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Name: ICONIC FREEDOM
Location: Scottsdale, AZ
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ON THE ISSUES: THE VALUE OF LIFE

How do you decide the value of life?

Where did you derive your ideas regarding the value of life?
 
The answer to these two questions will become the basis for this discussion.

ALL LIFE IS EQUAL
 
Recently the uproar over another czar of Obama’s is making a similar stance, but, as usual, the understanding of this statement is distorted and Sunstein’s mind walks off the map.
 
Stick with me here.
 
The value of life is similar to the free market system.
 
In a free market system we each decide the value of something, as a result, we take action of replacing the dollars in our pockets with the service or product we would rather have. This is a free and voluntary contract.
 
Life, any life, is the same.
 
I make my case by the following examples:
 
* You value your life more than Jihad, so you’d take Jihad’s life
* You value a cow or chicken less than your dog, so you butcher and eat them.
* You value a wild deer less than your pet cat, so you hunt it down and eat it.
 
Still not convinced? Okay, how about some of these personally placed values:
 
* I value my family’s lives more than my friends’ lives.
* I value my friends’ lives more than my neighbors’ lives.
* I value my neighbors’ lives more than an unknown American’s life.
* I value an unknown American’s life more than I value a foreigner’s life.
* I value a foreigner’s life more than I value an animal’s life.
* I value an animal’s life more than a plant’s life.
* I value a plant’s life more than a bacteria’s life.

Life begins at conception.
 
The value placed on that life is subjective, meaning personal opinion, by you the individual placing the value you’ve decided. This upholds your freedom to value this life much more than say someone across the world, that doesn’t.
 
We take life every day for safety, sustenance, sport, disregard or comfort.
 
How we decide the taking of that life is predicated on your philosophy. To make the assumption that the value of life is endowed through spiritual philosophy is to negate those who utilize no such beliefs but still uphold the value and regard for life; value is not exclusive to a party or philosophy. If you want to utilize a spiritual philosophy no one would infringe on your rights of that choice, however, you don’t need spiritual beliefs to have regard for life.
 
Some people have a presumption of "existence", however, this again is personal and subjective. To impose such presumption onto others infringes on their personal freedom of thought. You don't want to be told what to believe and neither do others.
 
We decide as a society that we want to favor our own species and of course we would – it’s probably a good idea since we want to continue the human race.
 
Every species favors its own. Of course, we subjectively decide which of our species’ life we take in war, in abortion, in defense, in anger. However, the value we place on each life is purely subjective to the individual.
 
The statement that a “dog engages in rational thought more” than a baby, well, to some degree is true because a baby can’t live on its own or fend for itself, but we favor the baby and hold higher value to the baby, which again, to me and you makes perfect sense – we favor our own species, why wouldn’t we. As a society we understand the vulnerability of the baby who cannot take care of itself. Again, very logical.
 
This discussion is so important in the dialogue regarding the value of life and abortion. While we would like to see abortions reduced greatly in our society, unfortunately, reality tells us that some women have not developed personal responsibility to the extent that they aren’t using abortion as contraception.

One great step forward toward this reduction is to stop having pluralistic tax dollars funding abortions.
 
Let those who want to have this option or who agree with this choice, fund the clinics that would provide such a service. In this way nobody pays for something they don’t agree with until we move past this.
 
Another great step is to let the free markets create educational centers funded by individuals and corporations where women could go to get counseling, education, learn ALL the options available to them in order to support them moving to developing personal responsibility.
 
Yet one more option is to create a network of mom’s who can swap out babysitting time so that women who find themselves having an unexpected expectancy, can still work and trade some of their time-off babysitting with other moms and eliminate the need for welfare because these women will be working. They may struggle and have challenges, but society cannot absolve them of their choices or save them from the reality they created through their choices.
 
Free markets can support solutions. 
 
When we educate people they move closer and closer to accurate choices.
 
How do we know these choices are accurate? The choices are upholding freedom, having regard for life, and accepting personal responsibility for each choice, having the ability to respond to each choice, all the while making their choice at no cost to others who didn’t consent.
 
One trap you don’t want to fall into is the trap of applying morality of your value to the greater society.
 
Morality is like value placed: personal opinion.
 
When you start arguing it, you’re really just arguing whose opinion is valued more. Well, obviously, each person thinks his opinion is more valuable. It’s circular and useless. You can't "prove" an opinion is fact, if you did, then it's a fact and not arguable.
 
It’s more powerful to debate freedom – there is no capitulating freedom, either someone is for freedom or they are not. Unmasking their need for control will dismantle the attempt to control and reveal who they are.
 
You’ll gain more solid footing by upholding freedom, and then look to how free society in a free market can come up with great answers regarding the personal issues that each of us places value and would like some resolution.

All done in the name of freedom – ICONIC FREEDOM!
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ON THE ISSUES: FREEDOM OF RELIGION, HEALTHCARE AND EVERYTHING ELSE!

Recently on FoxNews, Huckabee spoke in one segment with John Stossel about freedom and free choice when it comes to healthcare and a variety of issues, Huck even turns to the camera to dramatically emphasize its importance. 

In the very next segment Huck’s making the case regarding the United States as a Christian nation, attempting to credential it by stating that the “intentions” of the founders are to be upheld rather than what was actually written in our Constitution. 

We call this hypocrisy. standing for one thing while doing another.

Question:  how is it that the great founders of this nation got it, Huck, but you can’t seem to?   That irrespective of their belief systems, we needed to be objective in such matters so that each can decide for self?  Does this not support the very freedom and free choice that Stossel spoke about in the previous segment?

Freedom of choice cannot just be about the options you happen to agree with; just as free speech cannot just be about the speech you want to hear.

Let’s conduct a thought experiment.  Let’s give in to the idea that we’ll unanimously call ourselves a Christian nation, but with these caveats:  gay marriage will be enacted and abortion will remain unchallenged.

Here is the question to ask yourself:  are you willing to endorse it?

If you’re not willing to do so, is it because what you really want is policy enacted based on your religious beliefs?  

It really has nothing to do with just being recognized or called a Christian nation, it’s about much more than just that – it’s about controlling others with your ideological belief systems?  

Existence is a belief system, which is inherently subjective: meaning – opinion.  No American upholding freedom would infringe on your freedom of thought or opinion.

The very nature of bigotry, though, is one group telling its people that all the other groups are not valid; devalued in their belief systems; yours is the only true belief system.

Are you seeking religious dominance or pluralistic acceptance?   One is control, the other freedom.

Branding something is antithetical to freedom.  

If you’ve branded something, then it has no potential growth.   You’ve eliminated the probability of change; no revision or progressing toward something greater or more useful, more appropriate for the time, more convenient, more efficient.   

Thank goodness Edison didn’t think that about the word “light”.

Suppose that a cola company creates a product that becomes competitive with Coke.  The fact is that our founders drank Coke, so this new cola really has no value and we’ll even go so far as to disdain or devalue those who don’t drink Coke and especially those who drink no cola beverages at all.  

Any other drink that looks similar will not be considered, it has to be Coke – even if it’s a product that another company makes and wants to call Pepsi, Dr. Pepper, Tab, RC Cola, Diet Rite – doesn’t matter.

Since Coke was first and some of the founders enjoyed this beverage – they got to decide how the rest of the nation is going to be affected by such choices; doesn’t matter if you like Coke or not.   Even if some of the founders decided later to stop drinking Coke or drank 7-up instead, it won’t matter because Coke was the first and we must uphold that tradition.

Now, if tradition is your platform, why don’t you repeal slavery and women’s suffrage – these were traditions of our founders.   Why cherry pick which traditions; isn’t cherry picking, itself, subjective?

Look, limiting choice is nothing more than manipulation and control of others.  With the exception of your own, no life is for you to decide.

Just like the Coke story, religion and Christianity have come to be the foundations for attempting to control others with subjective morals and values; subjective ingredients. 

The problem is that you are not living in freedom by controlling others.   In fact, you’re actually opposing freedom since the very nature of religion is that you’re accountable to something or someone outside yourself.  

Why can’t I be accountable to myself?  “You can’t be trusted to make the right decisions!”  What political party does that sound like?

If your belief system demands that you believe yourself defective from birth, that’s fine.  Or that self-accountability is anarchy in your mind, that’s fine, too.  No American who upholds freedom would stop you.  But, what is your motivation for insisting everyone else hold such beliefs?

“Anarchy in the streets” is a scare tactic to do what?  Control your choices away from self-reliance.

It’s as if you’re too stupid to figure out how NOT to infringe on the freedoms of your fellow man. 

It’s as if you’re NOT to be trusted with figuring out how to make personal decisions for yourself toward your own self-interest whereby you create self-governance, self-reliance and self-wealth.  

Let’s face it, you just don’t get it and need someone else to decide for you.

Once again, if you want that life, no American who upholds freedom would stop you, but what is your motivation for insisting that everyone follow you down that path?  Is this some shared suffering in your mind? “If I have to be in bondage to this belief system, so do you!” mentality?

Again, what political party does this sound like?  Aren’t these the same arguments about healthcare?

If you hold the same ideological "belief-control systems" like the opposition, you’ll never advance freedom in the political arena.    Better to hold your belief systems in private for yourself & family, and then speak only of limited government and personal responsibility with regard to elections, our representatives and policies.

Look at reality over the centuries:  Freedom keeps advancing, not controls.

Develop Personal Responsibility  through accountability, which means you own each choice you make in life; responsibility means you have the ability to respond to each choice you make in life; consent means making each choice certain that the choice is not at the cost of another human being without his consent – voluntary contract; the byproduct is every virtue you could possible muster in your mind.

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ON THE ISSUES: FREEDOM OR RIGHT?

 
When we speak as Americans are we speaking about what is freedom or what is "right"? 

Recently at the Gilbert, Arizona Tea Party I heard a woman standing next to me commenting, to no one in particular, as the speaker pontificated about being “right” for being present at the party, “I like being right!”
 
Indeed, I’m sure you do.
 
What happens when we pursue what is “right”? We pursue a personal agenda.
 
When we seek what is "right" for others, we seek to control others and their choices by stating that they are “wrong”, rather than pursuit of what is free choice to decide for self. If that free choice is at no cost to another American unless he consents or contracts to such, it has no right or wrong implications except to the individuals involved.
 
When we limit choice, we seek to control – irrespective of any “do good” intentions of such behavior. The road to hell is paved replete with good intentions and unintended consequences.
 
We do not know for another human being how his life ought to be lived; only he can know that.
 
You insult others when you implicitly state, “you can’t be trusted to make these decisions for yourself, and therefore, I will decide what is right for you".
 
We each hold values and morals which are meaningful to us; some shared by others, some not shared by others. Freedom upholds the opportunity for each American, for each human being, to pursue personal values toward happiness of self.  Again, so long as it is not at a cost to others without their consent – it’s what free market systems are all about – consent and contract.
 
Where does this pursuit of happiness go astray?

When Americans attempt to make their “right” as a “right way to live” for everyone and demand subjugation or conversion to such “right” choices.
 
Be assured, some of your choices are just as distasteful to others as theirs' are to you.
 
If you seek to impose your “right way to live” legislatively or otherwise – that’s force; it’s not free choice any longer, it is manipulation for personal agenda and personal gain off the backs of others.
 
Do we uphold freedom when we persuade or when we force?
 
It’s not about being right, it’s about being free.
 
How much freedom are you willing to live in your own life? How much freedom are you willing to extend to others? Is the level of freedom you desire in your life directly proportional to the freedom you are extending to others?
 
We elevate ourselves toward being judgmental of others when we seek to impose what is “right” rather than what is freedom and free choice.
 
Some people like being controlled; it feeds their victimization of self. What kind of person are you who would engage, support and encourage such behavior. What does it say about you.
 
If elections are about winning in order to influence and increase levels of freedom, it’s easy to gather a mob of those who agree, it’s more telling if you’re able to persuade others to see the side of freedom.
 
The more freedom you live in your life, the more you are willing to extend to others. When you limit freedom in yourself, you will limit the freedoms of others.
 
Just because people agree or share your opinions does not credential those opinions toward law by which we control other people’s choices which have no cost to our own.
 
It’s not about being right, it’s about being free.
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ON THE ISSUES: MORALITY

 In America, we uphold freedom of the individual to decide his life. Our charter in this Republic protects the mob from the individual to seek his pursuit of happiness without threat of those who have dissimilar viewpoints, choices, and sources of morality & values.
 
Value is in the eye of the beholder, so is morality.

Morals are subjective. If you set a criterion for self & insist others be in abeyance to your criteria, then you seek to control others – you limit choice.

People don’t like the idea of individuals deciding their own morals because they lose the “moral high ground” argument by which to tell others how to live, what choices to make, what values to hold and sit in judgment on where someone else has “gone wrong”. You want to be “right”.
 
If you want to be “right” you’ve already abandon freedom for your personal agenda of imposing how you think everyone else should live. For what purpose do you need to be right?

If morals are only from within then affirmations outside you are not found and leave you floundering for approval. From whom are you seeking this approval? For what purpose would you be seeking approval outside yourself? Reward? Recognition? Favor? Righteousness?

Seeking of the any of the above for your choices negates your altruistic action; you do it for other reasons not as a natural choice you would otherwise bestow upon your fellow man.
 
If you’re helping the poor, for example, to seek favor from your personal deity, then you do so off the backs of others – where’s integrity in that? Using other people to get ahead? Ouch!
 
The poor need guidance toward self-reliance not a temporary-feel-good-in-the-moment handout which lands them right back where they were. There are solutions for that problem with the grace & generosity of others, certainly.

All interest is self- interest. Even if your choice is to feel good about what you’re doing – that’s self-interest in feeling good. There is no interest that is not self-interest.

Further, is it in your mind that everyone has to agree with your morals & values? How does that uphold the freedom of individuals to decide their own life which may not look like your own? Where is the free market value system in that kind of dictatorship?

The solution?
Get morality out of your life – it archaic, antediluvian and useless. Instead, develop personal responsibility where you own your choices (Accountability), you have the ability to respond to your choices (Responsibility) and make your choices at no cost to others without their consent (Contract).
 
From this comes integrity. True action of self toward the development of self not on the backs of others.
 
It also deflates political argument of what is or is not "moral" with regard to running government and society - it leaves it clean with the directive: "where is the upholding of individual freedom?"

We don't care about your morals & judgment of others, we care about how each will make his way in this life in total freedom of choice, not dictatorship.
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