Minor Thoughts from me to you

...apparently belongs to a certain species of Caribbean jellyfish.

I'd planned to finish up my commentary on the Book of Joshua today - there's little enough material in the last chapters that I think I can do it in one entry - but my father sent me a very hefty e-mail and I ended up writing a day's worth of words for him instead.

The subject on which we're writing each other is actually related. I told my father a little over a week ago that I was an atheist. He didn't come after me during the actual Skype conversation in which I said it, but his first salvo of Christian apologist answers to atheists - all of which you've probably heard before if you're interested in such things - started appearing in my e-mail box within 48 hours. I'll be answering them until he tires out. That might be bad news for the commentary if we weren't so close to the end, but I'm sure I can squeeze out one more post in the next day or two.

TTFN.

Greg Mankiw explains the spending problems with the healthcare bill through a short, imagined dialog between two friends. Here's the kicker:

Even if you believe that the spending cuts and tax increases in the bill make it deficit-neutral, the legislation will still make solving the problem of the fiscal imbalance harder, because it will use up some of the easier ways to close the shortfall. The remaining options will be less attractive, making the eventual fiscal adjustment more painful.

With the President's current budgeting trends (spend as much as you can, as fast as you can), we're facing an $11.3 trillion deficit by 2020. By that time, the federal debt will be a staggering $20.3 trillion. (The debt was $5.8 trillion at the end of 2008.)

It's not enough to be happy that we're maintaining the current levels of spending or -- even worse -- that we're managing to spend more in a "deficit neutral" way. It's serious business and it's time we stopped "kicking the can down the road to future generations", as the President likes to say.

Off-duty O.C. sheriff's deputy is arrested on DUI charge after crashing twice within 30 minutes | L.A. NOW | Los Angeles Times.

An off-duty Orange County sheriff’s deputy, who allegedly was intoxicated when he crashed his Mercedes-Benz into another vehicle and injured a passenger, had crashed 30 minutes earlier and was allowed to drive from that accident scene by fellow deputies, authorities said Friday.

Sheriff’s deputies were called Monday afternoon to a crash involving Deputy Allan James Waters, 36, and another vehicle outside City Hall in Dana Point. Deputies took a report and permitted Waters keep driving, said Assistant Sheriff Mike James.

About 30 minutes later, at 5:20 p.m., Waters crashed his Mercedes-Benz into a Toyota in Laguna Niguel, causing it to cross the center median and slam into a tree, according to the California Highway Patrol. Dolores Molina, a 78-year-old passenger in the Toyota, suffered minor injuries.

And that, right there, is pretty much why I don't respect law enforcement these days.

Power Line - Geert Wilders speaks

Geert Wilders, possibly the next Prime Minister of the Netherlands, finally gets his chance to speak to the British House of Lords about the threat posed to Western Civilization by radical Islam. (Great Britain refused to allow him into the country last year, claiming that he was too bigoted to be allowed to speak.) Here's the money quote, about the problem facing us.

We see Islam taking off in the West at an incredible pace. Europe is Islamizing rapidly. A lot of European cities have enormous Islamic concentrations. Paris, Amsterdam, Brussels and Berlin are just a few examples. In some parts of these cities, Islamic regulations are already being enforced. Women's rights are being destroyed. Burqa's, headscarves, polygamy, female genital mutilation, honour-killings. Women have to go to separate swimming-classes, don't get a handshake. In many European cities there is already apartheid. Jews, in an increasing number, are leaving Europe.

It turns out that my two-car lifestyle with no pets is just as "sustainable" as the no-car plus pets lifestyle. Cool.

From The Dominion Post of New Zealand:

The eco-pawprint of a pet dog is twice that of a 4.6-litre Land Cruiser driven 10,000 kilometres a year, researchers have found.

Victoria University professors Brenda and Robert Vale, architects who specialise in sustainable living, say pet owners should swap cats and dogs for creatures they can eat, such as chickens or rabbits, in their provocative new book Time to Eat the Dog: The real guide to sustainable living.

(FPOD* -- By: Mark Steyn via The Corner on National Review Online.)

Yesterday I found trying to write the archetypal 500-word op-ed so much fun that this morning I've decided to write a couple more on (what I will charitably call) the art form. And because Rabbi Jesus advised us to go where the sinners are - an idea revealing of His divine understanding of marketing - I've thrown it up on a blog on Townhall.com itself to feature it. I've named it "Townhall Reviewed".

This morning I pounded out the following column (took about 30 min.). While I won't claim its source to be divine, I frankly feel God probably agrees with it.

I'll probably do a few more, so c'mon back later if you find it pleasing.

A Varied Diet Is Good For You: Stop Reading So Many Conservative Pundits

If you’re reading this, odds are you’re not a very informed person.

Forgive me, but it has to be said by somebody.

And I say it, if it makes any difference, as a young man who grew up listening to Rush Limbaugh, at least until his father discovered any number of other talk radio hosts who quickly followed in El Rushbo’s historic wake, and who by my sophomore year in high school did not end a day without absorbing every new column published by Townhall.com’s elite assemblage of conservative pundits.

Over a decade later I still read and listen to them, too - they’re just not all I read and listen to.

Today I also listen to podcasts from Dan Carlin, a moderate. And also broadcasts from Air America, which isn’t. Books I’ve recently read: Barbara Ehrenreich’s Nickeled and Dimed and Hillary Clinton’s autobiography.

All of this is good.

For all the intuitive understanding today’s conservatives possess of the marketplace and specifically the wonderfully-termed marketplace of ideas, they tend not to bother shopping around in it. Six or seven years ago I certainly never did. What information I needed to know from the books, articles, and videos of my political opponents I learned from quoted excerpts within my own, which handily came with ready rebuttals to any points I might find troubling.

That I had encased myself within a bubble of groupthink, one no less Orwellian than that which envelopes our universities, did not occur to me until late in college, when in my zeal to become the most effective culture warrior I could be I decided to start reading the works of my enemies; I wanted to be a Christian apologist and writer, so I started by putting away Norman L. Geisler, Lee Strobel, and other “defenders of the faith” and instead reading alternative commentaries on the Tanakh by moder-day Jewish scribes like Gunther W. Plaut and Dennis Prager, after which I graduated to the atheist treatments of Dr. Robert M. Price and the full-bore counter-apologists we all know so well: Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris, et al.

I liken the effect of this expanded reading list to having eaten only American hamburgers for most of my life and then discovering ethnic food exists. The variety and richness of thought I encountered, even though I disagreed with a lot of it, was intoxicating – and yes, I started coming across arguments against Biblical inerrancy and various Christian values that C.S. Lewis, Norman L. Geisler, and the rest never mentioned to me. For the first time in my life I was truly being challenged, and only the opinions I truly deserved to have survived this refiner’s fire.

Naturally, I soon enough applied the same approach to my politics, and now – well, now I’m in a place I’d never thought I’d be. Which is scary, but also very exciting.

There’s little practical difference between living in a one-party state where you are constantly brainwashed and living in a two-party state where you are constantly conditioning yourself. Don’t waste the blessing you’ve been given of living in one of the few countries on Earth where you really can explore every point of view. It’s too rare a gift and it’s dishonest.

Take a break today from Townhall.com. Hell, take a week off. It’s not like you don’t know what all of these people think about everything anyway. Instead, jump over to a Libertarian website (they half-agree with you! Good place to start!), or even a Democrat one if you’re brave enough. Then when you return to the discussions here, at least you’ll have a unique voice, as opposed to being just another Republican repeating the exact same points from the exact same sources that everyone else is repeating.

Become informed.

So I've been learning Krav Maga (the Israeli art of Arab-pummeling) for several months now, with a break for my nuptials - and this week I accidentally knocked the stuffing out of my instructor.

In retrospect this feels like both a victory and a tragedy: a victory, because it's proof all my lessons over the last few months haven't been some sort of scam. It's kinda hard to tell when you're just hitting pads.

A tragedy, obviously, because you just know he's going to call me up a lot more often for demonstrations, or continuously pair you with Trogg, the he-mountain to my left.

So, hey, it's been more than 3 weeks since I last wrote anything over here. Time sure flies when you're having fun, don't it? And I have been having fun, never doubt that. I have several personalities trapped inside my skull. There's the wannabe theology wonk, the wannabe healthcare policy wonk, the system administrator, the programmer, the reader, the fantasy football freak, and the gadget freak. There are probably more, but I don't particularly feel like tracking them down right now.

So, three weeks ago the theology wonk was firmly in control. I was churning out the blog posts on theology, reading about theology, thinking about theology, and having a blast. So much so that I even ordered a biography of Calvin and picked up a copy of the Institutes to read through. I had planned (as much as I ever plan) to keep doing that for a couple more weeks.

Then, out of nowhere, the system administrator and the programmer ganged up on the theology wonk and sandbagged him. They've been running riot for the past two weeks. The system administrator got to play first. I've been tweaking the setup of my hosting account at Joyent optimizing the speed and efficiency of the whole thing. (If the blog at all feels faster, that's part of the reason why.) Then the programmer came out and I spent a ton of time rewriting some of my personal web apps, fixing bugs, and adding features. I've been going to bed after 11pm and waking up around 4am or 5am in order to squeeze in as much coding time as possible around my actual, paying, job.

That urge has slowly been dying down. I think the programmer and system administrator are ready to go back to sleep. The reader seems to be re-emerging, as I take more interest in both fiction and non-fiction again. I'll probably dive back into some of that theology reading that I have queued up.

It looks like I'll have a good 3 weeks to prepare before Adam returns to the blog. That's good. I'll need every minute of it. Maybe I'll even write a post or two before he returns, just to grease the wheels a bit.

As the wedding day of yours truly draws ever closer (golly, can it be less than two weeks away now?), certain facts of life are becoming impossible to ignore any longer. Among these: that my freedom to loaf for days' worth of time playing a much-anticipated video game with my brother shall soon meet its end.

So, I'd better get while the getting's good, eh?

Rather than blogging these next two weeks, I'll be spending my remaining free time as a man unattached playing Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, which by either wonderful coincidence or karma happens to be the final installment of my very favorite game series (I've been following Metal Gear and its hero Solid Snake since its initial release in the '80s).

And then I'll be on my honeymoon, at which point video games will likely seem an inconsequential loss.

Webmaster Joe shall entertain you while I'm saving the world. Later!

The Economist's new Lexington columnist (a charming detail of the magazine is that its regular columnists all write under psuedonyms, but rather than create new ones when they are hired they instead receive the psuedonym of the writer who worked their beat before them) kicks off his tenure with an article about atheist camps for children in the United States.

I've heard about these; I even once listened to an podcast interview with Don Sutterfield, an ex-Christian who nowadays works at the same "Camp Quest" Lexington explored for his article. I was amused as much then as now by its challenges to its campers, which include the camp counselors informing all the kids that an invisible unicorn lives in the woods, and that they'll receive a prize if they can prove it doesn't exist. Most of the daily activities aren't anti-religious but are likewise centered on critical thinking. Though I still don't count myself an atheist (yes, even despite my fall from grace), I'm still rather pleased to hear that such a place exists, wherein kids are taught how to consider information rather than what information to accept.

By contrast, both Webmaster Joe and I spent at least one summer together (Joe, how many times did you go overall? I think I went thrice) at AWANA Scholarship Camp, which I was saddened to learn today no longer exists. When we weren't belting out hymns for Jesus we were crooning pledges to America. At night we'd stand up before the assembly to declare our intention to throw away our country music albums for Jesus soon as we got home we swear, or give our testimonies or whatever. The point was clearly to rejuvenate our allegiance to the Christian values which so naturally erodes over time spent with... with...

Well, let's just say it:

Public school kids.

Above: AWANA's mascot Sparky, as Joe and I knew him back in the day. Below: The new-fangled Sparky of today. When did the whippersnappers give him wings?

I seem to recall the camp succeeding in its mission too, at least with me. I returned to my neighborhood feeling very purified, driven, and ready to serve as a light in the spiritual darkness (we secretly watched Mortal Kombat and Die Hard while the 'rents were asleep) of my neighborhood. This lasted until "Mortal Kombat II", at least.

The very different summer getaways underline the differences between mainstream Christianity/other religions and skeptics/free-thinkers. To become more dismissive of evidence and thought contrary to your worldview is to "grow in your faith" in the eyes of the Church, but to simply be close-minded to the skeptic. The established religions ferociously grip old answers and consider it a testament to the strength of those old answers that they've succeeded in doing so for millenia. Skeptics of course see that same unwillingness to adopt new theories in light of further evidence as a gross weakness. One group lives by trusting what they are told; one group lives by questioning what they are told.

When the kids at camps like these grow up, which of them will have been better served by their experience?

And will the latter group remember all the words to the Sparky Song? 'Cause this is all I got:

_We are Sparks for Jesus

Sparks to light the world_

[something something something]

_As we tell each boy and girl.

We will hide God's Word in our heart

We will [something] right from the start.

We are Sparks! Sparks! Sparks! Sparks!

Sparks to light the world!_

Now this is interesting (well, to me):

I don't know much about the current situation in Honduras, but most of the news reports I've heard have generally portrayed the ouster of its president Manuel Zelaya as a military coup, albeit one of a man who seemed likely to make a play for the role of dictator.

Well, reknowned conservative commentator Dennis Prager has informed his listeners which side he supports by flying to the country and broadcasting his show from there. I think it's an unusually bold move; commentators are generally sedentary creatures who enjoy talking about the issues more than anything productive (and why not? Talking's easier), but his move here underlines the passion he communicates in his article.

Am I convinced? I have no idea, still knowing little about the country and its problems. Dipping my hand for but a moment into the well of information that is the Internet, I find that in 1998 the county was declared the third-most corrupt country on Earth by Transparency International's Corruption Research Center. A more recent (2008) publication from the Overseas Security Advisory Council informs me that Honduras was full of gang violence, kidnapping, and political shenanigans even before the "coup". Finally, I notice that as of July 2 the military has restricted citizens' rights, although Prager rightly notes they haven't taken power (so calling this situation a "military coup" is very much a misnomer), not even from Manuel Zelaya's party. All of this suggests we're talking about a struggling, nearly failed state that is chaotic but has thankfully had too much recent experience with complete authoritarianism (the military ruled until the 1980s) to succumb to an obvious power play.

That said, some of the response by the Honduran government is unquestionably illegal, such as Zelaya's deportation (no Honduran citizen may be forcibly removed from the country, according to the country's constitution), so it appears that the Hondurans have allowed themselves to push a little harder against the encroachment than was strictly advisable.

Shoot, let's just invade.

It's photos like this that demand we start a "Mad Libs" category.

And yes, since I know you're wondering: she_ is_ an actual representative. Brazil.

Above: Jonathan Edwards.

Webmaster Joe's really been crankin' out the apologetics recently. And it's all interesting - not so much the in-and-outs of the arguments themselves (which I say without offense to Joe, I hope - I simply know them already) as my reaction to them from a new, quasi-outsider perspective, what I'm learning about how mental paradigms work.

The theology Joe is taking the time to explain to all of us seems to me self-evidently crazy and even evil. Reading it, I realize how Nazis could slay 6 million Jews (or Jews could wipe out lands full of Canaanites), how Muslims could understand why one should blow up women and children on buses, why Catholics once forced baptisms and lit people on fire. Yet I remember quite clearly once making many of the same points to other people, and how justified I felt in doing so at the time. What's more, I know the man making them now, and I would never consider him less morally-inclined than I. I'm forced to reconsider a bromide I once casually dismissed about good men, bad men, and religion.

But I suppose I'd better get to answering it all. And that shouldn't take much time, since Joe stipulated at the beginning of his post that all of his logic is based on the unwarranted assumption that the universe exists according to orthodox Christian theology. On that basis there's little arguing to be done.

Except with Jonathan Edwards' logic. That might hold up if not for the fact that his entire argument is made up of phrases that either don't mean anything or are self-evidently untrue. That is, God does not have "infinite glory" since glory is something He has to be given by others - beings which are not Him. He is also only "infinitely excellent" (read: perfect) because we're judging Him against Himself. "Infinitely lovely" because... because... Well, that one just makes my head hurt (seriously, what on Earth is that supposed to mean?). And he certainly isn't possessed of "infinite majesty" - He may well have "all" majesty, but not "infinite" majesty. There's only a finite amount of majesty (def: sovereignty, authority) to go around, at least as applies to us humans.

Really, the only term understandable within Edwards' whole fubar essay is "infinite punishment", which is very understandable - and horrifying. Uncalled for, too: even taking Christian theology for granted, I can't possibly be under obligation to God for any more than has been given to me, which would be one life's worth of service. You're not obligated to give a return on what you haven't received. That's why when we give God "all praise" we (presumably) mean that we are thanking Him for "everything we have" rather than infinite possibilities (unicorns, pink elephants, honest politicians?).

But maybe I'm trying to prove far more than is necessary here. After all, there really isn't any reason for me or anyone else to bother refuting Jonathan Edwards' analysis of why we deserve Hell, since Jonathan Edwards was a Calvinist and hence believed the hellbound were predestined by God for eternal torture anyway. If that's the case, how can it make sense to say the hellbound deserve their fate, except in that they were built for it? One would assume the whole case to be an exercise in absurdity for a man of such beliefs.

Funny that the same objection was of course raised nearly 2000 years ago to the Bible's Paul. Funnier still that the self-proclaimed apostle had no answer, either.

I made an earlier obversation that Calvinism is a religion that possesses no perspective on humankind distinguishable from Atheism, except that many atheists cling to the idea Life has independent value. However, it does have a flaw the atheistic world view doesn't have; the Calvinist perspective might be structurally sound if unattractive ("We are God's organic toys. He loves some of us and smashes others because this makes Him look good"), but for the fact that Calvinists also must insist that we playthings somehow did wrong and thus _deserve _this whole process that shouldn't need any justification. That keeps tripping them up.

What Calvinism really needs in order to form a coherent perspective is to do away with the concept of Sin entirely - but its adherents naturally can't do that, so maintaining their beliefs requires a certain level of cognitive dissonance and a willingness not to think it through too much. I suppose they accept their confusion as part of God's mystery (His doubtlessly infinite mystery).

Would that they would take the advice of Ayn Rand, who said: "Contradictions do not exist. Whenever you think you are facing a contradiction, check your premises. You will find that one of them is wrong."

An absolutely chilling article from FOXNews.com informs us that the Obama administration is now claiming the right to "continue to imprison non-U.S. citizens indefinitely even if they have been acquitted (italics mine) of terrorism charges by a U.S. military commission."

Recall that the Bush administration was lambasted during its stay for (a) holding terrorist trials by military commission instead of a jury and (b) holding terrorists for indefinite periods of time. Now our new president, still fresh from campaigning on the promise of a more humanitarian policy toward these same people, is saying that even when alleged terrorists do get trials and are found innocent, they remain entirely at the United States' mercy.

Would even President Bush have dared to suggest that? And what are we going to do about it?

I just learned about two new books that I'm interested in reading. (Editor: Isn't that true of every book you hear about?)

This one interests me because Dr. John Walton interests me. I transcribed a sermon he gave on Genesis one, Why Didn't God Call the Light, Light?, and have read some shorter pieces he's written. His perspective on the Origins debate and Genesis one is unique and thought provoking. I've wanted to learn about it in more detail ever since I heard his message. This book is my big chance.

Westminster Books has a PDF with some sample pages from the book. The publication date is "July 30, 2009", but Amazon claims to have it in stock. Amazon also includes two brief blurbs for the book:

This book presents a profoundly important new analysis of the meaning of Genesis. Digging deeply into the original Hebrew language and the culture of the people of Israel in Old Testament times, respected scholar John Walton argues convincingly that Genesis was intended to describe the creation of the functions of the cosmos, not its material nature. In the process, he elevates Scripture to a new level of respectful understanding, and eliminates any conflict between scientific and scriptural descriptions of origins. ----Francis S. Collins, head of the Human Genome Project and author of The Language of God

Walton's cosmic temple inauguration view of Genesis 1 is a landmark study in the interpretation of that controversial chapter. On the basis of ancient Near Eastern literatures, a rigorous study of the Hebrew word bara' ('create'), and a cogent and sustained argument, Walton has gifted the church with a fresh interpretation of Genesis 1. His view that the seven days refers to the inauguration of the cosmos as a functioning temple where God takes up his residence as his headquarters from which he runs the world merits reflection by all who love the God of Abraham. -- The Publisher

This one interests me because John Calvin interests me and this is a novelization of his life. Since I discovered it through Tim Challies's review, I'll let him do the talking.

The Betrayal, published by P&R; Publishing, comes from the pen of Douglas Bond who has written several historical fiction novels in the past. In this new book, he writes from the perspective of a lifelong sworn enemy of Calvin--a boy who grows up in the same town and who, as a man, remains involved with Calvin's life to the very end. As the publisher says, "This fast-paced biographical novel is a tale of envy that escalates to violent intrigue and shameless betrayal." I hesitate to say too much about the plot lest I inadvertently ruin it for those who would like to read the book.

... As for me, well, I'll be honest and say that I read fiction only on rare occasions and my preference would always be to read a standard biography over a historical novel. However, I do know that a lot of readers prefer fiction and for these people, I think The Betrayal will be a great way of getting a useful overview of Calvin's life. I was sometimes amazed at just how much of Calvin's life is present in this book but never in such a way that the novel becomes bogged down in irrelevant details. Bond has done a great job of integrating reality with fiction so the reader will hardly know when one begins and the other ends.

If you are a fan of novels or of historical fiction, and if you are anxious to learn a little bit about John Calvin, this man who is so fondly remembered even five hundred years after his birth, you cannot go far wrong in reading The Betrayal.

I like novels a lot more than I like most biographies (killing the memory of great people and events under a pile of dusty prose since the beginning of time), so this is the "biography" of Calvin that I'd like to read.

"I like to pay taxes. With them I buy civilization." - Oliver Wendell Holmes

The above quote encapsulates the answer with which liberty activists are often met. We are reminded of how much we owe to our various levels of government. Have you been recently accosted? Of course not, because your tax dollars pay for the police. Did you take the road to get here? The government built our road system. You should pay your taxes because you benefit from the government's services.

The implication is that we are ungrateful... er, ingrates, but it's a silly argument. The position is akin to nothing so much as that taken by the homeless man who sweeps a cloth over your car window and sticks out his hand expectedly (then proceeds to break your wipers if you renege on paying for the service you didn't request).

Benefiting in no way obliges the beneficiary unless that beneficiary has asked. I don't owe the government anything.

Neither do you.

Liberty activist Sam Dodson's recent victory over the Cheshire County government in New Hampshire has inspired our own Webmaster Joe - but like many family men, he feels he hasn't the right to jeopardize his wife and two daughters' security by committing civil disobedience.

I'm not sure I agree with his description of illegal activism as "self-indulgent". Most of the men and women who have previously liberated American society from various evils had families; most of the Iranians currently protesting in Tehran's streets and opposing Ahmadenijad at risk to life and limb (God bless them all) likely have them. That they were and are still willing to engage the enemies of freedom underscores their commitment against injustice - and if we all felt such conviction, the injustices of today would likely never have been allowed to take root in the first place.

Which is not to downplay Joe's concerns regarding how civil disobedience might affect his family or to suggest he needs to "man up" and get to chaining himself to fences. No, no - the point deserved to be made, now has been, and I'd prefer to suggest methods by which citizens like Joe might contribute without undue risk to their livelihoods.

Having said that, my first suggestion will probably seem strange: cheat on your taxes. Starve the beast of government by denying it the funds with which to finance its clearly immoral and illegal programs. For the time being this is actually very safe, according to BookKeeperList.com, which writes that in in one recent year "only 2,472 Americans were convicted of tax crimes — .0022 percent of all taxpayers." That's despite the fact that the IRS believes 17% of Americans are not compliant. The IRS just doesn't have the manpower or data-mining equipment to inspect everybody and when it does find suspicious claims it rarely prosecutes. So really, what's the worst that can happen? Paying back-taxes? A penalty, maybe?

But I am am addressing at least one (and probably several, statistics tell me) Christians, so the question naturally arises: isn't that unethical? I've recently reached the decision that it is not. Even if you believe that every government which obtains power over you is legitimate by divine decree (which is stupid - does that mean African-Americans were wrong to protest in the '60's?), to "render unto Caesar" is one thing, especially in a country in which we have a deal with our Caesar; to render unto a known embezzler is another - and it is now undeniable from public information that we Americans are being taken for a financial ride. Even if you accept the idea that they have the right to take money from some people and give it to others, they're not doing that with the money you give them. They're just thieves.

Take for example John Stossel's investigation into the government agency meant to assist Native-Americans in poverty. He's found that $40,000 is purportedly spent on each Native-American purportedly being helped - an amount which obviously would put them all in the middle-class if we simply cut each of them a check for the amount.

Obviously, that money isn't going to those tribes. The government tells us it is, but it isn't - and even the government isn't so incompetent as to mismanage that much moolah. People aren't that stupid, Folks. It's being stolen from you - just as it's being stolen from you inside the Department of Defense (they've been trying to produce a credible financial statement for approximately a decade now), inside the Fed (which hasn't been audited in nearly a century), and doubtlessly inside many other departments.

I'm not saying it's necessarily being stolen from you without being accounted for. I'm sure most of the money that our government officials give to their friends is accounted for on their budget and rationalized, if poorly. But it's still being stolen. The intent of these people is not to help Native-Americans.

A second argument against faithfully paying taxes: I won't declare paying your taxes to be sinful (after all, it's basically the equivalent of handing your wallet to a robber - "Give us the money or else!"), but through your taxes you are funding programs you know to be morally wrong. I can't see that failing to assist evil men in their evil actions can be wrong.

(I wish this conversation was more than academic for me. In my life, the metaphor of the government as highway robber takes on a light-hearted tone. Thumbing through my wallet, the masked menace's eyebrows rise. "Really? This is all you have? Dude, tell you what - just keep it.")

Let's move on to another idea: If you can't be disobedient, fund people who are. The CD Evolution Fund is a charity which financially supports liberty activists in New Hampshire, usually by paying for their legal aid. The fund was instrumental in supplying Sam Dodson with representation during his two-month incarceration.

Obviously, you can also support other liberty-oriented projects. In fact we may want to discuss a libertarian tract of the sort produced by Mr. Ditko; I have $250 in my "Time for another project" account and am currently considering what might eventually pay for itself.

Finally, don't cooperate in your victimization to the extent the law allows. This will still make your life more difficult, as police and government officials don't like it when citizens remind them of their limitations, but freedoms are like muscles - if you don't exercise them, they waste away. Never let a government agent or policeman inside your house without a warrant. Don't tell traffic cops where you're going or where you're coming from if all they stopped you for was speeding.

A number of Free Staters and general libertarians take this tactic to daring levels, openly carrying firearms in areas legal to do so.

Before I close, a note on one tactic you haven't yet heard me mention: voting. To vote for a Libertarian is a harmless enough act, I suppose - and sure, it registers disapproval with the system as it stands - but like Ian on Free Talk Live I'm now wondering if it wouldn't be more productive to deny the legitimacy to our government granted by the electoral process. One of the reasons so few people offer more than token resistance to any government program is that the government is still considered to some extent "all of us", even if it's doing something illegal. But it's not. And perhaps ceasing to play into the pretense that it is would help bring light to that fact.

I think I'm done for now. One thing's for sure, Joe... With people like Sam Dodson doing as much as they are, there's one tactic we can't choose: getting along to get along.

I just had two nice, young college age boys stop by my house. They were in the area representing a window installation company. Their company is trying to drum up business by setting up appointments for their "consultants" to tell me how their energy efficient windows will save me money on my energy bills.

That's a sales pitch that only works for those who don't think about it. I have thought about it, so I made them think about it.

I asked a simple question: "what's the payoff time? how long would it take for the new windows to pay for themselves?"

Well, they tried to duck the question. "That'd be a great question for our consultants..."

I interrupted: "Do you have a ballpark estimate?"

"No."

"Tell your consultants to send you out with a ballpark next time and I might be willing to talk." I didn't let them leave me a flyer either.

I've done the math on this before. My gas / electric bill is $170 a month. Installing new windows throughout the entire house will cost us between $2500 and $7000, depending on the make, model, and installer. It's a simple problem of division. Assuming their windows were miracle windows and eliminated my entire energy bill (hah!), it would take between 15 and 41 years for my new windows to pay for themselves.

There are many good reasons to install new windows. Energy efficiency is not one of them. Not even close.

Confirming what I've suspected: "So far, June's chill is one for the records". http://bit.ly/o5LKx