Dakota Beacon

Reviewing “The Creature from Jekyll Island” by G. Edward Griffin (1994) proved a worthwhile reconsideration of the US debt and deficit issue. Griffin presents a very readable history of the creation and workings of the Federal Reserve System, America’s central bank. The title refers to Jekyll Island off the Georgia coast where a clandestine meeting in November 1910 attended by an elite group of financiers gave birth to the Federal Reserve. His book reads like an unbelievable story of smoke and mirrors; pulleys, cogs, and wheels creating a grand illusion we call money.

Griffin contends that debt is money. He calls it funny money. Others call it fiat money. The center piece in his argument discusses the “Mandrake Mechanism,” a name derived from a 1940s cartoon character called Mandrake the Magician. The mechanism described details the method by which the Federal Reserve creates money out of nothing, or out of debt to be more accurate. He reduces the technical to the understandable for the benefit of the lay person.

Voting in 2020 requires Work in being well informed on the various issues, walking or driving to your polling place, protecting others by wearing a mask and physically distancing from other voters, and the Courage to vote in person after determining that you do not fall within groups seriously at risk of death from Covid-19. If you are one of those seriously at risk, the absentee ballot option is probably best for you.

On August 10, Hong Kong police arrested billionaire Jimmy Lai. His crime was to express opposition to the mainland Chinese Communist Party’s aggression against Hong Kong. In this article, Dr. Mark Hendrickson details the life of Lai and how one event changed his path forever. Hendrickson writes, “Lai could have coasted through the rest of his life enjoying his vast fortune, but China’s 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre was his epiphany. He adopted a new life mission: to bring freedom to the long-oppressed Chinese people. He left the clothing business and, with no prior experience, started a pro-democracy newspaper, Apple Daily.”

A CUTE BUFFALO CALF; WRONG DIRECTION; ND BUDGET OPTIMISM; THE JASPER HOTEL; ROAD TRAINS; HAT IN HAND; FORBE NAMES FARGO; "IT COULD BE A REAL ZOO"; BREMER BANK; IN OTHER STATES; ACKNOWLDEGE THE OBVIOUS; DAKTOIDS

It’s not hyperbole to characterize Clinton and other leftists as childish, for such people never matured spiritually, philosophically and morally. The problem is that they can’t be corrected with a spanking, and when they have enough power, well, you might as well then be governed by the malevolent, sociopathic little girl in the Bad Seed.

In the Golden Age of Hollywood musicals, no name shone brighter than that of Gene Kelly.  Today would be Kelly's 108th birthday and it seems only fitting to celebrate it with his story and a few of his most notable performances on film.  Sit back and enjoy!

If you are a Democratic Socialist, you belong in Venezuela, where they have been in power for 21 years. Hugo Chavez was elected four times and his successor, Nicolas Maduro was elected once. We Americans do not have the excuse of illiteracy that Venezuelans peasants can rely on to explain their poor choices at the ballot box.

The thing that leftists do that frustrates me the most is their tendency to waste their God-given opportunities, insist on more government and higher taxes, causing their poorly managed state to go bankrupt… and then have the audacity to move to a well governed state and repeat their deficient voting habits.

COLLEGE FOOTBALL SEASON SHRINKS; "BE LEGENDARY - WELCOME TO NORTH DAKOTA; MORE MEDICAL MUSCLE; ND IS STRUGGLEING TO CONTRO VIRUS; ND VACCINE PILOT PROJECT; POLICE POPULARITY; TRUE NORTH EQUIPMENT; SOUTH DAKOTA'S SALES TAX; SWEDEN WAS BAD BEFORE IT WASN'T; TAKE  YOUR CHANCES IN STURGIS; CHINESE COUNTERFIEIT; DAKTOIDS

In this article, Dr. Earl Tilford looks back on a 21-year military career, his time in Thailand, and how the Vietnam draft affected higher education—especially graduate schools. Tilford writes, “I write this not because I’m on the endangered species list as a mid-septuagenarian trying to ready my soul for eternity. Christ took care of that. I write because serving my tour also shaped my life.”

August . . . sigh.  The last gasp of summer.  It is also the birth month of some great composers, some we associate with the world of classical music - pause and take time out this Sunday evening to listen to some great music and a few facts about the composers who wrote it.

The farther we get into this year, the more absurd and strange it becomes.  We are ordered around by 17-year-old store clerks, demanding that we pull our masks up.  We stand outside stores' doorways reading the sign posted there instructing us as to what we must do and comply with in order to be allowed to enter.  We have spent the whole summer looking at people with their faces covered in wads of cloth, as if in some strange, never-ending nightmare where we are the subjects of some bizarre experiment in someone's unholy lab.  While we are sectioned off, with plexiglass or sheets of plastic from the checkout girls, little holes cut in them to pass money through, when toilet paper shortages are only a faint, fond memory as the horror of 2020 lurches on, we are now subjected to rioting, demands that we turn our homes over to BLM, even as we are about to be ordered to turn them over to our mortgage holders, inasmuch as we have been losing our jobs and livelihoods.  Even so, our governors are overlooking the riots and the arson and looting (occasionally blaming it on Trump) and instead are concentrating on telling us the dire consequences if we should deign to go anywhere without a mask.  Or stand too close to one another, unless we are rioting.  Are you as sick of this as I am?  Are we going to do something about it?  I'd appreciate your opinions.

We have as yet not got the answer, the "magic bullet" for COVID-19.  That, however, has not gotten in the way of a nearly complete shutdown of our nation's economy for the entire summer, American citizens running around in public mumbling through wads of cloth over their faces, standing apart weirdly, not shaking hands.  We are being ordered about by store clerks on their first jobs, who are being ordered about by state governments.  No one is very happy about this.  People are attacking each other over this, we've all had enough of the "new normal".  What we need now is actual normal and an end of acceptance of "mandates" from governors who are overstepping their authority.  We need to take back our lives and use our own best judgment about how to live, we need to restore to doctors the right to prescribe medicines they believe will work - that have been working.  We need to remember this is America, not Communist China or some banana republic.  

As a kid, I enjoyed hanging around adults in conversation. These were grown-ups at play in a silly sort of way. In their words, jargon, and gestures they resembled actors on a living room stage.

Now, as an adult, participating in conversation transitions into more than a spectator sport. Swapping information, sharing stories, and trading ideas with friends hints of quiet leisure. Before radio, TV, and smart devices, conversation in the salons of Europe provided stimulating entertainment. Even today, coffee houses and cafes still offer fine opportunities for pleasant conversation. Talk is cheap and chatting is an inexpensive form of recreation.

Should inheritance taxes be increased? Or should they be abolished? In this article, economist Dr. Mark Hendrickson responds to a recent New York Times article that called for the tax to go up. Hendrickson writes, “Calls to raise inheritance taxes stem from two common failings, one moral, one intellectual.”

It's Sunday - time for a "pick-me-up" and there isn't much more upbeat than a Bobby Darin finger-snapping song.  Darin was a phenomenal star, versatile, with a great sense of humor.  He was a popular guest on many of his era's top entertainment TV shows and had a couple of his own as well.  A songwriter, singer, actor, impressionist, Darin was a unique star.  He really did it all in the entertainment business, on both sides of the camera, as a business manager and producer, mentor, creator and performer.  During his all-too-short lifetime, few were aware of the stresses which both challenged and drove him - his serious lifelong illness, his heartbreak in learning of his true parentage, his devotion to his son, Dodd, his love for the women in his life.  His remarkable intelligence was really no secret to those who were familiar with his work.  Let's take a look back at one of America's greatest entertainers - Bobby Darin.

Can you handle the truth?  Or do you want to continue the stream of lies gushing at you as from a fire hose from the media?  If you question their narrative you are taken down.  If you offer information they have not approved or seek to explore options they don't endorse, you're "out".  We can see with our own eyes the prevarication of the so-called "experts" - people like Fauci, who are filmed blatantly throwing out the first pitch at a baseball game and then sitting cheek-by-jowel with companions and not wearing the mandated mask.  We can look at nations such as Sweden, which took an entirely different and more constructive approach to the "pandemic".  We can consider the evidence that well-known, accepted drugs provide effective treatment and even cures.  We can examine and verify statistics that are thrown around - shocking statistics (like 100% infection in the state of Florida).  Or . . . we can sit back in our masks and eat whatever CNN and other leftist organs feed us.  Your choice.  If you are inclined to question, then it is time to take down the leftist media that has been playing us, using us and our very lives as pawns in their shabby game.

Satisfy your own curiosity and do a word search for Turning Point USA and Blexit. Then, let’s see what happens in November.

Speaking of good news and potential Democrat voters, where are the caravans of illegal aliens storming our southern boarder? Whatever happened to the coverage of illegals from El Salvador and Nicaragua marching through Mexico on highways and freight trains heading toward the US? Your guess is as good as mine. Rest assured, if the news would hurt President Trump’s re-election bid it would be top story. The media would have spun the migration to hurt Trump. For some reason the media, Democrats, and illegals all lost interest. Maybe this group is losing the PR battle with the American people.

Has anyone heard these news items reported?

The media, nationally and locally across the country, has been in a mad frenzy to push senseless responses to COVID-19.  One of the more alarming and totalitarian ideas is the "mask mandate".  State after state is falling prey to this lunacy, without the scantest reference to real scientific evidence in its favor, much less the possibility that it could result in long-term suffering, On July 25, the Grand Forks Herald published an opinion piece by one Jim Shaw, purportedly a "columnist" somewhere, which promotes enfocement of mask-wearing in all public places.  His rant is riddled with factual errors and distortions , which are addressed in this article.  

The Venezuelan Warning

Socialists were elected in not less than five very close elections in Venezuela. The Venezuelan voters were perfectly happy with the nationalization of their oil companies in the early years. Stealing from corporations was justifiable for the “good of all”. As more of Venezuelan society was converted to government ownership and oil profits fell, the economy began to suffer, as it always has under socialism... everywhere it has been tried. Cuban mercenaries were brought in to personally monitor each and every government official to insure compliance with the “elected dictatorship”. Business owners fled for their lives as their businesses were swallowed up by the “elected dictatorship”. The cry of socialism is “Workers of the World, Unite”. No matter how “united” the workers of Venezuela were, they could not miraculously bring efficiency to bureaucracies of government. Most of the workers (the ones not murdered for doing so) left for greener pastures. The result is a failed state where totalitarian dictatorship holds on by its fingernails as suffering reaches daily new heights in Venezuela.

We Can be the New Venezuela

DAPL DEVELOPER ENERGY TRANSFER; THE PANDEMIC PICTURE IN ND; HE’S SEEN ENOUGH; DELAYED SHOCK; THE COAL CREEK STATION; THEY’RE HIGH NEEDS; TIME FOR A CHANGE?; DO YOU HEAR A CHOKING SOUND?; THE DEVIL MADE ME DO IT!; SHOW MORE RESPECT; DAKTOIDS

Daily, the mainstream media reports that the number of positive COVID-19 cases in the United States is up dramatically this summer. Yet the death rates are still well below the numbers from April and early May. Why are the death rates across the country much lower during a time when the number of new cases is skyrocketing? In this article, Dr. Gary Welton examines the data and offers six factors that may be playing a role.

Over the course of one summer we have seen the loss of most of our constitutional rights - rights which our forefathers secured (or thought they had) through bitter struggle and extreme personal risk.  For over two cienturies we have enjoyed these rights and prospered with them.  Suddenly an illness imported from China has been the excuse for abandonment of our culture of freedom.  I am not objecting to emergency measures intended to protect citizens in time of disaster.  I am talking about powers assumed under the guise of an emergency - an emergency that somehow never goes away.  Did we, in one summer, determine that we can no longer live as a free people?  Because this has been going on too long to be legitimately called an "emergency".  It has become totalitariansim.  It must be stopped before ii is too late.  This is an open letter to members of Minnesota's state legislature.  Every two years they put their signs up in yards, they knock on doors and pass out literature to persuade us that it is important to vote for them.  So - is it?  

Many black leaders would quarrel over BLM’s choice of heroes because BLM’s choices are restricted to the victim narrative. Lawrence Jones, Larry Elder, Leo Terrell, Robert Woodson, Shelby Steele, Walter E. Williams, Thomas Sowell, Clarence Thomas, Candace Owens, and more beg to differ.

As Bob Woodson says, “BLM has appropriated the authority of the Civil Rights movement to promote insurrection.” And, “There is no excuse for 18 and 19-year-old black males to claim an exemption from personal responsibility to riot, loot, and destroy under the rubric of ‘institutional racism’.” Shelby Steele echoes, “…our culture is unique from other communities because we are the only community that caters to the bottom denominator of our society.” Regarding Floyd, Candace Owens says, “But we are unique in that we are the only people that fight and scream and demand support for the people in our community that are up to no good.” In BLM’s arrogance, they claim the biggest threat to young black men is police. BLM ignores crime by young black men committed against their own.

Is the greater public, both black and white, being bamboozled and duped into silence by the Marxist-led BLM narrative with the help of the media’s PR scam? You decide.

FORMER UND PROVOST TOM DILORENZO; NOTHING LIKE COMPETITION; ALTRU HEALTH SYSTEM; STATE HITS A TRIPLE; DISPUTED ROYALTIES; OIL CRISIS; IMPORTANCE OF DAPL; MORE OIL TRAINS; PROTEST LIVES ON; THE MINOT CITY COUNCIL; THE NCAA; DO YOU AGREE?; CRIME UP, POLICE DOWN; DAKTOIDS

We are being lied to and because of that, people are dying needlessly.  Watch.

It seems as though America has lost its collective mind.  People are screaming obscenities, assaulting each other, committing acts of violence, all the while we are acquiescing to calls for disbanding the police.  Does anyone remember the America of a few years ago?  The golden age of Ronald Reagan - or even a year ago?  People seem to have descended into madness, some involved in mayhem and random murder and destruction and others neurotically obsessed with trying to hid from or outrun a virus.  It really is insanity.

Our nation has been under attack all summer.  So far nothing has stopped the violence.  Far from curtailing the lawlessness, the mayors of our great cities have been siding with the attackers.  It has been an  orgy.  It is time  - past time - to put an end to this and let the perpetrators know once and for all that we will not tolerate this in America.

We are admonished to go along to get along.  Don't make waves.  It's no big deal.  What difference does it make - just keep quiet and do as you're told.  It's good for the public, it's safer this way.  You don't want to create a problem, do you?  So you dutifully put on your little face mask.  You carefully practice awkward "social distancing", standing six feet apart everywhere.  You carefully choreograph your grocery shopping so as not to go the "wrong way" down an aisle.  You have all but severed your real-life friendships, living online now, skyping, living "virtually".  Dinner parties are a thing of the past, as are family reunions.  Remember the festivals and fairs you once attended?  THe concerts?  The dances?  The birthday parties with friends?  It all seems long ago.  It was.  We have been "shut down" for months now.  News flash:  there is no end.  

Summertime 2020 is Covid-19 sequestration time and a good time to catch up on books new and old. What I am reading (and re-reading) I can recommend to others. A dozen more books could be added to the list, but I’ll constrain myself to a few.

DAPL LEGAL BATTLES BEGIN; ECONOMIC DEVASTATION; DAPL HAS ALLIES; GOVERNOR BURGUM EFFORT FOR STANDING ROCK; WE STILL NEED POLICE; BYE-BYE GF BIG RETAILERS; WHAT A DEAL!; PRAIRIE KIDS DID WELL; QUITE A LIFE!; NOT A NICE THING TO SAY!; PAWNING AN HEIRLOOM; DAKTOIDS