counter-protest - libertas victor!

  The forces of counter-protest today won a major victory in the battle against the anti-choice crowd: the opponent abandoned the field! With a new sign in hand (ANTI-CHOICE IS ANTI-LIBERTY opposite NO ROSARIES IN MY OVARIES), I arrived on the Hanover square at noon sharp, in time to witness the PRAY TO END ABORTION crowd blatantly violating the borough noise statutes by hoisting colorful signs reading HONK 4 LIFE, thus creating a public nuisance. (I am not a snitch, nor a police informant, so I refrained from informing the borough peace-keepers that noise violations were occurring willfully and continuously.) Less than an hour later, by one pm, the last HONK 4 LIFER had rolled up her sign and sped away in her minivan.

  I was not shaken when they sent a priest to intimidate me; I was not shaken when they sent a local cop to issue his warning – but the pro-lifers seem to have been shaken by my persistence on the square, and by my brazen mockery of their beliefs.

  The field is ours! Our foe is in disarray, routed and scrambling for the hills. Maybe just for one more day, the inalienable, Constitutional right of women to dispose of their bodies (their only true property) as they see fit has been defended by a new Guard for the future Security of the People of America.

  Fetuses are not babies until they are born! If I wanted religion in my womb, I would have slept with Jesus! Keep your rosaries out of my ovaries!

Thanks to everyone who voiced an opinion to the action of these last few days, be it yelled from a car or scrawled on a website. Defend your rights every day – let no man bar your way.

Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp

counter-protesting - day # 4

  This picture shows the sign I have been holding on the square in Hanover PA for the last few days (the opposite side reads, CHOICE = LIBERTY - DEFEND THE CONSTITUTION). Today, however, things got a bit nasty: a priest showed up, grabbed the pro-lifers' only PRAY TO END ABORTION sign, crossed the street, and stood directly behind me for a good forty-five minutes. We had a brief conversation about the freedom of speech (he was incredulous when I told him that most modern nations allow their people to speak freely), but he retreated all the same, with a farewell, "See you later," when his attempts at intimidation didn't cause me to immediately vacate my spot.

  Many were the people who voiced their support for my efforts at counter-protesting, among them a shopkeeper from a nearby store (who praised me for keeping my distance from the pro-lifers and not posting up directly behind or next to them), truck drivers, people in passing cars, and the very nice couple who, out of solidarity, bought me a coffee and a water. Many also were the people who voiced their opposition to my signs, either through thumbs down or by yelling angry threats from passing cars.

  The culmination of my day, however, was when the local police showed up to inform me that they had received multiple complaints about the fact that I was displaying in public the word vagina. "This is borderline disorderly conduct," the officer said; "you have the right to speak freely, but we're getting complaints about the word vagina on your sign." I asked him if I could complain about the fact that the pro-lifers have pictures of dead and bloody fetuses on their signs, which I find disturbing and offensive, and he told me to file a complaint at the station. He took my name, address, and date of birth, and thanked me for being civil about the complaints. When I raised my coffee to him as I was packing up and he was pulling out of the parking area where I had been standing, he nearly shouted out with glee.

  I can imagine only one source for the complaints: the pro-lifers who had tried to bring out the big guns, and, having failed to shake my resolve, turned snitch. To stay out of trouble with the law, I will change my sign to read, "KEEP YOUR PRAYERS OUT OF MY WOMB," but womb is not nearly as memorable as vagina. Every action has an equal and appropriate reaction. I refuse to turn snitch and complain about signs bearing bloody and mangled fetuses, but I will not abandon my battle to secure for the women of this land the Blessings of Liberty. 

Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp

on abortion (counter-protesting)

  I am just come from counter-protesting the abortion protesters who have been infesting the central square in the small, rural town where I live. For weeks now, I have driven past them day after day, middle-aged men, grandmothers, and nuns standing out in the cold, standing up for that in which they believe. They carry professionally-made signs that say, PRAY TO END ABORTION, or, LIFE IS PRECIOUS. Some of the signs bear pictures of aborted fetuses, some pictures of cute and cuddly little babies.

  The first sign I made, at two Saturday morning with a head full of booze and a heart full of indignation, said, CHOICE = LIBERTY – KEEP ABORTION LEGAL. Having spent the day playing disk golf at Codorus State Park, I remembered the sign I had shoved into the trunk of my car the night before, and made it out to the square just before dusk, Saturday evening. Within a few minutes, two separate drives had either booed me or given me thumbs down, while one of the protesters, a young, sporty-looking woman, had waved to me at least five times. Fortunately, my disk golfing partner was there to back me up, and to take pictures for posting to the socialverse.

  Once again fresh from disk golfing, today I debuted my new sign, this one with two sides, and two messages. The first: CHOICE = LIBERTY – DEFEND THE CONSTITUTION. The second: KEEP YOUR PRAYERS OUT OF MY VAGINA. I made sure to hit the square around lunch time, this time without backup, to catch the midday traffic. Immediately, there were honks and jeers, thumbs up and down, brief conversations with drivers stopped at the light where I stood, and many, many people looking away in shame or embarrassment. More than one driver agreed that it was “only a matter of time” before someone did what I was doing. The sporty young woman waved once or twice, but her companions, two women in their seventies, never ceased shooting daggers at me, their looks dripping with malicious contempt, their polished little signs no match for the giant piece of spray-painted cardboard upon which I had clumsily scrawled my counter-slogans.

  I caught a half dozen drivers taking pictures, and a trio of proto-hipsters approached me at one point, to have their picture taken next to the vagina slogan, but the highlight of my hour on the square was the local rapid-transit bus that circled the block so that one of the passengers could take a picture of the vagina slogan, the bus's driver laughing and signaling to me with her hands to flip over my message-board.

  I believe strongly in my messages. According to just about every doctor on the planet, a fetus is just not a baby until it emerges from the mother's body. Until such time that it emerges, the fetus is the property of the mother – she has the inalienable right to do with it what she pleases. In the fourteenth amendment to the U.S. Constitution, each person is granted the right to life, liberty, and property, rights that pertain to the body specifically, that property without which life is impossible.

  If one thinks that the fetus during the first trimester is human life (when it is only a cluster of cells), then abortion activists surely oppose (on moral grounds) surgery of any kind. During liposuction, living human tissue is removed from the body. Similarly, a cancerous tumor is living human tissue – when it is removed from the body, it dies. Who is protesting publicly to end the removal of cancerous growths? No one. When my pancreas is issued a passport, or when my trachea obtains the right to vote, I might agree with the protesters, but these internal tissue clusters are part of me, not separate entities: they are mine to dispose of as I please.

  No country of which I know issues a certificate of conception, whereas most countries issue some sort of certificate of birth. I think this shows us what modern, enlightened society understands: that anything growing within your body belongs to you. Our Constitutional rights must be guarded continuously from attacks by persons and groups that wish to take them from us. So stand up, speak out, and keep your prayers out of my vagina

Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp

on dominionism & al-Qaeda

  In certain respects, the movement known as dominionism resembles the terrorist organization al-Qaeda. Both are extremist religious movements made up of fanatical zealots with whom can be neither argued nor bargained. Both have the goal of dismantling the rightfully elected governmental structure that currently presides over these United States of America. Both seek to destroy the Constitution, whereas al-Qaeda acts to annihilate it, and the members of the dominionist movement plan merely to enslave it to a totalitarian theocracy allegedly spoken about in the Christian bible.

  I have read most of the Koran, Allah be praised, and the majority of the Christian bible, Amen, and from neither text was I able to glean a clear mandate to impose upon the foundations of modern, enlightened society the restrictive policies of long lost civilizations. (Such mandates can be pulled from any text, let alone religious ones, so long as pastors, imams, and priests are willing to ignore teachings of love and compassion and focus on righteous fearfulness and calculated xenophobia, as happened during the Iranian Revolution.)

  As we fight al-Qaeda around the world, the blood of our brothers and sisters pouring out on distant sands and in foreign lands, let us remember that religious fanatics are at work here in the motherland, in plain view of the American people, zealots who wish to see one of their own elected to the Presidency, all the while praying with every thing they've got to dismantle our Constitutional republic and to erect in its place a system of theocratic dictatorship. Our brave, proud troopers are battling religious extremists abroad: it is up to each American living here at home to defend the Declaration of Independence, and the Constitution, from any and all who may wish them harm.

  Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp
p.s. Ghadhafi is deposed! Praise be to the Libyan people for their hard-fought, righteous victory.

commie don't float

  Lock your windows, and close your doors – there are commies about!
  Communists (commies), those self-same socialist scumbags that have infiltrated American society to its very core, are inherently evil, and ought to be killed on sight.
  You will find commie using such fiscally burdensome and morally decrepit things as public roads, bridges, communal parks, street-cars, and sidewalks. The interstate and intrastate highway systems are built and maintained using communal funds provided by the taxpayer, and, as socialist services that are dangerous to the American way, they must be avoided until they can be destroyed. (Switch to privately-funded road systems and for-profit bridges whenever possible, so as to avoid proximity to commie.) Avoid public libraries, public transportation, and public universities – these are all socialist holdouts (funded by taxpayer dollars) that provide services to all Americans equally. As institutions crucial to the socialist ideal, they must be avoided.
  Commies have been known to participate in local elections, where they support unnecessary and downright wasteful services such as police, firefighters, and sewage and water treatment services. Furthermore, the commie will, on the local as well as on the national level, support programs that provide assistance to the poor, the disabled, the elderly, and anyone equally as lazy, as incompetent, and as stupid to forestall buying into the glorious, inherent inequality of our beloved (free) market capitalism. Anyone who has voted for programs such as these, is a commie. Anyone who thinks that the wealth generated in America every year could feed, clothe, and house each and every citizen (if that wealth were not funneled into the pockets of the entrenched plutocracy), is a commie. Anyone who is stunned upon hearing that millions of America's children go to bed hungry each night, is a commie. Do not trust these loathsome miscreants.
  Wily and suspicious by foul, hellish nature, commie can be lured only into cunningly camouflaged traps, although it will come running readily if you hoist a red flag, or if your daughter is in heat. Commie will thrash about wildly once captured, so have your killing implement (bludgeon, cudgel, or similar) near to hand. The best bait for your commie-trap is any of the superb national brands of mechanically-separated meat product (preferably with a high sodium content) mixed with stale gingersnaps.
  As the headline suggests, a dead commie thrown into a river will not float – his body is made of a fibrous material similar to asbestos (but far more lethal when it comes into contact with the skin). Once it is killed, you should remove the dead commie from the water as soon as possible – its body will rot abnormally quickly, transforming almost overnight into an as-of-yet poorly understood substance that has the tendency to disperse before hardening, thus posing a hazard to shipping lanes and the elderly alike. As of press time, we have not been able to catch a commie to dissect its body in its living state: we knew enough not to let it live; we kill commie before commie can kill us.
  Remove the head of the dead commie as soon as you can – it might be faking death in hopes of spreading democracy and equality amongst the peoples of the world, when you are not looking. There is nothing worse than a wounded, near-dead commie spreading chaos and egalitarianism amidst your defensive lines. Wounding the commie will only enrage it, so take it down good and hard, as it will still be combat effective even after losing several limbs. Shooting off commie's leg will only slow it down, not stop it, so AIM FOR ITS MISSHAPEN HEAD!!! Setting the vile scum on fire (as with an improvised incendiary device) will only enrage it – it will charge your position and do everything in its power to burn it down before consumed by the flames. Stay alert – stay vigilant. Think of your loved ones. Think of the children. Do not hesitate.
  Every step toward communism is a step away from the American Way of Life. We must band together to stamp out the aforementioned socialist institutions. We must padlock our public schools, tear up our roads, disband our emergency services, raze our parks, smash our bridges, stop up the sewers, and burn our libraries to the ground. Only then will America be free of communism and its bastard cousin, socialism; only then might this shining land flourish once again.
  Know commie. It may seem peaceful, erudite, and well educated, but it is certainly an atheist, and a believer in small personal sacrifice for the greater common good. Mistrust commie – your stock options may depend on it. Fear commie – your life may depend on it. And remember, aim for its misshapen head, and put the bastard down for good.
  Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp

on Our forsaken Rights

  Citizens of America: We, the People of this land are at a crossroads, pausing now to decide whether to abandon our constitutional protections or to speak out against their destruction. Not long ago, an American named Anwar al-Awlaki was killed by his government without being first sentenced in a court of the United States. This latest action should not take us by surprise - the federal government (fed) has taken away our liberty by passing the Controlled Substances Act, legislation that robs us of the inalienable Right to live however we might decide to live; it has already violated our privacy and our properties via the Patriot Act, legislation that allows for unwarranted intrusions into previously protected domains.
  Now the fed has proven willing to take also our lives without so much as a by your leave. Life, liberty, and property are supposedly immutable rights supposedly protected under the 14th Amendment to the Constitution; they cannot be taken from the person individually, let alone from the People as a whole, without each individual facing the due and deliberate process of law, so that her liberty might be taken from her. (It can take years to revoke a man's right to life, with that man fighting every step to retain his sacred prize; the same process must take place, on an individual level, to revoke a person's liberty or property.) Now that the fed has proven a willingness to take freely our lives, let us honestly acknowledge that we no longer live in the country designed by the Constitution, that we can no longer expect reason from our overlords, that we sat back in quiet resignation and watched as our country was gutted from within.
  In truth, however, the American People have no protection from the overreaches of their federal government: while the 14th Amendment protects us from violations performed by the States, the Constitution does not protect our lives, our liberty, or our property, from violations done by federal hand.

  We witness with the death of al-Awlaki the unwarranted termination of American life. We witness with the Controlled Substances Act the unwarranted termination of American liberty. We witness with the Patriot Act the unwarranted termination of American privacy, and the unwarranted invasion of American property. Our inalienable Rights are being casually tossed out the window, and we sit here, helpless, smiling to hide the despair.
  Look not to Hope, for she has left these lands - with her she took Happiness, both laughing at our plans.

Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp

declaration of corporate supremacy

  When in the course of pursuing profits it becomes necessary to remind the People for whom it is they toil, and to formulate the rules by which they shall lead their lives, we, the assembled capitalists and corporations headquartered in these United States (but by no means necessarily operating here), only occasionally and perfunctorily respectful to the Opinions of Mankind, declare that the economic well-being of our executive boards and voting members by far outweighs the Right of the People to Safety and Happiness. The original Declaration of Independence, that document upon which the United States was founded, those words that might have given mankind the right to Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness, is, and has for some time now been, a dead and forgotten document, its declaration of unalienable rights null and void, its formulation of the core principle of the role of government - to bring about the Safety and the Happiness of the People - ground to dust under the jack-boot of our Capitalistic Greed.

  We hold these Lies to be enforceable through police action: that a small percentage of Americans should by rights reap the profits generated by the labor of who work in this country and across the known world; that we have the right to speculate and to risk the invested monies of those Americans stupid enough to have entrusted us with their savings, and, when our speculations fail and millions of Americans lose their hard-won gains, to be safe and secure in our gated communities, our ill-begotten money protected by the federal government, our risky businesses kept from failing by the taxes paid by the very people whom we had hoodwinked originally; that we shall profit from the sale of drugs, such as alcohol and tobacco, that are legally available to the People, drugs that kill them by the hundreds of thousands and maim them by the millions, while supporting the persecution and the imprisonment of the People in for-profit penitentiaries owned and run by us, for the crime of consuming drugs not to our liking, such as marijuana, drugs that have no discernible negative affect on their health or on their Happiness; that the US government should wage un-winnable wars against faceless foes (see the "war on terror") so that we may continue to manufacture, develop, and sell arms and weaponry, wars that might be won only if every person on Earth were placed in concentration camps and lobotomized forcibly; that we have the Right, through unscrupulous and down-right false advertising, to convince the People that unbridled consumption and unchecked personal debt are the bedrock of the American Dream, that Happiness does not grow from within, that it is not a fragile state of mind that blossoms from patience and self-understanding, but that it is something we cram into our wallets and pocket-books, that we spend in our shopping plazas, that we waste on useless items that supposedly make life easier but that constitute little more than clutter; that it was our patriotic duty to abandon the American manufacturing sector for foreign shores, sacrificing the jobs of millions of our countrymen to boost our profit-margins, allowing children across the Pacific Rim to work as slave-laborers in free-economic-zones so that unemployed Americans could buy cheap goods that break soon after the first use; that we have the Right, regardless of the complaints of tree-hugging hippies, to rape and destroy the land for short-term gain, to poison the streams with runoff from our mine, to clear-cut the once-great forests for export, and to pump the animals we slaughter for food full of steroids and antibiotics instead of providing them with clean and open places in which to live out their short and pathetic lives; that we have willingly and to vast personal profit rejuvenated the methods of the ancient Romans for controlling the lower classes by providing them with bread (fast food) and circuses (television), methods that poison the body and the mind but that keep the rabble blessedly quiet and contented throughout their pitiful and mostly worthless lives; that we will run our corporate societies, not as democracies, but as totalitarian fiefs, while convincing our workers that, through hard and dedicated labor, they might reach the highest rungs of our bogus organizations, while, in reality, they will, after infighting, backstabbing, and reckless self-promotion, find themselves flung out into the cold, the pathways to our fleeting and hollow ranks closed to all but a most rapacious and lustful few.

  At no point in the long yet subtle Process of making a mockery of this once great Nation did we pause to consider that our hoarding of the nation's wealth would violate the Constitutional directive of promoting the general Welfare, although we will, by funneling the collective wealth of all Americans into the pockets of our cronies and fellow oligarchs, secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and to our Posterity, not to all Americans equally, but to those who have, as we have, dutifully sacrificed their sacred Honor on the altar of the Insatiable Hag of Materialism, to those who have shat, as we have shat, upon the once-grand notion of Liberty and Justice for All. We have stopped our ears to the Voice of Justice, preferring rather the Shriek of Lies, preferring rather to profit from spying on the People (through the sale and maintenance of the materials necessary to the surveillance society), under the unpatriotic and anti-American Patriot Act, rejoicing in the violation of the flimsy protections once, but no longer, afforded the People by the Constitution.

  All this we pledge, and more, for: we have the means to lobby the Legislature for our own gain; we have the money with which to live comfortably for ten lifetimes while millions of American children go to bed hungry each night; we have convinced the People that consumption is preferable to ingenuity, that watching TV is preferable to creative expression and the telling of stories, that there is a universal formula for Happiness, a formula that starts with a dollar sign. We, therefore, the capitalists and corporations headquartered in these United States, Assembled, appealing to none but our majority share-holders, by our own authority and the might of our wrongly appropriated wealth, brazenly Publish and Declare, that this Country belongs to Us now, that the dream of a more perfect Union has no place in the world of top-few-capitalism, that eighty percent of all Americans shall toil ceaselessly to make us, those of the remaining Twenty Percent, rich beyond reckoning, that government is instituted not to secure the Rights of the People but to satisfy our every Desire, and that the People have no Right either to alter nor to abolish their government, as it long ago abandoned Them to satisfy the needs of the most monied few, as it is now too late, and They waited too long to act.

  So suck it, you hard-working American fools, and while you are sucking it good and hard, remember that you have abandoned everything for which your ancestors once fought and died.

Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp

on our Declarational legacy

  The United States of America was founded on such principles and organized in such form as to make the People Safe and Happy. In order for us to preserve for future generations even a shred of this nation's potential, we must redirect her course to honor and perpetuate the aims of the Declaration of Independence, and the promise of the Constitution. While this may sound complicated, the founders of our nation designed a relatively simple system with clearly defined parameters and expectations, those being: bestowing upon all mankind the inalienable Right to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness; forming a more perfect Union; establishing Justice; insuring the domestic Tranquility; providing for the common defence; providing for the general Welfare; and securing the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.

  Current conditions in our Union of States infringe upon the Liberty of the People by dictating how we might dispose of our bodies (by consuming drugs or aborting unwanted fetuses), and by allowing the People to indenture themselves to undemocratic and totalitarian corporations that offer the shallow promise of monetary gain at the expense of individual pride and self-sufficiency. These conditions undermine the general Welfare by eliminating funding for public schools, and by leaving us exposed, lacking a national health care system, to the ravages of sickness and disease. These conditions infringe upon the Safety of the People by exposing us to hostility from without (due to our continuing occupation of countries that Muslims consider holy), by allowing too young citizens to drive, by polluting the atmosphere through the burning of fossil fuels, and by granting privileged status to the economic interests of the top 20% at the expense of the economic Safety of the remaining 80% of the population, a privilege that furthermore does injury to Justice and the general Welfare alike when one considers that many millions of American children go hungry every day (see here).

  These self-contradictory conditions are tearing apart our country from within. We have made our government bloated and inefficient by adding layers of bureaucracy to Homeland Security and by paying corporations interested solely in their own bottom line exorbitant sums to supply and assist our troopers deployed overseas; we as a People have lost our way, capable neither of compromise for the sake of national progress nor of peaceful cooperation with fellow citizens who do not share our political or religious opinions. As long as our nation persists, however, the Constitutional parameters are the benchmarks against which all legislation and all government actions must be weighed. Any legislation or acts that infringe thereupon (such as the Patriot Act, and the 1970 Controlled Substances Act) are estimable to tyrants only, and, as they violate the very essence upon which America was founded, must be repealed immediately.

  Neither the Constitution nor the Declaration call for the dominion of one religion over the remaining religions or over the federal or state governments. Therefore, efforts by Sarah Palin and Rick Perry to spread like a suffocating blanket the teachings of their New Apostolic Reformation over our various halls of government can not, and will not, be successful. Similarly, any persons or groups calling for the incorporation of the rules of a specific religion into the laws of the land have no right to carry out their goals; indeed, any such efforts seek to abolish the Blessings of Liberty, and are thus intrinsically anti-American. The only acceptable actions that the various governments existing in these United States might initiate are those that satisfy the parameters of the Constitution and the Declaration alike.

  For us as a People to realign ourselves with the founding parameters and principles, we should: ensure the general Welfare by extending Medicaid to all citizens, by pursuing medical research (stem cells) that exhibits significant potential for healing, and by making affordable and high-quality education available to all persons equally; reinstate Liberty by granting women full custodianship over their bodies, and by extending to all grown citizens the right to consume whichever drugs they think best; provide for the common defence by recalling our armed forces from territories not our own, so that they might defend the motherland; create and expand domestic markets so that our citizens might pursue a decent Happiness on their own soil; form a more perfect Union by abolishing electoral laws that favor a few states (Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, Florida) at the expense of the remaining forty six states; rekindle the dying flame of Justice by retraining our police forces to protect rather than circumvent the rights granted the individual by the Constitution, and by altering the current rules of electoral fund-raising, rules that amplify well-funded interests while making irrelevant the voice of the common man; recalibrate the three branches of government so that they might once again gain the tender balance between executive, legislative, and judicial powers, a balance central to the (Constitutionally) correct functioning of our nation.

  There are many more changes that must be made before we will have met the parameters of our founding documents, but the few suggestions mentioned above will put us back on track. As Benjamin Franklin said, We have created a republic, but only if we can keep it. In order to regain this grasp, we must break down existing legal and moral conditions, so that we and our Posterity might once again enjoy the full, unbridled joy of the Blessings of Liberty.

  p.s. requiescat in pacem, Steven Paul Jobs, 1955-2011

Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp

dollar stores = commie outposts

  As of these last few months of 2011, millions of American citizens are directly supporting the People's Republic of China, our country's primary economic competitor and one of the sole remaining bastions of the socialistic world-view. Every day, we in this country support communism in the People's Republic of China, and all across this nation, in cities great and small, from the rolling central plains to the rugged western coastline, countless numbers of red-blooded, patriotic American citizens contribute directly to the ascending might of the Middle Kingdom.
  Dollar stores, which sell products ranging from shower curtains to miniature cast-resin busts of zebras, stand at the forefront of the Chinese invasion of, and its inexorable dominance over, the American economy. Purchasing an item that reads, Made In China, funnels funds directly into the rapidly growing Chinese economy (where most of the consumer items sold in dollar stores are made) rather than into the pockets of producers based in these United States. In the 1980s, the capitalistic-minded oligarchy that has been allowed to accumulate the vast majority of America's wealth saw an opportunity to further boost their profits, destroying the manufacturing economy in this country by shifting manufacturing capacity to foreign countries. As hundreds of thousands of our fellow citizens lost their manufacturing jobs, they had few options other than to buy the cheapest products in order to survive – they turned to dollar stores, thus supporting the very system that had swallowed up their jobs in the first place. The capitalistic oligarchy effectively enslaved the American consumer to the whims of foreign nations by shifting production overseas, to special economic zones that are, in everything but name, slave camps.

  I welcome our soon-to-be Chinese masters, and I would like to say Ni-Hao-Ma. As a Son of the American Revolution and a descendant of the Mayflower Pilgrims, my blood has been in America since day one. I, however, am not blindly patriotic, nor am I inextricably tied to our prevailing economic model of top-few capitalism. In fact, I find our current economic model, in which the fruits of the labor of an entire people are re-directed into the a pockets of a handful of corporate officers, deeply and intrinsically un-American. I am personally boycotting dollar stores (and, by extension, Walmart, Target, and the rest of the big-box stores), not to harm the Chinese economy, but in quiet mourning for our lost manufacturing economy. Join me if you wish, but know that this choice requires paying a bit more money for everyday goods, a sacrifice rewarded with a deep sense of pride and patriotic fervor.

  So, remember – if you aren't buying products made exclusively in the U.S.A, you are in part responsible for the gutting of the American manufacturing economy, for the demise of our middle class, for our high unemployment rate, and for the Chinese government's ability to purchase a significant portion of our national debt. Shopping at dollar stores is unlikely to have a positive economic impact on your personal finances, but it will certainly boost the profits of those very corporations that got us in this mess in the first place.

Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp

laurel of godlike achievement

  The founders of America were influenced primarily by two religions: Christianity and Hellenistic polytheism (see here). Our halls of government are festooned with plaques referencing the Christian texts (see here); let those same halls ring with praises for the people of this land who most readily display the virtues of those gods whose spirit filled the minds of Thomas Jefferson and his ilk.

  In the Christian tradition, achievements made by non-Christians are often ignored, swept under by the praises sung to individuals who have sacrificed solely for the cause of that religion, individuals who labored for what is considered, according that religion, positive change. The ancient Greeks, however, were not so partial to positivity – indeed, they preferred waiting to see how the chips would fall to the judging of actions based solely on how they helped to expand the scope of a particular religion.

  In the ancient Greek world, men who in battle displayed the guile, the strategic mind, the cunning, of goddess Athena were said to be the embodiment of that god, to be filled with her spirit. Great fashion designers were hailed as exhibiting the virtues of Arachne, the goddess of the seamstress, while skilled orators were said to be filled with the essence of Hermes, the god of public speaking.
  I hereby propose the creation of a group to determine, via a thorough and national vetting process, those Americans who in our times are most filled with the spirit of the Greek gods that so vastly influenced the founders of this nation.

  Great generals will receive the Laurel of the Owl and Shield for displaying heroic endeavor and cunning battle strategy, characteristics of goddess Athena.

  Great poets and authors will receive the Laurel of the Arrow and Lyre for displaying the poetry and truthfulness attributed to god Apollo.

  Great diplomats and merchants will receive the Laurel of the Winged Boot for exhibiting the diplomacy and cunning wiles attributed to god Hermes.

  Great societal disruptors and street artists will receive the Laurel of Helm and Spear for their civil disorder and manly courage, attributes they share with god Ares.

  Many other gods exist in the Olympian pantheon, and many more Laurels will be issued. The awards will be distributed in recognition of achievements that in any significant way affect the course of the nation, be they the actions of a spray-painting mad genius or the destruction of a Taliban outpost by special forces operatives dodging bullets in the torn landscape of Helmland province.

  The concept of the Laurel of Godlike American Achievement will celebrate people from all castes, all groups, all races, and all religions. It will allow the people to select from within their midst those individuals who exhibit the virtues we hold most dear, such as inventiveness, risk-taking, motherhood, and skateboarding where skateboarding is prohibited. It will whip the masses into a great churning froth of Happiness by giving them something to which to aspire, such as knowledge of the woodland arts (Artemis), metalworking and sculpture (Hephaestus), and the celebration of eternal youth (Dionysus), aspirations other than those based purely on the accumulation of capital or on the ability to repeat the same religious mantras for years on end.

  Your suggestions are welcome. Your readership is appreciated. Your hope springs eternal.

Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp

American theocracy - 3

  The following are quotes from the founders of the United States of America:
   "Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise." James Madison, 1774;
  "This would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it." John Adams, in a letter to Thomas Jefferson;
  "The way to see by faith is to shut the eye of reason." Benjamin Franklin, in Poor Richard's Almanac;
  "Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call on her tribunal for every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason than that of blindfolded fear." Thomas Jefferson, 1787;
  "And the day will come, when the mystical generation [birth] of Jesus, by the Supreme Being as his father, in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the generation [birth] of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter." Thomas Jefferson, in an 1823 letter to John Adams.

  The above statements were made by the individuals who created this nation. Similar quotes were made by George Washington, Thomas Paine, and Abraham Lincoln. The content and general message we can take from these quotes is that we were founded by men who shared a love for reason rather than men seeking the elevation of a particular religion. Never can we allow religious teaching to highjack our institutions of government: for to incorporate religious teachings amongst the laws and constitutions of our land would be to destroy the efforts of our founding fathers to create a nation of equal, rational, free-thinking, exceptional human beings.
  During a recent discussion, my counterpart stated that, The founding fathers were informed by Christianity; they drew from a common value system that was prevalent at the time. While this theory of osmotic religious indoctrination has some merit, I propose a theory that has perhaps equal merit. In the statements by Thomas Jefferson quoted above, we find two references to ancient Greek notions, namely Reason, and Athena (Minerva).
  If Christianity informed our founding fathers, and Jefferson foremost among them, then the polytheistic teachings and value systems of the authors of Hellenistic antiquity, who wrote such works as The Republic (Plato) and Politics (Aristotle), also informed our founding fathers. The notion of Reason – the fluid process of evaluation and decision-making by which man masters adversity – can be found in the writings of both Plato and Aristotle. The notion of goddess Athena – patroness of art, craft, guile, justice, strength, civilization, and wisdom – can also be found in the writings of these two men of old.
  Thomas Jefferson, an educated and well-read individual, in his crafting of the Declaration of Independence, drew upon the writings of the ancient political philosophers, and was sure to have been exposed considerably to the polytheistic notions of ancient times. And yet, when writing the Declaration, did he make mention of Zeus, or of any other gods from the Hellenistic pantheon? He makes no more mention of them than he does of YWH, the god of the Christians. If I were to stride into the Chambers of Congress and announce to those assembled that, since Greek deities informed our founding fathers, rites must be performed regularly to placate Poseidon, or to please Zeus, I would surely be laughed out of the room by all present. Congruently, any individuals entering said Chambers and demanding the observance of Christian rites is to be drowned out with raucous jesting.
  Our Constitution, in the first Amendment, states that no laws shall be passed that restrict the practice of, or that establish officially, any religion. This amendment gives the right to all who here dwell to practice their religion without fear of government repression or coercion. In my opinion, a person should be able to decide which god he or she should worship, which religion to practice, and what beliefs, however outlandish and outmoded they may seem to me, to hold. I rejoice in that freedom; I do not wish to see it ever taken from the people of this land. Efforts currently under way, however: to interfere with a woman's right to abort things growing in her private property, her body; to delineate the right to marry according to the religious tracts of one specific group; these efforts pose great risk to the first Amendment, to our Constitution, and to the foundations of this American republic.
  I applaud those individuals fighting against these efforts to abolish our core principles.
  I applaud the judges hearing these cases, and trust that they will approach the matter resplendent in the mantle of reason, their minds broad, their logic sound, knowing well of the dangers inherent to state-mandated religious doctrine.
  America, as a country, as a nation, as a concept, can only remain viable if it is founded on reason, justice, and the notion that all persons, regardless of class, creed, or color, can here find fertile grounds on which their dreams and aspirations may grow. If we allow even one snippet of religious code to find its way into our law, we will have failed our founding fathers by abandoning reason, and we will soon find ourselves in a barren and hostile wasteland rife with intolerance, and ruled by fear.
  This must not come to pass. Let us continue to fight – with patient voices and open minds – for the salvation of our nation.
  Stay true to our founding fathers: say NO to American theocracy.

Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp

American theocracy - 2

  In my writing, I am often more critical of Christianity than of the hundreds of other religions practiced every day in these United States. America is not a Christian nation, nor is it Muslim, Jewish, Buddhist, or Taoist. This nation was not founded upon the principles of any one belief system. Therefore, we as a nation cannot allow one religious group, under any circumstance, to incorporate their beliefs into the laws of our land; we can ill afford to take sitting down the intractable religious rhetoric spewing from the orifices of our public figures.

  Someone asked me recently: "Why are you so critical of Christianity? No one will defend Christianity, so you are better off taking Islam to task – that will drum up more controversy, boosting readership numbers on your blog in the process."

  I am loathe to attack Muslims because: they are not attempting to define legally the parameters of marriage according to their own religious texts; they are not attempting to restrict legally, again according to their religious texts, a woman's inalienable right to do to her property, her body, whatever she pleases (such as aborting a fetus), a right granted to all women under the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution; they are not attempting to claim for their own the reference in the Declaration of Independence to Nature's God, a moniker broad enough to encompass, in the spirit of true egalitarianism, the deities of all systems of belief, not a direct reference to one god in particular. (If, instead of Nature's God the Declaration read Yahweh, I would concede the field to the Christians, but it does not, so I will stand my ground.)

  In comparison, Christians are laboring to define marriage according to the books they consider holy (see here); they are trying to take from the women of this land the right to their bodies, their property, by making abortions illegal (see here); they claim that Nature's God refers to Yahweh, the god of the Christians, the father of Jesus (see here), when Nature's God could refer to anything from the Universe, to Chaos, to the Great Spirit once known to the Indian tribes.

  We hear in the news about the dangers of an Islamic caliphate arising in the Middle East. (For one example of this, see here.) Here in America, we face the dangers of an impending Christianity-based theocracy. Any system of government that rules according to the code of a specific religion will, invariably, subjugate those people living under it to its own laws; it will stifle freedom of expression by striking fear in the hearts of honest but non-believing citizens; it will, when challenged, resort to barbaric and unreasonable action to silence dissent; and, most crucially, it will render unattainable to ourselves and to our Posterity the Blessings of Liberty by coercing us into recognizing and worshiping a suicidal zombie who, being “one with god,” as the “holy spirit” impregnated his own mother.

  For an example of the horrors inherent to religious rule, look into life in Afghanistan under the Taliban. We, as a nation, must fight the efforts currently under way to further codify into law one religious doctrine in particular, no matter how long that religion has been practiced here or what percentage of the population holds it to be true. We cannot allow our fundamental principles to be made subservient to the beliefs of one specific religion: our republic, our rights, our liberty, and our lives are at risk. American flexibility and inventiveness will suffer under religious rule – these characteristics that we hold so highly will wither and die if confined in a closed and unchanging framework based on the writings of a desert people who lived in the Iron Age many thousands of years ago. To do any of these things would be to shatter fully our frail democracy, our tenuous republic.

  Future generations will cheer our efforts at maintaining a republic dedicated to the principles upon which it was founded, those being the general Welfare, a more perfect Union, the establishment of Justice, the domestic Tranquility, the common defence, and the Blessings of Liberty. If our nation were to fall under the sway of the religious zealot, even a supposedly pious zealot possessing of convincing fear-mongery, these founding principles would fall prey to the demands of righteous necessity.

  The Christians of America have not been subjected to a long Train of Abuses and Usurpations – thus, they have no Right, no Duty, to throw off such Government and to provide new Guards for their future Security: their communities are not under siege, their places of worship are being built regardless of location, they are not being attacked in taxi cabs, or in the streets. I believe in freedom of religion. I envy the faithful for their unfaltering belief. I support fully the right to pray to the god of your choosing in public or in private. I will not, however, stand idly by as born-again, my-way-or-the-highway, ultra-conservative types vie for this country's highest office with dreams of dominionism dancing in their eyes.

Fight theocracy in the U.S.A. Act now, for the forces of oppression seldom rest.

Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp

American theocracy - 1

  A dangerous effort is under way in these United States of America – the effort to define the concept of marriage, and its societal and legal ramifications, according to the code of a specific religion. If allowed to progress unopposed, this effort will abolish the concept of the separation of church and state as set forth in the U.S. Constitution. This effort is an assault on the liberty of the American people, and we can ill afford to further bind our nation to the tenets of one religion among the many that here persist. Just as we would not incorporate into our most hallowed documents the parameters of Shari'a law, or the teachings of Lord Krishna, we must not shackle ourselves to the strictures of the Christian religion, even though that religion is practiced by a relatively large portion of the U.S. population.

  For if these efforts were to succeed in binding the concept of marriage to the code of one specific religion, we would be forced to abide by all of Yahweh's clearly-stated mandates, including the one regarding the murder, in front of the father's house, of new wives found deflowered (Deuteronomy 22:20-21 NAB), mandates that would result in the abolition of Justice, the loss of the domestic Tranquility, and the nullification of the Blessings of Liberty – our code of laws would become subject to the whims of a blood-thirsty and destructive god with a long and well-documented history of genocide and mass murder (see the Midianites, and the denizens of Jericho, Sodom, and Gomorrah).

  George Washington and John Adams said, and the contemporary Congress agreed unanimously, “The government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion” (see the Treaty of Tripoli). These were more than idle words spoken in private, more than a backroom speech made to moneyed sycophants: these words were part of an official declaration made to a foreign government in hope of a future free of strife; they were written to placate the heated ire of another people by stating that we as a nation will not, under any circumstance, abandon rationality or assume to pass legislation based on the ethical code put forth by a god that demands loyalty above all, a god that ignores the balance of our needs and our desires, a god that seeks to rid us of the knowledge of a unifying and perpetual energy that lurks among the passions of our lives, a god that demands strict adherence to the myriad rules contained within the Christian bible, but one religious book among many.

  We are not a nation established on the concepts of one particular religion. We are a nation founded to establish Justice and to secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity. We do this by guiding our country, through legislative act, executive lunge, and judicial rule, via rational and lively debate, toward the emancipation of Happiness and Security among the People, not through rule of fear or codex, but through the application of our vast collective potential in service to all peoples of this land, not simply to a diminishing minority of the fabulously rich.

  Fight this impending American theocracy. If your governor prays to Jesus for an end to the woes facing your state, vote him out of office as soon as you can. If your Congresswoman claims to be guided by voices in her head that she thinks are her god, if she boasts of blind fealty to god and husband, write to her and demand she relinquish her post. There is room for faith in the hearts of the American people, but it must remain there and not pollute the halls of government – in those halls is room only for rational and measured debate focused on securing to ourselves and our Posterity the Blessings of Liberty.

Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp

on dating & economics

  The intricate dance within a romantic relationship can be compared to the efforts of economists struggling to contain erratic market fluctuations. In either situation, the party that responds to the sweeping changes taking place in his counterpart will find himself on the losing side, forever racing to keep up, forever implementing new methods to bring to heel the unfathomable maelstrom he thinks he has the capacity to control. Whether this unfathomable maelstrom be the mind of a woman or the global crude-oil market, the economist, an outside observer inherently blind to the vast and incalculable influences that shape the mood of his counterpart, will enact measures he hopes will soothe the fury of that which he holds dear, often sacrificing long-term stability for the brief elation of short-term gain.
  I have learned one thing about relationships, one truth I have had to relearn time and again: the less you try to control your counterpart, the better off you both will be. When done with patient persistence, attempts to fathom your lover and to steer him in a direction you think best can indeed effect change; the nature of this change, however, will likely range from intensive introspection, over increased volatility, culminating in full-blown systemic meltdown. It is impossible to predict accurately how your counterpart will react to the pressures you have applied – any action will have an appropriate and equal reaction, but its full scope will forever remain known only to the reactive party.
  Imagine for a moment your closest friend, the innumerable events and countless little decisions that helped to mold him into the person you (think you) know today, the environmental and gentic forces that influence continuously the shaping of his being. Now imagine hundreds, thousands, millions of individuals of similar complexity who by going about their daily rounds become what we call markets, with every act shifting the fortunes of various businesses, with each transaction affecting the cycles of supply and demand, their every decision impacting and being impacted upon by unique and innumerable forces. It is all but impossible to know the mind of your closest friend – how could anyone claim to know the minds of thousands of strangers in thousands of different locations across the globe?
  Controlling your lover is a Sisyphean struggle full of complications that subside one day only to reappear the next, a cruel practice that will gut your lover's soul, leaving behind a mindless and docile golem content to do your bidding, within her no room for independent thought, no capacity for abiding Happiness, the dark promise of future abuse her only constant. The controlling lover exhibits deep insecurity and persistent self-loathing every time he endeavors to bend another to his will; the controlling economist exhibits appalling arrogance and damnable small-mindedness every time she endeavors to shape the course of markets influenced by forces far beyond her ability to reckon.
  Just as in dating, attempts to control the market are bound to cause unforeseen complications, new trials that slither forth from the stumps of those just severed, new issues that reduce the economist to the point of mindless docility, her energies sapped by the despair that comes with the realization that, as a single piece of an enormous, shifting puzzle, her actions are unlikely to have the desired affect. In a romantic relationship, the supposedly dominant party can achieve an approximation of control, whereas in the economic arena, a market will defy all attempts at subjugation, the sheer number of influencing factors contributing to its enduring volatility.
  Every economic theory, be it that of John Keynes or Adam Smith, Milton Friedman or Joan Robinson, has proven incapable of condensing the markets into manageable and predictable entities – invariably, each falls short of stabilizing that which cannot be stabilized, causing long term damage greater than the short term benefits with which it is credited. In the romantic as well as in the economic relationship, the method that promises the greatest liberty to the individual is that which disposes of all restrictions on thought and deed, the one that allows for the unfettered fluctuation of markets, the one preferred by humanity since we stood upright and learned to use our thumbs: anarcho-capitalism.

Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp

on siding with liberty

  In Monday night's CNN/Tea Party Republican debate, Governor Rick Perry of Texas claimed that he "is always going to err on the side of life." Mr. Perry, you have frequently failed to err on the side of life, sending two hundred and thirty four men to their deaths as governor of your state. Mr. Perry, you may keep pretending to err on the side of life when it suits your political agenda: the American people will err on the side of liberty, always and forever.
  At the same debate, Michelle Bachmann bemoaned attempts to force insurance companies to offer the Morning After Pill free of charge (which would grant the women of this country the liberty to abort unwanted fetuses) immediately after she had complained about mandatory vaccinations against HPV, claiming that such vaccinations violated the liberty of the young girls they aim to protect.
  Which will it be, Rick - liberty unfettered by morality or religion, or the gleeful execution of your fellow man? You do not always errs on the side of life, governor - rather, you have exhibited a ready acceptance of, and a proven zeal for, death.
  Which will it be, Michelle? You advocate for one group's liberty at the same time that you decry the liberty of women seeking to rid their bodies of unwanted growths (ask a doctor: fetuses are not babies, and therefore not people, until they are born); you cannot have both, so do you prefer complete liberty, or liberty restricted on moralistic or religious grounds? Would you pass laws as president to expand the role of your chosen religion in American society? If so, for the sake of the enduring Liberty of the American people, you should drop out of the race, now.
Life is worthless without liberty, so give me liberty, or give me death.

on nine eleven

  On this day we mark a decade since the events surrounding the 11th of September, 2001. Many changes have taken place in our nation since that bright summer day, some that restrict us in our liberty, others that inconvenience to little noticeable advantage. Absent clear and defining purpose, we have foundered collectively among the shoals of short-sightedness and greed, bruised badly by the false promise of unlimited consumer credit, our public figures beating the drums of nationalism and xenophobia in tones ever more vituperative and religious, the cultural diversity of our peoples muted by creeping corporate homogenization, our inventiveness forgotten in the face of gadgets that rarely prove convenient to the economics of time, our artistic creativity lost in the mirror-maze of sequels, mash-ups, and gimmickry, our citizens willfully abusing the national flag in misguided attempts to prove to others their patriotism, that deep and pure sense of pride that shines most brightly when it is cultivated within the confines of the heart, a sense that shrinks when displayed too prominently.
  I was in Manhattan that day; I volunteered three days later in the dust and wreckage blanketing the North Cove; I lost a fraternity brother who had just started work high up in the North Tower. But, then as now, I will never succumb to fear, never believe in America-über-alles, never discriminate against someone because of their choice of religion, never accept torture as a means necessary to the common defense, never disgrace the Stars and Stripes to prove to another my love for country, and never cease in my attempts to secure the Blessings of Liberty to myself, my brothers and sisters, and our Posterity.
  My the people who died on that September day not so long ago continue to rest in peace.


Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp

on our current dictatorship

  Michelle Bachmann, on Monday 05 September 2011 (see here), warned that the federal government would become “a dictator over our lives” if it were to make the purchasing of health insurance conditional to citizenship. In support of the point she is trying to make, and to illuminate the majestic, abiding truth behind her words, let us review some of the other conditions that state and federal governments have forced upon the American people, conditions that violate our liberty and that Design to reduce us under absolute Despotism:
  The motor vehicle operators of this nation are being forced to insure themselves and their conveyances;
  The parents of this nation are being forced to educate their children;
  The users of this nation are being forced to choose between alcohol, tobacco, and caffeine, all other drugs having been declared illegal;
  The heterosexual couples of this nation are being exposed to the threat of prosecution if found living together while not married (in Florida);
  The homosexual couples of this nation are being restricted in their right to marry;
  The women of this nation are being besieged by forces seeking to restrict their right to terminate unwanted pregnancies;
  The property-owners of this nation are being forced to pay school taxes, even if they are childless;
  The sick patients of this nation are being forced to suffer needlessly, the cures and remedies potential to stem-cell research unexplored and otherwise retarded by the staunch efforts of moralistic and religious extremists;
  The non-believers of this nation are being forced to abide by the tenets of a religion not of their choosing (Pennsylvania's blue laws, laws defining marriage according to the Christian bible), and they have little choice but to handle currency which bears the religious statement, “In God We Trust;”
  The workers of this nation are being forced to live in poverty, their jobs having been sold to the lowest foreign bidder by native corporations seeking to maximize dividends at any cost;
  The peace-loving people of this nation have been forced to accept torture as a means essential to the common defense of their homeland;
  The gullible inhabitants of this nation have been forced to live in constant fear of the specter of terrorism, their fists balling at the mere mention of Islam, their anxiety fueled by the vague warnings and hysterical rhetoric emanating from TV personalities and politicians alike;
  The minority populations of this nation have been forced to live as second-class citizens, their communities neglected, their schools under-funded, their young people incarcerated disproportionately, and their adults abandoned to the ravages of disease and addiction;
  The tranquil people of this nation are being forced to defend constantly the sanctity of their persons and other such property from unscrupulous local police officers, who, in blatant disregard of any pledge they might have made to defend and uphold the Constitution, too often resort to tricking the
people into relinquishing the protections granted them in the Bill of Rights;
  The millions of registered voters of this nation are being forced to select from candidates of but two political parties, political parties that because of their size, complexity, and ossification cannot possibly endeavor to represent the myriad opinions of a people as diverse as our own;
  The once-proud citizens of this nation have been forced to give up their inalienable rights, their elected officials passing legislation (Patriot Act) to this effect soon after 11 September 2001, legislation that has left the citizenry exposed to willful and unwarranted intrusions into its private affairs.

  Americans do not fear the threat of dictatorship: we have already engaged the existing dictatorship. I call on Michelle Bachmann to expand her efforts, and to join in the struggle to right the wrongs listed above, if not to satisfy her base, then to prove to the rest of the voters that she is prepared to battle oppression regardless of form or frequency.
  It matters little our color, conviction, or creed – we must never forget that our republic is a fragile and fleeting affair, an unusual configuration too easily corrupted by those with much to gain, too readily abandoned by those with nothing to lose. Only through vigilant and persistent action can we rekindle the Torch of Progress, and regain for ourselves and our Posterity those Blessings of Liberty that for generations have been denied us.

Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp

on acting like a bitch

The mentality of the average American voter bears certain resemblance to that of a skittish dog rescued from the pound. No matter her physical size or how well she is treated by her adoptive family, the canine will likely never shake the Fear put into her by her abusive former master(s). If when out walking she is spooked, she at times will shake off her leash and bound away at high speed, her face seeming to express an exuberant anxiety. Gracefully eluding all attempts at capture, one of the few options for bringing her back under control is to trick her into entering a vehicle (an action that normally means a trip to the park or some such thing). Once inside the vehicle, she forgets the potential for freedom unbound that lies but a quick tug of the head away, and allows the leash to be bound around her neck once again.
  So it is often with voters in this nation, especially with those who were so scared by the events whose ten year anniversary we will soon mark that they sat quietly by, cowed by Fear-driven propaganda into allowing the Patriot Act to pass unopposed, believing of the lies spewing forth from the suck-holes of power-hungry politicians desperate to expand their base, cheering as we joined the short-list of nations guilty of initiating a war of aggression, re-electing a president who forever tarnished America's long and honorable traditions by valuing the paltry benefits of enhanced interrogation over the unalienable and immutable Rights of the individual.
  A dog raised to fear is unlikely to shake its burden; an individual provided the opportunity to fear will settle gratefully into the welcoming cocoon that fear provides, forever ignorant of the beautiful savagery inherent to mankind, never doubting the actions or the rhetoric of persons claiming to have all the answers, forever trusting any individual who stokes the fires of that fear and who makes skin-deep promises that evaporate immediately upon re-election.
  When the conditions seem right, the voter is likely to break free and to dash about wildly, demanding changes in the status quo through the implementation of untested strategies championed as the solutions to our economic and societal woes, believing with exuberant anxiety in the clever deceptions of the heads shouting on TV, scrambling madly for the first door that promises even the faintest hint of Happiness only to succumb instantly, wild-eyed and out-of-breath, to fear's soothing grip as the shackles of ignorance and repression are calmly reapplied to the cardinal points of the soul.
  It is without question easier for the People to accept the oppressions to which they have become accustomed than for us to venture forth, without a backward glance or the slightest hesitation, in search of new Guards for our future Security. Unlike a tortured and skittish bitch, however, once we have broken free of the chains that have held us in check, we have the capacity to maintain that newfound freedom by consuming news from various unrelated sources, by being wary always of the power of propaganda, and by not forgetting for an instant that, as Frank Herbert said best in his book Dune, “Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little death that brings total obliteration.”
  Fear in itself is a sufferable Evil, but fear employed by the highest powers as a tool for controlling the hearts and minds of the People is an Evil that has ceased to be sufferable. Freed from constriction, the mind is capable of feats far-reaching and grand, while a mind hobbled by perpetual paranoia functions similar to that of a broken, groveling beast who understands only the bite of the lash.

Speak freely. Stay vigilant. Spread liberty.

Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp