Eye Witness Accounts

I recently watched, via Netflix, the Case for Christ by Lee Strobel. The parts he highlighted from the New Testament that demonstrate that the authors of the four gospels were either eye witnesses themselves to the events they wrote about, or drew on eye witness accounts. In the case of Luke, he makes it clear that he spent considerable time interviewing several eye witnesses to make sure he had the most accurate record of all.

Drawing from this fact alone, I was inspired to see how inspired the New Testament really was. Someone living at the time of Jesus near Jerusalem wouldn’t have a hard time finding one or several eye witnesses. The stories of Jesus’ actions would likely be a topic of the day. The congregation of Christians who met regularly to talk about Jesus after his death and resurrection would have more scripture in whispers than we have in the entire Bible.

The authors of the four gospels went through great lengths to extract only the most important bits of Jesus’ life and teachings. Their purpose was clear—to convince people of the important of worshiping Jesus as the Son of God and sole means of salvation. To that end, they did an extraordinary job.

The critics of the gospels, those who believe Jesus was some preacher stoned and hanged on a tree, or who believe Jesus never existed or did exist but hardly did anything miraculous, or did some miraculous things but was not the Lamb of God, and so on and so forth, have a lot of explaining to do. Unfortunately, I can’t imagine anything they can say or do that would convince me of disbelieving the gospels. The evidence is too strong in my mind and heart.

As we worship Jesus this Christmas (let us not be distracted from that!) let us imagine for a moment what it would have felt like to see the shepherds running through the streets of Bethlehem loudly declaring that the Savior of the World is born that night. Would we ignore them as lunatics, or would we take a moment to pause and praise God for sending His Son to save us?

If we were to walk in the streets where Jesus taught, would we have followed the crowd to listen to the teachings of Jesus, and perhaps get a glimpse of his face? Would we take the time to ask people who claimed to be healed by Jesus? Would we remember the Sermon on the Mount?

As Jesus was triumphantly praised as he entered Jerusalem on the back of a donkey, would we join in that praise? Would we still praise him even when the political storm turned against him, and we saw him bleeding? Would we offer to carry the cross for him up that hill?

Where would we be after his death? Would we wait by his tomb, impatient for his resurrection, or would we scatter and flee like the early saints?

Oftentimes, people accuse members of the LDS church of poo-pooing the Bible because we only believe it “as far as it is translated correctly”. This completely ignores the positive affirmation “We believe the Bible to be the Word of God”, which we believe first and foremost. It is more positive than the “We also believe the Book of Mormon to be the Word of God”, which almost seems conditional on our belief of the Bible.

Foundations

There is, ultimately, only two sources of truth. Either we base truth on the precepts of mankind, or we base it on something far superior to mankind, something supernatural.

To ancient man, the philosophy of reason and logic were curiosities. They believed that there was only the truth beyond themselves, and that supernatural forces were at work everywhere at all times.

To ancient Hebrews and Christians, they believed the same except the nature of that supernatural force was defined as being of a human-like quality, albeit perfected in every way. They believed that God, the creator and lord of all creation, governed the motion and seasons of all things according to the laws he wrote, which laws he himself bound himself to.

This is what I believe. And this is why I enjoy math and physics and science so much. It is because by peering into the smallest detail of the way things are and the way things work, I learn more about the mind and intent of my Creator. I feel a certain closeness as I understand more about what secrets nature holds from us, and what blindness we have allowed ourselves to be overcome by simply due to our ignorance.

There is another philosophy, ultimately, in my mind, an absurd one. It starts with nothing and from nothing proclaims that nature cannot have supernatural events. It also claims that unless something can be sensed and repeated, it cannot be true. This is what is called “naturalism” and “materialism”, two philosophies of which I only agree in part. (More is explained here.)

To be honest, I can’t understand why people cling to these two philosophies. They are so defeatist in practice, and turn the bright and interesting aspects of science (exploring the nature of something far superior to ourselves) into something mundane and ultimately meaningless. Whereas I feel compelled to seek after knowledge (science) by increasing my understanding of the Almighty by witnessing his works and trying to comprehend them, the naturalist and materialist is doing something without purpose or meaning.

But more importantly, I fail to see how people can argue that there is no God from these philosophies. Of course, if your founding doctrine is that there is no God, then of course you are going to conclude that there is no God. But that hardly proves anything except that you are adept at circular reasoning. What has fascinated me are the proposed arguments that, based on naturalist and materialist worldviews, purport to contradict the very assumptions made from the beginning, showing that the original assumptions contradict nature herself.

How important it is that we choose the right foundations! If we cannot lay our foundation right, what more can we hope for? Indeed, as the proverbs state, the fear of God is the beginning of knowledge. And later in the same book, the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom. Wisdom being applying our knowledge well, it is important that we base both on God.

One accusation hurled towards the Christian scientist is that we explain things as “God wanted it that way”. Indeed, this is true, but the very next questions we ask are:

• What is “that way”, specifically?
• Why does God want it that way?
• What other ways could exist and why don’t we see these in nature?

These are all questions that all scientists should be thinking of always. Indeed, the pattern I have seen is to first define things carefully, then define the observed processes carefully, then to question what other processes could occur and why those did not. This is, indeed, the very way that entropy and the Second Law of Thermodynamics was discovered.

Naturalists and materialists don’t want to have this debate with Christian scientists. Instead, they label us as backwards thinking and retarded. Despite the fact that these ideas, not naturalism and materialism, are the foundation of modern science, they continue to persist because of their war with God.

Don’t count me part of that. I don’t believe science and God are separate in any way except in the imagination of fools.

Beating North Korea

One Free Korea advocates a subversion of the North Korean regime in all areas. These include the four principle areas of internal politics, external politics, financing, and military strength. By completely crushing North Korea’s ability to exist as an independent state, and by fomenting revolution within, North Korea may topple without Americans or South Koreans firing a single shot. And the Chinese will not be able to stop it.

Part of this strategy relies on the US, Japan, and South Korea to take a hard line against North Korea. Not only should we aggressively condemn North Korea’s belligerence, but we should openly talk about North Korea’s abuse of its people and demand that they allow the people to have liberty. By focusing the international dialogue on the plight of the people. North Korea will hardly be able to build any consensus or compassion among the nations.

The US, Japan, and South Korea need to portray the image that they will respond aggressively to any military provocation. We need to make sure it is understood that North Korea cannot expect to survive more than a few minutes if the war was reignited.

Financially, we can, and are, crushing North Korea’s overseas bank accounts. By systematically seizing North Korean assets, and making them work in the black market of world finance, we are hurting their ability to obtain the capital they need to finance the lavish lifestyle of the elite and the massive military along the border. Without money, and without all that comes along with that money, the North Korean government will have a hard time buying favors even among its own people.

Most importantly, we can be fighting a war behind the scenes in the streets of North Korea. The border between China and North Korea is almost as bad as the border between the US and Mexico. There is major trafficking in drugs manufactured in North Korea and humans enslaved by one side or the other. We can exploit this to get food, medicine, flash drives, and even weapons into the hands of the North Korean people.

North Korea is a small enough country that it isn’t too difficult to get messages in and out. Nowadays, more and more North Koreans have cell phones that the government does not know about nor allow. With this communication network, news can spread quickly—false or true—but more importantly, it is possibly to fight a coordinated political and insurgent war.

Also, more and more North Koreans are obtaining radios and TVs and computers with which they can watch South Korean broadcasts. The South Korean broadcasters are petitioning the South Korean government to allow them to actively broadcast to North Korea, and distribute the culture and news of South Korea to their northern brethren.

I don’t know if we are smuggling money, food, medicine and arms into North Korea. If we were, not even Julian Assange should know about it. (I pray he never finds out.)

Worst case scenario is that North Korea turns into Afghanistan—a hardened, independent people with the arms to protect themselves from each other and foreign invaders. If North Korea became such a fierce land—and the historical precedent is there—then that would mean a safer world for us and even for the children of North Korea. After all, at least the children in Afghanistan have freedom.

But most likely, what will happen is the government will collapse under its own weight. When people stop working for the government, or when government becomes so corrupt that not even the officials are doing what they are asked, and if the military becomes unruly and disorganized, then it will be ripe for South Korea to step in and absorb them all in. We are already well on the way there. Who knows? Perhaps tomorrow the country will collapse, as quickly as East Germany did, and just as surprisingly.

If it is possible to defeat the North Korean government without firing a single shot—and the precedent is there for the Korean people—then I am all for it. I would rather have North Korea freed without shedding a drop of blood.

But if it is not, and all-out war is inevitable, then let us fight it sooner rather than later, so that our children can enjoy a peace we did not.

Right now, I don’t mind either way. I am sure the US, Japanese and South Korean governments are working towards a proper resolution to this old conflict, and I am sure they care much more about the result than I ever will.

More Chinese Dead

Update your history books. The “Great Leap Forward” murdered 50% more than previously thought, bringing the grand total to 6.5% of the population of China at the time. (link) If only state-planned starvation were rare under communist rule, but it’s not.

Communism kills on a scale capitalism cannot even fathom.

Let’s embrace freedom, the freedom to succeed and the freedom to fail. Let’s eliminate social security, medicare, Obamacare, medicaid, unemployment entitlements, and all other government programs designed to transfer wealth that were inspired by communism. After all, 6.5% dead would be the entire State of New York. We can’t risk death on that scale.

Republicans Remember

Remember when Democrats broke tradition and used the filibuster to block President Bush’s judicial nominees? Well, Republicans certainly do. Power Line Blog has a post on the current status of President Obama’s nominees. The republicans are using the precedent set by senate democrats and will block several of them from ever getting a vote.

Personally, I would hope that republicans vow to only support strict constuctionalists and block all the rest. Republicans could even begin the process of removing from office those justices and judges who have a hard time understanding natural rights and the constitution.

If there is ever a political fight worth having, it is over who should judge over the American people. If every ideology and political philosophy matters, it matters when deciding cases that aren’t clear cut.

Growth and Taxes

A handy number: 70. Take 70 and divide by the growth rate. You’ll get the doubling period.

Let’s say the economy grows 3% a year. This is a fairly slow growth rate. This implies a doubling period of 70/3 = 23 1/3 years. That means our GDP would double every 23 1/3 years, making the GDP about $28.5 trillion in 2033.

If we can change that growth rate to 5%, then we double every 14 years. 7% is 10 years. 10% is 7 years.

When I die in roughly 50 years, based on these growth rates, the economy could be:

• $62.5 trillion at 3% growth
• $163.5 trillion at 5% growth
• $420 trillion at 7% growth
• $1,670 trillion at 10% growth

Now, let’s suppose that the tax rate determines the growth rate. I’ll invent some numbers, since there are so many other factors to the growth rate beyond taxes, namely regulations and forecasting.

Right now, we tax about 25% of the GDP, and we get, on average, about 3% growth. If we lowered taxes significantly down to 20% GDP, then we might see 5% growth. Cutting taxes in half beyond that to 10% might give us 7% growth. And the tiny tax burden of 2% would give us 10% growth.

Question: Would you rather have 25% of $62.5 trillion, 20% of $163.5 trillion, 10% of $420 trillion, or just 2% of $1,670 trillion? Obviously, the first would give us about $16 trillion, the second $33 trillion, the third $42 trillion, and the last $33 trillion.

But, you have to completely ignore the fact that you’d be a part of an economy. If taxes were 1%, you’d be part of an economy more than 25 times as wealthy as the first. That means, whereas there are, say, 1.5 cars per family in the US today, and under 3% growth we could get to the equivalent of 6 cars per family, under the 1% plan we would have the equivalent of 150 cars.

Obviously, wealth won’t be measured in cars. However, it is measured in dollars, and the dollars I am using are not inflated dollars. That means $1 in the future would buy the same as $1 today.

When you hear about “trickle-down economics”, understand that people get behind this because they want to see 5%, 7%, or even 10% real growth. They want the entire economy to grow as quickly as it can.

I advocate not just a small reduction in taxes, but the complete obliteration of taxes and spending and regulation. I believe we are selling ourselves short by not enjoying 10% growth. If every worker of today is not 10% more productive tomorrow, then we are doing something wrong. If every worker isn’t bringing home 10% more in real income, and every worker cannot afford 10% more valuable goods, then we have failed.

America didn’t grow from barely inhabited forests and plains to the unimaginable economy it is today by slow growth rates. It did so by unleashing the human spirit and allowing everyone to grow their own economies as fast as they wanted, and then reinvest their newfound wealth back in themselves ad infinitum.

Tyranny vs. Liberty

There are, ultimately, only two political philosophies.

One is “Government should take from one to give to another, thus making life better.”

The other is “Government should treat all equally, thus making life better.”

The first form of government is, obviously, unjust. Our communist, liberal, progressive, and even some conservative friends don’t understand this. If you view it in simple terms, however, it becomes quite clear. What right does anyone have to the property of another? Or put in terms of duties, why does anyone have a duty to provide for another?

The first form of government encourages people to seek power in government for the purpose of manipulating the system to their own advantage. Does that sound familiar? Those companies succeeding today are not necessarily successful because they are better than other companies, but because they have curried favor with the Obama administration and the democratic-controlled congress. They are, as democrats like to put it, part of the problem, but a problem created by the same polices that democrats support.

It’s like trying to eliminate ants by assaulting them with honey. Each onslaught brings only more ants, and the problem persistently grows worse.

Isn’t it obvious that by concentrating power, influence, and money in Washington DC that all the corrupt elements of our society would gravitate towards it? Isn’t it obvious that giving even more power, influence, and money to Washington DC only makes the problems worse?

The second form of government is inherently just, almost regardless of what the laws are, as long as everyone is treated the same. Someone trying to manipulate the system to their advantage would find it extraordinarily difficult. If they were successful in corrupting a part of the government such that it favored one group of people over another, this would be an anomaly, something that needs to be repaired by the elimination of it.

Suppose that rather than regulating Wall Street and bailing out banks and showing favoritism to some banks over another, the federal government simply said, “We’re out of the business of regulation, bail-outs, and favoritism. We don’t give a hoot which bank succeeds or fails, and we aren’t going to program any of our tax policies to encourage one behavior over another.”

What would be the natural reaction of the corrupt fat cats on Wall Street? They would leave Washington DC. There is nothing to manipulate there to their advantage. They can only succeed or fail based on their individual capacity to provide a greater service for a superior price to their customers.

Suppose they no longer hide behind the SEC and have to convince the American people that they are not manipulating the markets without government endorsement. What would it take to convince the American people, and having lost the trust of the American people, how would they ever gain it back?

This is what people don’t understand. Were it not for Washington DC’s meddling in the affairs of Wall Street, they would long ago have expelled their corrupt elements for fear of a backlash of the American people. If they could not do so successfully, Wall Street wouldn’t exist in anything like the form it enjoys today. If you really, really want to see the Wall Street Fat Cats go down, stop allowing them to use your name to endorse their actions through the SEC.

As for me, I want the federal government to retreat back to the hole wherein they should have been contained for a very long time. If the Federal Government only concerned itself with ensuring free trade between the states, setting a wise foreign policy and enforcing it, and fighting hostile powers until they surrender, then it would be a tiny fraction of the size it is today. Our federal tax burden would be virtually nil. And if Congress printed money the way our Founding Fathers intended, we wouldn’t have any national debt nor would we require one red cent in federal taxes. There might even be enough money to send to the states, a sort of negative tax, and eliminate taxes altogether from our country.

2010 the Hottest Year Ever?

Here’s a good explanation of why calling 2010 the “Hottest Year Ever” isn’t supported by actual measurements. (link) Keep in mind that Hansen (who doesn’t deserve to be called Doctor anymore) is the scientist at NASA who was found to be committing outright fraud by manipulating data. He was also on the payroll of George Soros.

Now, let’s ask ourselves some fundamental questions that apparently we, the non-climate scientists, are not allowed to ask. These cut at the very heart of the issue.

Laying aside the Second Law of Thermodynamics and the Greenhouse Effect, let’s consider what they mean when they say “hottest year ever”.

How do you measure the temperature of a year? It almost sounds absurd when you put it like this, but this is what they are claiming to do.

See, temperature is something you measure once the systems come into equilibrium. It is a constant number, one that doesn’t change as you leave the thermometer in the system longer and longer (provided you have properly insulated your system.)

You can stick a thermometer into a pot of water and watch the mercury rise as you heat the water. You can record the temperature of the pot of water at specific times, but really you are only recording an approximate temperature. For instance, the bottom of the water may be hotter than the top, or one side may be hotter than the other. You really can’t say, at any particular moment in time, what the temperature of the entire pot is.

Someone might suggest you stick thermometers at different areas of the pot, or at the top and bottom, or in some combination thereof. These thermometers might give different readings at different times. But you can’t use these measurements to tell what the exact temperature of the pot of water is.

If someone were to ask you what the temperature of the pot of water during the entire process, from start to finish, was, you’d draw a graph or explain that the temperature was changing. You can’t give a single number and accurately describe what happened.

This is important because we know that during the course of a day, the temperature might swing from highs 70 degrees F different than the lows. The temperature in the shade is different than the temperature in the sunlight. The temperature of the ground is different than the temperature of the air. What is the temperature of the day? If you tried to use a single number, you’d be making up a story that didn’t make sense. If the high was 110, and the low was 45, what was the temperature that day? It’s an absurd question.

So likewise is the question of what the temperature of the week or month or year or decade or century or millennium. What was the temperature of the Ice Age? The 1990′s? These questions don’t make sense, and can’t be answered except in describing the range of temperatures observed or describing how the temperature varies throughout the day and how measuring the temperatures of the dirt, or air, or shade or sunlight would give different readings.

How then do climate scientists even begin to talk about the temperature of 2010 being hotter than 2009 or any other year?

Do they mean the average high of each day? Or the average lows? Or the average of half of the sum of the highs and the lows? Are they measuring air temperature in the sun or shade? Or the temperature of the earth? I cannot answer any of these questions. I doubt the climate scientists would like to either. It’s certainly not convincing when you say something like, “We recorded the highs all over the earth, and found that there were a few more days with a higher high than normal, and not enough days with a lower high, and thus the highs were slightly higher than they were over the last century.” Well, what about the lows? Is it possible to have the hottest and coldest year on record in the same year? It depends on how you measure it.

Finally, I want to tell you about the fallacy of measuring the average temperature, something I hear people talk about from time to time without explaining why it even makes sense. First, what sense does it make to measure the average of anything? When we want to summarize a population, if we only have the average we really don’t know much about what the population looks like. Other numbers, such as the standard deviation, the mode, or even the median give us much more insight into what the population looks like.

Assuming you do take the average of all the temperatures. What significance does this number have? You have effectively taken an instantaneous measurement of a value that varies over time and space, points which aren’t even representative of the entire sample, and derived a new number. How easy it is to manipulate this data! If you stick more thermometers where things are getting hotter, and fewer where things are getting colder, you can greatly change the average, all without changing the underlying facts.

Until someone proposes a significant meaning to average temperature, when that average is taken over time or space, I don’t care who says what year was hotter than which other year. We might as well be talking about how blue the Smurfs are or have been, because there is jus as much significance to that as average temperature.

A Scenario

I know we don’t like to consider worst-case scenarios, but we must.

Suppose something like what is happening today in London happens here in the US. I imagine it would unfold something like this. First, the governments can no longer raise the money necessary to support their spending through taxes and borrowing. Next, they stop returning tax refunds, paying promised benefits, and paying for critical services in addition to welfare services. In other words, a whole lot of people get screwed.

This makes everything worse. Now taxpayers won’t pay, nobody works for the government to make them pay, and we have anarchy.

Those who were on the receiving end of the government’s institutionalized theft program (Social Security, Medicare, and welfare recipients) have a couple of options.

One, they can do nothing about it, but simply try to do the best they can with what they have.

Two, they can direct their anger towards a government that is collapsing.

Three, they can direct their anger against a group of people within society, such as the rich or the businesses.

Now, what would be the natural response of Americans? Keep in mind that Americans are armed to the teeth.

If society were to decay to such a degree, eventually those of us who want a lawful society will create one over the dead bodies of the unlawful. I’m not talking about obedience to the laws of the land, but the natural, moral law that binds everyone and nature herself.

For instance, if someone loots my neighbors house, or a mob shows up demanding blood and destroying property, I will find it quite reasonable to quickly organize our neighbors into a make-shift militia. Hopefully seeing a bunch of regular-old Americans lining up with rifles will be enough to disperse the mob and looting. If not, then we open fire. Without a government that can effectively restrain us, nor protect our rights, the duty of defending our rights falls in our own hands. And when we don’t have the luxury of trials or political debate, irreversible decisions are made quickly with fingers on the trigger.

Will there be reporters to report on how many rioters were killed? Will anyone ever know who did what, or would these things simply be whispers and echoes of things among the shouts of economic upheaval? I don’t expect there will be much justice in those days, not like the “justice” we see today, at least.

I don’t believe communists and progressives truly understand this. If they do, then I understand why they so badly want to disarm America. If they do, then they would never talk of rioting or collapsing the American government.

When I see the rioting that happened in Greece, or the rioting in London today, or rioting in other parts of the world, I think, “Can that happen in America?” Only as long as the military keeps the regular Americans out of it. What kept LA from descending into a civil war between the rioters and murderers who roamed the streets and the lawful people who bore arms in defense of their homes and businesses was the fact that the National Guard showed up and restored order.

I recall the image of a few Koreans atop a store of some sort with boxes of ammo during those riots. I don’t believe they had to kill anyone, just shout at them and point guns, Regardless, their store, among all the others, was not damaged in the rioting. Is this a symbol of what will happen to America during financial crisis?

I also remember the video of a man being pulled from a truck and being beaten to death. Seeing that image, I recall a certain tension among the adults I knew, mumbles of “Never again”.

We are heading for a disaster. The election of 2010 was not enough to avert it. We are not going to get a balanced budget with tax cuts in 2011 or 2012. Things are going to get much worse. There is the very real possibility that Medicare and Social Security checks will not get written in the coming months. There is no hint that the democrats in the senate are capable of righting the ship, and no indication that the president even comprehends what is happening.

Perhaps, perhaps, the democrats and president will come to realize what is really happening, and decide to reverse course. I truly doubt this, however.

Balance the Budget, NOW!

Another treasury sell-off is happening right now. This means people are getting rid of their treasury bonds, the pieces of paper promising cash in the future that the federal government gives to people in exchange for cash now.

Why would people want to dump the bonds? Simply because the federal government may not be able to pay them.

So the federal government is left with two choices. Either it stops issuing bonds, or it raises the promised pay outs on the bonds.

Actually, it only has one option: Stop issuing bonds. See, by raising the promised payouts, the federal government is hoping someone out there believes the government can actually pay on its loans. No one believes that today. The federal government will never be able to pay its loans back, and it can barely afford interest on the loans today.

Why do I say this? Because when the president and many republicans in congress come to an agreement to cut taxes, the majority party in power disagrees. They want to raise taxes. However, everyone knows that raising taxes won’t actually raise revenues. We know this because the last time taxes were cut, revenues jumped.

Here’s what needs to change, and what won’t change for a long time.

1. The federal government must pursue aggressive cuts in spending. By aggressive, I mean cutting spending by 50% of more. This means everything is on the chopping block. A simple way to do this is to simply look at the constitution and cut out everything that is not clearly in that document from our spending. Bye-bye Social Security, Medicare, welfare, unemployment benefits, along with the larger portion of our government. The only thing that really survives this is the military. Let’s face it, without a strong military, we have no future.

The federal government has vast assets it can use to raise money temporarily. It can sell these assets, mostly the land and buildings, and raise quite a sum of money.

But the federal government also has a tool which, once used, can give congress a massive amount of hard cash to play with, in the order of tens of trillions. By raising the bank reserve rate (the amount banks must have before writing a loan) to 100%, and putting the power of money printing back in the hands of congress, we can transfer a tremendous amount of wealth from the banks to congress. This money can be used to pay off the national debt, although the balancing act of transferring this cash is something only a few people can actually understand let alone pull off.

In the long term, as long as congress only prints money at a rate matching the growth of the economy, ensuring the dollar neither increases nor decreases in value, it can have vast fortunes to play with that it creates from thin air without harming the economy.

2. The federal government must simultaneously dramatically cut taxes, and by dramatically, I mean cutting tax rates until they are so low no one even notices them. I’m thinking an income tax somewhere around 1%, and and elimination of pretty much every other tax. Or a consumption tax of around 1%. If it is possible to print cash and finance all of the government’s operations, then we can eliminate taxes altogether. What a world that would be!

3. The federal government must also stop enforcing the endless regulations on the books. We can do this simply by saying no regulatory body has any power to write a single regulation of any force because the constitution says only congress has that power. We can also ask the president to stop enforcing unconstitutional laws.

The effects of these three dramatic changes will be a dramatically diminished federal government, and a dramatically enhanced economy. The massive debt on our and our children’s heads will seem manageable if only we can get the economy to grow faster than the interest rate, consistently, forever. That can only happen if we make it advantageous to invest in our economy, which happens only if we practically eliminate all regulation and taxation. We are, after all, competing with countries with a 0% corporate tax rate, and countries where the only regulation is don’t do harm.

This cannot happen and will not happen for a very long time, unless something gives. Here are the things that are going to give, and they are giving and have been giving for some time now.

1. The people who produce wealth in this country no longer produce it, not out of choice but necessity.

2. The federal government runs out of money to spend, with no way to tax, borrow, or print it.

3. The people who depend on government checks no longer receive them.

What will a world look like with a powerless federal government (unable to enforce its regulations), a destitute people (not receiving any government checks and incapable of creating wealth for themselves)? We’re going to find out very soon, because we are heading down that path.