I HATE ignorance

I have come to the point to where I hate ignorance.  Ignorance is usually a self omission from factual data.  Case and point, people were all about some graph that was put out by moveon.org showing % increases in government spending since Regan.  Instead of the average American finding out what this meant or what the data reflected, they said, “Ha!  See the numbers don’t lie! Obama is doing great!” 

I hate ignorance.  I hate it with a passion.  I hate the passionate disbelief of fact.  I hate the facts that get lost in passionate obsessions of ignorant devotion to an ideal.  People today have made up their mind.  The middle ground is narrowing.  When the middle ground diminishes to less than 1%, there will be outrage and violence.  We the people in order to form a perfect union have abolished our willingness to perceive factual data and create opinions isolated from those opinions of others.  Our liberties are not stolen, they are bought very cheaply.  We have whored out the heart of our Nation for social security, Medicare, Medicaid, welfare, interstates, subsidies, tax exemptions and many other programs. There is no power the government has that we the people haven’t given them.

I see the ignorance all around me.  The pacifist attitude towards the future of our nation and it scares me. 

America wake up. 

Social Inequality

Social Inequality.  What is that?  What is Social Equality?  The always accurate Wikipedia states, “Social equality is a social state of affairs in which all people within a specific society or isolated group have the same status in certain respects. At the very least, social equality includes equal rights under the law, such as security, voting rights, freedom of speech and assembly, property rights, and equal access to social goods and services. However, it also includes concepts of economic equity, i.e. access to education, health care and other social securities. It also includes equal opportunities and obligations, and so involves the whole of society.” I don't like quoting Wiki, but hey Social Equality should be defined by pop culture...everything "Social" is pop culture anyways.

So with that so clearly defined, now ask yourself, “Do I want that?”  If you answered yes then you are either a philanthropist, or a thief.  I agree with human rights.  Freedom, the liberty to achieve the maximum of your potential and leave the world better for your kids and theirs, is the most basic right we are entitled to.  That is given by God.  Just as God gave us everything we need, it is on us to give our needs for our wants.  At one point we all had everything the same.  Some did a lot with what they had some did nothing and some further squandered it.  Just because you were a poor steward does not mean that new laws need to be put in place to make up for your or your forefathers mishandling of wealth. 

This country was founded on a dream that all man can accomplish whatever they put their minds to and no laws shall be put in place to prevent one from achieving the maximum of their potential.  Some fail, some succeed.  The importance is even if someone fails, their kids will try again and they will continue to better the world by continuing to struggle to better themselves.  Social Equality is a pipe dream that dictates the whole suffering for the lazy, and unproductive aspects of society.  Social Equality is a ransom note to keep the dregs of society appeased so as to keep crime low.  When is enough, enough? When we the productive quit giving our gifts from God away to those who have squandered their gifts.   

Entitle Me!!!

This sense of entitlement today has become insane.  When did we begin viewing our luxuries as entitlements?  People are not looking to earn their joy in life, which brings joy in return.  Instead there is this notion that the object brings the joy, not the pursuit and accomplishment. This is a fundamental problem today.  Just because I have a Harley doesn't mean EVERYONE should have a Harley or some equivalent.  Just because others have a house doesn't mean I should own one too.  I know I am not ready for it.  I have work to do before I get to that point in my life.

The things that people consider entitlements are things that don't bring joy but the absence brings "uncomfort". Hot water is a luxury that doesn't bring joy to most people, but take it away and they will tell you how entitled they are to it.  Services are fleeting and based on the desire of one to provide the said service.  Go back a couple posts, in a simple trader society, I need this you have that, you need this and I have that.  Comforts are in even balance.  Throw in the guy who says he can do X or Y with this and sell it, well now you have the indirect services.

People need to understand that when you put nothing into a system, don't be astonished by how little you get from it.  Truth be told, they should be grateful for what they DO get from the system.  Take away what they get and you'll see the entitlement come out.  Today everyone "needs" an iPhone, iPad, 50" TV, Nice Car and an $80K a year job.  We wonder why we have a national debt issue.

Hard facts. We are NOT entitled to the best military in the world.  We are NOT entitled to the best economy in the world.  We are NOT entitled to the best education system in the world.  We are NOT entitled to a job.  We are NOT entitled to food.  We are NOT entitled to a house.  We are NOT entitled to shelter.  If you think we are than you premise is wrong and it is time to look at what you expect out of life, cause if you spend all your time waiting for those to come to you than you are a waste of breath.     

Man is selfish. And thats not bad.

A lot of people see conservatism as a negative heartless viewpoint of society.  If by heartless they mean that we do not give what is not earned, then yes we are.  If by heartless they mean accountability vice political correctness, then yes we are.  All sarcasm aside, there is always multiple perspectives to every viewpoint.  I view the overarching goal of conservatism as positive.  See the founding belief is that each person will do good in order that goodness my be returned to them.  Makes you question selflessness?  There is nothing that is selfless.  All things support a greater purpose.  Christians are selfless for the reward of heaven, Leaders are selfless so they may demand the same.  The true philanthropist is selfless for the title.  Everyone has their own greater purpose for every action.  Its physics, and less face it biology is applied chemistry, and chemistry is applied physics.
So is it bad that people do good for good to be returned?  No!!!  It is a noble pursuit. If everyone did good to have good returned than no one would hate, theoretically (not practically). I earn money to afford survivability of my progeny.  I better myself further to afford comfort.  My employer gets a more efficient worker for my selfish desire to not stress about money, and in turn he gives me more.  When I reach the point where I am content, then my employer need not worry about increasing my pay, and can now focus that planned pay for the next guy looking for comfort from finances.  It's good, it's fair and more importantly, it is a merit driven system.  Class warfare?  Doesn't exist.  Sure money can still be inherited, but those who do nothing to better will lose there money to those who wish to better themselves. 
In the most basic type of society, a trader society, one man would grow a crop and trade his crop with a guy who had sheep.  The guy with sheep could get milk, wool and meat.  The guy who had the crop had food for his family and could feed livestock.  They both see an immediate need for each other.  Both will be at the very least civil with each other just to ensure their own survival at their present comfort level.  By getting feed for his sheep, the rancher could now continue to feed sheep the higher quality food so he could keep milk going through winter.  The rancher wants the milk and wool for the winter as well, so they sustain each other. 
Somewhere in the middle we lost this idea and believed that someone had to tell the farmer to sell to the rancher, and what amount must be sold.  Now the rancher and farmer didn't eve have to talk anymore and became more distant.  They could now quarrel amongst each other over land being used for grazing vice farming.  Not realizing they were killing their own customers. 
Conservatism dictates that this middle person dictating the "musts" has to be done away with.  Mutual assured prosperity/destruction are the most primal causes for society.  They work, and they work well.  Conservatism dictates that we get along so WE can get along.  That is very positive. 
Today it is cities vs Rural.  Both desire each other for their comforts, but are now at odds.  Cities lack the raw materials to produce and rural like the amenities that cities provide.  Cities know that there is a disadvantage and dictate through legislation.  This is not the true path.  You make life hard on farms than they will move to cities for the comfort, they move to cities than Cities lose food.  Plain and simple.
You can't dictate against human nature.  You can tweak the understanding of it so society can respond in kind, but man is selfish.  And that's not a bad thing at all.

Why Government is Never the Solution.

There has been a swelling of support for the intervention of government into every social issue under the sun. In the past two hundred years we have gone from a very motivated and proud nation to one that refuses to grow up and take ownership of ones mistakes just as equally as we do our successes. Aside from the social issues that have brought us here, we first have to stop the bleeding. The bleeding is the Government involved in our day to day lives.

Government always brings in a lot of money, but where does this money come from? The government produces nothing. The government will never take a product, reshape it, and then sell it for more than the original product cost. Everything that touches the government comes at a loss. When we talk about the government and what they spend money on, you must ask yourself, "Why do I want to spend money on _____?" How often would we answer that with us not wanting to spend money on some obscure project. Or better yet, ask "Why do I want my neighbor to pay for _____?" Think how little support welfare would get if the recipients had to drive from house to house in the county and go door to door asking people for money to support them while they don't work! Yet government hands them the checks. This is not a knock on welfare, it is a knock on the separation we as Americans allow. Somewhere down the line we have forgotten the accountability we as citizens of this republic have for the decisions of our government.

 The basis behind government employment has nothing to do with a performance based reward system, be it through bonuses or on the opposite end of the spectrum, firing. There is always a simple "criteria" that is laid out for an employee that must be achieved, or must not be violated, that guarantees employment until the employee deems their employment over, not the other way around. Job security is a nice thing right? Wrong! Job security should mean that you are so good at your job and have proven to be an asset to a wealth generating system that you have been deemed an acceptable liability that the company wishes to carry over into retirement, not out of some sentimental reason but because it will serve as motivation to demand a higher level of production from future employees. Too harsh? No. Not harsh enough.

So first problem is government allows blanket job security, regardless of superior or par performance. Secondly, steals money from producing Americans to pay non-producing. The third problem is it isn't even about the money. The government has no stake in the financial well being of the country. They view the entire country in short term problems. 4-8 years is short term. So every problem that is encountered will always be blamed on the previous guy, and any upcoming problems will be left for the next one. So there is no accountability.

Government has NEVER been efficient. Government is NOT an industry. Government is NOT and employer. Government is NOT accountable.
Federal Government really has very few simply stated jobs.
1. Maintain a well functioning military to protect citizens.
2. Promote interstate trade.
3. Represent the 50 SOVEREIGN States of our union to foreign countries.

Leave the rest to smaller government. Let California worry about its impoverished, Texas shouldn't pay for that, Texas doesn't care! Don't get involved with a publicized case in New Hampshire, that is for New Hampshire. Whatever Big Government solutions work there won't work for Louisiana. Plain and simple, Federal Government stay out of the day to day running of our wonderful states. You worry about holding the union and keeping the enemies off our backs.

To quote the Greatest conservative of all time, "The 10 scariest words ever uttered are, I'm from the government and I'm here to help you."

Conservatism and Leadership

There are many aspects of leadership which embody the idea of conservatism. It is believed that at the heart of conservatism is self accountability. At the heart of leadership is accountability in not only your leadership but in the actions of those whom you lead. That implies that leaders are responsible and accountable for the actions of those they lead either through direct interaction or through delegation. It is a constant debate whether or not this is completely fair, but if it was then that would mean that life was fair and burdens were fairly distributed to each individual. On the same logic fairness implies equal qualities without advantages over anyone at any task. For people to have everything be fair, means there are no advantages or disadvantages in life. This philosophy is good for the disadvantaged, because the disadvantaged move up in life, but bad for the advantaged, since they move down. Ironically if this ideal were to come to fruition people would find out where they really were on the advantaged/disadvantaged scale. I think people would be shocked to realize were they really are.

The latter is the dream of liberalism, that no man (not gender specific) should have a burden. This philosophy is also flawed, where would burden go? As far as people are concerned, they aren't concerned as long as burden shifts away from them. (great spot for a moral plug but this is a blog not a book) People sell this dream as a clean slate that never fills except equally across the slates of others. Society will share the problems of society equally. So, is this even an achievable dream? The answer is no. The sad part is this dream is rooted in one of two places, one in people believing/willing to give all for the benefit of others and two those who believe in entitlement.

To tie this back to leadership; leadership today implies that the authority to carry out tasks can be delegated but the accountability to accomplish the assigned task lies solely on the shoulders of the leader, usually the leader that was furthest down on the delegation. To me this idea has a huge flaw. This idea of leadership in a non-trickle down of accountability leaves the majority without any ramifications for their actions. The only ramification is when the leadership fails and those below are not supported by the established leadership and are left one their own, which they are not accustomed to. Todays leadership theory, like todays society, tries to appease all aspects of society. It merges the liberal view of no ones fault and spreading of burdens regardless of capability with that of the conservative accountability. So regardless of the abilities that people possess, all should be able to accomplish the same tasks within an organization and if they can't then that task failed due to leadership vice poorly trained or inept employees/Sailors. In the end the two cannot sustain each other. The leadership gets bogged down with the ramifications of decisions and the lower go idle. Leadership has no motivation to reach beyond the status quo because to do so is a constant risk and potential career ender. Being idle though is not in the vocabulary of a true leader, which leaves their, be it their own or their heirs, downfall as inevitable. Once a leader fails there is no other job to which they can apply their talents in life. The workers on the other hand can move from job to job without endangering their livelihood. They have been taught to accept a ceiling to what they can accomplish and to just look for a leader to give direction. That position is sustainable, low risk but low reward. Yet this is the class of worker that demands more for less.

This is where the human history of classes come from. The higher classes have always been the high risk high reward. Call them Aristocrats, CEO's, Royalty or Managers. Society always dictates and rewards those who step into that challenge and forever punishes them when they fail. The solution is to enforce accountability all the way down. Every person should be held accountable for their own performance. If people became accountable on all levels then that would breed a productive workforce all striving to accomplish more and more for job security and for reward.

It is my belief that this hybrid style of leadership that is active today is a self defeating doctrine. The only two possible outcomes from this doctrine is the establishment of a permanent upper class or the failure of a nation. Until we reach a point when our society can bluntly state, "You are responsible for your own success or failure regardless of personal situations." , then we will be plagued by politically correctness. I'll post later on thoughts on Unions and how they cannot carry our nation or workforce forward, but hold it back to old ideology.

Symptom or Selfish

I look at the results of today's politics as either a product of the decline of Conservative values in America, or as crooked politicians who look out for only themselves. I personally am more convinced of the decline of our Conservative values, I tend to believe in the overall good of people. It is easier for me to accept the fact that, as detrimental as most liberal ideas are towards a nation, that most ideas are done with the best of intentions.
last night when I was playing a game on Xbox Online with other people, there was a kid who believed in talking "smack", for older people that means being extremely disrespectful and usually derogatory. There was also another guy who I was playing with that is 36 years old, Texas A&M grad. This kid who was talking all this smack got me and the other guy discussing the decline of parental responsability in America. How could parents let this kid have a TV in his room, connected to the internet and allow him to cuss at adults? How do parents justify letting this kind of behavior go on in their house? Me and the other guy discussed the equivalent of what that would be like if we did that when we were growing up. Could you imagine playing a game of two-hand touch football with 26-27 year olds when you were only 16, then cuss at them and call them derogatory names when they did better then you? NO! You pull something like that when I was growing up, you were likely to get your butt kicked.
Where are the parents today? Do they take responsability for thier kids? Can they justify the complete lack of supervision in their lives? This is why I am against more regulations on movies, games, the internet, etc. These parents NEED to take their kids back from the world they have abandoned them to. I will never put my kids in theses situations, never.