The Architecture of Spectacle: From the Colosseum to the South Lawn

I have seen this loop before, and the script rarely changes. When the architectural symbol of a republic's executive power transitions into a literal combat arena, you are no longer observing standard political governance. You are watching the advanced stages of panem et circenses—the classic Roman formula of bread and circuses designed to distract a populace while structural decay accelerates underneath.

Staging the UFC Freedom 250 match on the South Lawn of the White House is not just an avant-garde stunt; it is a direct continuation of an ancient tradition where autocratic rulers merge state authority with raw physical entertainment to legitimize their own regimes.

In classical Rome, the physical landscape of power shifted dramatically as the Republic withered into the Empire. Republican governance relied heavily on the Forum—a space dedicated to debate, legal proceedings, and civic duty. As power centralized into the hands of narcissistic emperors, the civic focus systematically shifted to the Flavian Amphitheater (the Colosseum) and the Circus Maximus.

The current administration's decision to erect a temporary octagon outside the Executive Mansion—and the public musings about keeping it there permanently like the Eiffel Tower—mirrors this exact pivot. When leadership begins evaluating the "People's House" based on its seating capacity and visual framing for a commercial broadcast, the transformation from a civic institution to a populist amphitheater is complete.

Nero’s Stage and the Cult of the Performer

The parallels between this modern political regime and Emperor Nero run deeper than mere showmanship. Nero was entirely consumed by the need to be the center of public adulation. He did not merely sponsor the games; he actively participated, driving chariots in the Olympic Games and performing as a actor and musician on stage. To the traditional Roman senatorial class, this behavior vulgarized the dignity of his office. To the populist masses, however, it made him look accessible, entertaining, and larger than life.

Nero used the resources of the state to build the Domus Aurea (the Golden House), a sprawling, decadent palace complex in the heart of Rome that featured a massive bronze statue of himself. The psychological drive is identical:

• Both leaders view the state not as a sacred trust to be managed, but as a personal stage to be dominated.
• Both cultivate a dedicated following by presenting themselves as the ultimate fighters or anti-elite performers.
• Both rely on the aesthetics of strength and unfiltered outcomes to bypass traditional constitutional norms.

The Grift of the Late Republic

You noted the line between free, healthy states and those corrupted by capitalists and narcissists. In the late Roman Republic, optimization for private wealth systematically hollowed out public institutions. Figures like Marcus Licinius Crassus leveraged their immense wealth to buy political influence and military commands, effectively turning public policy into a private asset.

When a private sports promotion company receives exclusive access to federal property to stage a commercial event, it creates a feedback loop of mutual enrichment and political branding. In Rome, wealthy patricians funded lavish games to secure votes and build popular immunity. Today, the mechanics are cleaner and broadcast in high definition, but the underlying transactional nature remains unchanged.

The Death of Satire

Modern humorists like Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert frequently point out that reality has outpaced our capacity for humor. When life mimics Idiocracy this precisely, satire loses its edge because you cannot exaggerate an active cage fight happening on the executive lawn.

Roman satirists like Juvenal faced the exact same exhaustion. He was the one who famously coined the term "bread and circuses," lamenting that a Roman public, which once elected generals and governed provinces, had narrowed its anxieties down to just two things: free grain and chariot races.

When entertainment becomes the core metric of political success, the substance of governance evaporates. The cage on the lawn isn't a deviation from the current political strategy—it is the logical conclusion of it.

Clinton Spanish Posters: Hillary Or Evita?

A campaign poster for Hillary may seem a poor choice, or maybe just truth in advertising... 

"The image of the black-clad Clinton profile may seem familiar to those who love either Argentinean history or musical theater — specifically Andrew Lloyd Weber's "Evita.""

"The 1978 musical told the story of Eva Peron, the actress turned first lady of Argentina. Seen as ruthless and cunning, she and her husband drew support from the "descamisados," or the poor and the working class, to climb to power."

Truth is stranger than fiction... 

More:

http://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2015/10/15/448968801/new-clinton-spanish-posters-hillary-or-evita

Feinstein wants to delete The Anarchist Cookbook from the Internets

Senator Diane Feinstein tends to be ignorant of a great deal of subjects in which she involves herself. The latest is the Internet:

"I am particularly struck that the alleged bombers made use of online bombmaking guides like the Anarchist Cookbook and Inspire Magazine," Feinstein wrote. "These documents are not, in my view, protected by the First Amendment and should be removed from the Internet."

Feinstein only admits through her speeches how much she does not know about the world around her, including how the Internets work.

Mandatory Voting: A Bad Idea

President Obama believes that forcing people to vote is a good idea. But is voting still a right if one has no choice to abstain? Sheldon Richman breaks it down at Liberty.me:

"If voting is a right, it can't be a duty, and if it's a duty, it can't a right. Perhaps it's neither."

More:
http://sheldon.liberty.me/2015/03/25/mandatory-voting-a-bad-idea

Hillary Clinton's Self-destructive Campaign

Hillary Clinton continues to make bad decisions, whether through policy as head of the State Department, or in preparing for a calamitous big for the presidency.

"For a would-be presidential candidate with her deep experience in Washington, that's a lot of unforced errors. The foundation shouldn't have accepted donations from foreign countries so that no one could ever accuse Clinton of being influenced by that money. She should have stopped giving paid speeches a long time ago. And she should have used a government email address at the State Department. These should all be easy decisions to make, and yet Clinton got them all wrong. (And, in the case of the paid speeches, continues to get wrong.)"

More:
http://hotair.com/archives/2015/03/04/quotes-of-the-day-2015

This is Why You Want a "Do Nothing Congress"

Punk Rock Libertarians nail it with this realistic perspective on the nature of the state, that whatever the stated goal may be, the opposite tends to be the result. Rockwell's Law in action:

"So as per usual a bill has been passed that accomplishes the polar opposite of what one would expect by name.  The USA Freedom Act means less freedom as the Patriot Act would never be condoned by a true patriot, as the Affordable Care Act makes healthcare everything but affordable.  This my friends is why you want a “do nothing Congress.”"

More:
http://www.punkrocklibertarians.com/usa-freedom-act-passes-house-extends-patriot-act-2017

Why Wall Street Loves Hillary

"An odd thing happened last month when, stumping just before the midterms, Hillary Clinton came in close proximity to the woman who has sometimes been described as the conscience of the Democratic Party."

It would be interesting if Clinton became president. We've seen a man elected president primarily because of his race, would it be far-fetched to think that a woman could be elected simply on the basis of gender. Politics have become so dumbed down, along with the voters, that these sort of factors become more important than policy and candidate history. Obama had little to no political history, and Clinton leave corruption and scandal in her wake. Stranger things have happened.

More:
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/11/why-wall-street-loves-hillary-112782.html?hp=t2_r#.VGMCrVbWkds

Laying out a Picnic for Vultures

In Greg Palast's expose on state-corporatist system of the contemporary US, Vulture's Picnic, he focuses near the source of so many social, economic, and political problems:

Regulation, the rules they tell you to hate, are the way we apply democracy to the economy. Votes versus dollars. I think you can understand that.

　　Yes, I know, the government is deeply fucked up. That’s the U.S. government, the UK government, and let’s not even talk about the Chinese, Malaysian, and Tanzanian governments. People have been belly-aching about rules and regulations ever since Moses schlepped the first ten down from Mount Sinai.

　　But the Big Problem with government is that we don’t have enough of it; the rules aren’t tough enough to stop BP from blowing Cajuns to Kingdom Come. Or the rules are corrupted, made by politicians who are greased to make Steve Cohen’s monkey jump.

　　If you’re screaming for the “guvmint to git off” your back, I see your point. But you’re still a loser, a cheap mark, a decoy duck, a dim, unwitting stooge for forces even more powerful than that ugly guvmint, a toy for powers who are shitting on you while telling you it’s raining chocolate.

While he does a service by doing the hard work, the research and investigation that uncovers so much of the corruption in government today, he does focus a bit much on the corporate problems, which are a result and creation of an oppressive regime. Political school has little to do with it, and believing that more government can resolve the problems created by too much government is hardly a rational solution.

Michael Brown's Grandfather to Obama: 'I Voted for You,' So Come Meet Me

President Obama has become notorious among his Missouri supporters for not visiting the embattled city, and the grandfather of the teen shot by police there a week ago is perturbed over the President's distance. This week he went on TV to remind Obama he voted for him and urge the President to make his way to Ferguson to stand with his family.

Perhaps Obama has learned his lesson from jumping to conclusions in racially-charged cases, such as the Martin-Zimmerman tragedy, and is instead waiting for all of the facts to come in before taking any position or wasting any political capital on something that might come back to haunt him later. 

More: Michael Brown's Grandfather to Obama: 'I Voted for You,' So Come Meet Me

Damascus Goes up in Smoke

Pro-war Americans: this is what an aggressive foreign policy gets you; more violence and bloodshed. Stop trying to choose winners and loosers in foreign conflicts. It has nothing to do with America and we have no legitimate business there. Supporting militants known for unabashed violence will only make a bad situation worse, further destabilizing a nation in turmoil. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXDZ-lxHH5o&feature=youtube_gdata_player

The Strength, and Weakness, of the State

"A government strong enough to act in defiance of public feeling may disregard the plausible heresy that prevention is better than punishment, for it is able to punish. But a government entirely dependent on opinion looks for some security what that opinion shall be, strives for the control of the forces that shape it, and is fearful of suffering the people to be educated in sentiments hostile to its institutions."

Lord Acton, Freedom and Power

Mexican lawmakers present medical marijuana bill

If Mexican lawmakers proceed with medical usage for marijuana or even legalization before the US gets it's act together, they could effectively end the violent monopoly that the narco-cartels have enjoyed for decades. Prohibition creates large profit potential for those willing to accept the risks, and violence is the only way to defend an illicit industry that works outside of the legal system. Legal industries have much lower violence rates than illegal ones, such as the illegal drug trade. Prohibition fails to alleviate any of the perceiced social ills of drug use, while creating a variety of additional unintended consequences.

More:
http://feeds.reuters.com/~r/Reuters/worldNews/~3/jrSR47E9FrI/story01.htm

Don't Get Out the Vote, It Makes You Look Ignorant

Stop voting, it doesn't show you can think rationally, but only through groupthink. Sheldon Richman says it shows a lack of individual responsibility:

"A mass democratic system encourages voter irresponsibility, says Sheldon Richman. Because the consequence of any single vote is negligible, individuals have an incentive to vote on some basis other than an understanding of current issues — which would require, among other things, the costly acquisition of a grasp of basic economics. Voters, then, are free to vote their biases. This voter mentality is known as rational ignorance."

More:
http://reason.com/blog/2014/02/16/sheldon-richman-says-dont-get-out-the-vo

Voting is a Lousy Excuse to Inflict your Will over Others

Reason from, well, Reason:

"It matters not at all what any individual voter does. The odds are that no election in your lifetime would have been different had you done something other than what you did that day — including staying home. One vote is like one drop in the ocean: inconsequential."

The act of voting and the system it enables is simply one of mob rule. Whether that is what democracy is, or has devolved into, is aside the point. It is the system in place today. Seeking to inflict one's will over others through government is an immoral attempt to remove oneself from acting through aggression over others, but the act is nonetheless the same. If you would not force others directly, why rely on government for the same effort?

"Some will say in response, But what if everyone thinks like that? This misses the point. No one is waiting to see what you do on election day. The rest of the country will do whatever it’s going to do — no matter what you do. (But if everyone did stay home on election day, think of the message that would send!) You control only yourself, and you undertake actions only when you believe they have a good chance of effecting consequences that matter. Otherwise you don’t act."

http://reason.com/archives/2014/02/09/the-cruel-joke-of-sacralizing-voting

Like they say, if voting changed anything, it would be illegal. I am more encouraged by low voter turnout, a sign that the population is starting to see the futility of electoral politics and government in general.

Keep voting. I'll keep laughing.

The Problem with Public Spending and Debt

Public debt has been a growing problem for decades, but the gap between funded (+$17 trillion and predicted to rise to $20 by 2018) and unfunded (most estimates are well over $100 trillion) liabilities should draw more attention than it does. Revenues are simply not keeping up with the increases in public liabilities, though federal spending far outstrips state and local levels. The debt to GDP ratio is rising to unsustainable levels. The efforts to close that gap will be through such avenues as you as you mention, but those austerity-like measures will hit the public sector hardest. Many public sector jobs are just not as economically-productive as the private sector. Regulation hinders profits more than it encourages them. 

Whether anyone agrees with the pension schemes of states and municipalities, the worry should be recognized. In the short term (the only way politicians seem to think), we are getting by, but it just takes a critical view to recognize what happens when those liabilities overload a system like Detroit when a recession hits hard, a trend that also seems to be slowly becoming more common. Some go down for obvious reasons, others seem unsinkable until they start to show signs of weakness. The rate of increase of the public debt unfortunately has increased, making tough economic times even moreso on the average taxpayer. Naturally, the rate of municipal bankruptcy filings has increased as well since 2008, to 8 cities or counties and 38 total municipalities by December 2013.

The positive side of all of this gloom is that we have numerous examples of the results of poor public policy that enables such out of control public spending and debt levels, which should encourage most municipalities to refrain from irresponsible levels of spending and debt. I try to be optimistic, but what I see in the news doesn't seem to be as encouraging. Perhaps it is time to consider something different, like Repudiating the National Debt?

Defending Cannabis by Blaming Racism

"Historian Doris Kearns Goodwin tells Remnick that in 2007, Obama explained, “I have no desire to be one of those presidents who are just on the list—you see their pictures lined up on the wall. … I really want to be a President who makes a difference.” But Obama’s approval ratings are mired in the low 40s, a reality he partially—and unconvincingly—attributes to racism: “There’s some folks who just really dislike me because they don’t like the idea of a black president.” As HotAir’s Ed Morrissey notes, the existence of rump racists completely fail to explain Obama’s two electoral victories and his 60 percent-plus approval ratings at the start of his presidency. A far better explanation is simply that he’s failed to accomplish much of anything the public likes."

More: http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/01/21/ending-the-war-on-pot-is-obama-s-last-chance-for-a-legacy.html

What a poor excuse from a lame duck president, that racism, when a large portion of minorities now disapprove of Obama, could be the problem, and ending another example of the inherent failure of prohibition by legalizing cannabis could be nothing more than a token (tokin?) gesture to appease those who have been most harmed by his partisan policies. Given the progress of the legalization movement, which effectively nullifies federal law under the Tenth Amendment and has been used since the northern war of aggression to end slavery on a state level without violence, institutionalized or otherwise. The president would do better to simply recognize reality instead of resisting it. Good ideas do not require force, nor do they need defending. But they do require indefatigable recognition. And is on us as individuals to promote the conscious solutions to predative, collectivist problems that a free society so greatly requires.

What's so Great About Government Health Care

I am at a loss to figure out why anyone with healthcare coverage would want to support Obamacare (the Affordable Care Act), especially those working in the public sector where quality is akin to HMO plans today. Maybe that is being too generous. To see the final result of a widespread policy, we only need look at the public sector. As regulation and rising costs forces private firms from the market, government will fill the void, and we will all end up with the same low level of coverage government workers receive. In that transition, costs will likely rise significantly as few large firms are left creating a monopolist market conditions. Obamacare was known to anyone with an introductory education in simple economics would have this effect. Except, of course, those making public policy.

Governmet in a nutshell: providing ineffective solutions to the problems it creates.

Anti-Federalists Prophesied The End Of Freedom

Spooner was right, the Constitution enabled government to infringe upon individual rights. From it's inception, the federal government has been a tool of oppression against the lower classes.

"On the eve of the federal convention, and following its adjournment in September of 1787, the Anti-Federalists made the case that the Constitution makers in Philadelphia had exceeded the mandate they were given to amend the Articles of Confederation, and nothing more. The Federal Constitution augured ill for freedom, argued the Anti-Federalists. These unsung heroes had warned early Americans of the "ropes and chains of consolidation," in Patrick Henry's magnificent words, inherent in the new dispensation."

"After 200 years of just such "consolidation"—in the magisterial “Liberty, Order, And Justice: An Introduction to the Constitutional Principles of American Government”—constitutional scholar James McClellan distilled the Anti-Federalist argument with the respect it deserves."

More:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/economicpolicyjournal/YZSb/~3/bjgkr5Bh3rc/anti-federalists-prophesied-end-of.html

LBJ Killed JFK

With all of the political corruption and murder conspiracies, Johnson is the most likely candidate as the motivating person behind the murder of president Kennedy.

http://www.lewrockwell.com/lewrockwell-show/feed/

Another Boom-Bust Example from the Fed

An interview with Mark Thornton of the Mises Institute, in which the scholar discusses the Austrian Business Cycle, the Skyscraper Curse, and how Federal Reserve policy enables out of control government spending to demonstrates the former in the form of the latter. Debt is not wealth, and a government cannot spend, through increasing debt, an economy into prosperity. But bad monetary policy can debase the very commodity that policy intends to prop up; the US dollar.

Unfortunately, good intentions do not guarantee good results. Without natural market corrections, reallocating resources through price signals, entrepreneurs will continue to make bad long-term investments. By allowing interest rates to rise and monetary volume to readjust properly and signal spending reductions and savings increases.

When all major economies are in a race to the bottom to debase their currencies to make exports more competitive. But there is only one end-game; the bottom. Our politicians are playing "chicken" with those in the oligarchy, and we in the proliteriat are the cars.

http://feeds.mises.org/~r/MisesMedia/~5/cvITDPKFOwI/Monetary%20and%20Fiscal%20Policy.mp3