In all, we had a good event. To clarify, we were trying to unite people across the political spectrum against excessive taxation and the bailouts. You can watch some of the event here.

Also, to clarify, we were NOT trying to promote candidates. This was made clear to all the candidates before they arrived and in the Q and A posted before the event. Let it be made clear again.  

In Hartford, we got as many people involved as we could. Many requests were added at the last minute and incorporated successfully. We had speakers across the spectrum, but we tried to stay focused on the bailout and excessive taxes.

With infrequent but acute (probably inevitable) deviations into the drug war, abortion, immigration, ect., we largely succeeded. We also succeeded in establishing a consensus that this is, in fact, a two party problem. One person even chimed in “what two parties” because they are the same one.

Unfortunately, those side issues had the potential to and did create some division, and I think an equal result could be created by controlling such an event too much by interjecting too many progressive, or as one termed it “naderite” speakers. On the other hand, those we could call “naderites” do agree that spending and taxation are out of control.

As a Libertarian, I find many of their positions downright insane, but recognize that we need a unified effort lest this become a “rah rah GOP” event where we throw the Democrats out only to be left with similar, albeit more severe degrees of the same result… kind of like when we threw out the GOP in 2006. And the joke really was on the Democrats when it came to the war, reckless spending, the economy and reading the legislation voted on in general.

The discussion, which was something I had aimed for in organizing the Hartford, CT event, did evolve into ideas on what we could do about the situation. On the whole, it was very positive. 1,000 (at peak) isn’t as many as I’d like, and there can never be too many for something that should have happened 80 years ago, but it was far better than the 100 most of us involved expected on a July 4th holiday. 

Due to partisan concerns, I ended with some of Washington’s remarks from 1796 -

“But the Constitution which at any time exists, till changed by an explicit and authentic act of the whole people, is sacredly obligatory upon all. The very idea of the power and the right of the people to establish Government presupposes the duty of every individual to obey the established Government.

All obstructions to the execution of the Laws, all combinations and associations, under whatever plausible character, with the real design to direct, control, counteract, or awe the regular deliberation and action of the constituted authorities, are destructive of this fundamental principle, and of fatal tendency. They serve to organize faction, to give it an artificial and extraordinary force; to put, in the place of the delegated will of the nation, the will of a party, often a small but artful and enterprising minority of the community; and, according to the alternate triumphs of different parties, to make the public administration the mirror of the ill-concerted and incongruous projects of faction, rather than the organ of consistent and wholesome plans digested by common counsels, and modified by mutual interests.”

Before this and similar events, the Tea Party movement was already marginalizing itself by not only focusing on Republicans, but just about any Republican it could find or who sought audience. The case and point here in Connecticut is Rob Simmons, former congressman running for senate and co-conspirator in tripling the size of government. When asked if I would welcome him to speak, I stopped short of saying “Why not invite Chris Dodd, or for that matter, Barack Obama?”

His game, like Dodd’s relies on ordinary people remaining divided, codependent and enslaved to “voting the rascals out” as Carroll Quigley described in Tragedy and Hope. Pay close attention to this particular senate race - the two party (one party) system needs it to survive. Hands down, the Dan Reale guarantee is that the special interests funding both will use Tea Party and other movements in an attempt to –

1) Fund both under the color of difference, Simmons through the Tea Parties and Dodd through racist/right-wing labeling of the tea parties 

 
2) Use attack ads and whisper campaigns in tandem with the first item for the same purpose

3) Focus everyone on the most divisive issues possible, such as abortion, religion, immigration, gay marriage and the drug war to obstruct unity against unprecedented theft

4) Reinforce the illusion that both parties are somehow different

5) Increase inflation, spending and taxes when the previous items work - after the rascals are thrown out

There are some people who execute those objectives without knowing, usually through buying into carefully targeted media campaigns executed by those with some idea. Ultimately, those really in the know donate the most to both major parties – campaign finance rules don’t apply and/or Jim Crow laws in campaign finance for the average voter. 

An excellent example is Goldman Sachs -  
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/28816321/the_great_american_bubble_machine/print

They are asking whether the Democrats or the Republicans will fully implement the carbon offset bubble. We should answer the question of whether it will be implemented or not by exposing the game and finding common ground. 

Both parties do not want we the people coming together and truly ending their card game, a game where drunks in Washington gamble with our money instead of having the decency to do it in a casino with their own money. We threw the Democrats out in 1994 for fiscal recklessness and other reasons. Then we threw the Republicans out in 2006 for fiscal recklessness and other reasons. Now, we’re told to throw the Democrats out again as if the Republicans are different, for the same things, as if this is the answer.

As a citizen, I’d like to tell the truth. And I’m not saying it as someone working with Reteaparty.com. I’m saying it as Dan Reale. If throwing the Democrats out for the Republicans is your only answer after coming together like we have, as Americans above partisanship, then you have not been taxed enough. That’s after years of being schooled in the kind of theft, the kinds of lies those at the top of both parties perpetuate against we the people.  

Every time that approach off shored jobs, it was a tax. Every time that approach increased healthcare costs, separated families and sent young men and women to wars predicated on a lie; that was a tax. Every permit, form, license, fee and application taxed your time. Every decision in your personal affairs was a tax. Every year that tired, failed and faithfully repetitious solution destroyed your purchasing power through the Federal Reserve was a tax. If you aren’t tired of working for government for half of your existence, you have not been taxed enough. Comes now the cap and traitors, unwitting servants of special interests the Republicans could have stopped. They will tax you and every facet of your earthly existence even more.  

That’s not extreme. That’s a measured and accurate response to swarms of officers eating out my substance, your substance and the substance of generations yet to come.  

I need no counsel or advice from those who continue subscribing to the same answer that produced slavery, gave them a master and made them servants. They clearly want a master and deserve one. I wish them well, including my desire that their shackles fit comfortably and that they look favorably upon the tasks set before them. 

I am never too afraid of any greater evil or chances of success to object. If I do not give it my all, if you do not give it your all, if we the people do not give it our all; we’re done. There will be no United States of America if we don’t.   

Going forward, there will be future events. I’m tentatively shooting for Constitution Day, which is September 17th. We’ll be incorporating comedy. Half of the event will be audience participation. We have yet to decide upon a location.

What I have decided is that we are taxed enough. Those taxes in all forms exceed constitutional limits. The Constitution isn’t a suggestion – it’s the law of the land ordained and established by we the people.

The speakers here today don’t agree on everything. Where we do agree is simple. We agree that theft is wrong.

That’s what our current level of taxation is. That’s what inflation through the Federal Reserve is. That’s what these bailouts are all about. That’s what $99.1 trillion in Social Security and Medicare liabilities are because there is no lockbox. That’s theft. Congress is stealing our money.

The average American, through taxes at all levels, inflation and costs passed on by businesses in the same boat, pays more than half of what he or she makes. This isn’t freedom. This is debt slavery to special interests.

I pledge allegiance to the Constitution and the republic for which it stands. That’s why I ran for Congress as a libertarian. That’s why I’m running again. That’s why I have organized this event so we can come together against theft. There can never be too many of us here and this could not have happened too soon. That’s why we should all do everything we possibly can.

Ask what a free people would do, right here, right now. Ask what Thomas Jefferson would do. Start by saying “it’s not your money”.

I mean for the Constitution to be followed. I can’t sit back and make any compromises on that. Neither can you. We’ve been there and done that. And it works less every year.

We have allowed special interests to take over both major parties, to make favors a condition to be nominated. And those interests own the leadership of both parties. They created a never-ending series of permits, taxes, registrations, fees, fines, licenses, boards and committees. With the passage of HR 2454, which every Congressman from Connecticut voted for but clearly had no time to read, they have now taxed everything as the cap and traitors they are. Like other bills contrary to their stated purpose, this one harms the environment, enslaves the economy and creates even more pollution.

There is nothing I want nor any of us should want from the special interests running both major parties, our wallets and America into the ground. The bills they write for Congress to pass make this clear. There is a place where their favors belong. It’s time someone told them where to stick those favors.

The leadership of both major parties lead the fight for higher taxes, higher spending and selling our future along with our children’s’ future. Joe Courtney, Rob Simmons, Chris Dodd, Joe Lieberman… the list of enablers goes on. And these types of people come around telling us how they’re not part of the problem or that they’ve changed. Their compromises, like too many others, say to we the people that they know best what to do for us with our own money.

I’ve heard it before and so have you. They’re nice people in person. They talk a good talk. But it’s not their money.

No one deserves a 3^rd or 4^th chance. And if you put up with it, they’ll be asking for a 23^rd chance as we cart wheelbarrows of money to the grocery store for a loaf of bread. And they’ll still be treating you like an unlimited credit card.

We were warned about a central bank of issue, and the day of reckoning was in 1973, the last year median households got a true raise adjusted for inflation. We were warned about an income tax back in the days of Daniel Webster, a tax on our labor as if it’s not slavery. And we were warned about “factions” like the Democrats and Republicans in George Washington’s 1796 farewell address. Above all, we were warned by Thomas Jefferson to take the Constitution literally, not to stretch it for whatever meaning we desire. And I say that both major parties have usurped power by not amending the Constitution for the level and purposes of spending we see today – as if our money is their money. I take the warnings of our founding fathers seriously and object now.

It’s not their money.

And they use that money to tell us how to live. They have stooped to the level of bribing us with our own money. They use that money to assert what we can and cannot do with our own lives and our own property. They tell us how to raise and educate our children as if they are responsible for the outcome. They tell us what doctor to see, how much that doctor will be paid and where we can or cannot work through a never-ending series of laws, treaties and regulations. And they are so arrogant to suggest that they even pay us in action, or even outright speech sometimes. If you’re lucky, maybe unlucky, you can hear them refer to tax dollars as “their money” or “my money for their district”. And it angers me how servile Congress is when it comes to the Constitution, as if Valley Forge was a ski resort… with food or shoes.

Let me be the first to tell these people they can pound sand. It is not their money.

They tell us that it’s a problem that people who buy overvalued assets go out of business. We make bad decisions and pay for them everyday. Thanks to Congress, we now pay for good decisions. $15 trillion committed and spent on the bailout is paying dearly, with real unemployment, assuming you want to count all the unemployed, near 20%.

What’s next? Is Pelosi going to suggest stimulating the economy with bloc grants for chocolate covered dust bunnies? Will Obama suggest bailing out the economy by funding business ideas like Pizza Plane: the plane that delivers pizza? I say “why not?”. At least it’s more logical than bailing out casinos like Wall Street and telling us that a retail/service economy is fine because we don’t actually need to produce value to have an economy.

I want to work to create value, so I can live. I don’t work just to live like republicans and democrats want me to. How about you?

We need that kind of stimulus like we need a hole in the head. We need our money where it belongs – in our pockets. Giving credit where it’s due, there’s a difference between Washington and a casino. In a casino, the drunks gamble with their own money.

We need to remember that there was a depression between 1920 and 1921. Do you know what Congress and the Federal Reserve did? Nothing. We recovered in 18 months and shrank the federal budget. That’s opposed to what FDR and Herbert Hoover did then and what Congress and the Fed did starting in the Bush years. I notice this is conveniently omitted from the textbooks in our government schools, probably for a reason. Perhaps there isn’t a better way to sell paying farmers to destroy food so poor people without money can pay higher prices.

But you need to ask where we’d be without Congress… for at least the last 60 years… probably at the doctor’s office or buying groceries because we could afford to using the money we kept.

While we’re all here, let’s straighten out this business of where rights come from. They come from ownership. You own yourself. You have nowhere to ask for permission as long as you’re not hurting anybody else or using their property – regardless of any inane law or statute contrary to the Bill of Rights. I dare say you should challenge it with civil AND criminal complaints whenever possible. You are responsible for yourself. You are the sovereign. You hold the highest office in the land – citizen. That’s the way of freedom. That’s how we cut spending. That’s how we keep taxes low.

That is how we tell them that it is, in fact, our money.

It is exactly as the Constitution prescribes. That’s what made America an economic superpower. And it’s about time we went ahead with that plan because it worked, firing disobedient servants along the way. If we can find a criminal statute that fits an act they’ve committed, I say we follow up with grand jury complaints.

It’s not their money.

Let me close with some words of wisdom from the past:

But the Constitution which at any time exists, till changed by an explicit and authentic act of the whole people, is sacredly obligatory upon all. The very idea of the power and the right of the people to establish Government presupposes the duty of every individual to obey the established Government.

All obstructions to the execution of the Laws, all combinations and associations, under whatever plausible character, with the real design to direct, control, counteract, or awe the regular deliberation and action of the constituted authorities, are destructive of this fundamental principle, and of fatal tendency. They serve to organize faction, to give it an artificial and extraordinary force; to put, in the place of the delegated will of the nation, the will of a party, often a small but artful and enterprising minority of the community; and, according to the alternate triumphs of different parties, to make the public administration the mirror of the ill-concerted and incongruous projects of faction, rather than the organ of consistent and wholesome plans digested by common counsels, and modified by mutual interests.

Here’s the good news: I’ve had to beat my phone and inbox back into control with a stick. Interest in the event has far exceeded my expectations. To keep everything under control, I’ll answer a lot of frequently asked questions here –

Q: Where’s the tea party?

A: In Hartford at the Capitol between noon and 3PM July 4th.

Q: Can we bring signs?

A: It’s encouraged.

Q: Can I bring flyers, leaflets, ect?

A: Yes, if you clean up in the event any fall on the ground. The same goes for anything else. If you bring it, make sure it leaves with you or someone else.

Q: Who will be speaking?

A: Andy Rule will be reading the Declaration of Independence to start the event. Other speakers include myself, Deborah Stevenson, Vincent Arguimbau, Robert Jones, Matt Daly, Peter Schiff, John Mertens, Joe Markley as “uncommitted” for US Senate and G. Scott Deshefy. That’s the final list. Speakers will not include recycled politicians who were part of the problem, voted for spending increases and suddenly decided to run for senate. It’s not happening.

The final schedule for speakers goes as follows –

12:00 – 12:20 Andy Rule (reading of Declaration of Independence)

12:20 – 12:25 Robert Jones

12:25 – 12:45 Dan Reale

12:50 – 1:10 John Mertens

1:10 – 1:30 Joe Markley as Uncommitted for Senate

1:35 – 1:45 Vincent Arguimbau

1:45 – 1:50 Estelle Stevenson

1:50 – 1:55 Matt Daly

2:00 – 2:20 G. Scott Deshefy

2:25 – 3:00 Peter Schiff

Q: What can I do to help?

A: We need to make sure the Capitol grounds stay clean. Bring trash bags just in case. We could also use a back up microphone, sound system or amplifier. If anyone has a camcorder and a Youtube account, post a video of this event.

Q: “With the exception of Schiff, your platform looks like a coalition of European Social Democrats…how do you explain that?”

A: Three Republicans, one from the Green party, four Libertarians and one independent candidate who chairs the Connecticut for Lieberman party… I don’t follow, but even the big government people think taxation and spending are out of hand. The government isn’t just on the edge – that’s where it’s summer home away from the asylum is. We’re up the creek without a paddle if we can’t get all hands on deck unified against $100+ trillion in crazy.

Q: I heard that FBI agents were recording license plates at these events. Is that true?

A: Maybe, but it’s nothing 18 USC 241 and all other applicable charges can’t take care of if it goes beyond that. If you see anything like this, notify myself and the Capitol Police immediately.

Q: Is this event sponsored by or designed to promote a candidate for office?

A: No. Although we have candidates speaking, we’re going on the record as being united against fiscal recklessness.

Q: I’m with the media. Who do I talk to.

A: That would be me.

Q: What if it rains or we have bad weather?

A: Bring an umbrella. The least we can do, given that many of Washington’s troops stayed in Valley Forge without shoes or food, is tough it out. And it was really bitter cold.

Q: I heard there was a parade after your event. Is true?

A: Not at all. We haven’t organized a parade.

Q: I have a question that isn’t listed. Where do I ask?

A: Add a comment to this post.

And yes, I’m running again.

HR 2454 Passed…

The bill went through Patriot Act and bailout style, including a 300 page amendment filed at 3:09 AM the day of the vote. The original was 15 pages shy of Lord of the Rings. I’m a fast reader, but there’s no way to get through the final version, including the amendment while checking it against existing US code, in less than 24 hours.

It’s supposedly meant to create energy independence, jobs and less pollution. From what we had time to find out, it does the opposite.

Here are the highlights –

1)       Its proponents say it will cost everyone, taxpayer or not, approximately $2,500 per year.

2)       Fuel costs will jump by approximately 74%, excluding inflation coming down the road.

3)       We have to cut carbon emissions, including carbon dioxide (life giving gas) and carbon monoxide (the actual pollutant) whereas China, India and others must do nothing.

4)       All remaining industry will be driven out of business.

5)       Federal building codes.

6)       Additional housing inspections.

7)       It increases burdens for state and local governments in violation of the Tenth Amendment.

       It creates more Madoff style speculation in carbon credits, including carbon credit derivatives.

9)       It means selective enforcement of sanctions and selective disbursement of government funds to select industries and firms.

10)   It preempts local and state law.

11)   Higher electricity costs, as if we don’t pay enough.

12)   Zero protections for low income families, who are hit the hardest by current inflation and job losses.

13)   It’s an expensive way to produce a result equivalent to giving all homes and businesses free fluorescent bulbs (too simple, can’t let it happen).

14)   It increases housing costs.

15)   According to the Congressional Budget Office, the original bill would cost $821 billion alone at the federal level.

16)   It ships US money in the form of carbon credits around the world, as if we have plenty of it.

17)   It’s a bipartisan failure – the Republicans could have stalled this.

18)   Profits a very few at the cost of the many via government intervention.

19)   A multitude of offices and swarms of officers to eat out our substance. Sound familiar yet?

I’m not sure what everyone’s conversation was at dinner, at the office water cooler, in the bars, at the local VFW or wherever on June 26^th. But if it was Michael Jackson, something is terribly wrong here. Congress just voted to tax your entire life.  

If I were Rep. Boehner, I’d have been talking about it all night instead of limiting myself to three hours, which he could have. The Republican party deserves an equal amount of contempt for enabling, if anything, the very fashion in which this bill was passed by setting the precedent when they were in power. They alienate their rank and file members who stand for fiscal restraint just as much as Democrats alienate their rank and file who oppose the war in Iraq.

Add this latest outrage to $99.1 trillion in unfunded Medicare and Social Security obligations. Add this to the bailout, which has already exceeded the total amount required to pay off every mortgage and credit card bill in the US. Now, Congress has voted that we become carbon offset sharecropping debt serfs.

This is in a country where we’re told that change and hope come from indebtedness to moneyed interests.

They dare to ask this of a people whose jobs were actively off shored under NAFTA, CAFTA and GATT. They have created a system that deprives the sick and dying of potentially life saving treatments as it gouges doctors and patients, but that’s not enough. They dare to ask this of a people whose median income has not seen an inflation adjusted increase since 1973. And they do it in the name of environmentalism while ignoring the very real environmental dangers this centrally planned system has created.

Americans need to stand united against looting. This is why a transpartisan coalition among left, right, centrist, libertarian and even statists are coming together on July 4^th. It’s long overdue.

To my fellow Tea Partiers

It looks our July 4^th Tea Party at the Capitol will proceed. Nearly all the arrangements have been made.

Our speaker final schedule will be –

12:00 – 12:20 Andy Rule (reading of Declaration of Independence)

12:20 – 12:40 Dan Reale

12:50 – 1:10 John Mertens

1:10 – 1:30 Uncommitted for Senate/ Comedy Intermission

1:35 – 1:45 Vincent Arguimbau

1:45 – 1:50 Estelle Stevenson

2:00 – 2:20 G. Scott Deshefy

2:25 – 3:00 Peter Schiff

Welcome to the Connecticut Independence Day Tea Party Blog.  The organizer for this blog is Christina Tobin. If you would like to help organize or have any questions concerning the event, feel free to contact Christina at the following email:

email: christina@freeandequal.org