conservative springfield
conservative springfield
conservative springfield
conservative springfield
conservative springfield
Look Folks,
It’s not just
about
smokers,
it’s about
the
constant erosion of our personal freedoms for our own good. In the words of Ronald Reagan, “We don’t want a government that protects us from ourselves.” If you care about personal freedoms, “and we know you do” visit the good people at Illinois Smokers Rights. Get involved. CS.
Folks, if
you want
to see
conservatism expressed clearly, intellectually and concisely you must visit Anne at Backyard Conservative. You won’t be disappointed. CS.
Via Travis
Travis Posts
ISLAM: The Religion of Peace
Via Travis
Basic Economics
I HEARD A STORY RECENTLY THAT I WOULD LIKE TO SHARE WITH YOU. It began with a conservative and a liberal arguing about economic fairness. The liberal initiated the debate asking if it was fair for the CEO of a corporation to make hundreds of millions of dollars while the front line employee of the same company made, ‘in actual dollars’ a mere fraction of that. Walter Williams, ‘a renowned economic genius’ provided that economic, “Fairness” cannot be judged on economic results. He told this story; three people are playing poker together and enjoy doing so. Poker player, “A” wins 75% of the time, Poker player, “B” wins 15% of the time and sadly, “for him” player, “C” only wins 10% of the time. Williams asked if this was poker fairness. In economics, “fairness” cannot be judged by results, but instead be decided by process. In other words, to judge the, “poker fairness” of this example one would need to know if there was any cheating involved and did all of the players want to play. Provided it was a fair game and all of the participants joined in this game voluntarily then this would be fair and the results of the game genuine. My example; John Criminal is found guilty of a horrendous crime, is that fair? We cannot judge the fairness of his conviction based upon the result. To be fair, we need to be apprised of the process. If he received a fair trial and the jury had no biases then the process was fair and by default the resulting verdict and recorded conviction.
Economic fairness works much the same way. One cannot decide fairness in economics by results. The process must be judged as fair or unfair and the results of that process judged accordingly.
To wit: Are all Americans afforded the same opportunities? Is it possible that, given free will, we are all able to excel in life as far as our ambition, aptitude and ability will take us? If the answer is yes to these, “process” questions then, the results are fair. CS Staff Writer
Capitalism versus Socialism; the Cage Match
The socialists among us are coming out of the woodwork with their hair on fire. Were the subject matter of less import this might be amusing. The Marxists see the current financial crisis as their opportunity to convince Joe-six-pack of the futility and inequities of capitalism.
Personally, I just eat this up with a spoon. As these pseudo-intellectuals blather and bloviate on a subject they understand much as Paris Hilton understands advanced astrophysics they put on display the wasted tax dollars we spent on their public education.
Firstly, let us not vacillate on the difference between communism and socialism. Either ideology is interchangeable and not dissimilar. Suggesting a chasm is akin to two fleas arguing over the dog they inhabit, both are, “free riding” leeches.
The wooden dagger to the heart of socialism is that wherever it’s been tried, it has failed, including here. More on that in my jaw dropping close; stay tuned.
You might ask yourself, or have I ask of you, how, in just over two hundred years, America leads the world in all fields of human endeavor? As the author it is legitimate for me to answer my prescient posit thusly; it is our freedoms and capitalism. After all, in its most condensed form, capitalism is simply the freedom to engage in commerce.
Capitalism inspires competition insuring the best goods and services to the consumer. It invokes innovation by rewarding it. It is the best pricing mechanism known to the world as free markets will always self correct. Capitalism regulates supply by linking it to demand.
Socialism inspires no one and limits the potential of man by not rewarding perspiration and innovation. It rewards success and failure equally ensuring mediocrity. It stifles ambition by removing competition. It removes ambition, aptitude and ability from the success quotient. In short; it is the antithesis of democracy and makes comparable brilliant innovation and sub-par performance. Besides, America has had its foray into socialism.
A group of separatists first fled to Holland and established a community. After eleven years, about forty of them agreed to make a perilous journey to the New World, where they would certainly face hardships, but could live and worship God according to the dictates of their own consciences.
On August 1, 1620, the Mayflower set sail. It carried a total of 102 passengers, including forty Pilgrims led by William Bradford. The journey to the New World was a long and arduous one. And when the Pilgrims landed in New England in November, they found, according to Bradford’s detailed journal, a cold, barren, desolate wilderness. There were no friends to greet them, he wrote. There were no houses to shelter them. There were no inns where they could refresh themselves.
And the sacrifice they had made for freedom was just beginning. During the first winter, half the Pilgrims – including Bradford's own wife – died of starvation, sickness or exposure. When spring finally came, Indians taught the settlers how to plant corn, fish for cod and skin beavers for coats. Life improved for the Pilgrims, but they did not yet prosper!
This is important to understand because this is where modern American history lessons often end. Thanksgiving is actually explained in some textbooks as a holiday for which the Pilgrims gave thanks to the Indians for saving their lives, rather than as a devout expression of gratitude grounded in the tradition of both the Old and New Testaments.
Here is the part that has been omitted: The original contract the Pilgrims had entered into with their merchant-sponsors in London called for everything they produced to go into a common store, and each member of the community was entitled to one common share. All of the land they cleared and the houses they built belong to the community as well.
They were going to distribute it equally.
Bradford, who had become the new governor of the colony, recognized that this form of collectivism was as costly and destructive to the Pilgrims as that first harsh winter, which had taken so many, lives. He decided to take bold action. Bradford assigned a plot of land to each family to work and manage, thus harnessing the power of the marketplace.
Long before Karl Marx was even born, the Pilgrims had discovered and experimented with what could only be described as socialism. And what happened? It didn't work! What Bradford and his community found was that the most creative and industrious people had no incentive to work any harder than anyone else, unless they could utilize the power of personal motivation!
But while most of the rest of the world has been experimenting with socialism for well over a hundred years – trying to refine it, perfect it, and re-invent it – the Pilgrims decided early on to scrap it permanently. What Bradford wrote about this social experiment should be in every schoolchild's history lesson.
"The experience that we had in this common course and condition, tried sundry years...that by taking away property, and bringing community into a common wealth, would make them happy and flourishing – as if they were wiser than God," Bradford wrote. "For this community [so far as it was] was found to breed much confusion and discontent, and retard much employment that would have been to their benefit and comfort. For young men that were most able and fit for labor and service did repine that they should spend their time and strength to work for other men's wives and children without any recompense...that was thought injustice."
Why should you work for other people when you can't work for yourself? What's the point?
The Pilgrims found that people could not be expected to do their best work without incentive. So what did Bradford's community try next? They un-harnessed the power of good old free enterprise by invoking the under girding capitalistic principle of private property. Every family was assigned its own plot of land to work and permitted to market its own crops and products. And what was the result?
"This had very good success," wrote Bradford, "for it made all hands industrious, so as much more corn was planted than otherwise would have been." They prospered and what followed was the great puritan migration. The rest is history, as it were. Capitalism is seems is infectious and an abiding principal of the human condition; provided it is to succeed.
Conservative Springfield
Travis McCoy is our field operations President
I’m punching my ex-wife in the mouth
Imagine my dismay when the second smartest person I know, “I being the smartest” parrots what the media has convinced her of. That being that Sarah Palin is unelectable. Most frightening, from my vantage, is the fact that this disbelief comes from my own daughter Megan, a rock rib conservative of exceptional intellect. After all; genetics matter.
I do think that some of this thinking can be explained by the media campaign to destroy Palin, yet…in most cases there is more at work here.
Conservatives have been hoodwinked by the Republicans since Ronald Reagan retired to his ranch in California. Every primary we are promised Reagan conservatism and just after January swearing-in we are abandoned till the next election promises are rolled out.
Reagan was both the best and worst occurrence to ever influence the conservative movement. Even in death he is the conservative standard bearer and his legacy remains so untarnished that it is impossible for any pseudo conservative, Republican to live up to.
Until now that is… as hard as it is for some conservatives to believe.
Yet draw close and pay heed, for the next Reagan walks among us and she is electable. The build-up to Palin’s book was nothing short of biblical. She set records for advance sales and after a mammoth printing of 1.5 million copies many distributors were fearfully low after one day of sales. The publisher is cranking up the presses to stock 3 million books. Sarah’s appearance on Oprah’s show not only set a two year ratings record, “even smoking the Bamster’s couch visit” it got Oprah to stop eating Twinkies for the full hour; a feat not accomplished since Tom Cruise jumped up and down on her Twinkie stash. In Kentwood, Michigan, Palin fans camped out for a chance to get an autographed book. The book store had expected 500 people and ended up with a crowd of thousands. Palin has the most influential talk show host in the world, “Rush Hudson Limbaugh” securely in her corner along with the number two guy-Sean Hannity. Wherever Palin goes count on throngs of supporters and take note of the fact that she is truly a political rock star. Despite…the seemingly yawn of the Republican establishment.
Because; as we know…Republicans are still trying to decide how to handle the Palin phenomena; yet…what they should be doing is realizing how Palin will handle them. In Alaska Palin destroyed the corrupt, “RINO” republicans. She has made it clear her goal is conservatism and the Republican Party be damned. And…still my own daughter, recipient of my DNA has doubts. This has led me to question her genealogy and my contribution; causing me to want to punch her mother right in the mouth. After all; we did have a mailman.
Conservative Springfield Staff Writer
