Yes to Legalized Gay Sex and No to Unleashed Dogs in Amsterdam's Public Parks

The Dutch government is legalizing gay sexual activity in its public parks, but will take criminal action against dog owners who allow their dogs to wander on them without keeping them on a leash.

While I'm all for getting the government out of our bedrooms and free speech on government-owned, government-funded parks, the problem with this scenario is that they are, more or less, public property. In other words, the "people" own the parks. To break it down even further, the government is the owner, and not truly the citizens of Amsterdam.

The Dutch may be tolerant of trade-offs regarding those state-controlled, state-run, state-owned properties, but the issue here is whether the state should be owning those parks in the first place. This latest episode showcases the need to abolish government-run, government-owned properties and hand them over to the free market. Besides, most parks, even here in the U.S., are not that clean, and at just about every park I've gone to, I've seen litter on the ground. The government employees of those parks do a lousy job of cleaning them up. You can smell the air of bureaucracy when you're at the grounds, and none of the park rangers are nice, cordial, and even helpful as well.

But this is a very contentious yet important issue to consider. Why should they be owned by the state? Answer: in the eyes of the statists, it's because the free market can't handle this problem, but the state can. Who decides what and who benefits from that decisions? Answer: the government, not the "customers" (taxpayers) whom the state is supposed to serve.

As for the Dutch, the bigger questions are of the following: why are the Dutch putting up with that crap by allowing their tax dollars to fund these government-owned, government-operated institutions? What tangible benefits, if any, are they getting out of the entire thing?

The Dutch should be pursuing private property rights in lieu of this decision, but, in the interim, the state shouldn't be in the business of deciding what can or cannot be transpiring on the grounds of these parks.

Hurricane Katrina Homeowners Still Awaiting Government Reconstruction Checks

Irate Hurricane Katrina homeowners have yet to receive their rebuilding checks from the Leviathan. What's worse is that a government-subsidized, government-colluded "private" firm is the one carrying the contract for the subsidies and is a proud member of economic fascism/state capitalism.

Check out the excerpt from the article, as it will make you very queasy:

NEW ORLEANS - Two-and-a-half years after Hurricane Katrina, tens of thousands of miserable homeowners are still waiting for their government rebuilding checks, and many complain they can’t even get their calls returned. But the company that holds the big contract to distribute the aid is doing quite well for itself.

ICF International of Fairfax, Va., has posted strong profits, gone public, landed additional multimillion-dollar government contracts, and, it was learned this week, secured a potentially big raise recently from the state of Louisiana.

In the waning days of Gov. Kathleen Blanco’s administration, state officials increased the management contract ceiling from $756 million to $914 million — this, after the Legislature wanted to fire ICF over its handling of the homeowner recovery program, called Road Home.

'I’m flabbergasted that this company could be so inefficient and could mess up so consistently and for so long,' said Bill Yurt, 57, who has been living in a FEMA trailer for 2½ years.

He said ICF hasn’t sent an appraiser to determine the grant amount that will resurrect his gutted house in Gentilly. And his calls to an ICF caseworker have gone unreturned for a month.

Update: I forgot to mention here that the Katrina victims, who should have known better to buy homes in those high-risk areas of those affected neighborhoods, should be angry at themselves for being a part of the welfarism itself and supporting the economic fascistic/state capitalist model devised and engineered by the U.S. federal government.

Fewer Americans Are Aware of Iraqi Civilian Casualties

A survey by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press reveals that just only 28 percent of Americans know that the U.S. troop casualties in Iraq are approach 4,000.

Here's a very small yet interesting excerpt taken from that opening paragraph of the Washington Post which covers the survey:

[N]early half thinks the death tally is 3,000 or fewer and 23 percent think it is higher, according to an opinion survey released yesterday.

Interestingly enough, very few Americans at large -- including the mainstream press -- are aware of the fact that the body count of Iraqi civilians now totals 89,573 casualties.

Nonethless, there's no indication in the piece of how many Americans are actually aware of that entire body count. Well, except Yours Truly.

The Further Decline of the U.S. Market

The significant decline of sales in the U.S. market -- specifically the retail, energy, and housing sectors -- is seriously attributed to the government's unfettered and incessant coddling, control, regulation, and subsidization of those industries.

Incidentally, wasn't the recently-passed, recently-signed "economic stimulage" package (it's really a political stimulus package) supposed to seriously boost the economy? After all, the stimulus package originally was proposed to be at $145 billion, then $146 billion, and then it went up to $156 billion. But, as libertarian blogger and columnist Sheldon Richman correctly noted, the economy isn't some machine that the government can just tend to and "fix," what the social engineers, statists, and collectivists often say notwithstanding. That economic stimulus package is merely a welfare redistribution scheme that transfers money that's's already in the economy (steals your money, in other words) to those who don't have it, especially if they pay little or no federal income taxes.

Moreover, it perpetuates the mythical view that one must spend his way into prosperity when that is utter fantasy. Government, by its very nature, is not a progenitor of wealth, unlike the free market which is such by the way; it merely destroys your ability to create wealth via the various machinations imposed by the state. That's the unseen effect of which most Americans have no idea.

The best way to REALLY economically stimulate the economy is to repeal all regulations and taxes and slash spending to the bone, scrap the IRS code, transition our economy from a centrally-planned one to a free, self-regulated one, phase out the Federal Reserve, replace our monetary policy with one that allows the return of the gold and silver standards, a repeal of legal tender laws, and end our foreign policy of interventionism.

That's a real economic stimulus package right there.

Ron Paul's son Rand Paul: "Ron Paul Campaign Is Not Over"

Ron Paul Will Not Endorse John McCain

Alan Bock of the Orange County Register says that Ron Paul, who appeared on CNN with John King last Monday to talk about the future of his campaign, will not endorse the GOP's Anointed One a.k.a. John McCain.

For those of you who haven't seen Ron's televised appearance on King's show, here you go: