Which way are you all going to vote on these two ballot initiatives?

Amendment 2: I’m against it. Not sure why. Can anyone tell me why I’m voting against this?

Amendment 3: I’m for it. I’m don’t think it’s right that taxpayers foot the bill for the increases in healthcare costs brought on by smokers. It makes more sense to charge them up front (in the form of a tax) for the medical bills that will result.

I have spent the last two days dreaming of these two items. Last night I checked out a book from the local library by Ricki Carrall, Home Cheese Making. It is full of great information and is probably the most popular beginners books out there. Did you know that you can make cheese out of regular department store milk? I thought you had to get it from a farm directly. There is a 30-minute mozzarella cheese recipe in there that I think I will try first. Of course my goal is to make chedder and eventually parmesan.

I also checked out a book on gardening. While I was at New Town visiting Trevor, I met a lady who recommended me read any book from the publisher Rodale. They are an organic gardening publishing company. So I picked up a book called Lasagna Gardening for Small Spaces by Patricia Lanza. It gives a fascinating technique of gardening. You don’t even have to dig! Or Weed! (In theory that is, I have never tried it.) All you need do is find a plot of land you wish to have a garden on, place wet newspaper over that land, then add layers of organic material such as grass, hay, leaves, compost, peat moss, etc. alternating between layers. From the way it sounds, you end up with this 6-24in mound in your yard. Cover it with plastic for a couple of weeks, and bam! You got yourself a garden. The thing I like about it is you don’t have to till the soil. The newspaper kills the grass and weeds below and attracts worms which till the soil for you. It is modeled after the forest floor. I think I am going to try it out and see what happens.

Well the polls are in. St. Louis is the the most dangerous city to live in. Check out this link:

http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/10/30/city.crime.ap/index.html

I wonder if urban renewal will help, or just give the criminals fresh meat.

Hey all. Sage and I have been actively discussing some basic economic and political ideas over email. Sage agreed to let me share our dialogue here. I hope you enjoy it. If you get bored, skip to the end and read the last few entries. Methinks you will like.

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Trevor You said “corporations do not pay taxes; they pass them on to us”. Well, that assumes that profit margins are minimal which is not necessarily the case. As a good Austrian you should know better than this. The price of a good is determined by subjective valuation of individuals…NOT the cost of production. The later is called the “labor theory of value” and has been destroyed by your favorite economists.

Hence, corporations would not pass taxes onto the consumer. Doing so would result in the falling of demand and lower profits. Only if the taxes were higher than the profit margins would corporations be forced to raise prices [...]

I took the test, and it told me that I’m to the left of Ghandi. Who’da thought?

 http://www.politicalcompass.org/questionnaire

So….what’s the story with this anyway? Branden mentioned it to me this last weekend. I had no idea. I thought this pope was a favorite of Catholics. How could this be given such acts as these?? I’m confused.

Hey, it’s due time for us to put up a series of approved links on the sidebar. You know, links to sites that we agree with ideologically. Sites like the one Amanda gave in the last post or sites on distributism, traditional conservativism, etc.

What say ye? I’m thinking it would be best to paste them into the comments sections of this post and I’ll add them to the sidebar.

I stumbled across this very cool site, SuperNaturale

http://www.supernaturale.com/

It’s all about do-it-yourself, and local mentality.

Fascinating and fun articles, and projects!

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Also, I am pleased to announce the imminent launch of a line of women’s clothing I am involved with; Lo and Behold.

More information about that soon, just let it be said that I am very excited and I think this is a great idea.  We’re hoping to launch in a month, so I have a lot of designing to do, samples to cut and sew… Just you wait!

One of the beauties of libertarianism and traditional conservatism is the emphasis on small government. My question, for all ye wise friends, is what defines the scope of this idealistic “small government”? In what areas would you propose to limit its power and in what areas would you broaden it?

Another question ringing though my mind is that of financing. The size of the government is directly proportional to the tax revenue they can squeeze out of us. As such many of us would seek to lower taxes. Yet, even if we accomplish this great goal, present systems allow politicians, human as they are, to quickly and easily raise taxes again. In the past, our wise forefathers overcame this greed for power found in man by setting up a system of checks and balances in government. Likewise, non-monopolistic laissez-fair capitalism turns human greed into public welfare (in most cases). Is there not a way to reign in the greedy nature of politicians and use if for our good?

Let me give one example to the negative. Many advocate for the national sales tax to replace all other taxes. Such a tax, although much more efficient than our present system, would not stop politicians from continuing to raise taxes. In fact, sale taxes historically are the easiest to increase. So we see that this sort of tax reform, although much better than our present system imo, does nothing to limit future tax increases and ever expanding government.

This problem seem equivalent to the great problems of power discussed and debated by the founders of this great country. Money is power, as we all know, and limited money means limited power. I think we all agree that we like best to see power distributed to local communities over and above state and federal. The question for us seems to be “how” not “why”.

Hey, I’m all about getting involved in government, especially local government, but what’s the harm in NOT voting for state and federal offices if all the options are negative? I see at least one positive attribute. It sends the message that we are disillusioned with the government system and the “options” they send our way. (Which we are, correct?)

Think about it. As long as we continue to vote for the “lesser-of-two-evils” we send the message that the present system is just fine. BUT, by not voting we make the present system more and more illegitimate. How long will Americans continue to give weight to a political party/candidate that wins 50+% of the 15% voter turnout? Methinks that if voter turnout was so extremely low it might spawn a populist reform movement. Maybe the fastest way to reform is through the breakdown of democracy, not through third party reform.

Granted, this is a new idea for me and I’m still working through it, but lacking any better argument I will probably NOT vote in the senate race and will try my best to only vote for candidates that are truly worthwhile. I will not lend my approval to a corrupt system anymore.

I’m still drying my cheeks as I lament the cessation of one of my favortite on-line reads–The New Pantagruel. I recommend to all you, my fine, well-read friends, to check out their farewell address at http://www.newpantagruel.com/.

One of the lines that sticks out the most to me is this one: “Ours can largely be summed up as a localist, decentralist, anarcho-Christian and authentically conservative approach to politics and culture.” And this is why Stegall and Co. have closed shop, to focus more intensely on their own locality. Sad for me yet enormously happy for their community of Lawrence, KS. May the Stones be recipients of such awesome localism.

A book I read this weekend, Bill Kauffman’s Look Homweward, America, expresses the same in a most poetical, page-turning manner. Consider:

“I am an American patriot. A Jeffersonian decentralist. A fanatical localist. And I am an anarchist. Not a sallow garret-rat translating Proudhon by pirated kilowatt, nor a militiaman catechized by the Classic Comics version of The Turner Diaries; rather, I am the love child of Henry Thoreau and Dorothy Day, conceived amidst the asters and goldenrod of an Upstate New York autumn. Like so many of the subjects of this book, I am also a reactionary radical, which is to say I believe in peace and justice but I do not believe in smart bombs, daycare centers, Wal-Mart, television, or Melissa Etheridge’s test-tube baby.”

That’s what I’m talking about.

Yes, yes it is.

A friend of mine wrote a nice review of Illinoise recently on his blog and I thought I should share the link. I’m trying my best to convert Branden to the joys of this music but he’s been slow to take. Maybe, just maybe, this short review will help in his conversion.

http://rmfo-blogs.com/richard/2006/10/16/a-review-of-sufjan-stevens-illinois/

Others on this blog who, methinks, would love this music:
Ira Dunn – You like weird music anyway so this shouldn’t be too hard for you.
Kevin Lee – The writer of the review is first and foremost a fan of Caedmon’s and Derek. As such, I believe that you too could learn to like Sufjan. Your first listen should be to the “John Wayne Gracy Jr.” tune.
Damon – for the same reason given to Kevin.
Father Doug Shivers – As one who appreciates deep Christian themes hidden in art (can we say Lord of the Rings?) you should find much to love in Illinoise.

The Russell Kirk Center at Kirk’s ancestral home of Mecosta, MI held a conference this weekend where the theologian Vigen Guroian criticized the “crunchy cons” concept of embracing neotraditionalism. Present at the conference was Crunchy Cons author Rod Dreher. The criticism was basically that it is unnnatural and artificial to try and adapt a tradition you were not born into. This is a point I’ve heard before. When considering entering the Catholic Church, I was told by a professor that he saw that as artificial for the same reason.

Dreher’s response was the same as mine: “Yes, there is something artificial about trying to lay claim to a tradition that one wasn’t born into, or that previous generations in one’s line have jettisoned — but what’s the alternative? Late modernity has been a catastrophe for nearly all inherited traditions, at least in the West. We are all walking around like survivors of a carpet-bombing, bumbling around in the ruins trying to find a place to take a stand and start the recovery, the rebuilding. I know a number of Episcopalians who have converted to either Orthodoxy or Catholicism. At least one reason they’ve done so is the conviction that they’ve got to root themselves in a Christian tradition that can stand the test of time and the lashings of modernity. They are adopting traditions not their own, true, but again, if we don’t attempt some sort of Great Re-Learning, what’s the alternative?“

I just came across this film and it made me sick. Check out the trailor.

http://www.jesuscampthemovie.com/

What is really sad is that this movie looks like it might be a true documentry.

I will be submitting a paper to ‘Zeitgeist’, which is an academic conference for the Arts that Biola is hosting, and I think I will be writing on the necessity of a contextual understanding of history for a full enjoyment of cinema, art, and music.  If I am chosen, I will get to present and field questions.  I have a pretty good chance of being chosen, my topic is base enough, but I come at it from a good angle.

I was also asked to be part of a panel lecture on “How to Critique Art”, so I might also submit a paper about intent in art versus actual created substance, and how you have to judge both, in tandem.

 Any thoughts?