This Could Be A Full Time Job For Me

So on this fine DC morning I was planning on writing about Congress voting to buy themselves three private jets after bashing the leaders of the Big Three for taking private transport to ask for bailout money. Instead, however, there is a much more sinister issue that has come to light in the past 48 hours and that is of the White House asking citizens to forward "fishy" information concerning health care to the administration at the email address: flag@whitehouse.gov

The whole article published by the White House can be read in its entirely here: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/Facts-Are-Stubborn-Things/

This should be a huge cause for concern. The White House is going to develop a database on who people are that disagree with ObamaCare. The Administration will have access to e-mail addresses, IP addresses, and identities of those who have differing opinions. I hope you find this as unconstitutional as I do. Who decides what is considered disinformation and, therefore, "fishy"? I certainly don't trust Obama's judgement for that!

When citizens know that if they express an opinion that is against that of the administration they will be tracked, they will hesitate to express that opinion. That, right there, is undemocratic. The whole point of our government is to give everyone a voice. So what is the point of having a say if you are scared to use it? Webster's defines Democracy as "a government by the people" so why, in a democracy, is one person allowed to corrupt the voice of the people?

What if Bush had done this? I am NOT a fan of Bush in the least but there would have been a MAJOR uproar had he proposed something similar. So why the love for Obama? Why the double standard? Just because he's black? Just because he's a Dem? Just because he is fashionable? Whatever the excuse, it is a truth that must be stopped. You can't argue the fact that Obama has been given a easy ride so far and has taken advantage of it 100%. Let's wake up and challenge the "Hope" and "Change" that is going to destroy our liberties.

So everyone that reads this, I ask that you please e-mail flag@whitehouse.gov and tell them how you feel, I already have several times. Tell them how un-American it is that they are monitoring private citizens. Do not be afraid. Take a stand. "People should not fear their governments, the governments should fear the people" -T Jefferson, as American as they come ladies and gentlemen.

This tactic wreaks of Joe McCarthy, Joesph Stalin, Richard Nixon, and Adolf Hitler (and we all know how history judged them). What makes it different when Obama does it? Think about it PLEASE!

I'm Getting Old

Disclaimer: If you don't understand what I'm talking about here, you are too old.

I stopped by Starbucks this morning as I do a few times per week. As I am waiting for my fru-fru, sugar and cocaine infused "coffee", Nirvana's In Bloom comes up on my iPod. I couldn't help but thinking "Kurt would kick my ass if he knew how mainstream I have gotten in the last few years" (Yes, SBux and Nirvana are both products of Seattle but that's about all they have in common).

It has been a LONG time since I have listened to Nirvana with any regularity (6 years at least) but in the last few months, I have re-discovered my love for grunge rock (it might have something to do with me feeling like "the man" is getting me down, thanks Boh'Rock). This has got me to thinking...... where has the in-your-face, kiss-my-ass mentality gone that I knew so well as a kid? Maybe it's just me getting older but I do feel as if we are just too accepting of everything. When did the counter-culture attitude of the Fight Club and Black Flag persuasion die out?

Let's look at Green Day as an example (not one of my favorites but a great example of my point). Who remembers Dookie and Kerplunk? Those were albums I could listen to the entire way through. There were messages of hatred and angst captured there that had not been mitigated by mainsteam culture. Compare this to the "Green Day" of today. Every song is moaning and whining about Bush this, anti-war that. Where did the heart go? Where are the balls? The Green Day I grew up with didn't give a damn about the political process, all it cared about was destruction and telling the man to get off their back (I did most of my growing up in California so the effects could have been more pronounced for me). I am using Green Day as a mirror for what seems to be happening to society as a whole. We have accepted that this is the way things are and we think we need to conform (I am just as guilty as anyone here).

Would Nirvana have gone the same way as Green Day? I certainly hope not (Sorry but thank god Kurt died. Always go out on top of your game).

I guess what I'm saying here (this hasn't been my most articulate posting, I know) is let's think a bit more outside the box. Let's ask "why?" a little more often. Question authority (but please don't go home and die your hair blue, I did that once and it turned out pretty poorly). Let's bring back the Rape Me and Lithium attitude and crack some skulls (so to speak). So go home, put on Nevermind, and crack open a Zima for old times sake (my spell check doesn't like Zima, such a sign of the times).

Sorry for the departure from my usual Libertarian tirade although for some of you, this was probably a welcome occurrence.

Cash for Clunkers Rant

Now I know I haven't written about the CARS program (aka Cash for Clunkers) before today because I was hoping I would be wrong and it would do some good. Of course I don't agree with the government giving money to individuals to turn in their cars and buy more fuel efficient ones but I was desperately hoping something positive would come from it and I would be wrong....... too bad I wasn't.

Anyway, what everyone is talking about today is how wildly successful this program has been seeing that funds ($1 billion) were expended in 4 days (more or less). If the goal was to use that money as fast as possible, then yes it was a resounding success (too bad this is the way most people think). But really the goal was to provide a financial incentive to people who are driving older cars to turn that car in and buy a new, more fuel efficient car. An additional hope for this program was to help GM, Chrysler, and Ford move their inventory (a neat marketing trick from GM's management aka Obama).

There are two major issues with these goals the first problem being with getting the old cars off the road. It takes a lot of energy and effort to dismantle and crush a vehicle. You have to dispose of all the plastics, recycle every possible component, and dump the rest in a landfill. This entire process uses massively more energy than can be saved by a marginal increase in gas mileage. Also, let's not forget that a huge amount of energy also went into building the new car that person is going to buy (an even higher amount if it is a hybrid, the production process for hybrid batteries is grossly environmentally degrading which is why I have no respect for any hybrid driver for it shows their utter lack of intelligence or willingness to research a major investment. A real environmentalist does not drive a hybrid). So there are two huge energy usages in the creation and destruction of the cars and the trade off is a small (like 5mpg) increase in gas mileage. That does not make sense to me and what I would really like to know (and trust me, the government did not research this before they initiated this half cocked program) is how long you would have to drive a vehicle that gets 5 mpg more in order to balance out the energy costs associated with the destruction of the old vehicle and the creation of the new one?

Second major issue: helping domestic auto makers. It makes sense to me that the US government (which has a vested interest with GM) would like to keep domestic manufacturers afloat, they would like some return on investment like any investor with a pulse would. So we would expect that the numbers would show that the cars bought with money from the CARS program would mostly be made by GM, Ford, and Chrysler. Well the numbers are in!!!! But guess what, O! won't share them with us. They would rather us commit to giving them another $2 billion for a Round 2 of the program before releasing the figures (what happened to transparency?). WHO ARE YOU KIDDING? No one in their right mind would buy a car from any of those companies when their respective futures are so uncertain? Who would buy a car with a ten year warranty if the company can't promise it won't go under in the next 6 months? And let's not forget that American cars are generally sh*t anyway (some of my friends own American, sorry guys but your cars rank somewhere between gum on the bottom of my shoe and my flaking skin as a result of my latest sunburn).

This is like telling your parents that your grades are low because they don't let you stay out late enough on school nights and if they would just let you stay out until 2am instead of midnight, your grades would go up (I use metaphors because most people are too dumb to understand what I'm actually saying..... and I think I'm really clever).

So let's let this program die. The money is going to foreign companies when the intention was to keep to here. It is probably going to be detrimental to the environment in the long run. And it uses our money for it all. So please just stop.

^ Credit Nate Beeler for this cartoon. Nate, you often brighten my morning. Thanks so much.

(This was reproduced without his written or implied permission, please don't sue)

Update!!!

Here is a list of the top ten cars turned in to the government under the CARS program and it proves my point about American cars being absolute crap (I have to admit, I did love my first car to death and that was a 1997 Jeep Grand Cherokee. I still miss it today)

1. 1998 Ford Explorer
2. 1997 Ford Explorer
3. 1996 Ford Explorer
4. 1999 Ford Explorer
5. Jeep Grand Cherokee
6. Jeep Cherokee
7. 1995 Ford Explorer
8. 1994 Ford Explorer
9. 1997 Ford Windstar
10. 1999 Dodge Caravan

Here is a list of the cars bought under the CARS program. Honestly, it isn't as bad as I would have thought but it still ain't pretty.

1. Ford Focus
2. Honda Civic
3. Toyota Corolla
4. Toyota Prius
5. Ford Escape
6. Toyota Camry
7. Dodge Caliber
8. Hyundai Elantra
9. Honda Fit
10. Chevy Cobalt

The Sh*t Keeps Piling Up

Sorry for my hiatus everybody, I was at a conference up in Maryland for work. But now I am back and more upset than ever.


God Bless Canada! The Canadian Free Press anyway. They are reporting on the staff hired to manage Michelle Obama's agenda and activities. If that last sentence doesn't automatically make you sit up and get you a little verclempt, let's remember that she holds no official government post, no elected position, and makes zero decisions what-so-ever. So you say, "Okay, she can have a secretary to handle her public appearances" and I might agree with that but that is not the case in the least. Below is a list of everyone that works for her directly and how much they make per year:


-$172,2000 - Sher, Susan (CHIEF OF STAFF)
-$140,000 - Frye, Jocelyn C. (DEPUTY ASSISTANT TO THE PRESIDENT AND DIRECTOR OF POLICY AND PROJECTS FOR THE FIRST LADY)
-$113,000 - Rogers, Desiree G. (SPECIAL ASSISTANT TO THE PRESIDENT AND WHITE HOUSE SOCIAL SECRETARY)
-$102,000 - Johnston, Camille Y. (SPECIAL ASSISTANT TO THE PRESIDENT AND DIRECTOR OF COMMUNICATIONS FOR THE FIRST LADY)
-Winter, Melissa E. (SPECIAL ASSISTANT TO THE PRESIDENT AND DEPUTY CHIEF OF STAFF TO THE FIRST LADY)
-$90,000 - Medina, David S. (DEPUTY CHIEF OF STAFF TO THE FIRST LADY)
-$84,000 - Lelyveld, Catherine M. (DIRECTOR AND PRESS SECRETARY TO THE FIRST LADY)
-$75,000 - Starkey, Frances M. (DIRECTOR OF SCHEDULING AND ADVANCE FOR THE FIRST LADY)
-$70,000 - Sanders, Trooper (DEPUTY DIRECTOR OF POLICY AND PROJECTS FOR THE FIRST LADY)
-$65,000 - Burnough, Erinn J. (DEPUTY DIRECTOR AND DEPUTY SOCIAL SECRETARY)
Reinstein, Joseph B. (DEPUTY DIRECTOR AND DEPUTY SOCIAL SECRETARY)
-$62,000 - Goodman, Jennifer R. (DEPUTY DIRECTOR OF SCHEDULING AND EVENTS COORDINATOR FOR THE FIRST LADY)
-$60,000 - Fitts, Alan O. (DEPUTY DIRECTOR OF ADVANCE AND TRIP DIRECTOR FOR THE FIRST LADY)
-Lewis, Dana M. (SPECIAL ASSISTANT AND PERSONAL AIDE TO THE FIRST LADY)
-$52,500 - Mustaphi, Semonti M. (ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR AND DEPUTY PRESS SECRETARY TO THE FIRST LADY)
-$50,000 - Jarvis, Kristen E. (SPECIAL ASSISTANT FOR SCHEDULING AND TRAVELING AIDE TO THE FIRST LADY)
-$45,000 - Lechtenberg, Tyler A. (ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR OF CORRESPONDENCE FOR THE FIRST LADY)
-Tubman, Samantha (DEPUTY ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR,SOCIAL OFFICE)
-$40,000 - Boswell, Joseph J. (EXECUTIVE ASSISTANT TO THE CHIEF OF STAFF TO THE FIRST LADY)
-$36,000 - Armbruster, Sally M. (STAFF ASSISTANT TO THE SOCIAL SECRETARY)
-Bookey, Natalie (STAFF ASSISTANT)
-Jackson, Deilia A. (DEPUTY ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR OF CORRESPONDENCE FOR THE FIRST LADY)




I just did the math and that adds up to $831,500 and some of those people don't even have salaries attached! So let's call it around a cool million. What do all these people do? How many events can she POSSIBLY have? Why does she get ANY of these people working for her? She is not making any decisions or policy in the name of the United States so what is the point of all this? Give her a cell phone and a calendar and let her earn her own keep.




Flash back to the election, Palin got slammed for spending campaign funds on clothes for her and her husband. While I'm not a fan of Palin or her nutjob beliefs, I see her spending of this money as in better faith than paying the salaries of Michelle's entourage. At least Palin had a goal in mind, get her and McCain elected (after all, isn't that what campaign funds are for?) while Michelle is just passing the time she's in the White House (hopefully only 4 years or even less). I'm going to refrain from going into the whole "the media will crucify the conservative for the lesser evil while letting the liberal skate" tirade that I hear almost daily.




I'm going to be brutally honest here. I have a passionate hatred for Michelle. I hate her guts. She is about as un-American as you can get (where's Joesph McCarthy when you need him?). I hate that everyone likes her. I hate how she thinks she is a fashionista. And now I hate her for taking my taxes and hiring a staff of over-glorified secretaries.













































But really, what can be done? What recourse is there? She doesn't hold an elected position so we can't vote her out of office. We could try tarring and feathering but that is so 200 years ago (there would be an ironic historical accuracy for her crime however). Here is the crux of the issue, there is no way for us citizens to have any real impact or give any meaningful feedback as to where our tax dollars are really going. The federal government has gotten so bloated that it is absolutely impossible to have any real oversight. Essentially the government is seen as a bottomless piggy bank and the spending skyrockets accordingly. But, guess what, the money comes from two places: our pockets and foreign investment and both sources are being maxed out.

























The public is being fleeced, our pockets are being picked, we are being robbed blind......

When Did Big Brother Become Our Friend?

During my trip into work in the morning, I usually watch a movie on iPod. My movie du jour is that of Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine (I try to expose myself to both sides of the spectrum, the left wing commies and the right wing zealots, as they say "know thine enemy"). Aside from the fact that I, as a red blooded American, detest Moore as a person, I was struck as to how he actually WANTS a enormously powerful, Big Brother sort of centralized government and I feel this kind of idea is turning into a political movement today.

If we look at the tactics he uses we can see how he feels about American gun ownership. He demonizes the Michigan Militia (militia kicked the British out of here, remember?), he makes fun of Charleton Heston to his face for owning loaded firearms, highlights a bank's free gun program, and shames K Mart into ceasing to sell ammunition. Now, while I'm all for Moore being able to say what he wants, I am just baffled as to how our society has come full circle and we are now producing people like this that are just bashing the freedoms that were the battle cry of the late 1700s.

The whole point of the American Revolution was to allow every American citizen the freedom to live their lives the way they saw fit. They can own guns if they want, they can drink themselves stupid, they can build a fallout shelter in their backyard if they want. The beauty of this country (or at least it was at one point) was that every individual chose how to live their own life and that was all there was to it. The government didn't tell you what you could or could not do, where you could or could not do it, or insist on you paying for another citizen's health care. You make stupid choices with your life, you had to live with it and the government wouldn't bail your moronic ass out.

Sorry, I got side tracked, back to Moore. So, now, instead of having the government tell us that gun ownership should be restricted, we have actual American citizens shouting the same message as their government. This is what really scares me. This shows an inherent trust of the federal government (remember that one of the tenets of the American nation was that of a weaker central government with the real power residing with the states). So as a nation that grew out of anti-government unrest we now have returned to giving up own personal freedoms and we're happy about it (whoever works PR for the US government should be paid really well).

This situation is downright scary. Its not that the government is insisting on us giving up our freedoms that is scary (I'm used to that from Bush/Cheney) but the the fact that we, the citizens, are insisting the government take them from us! The American public is more-or-less saying "I would much rather have government make my decisions for me than have to be responsible for my own choices". I understand that making big ticket decisions can be hard, but do you really want politicians and bureaucrats in DC making those choices for you? Who knows your situation better, you or them? People are just uneasy about having to live with the results if they choose poorly. Well..... that's part of life, get over it.

The solution to this problem of ignorance of the American citizenry? I don't know but what I do know is that the first thing that has to go is this trust most people have for the US government (no, I'm not some crack pot that is going to pull an Oklahoma City but the point remains, how do we get rid of this unearned trust?).

Our relationship to the US government is like this: you have a wife and she convinces you to move overseas to make more money for you and her, then when you're there she keeps insisting on more and more and more money and won't take no for an answer, you divorce her and the legal battle lasts for years, you stay overseas and meet someone else. Are you going to rush into another marriage and give all your money away again? Of course not, so why are we doing just that here?

Parting thought: Do you want to have to pay for the medical care of Michael Moore?

Neither do I, I don't have enough money to cover that many bypass surgeries.

Racism is an equal opportunity employer

His Illustriousness B Obama spoke out against the arrest of Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates. This came at the tail end of Obama's speech about healthcare (more like advertisement for it) when a Chicago Sun Times correspondent asked Obama's opinion on the matter and what it said about race relations in the US. This means we got to hear Obama's opinion more or less unfiltered by speech writers and his advisers (AKA they didn't have time to make sure everything he said offended absolutely no one).



So what came out of O!'s mouth was that the police had "acted stupidly". While disregarding the fact that Obama knows little to nothing about the incident, I must say that two black men breaking into the home in a predominately white neighborhood should, without a doubt, create a stir. And the fact of the matter is that a citizen called the complaint in! It isn't like the police just saw two black men randomly sitting on the front porch of this house, they were responding to a call from a concerned citizen (funny no one is saying that citizen is racist here..... they aren't at all, I'm just making a point that people rush to demonize police). If the police hadn't acted on the tip and it turned out to actually be two thieves and the police let the home get broken into, the community would be livid!





So here is what it looked like from the police side of the story (and you can't tell me you wouldn't have acted the same way):


-Call comes in from a neighbor saying that two men were breaking into a home
-Police respond to that residence
-Police question the man (Gates but not yet identified to police) inside the house
-Man refuses to provide proof of who he is
-Man verbally abuses officers
-Officers ask man to come outside
-Man continues to yell
-Police arrest man for disorderly conduct
-Police verify his identity after arresting him
-Police release him




That, right there, is text book police work. You see something fishy going on, you err on the side of caution and make sure everything is copacetic (because *gasp* sometimes criminals lie about who they are). Had they not followed procedure and it turned out the house was actually being broken in to, there would have been hell to pay (for one, I'd rather be in jail for an hour for breaking into my own house than let someone who claimed to be me steal all my stuff).



So now, let's turn to Gates. He is crying racism over the entire incident. You know what that says to me? The first thing to come into his mind is "I'm being arrested for being black", not "I'm being arrested for breaking into a home". Doesn't this show who the racist really is?



And let's look at the officer in question here, Sgt. James Crowley. Here is a guy that taught classes in how to avoid racial profiling to other officers (BTW a black police commissioner picked him for that job). Don't you think he might know a thing or two about how to avoid racial profiling? And I also have a feeling that if Crowley were black, we wouldn't be hearing a peep about racism but the event would have gone down the EXACT same way.


So now Obama answers a few questions about this incident at his health care press conference and ends up saying that the officers 'acted stupidly'. There are a few problems here: (1) Obama has no first hand knowledge of what went on, (2) he doesn't defer to the judgment of law enforcement who were actually there, (3) he actually questions the law enforcement process of public safety by saying that officers following procedure were acting stupidly, (4) he implied that race had a role in this at all because it was a black man being arrested.




Now I hate to jump to conclusions here (who am I kidding, I LOVE jumping to conclusions!), but in any situation like this I say "would this be an issue if both people were white, black, yellow, green, etc?" The answer is HELL NO, there would have been no shout from Gates about this being a race issue, Jesse and Al wouldn't be back up on their respective soap boxes, and Obama wouldn't be questioning the integrity of a highly respected law enforcement officer.





So Gates, Al, Jesse, and Obama, to save yourself from appearing racist (even though anyone with an ounce of intelligence knows you are), just shut up.

Update: Obama and Gates were friends before the incident (SHOCKING!), more about Crowley is coming out about him being an upstanding citizen and family man.

Read about it here: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5j4S-r9G0m8HEq4JAFUw7_epFRb9QD99KQSJ80

Another update: Obama calls Crowley to semi-apologize (still not good enough!)

Here: http://www.wtop.com/?nid=116&sid=1723683

The Road to Hell.....

How to Speak Washingtonian

Today we learn how to see through the utter crap that comes out of the political offices in DC today..... here is a case study.

"Washington, DC—Representative Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore) today introduced bipartisan legislation to establish a Water Trust Fund for investing in America’s broken drinking water and sewage treatment systems. The “Water Protection and Reinvestment Act,” H.R.3202, establishes a $10 billion annual fund for repairing America’s corroded pipes and overburdened sewer systems, which pose serious health, environmental, and security consequences." (Please refrane from making fun of him based on appearance alone. I assure you there is more reason to hate him than just his bicycle pin and awful fashion sense.)

The above passage is directly from Rep. Blumenauer's website: http://blumenauer.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1524&Itemid=1

Upon first reading of the above passage, most people think "Oh, that sounds noble and worthwhile." (sounds like how O! got elected). I agree it may sound benign enough but let's look a little deeper (something most Americans clearly fail to do so regularly or this guy would be out of a job). We need to ask the question "Where will this $10 billion come from every year?"

Here's the answer: "The Water Protection and Reinvestment Act will be financed broadly by small fees on such things as bottled beverages, products disposed of in waste water, corporate profits, and the pharmaceutical industry. This will provide a long-term, sustainable source of revenue to ensure economic prosperity and protect the health of people and the environment."

Translation: Taxes will be put on bottled beverages (Coca-Cola, Pepsi, bottled water, etc), products disposed of in waste water (toothpaste, toilet paper, mouthwash, dish soaps, etc..... yes, I double checked this), corporate profits (the overall profits that companies make that are already doubly taxed), and the pharmaceutical industry (why single them out? They already have to compete with generic drugs). So what this boils down to is that all the items we buy because we need are going to go up in price (the companies cannot afford to eat these costs and there is no reason they should have to). So this means less money in YOUR pocket.

Next question we need to ask, "Where is this money to go?"

Answer: "The $10 billion annual fund will create more than 250,000 jobs."

Translation: All the money taken from you (through the increased prices of the taxed consumer goods) will go to creating and paying the operating costs of a brand new governmental agency that will oversee the entire process of taxing and enforcing this new Act. In the past, when this type of agency has been created, it turns out to be a bureaucratic nightmare (the money all goes into paying people to create the organization and the ultimate task (upgrading sewer systems in this case) never gets done). The phrasing here about creating jobs has the unmistakable stench of a PR house about it (guess who paid for the PR work for Rep. Blumenauer?). Job creation is a buzz term that is used in cases just like this to make one thing seem like something completely different.

There are numerous stories like this that run almost hourly. People read them and say 'Oh that sounds noble, why not?' when, in fact, they should be saying 'Stop trying to trick me into giving you more money!' And let's not make this a partisan issue either because Republicans have their hand just as deep in the cookie jar as the Dems do (who am I kidding....much deeper in the cookie jar, that's how they all got so damn fat).

So don't let yourself be sweet talked by politicians. We elected them, they should be doing exactly what we want. Let's cut through their crockery and take a stand.

Yes, he bikes around the capital. I'll knock him off of it if I ever see him (BTW he is breaking the law by going the wrong way down the street, can I have a cut of the tax dollars generated from the ticket?)

To Put Things In Perspective

According to Neil Barofsky (Inspector General for TARP), the overall cost of the 'bailout' could be as high as $23.7 trillion (http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aY0tX8UysIaM)

Now we've all heard a lot of numbers tossed around lately and they tend to lose their meaning without something to scale them by. Let's remedy that, shall we? The GDP of the US last year was a touch over $14 trillion. China's was $7.8 trillion last year (talking about purchasing power parity here, not nominal). So that's saying that if you take our GDP from last year and combine it with China's (the two largest economies in the world), we STILL haven't paid off the bailout. Think about that..... where do we expect this money to come from? *Cue Jeopardy theme song*

History Lesson

It seems in this day and age, many of us have acquired a false sense of US infallibility. This belief that we, as a nation, can't do anything wrong is a very dangerous mindset to have. Let's rewind about a century to see what I mean.....



The year is 1907 and the State of Indiana (don't poke fun at Indiana, it happens to be my favorite state) has just passed the Compulsory Sterilization Law which states that 'confirmed criminals', 'idiots', 'imbeciles', and 'rapists' are to be forcibly sterilized. This means that the state will sterilize criminals and mentally retarded people. The sad thing is that Indiana was a trend setter in this case (rarely happens now-a-days) and 29 other states adopted similar laws (as well as Nazi Germany). California moved into the "forefront" of eugenics as it really embraced the program (now you know why California liberals scare me quite badly) and they forcibly sterilized about 20,000 people (out of about 60,000 sterilized total in the country)(source: http://www.toolan.com/hitler/append1.html).



























This is about as arrogant as a society can get, telling someone they aren't of high enough value to control their own reproductive function (not to mention being completely and totally unconstitutional). Would society be better off if certain elements were not allowed to procreate? Who knows (by what standard are we measuring 'better'? who is setting the direction of society? It's a dangerous game). But what I do know is that taking away the freedom to have your own offspring unequivocally violates someone's right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And we (as citizens of the Land of the Free) let this go on openly and did little to nothing to prevent it.


Bottom line (other than the fact that Hitler used California's forced sterilization program as a framework for the Third Reich's eugenics program) is that we may think we are hot stuff because we have the most technologically advanced military or the strongest economy (or had rather), but we are just like everyone else, prone to making mistakes and missteps. So let's not get carried away and think we can't F it all up.