Archive for April 6th, 2007
The tree of liberty must from time to time be refreshed with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.
— Thomas Jefferson, Letter to William Smith [November 13, 1787]
Jefferson, and others, recognized the tendency for government to increasingly strip away our freedoms and assert control over the people. It is my opinion that we are nearing the point of establishing a critical mass that will rise up and reverse the current trend.
Increased government control has not led to better living standards, just higher taxation. War is the most insidious tool of government to strip away rights and assume more control. The state of public education and health care is criticized uniformly by most people, yet they don’t realize more government is not the answer.
Ray, from The New Liberty and Free New York blogs, put forth a very good perspective on our current woes.
There is one, and only one, candidate for President who firmly embraces the Constitutional values of freedom, liberty and property — Congressman Ron Paul.
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I went to the Broadway Market today to do some shopping for Easter Dinner. The place was mobbed and smelled wonderful. It was nearly impossible to get near the Lupus Meat counter shown in the background.
The variety of colorful confections was mind boggling. There was chocolate in every conceivable shape and size of chocolate available.
The Butter Lambs were getting scarce by 2:30 this afternoon.
The fresh produce looked absolutely gorgeous. Those are not your typical supermarket tomatoes!
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Michael Rozeff’s plan to downsize and/or eliminate the State.
Make a list of all government programs. Then repeal them, all of them. Any order will do.
Here’s a bit more detail.
There are countless other political changes that will downsize the state. We might begin by repealing laws that regulate industry and favor special interests. Chief among these interests are the military (usually called defense, but really offense). Releasing our economy from its unnecessary military burdens and reducing taxes accordingly will allow greater economic growth, making it easier when other matters are taken up. This also makes it far more difficult for our leaders to engineer their further power-seeking and suppression of our rights. Stopping the involvement of the U.S. overseas has a high priority.
Other obvious areas of importance are education, health care, and the monetary system. The health care system is still moving in the wrong direction. Surveys always show the public interested in universal health care financed by higher taxes. Clearly people are letting their emotions and hopes speak. They do not understand the economics of ill-health that they are supporting. Re-education on this subject is very important. Similarly, people are still wedded to the public schools, despite their abysmal performance. The monetary system hasn’t been right for a very long time. The state simply has no business being in the money business. Other serious problem areas are energy and the environment, where myths abound and dangerous wedges into central socialist planning and regulation exist.
These are tough areas to change because the special interest groups have succeeded in spreading their views to the general public and gotten their approval for their harmful policies. In fact, attacks on any interest group, even rich agricultural interests, elicit a chorus of propaganda to defend the subsidies and regulations. We simply need to keep going after these interests tooth and nail. They are selfish and greedy sleaze balls who have no compunctions about robbing through the public treasuries. Their rationales for public aid are lies and fabrications. They should be held up to scorn and ridicule at every turn.
Read it all: Getting From Here To There by Michael S. Rozeff
One problem with learning more about using Photoshop and other digital imaging software is that it is always tempting to tweak a photo in order to make it even better. Of course, better is subjective and also addicting.
The thumbnail is the original photograph. I made 3 different exposure copies of it using Photoshop. The 3 exposures were combined into a single hdr image and tone-mapped with Photomatix. Finally, I tweaked the sky a bit with Photoshop and applied a frame.
The result — Voila! (click photos for large versions)
Technorati tags: Buffalo Savings Bank, Buffalo, photography, photoshop, photomatix, hdr, digitial, image
