Alarming News: I like Morgan Freeberg. A lot.
American Digest: And I like this from "The Blog That Nobody Reads", because it is -- mostly -- about me. What can I say? I'm on an ego trip today. It won't last.
Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler: We were following a trackback and thinking "hmmm... this is a bloody excellent post!", and then we realized that it was just part III of, well, three...Damn. I wish I'd written those.
Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler: ...I just remembered that I found a new blog a short while ago, House of Eratosthenes, that I really like. I like his common sense approach and his curiosity when it comes to why people believe what they believe rather than just what they believe.
Brutally Honest: Morgan Freeberg is brilliant.
Dr. Melissa Clouthier: Morgan Freeberg at House of Eratosthenes (pftthats a mouthful) honors big boned women in skimpy clothing. The picture there is priceless--keep scrolling down.
Exile in Portales: Via Gerard: Morgan Freeberg, a guy with a lot to say. And he speaks The Truth...and it's fascinating stuff. Worth a read, or three. Or six.
Just Muttering: Two nice pieces at House of Eratosthenes, one about a perhaps unintended effect of the Enron mess, and one on the Gore-y environ-movie.
Mein Blogovault: Make "the Blog that No One Reads" one of your daily reads.
The Virginian: I know this post will offend some people, but the author makes some good points.
Poetic Justice: Cletus! Ah gots a laiv one fer yew...
President Obama wants anyone saying something “fishy” about His health care scheme, to be reported to Him.
Nancy Pelosi feels free to publicly hallucinate about free citizens, exercising their constitutional right to petition their government for redress of grievances, wearing “swastikas.”
My own Senator Boxer de-legitimizes those same free citizens and demeans their entirely meritorious complaints, for no better reason than that they aren’t dressed like pigs as she evidently expects…
It hasn’t been a good week for freedom. And this helps to solidify, at least in my mind, exactly what was wrong with some of these arguments we heard over the last two weeks about the whole Obama-cop-perfesser-beer thing. I refer here specifically to the argument that in the privacy of your own home, and on your front porch, you should be “free”…to follow the cop around, berating him, insulting him and his mother, and you oughta be able to walk away from that. Failing that, the argument goes, the whole situation plunges headlong into that post-sixties territory of “If one of us can’t do it then we are all enslaved!”
A little perspective, please. There are lots of ways to measure whether we’re still free or not; many things have been placed in compromise, and yet still remain with us at some residual level. That means there are lots of things we can watch to see if we’re still free or not, and if we are, how much.
Whether we can get lippy with cops — it’s a non-issue. Really. Keep a vigilant watch, instead, on some of these other metrics. I count fifty of them. Fifty really sensible freedom metrics.
And that one really stupid one.
1. I can eat meat
2. I get to go to a sports bar and drink beer and eat meat
3. I get to go to a sports bar surrounded by girls in skimpy clothes young enough to be my daughter, drink beer and eat meat
4. I can buy a gun
5. I can buy ammunition for my gun
6. I can store a gun in my house, with ammunition, ready to use
7. I can use my gun in my home to defend it from a criminal, if I have to
8. I can pray if I want to
9. I can keep objects of my faith in places where I can see them
10. I can keep objects of my faith in places others can see them
11. I can pray where others can see me doing it, even if it’s on government property or in a place maintained by a government agency
12. I can spank my kid’s butt if he has it coming
13. I can spank my kid’s butt where others can see me doing it, if he has it coming
14. I can blog
15. I can blog in ways that are not politically correct
16. I can blog, and not get fired from my job if people at work happen to find my blog
17. I can stop an echo, and if I’m so inclined, I can start one of my own
18. I can say, write, and e-mail “fishy” things without the White House putting my name on some kind of a nag list
19. I can ride a motorcycle without a helmet
20. I can smoke
21. I can camp
22. I can hunt and fish
23. I can teach my kid to go camping
24. I can teach my kid to go hunting and fishing
25. I can teach my kid to fire a gun
26. I can teach my kid politically incorrect things, like that women and men are different, and the feminist movement is full of crap
27. I can teach my kid to avoid high maintenance, nasty women, so that in his adulthood he could support me as opposed to me supporting him
28. I can earn a living even if I don’t belong to a union
29. I can earn a living even if I don’t believe in global warming
30. I can earn a living even though I’m caucasian and straight
31. I can fight back, anytime, anyplace, about anything; I am never, ever obligated as a free citizen to just sit somewhere and take abuse
32. I don’t have to pay taxes to give someone else an income they’ve decided they don’t want to earn
33. I’m not legally obliged to help anyone out even if they genuinely need it; I get to choose my charities
34. I can have opinions
35. I can have detestable opinions
36. I can have reckless, extravagant, unlikely opinions
37. I even get to have just-plain-wrong opinions
38. I get to have opinions about who’s “married” and who isn’t
39. I can show up to a protest my government’s dumbass healthcare plan wearing clothes just as snazzy or as shabby as I want (within reason)
40. I can emit carbon
41. I can buy things from people who emit carbon
42. I can acquire goods and services that involve the emission of carbon
43. I can leave my child unmedicated when all the “experts” are screaming at me to “get him the help that he needs” to make him pliable
44. If my case is sound, I just might prevail in a court of law — even if I’m a stinker and the other guy is oh so wonderful
45. I can hurt myself
46. I can do stupid things to make it likely that I, and only I, might get hurt
47. I can make foolish purchases and investments; I can buy high and sell low
48. I can buy alcohol on a Sunday, and skip church
49. I can have sex with a willing partner in any position we choose
50. I can be a non-participant; not partake in a prayer, not partake in a fashion trend, not drive a hybrid
51. ……..I can make a complete asshole out of myself in front of a cop?
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.