Dakota Beacon

This past week everyone was atwitter about Elon Musk – well, acquiring Twitter.

The Right says, “Finally. Free speech and a level playing field in social media!”

The Left retorts, “Robber baron! With all his money, Elon Musk is nothing but a robber baron! Nobody gets that wealthy without cheating and ripping off the little guy.”

Liberal heads exploded producing a strange phenomenon. Media heaped vitriol on Musk because he dared to advocate Twitter’s future as a free speech platform! Imagine media taking an anti-free speech position. The height of irony! Taken by surprise and not knowing what else to say, the left reflexively branded Musk a “robber baron.”

When what we need is not more sad accounts or disingenuous "apologies" from stars that their sudden disabilities have forced them to cancel.  It is not more sadness and sympathy on the part of their fans, whether in sports or the entertainment industry.  What is needed is for these injured celebrities to be honest.  To quit shilling for the products that put them in the wheelchairs and gurneys, that crippled them and stole their talents from them.  What is needed is for these well-known pop heroes to admit the truth.  They need to come forward as best they can in their compromised conditions and tell the damn truth.  While they are receiving their daily deliveries of flowers and messages of encouragement from their well-wishers and fans, these fans are dying and being injured.  While everyone focuses on the tragedy of a multi-million-dollar career cut short for a Celine Dion, there are millions of non-millionaire victims of these injections who are not enjoying the words of sympathy but instead receiving notices of permanent layoffs or foreclosures.  No one's doctor is able to help these people.  If there were such a thing as help for them it would first be employed for someone like Dion who can afford the best.  Everyone is sorry to see someone fall victim to something like this - it is tragic.  But for some the tragedy is unlimited.  Celebrities could do a world of good if they spoke out and told the truth.  

Do Russia’s current losses in Ukraine make it more likely that the world will witness another World War? In this article that first appeared at The American Spectator, author and scholar Dr. Paul Kengor reviews some of Russia’s history with death. Kengor writes, “The Russians always persist when they’re getting their tails kicked on the battlefield, whether by the Kaiser or Hitler or retreating from the Mujahedin. It’s a way of life for them; or a way of death.”

I have a confession to make, I wasn't surprised when I heard President Biden announcing his disinformation bureau, I saw it happen right here in North Dakota by the NDGOP!

Below is the wording from the NDGOP web site regarding anyone violating the "Code of Conduct".

NDGOP Code of Conduct  (Link)

Perceived violations of this Code of Conduct should be reported to the Chairman and the Executive Director so they are aware of conduct that could be detrimental to the success of the North Dakota Republican Party.

Do you understand what Perceived means?

Do you see the risk of Perceived?

Who determines What Truth is?

Whose Perception of Truth will be determined?

We hear the "loud alarum bells" tonight for our republic.  Will we soon hear the "iron bells"?  One of Edgar Allan Poe's more intensely compelling and disturbing poems foretold a grim end through the sounds of the bells.  I think we are now in the third stage.   Those poor souls welded into their tiny apartments left to scream are perhaps at the fourth stage now.

In 2021 Texas saw a record 2 million migrants cross the US southern border illegally. A few carried enough fentanyl to kill every man, woman, and child in Texas, California, New York, Illinois, and Florida combined. One cannot massage the numbers away. "It's just astonishing that we have a president who is failing to step up and do anything about it," Texas Governor Greg Abbott said on Fox Business 1/28/22. "The president has to…do something about this."

Most people sympathize with those fleeing oppressive regimes and crushing economic hardship. For years America served as a beacon of hope for the disadvantaged. A rational process of regulating the flow and screening of immigrants was implemented and enforced to the advantage of all. Now, by political design, the Biden administration abandoned that process without explanation. Opening the borders with no restraint encourages ne’er-do-wells to take advantage of that botched program.

Before you run out and set up your new Twitter account, you might want to pause to give it some serious thought.  In the great comedy, To Be Or Not To Be (my favorite version is Mel Brooks' of 1983), the trusting and naive Lt. Sobinski and his comrades in the Polish Air Force, rush to provide the celebrity "patriot" Professor Siletski with the names and addresses of all of their family members, friends and political associates.  Siletski, of course, was working for the "other side" and put the information to good use.  This is how I see the trusting people all celebrating the overnight takeover of Twitter by Elon Musk.  Do you really think his object is "free speech"?  Or do you think it might be "free information"?  I think there is plenty of room for skepticism here.  I'm not celebrating just yet.

Even as we hear the screams of the tortured Chinese, now close to starvation, even as we watch the destruction of tons and tons of food in Shanghai, Donald Trump has seen fit to endorse for the US Senate a man who is famous for his support of China's bizarre and shocking treatment of its people as a "response" to Covid - a disease, by the way, which they co-authored.  A darling of pop TV, including Oprah, Oz surprised many by announcing his run.  A much greater surprise to many, however, was Trump's embrace of this disgraceful man.  A worse person for the US Senate would be difficult to dredge up.  But some of us are a little less surprised - after all, we saw the people with which Trump surrounded himself - people who couldn't wait to stick a knife in his back, people who have betrayed not only Trump but all of us who care about the Constitution.  So some of us were not so much surprised as disgusted.

Under MMT, taxes serve a very different purpose. Instead of being used to raise revenues to pay for government spending programs, they function as tools that help politicians manipulate the economy...as weapons to punish those businesses and groups that government does not like, i.e., those pesky “Taxed Enough Already” (Tea Party) activists.

Why is printing money necessary to pay for deficit spending, you ask. Because under MMT, inflation is the warning sign of overspending, not deficits. And the cure is to raise taxes so individuals cut back on spending to make way for government spending. Put another way, under MMT, the government would battle inflation by removing wealth from individuals, including the middle and working classes. Under MMT, taxation is a way to redress decades of “rising inequality of outcomes” (as opposed to “inequality of opportunities”). And deficit spending and associated printing of money is “needed” to wipe out student loan debts, mortgage debts, auto loan debts, and credit card debts of American households.

I have a confession, I am really sick and tired of everyone trashing a good man by the name of Frederic Bastiat.

Bastiat was an advocate of classical economics and the economics of Adam Smith, he favored a free market and influenced the Austrian School.  (At the bottom of the article I have included Bastiat’s Broke Window Parable)

He argues we must protect all the rights of an individual, including private property and we ought not plunder other people’s property.

Bastiat said, "Each of us has a natural right – from God – to defend his person, his liberty, and his property."

It keeps slipping out, doesn't it?  We have been formally and pointedly assured that we will not see any "boots on the ground" in Ukraine.  And yet . . . weird things keep slipping out when Biden gets in front of a microphone.  He has been caught telling American troops in Europe about "what they will see when they get to Ukraine".  He has suggested that the US would pursue a "regime change" in Russia, that Putin "cannot remain in power", which would not seem to be his option.   He continually refers to Putin as a "war criminal", a "brutal dictator", terms he has avoided in the case of Xi Jin Ping.  They might easily apply to his friend Zelenskyy, but no.  They are reserved for Putin.  He has allowed his State Department to "leak" the idea that Putin is planning to use chemical warfare - a war crime - without any substance to the rumor.  This, coming from an admitted war criminal government - our own - that has promoted and built with official tax dollars labs in which biological weapons are being developed and produced.  Hard to make this stuff up.  But it is not pointless, although pointless it might appear.  It is the old smoke-and-mirrors, the sleight-of-hand of the music hall magician.  The administration's* thinking apparently is that if we are all revved up on jingoist war propaganda and we're all focused on rooting for the Ukrainian team we won't be concerned that our gas tanks, our grocery store shelves, our bank accounts and our businesses are all empty because of his toxic domestic policies.  Some of us thought that his tapping the Strategic Oil Reserves was an effort to ease the financial crisis he has created, but then we find that the oil is bound for Rotterdam instead.  Not Omaha.   Not Chicago.  Not Barstow.  Rotterdam.  He needs this war.  But we could be paying a terrible price for a card trick that could end up in a world war, a nuclear disaster of the greatest magnitude.  And at the very least, more lives lost.  There must be a limit to the cynicism - even in Washington.

Stupid and incompetent Vladimir Putin is not. Mean, Machiavellian, and malevolent more accurately describes him. For years Putin thwarted US energy independence. Here’s how it works. Russia provides dark money to environmental groups. Environmental groups fund propaganda, political campaigns, and candidates. Once elected, politicians support anti-fossil fuel legislation in favor of alternative “green” energy. The result brings devastating harm to the US oil and gas industry causing disruption to the US economy. No conspiracy theory here. Forbes, The UK Guardian, The UK Sun, The Hill, and NATO all have confirming stories.

Practical solutions to one of the most contentious issues of our time have been ignored by those who believe they alone know what’s best for the rest of us. These partisans have posited the choice as either a free market driven fossil fuel economy or a central planned replacement of fossil fuels by other energy sources. Generations of school children have been taught that fossil fuels are destroying the planet and mankind is to blame.

I have a confession to make; sometimes I am ready to quit and give up.

Some of you might ask why?

I have been reading the various media reports and comments from the Rockefeller Republicans. They are doing all they can to shut down the conservatives wanting answers and trying to participate in the process.

When I first got involved in the GOP 40 years ago it was all about involvement and firing up the grassroots.

No more!

Globally, the Covid-19 years have brought tragedy: death, isolation, anxiety, depression, and much more. Add to that a war in Ukraine and inflation nearing 10% in the United States. It all seems so challenging, but is there a silver lining? In this article, Dr. Gary Welton reflects on the current circumstances and examines data from a recent survey that queried people from 150 countries. Welton reports, “Thissurvey, conducted annually since 2006, includes three questions about altruistic behavior. Respondents are asked to indicate their behavior in donating to charity, helping a stranger, and volunteering. Answers to all three questions, across every part of the globe, increased by about 25%.”

In a recent article in the Front Page Magazine website, Robert Spencer expressed deep concern that if Russia wins in Ukraine (as they are almost certainly destined to do) that it would be the beginning of the end of US world "leadership".  Perhaps we should desire this.  Maybe what America needs most right now is a return to our roots, to our heritage - which was not to "lead the world" but to be as excellent an example of freedom at home as we could - to construct a society which enabled each of us to enjoy as much liberty as possible within the restraint that we not steal it from our neighbor.  This concept helped us to develop the greatest economy the world has ever known - built on that freedom and self-interest.  As with many fine things, however, excess has seemed to have corrupted our ideals.  We exchanged a good, strong, happy and prosperous society for "world leadership" - through the offices of people like Woodrow Wilson and Teddy and Franklin Roosevelt and later the Bushes and others - people whose ideals were some kind of world domination instead of real freedom in our own country.  And as with many other overly ambitious goals, this robbed us of our essential American attributes and replaced them with a network of cunning and deception, bribery, sometimes force, to achieve our perceived ends.  It has been a disaster.  If Russia brings this experiment in world domination to an end it might be as welcome as when Gorbachev hoisted his white flag 30 years ago.  

Maybe we should hope for a return to concentration on our own ills - enforce our on border, balance our own books, restore our own freedom, fend off other internationalists plots and schemes and educate our own kids properly.  This might be a better goal to fix our sights on.

Illegal aliens pour across the US southern border by the tens of thousands with zero effort by the Biden administration to stop the flow. In a weird sort of way, the administration’s plan seems to be to welcome the aliens and then distribute them inland. When questioned about the open border, Biden’s administration stays mum. Call Biden’s transparency opaque at best.

Since at least the summer of 2021 (maybe earlier) border officials sent over 70 flights of migrants from the southern border to Florida and New York without disclosing any notification or information to state or local officials. “Secrecy” marks the operation. Why?

Corporate activism is nothing new. Corporations make donations to groups and/or make public statements on many issues such as: climate change, natural gas exploration, infrastructure, social justice, tax policy, etc. But, has one company taken activism to the next level? In this article, Dr. Richard Kocur examines The Walt Disney Company’s recent statements on Florida’s House Bill 1557. Kocur writes, “Disney’s activism is a bridge too far even in the current day of woke corporations. Making donations to activist groups or voicing support for social justice or climate change is one thing, but using platforms designed to provide entertainment for children—children—to promote alternative lifestyles is a new layer of the woke stratosphere.”

Our government's credibility is lost.  When this happens things are in a sort of free-fall.  We don't know what to believe - but most likely we won't believe what they tell us.  We were shamelessly lied to about every aspect of the Covid scandal and now we are being lied to about pretty much every aspect of the Russia-Ukraine war.  At this point, the very best thing we can possibly do is stay well out of it and our government stop commenting on it.  Russia is winning this and there is no reason to think they won't continue to do so.  All of the West's bluster has been proven to be exactly that - bluster, empty words.  Austria just sent its Chancellor to Moscow.  I don't think it is to deliver any stern message.  Meanwhile the cocky little fellow running the Ukraine for us - Zelenskyy - retracted all of his offers of peace.  What kind of leader is that?  Offer specific concessions that would certainly lead to Russian withdrawal and an end to the carnage and destruction, and then when it looks like an agreement is in the offing, succumb to what  appears to be pressure from the US and other western countries to take them all back, to pull the rug out from under the Russian negotiators.  OK, Zelenskyy - go it alone.  We should shun the Ukrainian government from here on (of course we won't - the Biden family is too heavily invested in it and far too compromised to let that happen).  

The proposed 2023 federal budget is a staggering $5.8 trillion. Where is the revenue coming from to pay for such a large budget? The plan includes a new type of tax called a wealth tax. In this article, economist Dr. Mark Hendrickson details the wealth tax and argues that it is unfair, inefficient, and unconstitutional.

Jesse Watters on Fox PrimeTime publicized information on March 29. Americans' perception of reality does not align with the facts. Major policy makers accept what people perceive to be true which is far different than reality. Observe carefully the individuals and themes populating entertainment, news, and commercials and you may conclude that a large percentage of the US comprises persons of color and/or LGBTQ.

Viewing TV shows, commercials, movies, and blogs shape our beliefs. Our viewing habits fill us with questionable discernments – perceptions divorced from reality. On that basis, the public draws muddled conclusions. Politicians and bureaucrats assume these skewed perceptions qualify as fact and set policy based on this alternate reality.

Agendas of small obscure but vocal minorities have become public policy. Such questionable public policies were developed under the illusion of broad public support when in fact most of the public remained blissfully ignorant. This happens by design using the Delphi Technique (discussed a few times in The Passing Scene in years past).

There is a video linked here that you should watch.  We need to stop listening to the warmongers in Washington and Hollywood and at least try to find out what is really going on in Ukraine before we find ourselves under a mushroom cloud.  We are being lied to.

We often hear about "the fog of war".  It basically means that in the chaos there is uncertainty over who did what.  Often this is used as cover for a lot of evil deeds.  The good news is that a lot of our television celebrities like conservative darling Jeanine Pirro and her fellow members of Fox News' "The Five" have managed to see through it all so they can tell us exactly who did what.  At least close enough for them.  Unfortunately for some of us, we don't have this x-ray vision and feel uncertain, like we want more evidence or something, Maybe a motive would help.  Or maybe elimination of other explanations.  Anyway, SOMEONE left a number of citizens dead, executed, their hands bound behind their backs.  Trouble is, we don't know precisely where or when this tool place.  Was it in Kiev?  Or somewhere else?  Maybe Donetsk?  Maybe somewhere far away.  Was it this year or some other year?  Who did it and to whom did they do it?  Who are the victims?  Could the perpetrators possibly be someone else?  We know that the Zelenskyy government uses its civilians as human shields, we know he has ordered citizens to "take no prisoners", effectively giving permission and encouragement to shoot in cold blood rather than ask for surrender.  And we also know that a couple of weeks ago the mayor of a Ukrainian city was "arrested" by Ukrainian partisans at his home and shot in the street outside his door without a charge or a hearing, in front of his family.  So we can be sure that there is enough evil to go around in Ukraine, much of it home-grown.  Could Russians have done this?  Possibly.  Is it the most likely scenario?  It wouldn't seem so. 

First of all this is the first time in my memory that the convention was held in a single day. Second it should have started at 9 AM not 11 AM.

Why did they do it?

I can only speculate…perhaps it was to keep the debate to a minimum, silence the conservatives and/or send a message to get in line.

The convention is meant to be a deliberative body… it has become anything but.

I have a few take-aways from the ND GOP state convention:

What we have been doing in Ukraine for years is immoral.  It is not only harming Ukrainians and the rest of the world, it is harming America.  Our Founding Fathers wisely warned us against becoming entangled in foreign wars and governments and unnecessary treaties.  What these kinds of intrigues did to bring about World War I they will do again and keep doing.  It is time to take power away from our own neocon leaders of both parties, to demand that America be what it has been pretending to be and once was - a nation of free men and women.  Chronic war is robbing us of our own values.  Over and over these tactics and schemes have proven most harmful to America and our national interest.  It's time to stop.  No better time than right now.  

“Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes… known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few.… No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.” — James Madison

I have a confession to make:  I haven’t always been a Republican.  

It was my senior year in high school. The year was 1976.  Jimmy Carter was running for President. Being the democrat I was raised, and the bleeding heart that cries at movies, I began to listen more closely to the political rhetoric.

The following joke beautifully illustrates the insane infliction of woke culture on society. A guy walks into a bar and wagers a patron for a drink. “How many legs would a dog have, if we called the dog’s tail, a leg?” Through a slightly inebriated haze the patron confidently replies, “Five, obviously.” The truth is, calling a dog’s tail a leg does not make it a leg.

Funny. We laugh while being asked, no -- required – to pretend a man is a woman. Non-compliance with this idiocy of pretending will get you “cancelled,” or worse.

When I read the last fundraising piece that came from the NDGOP, something hit me after the first sentence.  I gave into this strategy once. That it is all about winning—no matter the cost. 

Another thing that struck me was that the message was canned—it had nothing to do with what is going on here or the gravity of what’s at stake at the convention in ND this weekend.

This isn’t about winning.  The Democrats are not even fieldling serious candidates.   This is about the very essence of who we are as Republicans in North Dakota.  This is far more about what we stand to lose if we face this challenge sitting down.

Is America on the path to return to the stagflationary economic conditions of the late 1970s and early 1980s? What are some helpful economic policies to navigate through this tough time? In this article, Dr. Mark Hendrickson examines the situation and writes, “A big part of the inflation problem is as much psychological as economic.”