Author: Simon

Eric and I met up on Saturday Night at the Irish Rose one of Rockford, Illinois’ fine eating establishments. We had a friend take a few pictures. One of which is above. I have a few pictures of the friend, but she declines to be identified. Sorry. For more (not much) on the dinner at…

I had some friends visit for the holidays. A loving time was had by all. Pictures when the first mate gets back with the camera. (It may be a while.) Cross Posted at Power and Control

I seem to have gotten the Michelle Obama quote wrong. It’s important for him to finish what he started. If she has started whining about her husband finishing the work he started two years before the next election I’d say he was already finished. Cross Posted at Power and Control

I wrote this back in 2005 (I haven’t checked the links some of them may be broken) and exactly what I was talking about then has come to pass. And back then? Well of course back then (before the TSA Follies) I was a hysterical weenie. This was America. Land of the Free. Home of…

ASTROGLIDE? How about coarse dry sand? Iowa Hawk blogs at Iowa Hawk. Cross Posted at Power and Control

Eric Is Wishing everyone a happy Thanksgiving. I’m doing the same plus I’m thanking Mark Ames personally for a very special gift for which I will be eternally grateful. ==== Mark Ames, who has never met me, doesn’t like me. I’m honored. Anytime anyone says anything libertarian, spit on them. Libertarians are by definition enemies…

Conservatives, like liberals, when they imagine a government program imagine that the job will be done well. I on the other hand imagine it will be done the government way. Which is why I’m a libertarian. I have the American disease: I don’t trust the government. Government operates on the LCD principle. And that is…

I get all kinds of e-mails and comments. One constant theme among my social “conservative” friends runs something like this: “If we don’t keep all the laws we have and especially the ones targeting rope smokers civilization will break down and the child molesters will be out in force.” Uh. Wouldn’t that be “Law worship”?…

Resist.Net [was Tea Party Patriots – which is incorrect ed.] – a social conservative group masquerading as a TEA Party organization – has a post up with the title: Justice Scalia: Founders Never Imagined Abortion “Rights”. Well I have news for him: They never imagined Vagina Police modeled after the TSA either. Well super. The…

The the Drug War has helped spawn the TSA. The precedent on how to deal with contraband has been set. It is now going to be applied to everyone. Bet you weren’t expecting that were you? Oh yeah. It turns out that a dope case, Raich vs Gonzales, can be used to justify the mandates…

It seems the Senate is about to pass S 510. Maybe. It is about food safety (do you really believe that?) and the regulation of food products that could cause illness from contamination. According to what I consider overblown (for now) rhetoric it will be messing with home gardeners and legacy seed growers and collectors.…

Eric in a previous entry linked to a page of John Stuart Mill quotes and featured one. I thought, given, the discussions that have gone on around here the past few days that it deserved a more prominent place. …it is the absolute social right of every individual, that every other individual shall act in…

An e-mail friend suggested I take a look at A Common-Sense Platform for the 21st Century. From the excerpt I read it looks pretty good. It is all about how to roll back socialism in America in the 21st Century. Cross Posted at Power and Control

As usual I’m trying to talk sense with one of my solipsistic social conservative friends. Rough slog that. You can’t reason with faith. I’m trying to figure out if that is a bug or a feature. Well my friend is questioning the libertarian “faith” which is an interesting way to describe a political philosophy. If…

In the comments to Did I impose on PETA last night? some one says I’m a fanatic. To wit (or without it): M. Simon, you’re a fanatic, and I know you mean well… I’m a fanatic and I don’t mean well to the statists of the left and right. I would remind you that extremism…

The drug war and its search for contraband was the prototype for all this. All made easier by the Drug War Exception to the Fourth Amendment. You peed in a cup to get your job didn’t you? Why all the pissing and moaning about the TSA? After all they are doing it to save the…

The link to the above was sent to me by my #2 son who is a staunch libertarian, graduated with honors in Russian literature from U Chicago, and now teaches American Culture at a University in Smolensk under a Fulbright Grant. Every time I think of that it cracks me up.

There is a unifying thread between the TSA and the drug war. The unifying thread? The search for contraband. You gave up the 4th Amendment to get at the dopers. And now that you are a suspect you have nothing to protect you. Because the 4th Amendment has already been torn down to make searching…

Some Birther Madness from Ulsterman’s Deep Throat. The she in question is supposed to be Nancy Pelosi. We shall she. Insider: Well, she was at it again and then she says something along the lines of, “How about I just hand over the goddamn certification file. They want me to go there? Because that’s where…

Every time a discussion of the correct scope of the laws comes up with social conservatives this little ditty or something like it is trotted out to justify the death penalty for picking your nose or for growing the wrong kind of plants. So do you advocate getting rid of laws that deal harsh consequences…