Budget Issues

 Lets take a look at some issues effecting the budget and the Freedom party's stance.

-Cuts to government subsides

-Medicare & Social Security Reform

-Replace Welfare with a small universal government payment

-End to the "War on Drugs"

-A Carbon Tax
-Less interventionist policies including a rejection of the Bush doctrine and an end to the war in Afghanistan

First off, the party is in favor of a balanced budget, primarily through spending cuts. To accomplish this the first order of business is to look at our federal expenditures.

What would we cut from this picture?
1) Medicare and social security ages need to be raised.  It's mind boggling that we are now retiring at the same age we did when we started social security (When the life expectancy was 64!) as today, and yet wonder why we are in debt. Some people argue that you can't make manual laborers  work any longer, but they is a simple solution to this, exempt them, lower their age even.  Or better yet, give out a small portion to of the GDP to all citizens increase that amount for Seniors, and let them handle the rest.
2) Subsidies need to be cut across the board particularly in the area's of agriculture and oil to encourage more sustainable living, and because any distortion of the free market needs to be very justified.  These cuts would come primarily out of the departments of agriculture and energy.
3) The global war on terror & department of homeland security should be reduced or eliminated for moral and practical reasons without even considering the budget effect.  Fighting terror on foreign soil creates more enemies than it destroys when when Innocent civilians are killed, which in the chaotic regions terror thrives in, is inevitable.  Meanwhile the department of homeland security is all either redundancies or violation of our constitutional liberties.
4) This is minor at a national level,but sinice more than half of our prisoners are in for drugs crime, end the war on drugs should make a massive cut to law enforcement spending.
5) the replacement of welfare with a universal goverment payout is a long term goal that we might work towards in times more stable for the budget, as this would be an increase, not cut in spending.

Meanwhile the carbon tax would raise revunes that chould be used directly to fund the EPA, department of energy, and the national science foundation among others.

An Outline of Positions

Aright, so we know what this page hopes to achieve, and why the extreme libertarian platform doesn't fit that, it's time we get down to the specifics.  

Outline of Positions (subject to change and very open to compromise):

-Cuts to government subsides

-Medicare & Social Security Reform

-Replace Welfare with a small universal government payment 

-Repeal of patriot act & authority to indefinitely detain without trial

-End to the "War on Drugs"

-A Carbon Tax

-Replacement or reduction of corporate, investment, and income tax with a national consumption tax

-Less interventionist policies including a rejection of the Bush doctrine and an end to the war in Afghanistan 

-Election reform: End the electoral collage and Super Pacs

-Abortion always legal in cases of rape incest and life/heath of the mother, otherwise left to the states

-Local authority on gun control

-Marriage Equality and end to capital punishment, on a state-by-state basis

-Moderate deregulation measures 

-Raised budget for education & environmental protection

-eliminate legal tender laws and to remove the sales tax on gold and silver

In the posts following this, I will make the case for each of these positions.

An Argument Agianst Minarchy

The primary role of government is to protect the rights of the individual.  This truth is self-evident, if The Declaration of Independence and The Social Contract are to be believed.  From this, minarchists, (the core of The Libertarian Party), draw the conclusion that the one and only role of government is to protect those rights, deemed by them as life liberty and property, the "Natural Rights" of man.  The philoshopy is summed up by the phrase, "minimum government, maximum liberty."

Sounds great, until those pesky modern liberals show up with these idea's about "Positive Liberty", the power to fulfill your potential. For instance, if the government doesn't support seniors in their old age, they my not find the liberty to retire. They say that the government should work to achieve a balance of high positive liberty, and high negative liberty (freedom from having your rights infringed open). 

Minarchists deny, that positive liberty is a concern of the government, claiming you are not entitled to force others to give you and opportunities.  I am not going to deny that claim.  What I am going to do is claim that we have one positive liberty that we should be granted by nature.  The right to live from the land.



Consider this, when we are born, we are born suited to live of the land.  Our hunter-gatherer ancestors always took for granted that they did not have to rely on other humans or the ownership of property to survive.  And they had a right to take that for granted as well, as humans are made from the same matter that was once in other organisms and before that the earth and atmosphere.  We are part of the earth, that is simple science, and as such we are entitled to the chance to reap the benefits of the earth.  Modern society no longer allows all of us to do that.  I propose, therefore, that society must compensate all of it's members with the resources to survive and prosper, at least until it is possible once more to live from the land without "purchasing" it. 



Introduction

What is this?

To begin with, this is a call for a political party for the moderately fiscally Conservative and the moderately socially liberal.  This is a call for a party that understands the need for responsibility and reform by pragmatic leaders, but also the need for a political stance that points strongly in one direction.  It's only just a thought so far, a thought that with Patience and dedication, at may be possible to challenge the status quo in the name of liberty and justice for all.

What would this party be like?

A moderate libertarian party. Smaller (but more than minimal) government.  Free-market Environmentalism. Less interventionism. Fewer Restrictions on people and on business.  Care for the poor.  Improve education with the best of both standpoints.  Promotion states rights. Power to the people.  All types of power.  Political power, social power, economic power, and yes firepower.  That's the goal.  Specifics will get clearer and clearer with the passage of time.

How would this party be different from...

The Democrats?
It would advocate less government intervention into business, constitutionally limited government, lower taxes, a balanced budget, gun rights, states rights, and property rights.

The Republicans?
It would advocate less government intervention into privacy, the rejection of the bush doctrine of preemptive attacks, emphasis on criminal rehabilitation, environmentalism, an end to marriage restrictions, drug restrictions, and expression restrictions.

The Libertarians?
It would advocate SOME government intervention into business, SOME form of social security, SOME form of welfare, SOME foreign interventionism, SOME social issues left to the states,SOME environmental provisions, and SOME attempt to advocate public morality.

America needs a balanced, reasonable movement towards freedom, and no party around today wants to deliver that.  So we shall make one.