
by Ken Matesz for Governor, OH
Many supporters of my campaign are aware that I teach classes about the US Constitution. In fact, my first public announcement of my candidacy for Governor of Ohio occurred at the very end of one of my classes last winter. A month or so later at a tea party gathering where I briefly spoke, one of my students came to me and said, “I really appreciate your class and everything you are doing, but I will not be voting for you. I have to cast a vote for the Republican candidate. We can’t let the Democrats stay in office.”
This makes me wonder about the value of the tea party groups. If their only goal is to prevent Democrats from being elected, then why all the education? Why bother with learning the Constitution? Why bother circulating petitions for health-care amendments? Why bother calling and writing to congressmen and senators? Why bother learning more about free-market economics? Why study the founders and our founding principles? If the solution lies in electing Republicans, then there is no more you need to know. Just show up and vote Republican and all will be well.
I get emails from some of my students telling me how horrible the Obama spending binges are – how his deficits dwarf those of George W. Bush; how the debt under Obama is increasing wildly, when it “only” increased by $4 trillion under Bush. And I ask them, do you have any idea how much money $4 trillion is?
In Ohio, you have three viable choices for governor; but you only have two choices in ideology. You can either work to elect me, a strict constitutionalist, or you can elect a statist. Both John Kasich and Ted Strickland are statists.
What is a statist? This term gets thrown around here and there. Merriam-Webster’s dictionary defines statism as, “concentration of economic controls and planning in the hands of a highly centralized government often extending to government ownership of industry.” Evolving statism is what we have across the United States right now. As we’ve seen under the Bush and Obama administrations, our elected officials no longer have any qualms about using taxpayer dollars to bailout private firms such as financial institutions and automobile industries. Step by step we are moving closer to, not just statism, but totalitarianism.
Now, totalitarianism is defined as, “centralized control by an autocratic authority” or “the political concept that the citizen should be totally subject to an absolute state authority.” John Kasich, in particular, is totalitarian minded. This was most blatantly revealed in a recent interview he had with radio host Brian Wilson on Toledo’s WSPD radio station (1370 on the AM dial). First, Mr. Kasich indicated that the assault weapons ban he championed as a career politician in Congress was not “effective” and he “doesn’t think” we need to do something similar right now. In other words, if he thought it would be effective, he would be all for the state dictating your gun rights. This is a statist view.
Mr. Kasich likewise champions the statist view that government or a majority has the power to decide what rights a person has. When asked about the smoking ban and the rights of private property owners, he simply said that he likes the law and supports it. He does not want personal property rights defended.
Neither Kasich nor Strickland care about your private property rights, your natural rights, or the very freedoms supposedly preserved in the Ohio Constitution’s Bill of Rights. If you are busily circulating and supporting initiatives like the Ohio Project (Ohio Health Care Freedom Amendment) or state sovereignty issues and amendments, you might as well stop doing so if you are going to cast a vote for John Kasich or Ted Strickland. Neither one has the ideology to support these initiatives. The only reason we even need these initiatives at all is because we have elected officials who are statists. What good does a constitutional amendment do if no one in office cares about the constitution? Our Ohio Constitution already prohibits the new federal health care mandates, but do you see anyone (i.e. Ted Strickland or John Kasich) talking about that? Of course not. Because they don’t care. They just want to get elected. Neither one knows of any successful life outside the political arena where they live off the public dole.
Fortunately for them, they are running as part of the Democrat or Republican Party. And we all know that everything will be solved if we just elect the Republican this time around, because “we can’t let the Democrats stay in office.”
I hope you will be happy with your next statist governor of Ohio! I guess the good news is that you’ll still have something to hold protest rallies for!
A Short Introduction to Libertarianism
by Chris Cantwell – Congress 2010 New York
(as posted on the Conservative Society for Action Message Board 12/15/09)
The Basic Principles
1. Self Ownership – You own your life, you own your body.
2. All Rights Derive From Property – You have the exclusive right to exercise control over your property.
3. Non-Aggression – The Only limitation to your rights is the equal rights of others.
4. The Right To Contract – The Right to contract is one of the most fundamental human rights, and
is essential to economics and human interaction.
5. The Only Purpose of Government is to Protect The Rights – Including and especially, the rights of the minority.
These rights do not come from government, the constitution, citizenship, or any other source but the laws of nature.
Examples,
You have the right to freedom of speech, not because of the first amendment, but because you own your lungs, you own your lips, your vocal cords, and your mind and your ideas. If someone tried to limit your freedom of speech, they would be implying some ownership over these things.
You have the right to keep and bear arms, not because of the second amendment, but because you have the right to protect your property.
Your freedom of speech is limited by the property of others. I do not have the right to say whatever I like on this forum, it is a privilege for me to do this, because the database is owned by meetup.com and they have the absolute right to delete any post I make or ban me from the site. Stephen Flanagan has made a contract with meetup.com (his agreement and payment to run this group), so he has the right to delete my post or ban me from this group at any time, for any reason or no reason at all. Either or both entities may do this because they have the right to protect their property.
Meetup.com has the rights, and has made a contract with Stephen Flanagan to delegate some of those rights to him. President Obama cannot grant Stephen Flanagan the authority to exercise control over the meetup.com database because President Obama does not own the database.
Only the owner of the property can exercise control over property, or delegate authority to someone else to exercise control over the property.
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Government is made up of human beings, and they have no rights or claims higher than any other human beings, you cannot grant the government any powers that you do not have yourself.
You have the right to protect your property, so you make a contract (your vote and taxes) with the government to protect your property for you (Police). This is important because for an economy to thrive, people need to be able to trade without threat of violence or coercion.
You have the right to contract, so you make a contract (your vote and taxes) with the government to create courts which will enforce contracts. This is important because without contracts, our economy would shrivel up and die.
You have the right to travel, so you make a contract (your vote and taxes) with the government to make sure there are paths by which you may travel without violating private lands (roads).
You do not have the right to someone else’s property. You have no right to make a contract with your vote to take away my money to pay for your health care, nor can you make a contract with the government to compel doctors to treat you for free.
You do not have the right to abridge someone else’s right to contract. You have no right make a contract with your vote to prevent two men, or a man and five women, from making a marriage contract. You do not have the right to decide who an employer may or may not make an employment contract with (immigration).
You do not have the right to kill, outside of self defense. So you have no right to make a contract with your vote to have the government kill outside of self defense on your behalf.
You have the right to use drugs, it is your body, your life, you have the exclusive right exercise control over them, to destroy them if you see fit, you also have the right to shoot yourself in the foot, or burn your house down, I don’t recommend you do any of these things, but I support your right to do so. But you do not have the right to steal to obtain drugs, or to collect welfare because you are unable to work due to your addiction.
It is the role of government to secure borders to guard against aggressors
It is the role of government to protect, not redistribute, property
It is the role of government to enforce, not abridge, contracts
It is the role of government to punish aggressors
It is not the role of government to grant any preference to one culture or religion over another
It is not the role of government to legislate morality
It is not the role of government to create a perfectly safe environment
It is not the role of government to make sure you have what you need or want
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