Read the Bill of Rights and indicate which amendment is the most important and defend your choice!

I was given that assignment.

Response:
While every amendment to the constitution of the Unites States is important, the single most important is paradoxically the Second Amendment. The freedom of speech of only truly guaranteed by the capacity of the populace to cast out the tyrants who would quash the freedom of speech/ the freedom of press is safeguarded by the right of publishers to protect their assets. The right to peaceably assemble and petition for redress of grievances is prevented from becoming a Tiananmen Square massacre by the right of the people to bear arms. The right to freely exercise ones religion is guarded from giving adversaries a facility for intimidation and extermination as a whole. Without the not so subtly implied threat that an armed populace presents, the protection against quartering of soldiers without consent would be non-existent. No citizen could truly be secure in their persons or property without the capacity to defend themselves or their property. Without the capacity to arm, and by extension defend oneself, a lynch-mob can easily deprive you right to a Grand Jury, or protection against double jeopardy. The protection against secret and long drawn out trials would evaporate ones the First amendment rights were lost. The right to a jury trial would disappear once the Grand jury did. I fully expect all bail to be denied once a puppet court with secret proceedings, no right to counsel, no right to face your accuser has become the operating principle of the justice system. Without the capacity for the people to reform the government whether by voting, the judiciary, or even open and armed revolt; they will become nothing more than subjects.

"Time to unplug"

In today's world of always on and always available distractions, wants are far too often confused with needs. To prevent one's brain from becoming overly dependent on pervasive connectivity, have a "Pioneer Day." A Pioneer Day is a day without anything invented after 1890. Turn off the cell phone. Unplug the computers. Flick off the lights. If it's between 50 and 90 degrees Fahrenheit, turn off the HVAC and open the windows.

With the myriad of intrusions abated, one can begin to appreciate the truly important things. Conversation is one of the first things one will notice. Without the arbitrary 160 character limit imposed by SMS text messages or the 140 character limitation of Twitter®, conversations now take on a meandering voyage instead of the staccato machine gun "instant message" version.

Now being dependant on the desk lamp in the sky, we find ourselves synchronized with the pulse of the world. A metabolically reasonable bedtime takes us to slumber in the evening. Our bodies call us to wake when the rest cycle is complete.

Thoughts, once fleeting, are now given opportunity to take root and blossom. Boredom once filled with purely passive activities now requires engaging activities. The purely tactile joy of turning a page in a well loved book should fill the boredom of even the most tech crazed neophyte.

The technology that allows us to contact any distant relation at any time has robbed us of the appreciation of the relations within arm's reach.

Life Happens

I apologize to my 3.2 readers for the dearth of posts.

The XO is 5.5 months away from completing her degree in nursing.

Still waiting to find the time to kill some more paper people. (That'd be targets, not shallow, fake persons)

I did make the time to reread Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand.
I Highly recommend it to anyone confused by the state of the world.

An interesting take on ObamaCare

Nutshell version screw 90% of the US to "help" 4% get health insurance.

My thought is this. When job shopping, get a job that matches your priorities. What those priorities are, is for you to decide. Flexible hours, night shift, higher pay, less of a commute, health insurance, whatever. It's all about compromise, I could make 30% more in salary but would have to commute an extra 12 hours a week; this is a deal-breaker for me. If my employer switches to some craptastic health insurance plan, or forces me to commute to a satellite office an hour farther away; I will go somewhere else.

You just cannot legislate good judgement, morality, or motivation.

I wish the legislature would realize they're not God and stop trying to play him on TV.

Link here

This just doesn't sound like a good idea.

The Federal Reserve, already arguably the most powerful agency in the U.S. government, will get sweeping new authority to regulate any company whose failure could endanger the U.S. economy and markets under the Obama administration's regulatory overhaul plan.


Link here:

National Health Care is going to suck

In a nutshell, a 20 year old non smoker will pay the same premiums as a 55 year old chain-smoking obese diabetic. That doesn't seem fair to me.

I choose to not drink and drive or speed. Therefore I have a clean driving record and enjoy lower insurance premiums commensurate with the lower risk of the insurance company paying claims due to my actions.

I've enjoyed the highly polarized comments the most.

As a side note McDonalds (yes, the original entry level job) has health insurance available for all employees. If health insurance is your highest concern, get your own policy or get a job that has one.

http://www.forbes.com/2009/06/11/obama-health-care-reform-insurance-business-healthcare-obamacare.html?feed=rss_popstories

The brown shirts and indoctrination of the youth has begun.

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