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Terry’s Tidbits

March 27, 2006

By Terry Gray

What Fools.

We, the American people have a contract with the United States government.  This contract is called the Constitution of the United States of America.  The contract keeps changing and the changes are made by those who are bound by the amendments to the constitution.

The contract stipulates our freedoms as American citizens.  It regulates the powers that the government has over us.  It is black and white, cut and dry, and still it is interpreted by those wishing it mean things that it doesn’t.

Would you let your plumber negotiate changes in your contract with him?  Would you let him change the rules to benefit him as he sees fit?  He raises his rates without regard to your protests.  He refuses to adhere to the parts of the contract that benefit you.  He spends the money you pay him on things not related to the contract and adjusts his bills to you to pay for these things.  You pay for his lunches, his trips, his schooling, his retirement, and for most everything else that makes up his daily life.  He fixes other peoples plumbing and charges you for it.  You would change plumbers, wouldn’t you?  At the very least you would pick up the phone and demand some answers.  You don’t do this with government.  What fools we are.

Seatbelts save Lives?

Statistics state that not wearing seatbelts costs government $20 billion a year.  There is the motivator for mandatory seatbelt laws.  Do you really believe that your government cares if you live or die?  They just care about how much it costs them.  How much is the Iraqi war costing us?  We sent soldiers there to die.

Kentucky is just a breath away from enacting a mandatory seat belt law.  The odd part is that the proposed bill fell on its ass when submitted by itself.  It had to ride a bill to protect kids from lead based paint and ATV injuries in order to pass.

Simple statistics say that of 1000 accidents, 21% were not wearing a seatbelt and 64% of those folks died.  This means that 134 out of 1000 people not wearing seatbelts died in traffic accidents.  Out of 1000 accidents, 79% were wearing seatbelts and 36% of them died.  This means that 284 out of 1000 people wearing seatbelts died in traffic accidents.    

Sure, I manipulated the results but so do those who scream for seatbelt laws.  The numbers speak for themselves,  however.

The NHTSA has a website to tell people how to organize freedom-hating Nazis to get mandatory seatbelt laws passed.  They emphasize four essential ingredients:  demonstrate the law’s effectiveness, gather all law enforcement resources, promote enforcement, and publicize enforcement – again and again.  If you’ll notice, the whole scenario involves coercion.  It is all about a show of force.

NHTSA also has a plan to minimize the effectiveness of opponents.  It’s called propaganda.  It also involves enlisting baby Gestapo.  They suggest inviting community leaders, especially leaders of minority groups, to help plan and monitor enforcement efforts.  This shifts an opponent’s incentives and gives him a power cookie crumb.  Where he was once on the outside, a victim of the law, he is now a part of the process and helping to make the law.  This tactic has been used by every tyrant in history – “you’re either for us or against us”.

NHTSA’s plan calls for getting law enforcement on board.  Nowhere does it call for getting the citizens on board.  This should speak volumes about this insidious freedom grab.

Are seatbelts good?  Yes, I would agree that they are.  But they protect no one who isn’t immediately involved.  If I don’t wear my seatbelt, I’m endangering no one but myself.  There is the gist of most Americans’ argument against seatbelts.  The government doesn’t listen.  They are going to protect us against ourselves come hell or high water.

Are there other benefits to citizens with this law?  Well, there is the $11 million that Kentucky will receive in new federal money.  Our state government is selling our freedom to the feds for $11 million.  They don’t place a very high value on freedom, do they?  We are also told that the law will reduce taxpayers’ medical costs.  Other than that, I can’t seem to find any benefits. 

I once was told by a thoughtless moron who was trying to justify a mandatory seatbelt law that his insurance rates were affected when people don’t wear seatbelts.  Really?  Will our insurance rates decrease when this law is enacted?  He said that his taxes are higher because the state has to pick up the tab for indigent drivers that are injured and not wearing seatbelts.  Really?  Will his taxes decrease because of this law?  Then he went on to spin a yarn about how someone not wearing a seatbelt could have a heart attack and crash into someone else.  Funny, he could have a heart attack and crash into someone else if he were wearing a seatbelt.  He was just another moron breathing my air.  No logic, no sense.

Topping the stupidity list are those people who say that if there was a mandatory law then they would wear seatbelts.  What kind of idiot needs a law before he will protect himself with a simple device?  These are people who have been socially engineered to blindly walk where told, not looking left or right.  There should be a mandatory law that these people NOT wear seatbelts.

Heather Glaser of Oldham County is this week’s poster child for seatbelts and at the top of the Courier Journal’s propaganda assaults.  She had an accident, wasn’t wearing a seatbelt, and is still badly injured.  Heather and her mother now say that wearing a seatbelt is just common sense.  So Heather and her mom don’t have common sense unless the government tells them to have common sense?

This proposal in Frankfort has been shuffled from bill to bill.  It is a shell game and we citizens can only lose.  Freedom is the biggest loss, but the inability for citizens to use common sense without the government making them ranks right up there.  The more social engineering we conduct on the people, the more the people will rely on government and less upon themselves.  The government and the morons love it, and true Americans hate every morsel of it.

 Bush Again

          His supporters say he is standing his ground.  I think this is fine as long as one’s grounds aren’t stupid.  When Bush vocally stands his ground, it seems that he is screaming, “I’m stupid and I’m going to continue to be stupid.  That is the only way to convince everyone that I’m stupid.

Speaking of Dogs

          I recently had a run in with the puppy police in Louisville for doing the right thing.  I licensed both of my dogs last year simply because I wasn’t up to fighting with the Nazis at the time.  My main argument against licensing is that it gives control to folks who otherwise have no control.  They become yet another quasi-governmental organization with their hands in my business.  I just decided that I had too many other worthy fights going on to take on this issue right then.  Hey, fighting Nazis is a full time job and sometimes you have to let the little Nazis have their way so you can fight the big Nazis.

          I got a letter from Animal Services telling me that the registration for one of my dog friends is due at the end of March.  They never thanked me for registering last year but were quick to point out that they now had me.  They never told me that my money goes to help abandoned animals or that keeping my pets inoculated was the responsible thing to do.  Nope.  They told me that if I didn’t reregister my dog by the due date they’d fine me $10.  Now I’m pissed.  I fired back a letter as follows:

To whom it may concern,

“My dogs get all inoculations as they are needed, to include heartworm, parvo, and rabies.  They get these shots as well as check-ups to keep them healthy.  I register them because it is easy to do and inexpensive, not because the law says that I have to.  None the less, I obey the law, voluntarily.

I am not only insulted by your bill but I am angry that you assume you are authorized to charge a late fee for registration.  There are thousands of pet owners in this city who do not register their animals or take care of them.  There are thousands of pets that roam the streets and are nuisances.  My pets are not among them.  I do the right thing.  If I see fit to register my pets a day, week, or month “late” I will do so.  I will not pay your penalty if this occurs. 

Too many times and in too many places little sub-government divisions make assumptions and take liberties with our liberties.  You are not a taxing authority or a judicial authority.  Unless you pursue due process in levying fines, your fines are unenforceable and moot.  You should be happy that good citizens register their pets at all.  Your threat of a penalty is nothing more than strong-arm tactics that are unnecessary and assumptive as well.  There is no reason for you to take this tone and attitude.

I would suggest that you curtail your threats and treat pet-loving citizens as responsible adults that they have proven themselves to be through their past participation in your registration program.

I don’t deal well with threats, especially idle ones.  As a tax paying, law abiding citizen I have rights.  Those rights are not up for usurpation by you.

Sincerely,

Terry Gray”

          I haven’t heard back.  I’ll get my dog registered a day or two after the due date and see what happens.  I am now prepared to do battle on this issue.   I hate Nazis.

Meth Labs and Kids

          There was a recent news story about a meth lab in Southern Indiana with emphasis placed on the location of the lab being close to an elementary school.  Actually it wasn’t even a meth lab.  The folks renting the house simply had the ingredients needed to make meth.  Those ingredients are legal to own by themselves but not together.  It’s a little like an Illinois law that makes it illegal to be drunk and have access to your car keys.  Even in your own home.  They can arrest you for DUI just for having access to your car while drunk.  I think it’s Illinois.  Anyway…

          It seems that area residents were concerned that the location of the “meth lab” was so close to a school.  If meth were eventually produced in this house, what effect do the local residents believe it would have on the school or the kids?  I don’t get it.  It reminds me of the lady who destroyed a television because she found out her husband watched porn movies on that television and she didn’t want her kids watching cartoons on the same television.

          The news and the authorities made a big deal of the location of the “meth lab”.  The authorities rerouted school buses around the area so the kiddies wouldn’t be in danger.  The media soothingly told us that the kids were safe.  I sat there watching this debacle dumbfounded.  I’m sorry but I just can’t seem to put logic behind the sentiment.  Please, someone tell me why the kids were in danger from a couple of bottles of drain opener.  I’m lost.

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