that level of technology who invariably voluntarily order themselves and cooperate without ANY leadership hierarchy or any "leaders", as it were, in the universal socialist democracy (what Marx called "primitive communism") of cultures of that level of technology. "Leadership" is a concept invented to benefit "leaders", usually depending on some dark, superstious fear mongering by those personally ambitious - or, perhaps, simply self imagined and self important - would be leaders of the greater mass of the people.

I don't see why, "according to the precepts of the hypothetical", you can't just relinquish control and allow democracy to flourish - unless you would see this as an opportunity to force a vainglorious fantasy on someone else.

Kend ~ California and New York are in debt? Any who my friend is going to bail out California and New York, Mississippi? I think you have that backwards, my friend. We are the states that bail out everyone else.

http://ringoffireradio.com/2015/01/a-glimpse-at-the-voter-base-that-the-gop-has-built-in-the-south/

As far as your question about Hemp from #40 is concerned, I think most of that has to do with infrastructure and profit. Oil companies knew way back in 1900 that Hemp was a better way to go. They chose oil because it was readily available and easy to pump out of the ground without needing to pay farmers to sow, till, harvest and process. They simply didn't want to share the profit with anyone else; so, they conspired to use the government to eliminate that competition.

Today, there is an entire infrastructure in place to produce energy from oil. Wars have been waged to secure rights to the resource. Not only would there be money lost in switching over, there will be huge startup costs. As before, profits would have to be shared amongst farmers, harvesters, and processors. The bottom line here is greed. As a result, the only way to make the changeover back to Hemp from oil is the same way it was changed in the first place--the government has to step in and force the industry to change.

Reply to #40: What are you missing, Kend? Start with Thom's introductory post at the top of the page and start reading, all the way to the bottom. See if for once, you might manage to retain a kernel or two of that information.

Pfnelkak. Yes a lot of companies have storage facilities in Hardisty. Because Keystone has not been approved they are moving the oil by train from there. Which scares the hell out of me. For the record the Chinese have the largest stake in the oil sands over all. It is the largest oil reserve in the world everyone has a stake in it. The Kochs are small players. Not to down play the massive amount of money they will make your right there. Canada just passed a law that all new mergers or take overs have to be approved by the fed because of the all the forgien ownership.