Very seldom do I encounter excellence in-person. It’s rare to meet that individual that leaves you in solemn acknowledgment that some people do strive to summon the best within them; the type that gets so intimately lost in their work that it actually becomes an extension of their existence, under full introspective control.

On Wednesday, I met such an individual. Erin Sage, an obviously prodigenic enthusiast of photography, lent her undivided attention towards the effort of enabling two entranced parents an opportunity to etch their unparalleled era of happiness into memory. She carries an instantly conspicuous manner of warmth and familiarity that becomes insolent once you realize that you’ve just met her.

Her ability to wrangle and seize the essence of the moment demands attention. In a manner that seemed to defy all existential boundaries, she’s bent on finding the right angle, distance and mood to grab a split-second drop of life. Granted, the subject of this engagement offers little in the way of aesthetic obstacles, Erin managed to capture a perception of joy and beauty that must typically evade sensation.

This quote from The Fountainhead comes to mind:

I will indefinitely hold her work not only as a persisted tribute to the love and value that Sam adds to my life, but as a vivid reminder of what talented, driven and passionate individuals are able to achieve.

• Reiterating the fact that a dollar can only be spent once, i.e., that A is A, the current staff of lords announced the shocking revelation that their entitlement piggy-bank of looted wealth isn’t immune to the economic disaster they’ve heaved on the world.
• Unions are learning first hand that a business can’t operate at a loss and still make money, i.e., the law of causality, and that even their precious bully friend Uncle Sam will throw them under the bus when he’s desperate.
• Interesting… Our economy is circling the drain, but somehow there’s still enough loot to fund research into homosexual activity in Argentina and teach Chinese prostitutes to drink responsibly. I’m sure these funds were selflessly donated from the salaries of our esteemed members of congress.
• Importing far more than Chinese goods, Puritan Statists in Minnesota found a new way to tackle online gambling.
• The anointed have discovered that Soda Taxes would fulfill paternalistic nanny-state cravings and fund socialized medicine. What a crafty bunch!

Tack one more nail in the American coffin. The rights-trampling frenzy continues with restaurant and bar owners being the latest victim burnt on the collectivist mob-rule stake as The People’s Republic of North Carolina has finally passed their precious smoking ban.

A similar attempt failed a few years back, but the statist yearning to rule by force is insatiable. This debate emphasizes the typical degree of concrete-bound, irrational thinking that consumes most of our population. If we were to extract the essentials from the average opinion supporting this law, we’d discover a criteria template that could justify any law imaginable. However, when the facts are considered, the silly, evil, and obtuse nature of this law is abundantly clear.

Relevant Facts:

1. Freedom: In a rational, civilized society, individuals are free to choose which establishments they patronize. Virtually all supposed justifications for this pathetic abuse of power evade or ignore this fact completely.

2. Property Rights: In a rational, civilized society, property owners are free to determine their own smoking policies. This is the core issue at hand.

3. Role of Government: In a rational, civilized society, the proper role of Government is to protect individual rights from forceful encroachment. Instead, this law relies on initiation of force by Government.

4. Objective Law: In a rational, civilized society, laws and legal enforcement thereof should be based on rights. If an action doesn’t forcefully encroach on an individual’s right to life, liberty or property, or doesn’t objectively convey intent to do so, it shouldn’t be illegal. Whenever considering any law or regulation, justice demands we ask “whose right to what is being forcefully violated?”, and if there is no clear and objective answer, then justice is not the motive at hand. In this context, where smoking is permitted by the owner and other individuals are free to leave, no one’s rights are forcefully violated.

Irrelevant Misconceptions:

“The issue is smokers vs. non-smokers…”

This issue is about the rights of property owners. The owner of a restaurant or bar has the right to determine his own policies regarding smoking. This law imposes on the property owner, not the customers. See #2.

“When you serve the public you forfeit your property rights.”


Perhaps in a collectivized, mob-rule nation ignorant of the concept of rights, but not in a free country. Individuals conducting commerce are traders - not servants. They are offering a value in the form of a product or service that other traders can choose to consume or not, depending on whether they find the value offered as beneficial in proportion to the cost. These two individuals, the traders, are the only two who should rightly decide on the details pertaining to their barter. If a consumer is unhappy with the product or service offered they are free to seek consumption elsewhere, and the seller must adjust his offering to remain in business. The only proper function of Government in the barter is to enforce contractual obligations breached by force or fraud. Any other Government intervention in this voluntary transaction is illegitimate and a violation of one or both of the trader’s rights. Only the competition of a free-market can rightly and justly promote change in the seller’s offering. In a rational and just society, this rule applies to any and every aspect of the business and barter. The fact that we’ve set precedent for such encroachment with OSHA, FDA, zoning, wage and countless other regulations does not justify yet another blatant disregard for the sanctity of property rights. See #1-4.


“Smokers don’t have the right to smoke anywhere they choose.”

This is correct, but the decision to allow or prohibit smoking is up to the property owner and no one else. See #2.

“Do you smokers have the RIGHT to harm other people just because you think it’s ok to smoke around them?”

Of course not, there is no such thing as a right to harm others, but this question evades the fact that the “victim” is free to leave an environment where conditions (including second-hand smoke, noise, temperature, food quality etc.) aren’t suitable. See #1.

“This ban is guarding the public safety.”

See #1 and #4.

“It’s a darn shame that a law had to be passed to prevent the inconsiderate nicotine addicts from spreading their disease and stench while ruining ones meal.”

If their lack of consideration offends you, you’re free to leave. See #1 and #4.




“Studies show that {insert any fact supporting the negative impacts of second-hand smoke} is harmful.”


See #1.

“An owner that accepts non-smokers does not reserve the right or choice to put the life of the non-smokers family in danger of death due to lung cancer to satisfy the addiction of a smoker.”

Their lives are only in danger if they choose to be present in such conditions. See #1.

These are only a handful of the common justifications used by advocates. As I hear new ones I’ll add them to the list along with a proper debunking.

Conclusions:

There is no just basis to support a smoking ban on private property - only emotion-driven rationalizations that undermine the rule of law, and scoff at the American essence. Objective law requires for an individual’s rights to be forcefully violated. So long as one’s presence in such establishment is voluntary, force is absent, and any legal intervention represents an injustice.

If all private restaurants and bars closed their doors (the appropriate response to this and any other meddling in business), how many days before this fascist tripe would be repealed? The first day they’d call their bluff. The second day they’d call an emergency session with expedited Governor sign-off so all the statist thugs in Raleigh would have a place to grab lunch, and this wretched idea would never be brought up again.

Do I look forward to the first Sunday morning I enjoy a completely smoke-free breakfast at Cracker Barrel? You bet I do. But, for that reality to come into fruition through an anti-American, rights-stomping, emotion-driven law is hideous. I’d rather endure smoky meals for the rest of my life to hang on to the smell of freedom than condone such a contemptible mob-rule measure. Precisely because this is happening in America, the first nation founded on justice and freedom, we truly are in the golden age of injustice.

In a sickening attempt to memorialize one tragedy, a more profoundly reproachful one is carried out in the name of justice.

“We always prefer to get that land from a willing seller. And sometimes you can just not come to an agreement on certain things,” park service spokesman Phil Sheridan said. [emphasis mine]

What concern are one man’s rights in the face of the USSA?

Of all the contemptible evils being carried out by our leaders, eminent domain is perhaps the most blatantly vicious. I can hardly imagine a more despicable and inadequate manner of offering a supposed tribute to a horrible event.

If I had lost a friend or loved-one on 9/11, this would undoubtedly add insult to injury. A monument built on theft is very unbecoming in the context of solemnity.

Read the whole disgusting piece.

More Here:

• Flight 93 - Eminent Domain

There was a point in my life where her writing was almost therapeutic, but disgusted sympathy is the only response I can muster to this luke-warm call to arms by Peggy Noonan.

Like a basketball team which never identifies which goal to shoot for, or a football team who narrows it down to a only a few plays in the huddle, conservatives have no unified goals or principles. Philosophy drives ideas and any group based on an alleged ideology void of explicit principles will be ineffective. Noonan understands that unity within her party is non-existent and makes an attempt to define some basic tenets. Just like other pragmatists, the prescription is a call to abandon principles.

The poles that keep up the tent are the party’s essential beliefs. Republicans over the next few years should define what each of their tent poles stands for—a strong defense being an obvious pole, a less demanding and intrusive government being another, a natural affection and respect for tradition and for life being a third—and how many poles there are.

I can’t argue with the first, which is about the only position of the right that stands to reason. After the first, however, we get the same vague, implicit notions that the republicans have coasted on for decades.

Less demanding and intrusive? In what manner should we seek less demands and fewer intrusions? Should a proper government in a free society be demanding at all? Less intrusive? Should it be intrusive at all? In what way might it rightfully intrude?

Affection for tradition? To what aspects and to what extent? The American tradition imparts a shift to statism, should that pattern be upheld?

Respect for life? Absolutely, but in what sense? I can only guess this means violating the rights of women to their own lives by banning abortion.

In summary, here we see the same worn-out bromides that have defined the right for the last 50 years:

• The mixed economy is proper, so long as men can still produce.
• Uphold the status quo, whatever that might be.
• Tie it all up with theocratic underpinnings.

Noonan, like the troops she’s trying to rouse, shares the same moral base as the left - altruism. Hers is only decorated by trivial subtleties, tinted by religion, and hued by an implicit “common sense” provided by a foggy understanding of how freedom equals prosperity.

The ground is shifting. It’s hard to get your footing in an earthquake. As Republicans on the Hill try, they must also try to steady their party. It needs a greater sense of realism about its predicament. It needs less enforcement and more encouragement. It needs to inspire the young and the politically unformed not with bloodlust but with ideas.

Right, but which ideas? There’s not a single mention of the proper role of Government, individual rights, or any supposed alliance with the founding principles of this nation.

A great party allows everyone in, and allows prospective members to self-define. If they say they’re Republicans, they should be welcomed and helped to find a place where they fit. A great party has a lot of such places. A great party is expansive. A great party has [to] give. [emphasis and edits mine]

Abandon principles (which have yet to be defined), be flexible, give in, cooperate, compromise - the only thing that matters is what group one professes to belong to. So long as the jersey has an ‘R’ on it, they’re on the team!

By her prescription, not only will the conservatives remain pathetic in the defense of rights, freedom and Capitalism, they’ll continue to shift further towards the statism of the left - leaving America to choose only between two variants of the same collectivist nightmare.

You’ll be hard-pressed to find a more eloquent tribute to the superficial nature and impotence of the republican party.