FREEDOM NEWS
October, 2000
|
|
THE HAMPTON ROADs FREEDOM NEWS October, 2000 |
|
PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN HITS HIGH GEAR
|
|
Democrat Al Gore and Republican George W. Bush are pushing through
to the finish line in the closest Presidential race since 1976.
Unfortunately, other political parties and so-called parties
have not made much of an impact in this election so far.
There is no reasonable scenario from which to dream they will
make a lasting impact this year (or anytime soon).
The era of federal arrogance in American history is certain
to continue. |
 |
Beyond debating how voters can be energized to actively support greater freedom in their lives, we serfs need to also look at what the immediate future holds at the federal level: Gore or Bush.
Unfortunately, these policies come in a package that is not nearly as
attractive overall.
Republican drug warriors are at least as rabid as Clinton and Gore in
trampling on privacy and common sense; Bush included.
Bush favors federalizing all commercial and personal injury
litigation. Maybe his
greatest policy initiative is to skew the tax code as much as possible
in favor of his base constituency.
He wants to pour more mega-billions into the military/industrial
complex without a hint of increased accountability at any level,
including a self-defeating Star Wars dream.
Bush has no plan to scale back government at any level or to pay
off the National Debt. If a
Bush Presidency were to join with a Republican Congress the right wing
social agenda would gets its strongest hearing yet in Washington. |
|
The
incumbent of sorts, Al Gore, seems to be a moderate fellow, but his
rhetoric and his record in office say something quite different.
Even more so than Bill Clinton, Al Gore seems to believe that
solutions to all of society’s ills lie with an omnipotent federal
government. He champions
the wasteful and fraud ridden federal entitlement programs seeking to
expand their grip on retirement earnings and the practice of medicine.
Gore calls for protecting the monopoly status of the failed
public schools while throwing untold billions and billions of federal
dollars at schools already proven incapable of effectively teaching
their trapped students.
Gore is a big part of the problem in this greatest failure in American
society. The Clinton/Gore
administration has also arguably done more to trash the protections
within the Bill of Rights than any previous government.
The War on Drugs has become a pretext to allow the feds to rate
the suitability of television programming, to secretly enter our homes,
to look through private records on a whim and to forcibly disarm the
public. Big Brother is
watching us much more now than ever before.
If these trends continue, America can expect the world-wide-web
to ultimately become much more of a tool of government repression than a
breath of freedom. |
 |
ROBB/ALLEN SENATE CONTEST HAS HIGH STAKES
|
Former Governor and present second term Senator Chuck Robb is the most
successful Democratic politician in Virginia.
Former Governor and Congressman George Allen could easily make
the same claim to fame from the Republican ranks.
The
November election for a Virginia Senate seat though will be much more
than the end of one of these high- powered political careers. It could
also make the difference in which political party will be running the
Senate for the next two years.
Money is pouring
into the Virginia race from everywhere.
The airwaves are full of Robb and Allen already.
Which man will be better suited (or least unsuited) to advancing
the cause of freedom?
|
 |
One is
hard pressed to find any policy differences of importance between the
two. Both favor the usual
conservative mantra: increased military spending, the death penalty,
restrained domestic spending, the Drug War, military hegemony in global
affairs, big pork for big business.
Allen has expressly dropped his deeply held view during his days
as Governor that federal social spending, especially in primary and
secondary education, should be drastically reduced or abolished.
Indeed, Allen is trying to convince the public he is a socialist
as much as Robb is trying to convince the public he is not a socialist.
Allen has also dropped his convictions about gun ownership in the
face of adverse polls on the issue.
Robb has defended his record for supporting increased taxation as
something no longer required.
Robb remains philosophically committed though to a huge role for
the federal government in every citizen's life.
Allen is just willing to look the other way while Uncle Sam runs
things for all of us.
|
 |
When there is not a
dime's worth of difference on policy grounds should the candidates' character be
the decisive difference? If your
answer to that question is yes, this paper suggests you choose the combat Marine
who sticks by his mistaken beliefs over the son of celebrity whose sophistry is
as flexible as it is hollow. At
least then the voters know what they are getting.
Chuck Robb is no freedom fighter in Washington, but he may become a
fail-safe against Republican policies that are even a greater threat to the
nation's freedom than his own are.
Tens of thousands of military homes in Hampton Roads grieve this week
over the consequences of war.
Seventeen American families bear the ultimate price.
The hole blown into the hull of the USS COLE echoes an eerie
warning to the American people: Enter our battles, then expect to become
a casualty as well.
Is the price
one that is too high to pay?
A MISSION TOO FAR
 |
Our national
leaders say that keeping a dominant Navy force in the Middle East is in
our vital strategic interests.
Why is that? Are
Palestinians throwing stones likely to invade New York harbor anytime
soon? Are the corrupt
autocrats of the Arabian Peninsula really a threat to our shores?
Indeed, if we did not maintain a bully's presence in the Middle
East and elsewhere would not the only reason for terrorism directed at
the United States disappear entirely?
The shadow of the Soviet Bear passed long ago.
With it, so did any need to take sides in foreign wars.
The
other reason commonly given for our role in the Middle East is, in a
word, absurd. Are we really
asking American servicemen to risk death on foreign soil in order to
hold down (or up) the price of oil from the Persian Gulf?
Is this the ultimate corporate welfare for foreign despots?
How does violence along with an arms race half a world away serve
the American economy anyway?
There must be a less painful way to fuel our Hondas and SUVs.
|
|
The unspoken
reason for foreign adventures in the Post-Cold War era is "Nation
Building". This could also
be called excessive egotism: imperialism: the Ugly American syndrome.
If our beliefs in free markets and free people are so convincing
why do we need to rely so much on the force of arms to advance them?
Is the Pentagon mission overseas to save oppressed people from a
chosen few dictators? Or is
it to satisfy the ethnic preferences of swing voters?
Neither purpose is legitimate national defense.
Neither could ever justify the loss of a single American life. Yes, folks. The price paid this week for the Middle East is one far too high. It is time the United States let the warring peoples across the globe find their own solutions and their own heroes. |
|
NORFOLK’S BLACK SLIME PLAGUE
Workers have
been contracted finally to eradicate the amoebae-like, greenish,
blackish slime that afflicts the exterior of the Norfolk Federal
Courthouse. After the
debacle several years ago when the façade of the Norfolk Federal
Building simply fell down, the last thing Norfolk needs is another
eyesore from Uncle Sam. How
can the Drug War be won and all of Washington’s regulations enforced in
a building that looks like it suffers from a fatal disease?
Speculation has been feverish concerning the source of the problem.
Conventional wisdom has it that the steamy eastern Virginia
climate creates a good environment for the slime to form.
But why is this one building so badly affected?
A local
attorney asked a foreman on the job what they were facing.
The foreman whispered that the condition was much worse than even
the most negative speculation has it.
The weather was a factor, yes, but the root cause was coming from
within the building’s walls.
His prediction was that the slime would reappear each year so
long as nothing changed.
Has
there ever been a more visible reason for establishing libertarian
government?
|
|
|
|
Two
important political campaigns visited Norfolk last month.
The
Harry Browne Presidential campaign accepted interviews on the Tony
Macrini Show on 790 AM and Joel Rubin’s On the Record on Channel 13.
He also held a rally/press conference in Ghent that attracted
almost seventy people on a weekday morning.
(Media Sweetheart Ralph Nader attracted only twenty-seven people
to a Richmond rally the day before.)
Harry pronounced the obvious: If you want your vote to favor
meaningful change in this country do not waste it on Al Gore or George
W. Bush.
Thanks
for the success of the Browne visit goes largely to Robert Dean: a
former Virginia Beach councilman and longtime freedom fighter who has
just recently formally signed up with the good guys.
|
|
The other
campaign visiting Norfolk that day was the Sharon Wood campaign for
Virginia’s First Congressional District.
The first Libertarian to ever get on the Congressional ballot
there, Sharon has been rampaging from Newport News to Fredericksburg
with a message of freedom.
Call for
large and small ways you can help the Sharon Wood for Congress Campaign!
|
|
CLASSIFIEDS
WANTED!
Distributors
Writers
Subscribers
Advertisers
Advocates
Protesters
Contact: The Hampton Roads
Freedom News, 757-623-4200
|
|
*************************************
COMING SOON!
The Harry
Browne Campaign: Highs & Lows.
The
Electoral College Vetoes the Electorate (?) ************************************ |